Every type of problem that I have seen is related to graphics, so there's some work to be done. First, the base game is very unstable, so it is recommended that patch v1.01 is installed for this game. After all is done, the game can be run to troubleshoot the problems. The game has HW and SW modes. There are a lot of graphics card selection for HW acceleration. According to my tests, each of them works fine, but I would recommend to start with the 'Generic 3d accelerator' to eliminate many confusions with glitches to the text. The problems are as follows:
Under SW acceleration, the game allows only one type of texture in the game's texture setting - 8-bit paletted textures. The issue is they are unsupported in modern cards and they require implementation in the DirectX library again, DxWnd doesn't have it. As a result, the textures in the SW mode is filled with graphical glitches.
When the game is running in a window, if the window style is not set to default, the game window frame will collapse in any resolution change. I was trying to make the game window resize with resolution change, I forgot what setting I changed in DxWnd but it even collapsed the window frame with 'default' window style.
If the game resolution is less that 640x480 and 'Run in Window' is disabled, the game will be rendered in a corner of the screen, in the monitor native resolution window. If the resolution is 640x480 or higher and 'Run in Window' is disabled, the game will still have a window around it BUT it will obey the GPU's scaling settings (black borders for non-4:3 resolutions or stretching the 640x480 or higher window).
With 'Run in Window' disabled, the window frame will still collapse at any resolution. A big problem here can be taken as follows: Suppose the resolution is at 800x600, you decrease it to 640x480, keep decreasing further and/or else increase it to 800x600 again, the game window will render only part of the screen. That is, more than 1/2 part of the screen gets inaccessible with this technique. With more tries of this resolution change, you may reach to a pinpoint image of the game window!
Under HW acceleration, the 8-bit paletted textures is inaccessible. They will be accessible once you implement it, note that these textures are supported in dgVoodoo2 and it supports this game's HW acceleration, but not SW.
Last edit: BEEN_Nath_58 2021-12-31
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Regarding problem 1 and problem 4, I think the 32 bit texture set for this game will solve the problem.
I tested them as asked. But they didn't solve my issues. In fact the texture color depth was only increased. As far as I know, 8-bit paletted textures put a filter on the default textures to make them look higher quality. This still happens until you edit the game engine, so it doesn't solve number 1.
For number 4, it didn't help either. It only changed my menu text language. This should also be linked to the game engine, and the only good thing is from PCGW's quote:
Engine is open source with a modern multi-platform port available.
But I didn't find it anywhere, and the only thing I got was a community port of this game.
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This game is using some kind of weird techniques. With resolution 640x480 or higher + DDrawCompat, I was able to eliminate the border completely. But even with DDrawCompat with res 640x400 or lower, the game is rendered in a corner of the screen. The strange thing here can be seen in the following screenshot:
As you see, you can't see the game, you only see window. The game is in the left-most corner of the screen, but strangely I can't take a screenshot of it!
The useful thing I can see here is DDrawCompat can hide the window properly, 640x400 or lower takes a completely different route .
Update: I was able to hide the window using NO DWM in any resolution from DxWnd, but there is space on top of my screen in every resolution. The problem is that with DDrawCompat here, I still have a window at resolutions 640x400 or lower and I can't take screenshots, and without DDrawCompat, there is space on top of my screen at any resolution in every resolution.
When the game is running in a window, if the window style is not set to default, the game window frame will collapse in any resolution change. I was trying to make the game window resize with resolution change, I forgot what setting I changed in DxWnd but it even collapsed the window frame with 'default' window style.
Some ideas here, with DDrawCompat this doesn't occur, because there's no window frame. With NO DWM, there is no window but the collapsed window always exists, even if you don't change resolutions. Some ideas from DDrawCompat can be implemented to have uncollapsed window frame.
In the given picture, when the frame used to collapse, the white space remained; With NO DWM this is constant but DDrawCompat fixes it.
