The game engine used by Empires can display simplified Chinese characters. There are a several steps you would need to take to see them in the game, to load an appropriate font and define a new language for the game.
In the Core folder of the game install:
- Add your font in TTF format
- Add the EXTENDED.DAT file found here:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/rx9h6j59cr5xz ... D.zip?dl=0
- Open LANG.TXT and add a line for the new language for the game to use, for example [CHI]
In the System folder of the game install, make a copy of the FONT.TXT file and name it FONT_CHI.TXT. In this copy:
- Add a line at the top "EXTENDED".
- For every font in the file, change the name line to refer to your font. So, if you added Core\myfont.TTF above, your font_chi.txt should start:
Code: Select all
EXTENDED
[DefaultFont]
height 12
name myfont
[TinyFont]
height 8
name myfont
...
In the Data\Text folder of the game install, you will find most of the text for the game. For each Text#.txt file in the folder that you wish to translate, copy the Text#.txt to Text#_CHI.txt. Then open the new file in a text editor and replace the English quoted text with your translations. There is additional text in the Text1.txt file of each scenario in Scenarios.
Also, in Text2.txt, add IDS_LANG_CHI,"Chinese", which will be shown in the language menu in English initially when switching languages.
There are also two textures used for the language:
Data\UI\Textures\langicon_chi.tga - the flag shown in the language menu
Data\UI\Textures\lang_chi.tga - the button shown on the main menu (one quarter of the image is used for each button state)
Then, when you start the game, you should be able to go to the language menu, select your new entry, and the game will display your translations. The main menu text is found in Text2.txt, if you want to quickly verify that characters are displaying correctly.
