[Request for Feedback] - Guide to Developing GTA V Mods with ScriptHookVDotNet and LemonUI - Help Improve My Step-by-Step Guide!

KimonoBoy

Hello everyone,

I'm excited to share my latest project with the GTA V modding community - a comprehensive guide to developing mods using ScriptHookVDotNet and LemonUI. My goal is to provide a clear and detailed guide that will help modders of all levels create their own mods from start to finish.

I've worked hard to create a step-by-step guide that covers everything from setting up your development environment to creating a complete mod. You can find the guide on my GitHub repository, along with the associated Wiki that provides a step-by-step development guide + additional information and resources.

Nuclei
Wiki

Now, I need your help to make this guide even better! I'm looking for feedback on the following areas:

Clarity: Is the guide easy to follow and understand?

Organization: Is the information presented in a logical and accessible way?

Comprehensiveness: Does the guide cover everything you need to know to develop a complete mod menu?

I welcome all feedback, positive or negative, and would be grateful for any suggestions you have on how I can improve this guide. Your input will help me make this guide the best it can be for the GTA V modding community.

Thank you for your time and support!

Best regards,
KimonoBoy

Note

Please note that no section in the Wiki is in a finite state. Everything will be revisited and properly documented.

JohnFromGWN

@KimonoBoy This is by far the best documentation for LemonUI available and I would also say the most organized documentation for GTA 5 scripting I've personally seen. Highly recommended.

I haven't had time to go through the wiki, but 2 things came to mind that could challenge a beginner:

In some sections, the comment lines drown out the actual lines of code. This makes the code look much more daunting than it is although I fully understand the rationale. Not sure how you can or if you can address this. Hyperlinking would be an unpractical option. Hovering, although I doubt Github supports it, would be ideal.
Visual Studio, for non-programmers, can be overwhelming. Particularly for those who have trouble installing ScripthookV, let alone a full IDE. While it definitely is the route to follow, absolute beginners might be encouraged to start - and to continue their journey - by creating uncompiled scripts - perhaps using vcode as an editor to help with the syntax. For example, having rainbow braces.

Again I fully acknowledge that scripting in a text editor environment is definitely not ideal, it might be a way to get novices hooked. The second step would then be upgrading to VS. Personally I started with notepad, next notepad++, and very shortly aftewards VS and vcode both.

Your step by step instructions on VIsual Studio are excellent, but I fear they will dissuade beginners.

Would be much more interesting for someone new to scripting GTA5 to comment because I'm not the target person for the setup part.

KimonoBoy

@JohnFromGWN said in [Request for Feedback] - Guide to Developing GTA V Mods with ScriptHookVDotNet and LemonUI - Help Improve My Step-by-Step Guide!:

@KimonoBoy This is by far the best documentation for LemonUI available and I would also say the most organized documentation for GTA 5 scripting I've personally seen. Highly recommended.

I haven't had time to go through the wiki, but 2 things came to mind that could challenge a beginner:

In some sections, the comment lines drown out the actual lines of code. This makes the code look much more daunting than it is although I fully understand the rationale. Not sure how you can or if you can address this. Hyperlinking would be an unpractical option. Hovering, although I doubt Github supports it, would be ideal.

The comment lines you are referring to are documentation - this is used to display information to the IDE when calling the method. It's intentional - but maybe you are right, maybe it should just be in the source code and not part of the guide.

Visual Studio, for non-programmers, can be overwhelming. Particularly for those who have trouble installing ScripthookV, let alone a full IDE. While it definitely is the route to follow, absolute beginners might be encouraged to start - and to continue their journey - by creating uncompiled scripts - perhaps using vcode as an editor to help with the syntax. For example, having rainbow braces.

Thinking of something like a simple script with e.g. 5 features? Some keybinding and ticks to do a few different things? I didn't experience the IDE issues you're referring to when I learned software development, but I guess some people might - I can add this as it's own section in the wiki og maybe create a new repository with a mod and a small wiki? What do you suggest?

Edit: I sounded kind of condescending - was not my intention!

JohnFromGWN

@KimonoBoy said in [Request for Feedback] - Guide to Developing GTA V Mods with ScriptHookVDotNet and LemonUI - Help Improve My Step-by-Step Guide!:

I didn't experience the IDE issues you're referring to when I learned software development,

I'm not talking for myself. When I started with a text editor it was actually because I thought it would be more boss. However without any documentation I was forced to use VS for the intellisense function. Software doesn't intimidate me, nor hardware.

Your documentation currently will enable those who are curious to take the plunge. My comments about difficulty, and this will definitely sound condescending, is from my experience on these forums and others regarding the computer skills level of the average gamer.

When people install hyperlinks to SH5 instead of the dll, or try to post images on the forum by linking to images on their local drives, you realize that you either dumb it down or cater it to solely to programmers in need of documentation.

With respect to simple uncompiled scripts with keypress as a trigger, that might whet their appetite.

I don't know, just throwing ideas off the top of my tired head.

Just to conclude, your wiki is definitely filling a huge gap. As I wrote before, Lemon is updating his wiki and hopefully it is significantly more robust than in its initial state. I think his wiki will supplement yours, not conflict with it.

KimonoBoy

@JohnFromGWN
I'm thinking to split the wiki into two sections - a "Getting Started" section where we cover the basics of writing scripts to .cs files and use e.g. VS Code or notepad++ to write 10 different features and then an Advanced Section to make the complete mod of Nuclei with VSStudio and compiled scripts (.dll).