A fix to this should also help in Daytona USA as it gets DDERR_SURFACELOST; this was assumed as both games get a right-upper corner mouse-navigable dot area(not visible in screenshot) which when clicked in Daytona USA, crashes with the aforementioned error but not all games have this error. Yet DDrawCompat hides the white areas to fix all issues.
So I tested the game in HW mode with dgVoodoo2 and the broken window frame is non-existent. Also dgVoodoo2 doesn't take the game to the corner of the screen with a lower resolution like 320x200. The issue I have is a GCN1.0 isn't the best player of DX12. Definitely, it should be fixable. I hope you see this for once, I know there are couple others you are working on rn :)
Last edit: BEEN_Nath_58 2022-01-11
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Yes, I'd like to start on this wonderful game, but I need to focus a little, the game in my past attempts proved to be quite tricky. What release are we targeting? (please, provide an abandonware / shareware link if possible). What mode? (I guess, windowed mode, D3D HW accelerated the higher res the best).
I also recall that the saving of the video mode was troublesome, the game has an attitude to start always with the worst possible mode. I patched this behavior by fixing a decent configuration in the static virtual registry keys (I think I recall... not sure), would that be acceptable?
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The game is from here:
http s://archive. org/download/forsaken-pc-redump/FORSAKEN-PC-REDUMP/Forsaken%20%28USA%29.zip
The base game is very unstable, with a lot of exception errors in it. Thus installing patch 1.01 is highly recommended from:
https ://www. patches-scrolls. de/patch/1715/7/
What mode? (I guess, windowed mode, D3D HW accelerated the higher res the best).
On HW, windowed, I had to change the window setting to default from thin frame because otherwise the window frame breaks in a resolution change.
On HW fullscreen, the fulscreen can be achieved by using default in window setting and ticking NO DWM. But the problem in fullscreen is the white patch in the left corner I am getting (see prev. posts)
I also recall that the saving of the video mode was troublesome, the game has an attitude to start always with the worst possible mode.
That happened if I changed some (I don't remember which) DxWnd setting, probably the game resets it's settings on HW feature changes (here, through DxWnd)
I patched this behavior by fixing a decent configuration in the static virtual registry keys (I think I recall... not sure), would that be acceptable?
I didn't find it necessary, I think the patch should fix it, or at least what I described.
Please note that I had to use Inject Suspended Process on FORSAKEN.EXE and not the other two because they would remove the intros. Still the behaviour of my mentioned problems existed even if I set the main executables, or shared hook or external hook or both.
At least for now I will keep the other problems aside, let's have 1 issue at a time.
Last edit: BEEN_Nath_58 2022-01-11
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Ok, loud and clear now.
To start with, I begun killing a problem of mine: after some attempts and DxWnd experiments the game finds a corrupted registry and requires a full reinstall. The thing is quite annoying, if it happens twice a day, so I spent some time to define a valid virtual registry configuration. This will also make sure that every time we start the damn'd game it will always show the same configuration.
Unfortunately, the game is awfully picky about the registry configuration (it doesn't bare any tiny mistake), the DxWnd registry syntax does not help and the font size is small, so it took me some time and effort, but at last here it is.
The attached configuration should start the game with default (minimal) settings (that I will change ASAP) and should work for everybody provided that you first set the correct value of the "IP" key. In effect, I was initially baffled by that key, I thought (quite obviously) to an IP address, while in reality it appears standing for Installation Path ... to be tested with the virtual CD as well.
Tomorrow I will begin with the other problems...
Well another thing to note is you used ForsakenHW.exe. Although Forsaken.exe is the launcher, I think it would be better if you use that. And if you still get corrupted files, try the NO SHIM. Saying as it would configure settings on the go.
NOTE: The resolution changes problem appeared in the version 1.0 where there was a lot of exceptions (iirc) and it disappeared in 1.01 completely. My original post would have about 15 points if I hadn't installed that.
Update: Also how is your registry that long, mine was as short as a worm:
Are we still using the same game, with the update patch installed?
Although Forsaken.exe is the launcher, I think it would be better if you use that.
