game_text

Code classes:

• CGameText
• CRulePointEntity
• CRuleEntity
• CBaseEntity (all ents)

game_text is a point entity present in all Source games. It displays text on players' screens. Bug: Does not work in .

Flags

• 1: All Players - Makes text show to the whole server, otherwise multiplayer games will only show to the !activator.

Keyvalues

Message Text (message) <string>

Message to display onscreen. Mods doing localization (or single mappers, if possible) should insert a string from a text file in resource/. (E.g. #Valve_Move_Forward, defined in valve_english.txt will produce text saying "Move forward" in whichever language the player is using.)

Tip: Use \n signify a new line of text.

Bug: Hammer will automatically change \ to /. This can be worked around by editing the VMF with a text editor, although it will need to be done after saving.

X (0 - 1.0 = left to right) (-1 centers) (x) <float>

Horizontal position of the text. 0.0 = far left, 1.0 = far right, -1 = perfectly centered.

Y (0 - 1.0 = top to bottom) (-1 centers) (y) <float>

Vertical position of the text. 0.0 = top, 1.0 = bottom, -1 = perfectly centered.

Text Effect (effect) <choices>

How the text appears and disappears.

• 0: Fade In/Out - The whole text fades in and fades out.
• 1: Credits - Identical to Fade In/Out.
• 2: Scan Out - Puts each letter in one by one and gives the letters an alternative color if they were just put in.

Color1 (color) <color255>

The primary color used by all text effects. Note: Bright backgrounds or dark text colors can result in the text being nearly invisible if it's applied additively. Valve sometimes used a fourth number, but it doesn't seem to do anything.

Color2 (color2) <color255>

The color a letter will be when it's first put on the screen when using Scan Out.

Text Channel (channel) <choices>

The game can have up to 6 game_texts active at once, but every text message must use a different channel otherwise the previous message on that channel will be erased. In some games, the text channels have different properties (rendering additively, different sizes, different fonts). If more than 6 channels are used, ones with lower numbers will be written over.

• 0: Channel 0 (Not in FGD)
• 1: Channel 1
• 2: Channel 2
• 3: Channel 3
• 4: Channel 4
• 5: Channel 5 (Not in FGD)

Fade in Time (or character scan time) (fadein) <float>

If Text Effect is Fade In/Out, this is how long the text takes to fade in. If it's Scan Out, this is how long each letter will take to pop in.

Hold Time (holdtime) <float>

Once all the text is fully on-screen, how long to keep it there before fading away.

Fade Out Time (fadeout) <float>

How long it takes for text to fade out after Hold Time is over.

Scan time (scan effect only) (fxtime) <float>

If Text Effect is Scan Out, this is how long it will take a newly-created letter to fade from Color2 to Color1. Note: This fade time is not taken into account by Hold Time. Hold time begins the moment the last letter pops on the screen.

Inputs

Display

Shows the text. In multiplayer games, text will only show to the activator unless All Players is checked.

SetText <string> (available in all games since )

Sets Message Text.

SetPosX <float> (available in all games since )

Sets X.

SetPosY <float> (available in all games since )

Sets X.

SetTextColor <float> (available in all games since )

Sets Color1.

SetTextColor2 <float> (available in all games since )

Sets Color2.

See Also

• env_message
• point_message