BFME2 & RotWK Widescreen and Triplehead Mods--Released

Post by **skipclarke** » 02 Aug 2008, 03:57

Sorry to piecemeal this, but can you post a little write-up I can copy as well, or I can create the Wiki page and let you edit it.

Post by **GeneralAdmission** » 02 Aug 2008, 07:06

Looking forward to the video. Hopefully you will let us include it in our collection.

That's my plan. :) I might even send it by your "desk" prior to posting just to get your feedback.

I can work on a write-up while producing the video since they will be most effective presented together. If you set up a Wiki page I'm fine editing it myself.

The Surround version of the mod will be forthcoming, though it will take a bit longer since more tweaks are required.

Mergatroid · Post by **Mergatroid** » 02 Aug 2008, 18:35

Tested one two-player map in both the original and the expansion last night. Worked flawlessly. One caveat, though: The performance hit when building units is exponential the further out you zoom. 10 squads at max zoom (600) had me hovering at around 20fps on an 8800GT. This can't be helped, but I thought I would just mention it.

Thanks for all your hard work, GeneralAdmission.

I think I'm going to go into the game assets and try to find the static images for the hud elements so I can adjust them. They aren't much of a problem on 16:10 or 16:9, but I don't see this as playable on TH2G due to the stretching.

Post by **skipclarke** » 02 Aug 2008, 21:07

Created this Wiki page - http://www.widescreengamingforum.com/wiki/index.php/Battle_For_Middle_Earth_2_Camera_Fix

If we get new HUD elements, I will add them as well.

Mergatroid · Post by **Mergatroid** » 02 Aug 2008, 22:19

Yeah, about that...I realized after about 5 minutes that changing the appearance of the elements wasn't going to be the problem. The real problem is how am I going to reprogram the interface so they work correctly, since everything that is important to gameplay is interactive.

Any suggestions?

Post by **GeneralAdmission** » 03 Aug 2008, 02:33

Thanks for the report, Mergatroid. Glad it's working correctly, and you're welcome. :D

Yes, there is certainly a performance hit--that's one of the things I'll be sure to note when I flesh out the wiki page/readme. Moderate framerate drops in RTS games don't bother me too much. I once played a game of Zero Hour against 7 AI opponents that had my rig chugging along at 5fps at certain points and the game latest 8+ hours! That said, I know it will be an issue for some more than others, so I plan to provide warnings and tips on the wiki.

I've thought about modifying the HUD elements as well. I agree that 16:10 and 16:9 don't warrant a fix because the stretch is not horrible. Triplehead does spit out one fat HUD, though :shock: :lol:. Since most of the Palantir interface would be on the left screen I don't think it's that bad. If you learn the keyboard shortcuts you could probably just turn off the HUD with F9 much of the time--the minimap is actually not as valuable in TH2Go since the modded FOV gives you 5-6 zipcodes onscreen at once! :D

The graphical HUD elements shouldn't be too difficult to change, but as for getting things to match the coded on-screen interactivity, I currently have no idea how that works. I would probably start by doing a number of searches through the ini files for keywords like screen, hud, palantir, menu, etc., to see if the data is even available in the config files. Maybe looking online for a sage engine mod that features a modified HUD could help. If one exists, the changes could be found by digging through their data files. I might look into this more after completing the Triplehead tweaks, but if you want to run with it, I won't stop you. :wink:

Thanks for setting up that wiki page, Ibrin. I hope you don't mind, but I planned on naming the mods "Widescreen Enhanced" and "Triplehead Enhanced", respectively. Simple names that get to the point, while also self-advertising as a 'superior gaming experience' that will hopefully attract more attention than just calling it a fix. :wink: :) What do you think?

Mergatroid · Post by **Mergatroid** » 03 Aug 2008, 04:38

I think I found the files that need to be edited to change the interface. I'll let you know what I come up with on Monday.

Post by **GeneralAdmission** » 03 Aug 2008, 05:02

I think I found the files that need to be edited to change the interface. I'll let you know what I come up with on Monday.

Very cool.

Do you need a sample map with my TH2Go camera tweaks for testing purposes?

FYI-I'm guesstimating 1-2 weeks to complete the map changes, so you don't need to rush your work. I also need to work on the wiki page and demo video, so it may take longer.

Post by **skipclarke** » 03 Aug 2008, 06:01

I have no problems on the names. It's all your work. I think "Enhanced" or "Enhancement" is a great title. I believe you have a Wiki account. Now that the page is up, feel free to edit as you like. We can change the title as well. If possible, let's make the Wiki page 100% to go along with the TripleHead fixes.

Post by **GeneralAdmission** » 03 Aug 2008, 21:00

Made an interesting discovery while modding. The SAGE engine ties the game speed directly to the framerate. The engine caps the framerate at 30fps, which is 'normal' speed. Take a look at what happens with the FPS uncapped:

http://generaladmission.home.comcast.net/files/RotWK_fastFPS.avi (Go, builder, go! :) )

Unfortunately I don't think there is any performance gain to be had by unlocking the framerate. I tested a complex battle scene and found that performance was the same capped or uncapped if the graphics demands forced fps below 30. And at higher FPS the game speed ramps up dramatically and unpredictably:

http://generaladmission.home.comcast.net/files/RotWK_PoorTroll.avi

I am very curious as to why they would tie game speed to the framerate. Surely the game speed could be independent of FPS, and it might yield decent performance gains during moderately complex scenes. Any designers in this forum with insight on this?

