Beamdog Forums - [MOD] Classic BG UI v1.6 (2024)

K4f4r Member Posts: 14

February 2022 edited January 2023 in UI Modding

Green stone UI from original Baldur's Gate for BG:EE
Download link, pick Source Code(zip).

Patch 1.6

Added gamelog search (on ENTER; SPACE is a special character that will remove empty lines; F to focus),
Added missing BG1 container icons (they have stone-like effect on them),
Added gameplay-changing option of "No pause in inventory screen" in GAMEPLAY OPTIONS (this will probably get you killed on occasion if you opt into it),
Fixed missing icons from SPELL DESCRIPTION,
Adjusted left sidebar icons slightly (they were too close to the right side),
Backstabs and Wild Surges are marked very distinctly in gamelog as they're important events, you should be able to find them quickly (if you don't play in English, you need to edit M_JFflang.lua and add them using syntax from English version),
Some minor fixes that you probably didn't notice weren't working,

Patch 1.5

Inventory stats changed again, the previous version looked too out-of-place,
Added click effects to all Options menu (it's not there in EEs, buttons have only 2 states - active or not, should be transitory stage),
Script page slightly tweaked,
Various tweaks to "shopping" menus (added click effects, positioning of the text to mirror the original better, '(1)' for item count is not present like in the original),
'Enter' shortcut for both 'send to' and 'from backpack' added,
Q,W,E,R can be used to change shop tabs quickly,
Journal mosaics slightly tweaked and font changed for quest entries.

Patch 1.4

Click effect redone, now it's finally time based, not faked!
Inventory screen, specifically stats part, changed.
Added click effect for frames both in inventory and in journal, changed the look to little "goldier"
Narration's scroll speed varies, based on window's width, you can reasonably follow the voiceover now,
Container icon is a bit greyed out when it's empty (minor effect),
Already known spells for Sorcerers have green contour to differentiate from what you pick,
Minor graphical improvements in clock, frames in inventory and journal and priest scroll/mage book.

Patch 1.3

In character generation, pressing R will pick a (r)andom option,
Backstabs are marked pink in the gamelog (only Eng version),
Status effects are sorted alphabetically,
Adjusted right side panel graphic's brightness to match it better with the left side,
Improved "clicked" effect in various places (mainly character generation).

Patch 1.2

Added actual map markers from Classic BG (they blink red when hovered over! wow)

Patch 1.1

Added search bar for shops/containers.
Remove party member confirmation is pretty, not some generic garbage.
Your location (that knight icon on the world map) is bigger and higher res.
Increased some map markers sizes.
Some minor tweaks I already forgot about, it's a mystery.

Screenshots:
Full gallery

Installation: put everything you get from the archive into .../override. It will work on both Siege of Dragonspear and without, but without it, main menu is uglier and you don't get a donation animation.

For full BG1 experience you may want these mods too:

BG Classic Movies, for those sweet low res movies (entering Beregost, Gnoll Fortress, Ducal Palace, Candlekeep library etc.).
BG Nostalgia Pack, for paperdolls, icons, sounds (HADOUKEN! HADOUKEN!), maybe sprites if you're brave and backed up your saves.

If you use Bubb's excellent Extended Spell Menu, I made a plugin that will overwrite icons to match the style of this UI. Install it last and override the base SoD styled icons you get.
Download

This mod will work with SCS, but you need to open UI.menu in a text editor and change

iHaveSCS = false

iHaveSCS = true

If added Icewind Dale spells have gibberish names in Key bindings section, here's what you have to do:

make a new text file, name it "M_KEYS" (actually important part is M_ at the beginning, rest doesn't matter), then find "BGEE.lua" that SCS created in override, open it, find the section "keybindings".

Now, you need to copy everything, starting from "keybindings" all the way to both closing "}", leave the semicolon out (it will be 460+ lines of code) and paste it into that new file. Then names should show up fine.

I don't know why SCS doesn't do that by default, to be honest, as it's much smarter than overriding whole "BGEE.lua".

