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So, you want to translate this game into your language. I assume you understand the scale of this work. If not, then i'll recommend to read Safaquel's russian translation approach (Link), since this would greatly help you to work efficiently with the help of the community. This topic is about technical aspects of the translation. Data location Most of the translatable text data located in the assets/strings.xml. Menu entries, interface elements, etc can be found here. As for now, some of the text is hardcoded, so you can't translate it yet, but it will change soon. Xenopedia entries, respectively, are in the assets/xenopedia.xml. You'll also want to check soldiernames.xml and soldiernamesfemale.xml. Translating You can use MS Excel for more comfortable editing, if you prefer it. Open Office is known to corrupt xmls, though. XML files are encoded in UTF-8. That means you can just write there in your native language. <Data ss:Type="String">Normal</Data> turning into<Data ss:Type="String">Нормальная</Data> Be sure to save the file in UTF-8 because certain text editor tends to think it is smarter than you. Check the encoding in the save dialog and, even better, use notepad++ or akelpad. Data strings also supports basic formatting. For example, translated string above is slightly longer than original, and sometimes it can lead to the rather unpleasant results. That's how to fix it: <Data ss:Type="String"><font size='17' face='fonts/xenonauts.mvec'>Нормальная</font></Data> where < is a xml code for <, > is for >, so you basically got an xml inside of an xml: <Data ss:Type="String"> <font size='17' face='fonts/xenonauts.mvec'>Нормальная</font></Data> Second level is likely to be processed by another parser, so it should be writed in codes. And the result is: That's better. You can also use line breakers to start a new line. Font basics Playground SDK employ special outline font format called MVEC. Main game fonts are xenonauts.mvec, xenopedia.mvec and arial.mvec. Xenopedia font contains ASCII (of course), almost all of the Controls and Latin-1 Supplement (advanced punctuation and basic diacritics), all Latin Extended A (advanced diacritics), Greek and Cyrillic sets. Xenonauts font is slightly less universal, so it contains only basic punctuation, ASCII, Cyrillic, Greek and some of the Latin-1 supplement. This font is capitals only. Arial font is used in tooltips, but not only there. When you'll try to insert some character that is missing in xenofonts, the game will resort to the arial.mvec, which i didn't check, but it's pretty stuffed. Result will be looking like this (image by Schnittertm): Note the Ü character (Also note that this character is now redrawed and included in the font). If you are okay with how it looks, then leave it as is. If not, then proceed to the next section. What will happen if you try to write something like that? <Data ss:Type="String">出口</Data> You'll get nothing (in the best case) or even CTD. That's because this characters are missing even in the arial.mvec. And this bring us to the... Font creation If you are to add some new symbols in the font, you will need a converter. Playmate Font Maker will do. 1. Install the font you want to convert in your system. TTF fonts only. Be sure not to violate any copyrights. 2. Run the tool. You will see the glyph sets available for the importing. There are basic sets for most of the languages, but you are free to modify/add your own. And probably you will have to do so. The sets are actually plain text files in a tool folder (UTF-8 encoded). 3. Select what you want to see. Don't forget numbers, some punctuation and ASCII English. 4. Tool will show if the font is missing something. If everything is ok, push the button and save the font somewhere. 5. Replace every font file in the assets/fonts/, or you can choose to replace only default (arial.mvec). - Be sure to take into account UI stylistics. Xenonauts font must be heavier, while xenopedia should be readable even in small sizes. - Arial.mvec is a bit tricky choice. Basically, you should be able to include everything in this one, as it is the default font for which game resorts in a case of a missing glyph. But exactly because of that this font should contain as much letters as possible. Use unicode font, add everything, act on your own risk. Also, everything will be quite monotonous. Also, you may meet the repeating glyph problem when you are writing "АБВГ", but in the game it looks like "ААБГ" and so on. Fonts with languages which have some latin letters (like greek uppercase A,B,E,Ζ,etc) especially prone to this. Solution: Known issues and advices (by Schnittertm) - New Game, Load Game, overwrite save dialog buttons and Game Options are still hardcoded (though they have corresponding strings in xml); - No string for 'Funds' in the subscreens; - No string for 'Unassigned' in the Soldier and Vehicle subscreens; - Apparent strings for 'Fuel level' and 'Paused - Press Space to resume' for Aircombatmode don't work, presumably hardcoded; - Strings for soldiers nationality in the soldiersnames.xml files; - Groundcombatmode Tooltip for Equipment tile only working when in the grenade selection screen of the tile; - No tooltip on End turn button showing and End turn button seems to be a graphical element with no text string to adjust; - '%'-character in text (with- or without ASCII code) making tooltips dislay only ####, as xml seems to expect a variable to refer to and not finding it. Workaround for now, write out percent instead of using the character itself. Use double percent sign : %% * All tooltips in Arial and case sensitive, most other strings printed in the Xenonauts font with only capital characters. This is a reminder to write case sensitive for tooltip entries, with other entries it does not matter as it will be rendered out in all capitals anyway.

Greetings! I tend to like mods from more than one source. And in the interest in that, I'd like to learn more about how the various files work. Could anyone give me a quick rundown on how the files where you actually add items to them work? Do they have an ID number or something that needs to be unique? If one were to unify two mods and say the items.xml and strings.xml files both had modifications, how would you unify the two? Thanks!

As an opposite of psi's how about a tech psi that could hack into weapons platforms? Could we also eventually get a full release of a .dll so we could add new ai behaviors, completely modify environments, and mess with about anything in the game?

Will the Goldhawk interactive team be releasing a .dll file to assist with some of the more awesome points of modding? I'd like to add some things into the game that are not available via the xml files. For instance, maybe I want to add a huge tank alien that is a melee brawler. Lots of hit points. His purpose is to either melee or run toward enemy positions and force enemies out of their hidey holes for ranged weapon users to snipe off/mow down. Maybe I want to add a ninja class for the Xenonauts. Poppers? Those would be cool. Those could probably be handled with Ai there now however. How about technological control? It compromises tanks and andron units. Like mind control for robots. Mayyyybe I want to do a lot of things with this that would be cool. I totally understand that this is in beta, just asking.

Migrated to V19. Cant find armours_gc.xml and missionscore_gc.xml files. Is this information not modable anymore?

Where can i find the files to edit like my soldiers and equipment all i get is save games:mad:

Now most of project data is stored in xml files. And some of them are not pure xml files but MS Excel tables saved in xml format. They contain vast volume of excess information (such as column size, font styles etc). This information gives no help to game but: - increase volume of files (it is critical - game already include over 180Mb of XMls) - force you to use two different data reading modules, and it is a potential source of sudden bug (I stepped on this rake in my projects). I propose to unify data format. Preferrably as real XML, not "XLS as XML" My second proposition is save game in XML format too. Yes, it will increase volume of savegame file, but (by my experience) very much simplify debugging process. And in final release you can just add any simple-but-reliable zipping+crypting procedure to prevent savegame cheating. Only big minus I see - such save will reveal some of game's "inner kitchen". How to rate this risk is up to DEVs. PS. If such themes are not disputable, or if you prefer not to discuss game innards openly (moreover with outsiders), or "just who are you a_beorning to teach us how to write software " - DEVs, just say so (here or in PM), and I drop it, with no hard feelings on my part.

I read the wiki and changed the levelsetup_quickbattle.xml to the following: But it still only spawns 3 aliens along with a few civilians and friendly soldiers, and xeno's spawn in a chinook. Help please?