Descent 3 on newer machines ??

AceCombat · Post by **AceCombat** » Mon Oct 22, 2012 3:34 pm

yup, same result

Krom · Post by **Krom** » Mon Oct 22, 2012 3:49 pm

What monitor do you have and how exactly are you launching D3? (From the main launcher, running main.exe directly, or launched from some other program like vortex?)

Edit: Alright so I decided to test it out and installed D3 on my new machine, ran the launcher, selected opengl, joystick, system speed, network speed, command line: -nointro -framecap 0 -width 1920 -height 1200 -aspect 1.6
Went into the nvidia control panel, forced off vsync, forced 32x CSAA + 8x Transparency AA + 16x AF.

Ran perfectly fine, kicked over to 1920x1200, 200+ FPS average.

AceCombat · Post by **AceCombat** » Mon Oct 22, 2012 5:13 pm

i dont know what it is..............

launched through the D3 launcher... exact same settings as you...except height is 1080. -nointro -framecap 0 -width 1920 -height 1080 -aspect 1.6

ill tinker with my NCP

well now there is something different......................

i get the 1080P logo on my screen, which BTW is a Vizio M420SV LED 42" RAZOR ........................BUT.................................

the playing view is VERY small, corrupted and now LARGE print random textures show around the game view...... let me get my camera out...........

here it is:

: D3 snapshot.JPG (126.09 KiB) Viewed 40517 times

Krom · Post by **Krom** » Mon Oct 22, 2012 8:46 pm

You're using HDMI for that? Does the TV have a DVI or VGA input? If so, try one of them. (I've got a proper DVI-D dual link monitor attached, its about the only difference...) And just for kicks, try 720p...

AceCombat · Post by **AceCombat** » Mon Oct 22, 2012 8:48 pm

yes, straight HDMI from Card to TV

BUBBALOU · Post by **BUBBALOU** » Wed Oct 24, 2012 1:08 pm

MASH THE PLUS "+" BUTTON ON YOUR KEYBOARD!!!

once its fullscreen ... ENJOY!

fliptw · Post by **fliptw** » Wed Oct 24, 2012 2:00 pm

Wait... why are you using an aspect ratio of 1.6 when you are running 1080p?

Krom · Post by **Krom** » Wed Oct 24, 2012 2:07 pm

Yeah, for 1080p you want to use 1.78.

AceCombat · Post by **AceCombat** » Wed Oct 24, 2012 2:33 pm

that did it!! NOW i have everything right!!

now its time for table editing for total dominance!!! MUHAHAHAHAH

BUBBALOU · Post by **BUBBALOU** » Fri Nov 16, 2012 10:01 am

Added for Laptops with Switchable NVIDIA graphics
(Integrated on CPU / Discreet NVIDIA)

Nvidia Control Panel / Manage 3d settings

for Main.exe custom profile that you created - as per previous suggestions in this thread above

option #2 - "Select the preferred graphics processor for this game"

choose - "Use NVIDIA high performance processor"

create another custom profile for Descent3.exe(the launcher program) set same graphic card option (this way it detects the right card every time you mess with custom switches)

Welcome to "NVIDIA Optimus"

-------------------------------------

With edit in AMD options later

Glowhyena · Post by **Glowhyena** » Fri Dec 07, 2012 2:35 pm

Hello, MDs!

I had been playing Descent 3 for a week, I enjoyed that. With 4:3 aspect and vertical black bars that doesn't bother me at all, but the black screen. I figured out how to deal with the black screen. When you go to your desktop by pressing Alt + Tab, and then return to the game back that the game will bring up the black screen. Try pressing TAB key two times to rip of black screen. Make sure the game is not paused. It really works, but the problem will come back. Pressing the key to take it down again.

I hate the main menu and automap that are 640x480.

Hippox79 · Post by **Hippox79** » Mon Jan 07, 2013 2:46 pm

Hey.

Just wanted to let you guys know that if you have issues with setting the video mode with commands like '-width', '-height' by the launcher, well, then just launch the game directly with the '-launched' command, that works.

Example:

''C:\Spil\Descent3\MAIN.EXE -launched -width 1920 -height 1080 -aspect 1.78''

THIS is the only way that I could get widescreen 1920x1080 resolution to work. Running the launcher as admin had no effect.

Also, remember to press '+' in-game, as was suggested as part of the fix.

Thanks guys

Xamindar · Post by **Xamindar** » Sat Jan 10, 2015 1:39 pm

Hey guys! I'm back to try playing some Descent again. I can't even get the installer for Descent 3 to launch under Win 7 64, any ideas?

