Widescreen 1920x1080 Sega Rally Championship 2

[emusa]

First of all, thanks for this great website & forum! A lot of old games looks better than ever thanks to the widescreen/FOV fixes :cheers

Secondly, I've looking for a fix for Sega Rally Championship 2. It's an oldie, but a goodie. It looks like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-WMRMWXe1g&feature=related

The max. resolution is 800x600. I would love a bump to 1920x1080 for my HDTV.

Could anyone help me out?

[BooTx]

I'll look into it.

[emusa]

I'll look into it.

Thank you! :)

[BooTx]

I was able to increase the resolution (I've tried 1280x720 and 1440x900) and luckily it doesn't stretch. It is Vert-, but it's not really a huge problem with this game (the car is a little closer to the screen and you see less of the sky) and because of the really low default resolution it looks very much improved.

Unfortunately the HUD is still stuck at 800x600 and I haven't yet figured out how to move it. So it looks kinda stupid, as you can see.

800x600 (4:3)


1440x900 (16:10)


I'm not certain how I'm going to be able to solve that problem. The (800x600) HUD elements (minus the tach) are located in a file called meter02us.txr in the BINDATA directory. The .txr extension appears to be a CorelDRAW format. I don't have that program, so I don't have any way of editing them. Simply deleting the file kept little white boxes on the screen where the elements are supposed to be, though, which leads me to believe that the screen coordinates for the individual elements are possibly located somewhere in the executable itself, but I haven't had any luck finding any of them.

Anywho, the resolution fix itself is quite easy.

You will need a hex editor such as Be.HexEditor. Open your SegaRally2.exe file with it and search for the string 20 03 00 00 c7 05 d0 4d 4d 00 58 02 on line 00020930.



20 03 and 58 02 represent the resolution 800x600. Replace those with the resolution of your choice.

1024x600 - Replace 20 03 with 00 04 and replace 58 02 with 58 02
1280x720 - Replace 20 03 with 00 05 and replace 58 02 with D0 02
1280x800 - Replace 20 03 with 00 05 and replace 58 02 with 20 03
1366x768 - Replace 20 03 with 56 05 and replace 58 02 with 00 03
1440x900 - Replace 20 03 with A0 05 and replace 58 02 with 84 03
1680x1050 - Replace 20 03 with 90 06 and replace 58 02 with 1A 04
1920x1080 - Replace 20 03 with 80 07 and replace 58 02 with 38 04
1920x1200 - Replace 20 03 with 80 07 and replace 58 02 with B0 04

Then simply select 800x600 in the launcher (640x480 actually crashed the game for me; looking online it appears that it's a fairly common issue). The main menu stays in 640x480, but the game itself (along with a couple other screens) will use the higher resolution. Again, I've only tested it with 1280x720 and 1440x900.

I should note that I'm using the demo for this since I do not own the game. Hopefully the full version works just the same.

I'll screw with it more over the next couple days and try to find a fix for the HUD. Let me know if 1920x1080 works for you.

Oh and because of the two camera angles offered I was able to use a memory hacker and make some progress towards isolating the FOV variable, but didn't have much luck getting it to change.

[emusa]

WOW!! Thanks for all your trouble thus far!

What you need to know is that I need to run the game @640x480 resolution - or else it crashes. I use "95/98 compatibility mode" in Vista. When I load the game @640x480 it runs just fine.

I can't find the exact string you mention. The 640x480 equivalent neither, which would be (if I'm not mistaken):

80 02 00 00 c7 05 d0 4d 4d 00 E0 01

Could there be a difference in demo/full version .exe?

Thanks again for you help, I hope we can make this work!

[suiken_2mieu]

please remove your torrent link, we, as a whole, are against piracy. It hurts the industry, and everyone gaming experience. It's there reason DRM is sooooooooo harsh now.

[BooTx]

What you need to know is that I need to run the game @640x480 resolution - or else it crashes. I use "95/98 compatibility mode" in Vista. When I load the game @640x480 it runs just fine.

Haha, oh man that sucks. I can't run the game in 640x480 and you can't run it in 800x600 (I'm using 98 compatibility mode in XP). How weird is that.

So yeah not being able to load the game in 640x480 will make it difficult for me to figure out which string is correct, so uh...try 80 02 00 00 c7 05 c4 56 5a 00 e0 01 and if that doesn't work then try 80 02 00 00 c7 05 30 ed 5a 00 e0 01 (or both at the same time).