Added functionalities:

When you roll for stats, right click will dump 3 last stats and max strength (for those fishing for a good 18/xx score over everything else); 'P' will give you the next 90+ you would have gotten if you kept rolling and didn't fat fingered REROLL.
Thieves add points in multiples of 5 (don't pick that option in SCS install).
On Color Choices screen, you can get random colors by clicking on a right paperdoll. Sometimes you get some truly good color combinations.
Whenever you have to scroll left and right, it's on A/D keys. Quickloot, pages in mage book and priest scroll, spell descriptions, you name it. The only exception is actionbar which is hardcoded.
On reform party screen, holding "Remove" will skip confirmation screen, right clicking will remove everyone at once (when you need to get that fat XP drop for your guy ASAP).
Double clicking on a room will rent it (skip one click, woohoo).
On Buy and Sell screen the buttons next to names: left click to select everything, right to deselect, double click for select AND sell/move. Sell entire gem bag in one double click today, order now.
On Donate screen, right clicking will add 100 instead of 1, upper right corner of the paper has Reputation cheat sheet for lazy people like me who don't want to go to wiki every time they do something nasty and NPCs are whining.
On Identify screen there's "select all" button to save you some time.
Container screen can be extended if your horizontal screen resolution is above 1030.
Added search bar for shops (I know it wasn't in the original, but that screen is so tiny and annoying to navigate when you need to buy arrows it got tiresome quickly).
Pressing (R) will pick a random option for you in character generation, if you want to let Jesus take the wheel on what you're gonna play.

Known problems (they're all fixed now):

Not a "problem" per se, but donation bowl is ugly, because after trying to get a proper animation that a) works b) doesn't crash the game c) is not weirdly mirrored or deformed d) has the exact colors I put in in source proved impossible. I settled for bad colors. If someone can get me a proper wbm from THESE frames I could fix it right now. I just can't be bothered to waste my life on ffmpeg.
I managed to fix it. Only works with SoD, because the base game, for some god forsaken reason, doesn't seem able to handle transparency. Anyway, bowl is now pretty as it was meant to be. Increasing resolution fixed the colors. For whatever reason. They were always fine in normal video player, but the game itself can't handle it when it's too small somehow. This is ffmpeg command line that did the trick if someone's interested:
```
ffmpeg.exe -r 29.970 -f image2 -i DONATE%%05d.png -codec:v libvpx -cpu-used 0 -pix_fmt yuva420p -b:v 2M -qmin 10 -qmax 42 -maxrate 2000k -bufsize 4000k -threads 4 -vf scale=-1:1024 -codec:a libvorbis -b:a 128k -f webm -auto-alt-ref 0 DONATE.wbm
```
Sequencer screen is laggy. Deal breaker in BG2, but in BG1 you almost don't make them (in classic BG you don't period, it's not even in the game). Fixed in 1.5
This one is and isn't more serious. If you don't use EEex, you can skip this paragraph. Basically, when you install it and start the game via InfinityLoader two screens destroy frames - namely CHARGEN_CHOOSESPELLS (where you pick spells for your newly created mage) and CHARGEN_MEMORIZE_MAGE (where you choose what to have memorized at the start).
By 'destroy frames' I mean, average frame rate can drop to single digits. Second one is the worst - 1-3 spells on the screen and "average fps: 9". First one is even funnier: when I level up sorcerer, screen with 4 level spells is completely fine, no fps drops. When I create new higher level mage in Siege of Dragonspear, level 3 is fine. If you can even begin to explain what's going on (again, only with EEex), you're already smarter than me and you should be in charge of this project.
If you have some beast rig you can probably plow right through. If you just create your mage without EEex(start with baldur.exe), then save the game and restart, you can bypass this until some real man looks at it and fixes it, because I am at a loss. Or just wait at low fps, not that it's broken, just slow, should work fine.

Final notes: If it looks like I run out of steam at the end (journal screen, for example), it's because I did. It was over a month of not that fun work and that UI isn't even that good, because it was designed for 4:3 640x480 resolution. Pixels can poke an eye out nowadays. And keep in mind that majority of them were already handled by Photoshop's neural filter to remove the worst offenders...I am only uploading it, because some kind soul helped me making it and I'd feel bad for wasting his time.

Signing out.

