Dragon Age: Origins

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FollowTheGourd

Uploaded by

FollowTheGourd

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About this mod

Readability improvements for cutscenes, the quest journal, the codex, conversation history, tooltips, the inventory, and other various menus. There\'s still lots more to go and more versions to come.

Requirements
Permissions and credits
Mirrors

Announcements



  • New! (May 8, 2011) Quickbar mod released. Use up to fifty slots total, multiple rows, quickbar centering options. FtG Quickbar. Compatible with FtG UI Mod without needing to optionally enable it.
  • If you plan on playing the latest DLC, you ought to upgrade to mod v2.1. Mod v2.1 should work with game v1.03 or v1.04.


News


November 14, 2010:
Uploaded a separate compatability file for Phaenan's The Winter Forge module. Credits go to Phaenan for
her crafting UI changes and allowing their further use. I just merged them together into this patch.

August 9, 2010:
Released v2.1. It supports upcoming DLC (game v1.04 changes) and fixes some issues mentioned in the README file's changelog.

July 24, 2010:
  • Released the mod configuration tool for Mac OS X. Thanks to Paulyboy69 for the request and trying it out.
  • Uploaded a backported version of FtG UI Mod v2.0b2r3 that should run on game versions 1.0 up to 1.02a. NOT OFFICIALLY SUPPORTED - I only heard anything from Riddleofsteel (thanks!) for my request for testing.


May 3, 2010:
Released a hotfix for the optional clickable Codex table of contents feature. Please forgive my one off laziness in naming the release. Font sizes are better respected, plus it mitigates an issue with links shifting by about a pixel when other links were hovered over. The only other alternative I can see right now would be to not highlight hovered-over links, but I think it adds more than the issue subtracts.

News Archives...



Summary


(Formerly "Larger Conversation Text")

This is still a work in progress, but has reached a decent level of completion. Rome wasn't sacked in a day, and not even just once.

Readability improvements for:
  • Cutscenes
  • Quest journal
  • Codex
  • Tooltips (still in progress)
  • Inventory
  • Conversation history
  • Other various menus


There's still lots more to go and more versions to come.

See the README file and PDF manual included with the download for more information.

Important: Dragging items from the inventory into the quickbar does work, but it's slightly awkward currently because of the icon size. Make sure that the hand cursor is in the quickbar slot and that the slot is glowing - it doesn't matter where the icon is, only where the cursor is. I plan to make this more intuitive in a later release.


FAQ


  • I don't like how the textures or paperdoll (character) in the inventory or character sheet looks when scaled up. Is there any way to change that? - Currently, you can configure the mod to not scale up any of the menus that use the book menu. The book background is a common UI resource, so all the other menus using it are affected as well. See this post for details. In a future release, I'll see about giving you the option to shrink it back down again. The other textures would likely require a texture mod, since a lot are already pixelated even at their original size.



Compatibility


This UI mod should be fundamentally compatible with almost any other mod at the current time. The following list isn't meant to look down upon other mod authors for their hard work, but it's shorter than specifying anything that's compatible and hopefully leads to less frustration for anybody experiencing problems. This is by no means exhaustive and if you know that the mod has become compatible, please let me know so I can update the list. Thanks.
  • Cleaner screenshots from conversations. There's a compatibility file for v1.1 of this mod on the author's page.
  • Farhang Mod Pack - it contains an older version of this mod for conversation text when it had fixed 50% scaling. It looks as if it's not available anymore, however. If you want to keep the other mods installed with it, I believe you can just remove the folder that had been renamed to "Larger Conversation Text" from your override directory.



Examples



Configurable Settings



The mod comes with a custom utility to set the various options available. More options will be presented over time as they mature. Currently, if you set fonts way too large or too small, you'll run into aesthetic issues, but I've left you with a wide range of choice to find whatever suits you best.

I can't make these INI file options, since the UI apparently can't read custom INI entries - I don't have access to DAScript from the UI either. I had to resort to using 2DA files, and the utility allows you to change those settings without needing the toolset installed. And the config tool doesn't alter your game files - or even the installed mod's really. It alters some custom configuration files that it copies into your override folder here: My Documents\BioWare\Dragon Age\packages\core\override\FTG_UIMOD.

*click*



Adjustable Cutscene Font Size and Color


1680x1050 non-modded cutscene text versus modded default size. It can be bigger or smaller even. Transparencies replacing letterboxes for now - I'll see about adding them back as an option and better in a future release. But there's no more 30% of the screen taken up by black bars if you have a non-widescreen resolution. If you really want the old cutscene bars and fixed 50% larger text back, you can also keep or install the old version, "ftg_uimod01", still in the files section along with this one - it should take precedence being in the override directory and only affect cutscenes anyway.

If you're interested, here was my write-up on how the letterbox sizes are determined in the non-modded game.

*click*



Optional Lower Subtitles


You can select these lower subtitles. They might seem a little high, but there are up to six player responses that they need to make room for. I'll experiment with optionally lowering them and moving them up when there's a greater than usual number of player responses.

*click*



Journal Improvements


UI scaling, font size settings, font color settings, and removed the background image that makes it harder to read. In a future release, I'll see about making it so the image is there when there's no text on the page so it doesn't feel so naked.

*click*




Scaled Tooltips


Note: Those tutorial popups aren't tooltips as such but I'm working on the rest of the UI still.

You can set the font size for tooltips. If you set them way too large they may not sit properly in their frame, but the text won't get cut off. I'll work on ways to make that better in a future release.

*click*



Scaled Inventory


The inventory is scaled up to screen height, along with the tooltip popups. There's not much to do about the paperdoll being lower-res other than optionally shrink it down in a future release.

Important: Dragging items from the inventory into the quickbar does work, but it's slightly awkward currently because of the icon size. Make sure that the hand cursor is in the quickbar slot and that the slot is glowing - it doesn't matter where the icon is, only where the cursor is.


*click*



And More...


This is a fraction of what's changed. The manual has a more complete summary of the mod's current state.