Will Rock (2003) widescreen and fov fix

[antrad]

Searching for a widescreen / FOV fix for Will Rock (2003) gave me no results. After playing the first 2 levels I got the sniper bow and decided to try my luck with Cheat Engine using the sniper zoom method. First time I tried doing this in a game.

1. There are two FOV values I found, or whatever you would call it, one is vertical and one horizontal. Luckily the vertical value is 59.84044647 which only appears once, so you can find it right in the first search with the following settings:
Value - 59.84044647
Scan type - Exact Value
Value Type - Float
Rounded (default)

2. Double click on it to add it to the bottom list in Cheat Engine (I think it is called table).

3. Also, luckily, the vertical and horizontal values are stored right next to each other, and once you find the address for the vertical, you get the horizontal by just reducing the vertical value address by 4 bytes. Just copy paste the row with you previously found address in the table list, and in the little "paste table entries" window that appears "adjust the address by" -4. The new entry should hold the value 75. Now you just have to change these values by double clicking on them. I change the 75 to 90, for my 16:9 monitor.



Here are comparison photos:
Before -> stretched horizontally

After -> fixed


Unfortunately these values change every time you zoom in/out with the sniper or if a cut-scene plays. Interestingly when you zoom in/out the vertical value increases, like the game wants to go back to its original 4:3(or 5:4, not sure) aspect ratio based on the current horizontal value, while in the cut-scene it just goes back to 75 and 59.840...

4. So, what I did is I made a hotkey(Q) which simply resets both of the values back to my numbers. Just right click on the table entry, click change/set hotkeys and create a new hotkey for both values:



The found addresses change every time you launch the game, so you will have to search for it every time. It's a minor annoyance, but it beats playing in 4:3 or being stretched. Until someone finds a better method, I hope this will help someone.

To spare you the trouble of making hotkeys and stuff, here is the Cheat Engine table file. Now all need you to do is search for 59.84044647, and once you found it just change the two addresses in the bottom table.
http://www.mediafire.com/file/6i0a1nqqvapwjgy/WillRock.CT

[scavvenjahh]

This is brilliant !

Unfortunately I can't get my euro cd game to run in Win7 without the russian exe and it looks gimped: can't select resolutions higher than 1280x1024, can't use Borderless Gaming, get two addresses instead of one for 59.84044647...

What exact region/version of the game are you using ? Any tips to make it work on a modern OS ?
The screenshot at PCGW suggests that at least 1920x1080 is natively supported, are you playing at 720p ?

Sorry to bother you with such basic stuff. I vowed to reinstall this game so many times. I wanna rock !

[antrad]

This is brilliant !

Unfortunately I can't get my euro cd game to run in Win7 without the russian exe and it looks gimped: can't select resolutions higher than 1280x1024, can't use Borderless Gaming, get two addresses instead of one for 59.84044647...

What exact region/version of the game are you using ? Any tips to make it work on a modern OS ?
The screenshot at PCGW suggests that at least 1920x1080 is natively supported, are you playing at 720p ?

Sorry to bother you with such basic stuff. I vowed to reinstall this game so many times. I wanna rock !

US version. I read that many have issues running it on modern systems, but the game just works for me on Win 7 64 bit, and my PC is relatively new with parts from 2013/2014. I didn't have to do anything, 1080p resolution was available to me in the menu. I even have 1440p, but that would give me a gsInitVideo() error on start. The options menu lists all resolutions my GPU supports.

Did you try setting the resolution in the willrock.ini configuration file, it should be in ..Ubi Soft\Saber Interactive\Will Rock\bin :
VIDEO_SizeX=1920
VIDEO_SizeY=1080
VIDEO_FullScr=Yes

It did happen to me once to get two addresses instead of one for 59.84044647, but only once. Just check if the address before it(-4 bytes) contains value 75.

[jackfuste]

This is brilliant !

Unfortunately I can't get my euro cd game to run in Win7 without the russian exe and it looks gimped: can't select resolutions higher than 1280x1024

Compatibility mode "Windows 98 / Windows Me" doesn't allow to enumerate all supported resolution, so remove it.

I even have 1440p, but that would give me a gsInitVideo() error on start. The options menu lists all resolutions my GPU supports.

DirectX 7 API have artificial limitation, resolution can't be higher than 2048 pixels.
To bypass it, copy D3DIM700.DLL from this archive:

D3DIM700.7z

(191.43 KiB) Downloaded 847 times

to the game folder.

[scavvenjahh]

Oooh yeah.



Placing that dll in \bin\ works wonders, thanks.
On my Surround setup I have to stick to windowed mode or the game crashes, whatever the resolution or refresh rate. There are glitchy textures too, but this looks directly related to the res (no glitches at 3072x768). No problem at all on the ultrawide screen, running at native fullscreen 3440x1440.

I still routinely get two sets of adresses to test but the whole process only takes mere seconds. Kudos on a working and very well-presented solution.

[antrad]

Glad to see you got it working. I can also confirm that dll method from jackfuste worked for me too, and now even 1440p works.

How come I haven't seen this method mentioned before ? I saw several threads on the web where people mention this DirectX 7 resolution limit issue, but no one knew about this solution.

