FIGHTER SQUADRON: Screamin' Demons over Europe Release Notes 3/3/99 Table of Contents 1. Installation 1.1. Minimum System Specification 1.2. DirectX 1.2.1. 3Dfx Glide Drivers 1.2.2. Direct3D Hardware Drivers 1.2.3. REFERENCE DRIVERS - FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS 2. Options 2.1. Options for Improving Frame Rates 2.2. New Options 2.3. CD Volume 3. Single-player 3.1. Mission Load Times 4. Multi-player 4.1. Performance 4.2. Aircraft Pause in Flight 4.3. Limit to Number of Players 4.4. Aircraft Sometimes Spawn on Each Other in Multi-player Missions 4.5. Difficulty Joining Multi-Player Games 4.6. International Keyboards 5. Mission Editor 5.1. Multiplayer 5.2. Ribbons 5.3. Mission Naming 5.4. Mission Performance 5.5. Missions left behind after uninstall 5.6. Mission Objectives by Percentage 5.7. Tragerstaffel 6. Customizing the Keyboard, Mouse, and Joystick controls 7. Compatibility 7.1. Video Cards 7.2. Resolutions 8. Known Issues 8.1. General 8.2. Video 8.3. Sound 8.4. Additional Peripherals 8.5. Force Feedback Joysticks ________________________________________________________________________________ 1. Installation 1.1. Minimum System Specification Software: Pentium II 266 with 32 megs of ram 120megs of hard drive space. 280megs with all campaigns cached. Hardware: Pentium 200 with 32 megs of ram with a Glide or D3D based video accelerator card. 280megs with all campaigns cached. 1.2. DirectX Fighter Squadron requires DirectX 6.0 or greater. DirectX 6 is included on the Fighter Squadron CD in the DirectX folder. You are also prompted during installation if you would like to install DirectX 6.0. If you select yes, DX6 will automatically install and update any previous version of DirectX you currently have on your computer. 1.2.1. 3Dfx Glide Drivers Fighter Squadron requires Glide version 2.53 or newer in order to run properly on any 3D card based upon a 3Dfx chipset. If the gamma setting is not properly functioning, try downloading the latest version of glide. You can get this driver at www.3dfx.com 1.2.2. Direct3D Hardware Drivers Fighter Squadron requires DirectX 6.0 or newer and Direct3D drivers which are compatible with DirectX 6.0. You should verify that you're using the most recent drivers for your 3D video card. Older drivers may exhibit problems that vary from no video output, to missing text, or depth-sorting artifacts. Reference drivers for these manufacturers cards may be found at the following addresses: 3Dfx www.3dfx.com NVIDIA www.nvidia.com ATI www.atitech.com Matrox www.matrox.com S3 www.s3.com 1.2.3. REFERENCE DRIVERS - FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS Q: What are "reference" drivers? A: "Reference" drivers are the drivers written by the manufacturer of a video chip. Manufacturers of video cards base their card-specific drivers on these reference drivers. Q: If these new reference drivers are better, why didn’t the manufacturer of my card use them? A: They haven’t had a chance to yet. After these drivers are released, it takes some time for card manufacturers to tweak them so that they get the best possible performance from their cards. These new drivers must then be tested with a wide variety of software to make sure they don’t introduce any problems. Q: If the cards are all based on the same chip, why do card manufacturers write their own drivers? A: While the cards are based on the same chipset (NVIDIA, 3Dfx etc.), each manufacturer does something different with their actual cards, to optimize it for those features they wish to emphasize. They then use the reference drivers as a base and modify them to take full advantage of the specifics of their card. Q: How do I know which drivers I should use, if any? A: Generally, you should only use reference drivers if you are comfortable with the process of installing, uninstalling, and reinstalling drivers and if you have the original drivers provided by your manufacturer with your video card readily available. Q: How do I run Fighter Squadron in software mode instead? A: To determine whether you are running in software mode, start the game, select Options and look at the Renderer option in the upper right corner. If it lists "Software Renderer," you are running in software mode. Q: What if I want to restore my original driver settings? A: While it's not possible to automatically uninstall the reference drivers, there are several ways to return to the original drivers you had before: You can reinstall from the original install disk that came with your board by following the directions that came with it. Your board manufacturer should have the original driver on their website, although we cannot guarantee so. Only your board manufacturer can provide you with specific instructions regarding reinstalling the original drivers. Note: Fighter Squadron requires 100% DirectX 6.0 compatible drivers to work properly. Note: Activision’s Customer service department doesn’t support the use of reference drivers. If you encounter any problems when using reference drivers with Fighter Squadron, you will need to contact your video card manufacturer. This also applies to installation and removal or the driver. 