Krom · Post by **Krom** » Sat Jan 10, 2015 2:44 pm

You can probably get the installer to work by running it as administrator or just throwing it into windows 98 compatibility mode. Otherwise D3 is on Steam now and is only like $10.

Glowhyena · Post by **Glowhyena** » Sat Jan 10, 2015 4:34 pm

Xamindar wrote:Hey guys! I'm back to try playing some Descent again. I can't even get the installer for Descent 3 to launch under Win 7 64, any ideas?

Really? It worked on my Win 7 bit-64. Strange.

Xamindar · Post by **Xamindar** » Mon Jan 12, 2015 4:11 pm

Glowhyena wrote:
Xamindar wrote:Hey guys! I'm back to try playing some Descent again. I can't even get the installer for Descent 3 to launch under Win 7 64, any ideas?
Really? It worked on my Win 7 bit-64. Strange.

Yeah interesting. I tried it on my wife's computer (Same windows version) and it installed just fine.

Xamindar · Post by **Xamindar** » Tue Jan 13, 2015 11:12 pm

Ok I just installed it on my wifes computer and then copied it over to mine. Couple of remaining issues. I installed nglide and am using that as it seems to work and look much better than opengl mode.

1) Movies do not play properly. They are very slow and constantly stall as if I am playing them on an ancient computer. Unwatchable so I have to skip them.
2) I can't seem to get the aspect ratio right when using nglide. I'm on a 1920x1080 screen. Here is my current command line options:

Code: Select all

D:\Games\Descent3\main.exe -launched -nointro -nooutragelogo -playermessages -z32bit -bumped -nomotionblur -framecap 0 -deadzone0 0.0 -deadzone1 0.0 -nocompress -width 1920 -height 1080 -aspect 1.78 -pilot xamindar

3) How do I enable the black pyro? Is there a reg file on the Mercenary cd or somewhere else I can load?

Foil · Post by **Foil** » Wed Jan 14, 2015 11:22 am

The Merc / BP issues are because the registry is missing some entries which are normally placed by the Mercenary installer.

Check out this thread over at PlanetDescent, where TechPro got it figured out.

Krom · Post by **Krom** » Wed Jan 14, 2015 1:01 pm

Yeah, there are some registry keys that have to be present for mercenary to work (but vanilla D3 works fine without them). If you have an actual install from a 64 bit system with mercenary installed on top somewhere else in the house, just export everything major that references "descent" (it shouldn't be that much stuff). Note that it doesn't actually matter where D3 is running from, so if it is installed on C:\games\descent3 on the computer that the registry files came from and you have it on D:\Descent3\ on the new system, the registry files will still work for it on the destination system. What it is looking for to make mercenary work doesn't actually have to point to the right location, it just has to be in the registry even if it is wrong.

pATChes11 · Post by **pATChes11** » Wed Mar 11, 2015 10:48 pm

In case anyone is wondering, here's how you can get 3D positional audio working again: IndirectSound! It's also great for plain ol' 2D audio, because it eliminates the cracks and pops you get while afterburning.

With nGlide, you have to set the Configurator to use the "By desktop" screen resolution setting, then set the aspect ratio at the command line. D3 is hardcoded to only allow 4:3 resolutions in Glide mode, so you should use -width 1600 -height 1200, or maybe something smaller (my monitors are 1920x1200). Attempting to set anything that isn't one of the standard 3dfx 4:3 resolutions is ignored (or maybe it screws stuff up, I don't remember - it's been a while since I got it working). Because of the screen resolution mismatch, many 2D elements will no longer be pixel perfect (most painfully, HUD text), but you get 32 bit rendering

, more and better lighting effects, and a lot less problems in general (no more white box reticle issues as with OpenGL, for example). You could try lowering the screen resolution to get the game to change the fonts to low res, maybe it'll look better (I haven't tried it).

Avder · Post by **Avder** » Wed Aug 26, 2015 3:03 am

pATChes11 wrote:In case anyone is wondering, here's how you can get 3D positional audio working again: IndirectSound! It's also great for plain ol' 2D audio, because it eliminates the cracks and pops you get while afterburning.

