Example mod · theonaris.examples.menu-tweaks 1.0.0

Menu Tweaks

Changes the game's own menus: edits text and styles, adds a news panel and a pause-menu button, and removes the About button. Everything is put back when the mod is turned off.

Changes the game's own interface: the three operations every UI mod is made of.

Everything is undone when the mod stops. Switch it off in Mods, press Apply changes, and the menus are exactly as they were.

#Try it

1. Install, start the game and allow Change the game's interface (ui.game).
2. The main menu subtitle reads Now with mods, the Play button has an orange edge, a news panel sits in the corner, and the About button is gone.
3. In a game, press Escape. The pause menu has a 💡 Tip button.
4. Switch the mod off in Mods and press Apply changes. Everything goes back.

#How it works

#Finding the game's elements

Game screens have ids (main-menu, pause-menu, building, vehicle-hud, interaction-prompt, planet-hud, hangar). ui.screens() lists them and whether each is open. Inside a screen, use the selectors you would use in a .uss file:

ui.find("main-menu", "#btn-about")          -- by name
ui.find("main-menu", ".brand-subtitle")     -- by class
ui.findAll("main-menu", "Button")           -- by type

To explore a screen's element names, list them while it is open. In the script editor's Console, on this mod's client copy:

for _, e in ipairs(ui.findAll("main-menu", "Button")) do log.info(e.name, e:text()) end

#Screens come and go

A screen's elements are created when it opens and discarded when it closes, so a mod applies its changes on ui.screen.opened, and once at start for screens that are already open. Check before adding (screen:find("#mt-news")) so reopening does not add a second copy.

#Undo is built in

With ui.game, every change to a game element (text, style, class, tooltip, enabled state, removal, children added) is recorded against your mod. When the mod stops for any reason, the game replays the record backwards. Elements you create are destroyed at the same time.

#Styling your own elements

ui.load("ui/news.uxml") applies <Style src="news.uss" /> to the elements in that file only. Game elements keep their own styles, so prefix your class names (mt-… here) to keep them distinct. To restyle a game element, use :style{ … }.

#Files

mod.json
scripts/client.lua
ui/news.uxml, ui/news.uss, ui/banner.png
data/news.json               the panel's text
data/tips.json               the pause-menu tips

All files