2. Options 2.1 Options for Improving Frame Rates Each of the following options may be disabled to improve the rendering frame rate: Enable Clouds Enable Hit Debris Enable Tracer Smoke Enable Gun Smoke 2.2. New Options "Show Enemy Aircraft on Lap-map" determines whether enemy aircraft will be displayed on the in-cockpit map. Disabling this option makes the missions a bit more difficult and realistic. "Couple Rudder to Aileron Controls" can be enabled if you don't have rudder pedals, or a joystick with yaw capabilities. With this option enabled, the rudder will yaw appropriately when the aircraft is banked/rolled left or right. Note: The "Steer with Rudder" option is irrelevant if "Couple Rudder to Aileron Controls" is enabled. 2.3. CD Volume The CD volume control in Fighter Squadron does not work on All systems. If you are having trouble adjusting the CD volume, Use the Windows volume control applet. In Windows 95, click on the Windows Start button and choose Programs, Accessories, Multimedia, Volume Control. In Windows 98, click on the Windows Start button and choose Programs, Accessories, Entertainment, Volume Control. Use the CD ROM volume slider to adjust the music volume level. 3. Single-player 3.1. Mission Load Times The first time you play a mission in each theater, Fighter Squadron must customize terrain textures for the selected renderer. These customized textures are stored on your hard drive in a texture cache file which can grow to over 250MB as you play missions in each theater. The conversion process can take up to several minutes to complete, depending upon CPU, bus, and hard-drive speeds of your computer. Once the conversion process is complete for a theater, any subsequent missions in that theater will load much faster. 4. Multi-player 4.1. Performance Multiplayer preformance will be highest if there is a game player for each plane in the Squadron List. Any planes not controlled by a player will be flown by the Host computer's AI. Those AI controlled planes will consume system resources and degrade the overall preformance of the Host system. Therefore, the best game play will be achieved if the game's host selects multiplayer missions which only have a single plane for each player. 4.2. Aircraft Pause in Flight The most common cause of this problem is that the system controlling the aircraft is not fast enough to maintain a real-time simulation rate. The quickest solution is to play a Half-time game, however this may limit the enjoyment of those players with fast CPUs. You may also try reducing the rendering resolution and detail settings of the slower machine to improve the frame rate. A less common cause of this problem is dropped or delayed packets, so creating the game for a Slow Connection may provide some benefit. 4.3. Limit to Number of Players Fighter Squadron currently supports up to 8 players in a network game. For added performance, you may want to limit the game to 4 to 6 total players. 4.4. Aircraft Sometimes Spawn on Each Other in Multi-player Missions. A work around is to give the squads different starting directions. The game decides what strip to place a given squad on, according to the initial direction set for that squad. 4.5. Difficulty Joining Multi-player Games If you are experiencing difficulty joining games in multi-player, we recommend that you reboot, create a new pilot, and then join again. 4.6. International Keyboards When chatting in multi-player using an international keyboard, you will notice that keystrokes will result in characters that correspond to the same key on the English keyboard, not your language's keyboard. 5. Mission Editor 5.1. Multiplayer Since Fighter Squadron currently supports up to 8 players in a network game, any missions you create in the mission editor which contain more than 8 players will not be available when you go to select the mission in the network game setup. 5.2. Ribbons The Ribbons field allows you to specify the path & filename of the ribbon bitmap to be awarded for successful completion of the mission. FS Ribbons are stored as 8-bit color, 85x30 pixel .BMPs. Custom ribbons should be stored in the Fighter Squadron\Media\GUI\Art\Scores\Ribbons folder, or any sub-folder therein. We recommend a folder for each country, and sub-folders for each theater. (Example: Germany\Africa\Germany\Dover, etc.) The ribbon path and name should be specified in the Mission Editor relative to the Ribbons folder (Example: Germany\Dover\Ribbon#01.bmp). 5.3. Mission Naming You should change the name of a mission using the Mission Editor. Renaming the file will not change the name that appears in Fighter Squadron. 5.4. Mission Performance Each aircraft or ground unit requires CPU time and resources when the game is running. Game performance will decrease as the number of aircraft and ground units in a mission is increased. Adding too many aircraft or ground units to a mission can make the mission unplayable. 5.5. Missions Left Behind After Uninstall If you create any custom missions with the Mission Editor, they will still be visible in the pull down menu under file. Even after you have uninstalled and reinstalled the game. You will receive an error message saying "file could not be found" if you try to select any one. 5.6. Mission Objectives by Percentage Mission objectives are based on percentages. For example, if your mission objective is to bomb an airfield you will need to destroy more than 50% to complete the mission successfully. 