That's easy: just change the target Path to "Forsaken.exe" and set extended injection + shared hook, both the launcher and whatever son will be launched will inherit the same configuration. Export in attach.
And if you still get corrupted files, try the NO SHIM
That sounds interesting. I thought the cause of the problem was the corrupted registry, but you suggest that the culprit could be some Microsoft SHIM applied without asking (it always happen when the game crashes too often, and Microsoft doesn't know that this could happen because of my "kill" command!). My bad, I could have saved some time. In any case, it's better when you start having control of the things that happen.
Also how is your registry that long, mine was as short as a worm
Surely you captured the registry at the end of the install procedure, while I did that at the end of the first successful run. The game needs few configuration keys to start, but then it completes the configuration with all the missing elements, and I didn't want to miss any (just to be sure).
Are we still using the same game, with the update patch installed?
Quite sure: the US iso from the InternetArchive collection has a very odd and unmistakable format, one .cue file and one separate .bin file for each track, I never saw that in any other game dump and only DaemonTool seems able to handle it. The patch comes from the link you suggested. But I have to tell that my game prejudices come from previous installs that were probably much different.
Surely you captured the registry at the end of the install procedure, while I did that at the end of the first successful run. The game needs few configuration keys to start, but then it completes the configuration with all the missing elements, and I didn't want to miss any (just to be sure).
That is the interesting part. My registry is same since the last December. I just exported it. In fact my changes aren't saved in registry. They are saved, but not there (interesting!)
I never saw that in any other game dump and only DaemonTool seems able to handle it.
Somewhere I read, this is a method where the individual music tracks are separated into .bins
But I have to tell that my game prejudices come from previous installs that were probably much different.
Starting over is the best, in the sense after you uninstall the game, deleting the registry:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\WOW6432Node\Acclaim Entertainment\Forsaken
I generally wouldn't launch game after installing again and would install the patch directly.
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First of all, I tried to dump the registry with better parameters, and guess what? The game doesn't save the values that I selected in the game option panels! I don't know if I made some mistake, but the operation is pretty straight forward, so I can't imagine could have gone wrong. My guess is that the game is simply baffling us, the parameters are used in the current game session and then reset all times.
Fortunately, forcing values in the virtual registry works. I built a "Forsaken (HQ).dxw" export that initializes the video mode at 800x600. Of course, I also tried with 1024x768 that is a supported res, but here an odd thing happened: running the game with initial res 1024x768 leads to a crash, while starting at 800x600 and then selecting 1024x768 works. Of course, this may depend on the system, so maybe it's different in your case.
Then I tried the fake CD. usual procedure: mount the CD image, copy all files in the cd subfolder, set the fake CD arguments (beware! The game is picky and checks for the CD label) - success. I didn't try to delete all but the necessary files, if anyone may want to do it, it will be surely possible.
After that, the CD audio tracks: this gave me the best satisfactions. Though mounting the image with Daemon Tool, I couldn't get any sound from the game or using a CD player. Even Fre:ac or CDRip were unable to extract audio tracks. So I mounted the disk and run the game with DxWnd CD audio mode set to "RIP CD audio". That worked, producing a set of .wav files. Then I switched mode to "Use audio files" and the tracks played fine. Gorgeous! If anyone wants, he may convert the big .wav files in more comfortable .ogg or small .mp3, up to him.
Finally, I merged SW and HW configurations in one single configuration by hooking the launcher and setting the shared injection mode. Here, I must admit, I got some problems because sometimes the game launch may fail, but I still don't know the reasons of that, maybe it has nothing to do with the shared hook, perhaps.
So, here the final export, where you can turn off the features you don't like (fake CD, CD audio emulation, shared hook).
First of all, I tried to dump the registry with better parameters, and guess what? The game doesn't save the values that I selected in the game option panels!
I would like to discover why I don't have the registry options you set in my PC, still it saves the setting. With your registry, more SADLY: "Installation Invalid"
After that, the CD audio tracks: this gave me the best satisfactions. Though mounting the image with Daemon Tool, I couldn't get any sound from the game or using a CD player.
