Code or content mod template for Visual Studio

This is the template I use for my own projects. I decided to make it into a template after being tired of just copying existing projects and renaming them. And then I decided that it might be useful for someone else, so I published it here.

I consider this template to be more clean and convenient than standard template, but this is subjective. Feel free to suggest features.

Put template .zip file into user\Documents\Visual Studio 2022\Templates\ProjectTemplates and then create new project in Visual Studio using this template (you can search for it by template file name).

You should name your project with desired mod id (only lower case letters are allowed)

You can configure template in:

• Properties/localSettings.props - local settings like path to the game, this file is added to .gitignore so each person using repo with this template will have their own settings
• project file - you can configure auto generated modinfo file here

To package the mod select Release build and build the project. To test mod in the game just run the project.

For content mod set ModType in project file to content and remove source files.

Features:

• supports hot reload
• supports assets reload via in-game commands
• packages mod on building the project in Release build (also packages mod in Debug build with _dev suffix, disabled in localSettings by default)
• for Windows user there is JSON formatter script (disabled in localSettings by default), you can configure what assets are formatted in Formatting JSON files section of the project file
• you can use VINTAGE_STORY environmental variable or set the path to the game in Properties/localSettings.props, path in local settings overrides env. variable
• supports alternative data folder for setups with multiple mods sets
• to add dependency on another mod dll just put it in the external folder
• after game startup, automatically creates world with mod ID as world name and enters it (disabled in localSettings by default)
• generates modinfo file from project parameters
• allows having multiple mods projects in same solution

Another mod template you might want to check out: Vintage Mod Templates