5.7. Tragerstaffel You will be unable to use the German squadron "Tragerstaffel" when creating a custom mission in the mission editor. 6. Customizing the Keyboard, Mouse, and Joystick controls The KEYBOARD.INP file is located in the folder where Fighter Squadron is installed, and it contains the control mappings for Fighter Squadron. You may edit this file with a text editor and customize the keyboard, mouse and joystick controls. Editing instructions are provided at the beginning of KEYBOARD.INP. Note: It is a good idea to make a backup copy of KEYBOARD.INP before making changes, so that it may be restored without reinstalling Fighter Squadron. 7. Compatibility 7.1. Video Cards There are known issues when running the following cards in D3D modes in Fighter Squadron. Diamond Monster Fusion STB Velocity 128 Diamond Monster Fusion is based on the Voodoo Banshee chipset from 3Dfx. You need to select the 3Dfx Glide option from the pull down menu in the options screen. Running this card in D3D mode, with the current manufacturer's drivers, will cause various problems. A work around for this is to download the latest drivers from www.3dfx.com and follow the setup instructions that download with the driver. If you have a STB Velocity 128 you will need to contact www.nvidia.com and download their latest reference driver for this chipset. Follow the instructions provided with the drivers for proper installation and removal. Note: Activision’s Customer service department doesn’t support the use of reference drivers. If you encounter any problems when using reference drivers with Fighter Squadron, you will need to contact your video card manufacturer. This also applies to installation and removal or the driver. 7.2. Resolutions Not all resolutions are supported on all video cards. If you are having trouble running the game in a particular resolution, try using one of the standard supported resolutions: 640x480 or 800x600. 8. Known Issues 8.1. General Ctrl-Esc was mistakenly placed on the keyboard reference card and is not currently a supported key combination in Fighter Squadron. When you hit Ctrl-Esc, you will bring up the start menu of Windows behind the game will lose control of the sim. When typing in your pilot's callsign, do not use any characters other than letters, numbers, or the dash ( - ) character. Any other characters, such as symbols, will likely cause the program to close. The "Calibrate Joystick" button, to which your manual may refer, has been removed from the Fighter Squadron user interface. Please calibrate your joystick in the "Game Controllers" section of the Control Panel in Windows. Fighter Squadron missions take place in a 40 mile square theater. All aircraft are constrained within the theater by strong border winds. As an aircraft reaches the edge of a theater, the headwind will gradually increase in velocity until the aircraft is no longer able to make forward progress across the ground. Windows 98 Disk Cleanup. If you are running low on free disk space on any hard-drive in your system, it is likely the Windows 98 Disk Cleanup utility will be activated when entering a Fighter Squadron mission. This most commonly occurs when drive C: has less than 100MB free space, or the hard-drive where Fighter Squadron is installed is running low on free space. Sometimes when you set an option in the options screen, it doesn't register the changes unless you quit out and restart the game. Fighter Squadron does not support WinNT. Fighter Squadron requires Windows 95 or higher. 8.2. Video When you run fighter squadron using a Voodoo2 based chipset, you will get a black screen if you hit Ctrl-F9 to adjust the gamma from in the sim. Hit Ctrl-F9 again to return to normal. Sometimes the Windows desktop appears between missions. This is normal operation for Fighter Squadron. Fighter Squadron only supports 1024x768 SLI mode in the d3d selection in the options screen. 8.3. Sound Sound effects cutting-out. Fighter Squadron handles a limited number of simultaneous sound effects. Occasionally, this limit may be exceeded during normal game-play, this will cause low priority sounds to be muted while the higher priority sound is played. 8.4. Additional Peripherals On the CD, there are three additional folders. Saitek: This folder contains the configuration file for your PC Dash from Saitek Open Plane: This is it! This is the programmer documentation for Fighter Squadron. This file has all the information necessary for an accomplished programmer to modify any attribute within the game. NOTE: This file is only intended for the use of a programmer to use at there own risk. Activision’s technical support does not offer any assistance, or support for the use of Open Plane. Joystick: This folder contains various joystick configuration files for your flight control system. If you encounter any problems using these files, please contact the manufacturer of your joystick. 8.5. Force Feedback Joysticks CH Force FX. If you are using a Force FX stick to play Fighter Squadron you may lose the throttle commands on the keyboard. A work around for this would be to setup a separate throttle device like the CH Pro Throttle. There is an option in the game to turn off force-feedback. If this option does not completely disable force feedback, please disable it through the Windows Control Panel.