"Crazy Drake" is a nice platform with some curious problems. The game seems born into Russia and it is available in its native language in o--.g---.ru as a compact and fully working RIP that can work in fullscreen mode with no need for DxWnd and also windowed with DxWnd default configuration, so this game version is not what I want to talk about.
What is interesting is that the very same game was then translated and devastated in a crazy English translation (also available on the same site). This operation brought 2 severe problems:
1) Some splash screen were added, but to slow the transitions these panels were drawn one pixel at a time. This is very inefficient and, with color emulation, become so slow that you can't wait the end of the show. Fortunately DxWnd can fix the problem by skipping some blits with the Timing > Skip flag
2) The end of the splash screens shows an error and doesn't let the game to continue. The error tells "Unable to create Display DC!" but the DxWnd logs don't show a clear error.
The English release is available as a CD .iso image, but the installer didn't work. It is possible to install the game the same by copying the game files from the CD "InstFile" folder. Here in attach my profile to start the game, bypass the first problem and get stopped on the second one.
Maybe this will help a bit. Here is the registry entry.
After installation, the game asks how you want to run the game:
Always in window (DRAKE.EXE -windowed)
Always in fullscreen (DRAKE.EXE -fullscreen)
Remember last view (DRAKE.EXE)
Furthermore, you will learn that you can switch fullscreen/window via F12
Always in window works for me without DxWnd here in Win7.
P.S.
The registry entry seems to say:
"VideoMode"=dword:00000000 = window
"VideoMode"=dword:00000001 = fullscreen
Very good, your profile with the hints you gave me works very well.
The game is peculiar because, in general, games work in DxWnd much better when set in fullscreen mode than in windowed mode. This game is the exception, it doesn't work at all in fullscreen mode and works much better in windowed mode.
The need for a "FPS > Skip" setting fortunately doesn't bring any further glitch as it happens in other games.
The windowed mode starts in a very tiny window, but it can be moved and stretched at will. I noted a small annoyance: when you alter only one size (either the height or the width) the game stretches also the other measure showing clipped images. Fortunately, it seems that there is a very simple trick to fix the problem: once you get the window in the desired size and position, you can stretch the window of a tiny measure grabbing the lower-right corner: this way the game readjusts the rendering to the effective window size.
Finally, the "Force HALFTONE" flag improves the rendering quality.
My current profile in attach, thanks.
What does the No ghosting flag mean, I couldn't find it in the help when I last looked.
It is a very recent addition suggested by crazyc: it tells Windows not to complain if the program doesn't flushes its message queue. In practice, it does the same services as the message pump, but without the risk to lose some precious message. I whish I knew that before ...
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"Crazy Drake" is a nice platform with some curious problems. The game seems born into Russia and it is available in its native language in o--.g---.ru as a compact and fully working RIP that can work in fullscreen mode with no need for DxWnd and also windowed with DxWnd default configuration, so this game version is not what I want to talk about.
What is interesting is that the very same game was then translated and devastated in a crazy English translation (also available on the same site). This operation brought 2 severe problems:
1) Some splash screen were added, but to slow the transitions these panels were drawn one pixel at a time. This is very inefficient and, with color emulation, become so slow that you can't wait the end of the show. Fortunately DxWnd can fix the problem by skipping some blits with the Timing > Skip flag
2) The end of the splash screens shows an error and doesn't let the game to continue. The error tells "Unable to create Display DC!" but the DxWnd logs don't show a clear error.
The English release is available as a CD .iso image, but the installer didn't work. It is possible to install the game the same by copying the game files from the CD "InstFile" folder. Here in attach my profile to start the game, bypass the first problem and get stopped on the second one.
Maybe this will help a bit. Here is the registry entry.
After installation, the game asks how you want to run the game:
Always in window (DRAKE.EXE -windowed)
Always in fullscreen (DRAKE.EXE -fullscreen)
Remember last view (DRAKE.EXE)
Furthermore, you will learn that you can switch fullscreen/window via F12
Always in window works for me without DxWnd here in Win7.
P.S.
The registry entry seems to say:
"VideoMode"=dword:00000000 = window
"VideoMode"=dword:00000001 = fullscreen
Last edit: huh 2026-04-03
Very good, your profile with the hints you gave me works very well.
The game is peculiar because, in general, games work in DxWnd much better when set in fullscreen mode than in windowed mode. This game is the exception, it doesn't work at all in fullscreen mode and works much better in windowed mode.
The need for a "FPS > Skip" setting fortunately doesn't bring any further glitch as it happens in other games.
The windowed mode starts in a very tiny window, but it can be moved and stretched at will. I noted a small annoyance: when you alter only one size (either the height or the width) the game stretches also the other measure showing clipped images. Fortunately, it seems that there is a very simple trick to fix the problem: once you get the window in the desired size and position, you can stretch the window of a tiny measure grabbing the lower-right corner: this way the game readjusts the rendering to the effective window size.
Finally, the "Force HALFTONE" flag improves the rendering quality.
My current profile in attach, thanks.
My profile is a little different, I don't need to resize the window, try this ;-)
P.S.
What does the No ghosting flag mean, I couldn't find it in the help when I last looked.
Last edit: huh 2026-04-03
It is a very recent addition suggested by crazyc: it tells Windows not to complain if the program doesn't flushes its message queue. In practice, it does the same services as the message pump, but without the risk to lose some precious message. I whish I knew that before ...