Surely you mounted the .cue? For me I don't even need the DxWnd VCDA. Music works out of the box for me. Until what I tested, using Rip CD Audio, Play from CD gave similar results.
Finally, I merged SW and HW configurations in one single configuration by hooking the launcher and setting the shared injection mode. Here, I must admit, I got some problems because sometimes the game launch may fail
I want to stress here. I had faced similar problems as you (leaving the CD music one) when I was on version 1.0. Are you sure you are on 1.01? See the main menu, it's written in bold in the bottom. Because you are having more complications than I do! I wonder when we'll reach the fullscreen issues. (check attachment)
Even Fre:ac or CDRip were unable to extract audio tracks.
Umm I am not quite sure about that and I have bad feelings before we can move on equally (see attachment)
I would like to discover why I don't have the registry options you set in my PC, still it saves the setting. With your registry, more SADLY: "Installation Invalid"
I can't guess for what crazy motive since we're using the same game release, but would that be possible that the game is using a .ini file instead of the registry? Search for a recent .ini file in the c:\Windows folder ...
The "Installation Invalid" could depend on the wrong path in the "IP" key. Did you change it to the drive letter of the game CD, as I wrote?
Surely you mounted the .cue?
Yes I did. Maybe that depends on the Daemon Tool version (mine is not "Pro"), or I just made some mistake ... it doesn't matter anyway, DxWnd worked.
Are you sure you are on 1.01?
Damn, you were right!! I applied the patch now. There are many differences, including higher resolutions and 32 bit color depth! How could I have missed that? I must be sick ....
I wonder when we'll reach the fullscreen issues.
Ok, let's start it. If I recall correctly, you wanted the game to work also without the "Run in window" flag in "real" fullscreen mode, isn't it?
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This tiny screenshot seems to represent the origin of the problem.
I got it with DxWnd .... turned off.
It seems that when run alone, the game doesn't support a native fullscreen mode. It makes the following "mistakes":
- change screen resolution to the impossible 320x200 screen res
- in ddraw SetCooperativeLevel it does NOT set the flags for fullscreen mode
- it doesn't even turn off the OFFSCREEN window style with no borders and no titlebar
So, this is not a condition where the game was natively fullscreen, you impose window mode and is enough to release some constraints to restore the original behavior.
Here the game wants to run in a titled window, though changing the screen resolution, and you must force some fake-fullscreen mode to get what you have in mind.
But how is that possible? I recall the old Forsaken game, it didn't work like this, or at least I try to remember.
I managed to get rid of the window by setting default window style, no dwm and disabling run in window. My window was in a much higher resolution, I set it in 1280x800 and it has been same since.
The game doesn't have such a window on XP, on changing the resolution the window disappears to create some glitched white area on Win11. I was thinking to say the samw thing about fake fullscreen, because many games will benefit instead of improving this area of DxWnd. The only thing I wonder is if DxWnd can still retain the resolution from game in fake fullscreen instead of the one set in the DxWnd main tab.
This is the old Forsaken game as far I can tell, from file dates.
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An updated export here. Apart from being in fake-fullscreen mode, it has two news:
1) not only the game exe uses the registry but there are a few keys used by the frontend as well. They control the startup mode (QuickStart, ShowSplash - they should correspond to the checkboxes in the frontend panel, and "Renderer", "Device", "Device Number" that probably set the default proposal for these fields) and also the command for netplay, so that could be useful, I don't know. Look at the updated fake registry.
2) With version v1.1 now you can set the registry for 1024x732 32bpp video mode. Quite better than before. I haven't tried higher res yet, I don't know if the game can bare higher values.
About the fake-fullscreen, there should be no problem. Just consider this difference:
a) in 2D ddraw graphic, the higher the resolution, the more CPU power is needed to scale the images from the emulated resolution to the fullscreen mode. This can be very heavy!
b) in 3D d3d graphic, there's no software scaling: the scaling from the backbuffer to the video primary buffer is done by D3D and in HW accelerated mode whenever possible, so game like Forsaken should run as fast in a small window as in a bigger one!
