Hi there,
I've recently noticed on a few well-modded cod2 servers that it is possible to add text and content to the HUD ingame. I believe this is done with .gsc files, but I'm not really sure (because I used to think it was done with .menu files). I believe all this is done with things called "shaders". But again, I'm not really sure.

If there's anyone that can shed some light on the topic, that would be great!

yes you could put a shader for a hud, but diffrent for a text.

level.texthud = newHudElem();
		level.texthud.x = 267;
		level.texthud.y = 100;
		level.texthud setText(game["text"]);

that will make a hud in the middle of your screen basicly with a text, but not done yet notice game["text"], you now have to make that hold a string.

game["text"] = &"Hello I Am Your Text!";
	precacheString(game["text"]);

now this would be different if you wanted a shader instead of, setText. you want setShader somthing like this

setShader("black", 640, 480);

the first perimeter is the Material Name the 2nd is Width and the 3rd is Height

but sadly does not end there yet for shaders, just like you had to do with the game["text"], you have to precache it. IMPORTANT: REMEMBER TO PRECACHE everything in your main function. so before any of your scripts basicly you want to precache it or else you will get an error.

now moving on the way to precache a shader is doing this.

precacheShader("black");

now keep in mind that White and Black are default shaders, but there are also plenty of default shaders but White and Black are used frequently and most the time already precached for you already.

look through the mod or docs

Unprecached text can be shown too, but requires a lot more effort. Im gonna try that in the future :D for some cod4 style intro text :D

well mr "i like to take the easy route" lol its best if they get use to precaching somthing because i use to do the same thing and at first no errors. but then after a while id get errors. so its good to know about precaching before you start taking the easy way out.

If i have a dynamic text i want to display, do i have to precache it everytime i change what the text is?

And, if i want to display the value of a variable in the text, how would i do it?

Like this?

game["text"] = &"Money = " + self.money; 
precacheString(game["text"]);

Or like this?

game["text"] = &"Money = ", self.money; 
precacheString(game["text"]);

r00t_ writes...
Neither.
game["text"]=&"Money";
hud.label=game["money"];
hud.value=self.money;
(maybe it was setvalue... im not sure)

setValue(self.money);

actually wondering my self right now, what is the difference of having & and no &. like this game["text"]=&"Money"; what if i didnt have the &. but anyways there are documents on what to use for huds you should start using it. its in your Doc folder in your Call of Duty 2 folder.

IzNoGoD writes...

I don't understand this at all.
All i want to do is make this appear on screen (somewhere in the lower left corner, for example):
YOU'RE MONEY: $500

And obviously have the 500 change when the player get's more money or loses money (the 500 would be a variable, obviously). If you already knew all this, then my bad, i just don't understand this explanation..

well first think... what is a hud? hud = heads up display. now what game modes that are in my reach that have huds? well all the gametype files have a hud, but for this instance you could look at the sd.gsc. now

level.clock = newHudElem();
	level.clock.horzAlign = "left";
	level.clock.vertAlign = "top";
	level.clock.x = 8;
	level.clock.y = 2;
	level.clock.font = "default";
	level.clock.fontscale = 2;
	level.clock setTimer(level.roundlength * 60);

that is what a hud looks like, this what shows the time limit on SD at the top left of your screen. now what iznogod showed you

game["text"]=&"Money";
hud.label=game["text"];

now what you can do with that is.

level.clock = newHudElem();
	level.clock.horzAlign = "left";
	level.clock.vertAlign = "top";
	level.clock.x = 8;
	level.clock.y = 2;
	level.clock.font = "default";
	level.clock.fontscale = 2;
        level.label=game["text"]
	level.clock setTimer(level.roundlength * 60);

and ofc

game["text"]=&"Money";

will go in your main() func. but what that code above will do is print the round length and a text saying Money. but you dont want setTimer you want to set an integer, wich self.money = int. so what you do is level.clock setValue(self.money); that way it will print how much money you have. but as well you want to look out for is

level.clock = newHudElem();

ofc you want it to print what SELF has not level... so you want to change level.clock to self.clock (ps: you dont need to have it as clock you can change that to w.e) anyways that solves 1 problem to that. notice it says newHudElem(); that is only for level. for self. you want newClientHudElem(self); i hope this clears a few things up for you about huds.