With nGlide, you have to set the Configurator to use the "By desktop" screen resolution setting, then set the aspect ratio at the command line. D3 is hardcoded to only allow 4:3 resolutions in Glide mode, so you should use -width 1600 -height 1200, or maybe something smaller (my monitors are 1920x1200). Attempting to set anything that isn't one of the standard 3dfx 4:3 resolutions is ignored (or maybe it screws stuff up, I don't remember - it's been a while since I got it working). Because of the screen resolution mismatch, many 2D elements will no longer be pixel perfect (most painfully, HUD text), but you get 32 bit rendering , more and better lighting effects, and a lot less problems in general (no more white box reticle issues as with OpenGL, for example). You could try lowering the screen resolution to get the game to change the fonts to low res, maybe it'll look better (I haven't tried it).

Ha, and here I was about to ask in this thread if there was a way to make Descent 3's sound not sound like ★■◆●, and here it is. Thank you!

And I'm tinkering with Glide wrappers as well. Annoying that you can only use official hardcoded 4:3 resolutions with them.

Glowhyena · Post by **Glowhyena** » Wed Aug 26, 2015 10:10 am

Avder wrote:And I'm tinkering with Glide wrappers as well. Annoying that you can only use official hardcoded 4:3 resolutions with them.

Yeah, that's why I can play the game in only 4:3 display. It's not bad at all.

It would be really nice if the game had widescreen resolution support.

Foil · Post by **Foil** » Wed Aug 26, 2015 10:20 am

pATChes11 wrote:...here's how you can get 3D positional audio working again: IndirectSound!

Another option:

For 3D positional audio in Descent3, I've used Creative's ALchemy (essentially a DirectSound3D wrapper) for a few years now. Works really well, IMHO.

Avder · Post by **Avder** » Wed Aug 26, 2015 6:15 pm

Dont you have to have a creative card to use that tho?

Foil · Post by **Foil** » Thu Aug 27, 2015 2:14 pm

It theoretically could work with any card supporting OpenAL, but after looking around a bit, it looks like it's desgined for Creative cards only (although there is at least one variant which works with other cards/chipsets).

Avder · Post by **Avder** » Thu Aug 27, 2015 7:03 pm

Glowhyena wrote:
Avder wrote:And I'm tinkering with Glide wrappers as well. Annoying that you can only use official hardcoded 4:3 resolutions with them.
Yeah, that's why I can play the game in only 4:3 display. It's not bad at all.

It would be really nice if the game had widescreen resolution support.

What are all the resolutions Glide supports? Would be nice if I could find one that results in almost no scaling to fit the monitor.

And well, I'm probably going to get a creative card for my next computer, which I plan on building sometime in the next few months, so I'll make use of OpenAL then I suppose.

This IndirectSound works perfectly in D3, no matter what mode I put it in.

Krom · Post by **Krom** » Thu Aug 27, 2015 8:53 pm

I threw a glide wrapper at some really old game I had and I had no issues getting it to spit out 1920x1200 iirc... Although I had to set the desired resolution and stuff in the glide wrapper settings (since the target game didn't officially support anything past 1024x768).

Avder · Post by **Avder** » Fri Aug 28, 2015 10:00 pm

So what kind of visual effects does using glide enable that aren't in opengl?

Spidey · Post by **Spidey** » Thu Sep 03, 2015 7:00 pm

Back in the day when I used Glide, it gave those nice metallic/3d looks to the textures that OpenGl turns into flat pastels.

Also renders lighting and shading much cooler.

But that’s from memory. (been a while)

Avder · Post by **Avder** » Sat Oct 03, 2015 3:51 am

Got some joystick questions.

Is there any way to get D3 to totally eliminate it's annoying software deadzone? I'm using -deadzone0 0.0 and -deadzone1 0.0 but despite that, I still have a 10% deadzone on all axes meaning I have to go above 55% or below 45% on the axis to get movement. Is there any way to get D3 to use the full range, or am I going to have to try to find some way to jury rig around it? I also have a .clt file created with the appropriate joysticks name and a deadzone=0.0 command in it.

Second, how many windows joysticks will D3 see and accept input from?

Krom · Post by **Krom** » Sat Oct 03, 2015 6:45 am

You are probably experiencing a deadzone at the driver level for the controller, because the command line options definitely work in D3 but they only go as low as what you get from the driver itself. Although it is a long shot, check and see if the driver has a raw input mode that bypasses the built in deadzones.

Also, I know D3 supports at least 2 joysticks/gamepads/etc controllers, but I have never tried any more than that.

Avder · Post by **Avder** » Sat Oct 03, 2015 12:36 pm

Krom wrote:You are probably experiencing a deadzone at the driver level for the controller, because the command line options definitely work in D3 but they only go as low as what you get from the driver itself. Although it is a long shot, check and see if the driver has a raw input mode that bypasses the built in deadzones.