Yes I did. Maybe that depends on the Daemon Tool version (mine is not "Pro"), or I just made some mistake ... it doesn't matter anyway, DxWnd worked.
I am on Lite. It also worked with Alcohol 120% FE
I can't guess for what crazy motive since we're using the same game release, but would that be possible that the game is using a .ini file instead of the registry? Search for a recent .ini file in the c:\Windows folder ...
There is none, unfortunately :(
Last edit: BEEN_Nath_58 2022-01-13
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Neat, the white glitched area is gone. I had to change the setting to hide the taskbar (Desktop work Area). But what DxWnd does (Desktop work Area or Desktop) is it stretches the 4:3 screen to the screen resolution (1920x1080) and the GPU renders the same. The Keep Aspect Ratio did a good job to get 4:3 ratio but how that worked is "4:3 ratio from 1920x1080 + black background (Hide Desktop background)". Thus I need an option so that the resolution is "not scaled" by DxWnd. My monitor cannot scale non 16:9 ratios so it stretches them a little wrongly (some part is outside the screen) so there is difference for me at least.
Also I would get "You need to install DirectX6" if I have the Virtual Registry enabled.
Last edit: BEEN_Nath_58 2022-01-13
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I tested the fullscreen with DDrawCompat and it completely fixed the white glitched part and I got the game to run as I wanted, but then I can't run SW mode. Also dgVoodoo2 works fine but the issue is both have problems on my remote PC (using a 10yr old Radeon).
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Every type of problem that I have seen is related to graphics, so there's some work to be done. First, the base game is very unstable, so it is recommended that patch v1.01 is installed for this game. After all is done, the game can be run to troubleshoot the problems. The game has HW and SW modes. There are a lot of graphics card selection for HW acceleration. According to my tests, each of them works fine, but I would recommend to start with the 'Generic 3d accelerator' to eliminate many confusions with glitches to the text. The problems are as follows:
Last edit: BEEN_Nath_58 2021-12-31
Regarding problem 1 and problem 4, I think the 32 bit texture set for this game will solve the problem. It just so happens that such a set already exists - https://www.old-games.ru/game/download/get.php?fileid=13142&modal=1
I tested them as asked. But they didn't solve my issues. In fact the texture color depth was only increased. As far as I know, 8-bit paletted textures put a filter on the default textures to make them look higher quality. This still happens until you edit the game engine, so it doesn't solve number 1.
For number 4, it didn't help either. It only changed my menu text language. This should also be linked to the game engine, and the only good thing is from PCGW's quote:
But I didn't find it anywhere, and the only thing I got was a community port of this game.
This game is using some kind of weird techniques. With resolution 640x480 or higher + DDrawCompat, I was able to eliminate the border completely. But even with DDrawCompat with res 640x400 or lower, the game is rendered in a corner of the screen. The strange thing here can be seen in the following screenshot:
As you see, you can't see the game, you only see window. The game is in the left-most corner of the screen, but strangely I can't take a screenshot of it!
The useful thing I can see here is DDrawCompat can hide the window properly, 640x400 or lower takes a completely different route .
Last edit: BEEN_Nath_58 2022-01-01
Update: I was able to hide the window using NO DWM in any resolution from DxWnd, but there is space on top of my screen in every resolution. The problem is that with DDrawCompat here, I still have a window at resolutions 640x400 or lower and I can't take screenshots, and without DDrawCompat, there is space on top of my screen at any resolution in every resolution.
Some ideas here, with DDrawCompat this doesn't occur, because there's no window frame. With NO DWM, there is no window but the collapsed window always exists, even if you don't change resolutions. Some ideas from DDrawCompat can be implemented to have uncollapsed window frame.
In the given picture, when the frame used to collapse, the white space remained; With NO DWM this is constant but DDrawCompat fixes it.
