An old timer vs his 64-bit Vista System.

[Stellar_Magic]

Well I've got two things to say. Number 1! I'm back!!!

 

Number 2! I want to play rebellion but I'm having major problems getting it running on my new-ish computer which is running Windows Vista Ultimate 64-bit. I fixed the Direct Draw problem, but now it doesn't detect the CD nor does RebEd detect its installation (I did it manually) I assume this has something to do with the game's registry, but I'm not sure how to fix it.

[Darth_Rob]

Wow...havent seen you around in a looooong time. Welcome back!

 

Unfortunately, I cant help you with your question. I still have my ol' lappy. Im sure someone else who has Vista will come along shortly.

[Ceorl]

Odd, I have Vista but had no problems with Rebellion beyond adding the d3drm.dll file.

 

However, I have the 32bit Vista (or whatever the cheaper version is called) and that may have something to do with it.

[Slocket]

Well I've got two things to say. Number 1! I'm back!!!

 

Number 2! I want to play rebellion but I'm having major problems getting it running on my new-ish computer which is running Windows Vista Ultimate 64-bit. I fixed the Direct Draw problem, but now it doesn't detect the CD nor does RebEd detect its installation (I did it manually) I assume this has something to do with the game's registry, but I'm not sure how to fix it.

 

I can give it a try. I use to play games using a **** to get the game to play without the hassle of the cd in the drive. That is one try. But you must have the registry key installed in order for the game to 'find' itself. That is where the exe will look for it (and to verify you have a cd in the drive for security).

 

If someone can give the .reg file copied from their install, just click on it will add it to you registry, then go in with regedit and change the drive to yours, and you install folder location. And since there is a generated key for security (not much maybe, just points at a certain file on the cd).

[DavidAdas]

Yes, try Slocket's suggestion first.

 

I myself have 64-bit Vista as well and have been trying to get it to work on here (especially because I've been building Rebellion 2 on here). I haven't tried very hard though so if Slocket's suggestion doesn't work, I'll get cracking on it for you

[DarthTex]

Welcome back SM (I've already stated my greetings in another thread )

 

In case you forgot, Budious had a work around posted in another thread. Krytos stated in yet another thread:

Budious' fix - read the entire first post

This should help - you might have to read through the entire thread. But, the fix is in Bud's first post.

I hope this helps you out. I've haven't got this far yet as I just started running XP a couple of months ago I have a hard time keeping up with all of this modern bug-filled OS chaos. I just use the patched and functional OS's that are slowly fading away

[Stellar_Magic]

There I got it working... now to open up RebEd and get it setup the way I want...

[DarthTex]

There I got it working... now to open up RebEd and get it setup the way I want...

If you want to try something different ... more in line with a more accurate SW galaxy, go here and get back to me

[Slocket]

DarthTex, do you have the games orginal co-ordinates for the star map galaxy view? I can not seem to dechipher (takes forever)the relative locations inside sector/system.dat files. Doing by hand is a pain in de arsce.

 

Maybe even for your version of the galaxy, the real on screen coordinates using 0,0, 768, 1024 absolute.

 

The galaxy mapper and tools are ready for release, I just want something for people to look at , like a full galaxy. Then they can play around with it. It can handle that whole map, it would be alot of work to plot in every star!

[DarthTex]

DarthTex, do you have the games orginal co-ordinates for the star map galaxy view? I can not seem to dechipher (takes forever)the relative locations inside sector/system.dat files. Doing by hand is a pain in de arsce.

 

Maybe even for your version of the galaxy, the real on screen coordinates using 0,0, 768, 1024 absolute.

