And one more)
Is there some kind of tutorial, how can I add ship and make Vanderdecken sell it? All I want to do is to make corsair frigate model more... cursed, well. So I wanted to change some stats and textures in that version. That's all. Sounds possible
You can change stats by editing "PROGRAM\Ships\Ships_init.c". Copy the entire definition for "PiratFrigateSup", paste it, change the "refShip.Name" name to something else, and edit the stats to suit yourself. If you change both "refShip.CanEncounter" and "refShip.CanBuy" to false, the ship can't be bought at a normal shipyard or encountered at random on the sea, so the only way you'll see it is at Vanderdecken's shipyard.
Next, copy the whole "RESOURCE\MODELS\Ships\PiratFrigateSup" and rename the folder to match whatever you called your new version. Then rename all the files to match. So, for example, if your new "refShip.Name" is "CursedFrigateSup" then you'll name your folder "CursedFrigateSup", and all the files become "CursedFrigateSup.gm", "CursedFrigateSup_figurehead.gm", "CursedFrigateSup_mast0.gm", etc.
To change the textures, you'll need
TX Convertor and
Hex Editor. You'll also want
GM Viewer. And you need some sort of picture editing software which can read "Targa" files, i.e. ".tga".
Use GM Viewer to examin "CursedFrigateSup.gm". There's a window which tells you which texture files the model is using. Most of them are for small details but the most important is "bortoutfrigateP.tga" - actually it's "bortoutfrigateP.tga.tx", and it's in "RESOURCE\Textures\Ships". Use TX Convertor to change this to ".tga" format, and note the format - "R5G5B5", "DXT1 - 4x compressed", etc. Now you can edit "bortoutFrigateP.tga". When you've finished, save the result as a new file with a name the same length as the original, e.g. "bortoutFrigateC.tga". Use TX Convertor to convert that to "bortoutFrigateC.tga.tx". And then use Hex Editor on "CursedFrigateSup.gm" - look for "bortoutFrigateP.tga" and change it to "bortoutFrigateC.tga", or whatever you called the new texture file. This is why the file name must be the same length as the original - the new file name has to fit exactly the same space as the original when you edit the model file. You can now use GM Viewer to examine your new model.
You'll need to start a new game for the new ship to show up. The easiest way to check it is to edit "PROGRAM\InternalSettings.h", go right to the bottom, and set "ENABLE_CHEATMODE" to 1. With cheatmode enabled, when you go to choose your ship, you can pick
any ship valid for your chosen time period, not just tier 5 or smaller. You should see a blank ship because there are some more things to do to make the ship appear properly, but if you select that, you should find yourself in command of your new ship. If you get this far and the game doesn't crash when you leave the tutorial deck and get to the port, we'll proceed on to how to get the ship to appear properly in the interface.