A fix to this should also help in Daytona USA as it gets DDERR_SURFACELOST; this was assumed as both games get a right-upper corner mouse-navigable dot area(not visible in screenshot) which when clicked in Daytona USA, crashes with the aforementioned error but not all games have this error. Yet DDrawCompat hides the white areas to fix all issues.
Last edit: BEEN_Nath_58 2022-01-01
@ghotik Can we start now?
I am back
So I tested the game in HW mode with dgVoodoo2 and the broken window frame is non-existent. Also dgVoodoo2 doesn't take the game to the corner of the screen with a lower resolution like 320x200. The issue I have is a GCN1.0 isn't the best player of DX12. Definitely, it should be fixable. I hope you see this for once, I know there are couple others you are working on rn :)
Last edit: BEEN_Nath_58 2022-01-11
Yes, I'd like to start on this wonderful game, but I need to focus a little, the game in my past attempts proved to be quite tricky. What release are we targeting? (please, provide an abandonware / shareware link if possible). What mode? (I guess, windowed mode, D3D HW accelerated the higher res the best).
I also recall that the saving of the video mode was troublesome, the game has an attitude to start always with the worst possible mode. I patched this behavior by fixing a decent configuration in the static virtual registry keys (I think I recall... not sure), would that be acceptable?
Thanks for the reply...
The game is from here:
http s://archive. org/download/forsaken-pc-redump/FORSAKEN-PC-REDUMP/Forsaken%20%28USA%29.zip
The base game is very unstable, with a lot of exception errors in it. Thus installing patch 1.01 is highly recommended from:
https ://www. patches-scrolls. de/patch/1715/7/
On HW, windowed, I had to change the window setting to default from thin frame because otherwise the window frame breaks in a resolution change.
On HW fullscreen, the fulscreen can be achieved by using default in window setting and ticking NO DWM. But the problem in fullscreen is the white patch in the left corner I am getting (see prev. posts)
That happened if I changed some (I don't remember which) DxWnd setting, probably the game resets it's settings on HW feature changes (here, through DxWnd)
I didn't find it necessary, I think the patch should fix it, or at least what I described.
Please note that I had to use Inject Suspended Process on FORSAKEN.EXE and not the other two because they would remove the intros. Still the behaviour of my mentioned problems existed even if I set the main executables, or shared hook or external hook or both.
At least for now I will keep the other problems aside, let's have 1 issue at a time.
Last edit: BEEN_Nath_58 2022-01-11
Ok, loud and clear now.
To start with, I begun killing a problem of mine: after some attempts and DxWnd experiments the game finds a corrupted registry and requires a full reinstall. The thing is quite annoying, if it happens twice a day, so I spent some time to define a valid virtual registry configuration. This will also make sure that every time we start the damn'd game it will always show the same configuration.
Unfortunately, the game is awfully picky about the registry configuration (it doesn't bare any tiny mistake), the DxWnd registry syntax does not help and the font size is small, so it took me some time and effort, but at last here it is.
The attached configuration should start the game with default (minimal) settings (that I will change ASAP) and should work for everybody provided that you first set the correct value of the "IP" key. In effect, I was initially baffled by that key, I thought (quite obviously) to an IP address, while in reality it appears standing for Installation Path ... to be tested with the virtual CD as well.
Tomorrow I will begin with the other problems...
Well the registry did unhelp me :(
Well another thing to note is you used ForsakenHW.exe. Although Forsaken.exe is the launcher, I think it would be better if you use that. And if you still get corrupted files, try the NO SHIM. Saying as it would configure settings on the go.
NOTE: The resolution changes problem appeared in the version 1.0 where there was a lot of exceptions (iirc) and it disappeared in 1.01 completely. My original post would have about 15 points if I hadn't installed that.
Update: Also how is your registry that long, mine was as short as a worm:
Are we still using the same game, with the update patch installed?
Last edit: BEEN_Nath_58 2022-01-11
That's easy: just change the target Path to "Forsaken.exe" and set extended injection + shared hook, both the launcher and whatever son will be launched will inherit the same configuration. Export in attach.