Oh and I appreciate the gesture but I don't support piracy either and even if I did I'm in no position to download anything remotely large because of my terrible connection.

[emusa]

*I removed the link*

Yeah I know, it's a real bummer.. Thanks for your help though.

I've tried both strings you adviced, but it doesn't work :( . The game starts, but everything remains 640x480.

Have any other ideas? I could send you the .exe? That ain't piracy 'cause you can't do anything with it..

[BooTx]

I downloaded an unpacked full executable last night and I found the strings for 640x480 (the full version executable actually lets me play in 640x480).

You'll find two instances of e0 01 00 00 68 80 02 00 00 - these control the screen resolution and both need to be changed. And then you'll need to change the first two instances of 80 02 00 00 e0 01 00 00, which control the actual gameplay area dimensions.

Tell me that works...

[emusa]

I downloaded an unpacked full executable last night and I found the strings for 640x480 (the full version executable actually lets me play in 640x480).

You'll find two instances of e0 01 00 00 68 80 02 00 00 - these control the screen resolution and both need to be changed. And then you'll need to change the first two instances of 80 02 00 00 e0 01 00 00, which control the actual gameplay area dimensions.

Tell me that works...

Thanks :) but..
There are no "e0 01 00 00 68 80 02 00 00" strings in my sega rally 2.exe.. how is that possible?

I have changed the first 2 instances of 80 02 00 00 e0 01 00 00.

[BooTx]

Really bizarre.

Well I'm using the no-cd executable from GameCopyWorld (pg-sr2nc.zip), so you could give that a shot.

[emusa]

Really bizarre.

Well I'm using the no-cd executable from GameCopyWorld (pg-sr2nc.zip), so you could give that a shot.

You've got a PM!

[emusa]

I've gotten a lot of great advice from Bootx, but now I've got a question he did not know the answer to:

Is there a way to upscale Sega Rally Championship 2 to 720p or 1080p, without changing the aspect ratio? In other words; I want this game to maintain its 4:3 ratio, while being upscaled to 720p or 1080p.

This would be awesome, because the game looks best in its original ration, but my HDTV doesn't like the 640x480 or 800x600 resolution; it would be much better upscaled to 720p or 1080p.

Does anyone know the answer to this? Thanks :cheers

[suiken_2mieu]

You can do 1080i (1440x1080 @ 30Hz) that's a 4:3 resolution.

[emusa]

You can do 1080i (1440x1080 @ 30Hz) that's a 4:3 resolution.

Great idea :) No idea whether my HDTV supports it or not, but only 1 way to find out.

What do I change the HEX into?

[BooTx]

The HUD would still be messed up because it doesn't scale at all with the resolution, so I don't think that's going to do what you want it to do. What you want to do is have the game rendered at 640x480 but have the video card upscale it to a resolution that your HDTV can handle (with pillar boxing).

It would be 80 02 -> a0 05 and e0 01 -> 38 04 though.

[emusa]

The HUD would still be messed up because it doesn't scale at all with the resolution, so I don't think that's going to do what you want it to do. What you want to do is have the game rendered at 640x480 but have the video card upscale it to a resolution that your HDTV can handle (with pillar boxing).

It would be 80 02 -> a0 05 and e0 01 -> 38 04 though.

You are right.. But there isn't a "force GPU to upscale to 1080p" mode, is there?

[yowie]

To fix resolution issues with the full version of Sega Rally 2:

1. Install both the full version and the demo version to seperate folders.

2. Copy all files except SEGA RALLY2.exe from the full version into the install folder of the demo version.

3. Run LAUNCH.EXE in demo folder and select 800x600 resolution.

4. Edit Sega Rally 2 DEMO.exe with a hex editor as per instructions.

5. Enjoy full game with widescreen and high resolution.

PS: You can delete the original full version and shortcuts if you wish but don't uninstall either program or game won't run.

[emusa]

Thanks for your reply Yowie, but I can't install the demo on windows 7 x64 - it gives an error.

[ste26]

Hi I wander if anyone can help please

I am trying to get the 1920 x 1080 resolution on the full version of Sega Eally 2, i can get it on the demo as instructed, but have followed the instructions for the retail version and am getting black borders on the left and the right of the screen