Registered: Dec 2000
Location:
Posts: 12

Well it's that time again. I dusted off my old copy of FreeSpace 1 for some awsome space action.

Unfortunately, this year's round didn't whether the technology changes so well.

Well the game installed fine and it even started great. However, once I got in a mission I was presented with the most painfully low resolution textures I've ever seen. Maybe my eyes have become a bit jaded with the eye candy of current games, but I seem to remeber the game looking a lot better in my old system. In fact, I dug up some old screenshots which do indeed confirm my problem. Anyway, no matter how much I mess with that texture detail slider the textures are still low res; actually, the texture detail slider seems to have no effect at all.

Now, it's not like I didn't expect this, after all I'm playing the game with a video card and a version of DirectX that are 2 generations more advanced than those available when the game was made. Still, the game is one of my favorites and I love to get this to work if I could.

My specs (the ones' that count):

GeForce 1 DDR w/Creative Labs v6.34 drivers (official)
DirectX 8.0

Right now, I'm leaning toward DX8 as the problem, which would stinks because it's a huge pain to get rid of DX8. However, it'd be even worse if it was my vid card: I'd have to dig my old Voodoo 2 out of the closet!

I was hoping you guys have heard of this problem before and know how to fix it. Actually, even if you've just heard of it before, please let me know so I'm not alone in this matter.

Thank you greatly.


PS. I tried the game with and without the 1.06 patch, I have the same problem.



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A word with two consecutive U's is vacuum.

A word with three U's? Well, that would just be unusual.

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Registered: Dec 2000
Location:
Posts: 12

N/M

The astounding gentleman known "IceFire" was so kind as to help me.

A little registry hacking and the problem is all cleared up.


Still, have many others experienced this problem.

From what I gathered it's because the game can not properly detect the memory of my vid card.

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Registered: Aug 2000
Location: Somewhere
Posts: 2894

I'm curious...specifically what did you have to hack in the registry?

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Registered: Oct 2000
Location: Duelist Kingdom
Posts: 774

Did you increase the detail settings in the Options menu?

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Registered: Jul 2000
Location: The Cold Northland!
Posts: 8392

Its not really hacking either

Under a certain directory in the Windows Registry if you add D3dTextureDivider (don't quote that, this is from memory) and you set the value to 1 it will not divide the textures and therefore reduce quality.

In FS1 with D3d the default is a divider of 4. So with a 256x256 pixel texture it displays as 64x64 which is a serious reduction in quality (and size) and thus results in faster performance on older computers.

FS1 came out when D3d was still crappy

FS2's detail slider properly adjusts between divider of 1 and 6 I believe.

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Registered: Dec 2000
Location:
Posts: 12

boct1584:

quote:

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Anyway, no matter how much I mess with that texture detail slider the textures are still low res; actually, the texture detail slider seems to have no effect at all.

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Registered: Dec 2000
Location:
Posts: 12

I'm not a newbie; to this board, yes, but not to FreeSpace or gaming for that matter.

I used to play the game on a 12MB Voodoo 2 (using Glide) which allowed the high detail textures.

However, I chucked my V2 about a year ago since I never used it after getting my GeForce.

It's the first time I've played FreeSpace since then; and the first time I played it in D3D. So I didn't really know that the texture res was so limited in D3D (without the registry tweaks).


[This message has been edited by Stevedrioid (edited 12-16-2000).]

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Registered: Oct 2000
Location: Earth
Posts: 512

You can play the game for 2 years , then come to the game community for the first time. YOU'LL STILL BE A NEWBIE.

Sorry , but its true. A newbie dosen't represent stupdity (ok , sometimes it does) but not in this case. A newbie (in this case) represents someone who is new to the community. There is a big difference between the community and playing alone vs the computer.

heheheh I'm lucky ....

WELCOME TO THE VWBB!!!!

..oh yeah.

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Registered: Nov 2000
Location: Beverly, MA, U.S.A.
Posts: 191

quote:

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Originally posted by Stevedrioid:
Yes, I'm not that stupid.

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Registered: Not Yet
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Posts: N/A

Man, don't ditch the VooDoo2! If you've got a free PCI slot in the computer, keep it in there in case you play any games that run better in Glide. Deus Ex comes to mind, as does almost anything else using the Unreal engine.

Just make sure you select the proper 3D device when you play games.

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"Before Lethal Weapon 2, I NEVER thought there could be a bomb in my toilet. Now I check EVERY TIME.

Mission reviewer for [url="http://freespace.volitionwatch.com"]Freespace Watch[/url]

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Registered: Dec 2000
Location:
Posts: 12

Actually Deus Ex does run better on the GeForce despite the game's D3D problems. Even with the problems the GeForce is still so many times faster than the Voodoo 2 that it plays fine.

I removed the Voodoo 2 because I only have a 250W power supply and I was having some power shortage problems. Even when not in use the card still uses some power. Also, every time I'd do a system format/reinstall I'd have all these IRQ conficts I'd have to clear up first. Removing that Voodoo 2 fixed a lot of problems for me.

Besides, the only thing I would keep it for is old Glide only games and right now I only have one Glide only game that's worth playing: Independance War. However, I have a Glide wrapper that works wonderfully for that game so I have no need for that 3Dfx piece of rubbish, hehe.

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A word with two consecutive U's is vacuum.

A word with three U's? Well, that would just be unusual.

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Registered: Jul 2000
Location: The Cold Northland!
Posts: 8392

3DFX = 0wnz0red

So don't buy 3DFX

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