That sounds interesting. I thought the cause of the problem was the corrupted registry, but you suggest that the culprit could be some Microsoft SHIM applied without asking (it always happen when the game crashes too often, and Microsoft doesn't know that this could happen because of my "kill" command!). My bad, I could have saved some time. In any case, it's better when you start having control of the things that happen.
Surely you captured the registry at the end of the install procedure, while I did that at the end of the first successful run. The game needs few configuration keys to start, but then it completes the configuration with all the missing elements, and I didn't want to miss any (just to be sure).
Quite sure: the US iso from the InternetArchive collection has a very odd and unmistakable format, one .cue file and one separate .bin file for each track, I never saw that in any other game dump and only DaemonTool seems able to handle it. The patch comes from the link you suggested. But I have to tell that my game prejudices come from previous installs that were probably much different.
Last edit: gho 2022-01-11
That is the interesting part. My registry is same since the last December. I just exported it. In fact my changes aren't saved in registry. They are saved, but not there (interesting!)
Somewhere I read, this is a method where the individual music tracks are separated into .bins
Starting over is the best, in the sense after you uninstall the game, deleting the registry:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\WOW6432Node\Acclaim Entertainment\Forsaken
I generally wouldn't launch game after installing again and would install the patch directly.
A lot of surprises here.
First of all, I tried to dump the registry with better parameters, and guess what? The game doesn't save the values that I selected in the game option panels! I don't know if I made some mistake, but the operation is pretty straight forward, so I can't imagine could have gone wrong. My guess is that the game is simply baffling us, the parameters are used in the current game session and then reset all times.
Fortunately, forcing values in the virtual registry works. I built a "Forsaken (HQ).dxw" export that initializes the video mode at 800x600. Of course, I also tried with 1024x768 that is a supported res, but here an odd thing happened: running the game with initial res 1024x768 leads to a crash, while starting at 800x600 and then selecting 1024x768 works. Of course, this may depend on the system, so maybe it's different in your case.
Then I tried the fake CD. usual procedure: mount the CD image, copy all files in the cd subfolder, set the fake CD arguments (beware! The game is picky and checks for the CD label) - success. I didn't try to delete all but the necessary files, if anyone may want to do it, it will be surely possible.
After that, the CD audio tracks: this gave me the best satisfactions. Though mounting the image with Daemon Tool, I couldn't get any sound from the game or using a CD player. Even Fre:ac or CDRip were unable to extract audio tracks. So I mounted the disk and run the game with DxWnd CD audio mode set to "RIP CD audio". That worked, producing a set of .wav files. Then I switched mode to "Use audio files" and the tracks played fine. Gorgeous! If anyone wants, he may convert the big .wav files in more comfortable .ogg or small .mp3, up to him.
Finally, I merged SW and HW configurations in one single configuration by hooking the launcher and setting the shared injection mode. Here, I must admit, I got some problems because sometimes the game launch may fail, but I still don't know the reasons of that, maybe it has nothing to do with the shared hook, perhaps.
So, here the final export, where you can turn off the features you don't like (fake CD, CD audio emulation, shared hook).
Last edit: gho 2022-01-12
I would like to discover why I don't have the registry options you set in my PC, still it saves the setting. With your registry, more SADLY: "Installation Invalid"
Surely you mounted the .cue? For me I don't even need the DxWnd VCDA. Music works out of the box for me. Until what I tested, using Rip CD Audio, Play from CD gave similar results.
I want to stress here. I had faced similar problems as you (leaving the CD music one) when I was on version 1.0. Are you sure you are on 1.01? See the main menu, it's written in bold in the bottom. Because you are having more complications than I do! I wonder when we'll reach the fullscreen issues. (check attachment)
Umm I am not quite sure about that and I have bad feelings before we can move on equally (see attachment)
Last edit: gho 2022-01-12
I can't guess for what crazy motive since we're using the same game release, but would that be possible that the game is using a .ini file instead of the registry? Search for a recent .ini file in the c:\Windows folder ...