JohnFromGWN

@KimonoBoy perfect. I wrote the most useful one line script if you want it.

KimonoBoy

@JohnFromGWN said in [Request for Feedback] - Guide to Developing GTA V Mods with ScriptHookVDotNet and LemonUI - Help Improve My Step-by-Step Guide!:

@KimonoBoy perfect. I wrote the most useful one line script if you want it.

Sure! Everything is welcome. I actually think I'll divide it into two different mods and Wiki:

Nuclei-Lite - Beginners Guide to writing .NET scripts for GTA V. I'm thinking of the following:

Installation Process
Quick introduction to Core Concepts of C# using the GTA V as the "environment" rather than a Console.

Data Types
Variables
Comments
Fields and Properties
Methods
Classes
if/else
for, foreach and while
Arrays/Collections
Events
Others?

A mod menu using LemonUI with 3 submenus that covers all the topics above.

Player
- Fix Player
- Invincible
- Wanted Level
- Super Jump
Vehicle
- Spawn Vehicle
Weapon
- Give All Weapons
And then a teleportscript on key press.

Note: I won't divide the guide into the sections above, i'll write scripts and then cover the subjects as we go and share resources. Maybe we'll create a Notification script first and explain Data Types.

Nuclei - Complete Mod, as of now every section of the current wiki also needs to be more thorough, with detailed explanation and thought process. With this in mind, the beginners guide should be finished first as it's the quickest to complete and the "advanced" full mod will be put on pause for now.

KimonoBoy

The Lite version can be found here

NucleiLite
NucleiLite - Wiki

Off to bed. To be continued.

JohnFromGWN

@KimonoBoy

Here is a very very useful script. It allows you to go through any obstacles or barriers, on foot or in a vehicle.
I use it every time I play, simple key press gets me out of trouble.
Also, in a vehicle this will stop a car instantly.

 if (e.KeyValue == 187) // Teleport Forward on = key, this is also an instant stop in a car!
                {
                if (!Game.Player.Character.IsInVehicle())
                {
                    var myPos = Game.Player.Character.Position + Game.Player.Character.ForwardVector;
                    Vector3 myForward = new Vector3(myPos.X, myPos.Y, myPos.Z - 1f);
                    Game.Player.Character.Position = myForward;
                }
                else
                {
                   Vehicle MyCar = Game.Player.Character.CurrentVehicle;
                    MyCar.Position += MyCar.ForwardVector * 4.5f;
                }

               }

KimonoBoy

Been really busy the last couple of days. Hoping to get some work done this weekend.

KimonoBoy

@JohnFromGWN said in [Request for Feedback] - Guide to Developing GTA V Mods with ScriptHookVDotNet and LemonUI - Help Improve My Step-by-Step Guide!:

@KimonoBoy

Here is a very very useful script. It allows you to go through any obstacles or barriers, on foot or in a vehicle.
I use it every time I play, simple key press gets me out of trouble.
Also, in a vehicle this will stop a car instantly.

 if (e.KeyValue == 187) // Teleport Forward on = key, this is also an instant stop in a car!
                {
                if (!Game.Player.Character.IsInVehicle())
                {
                    var myPos = Game.Player.Character.Position + Game.Player.Character.ForwardVector;
                    Vector3 myForward = new Vector3(myPos.X, myPos.Y, myPos.Z - 1f);
                    Game.Player.Character.Position = myForward;
                }
                else
                {
                   Vehicle MyCar = Game.Player.Character.CurrentVehicle;
                    MyCar.Position += MyCar.ForwardVector * 4.5f;
                }

               }

Thanks! I think we can find a place for this code.

JohnFromGWN

@KimonoBoy

ofc you could add that playerped or pp can sub for Game.Player.Character

KimonoBoy

Would someone mind giving me feedback on the following Wiki

Everything from the beginning of the Table of Content to the Fix Player script section is currently updated.

https://github.com/KimonoBoy/SHVDNTutorial-NucleiLite/wiki

JohnFromGWN

@KimonoBoy

You've done an amazing job and the community at large will benefit, but don't expect much feedback here. This is mostly "SH5 doesn't work".

The good news. The GTA5 community is huge. There are millions of users and quite a few would love to follow your tutorial.

My suggestions:

Post a new thread in the tutorial forum here and link to your wiki. Ask an admin if they can pin it as it definitely deserves it.
Post as well on GTA forums. They have a GTA 5 mods, documentation forum.
Contact Lemon, either on the LemonUI page or on his discord and let him know you've covered both his mod and the basics of C# scripting including VS. His wiki is incomplete and outdated and his migration guide for NativeUI is only suitable for modders from the 1950s who don't need tutorials.

P.S. Don't feel bad if you don't receive much or any feedback. Many posters here are transients, they post once, often don't come back, and very rarely give feedback or even thank someone for help provided.

I guarantee you that as I write, there are quite a few potential scripters out there searching fruitlessly for GTA 5 scripting tutorials. I wish I had had the benefit of your tutorial 2 years ago. Would have saved me hours of wasted/useless searches and trial and error.

Once more great work. You filled a huge gap. And thank you!

KimonoBoy

@JohnFromGWN

Thanks man! I'm "done" with the basic NucleiLite edition sometime tomorrow I think.

Edit: There's a new tomorrow tomorrow. Soo...... yeah.

Edit edit: Sometimes life happens, and yeah...

KimonoBoy

NucleiLite available here: https://forums.gta5-mods.com/topic/41063/tutorial-a-beginner-s-guide-to-gta-v-scripting/8