Post edited by K4f4r on January 2023

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Pecca Member Posts: 2,196

February 2022

Awesome. Nice work!
Bubb Member Posts: 1,003

February 2022

Looks awesome, great job! And the spell menu integration is nice
No idea why EEex would be causing certain screens to lag out. I just tested them and they run fine on my end, though my computer is pretty beefy so maybe it just chugged through it.
Abel Member Posts: 785

February 2022

Amazing! A lot of folks will be very happy to get back the classic BG UI and experience!
ThorThunderfist Member Posts: 8

February 2022

Kind soul here! There are still some kinks to be ironed out, but I love that we can have the classic grey/green stone back and I am determined to make this work. So not to worry about "wasting my time." I've already "wasted" plenty of my life on Baldur's Gate.
Fandraxx Member Posts: 194

February 2022

My goodness. This makes me feel old. But, god, it is cool. Well done.
lunar Member Posts: 3,460

February 2022

Oh! Ooh! People wanted for this for too long! Thank you kindly.
If anyone can recreate original BG2 SoA ui like this it would be even better!
Umm I installed this on bg:ee version 2.5 (no sod) and in the startup menu I can't get access to blackpits. Both symbols are of baldurs gate and neither gives access to blackpits.
ThorThunderfist Member Posts: 8

February 2022

See Also
Beamdog Forums - [MOD] Dragonspear UI++ (v2.42)EasyCheat with in-game UI (MCM)(SE)Is Baldur's Gate 3 Better With A Controller Or Mouse & Keyboard? Which BG3 Playstyle Is Best Gayming Awards 2024 Winners: Baldur's Gate 3 Wins Over Tears of the Kingdom and Spider-Man 2 - IGN

Your missing Black Pits issue is solved by the installation instructions above.
Change "START_noSoD" filename to "START" to somewhat remedy that.
To be more specific, this is referring to the "START.png" and "START_noSoD.png" files in override.
lunar Member Posts: 3,460

February 2022

Oh right....missed that line. Thank you.
AndreaColombo Member Posts: 5,527

February 2022 edited February 2022

Thank you very much for making this!
I'll add it to the list of mods my Nostalgia Pack is best enjoyed with
K4f4r Member Posts: 14

March 2022

[UPDATE] I did some fixes for the base, no Siege of Dragonspear, game. Should work without renaming anything and you should be able to access Black Pits without issues. Chapter transitions shouldn't display SoD graphics.
Also done some minor graphical fixes and moved portraits 2 pixels to the left, because they seemed too close to the right edge to me. It looked off.
Probably as good as it gets, but do report if I broke or forgot anything.
lunar Member Posts: 3,460

March 2022

This is superb! It works now, thank you!
I want to use this for bg2:ee too, but the main menus become all broken. Can you make a version for bg2:ee too? That would be the best continous experience, aesthetics wise.
emperors_fist Member Posts: 4

March 2022

Hi! I keep running into "An unexpected error is keeping you from copying the file. [...] Error 0x80070057"" when I try to unzip the linked archive. Can you check, if the archive isn't damaged?
K4f4r Member Posts: 14

March 2022

No, archive isn't damaged on my end. But you made me realize I broke something when I updated it earlier, fixed now.
emperors_fist Member Posts: 4

March 2022

K4f4r wrote: »
No, archive isn't damaged on my end. But you made me realize I broke something when I updated it earlier, fixed now.
Sadly, it still gives the same error. It's centred around text lua "startEngine:GetCampaign()"
emperors_fist Member Posts: 4

March 2022

emperors_fist wrote: »
K4f4r wrote: »
No, archive isn't damaged on my end. But you made me realize I broke something when I updated it earlier, fixed now.
Sadly, it still gives the same error. It's centred around text lua "startEngine:GetCampaign()"
Ok, 7zip works, so it seems Windows' file explorer has this issue...
cdx Member Posts: 90

March 2022

Just wanted to say thank you for the mod K4f4r, love it!

See Also
Beamdog Forums - [MOD] Lefreut's enhanced UI (for BG1EE, SoD, BG2EE and EET)
lunar Member Posts: 3,460

April 2022 edited April 2022

I am a big fan of your mod, and using it as a base I made a half-mod for original-bg2 skin for my personal use.