The "Installation Invalid" could depend on the wrong path in the "IP" key. Did you change it to the drive letter of the game CD, as I wrote?
Yes I did. Maybe that depends on the Daemon Tool version (mine is not "Pro"), or I just made some mistake ... it doesn't matter anyway, DxWnd worked.
Damn, you were right!! I applied the patch now. There are many differences, including higher resolutions and 32 bit color depth! How could I have missed that? I must be sick ....
Ok, let's start it. If I recall correctly, you wanted the game to work also without the "Run in window" flag in "real" fullscreen mode, isn't it?
This tiny screenshot seems to represent the origin of the problem.
I got it with DxWnd .... turned off.
It seems that when run alone, the game doesn't support a native fullscreen mode. It makes the following "mistakes":
- change screen resolution to the impossible 320x200 screen res
- in ddraw SetCooperativeLevel it does NOT set the flags for fullscreen mode
- it doesn't even turn off the OFFSCREEN window style with no borders and no titlebar
So, this is not a condition where the game was natively fullscreen, you impose window mode and is enough to release some constraints to restore the original behavior.
Here the game wants to run in a titled window, though changing the screen resolution, and you must force some fake-fullscreen mode to get what you have in mind.
But how is that possible? I recall the old Forsaken game, it didn't work like this, or at least I try to remember.
Does this sound correct?
I managed to get rid of the window by setting default window style, no dwm and disabling run in window. My window was in a much higher resolution, I set it in 1280x800 and it has been same since.
The game doesn't have such a window on XP, on changing the resolution the window disappears to create some glitched white area on Win11. I was thinking to say the samw thing about fake fullscreen, because many games will benefit instead of improving this area of DxWnd. The only thing I wonder is if DxWnd can still retain the resolution from game in fake fullscreen instead of the one set in the DxWnd main tab.
This is the old Forsaken game as far I can tell, from file dates.
An updated export here. Apart from being in fake-fullscreen mode, it has two news:
1) not only the game exe uses the registry but there are a few keys used by the frontend as well. They control the startup mode (QuickStart, ShowSplash - they should correspond to the checkboxes in the frontend panel, and "Renderer", "Device", "Device Number" that probably set the default proposal for these fields) and also the command for netplay, so that could be useful, I don't know. Look at the updated fake registry.
2) With version v1.1 now you can set the registry for 1024x732 32bpp video mode. Quite better than before. I haven't tried higher res yet, I don't know if the game can bare higher values.
About the fake-fullscreen, there should be no problem. Just consider this difference:
a) in 2D ddraw graphic, the higher the resolution, the more CPU power is needed to scale the images from the emulated resolution to the fullscreen mode. This can be very heavy!
b) in 3D d3d graphic, there's no software scaling: the scaling from the backbuffer to the video primary buffer is done by D3D and in HW accelerated mode whenever possible, so game like Forsaken should run as fast in a small window as in a bigger one!
I am on Lite. It also worked with Alcohol 120% FE
There is none, unfortunately :(
Last edit: BEEN_Nath_58 2022-01-13
Neat, the white glitched area is gone. I had to change the setting to hide the taskbar (Desktop work Area). But what DxWnd does (Desktop work Area or Desktop) is it stretches the 4:3 screen to the screen resolution (1920x1080) and the GPU renders the same. The Keep Aspect Ratio did a good job to get 4:3 ratio but how that worked is "4:3 ratio from 1920x1080 + black background (Hide Desktop background)". Thus I need an option so that the resolution is "not scaled" by DxWnd. My monitor cannot scale non 16:9 ratios so it stretches them a little wrongly (some part is outside the screen) so there is difference for me at least.
Also I would get "You need to install DirectX6" if I have the Virtual Registry enabled.
Last edit: BEEN_Nath_58 2022-01-13
Read this after the above is read:
I tested the fullscreen with DDrawCompat and it completely fixed the white glitched part and I got the game to run as I wanted, but then I can't run SW mode. Also dgVoodoo2 works fine but the issue is both have problems on my remote PC (using a 10yr old Radeon).