How we are using DesktopX to make our UI scaleable.

The last few days I have spent on our new planet management screen. This is going to be very cool in the game, but as for how it works and why I will have to leave that to Brad and the other coders. Myself, I just have to make it look good. This is one of the most complicated screens in the game, and is presenting a challenge when trying to make it scale.

(Please note this screen is not done and may not reflect the what will be in the final game.)
 

Now as you can see this all works out fine as long as we are running a standard resolution, but what happens when I am running on my laptop at 1440 x 900, or my desktop and I want to get more real estate and run 1280 x 1024, or even 1600 x 1200. The good new is in GalCiv2 you can run at other resolutions and we wont just stretch the graphics. All the screens will scale properly, and you will get more useable space. Lets see an example.
 

The only limitation to the sizing of the screens at this point is that you can't run below 1024x768. In theory though I don't have such a monitor, you could run this on a 30" LCD at 3400x1600 and it would work like a champ. Providing your video card could handle it.

How are we doing this you ask? Well its quite simple in fact, thanks to DesktopX. DesktopX supports scripting of objects. I do some of this when I am skinning, but I am no great scripter. Thankfully I don't need to be for this. In each of the objects that needs to be repositioned on a screen size change I insert a simple script. Most of the time it is only 1 or 2 lines of basic math.

Sample One:

Object.Bottom = Object.Parent.Object.Height - 208
Object.Right = Object.Parent.Object.Width - 127

Here is something a bit fancier, But still simple:

Object.Width = ((Object.Parent.Object.Width - 160) / 3) - 20
Object.Right = (Object.Parent.Object.Width) - ((Object.Parent.Object.Width - 160) / 3) - 15

Cari has written up a tool that takes our DesktopX pack, including its scripts, and creates the in-game screens. This allows the artist or designer of the screen to handle all the scaling, and saves our programmers for doing the much more difficult and complicated things that make the game more fun.

I will try and write something more detailed about how DesktopX helps us make these screen as soon as possible.