Fly! v1.0 README FILE July, 1999 Installation Should your computer system have difficulty installing from the Installation CD, or stop responding during the installation process, please try the following procedure: Copy the contents of the Fly! Installer CD to a temporary folder on (one of ) your computers harddrive(s). Run the Setup Program from this temporary directory. Follow the Installation instructions detailed in the User Manual. You may delete the temporary folder after installation is complete. Should you still encounter difficulties installing the program, please contact Technical Support. For product technical support, you can first check the official Fly! website at http://www.iflytri.com for the latest updates, hints, tips, and discussion groups. You can also send questions by e-mail to support@godgames.com. If you prefer to speak to someone in person, you can reach our tech support staff at (214) 303-1202. Hours of operation are seven days a week from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Central Time. If you prefer to send U.S. mail correspondence, please mail to: Gathering Of Developers P.O. Box 565032 Dallas, TX 75356 Attn: Technical Support Updating Scenery or Maps after initial Install Any items that are hi-lighted in blue are installed as far as the install program is concerned. Unhi-lighting them and then continuing with the update process, will cause the install program to remove those scenery areas and/or maps from the installed location. If you want to install additional items, it is not necessary to unhi-light them, as the install program will not try to install them if they were already hi-lighted. Keys Option ... Controls ... Airplane Keys ... Mixture Power|Economy, when the Realism Option "Manual Mixture" is unchecked (Auto Mixture), this key toggles between the Maximum Power Mixture and the Least Fuel Used Mixture. The thrust reverser key may not be mapped as a default. It can easily be assigned (to the R key for example) in the Options/Controls menu in the Aircraft section. Consult the User Manual for additional information on how to use the Controls menu. Weather Automatic Overcast Layer When the visibility is very low an overcast cloud layer will be created automatically. Abrupt changes in cloud altitudes Overcast cloud layers that intersect the ground (i.e. cloud layer is lower than highest peak of visible terrain) will be treated as a fog layer over the ground. Because of this, it is possible to set your cloud layer low enough so that when flying from an area of low elevation terrain into an area of higher elevation terrain (high enough to peak above the overcast cloud layer) the layer will immediately change into a fog layer. Because of the nature of broken cloud layers, they cannot (by definition) be treated as fog layers. Therefore, if a broken cloud layer is created at an altitude lower than the highest peak of the visible terrain, the broken layer will not be drawn. As in the case of the abrupt change in overcast layers, it is possible to fly from a low elevation area into a higher elevation area causing the broken layer to simply disappear. Multi-player Issues Host Slow-Downs The multi-player was designed such that no one machine would experience an excessive load (including the host.) However, host slow-downs have been reported (usually only in LAN games.) If you experience slow-downs of this nature, we recommend dedicating a machine as the host. To do this, simply go to the Briefing Room and click the Host Session button. This machine can be used as the host without entering the simulator. Removing Players Due to technical issues, the Remove Player button has been disabled. We hope to enable this button in future releases or updates. Session Player Limitations There is no inherent limitation to the number of players that multi-player will support. We recommend limiting sessions to eight players or less. Keep in mind that as more players are added to the session, the slower the session will run due to higher bandwidth, memory and CPU requirements. Faster machines with higher bandwidth connections will, of course, improve performance. Multiplayer Restrictions The following features are unavailable while participating in multiplayer network games: - Switching vehicles with the 'V' key - Dynamic scenery - Air Traffic Control Question and Answer 1. How do I change the date of a simulation: (ie, Fly out of Chicago in the Winter time, when it is currently Summer). Ans.: You will need to change your System date PRIOR to starting Fly! To do so, right click on the clock on the desktop toolbar and select "Adjust Date/Time", make the date change and select Apply and then OK. Repeat this process for flights on other than the current system date. This is a limitation of Fly! version 1.0. 2. I want to set my aircraft at a specific location. How do I do this? Ans.: Select an airport that is near the location you want to go to. When the Flight Plan is loaded, slew to the desired location and then Save the Scenario. When you want to start at that location again, simply load the saved scenario. 