[scavvenjahh]

One little thing about the sniper crossbow: by default the scope has a pretty powerful zoom.



However the zoomed view stretches in widescreen, and if you press the hotkey to fix the aspect ratio it also kills the zoom. What you get is just the (still stretched) scope sight sitting over your normal gameplay FOV.



To fix this I set a second hotkey with "zoomed in" values (using T and Y, but it could be Q and D or whatever):

Hotkey T - VFOV 59.84044647 - HFOV 91.31 - fix for normal gameplay (default HFOV 75 for 4:3)
Hotkey Y - VFOV 7.884647369 - HFOV 13.6 - max zoom-in (default HFOV 10.5 for 4:3)

Crude but effective. I'm not sure how we got to magnification x-180 though...

[czarman]

I have found the HEX Code for FOV and Aspect Ratio - the Zoom works also.

Example for 3440 x 1440:

FOV: 00 00 96 42 --> 00 00 F0 42
Aspect Ratio: 00 00 40 3F --> 00 00 D6 3E

Will Rock.JPG (103.06 KiB) Viewed 13823 times

[antrad]

That is great news !

But, how did you do it, how did you know what to look for, what are these values "00 00 96 42" and "00 00 40 3F" ? I want to learn.

[czarman]

Well 00 00 96 42 is 75 the FOV and 00 00 40 3F stands for Aspect Ratio. But not every Game has the same Values. The Aspect is 0.75 but dont ask me why

I use the this Calculator --> https://www.h-schmidt.net/FloatConverter/IEEE754de.html

FOV.JPG (32.87 KiB) Viewed 13781 times

[antrad]

I found that calculator a minute before you posted it.

Unfortunately I have to report there is still a problem. The sniper is now OK with your solution, but after a in-game cutscene finishes the aspect ratio stays, but the FOV changes.

Edit: This is about the czarman's hex edit.

[scavvenjahh]

Then use the other hotkey ? I'm not sure I see the problem. Cutscenes don't break hotkey functionality on my end, the game is fixed in the same way before & after.

[antrad]

Then use the other hotkey ? I'm not sure I see the problem. Cutscenes don't break hotkey functionality on my end, the game is fixed in the same way before & after.

I wasn't replying to you about the hotkeys, I was replying to czarman that his hex edit fix also isn't a permanent solution.

[scavvenjahh]

So sorry ! I missed a few New Posts somehow.

I wonder if looking for a diagonal FOV instead of horz or vert would help with the cutscenes.

[jackfuste]

Unfortunately I have to report there is still a problem. The sniper is now OK with your solution, but after a in-game cutscene finishes the aspect ratio stays, but the FOV changes.

Try this:

WR_ws.7z

(1.18 MiB) Downloaded 629 times

Hor+
Centred HUD
Fixed textures corruption on Nvidia cards

[scavvenjahh]

So purrfect All there is left to do is to find that sniper scope overlay texture and mod it for triplewide...

[czarman]

Nice and to get a higher FOV (75 is too little for my taste) you still can modify 00 00 96 42 in OFFSET 236BD0

[antrad]

I have some great news. Well, it's not about widescreen and FOV, and may be a bit of topic, but I will write it here as a reference.

Like many other games Will Rock renders enemies and other dynamic objects with low detail when they are further away. That worked great 10 years ago on slow PCs and with low resolution monitors you didn't even notice it, but now we don't need this and looking at enemies constantly switching between various models is distracting.

You can turn it off if you go to "game install directory"/bin/willrock.ini and set VIDEO_MaxLod=-10

This way the game will render the highest quality models all the time, making the game look better than ever.



With the high resolution fix, ability to force AA and AF via the GPU, and now this, who needs game remasters

[scavvenjahh]

From 14 years out of the DB to complete revamp in a couple weeks... What a time to be old and alive

I'm impressed by the flexibility of the old Saber 3D engine. If only all LOD issues in current games could be fixed with .ini edits.

That worked great 10 years ago on slow PCs and with low resolution monitors you didn't even notice it,

Really ? I remember loathing it even on my 1024x768 CRT. Using early ZModeler to fix NFS4, trying to enhance the lo-poly "distant" model of a car by copying the hi-poly mesh... Good times.

[antrad]

From 14 years out of the DB to complete revamp in a couple weeks... What a time to be old and alive

I'm impressed by the flexibility of the old Saber 3D engine. If only all LOD issues in current games could be fixed with .ini edits.

That worked great 10 years ago on slow PCs and with low resolution monitors you didn't even notice it,

Really ? I remember loathing it even on my 1024x768 CRT. Using early ZModeler to fix NFS4, trying to enhance the lo-poly "distant" model of a car by copying the hi-poly mesh... Good times.

Haha, when I wrote that I forgot it is already 2017 and 10 years ago it was 2007. I was thinking of the time of 15" 800x600 monitors

Yes, LOD and low draw distance is the "Achilles heel" of games. We have PCs now that can run them in high framerates, we usually have fixes for higher resolutions, we can force anti-aliasing and with 16x anisotropic filtering games look sharp like a razor. But all this makes the LOD switching and low draw distance just more noticeable. And it is such a shame since the high quality models are already there, in the game files, but 80% of the time we have to look at low quality ones until we come very close.