Also, I know D3 supports at least 2 joysticks/gamepads/etc controllers, but I have never tried any more than that.

It is absolutely not a driver level issue. The stick in question is a T16000M. I verified that this is a problem by having D3 open in one window and a joystick monitoring utility open on the other so I could see real time axis info. No movement occurs until an axis goes above 55% or below 45%.

So if the command line options work, why are they not working for me?

Krom · Post by **Krom** » Sat Oct 03, 2015 12:59 pm

Could also be directinput getting in the way with its own deadzone, don't know if there is a good method out there for bypassing that one though.

Avder · Post by **Avder** » Sat Oct 03, 2015 1:45 pm

Krom wrote:Could also be directinput getting in the way with its own deadzone, don't know if there is a good method out there for bypassing that one though.

The joystick monitoring thing reads from directinput, so it's not that.

Avder · Post by **Avder** » Sat Oct 03, 2015 3:06 pm

So I tried running Descent 3 as admin. No effect.

I also tried running without the deadzone parameters. Without it the joystick has to cross 62.15% to register movement. So the deadzone command shrinks the deadzone, but it does not eliminate it.

Avder · Post by **Avder** » Sun Oct 04, 2015 12:20 am

Well I managed to use Thrustmaster's TARGET scripting to bypass D3's persistent deadzone such that it's only 2% of the stick instead of 10%. Using CH Products CMS Scripting I was able to bypass the deadzone completely on my pro throttle. The T16000M now jumps to 45% when it reaches 49% and 55% when it reaches 51% on the X Y and twist axes. On the throttle any movement off center gets that axis to skip the 5% in either direction that's dead.

I'd still like to know why D3 doesn't completely zero out the deadzones like it should with the deadzone 0.0 parameters.

Tebo · Post by **Tebo** » Sun Oct 04, 2015 12:33 pm

I have the same issue and thought it was just a bug in D3, but now heard from several people that they don't have the problem, so I'm a bit surprised.
I refrained from bypassing it in multiplayer, because I thought everybody had to deal with it.
The T.16000m with bypassed deadzone feels incredibly smooth, at least in the X and Y axis. IIRC the R-axis on mine had quite a bit of a hardware deadzone until I replaced the poti. Later the mounting in the base of the joystick started to wear out, which introduced a deadzone in the twist axis that I couldn't fix.

Regarding number of joysticks, D3 only recognizes the first two by index. I worked around that by collecting all the inputs on a PPJoy virtual Joystick. Not sure if that exists for Windows 8 and later though and Windows 7 needs to run in test mode to use it.

Spidey · Post by **Spidey** » Sun Oct 04, 2015 12:34 pm

"I'd still like to know why D3 doesn't completely zero out the deadzones like it should with the deadzone 0.0 parameters."

Because it was designed for Windows 95?

Avder · Post by **Avder** » Sun Oct 04, 2015 4:57 pm

Tebo wrote:I have the same issue and thought it was just a bug in D3, but now heard from several people that they don't have the problem, so I'm a bit surprised.
I refrained from bypassing it in multiplayer, because I thought everybody had to deal with it.
The T.16000m with bypassed deadzone feels incredibly smooth, at least in the X and Y axis. IIRC the R-axis on mine had quite a bit of a hardware deadzone until I replaced the poti. Later the mounting in the base of the joystick started to wear out, which introduced a deadzone in the twist axis that I couldn't fix.

Regarding number of joysticks, D3 only recognizes the first two by index. I worked around that by collecting all the inputs on a PPJoy virtual Joystick. Not sure if that exists for Windows 8 and later though and Windows 7 needs to run in test mode to use it.

I had to manually calculate a response curve for use with mine. It's about the same as strength 2 S curve in the GUI.

Here's the script command for it:

Code: Select all

SetCustomCurve(&T16000, JOYX, LIST (0,0, 5,12, 10,19, 15,24, 20,30, 25,34, 30,37, 35,40, 40,42, 45,44, 49,45, 
		50,50, 51,55, 55,56, 60,58, 65,60, 70,63, 75,66, 80,70, 85,76, 90,81, 95,88, 100,100));

I use that on the X, Y and Twist axes.

Avder · Post by **Avder** » Mon Oct 05, 2015 11:46 pm

Anyone have some tips to make D3 stop freezing up so much and needing to be killed in task manager?