What's the "Extras" folder for?

[3371-Alpha]

I've already finished Marathon 1 and I'm halfway through M2 and I've never really paid much attention to it until now, but what do the scripts in the Extras folder do? I know what the Cheats.lua does and how to use it (even an idiot could figure it out) but what do the other few scripts do and how do you use them?

[Windbreaker]

If yours is the same as mine, it will have "Software Transparent Liquids" and "Carnage Messages" MMLs along with the cheats.lua.

The transparent liquids MML is pretty self-explanatory as well: it just makes the liquids a little bit transparent. The "carnage messages" MML basically displays all kills during multiplayer games. For instance, it would say "3371-Alpha [Rocket Launcher] Windbreaker", or something to that effect, in the upper left-hand corner of the screen.

Transparent liquids can be toggled on/off in Preferences > Graphics > Rendering Options, and carnage messages can be activated when gathering a game.

[Hopper]

To use the .mml files, place them in the "Scripts" folder of the scenario you're playing. The files included are:

Carnage_Messages.mml - as Windbreaker said, in a multiplayer game, messages are printed in the top-left corner of the screen whenever a player is killed.

Software_Transparent_Liquids.mml - when using the Software renderer, the surface of liquids will become semi-transparent, so you can see through them into the water/lava/etc.

Transparent_Liquids.mml - the same thing, but for the OpenGL-based renderers.

Transparent_Sprites.mml - adds the semi-transparent effect to explosions and rocket trails, when using the OpenGL renderers.

These are text files, so you can open them in TextEdit or your favorite text editor. There's an "MML.html" file in the "Documentation" folder describing everything you can do with MML.

[3371-Alpha]

Does the "MML" folder equate the scripts for official Marathon scenarios?

[Hopper]

The official Marathon scenarios all have a "Scripts" folder in the download, and that's the one you can place files into. If you're wondering about the "MML" folder mentioned in the documentation, that's the one inside ~/Library/Application Support/AlephOne. Usually it's easier to just forget about that one and stick to each scenario's "Scripts" folder.

Marathon 2 and Infinity ship with Transparent_Liquids.mml already installed. If you use the "HD Weapons" plugin, you probably don't want to use Transparent_Sprites.mml, since the replacement graphics already have some transparency effects.

[3371-Alpha]

I'm on mac so the main scripts folder for Marathon 2 would be
Marathon 2.app/Contents/Resources/DataFiles/Scripts/
Correct?

[3371-Alpha]

Anyone?

[HelviusRufus]

Don't know much about macintosh (there's an old song that starts don't know much about history)

but on my windows system, the scripts folder is here:

which is programfiles/marathon2/scripts ... it's on the same level as the exe .
don't know if this is any help.

[3371-Alpha]

Assuming Windows also has application bundles, can you place the scripts inside the exe file?

[HelviusRufus]

Don't know what an application bundle is, but from the line in your post I don't think so.
An exe file is the program that runs it. AlephOne in windows is AlephOne.exe (marathon2.exe is AlephOne.exe) which may be called an app on your system (an .exe is an application).

Here's what I'd do:
I'd run Marathon, go to Preferences, then Environment, then click Use Solo Script box if it is not already checked (Fig. 1), then click on Script File (Fig. 1), and then look to see the names of the scripts that are already there (Fig. 2). If you click the UP button, it will go up one level and show the folder name the scripts file is in (Fig. 3).
Search on some of the script names under Choose Script (Fig. 2) and see where they are hiding. Then put whatever scripts you want to use in the same folder.
On my system, the scripts are in the scripts folder in Aleph One folder (and not in the Marathon2 folder as I said yesterday, I was wrong there).

While the arrangement systems may be very different (I've never seen what it looks like on a Mac), looking at the names and arrangements on the Choose Script screens (Fig. 2 and 3 and which may look different on a Mac) you should be able to track it down.

Fig. 1

Fig. 2

Fig. 3

[Pfhorrest]

Application bundles are a thing in OSX where a folder that contains the actual executable file and a bunch of data file resources is named with a ".app" suffix and appears as a single program, not a folder full of things including a program. You can still open it up if you know how and change around those data files, though, which is what Alpha was asking about. To my knowledge Windows doesn't have any such equivalent.

To answer the original question, the Scripts folder lives wherever your Shapes/Sounds/etc files are. If you're dealing with a bundled app, then yeah, it's inside the bundle, probably in the location Alpha said (I'm too lazy to check, but if that's where the Shapes file is too, that's where you want it). In 3rd party scenarios (which are not bundled) and Windows and Linux (which don't have bundles), it just goes in the scenario folder (with the Map/Shapes/Sounds/etc), which may or may not be the same place as the executable (on Mac and Linux at least, you can tell the Aleph One app to load a scenario folder from anywhere; not sure if Windows does that too).

[3371-Alpha]

Thank you Pfhorrest, that's exactly where my shapes and other resources are. I guess this concludes this thread.

[HelviusRufus]

And thanks for the description.
It looks like making AlephOne run on Mac and Windows would be a real chore.

[Hopper]

Mac, Windows, and Linux all have different philosophies on how to handle data files associated with an application. This does make Aleph One development pretty challenging, as doing the right thing for each platform means we end up with convoluted code to find stuff at startup. The DOOM community usually handles this by making the "engine" (runs a scenario) and the "launcher" (shows a UI to pick your scenario, and tells the engine what to run) into separate projects, but no developer has stepped up to build a launcher.

If you want to add MML to your Marathon 2 game on a Mac, like 3371-Alpha is doing, you actually have four choices:

1. Run the bundled app, and put your MML inside the bundle as 3371-Alpha did. The downside is, you have to re-do your changes when you switch to a new version of the app.

2. Run the bundled app, and put your scripts inside [your home directory]/Library/Application Support/Marathon 2/MML. This sticks around when you update the app, but it's an obscure location and a hidden directory on more recent OS X releases.

3. Run the standalone Aleph One and download the Marathon 2 scenario files separately, with your custom MML in the scenario folder. This is how the Windows and Linux versions work, because there's no concept of a bundle there. (The Windows download of "Marathon 2" is literally just AlephOne.exe with a different icon and name, but on the Mac there are compiled-in changes to make the standalone bundle work better.)

4. Run Aleph One like in 3, but if you install MML in [your home directory]/Library/Application Support/AlephOne/MML, it will be used for every scenario you run. You can also install plugins here (in the "Plugins" folder instead of "MML") and they'll be loaded in every scenario. This is handy if you have generic things like cheats or custom HUDs that you use in multiple games.

For further reading, see File Locations on the Aleph One wiki.

[3371-Alpha]

but it's an obscure location and a hidden directory on more recent OS X releases.

Yep, that's not a problem if you're on Mac OS 10.5 ("Leopard") like me. If you're on 10.7 ("Lion") or later you have a problem.

[herecomethej2000]

Not really, find "go" in the menubar, hold alt and the user library shortcut pops up in the list. Apple does have an annoying habit of hiding the inner workings of the system from users but most of it can be reached fairly simply. Except system folders on 10.11, which can't even be changed with the root user. But in all honesty, if you are digging around in there 90% of the time there is a better, less system endangering, way. If there isn't, you do have to go through some hoops.

[3371-Alpha]

True, but it was more convenient in Snow Leopard & earlier.

[ThrashNeon]

Not really, find "go" in the menubar, hold alt and the user library shortcut pops up in the list.

.. and of course, at that point, you can cmd-option drag the ~/Library folder to your home folder to create an alias of it there so you don't have to screw around later.