Create a dialogue box error message, e.g. "Skin specified in config ('skins\greenglass\') does not exist / could not be found. Check path! - Use default skin? YES / NO, EXIT GAME" for... well, when the path can't be found.

Had this problem yesterday after I renamed the skin dir and forgot about it later, took me a few minutes of head scratching to work out why VO was quietly bombing out upon loading.

Oh, and while you're at it, how about a UI for skin instalation, management and selection at startup time, so users can select skins at startup, drag skin folders onto for installation, autodetection of skins inside standard \skin\ dir etc?

I've been considering writing a Win32 app to do this, but the conversion to Linux / OS X would be somewhere between tricky and impossible (Win32/Delphi -> Linux/Kylix -> Kylix/OS X!?)

Too fancy. If it means more content, I'm willing to sacrifice UI for command-line interface.

I agree, content takes priority. But the great unwashed noob masses probably won't like the cmd line stuff, so it's something to bear in mind if/when the game gains in popularity.

make one yourself?

sure, might be diff to port to other OSes, but it shouldn't be hard to do...

along these lines i think it would be cool if the HUD elements of the skin were seperat from the rest of the skin so that you could set a different HUD skin for each character.

Okay, I'll make one for Windows, and worry about porting (or not) later.

I have the following in mind:

Basic Functionality

Application allows you to choose a skin from an on-screen selection, and then launch VO. Also allows installation of skins, and deletion of skins.

Proposed Features:

Ability to install new skins by dragging skin folder onto program app icon or window, or by using a 'browse for...' feature.

Ability to detect any currently installed skins (providing they are either in a \skins\ folder or in another user-defined location).

Will show a logo/preview pic for each skin, if the skin maker includes one (include logo.jpg, for example).

Will show text description/credits for each skin, if the skin maker includes one (include desc.txt, for example).

Will detect VO path from registry.

Attempt to trap skin-related error conditions from reaching VO before launch so user can recover in GUI (e.g. path not found).

Anyone got any ideas for more features?

Does anyone else like the idea of seperating skins into HUD and Station elements so that the user can mash up the skins via the skin manager? I don't think I'll be able to effectively link skin to character, as the character selection takes place in the VO app, and can't be performed automatically from outside without some sort of nasty sendkeys hack, AFAIK.

yea the sugestion about seperating the HUD and other interface bits was mainly aimed at the devs, as it would require a level of tinkering that isn't allowed under the EULA.

if you want to take the HUD from one skin and use it with the other eleements from another you can just coppy the relevent pics from each into a seperat folder.