Mergatroid · Post by **Mergatroid** » 04 Aug 2008, 05:09

Made an interesting discovery while modding. The SAGE engine ties the game speed directly to the framerate. The engine caps the framerate at 30fps, which is 'normal' speed. Take a look at what happens with the FPS uncapped:

http://generaladmission.home.comcast.net/files/RotWK_fastFPS.avi (Go, builder, go! :) )

Unfortunately I don't think there is any performance gain to be had by unlocking the framerate. I tested a complex battle scene and found that performance was the same capped or uncapped if the graphics demands forced fps below 30. And at higher FPS the game speed ramps up dramatically and unpredictably:

http://generaladmission.home.comcast.net/files/RotWK_PoorTroll.avi

I am very curious as to why they would tie game speed to the framerate. Surely the game speed could be independent of FPS, and it might yield decent performance gains during moderately complex scenes. Any designers in this forum with insight on this?

They probably figured that a drop in framerate meant that there was more on screen, and therefore more for the player to control, so they drop the speed to compensate for the increase in micromanagement.

Also, the settings I found didn't change anything about the interface. I found a forum that is mainly dedicated to C&C games which use the sage engine and posted the question to them in their BFME2 forum. I'm not holding my breath, though. The last post in that subforum before mine was in April.

Post by **scavvenjahh** » 04 Aug 2008, 10:39

I am very curious as to why they would tie game speed to the framerate.

I have absolutely no knowledge in game programming BUT maybe it's to ensure max smoothness of the models' animations during the most epic-scaled battles. Maybe all animations in BFME2 were designed at 30 fps to begin with, and tied to the framerate so that when the game slows down, the game doesn't get choppy and always feels smooth and "cinematic". Unfortunately this also means that anything higher than 30 fps will make it all go "Benny Hill fast"...

I sure didn't remember the framerate was capped, hopefully it won't be too much of an eyesore when scrolling the map left and right at 3840x1024 :?

Post by **GeneralAdmission** » 04 Aug 2008, 23:25

Interesting ideas. You guys are thinking outside my 'box'. I know there must be one or more particular reasons for designing a game this way, but my lack of knowledge re:game design has me in the dark.

I've played Sage engine games since the first CnC: Generals. As best as I can tell, the games only lose FPS when the hardware demands become too great. I wouldn't worry too much about scrolling in TH resolutions, scavvenjahh. Your GTX card should do very well and you should only get slowdowns during major screen activity, or if there are so many units in play that the CPU becomes the bottleneck.

"Benny Hill fast" :lol:. Did you check out my fastFPS clip?

Mergatroid-
Thanks for investigating the HUD issue. If nothing pans out it's not a huge deal. The camera tweaks I've done for surround users actually make the game worth playing, with a fantastic horizontal FOV in particular. Without the tweaks, the game would apply such a cut to the Vert res that it would be like the camera is only 30' above the ground. Which reminds me, I need to get a screenshot of that so I have it for the before/after comparison.

Post by **GeneralAdmission** » 04 Aug 2008, 23:55

Here are the before/after shots for Triplehead resolution.

Regular (obviously unplayable for an RTS)

Modded camera

Better, no?

DaFox · Post by **DaFox** » 05 Aug 2008, 00:14

WAAAAAAAAAAAY worse! The developer did not want it to be like this!

THINK OF THE DEVELOPERS VISION!

:lol:

Post by **GeneralAdmission** » 05 Aug 2008, 00:37

THINK OF THE DEVELOPERS VISION!

Myopia FTW! :lol:

Post by **MobsterOO7** » 05 Aug 2008, 02:03

Everybody knows that the developers vision isn't what the consumer actually wants anyway. They just learn to like what they are given.

Post by **GeneralAdmission** » 05 Aug 2008, 03:15

They just learn to like what they are given.

9 words that could be traced to the root of innumerable social, cultural, economic, political manipulations/atrocities throughout history. Hence, we are called "sheeple".

Well spoken, Mobster.

Post by **GeneralAdmission** » 05 Aug 2008, 20:45

Stumbled upon this accidentally. It looks as if my Triplehead camera tweaks will also work for 16:10 resolutions (and possibly 4:3) and allow play at a camera height of 900.

Check out the view distance!

Look at the mininmap...it shows that you can see nearly half of an 8-player map! The camera is still zoomable down to any level.

I would not consider this optimal for a single-screen setup, but for those of you hankering for a 'skycam' (one of you voted Higher! in the poll), this should float your boat. :wink:

Post by **skipclarke** » 05 Aug 2008, 20:51

BFME2 is natively Vert-. Could this be used to make it Hor+?

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