Spellbook

Priest scroll

Spell desc.

Item description complete with that cute bg2 font (hard to read but I love its nostalgia feel)

Dialogue window

Inventory, sadly I can't make original bg2 inventory skin work with ee's new things like weapon armor info. I changed the empty slot to original bg2, though.
I am loving it!
Screenshots look crispier when opened in new tab.
jacklhoward Member Posts: 15

May 2022 edited May 2022

I tried enabling the console by adding "SetPrivateProfileString('Program Options','Debug Mode','1')"to .lua file. When I launch the game an error message shows up. and when i press ctrl+space I cannot type in console commands. other cheats work tho.
edit: lefreut suggested that in UI.menu "The line 19189 should be commented out, add -- in front of the line". It apparently works now.

problemLUA.png 19K
K4f4r Member Posts: 14

May 2022

Yes. Wonders of adding lines automatically without double checking. I fixed it.
Leilu Member Posts: 64

May 2022

Hi,
If you follow the Infinity Engine discord, you may have seen that I've been working for a few days on an attempt of reproduction one of the original BG2 interface fonts.
It's this font

I guess you will be interested in my work on this font.
It's far from perfect because reproducing such a low-resolution font is subject to interpretation and choice of style (rounded or sharp corners, pixel style or not) but I think it could be interesting for some people.
For the moment I have only made an English version of the font. I still have to take care of languages like French or German with their different accents. One thing is for sure, I won't be able to handle other languages with a non-Latin alphabet.
I also share the birdfont (an open-source software) work file if others want to take over my work or join in.
https://github.com/WillScarlettOhara/BG2-UI-Font
LyingInTheCornfield Member Posts: 6

May 2022 edited May 2022

Is there a way to make the bottom bar span the entire edge of the screen? I marked in red the parts I'd like blocked off. I don't mean stretching the UI, but just adding grey blocks with the same texture as the rest of the UI to block those parts of the screen.
jacklhoward Member Posts: 15

May 2022

K4f4r wrote: »
No, archive isn't damaged on my end. But you made me realize I broke something when I updated it earlier, fixed now.
"Would you consider making a weidu installer? to make it a smoother installation process
K4f4r Member Posts: 14

June 2022

LyingInTheCornfield wrote: »
Is there a way to make the bottom bar span the entire edge of the screen?
Yes. And no. Hypothetically I could do it, but that's a quite a lot of work when you think about. You're not making it for one specific resolution, when you put the game in windowed you can stretch the game horizontally as much as you want and right now it still works.
That much scaling is an issue, I don't know if I could even make it look good, it would have to be huge uniform stone texture, then "edges" and shading with transparency put on top. The only image type that seems to scale is BAM and that's a whole other problem to contend with, BAMs are for icons and the like. I already tried to make that type big and the game didn't handle it too well. Anyhow, I am not willing to put that much effort into this for reason I'll describe below.
It probably wouldn't even look good. It used to look this way in very early BG:EE, they ditched it for a reason - whole lot of screenspace wasted for nothing. The reason it looks good in original is because it was 4:3 and interface ended there. I don't even know what could be put there to make it look fine - random cracks maybe?
Eh, maybe one day when I'm super bored.
jacklhoward wrote: »
"Would you consider making a weidu installer? to make it a smoother installation process
I did consider it, but I don't really want to learn how weidu actually works (syntax and whatnot), because I dislike using it when I don't have to. Any change to SCS and here goes my next 15 minutes checking nonsense that wasn't even touched - on the other hand, if you want to remove my mod, you just put it in override again and either "undo copy" or everything should already be selected when you do that, so just press DELETE and you get your base game back, no harm done.
edgartheslayer Member Posts: 5

July 2022 edited October 2022

Amazing mod! It truly brought me much joy. It also seems to work with BG2EE at least I haven't seen any problems so far, with 1 exception:
I can't seem choose Throne Of Bhaal expansion when I launch the game, because there's no way to choose it in the main menu. Is there a file or few that I can exclude from the override to have the default main menu, while having everything else BG1 styled?

