Thanks for reply! But with such approach I get error on this line:

overlay[i]->bmap = leveldata->filename[i];

bmap is not member of a 'function'.

Probably oerlay[i] is not received as correcot pointer?
I var it as var* overlay[maxoverlays]; at the top.
Should it be something like PANEL* overlay[maxoverlays]? (this one causes engine to crash after very start)