The White Cross Hairs and "X" when using a mouse and keyboard

[fryerlawrence 7]

I am already familiar with using the "Space Bar" to toggle on/off and going into "Options" and turning of the H.U.D. (however it does not affect the cross hairs)

 

I was wondering if anyone would please care to take a look into maybe fixing the really bright cross hairs and "X" problem when trying to fly your plane? 

 

 

 

 

 

I will not be in the market for a joystick in the near future (maybe sooner than later....lol...hopefully) and will be flying with my mouse for some time. 

 

I would like to see the thing toned down almost to nothing.  Something that you can see but so ghostlike that you almost cannot tell it's there during night missions.  Same thing for day time flying.

 

Since we have Flight Tools... would this be a project that someone could tackle with a whole lot more experience than I do? Or would even Flight Tools even work for something like that?

 

Thanks,

-fryer

[LuisFelizTirado 33]

I completely agree with you, and have been looking for that little bugger for months. Haven't found the texture yet, if it even is a texture. But, if it does turn out to be, then it should be easy to change it.

 

That is an excellent question for Stonelance - don't hesitate to send him a note to the Toolkit address.

 

Best regards.

Luis

[fryerlawrence 7]

Sent the e-mail... will post here with updates as I can.

 

P.S. Btw Luis... those cross hairs are my BIGGEST "pet peeve" about MS Flight...

 

next to those pesky trees in the way of a runway.

[Air1 136]

I only use the mouse as a autopilot once in a great  while. But I can understand the concern, it does take away from the overall effect. Sometimes when on auto pilot with the mouse on a long flight I will forget and move the joystick to make a course correction and BAM, upside down and heading for the ground. Very disconserting to say the least.

 

Steve

[basys 4]

Hi Folks

 

LuisFelizTirado, on 28 Apr 2013 - 12:41 AM, said:
I completely agree with you, and have been looking for that little bugger for months.
Haven't found the texture yet, if it even is a texture.

Luis
The crosshairs are not a standard texture type.



All the in-game elements, e.g. menus, widgets, etc,
are Flash files compiled into some kind of container library,
and stored in a special compressed Flash format,
along with their actionscripts and various other resources. :blink:

These SWF files are located in the UI folder,
and are not playable in a standard Flash player. :excl:



The mouse crosshairs element is "shape 13"
and the shadow elements are "shape 12" & "shape 15"
contained in the file named - "InGameMenus.swf"



You'd need someone with an appropriate Flash toolset, :ph34r:
to extract, modify, reassemble/compress these.



I've attached the relevant elements as "Shape NUMBER.txt"
you'll need to rename the files to "Shape NUMBER.swf",
as this forum doesn't support uploading .SWF files.


In particular, Shape 12 needs lightening,
to lose some of its shading intensity.



EDIT -
The actual component displayed in-game might be "sprite 18"
which appears to be a 4 element composite of blank, crosshairs, +, O.
i.e. hidden, displayed, target, and mouse-look.
 

 

 

EDIT 2 -

Just to be clear,

positioning & scaling the element onscreen

is an actionscript task, (not a texture "resizing" task).

 

 

HTH
ATB
Paul

[HiFlyer 9,363]

I is happy go lucky about such things. I tell myself that I see no cross-hairs and instantly they fall below my conscious notice. This also works very well with most pop-up ads in the internet. My eyes instantly unfocus slightly so I usually don't see them except as blobs of color.    :lol:

[LuisFelizTirado 33]

Thank you very much, Paul. I had recently taken a look at those Flash UI elements, or rather attempted to take a look, but got nothing on the Flash player. Very interesting information and something really novel by the devs. I wonder why they decided to integrate these elements as Flash.

 

Best regards.

Luis

[stonelance 136]

Flight uses Scaleform for the UI which is a middleware for rendering Flash with DirectX for games.

[HiFlyer 9,363]

Flight uses Scaleform for the UI which is a middleware for rendering Flash with DirectX for games.

 

http://gameware.autodesk.com/scaleform

 

 

 

The #1 Video Game UI Solution

 

Autodesk® Scaleform® enables developers to leverage the power of the Adobe® Flash® tool set to create powerful and immersive user interface environments for video games and beyond. Used in over 1000 titles across all major platforms ranging from AAA titles to casual games, Scaleform provides a streamlined solution to create hardware-accelerated 3D game menus, HUDs, animated textures, in-game videos and mini-games.

 

[Air1 136]

Oh, so so much lost potential! Say it ain't so Joe. Well, maybe some day, if we keep at it!

 

Steve

[HiFlyer 9,363]

Oh, so so much lost potential! Say it ain't so Joe. Well, maybe some day, if we keep at it!

 

Steve

 

From the use of Speedtree technology to this, it seems Microsoft was being a lot more willing than usual to incorporate off-the-shelf-solutions from third parties. Wonder what else is in there? I will have to look at the credits screen again.

 

In the meantime, I am still not certain whether this means the OP's issue is addressable or not............

[Orion 2]

 

 

From the use of Speedtree technology to this, it seems Microsoft was being a lot more willing than usual to incorporate off-the-shelf-solutions from third parties. Wonder what else is in there? I will have to look at the credits screen again.

 

It's probably easier to read the credits from here, instead of waiting for Flight to scroll through everything at its own pace.

[stonelance 136]

Havok, FMOD and Granny3D are the major ones.  Speedtree was used as an artist tool to create textures.  We didn't use the tech in the engine.

[fryerlawrence 7]

Gentlemen...

 

Thank you so much for being passionate about helping fix this.  It really means a lot.

 

However, I think after reading all of the above just made the one brain cell I had... pop into oblivion. :blink:

 

I am always interested in learning new things, and could sort of follow along... heavy on the sort of part...LOL

 

@ Steve... I have done what you have done... there is no shame.  I am probably up to almost 2,000 crashes under my belt.   (1,838 and counting to be exact. Most of them came from the challenges.)  Then I bounce back like Wile E. Coyote. B)

 

"I is happy go lucky about such things. I tell myself that I see no cross-hairs and instantly they fall below my conscious notice. This also works very well with most pop-up ads in the internet. My eyes instantly unfocus slightly so I usually don't see them except as blobs of color".

 

@ HiFlyer... I'm kinda different.  once you notice the 400lb. gorilla in the room...it doesn't go away very easily.  Those cross hairs stick out like a sore thumb and in the way when you are trying to read the runway lights from a distance, which then hence turns flying into a chore b/c then you want to align urself on da runway without missing it, but cannot because of the pesky cross hairs.

 

@ myself... I have given it some thought and I think I am going to install a laser gun on the front of all my planes so that way I can make light work outta those pesky trees right in the flight path of the runway. 

 

@ everyone... I cannot tell from the chitter chatter....so is this project going to be "doable?", or are we stuck like Chuck in a rut? 

[LuisFelizTirado 33]

Thanks to Paul, the most important effort, that of identifying the files, is done.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I would be happy if the second image replaced the overly visible crosshairs, or even better, if the "mouse-look" small circle were the default.

 

All we need now is somebody with the right Flash editing tools who can make the switch.

 

Best regards.

Luis