Post edited by edgartheslayer on October 2022
K4f4r Member Posts: 14

July 2022 edited July 2022

First of all, don't forget to update your mod, I just released a new one.
I don't really want to officially add BG2 support, because that's work I'm not willing to do for something that I don't think even fits well to the general theme and "feel" of BG2
I don't honestly know how to do that, I am not familiar with BG2's ui.menu and how it handles switches to different campaigns. You may try installing NearInfinity, getting UI.menu from BG2 (type that into search bar) and copying section named 'START', sections are separated by single apostrophe. Though if you do, get the section above that too, those section above contain functions that the section below uses - it's not required, they can be anywhere, really, but that's how they chose to organize it and I'm grateful for that. If you do that correctly, you will simply get default BG2 start screen.
You may also try assigning "startEngine:OnToBButtonClick(true)" action to some button, this command seems to switch campaign to ToB, but I have no idea what is actually going to happen if you do. For all I know, the game just crashes.
Isewein Member Posts: 534

September 2022

Thank you for sharing this compilation! Would it be possible to install this last on an EET installation, then remove it to have the BG2 interface back for the second half of the game? I prefer the original look and feel, but EET offers NPC continuity and some exclusive mods...
K4f4r Member Posts: 14

September 2022

Isewein wrote: »
Thank you for sharing this compilation! Would it be possible to install this last on an EET installation, then remove it to have the BG2 interface back for the second half of the game? I prefer the original look and feel, but EET offers NPC continuity and some exclusive mods...
Possibly, yes. I don't know about EET enough to tell you. Chances are it won't work at all, I don't know the inner workings of that mod.
edgartheslayer Member Posts: 5

October 2022

1.4 patch:
The inventory change is interesting, I like it, but honestly I can't go back from the 1.3 version. It's just so much more "classic", I'll be sticking to 1.3 from now on . Maybe you could add a "guide" text document that let you know what files changes what screen, so that people could exclude some stuff, or mix up different versions? That would be cool. But regardless, please keep up the good work! Best wishes!
Isewein Member Posts: 534

October 2022

Just gave it a try and yes, it seems that removing it from the override brings back the standard interface without breaking a save.
Absolutely stunning work, by the way. Ironically this mod now brings the EE closer to the "original" experience than BGT was - for a player like me who first came to BG through BG2 it's an entirely new experience, so it's not just the nostalgia speaking when I say that I love the comfortable stoney interface and the various desks filled with miscellanea portrayed in the background wallpapers.
Just two things - the option screen is slightly off-centre when opened inside the game, and it's a real shame the journal window now looks incongruous with the others. I hope we can get the classic version for it as well some day!
@lunar Those BG2 menus look great too - are you planning on releasing them as a mod akin to this? Always loved the Gigeresque menu skins. Also, how did you get Maralie Fiddlebender to show up in BG2?
K4f4r Member Posts: 14

October 2022

edgartheslayer wrote: »
1.4 patch:
The inventory change is interesting, I like it, but honestly I can't go back from the 1.3 version. It's just so much more "classic", I'll be sticking to 1.3 from now on . Maybe you could add a "guide" text document that let you know what files changes what screen, so that people could exclude some stuff, or mix up different versions? That would be cool. But regardless, please keep up the good work! Best wishes!
I went back to something more akin to the previous version, so you should be happier. Yes, it didn't mesh quite well with the general style.
Isewein wrote: »
the option screen is slightly off-centre when opened inside the game
That's pretty much the exact copy from the original, it's not supposed to be centered. I mean, the whole image file IS centered, it's just how it looks.
Isewein wrote: »
the journal window now looks incongruous with the others
For the record, I am capable of doing the old journal screen. Problem is, it's funtionally worse than the one Beamdog made for 2.0+. Whenever I am faced with looks vs functionality, I usually choose functionality. The old screen looks pretty cool, but certain things that make it cool cannot be made with 2.0+, like very big scroll size.
How do you mark different entries on that? What could possibly mesh with it? It's extremely basic. If I made it like it, it would just drive everyone nuts trying to get info from this. And additional interface for notes etc. would have to be made regardless and I can't for the life of me even *imagine* the final product, much less make it.

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