DX uses a system called the Asset Stack when building assets. It allows you to override game assets with your own custom assets.

What is an asset?

An asset is a file of game data, as opposed to a code file. Examples of assets include textures, models, and audio files.

If you're familiar with LayeredFS from the Nintendo Switch modding scene, the Asset Stack behaves similarly.

How it works

In Visual Studio Code, click on the assets directory in the Explorer. You should see these subdirectories:

assets/dx/ contains assets from DX.
assets/us/ contains assets split from your base ROM (us because the base ROM is the USA version).

When building assets, DX will look in assets/dx/ first. If it doesn't find the asset there, it will look in assets/us/.

For example, when building the asset crash_screen/font.png, DX will look for assets/dx/crash_screen/font.png. If that file does not exist, it will look in assets/us/crash_screen/font.png. If it still doesn't find the file, DX will fail to build.

Adding a new asset directory

To add a new asset directory, create a new directory in assets/ and place your assets there. You should create a new asset directory for your mod. This will prevent conflicts between mods. Never modify anything in assets/dx/ or assets/us/.

For example, to add a new asset directory for your innovative mod "Paper Master: Mario Quest," right-click on the assets directory and select "New Folder". Name the folder master_quest (or whatever you like).

You can now place assets in assets/master_quest/, but DX will not use them. Note: do not use spaces in directory or file names.

To tell DX to prioritise your new asset directory, open the file ver/us/splat.yaml. Find the asset_stack list with Ctrl+F and prepend your new asset directory to the list.

asset_stack:
  - master_quest
  - dx
  - us

Now, when building assets, DX will look in assets/master_quest/ first, then assets/dx/, and finally assets/us/.

Overriding an asset

To override an asset, place a file with the same path in your asset directory as the asset you want to override.

For example, let's override the title screen background image! We can find this at assets/us/mapfs/bg/title_bg.png.

Copy that file. Then, create the directories assets/master_quest/mapfs/bg/ and paste the file there.

Then modify the pasted file in a pixel art editing program such as [Aseprite] (paid) or [LibreSprite] (free).

Finally, run the mod to see your changes.

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