What format type would you like (ASCII comma delimited, Excel spreadsheet, etc)? If I recall correctly the SECTOR.DAT file located the Sector Name (and by default the sector "box" you see in RebEd) on the galaxy background. I do recall a couple of times when I would move the cursor around the galaxy map, the sector name would appear "else where" in the galaxy; this was due to the "systems" not having coordinates that matched up within the sector "box". The SYSTEM.DAT file gave absolute screen coordinates (to get the little (unknown) "plus +" icons and colored (red or green) "dots" on the galaxy map). When you "clicked" on a sector, those systems tagged to be in that sector, AND had coordinates within the sector "box" would appear on the sector screen (the tall rectangular screen). Sometime (because coordinates were "off") I would be missing systems, or only have "partial" systems show up on the sector screen; then I would just have to "tweak" the coordinates abit. The hardest thing to remember was that the sectors are "rectangular" in their coordinates, but when you see them on screen (the sector screen), it is a "tall rectangular" screen. So a system directly across hoziontally from it, maybe the same "travel time" to a system vertically above it, even though it "appears" twice as far away. I beleive this is really because of the screen resolution size they defaulted in using. Hopefully with a better screen resolution you can bypass this optical illusion, maybe even showing more (up to 4?) sector maps on the screen at the same time.

 

Just let me know the format type, otherwise I might just send both (ASCII & Excel)! Send me a PM with your e-mail address

[Slocket]

OK, send me both. I think the reason they are a tall rectangle is because even though on the galaxy view screen a sector is square, but when you click on it to expand the view, the square must become a tall rectangle to fit on half the screen so you can flip from the given system to the target system. Two system maps can/must exist at once on the screen.

 

I had to make the absolute coordinates off the galaxy view star map be the true travel time. The System close up view of the 10 planets is actually distorted, stretched vertically and horizontally to fit inside the one half of the screen. It is that way in the original game. If I made the system view the same in dimensions, it would be difficult to place a close up pick of an item and open a second system map for a target. Unless I made a TAB key to flip the whole view from one to the other...

 

I sent PM. Thanks for help and insight into this negling problem. I think you understand the problem. I'll try to figure out a better way to display the system maps - I hope. Or just leave it as the original game did. Just knwoing the dimensions are stretched and squeezed in the close up sector view. You will see this in teh original game and what I did so far, in the two week behind demo I am trying to finish up over this Thankgiving Holiday weekend.

[Krytos]

SM Wow! Blast from the past! Welcome back mate, long time no read - what's new?

[Slocket]

Sorry if this thread got high jacked. OK with DarthTex help for readable coordinates from systemsd.dat file (it is nice to see it in more readable form to speed things up) I taken the absolute coordinates. Now I am using higher resolution so I am leaving them as absolute, the dev tool I created you can make your own maps any way you want for sectors and planets, for now I set one up for 300 of which only 200 original game planets are going to be used. There is no limit to number of planets. I would say 600 would start to crowd the map.

 

The 768*1024 resolution is higher than the original 480*640. I made a proportion factor /(1.6) to scale. Then if you imagine the small box inside the bigger box, (plus some odd linear translation x,y to make it look pretty centered inside itself). So the original universe is smaller in relative size on screen, you have 60% more real estate to work with. The original game coordinates are used so there is plenty of room. 200 planets is alot of work to translate and place into the game. For the demo GUI toggle the Loyalty random off/on inside the INI file. You can make your own custom maps and / or set loyalty or randomize. I am using these same coordinates to create the position of the system close up sector map pop-up in exact proportion; I hope using this higher resolution (roughly in the original game it was strectched by 25% in the verticle) as mentioned not as noticeable. The planets will arrange themselves automatically inside that sector map. the names will change color and such just like the original game. I take a breather after that run on sentence.

 

It takes alot, alot more work to give this mod ability, but this modablility and ease of use I hope will allow modders to create their dream custom galalxy with the command based dev tool galaxy mapper. Please give some time later to make that tool more user friendly with a nice GUI to place and plot planets easier. A simple Visual Basic application program is not that hard to do for a final release of the dev galaxy maper tool.

 

I swear, this is th hardest most boring tedious part of the project! But worth the work. You can use the primitive tool I created to make the very map, but take some practice with it. Later you can add in more custom planet pics not just limited to what I scabbed from the games resource files. Higher res look nicer, each planet can have its own unique picture since computers today have GIGs of RAM not limited to 32 MEG of the last decade. The graphics I am using are the recycled ones from the game, so just drop replace it inside the resource folder for the new custom pictures, you create or find off the Net.

 

These posts could be moved over to the development thread.