GUFSM 1.2
Again shamelessly plagiarised from Korath's 1.0 announcement
I am pleased to announce the 1.2 release of the Grand Unified Flag/Shield Mod, or GUFSM (pronounced "gum" -- the F and S are silent). The GUFSM is an ongoing project headed by Birger Jarl with help from Mad King James, Iostephanos, and Korath, and contributions from Trajanus, Walter Hawkwood, Txini, and St. Leo, to replace the shield and flag graphics of all the countries in Europa Universalis II with more accurate, high-quality, 24-bit renditions.
Some anticipated questions and their answers:
1. Where can I download it?
From my page:
http://birgerjarl.languish.org/GUFSM/GUFSM_1.2.rar (Complete version) ~12 mb
http://birgerjarl.languish.org/GUFSM/GUFSM_1.2_Flags(24bit).rar (Only the flags incl palette for 24 bit flags) ~6 mb
http://birgerjarl.languish.org/GUFSM/GUFSM_1.2_Shields.rar (Only the shields) ~6 mb
Decompress directly into your Europa Universalis II directory. You may wish to make backups of the original graphics first.
2. How complete is it?
The graphics for all the countries that appear in the standard game and as well the new tags in the 1.08 patch. Shields for Armenia Minor, the Hanseatic League, Perm, Salzburg and the Holy Roman Empire are in the download.
Additionally, all the graphic bugs in the 1.08 patch have been fixed.
3. The flags look too bright when covered by the fog of war!
24-bit flags, unfortunately, don't get dimmed out like 8-bit flags do. There's nothing we can do other than to use 8-bit flags. This is nonpreferable, since only whites, greys, blacks, reds, and dark blues are well-represented in the flag palette. All others either can't be used at all (for example, the light blue bottom stripe of Luxembourg) or are subject to ugly dithering (for example, the green Eire flag). The good news is that the flags will at least consistently not be dimmed out.
4. This flag or shield is incorrect.
If you have a better source than the ones we've found, please let us know. Almost all of our research is web-based; we're always happy to receive more accurate information. Furthermore, we were unable to find any information at all about the heraldry or vexillology of some of these countries -- or in fact discovered that they had none -- and instead based our images on some of their more important symbols, or as a last resort, used the same graphic designs as Paradox.
5. This flag or shield looks horrible!
I hope you'll phrase it less bluntly
, but we are certainly open to criticism, especially when you think our graphic looks worse than the Paradox one. When you've been working on the same tricky flag or shield for a half hour or more, you're inclined to say, "Good enough" and stop; it's difficult to tell whether the remaining flaws are flaws in fact, or are only visible to the author's eye.
6. The Burgundy and Spain/Moscow and Lithuania flags look too much alike.
We're aware of these two problems in particular (Burgundy and Spain are in fact identical, not just similar), and welcome suggestions on how to resolve them. We'd also welcome identification of any other conflicting flags.
You can get some alternative flags here: http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?t=133386
7. I only have zip installed. Why do you use rar?
Because the mod is really, really big -- thirty-three megabytes uncompressed -- and rar compresses better. Download winrar from at http://www.rarlab.com/ -- it's completely free for the first forty days, and still useable (though nagware) afterwards.
8. Can I help?
Please! We can use aid in research, mirrors (as mentioned above), and the actual graphics. You can find links to and instructions for Mad King James' shield and flag templates in the stickied threads in the Graphics Forum
Again shamelessly plagiarised from Korath's 1.0 announcement
I am pleased to announce the 1.2 release of the Grand Unified Flag/Shield Mod, or GUFSM (pronounced "gum" -- the F and S are silent). The GUFSM is an ongoing project headed by Birger Jarl with help from Mad King James, Iostephanos, and Korath, and contributions from Trajanus, Walter Hawkwood, Txini, and St. Leo, to replace the shield and flag graphics of all the countries in Europa Universalis II with more accurate, high-quality, 24-bit renditions.
Some anticipated questions and their answers:
1. Where can I download it?
From my page:
http://birgerjarl.languish.org/GUFSM/GUFSM_1.2.rar (Complete version) ~12 mb
http://birgerjarl.languish.org/GUFSM/GUFSM_1.2_Flags(24bit).rar (Only the flags incl palette for 24 bit flags) ~6 mb
http://birgerjarl.languish.org/GUFSM/GUFSM_1.2_Shields.rar (Only the shields) ~6 mb
Decompress directly into your Europa Universalis II directory. You may wish to make backups of the original graphics first.
2. How complete is it?
The graphics for all the countries that appear in the standard game and as well the new tags in the 1.08 patch. Shields for Armenia Minor, the Hanseatic League, Perm, Salzburg and the Holy Roman Empire are in the download.
Additionally, all the graphic bugs in the 1.08 patch have been fixed.
3. The flags look too bright when covered by the fog of war!
24-bit flags, unfortunately, don't get dimmed out like 8-bit flags do. There's nothing we can do other than to use 8-bit flags. This is nonpreferable, since only whites, greys, blacks, reds, and dark blues are well-represented in the flag palette. All others either can't be used at all (for example, the light blue bottom stripe of Luxembourg) or are subject to ugly dithering (for example, the green Eire flag). The good news is that the flags will at least consistently not be dimmed out.
4. This flag or shield is incorrect.
If you have a better source than the ones we've found, please let us know. Almost all of our research is web-based; we're always happy to receive more accurate information. Furthermore, we were unable to find any information at all about the heraldry or vexillology of some of these countries -- or in fact discovered that they had none -- and instead based our images on some of their more important symbols, or as a last resort, used the same graphic designs as Paradox.
5. This flag or shield looks horrible!
I hope you'll phrase it less bluntly
, but we are certainly open to criticism, especially when you think our graphic looks worse than the Paradox one. When you've been working on the same tricky flag or shield for a half hour or more, you're inclined to say, "Good enough" and stop; it's difficult to tell whether the remaining flaws are flaws in fact, or are only visible to the author's eye.6. The Burgundy and Spain/Moscow and Lithuania flags look too much alike.
We're aware of these two problems in particular (Burgundy and Spain are in fact identical, not just similar), and welcome suggestions on how to resolve them. We'd also welcome identification of any other conflicting flags.
You can get some alternative flags here: http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?t=133386
7. I only have zip installed. Why do you use rar?
Because the mod is really, really big -- thirty-three megabytes uncompressed -- and rar compresses better. Download winrar from at http://www.rarlab.com/ -- it's completely free for the first forty days, and still useable (though nagware) afterwards.
8. Can I help?
Please! We can use aid in research, mirrors (as mentioned above), and the actual graphics. You can find links to and instructions for Mad King James' shield and flag templates in the stickied threads in the Graphics Forum