3. I know the airport has runway lights, but I don't see any for that airport in Fly! Ans.: Fly! has the ability for turn on runway lighting using the Comm Radios Microphone. To turn on the lights, simply tune to that airports Tower Frequency and click the microphone (Backspace key on keyboard) 5 times within 3 seconds. The lights will then stay on for 15 minutes. If they turn off, reclick the microphone to turn them back on. 4. My graphics are not displaying properly in a Scenario or Flight. Ans.: Be sure to install the latest drivers for your video cards operating system. These can be downloaded from the Graphics Chip or card manufacturer. It is best to download the latest REFERENCE drivers that are designed for your computers operating system. Consult your graphics card documentation for additional information. A 4 Megabyte Video Card is required to run Fly! in other than software mode. Some graphic cards do not support the latest DirectX drivers. Try selecting the Directx5 compatible graphics selection in the Options/Graphics menu. Check the www.iflytri.com web site for updated files and drivers. Check the Gathering of Developers web site at www.godgames.com for updated troubleshooting information. Upgrade to a newer video card. 5. I do not want the default rivers and roads in the scenery. Ans.: Simply delete, rename, or move the following files from the System directory: For the U.S.A. roads; Roadusa.epd For the U.S.A. rivers; Riverusa.epd For the European roads; Roadeur.epd For the European rivers; Rivereur.epd 6. When trying to run Fly!, I get the following error message: "Mutual exclusion prohibits this". Ans.: This is caused by a conflict between your primary video cards Direct3D driver and that of a secondary Voodoo graphics card. Disable Direct3D support for Glide. (Right click on Windows Desktop, select Properties, Voodoo2, Advanced, Disable Direct 3D support). Some cards may have some different label, such as "Disable ArcadeFX2 Direct3D Support". In either case, Direct3D needs to be disabled in the Voodoo driver. Please consult your operating system/video card documentation for further information on how to modify your Video Card configuration. 7. Fly! doesn't startup. What can I do? Ans.: If you have problems on startup, your file in the system directory called user.rio could be corrupt. Rename it to another name and try again to start Fly!. Your automatically saved data is in this file so you won't be able to use it. 8. While running Fly! in full-screen mode, the system just freezes up and the sound stutters. Ans.: There are two possibilities: First, you may have pressed a key combination that included the ALT key (i.e. "ALT-V".) Windows reserves these key-combinations for menus (in the case of Fly!, ALT-V brings down the 'view' menu.) To fix this, simply press ESC twice. The first ESC hides the view menu, and the second ESC returns focus from the menu bar to Fly!. Note that some video cards will allow the menu to be visible even when using 3D hardware acceleration. Second, you may have discovered a bug in Fly! While we have done everything we can to prevent system crashes at all costs, it is possible that we've missed something. If this is the case, and you'd like to help us fix the problem by notifying us, simply go to the Intro screen in Fly! and click on support. 9. Sometimes after opening and closing a window, or using the full screen menu bar, camera keys (Ctrl+arrows) seem to stop responding. Ans: This was a known bug that is believe to be resolved. If you experience this problem, simply cycle the camera using the camera key ('C'), and control will return to the camera panning keys. If you experience this problem, please notify technical support of your machine configuration and operating system version. General Simulation Performance If performance is slow, try ratcheting down the various Graphics and Sound options (see User Manual, pp. 10-13). In particular, items such as Shadows and Clouds can significantly increase drawing time per frame, and Terrain Visibility can impact the number of textures drawn each frame. Some scenery areas are also more processor intensive than others, particularly those with mountain ranges. Application and saved game load times can be considerably decreased by adding more physical RAM to your machine, particularly machines with 64MB or less installed. If you believe low memory may be affecting your load times, make sure the Texture Cache Size option in the Graphics dialog is set as low as possible to conserve free memory. If you are seeing video "artifacts" or drawing problems, or Fly! fails to detect your video card, make sure you have the latest drivers available from the video card manufacturer. Having the correct drivers installed is absolutely critical to the correct operation and best performance of Fly! Graphics Card/Chipset specific issues: The Diamond Viper 770 video card has a bug in the driver and does not draw the overcast layer properly. Some 3Dfx cards will incur a large frame rate penalty the first time you enter Fly! If you believe your frame rates are much lower than you typically see during flights, press the Escape key (Esc) to return to the Fly! user interface, press the Fly! button in the lower right corner, then press the Resume Flight button. Frame rates will correct if your card has this particular anomoly. Certain cards that use the Velocity 128 Chipset (i.e. STB Velocity 3D) do not render properly in other than DirectX5 Compatible (640x480x16) mode. If your computer has a card with this chipset, and is experiencing graphics problems (especially aircraft rendering) in Fly!, please try selecting the above setting in the Fly! Options/Graphics menu. We have experienced problems when using Diamond Monster 3D drivers (up to version 4.01.10.1600). We found that switching to 3DFX's REFERENCE drivers alleviated these problems. These drivers can be found at HTTP://www.3dfx.com/. For best results, Fly! will attempt to auto-detect and configure your video card. If your video card is properly detected, but you still experience poor performance, try selecting the generic DirectX6 or DirectX5 video card from the video card list.