Speed Problem in Motobike and chocobo races in FF7 Solved

[Goku7]

I think it only worked for me (at first) because I still had drivers lingering from my old graphics card voodoo 4500 so having them there helped my computer to run it like that but like I said I had to format my harddrive and now it doesn't work if I set the driver to 2 all it does it make it into a window all the graphics are curupted and the fmv clips would not  play so Im soz I put this topic up I shoud have waited untill I formated my pc or did more testing but why it worked before but not now bathals me.

ps thx to Aaron    for that regersty file to open up my clock speed changer in my drivers it has helped wonder's

I highly doubt it could be related to the 3Dfx drivers.

Why?  I have a P4 1.5Ghz, and a Voodoo3 PCI.  Even 3Dfx drivers don't allow the game to throttle its speed, it's still running at like 5000 FPS for the Chocobo Race/Bike Minigame.  Okay, maybe not 5 thousand, but still...you get the idea....

[Anonymous]

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[Rubicant]

I actually tried that around 5 or so months ago with my 3dfx banshee and I got no results when I set paths for where the glide drivers were congregated. It really didn't make anything look good at all. Or fix anything for that matter. But I think it'd be worthwile for others to try it out.

[Contra]

It actually did help, even in direct3d. I got it down to about the normal playing speed of the race. It was a little choppy, but playable... If you're going for high-scores it won't work... but mine was going so fast that my computer couldn't keep up with the game and any time me or the truck collided with anything it crashed. once slowed down, it played fine.

I'll put that debug patch on it and give you the different framerates, if I ever have the time... I'll try to make it.

Ciao.

~Contra, Angel of Mystic Steel~

[Goku7]

Goku7: Do Voodoo 3 drivers still use glide.dll, glide2x.dll and glide3x.dll files, like 1 and 2 used?

First off, you'll have to forgive the fact that right now I'm not at my normal comp, (this one doesn't have a 3Dfx card), so I have to base my answers off my memory of what the file names are.  Once I can get back to my computer, I can double-check the results and give any corrections.

IIRC, glide2x.dll and glide3x.dll are definitely in there, heck, even 3rd party driversets aimed at the Voodoo5 6000 still have those files.

HOWEVER, "modern" (Voodoo3 and later) 3Dfx drivers do NOT use Glide to emulate D3D or OpenGL calls, like what was apparantly done for the V1/V2 OpenGL support.

For example, in the current driver set I'm using (called the "Amigamerlin 2.9"; win9x version of course ), the OpenGL ICD is a file called "3dfxogl.dll"; and from what I can tell, it shouldn't need the assistance of the Glide2x or Glide3x dlls to function; as the file's properties (under the "version tab") give it a description as being the 3Dfx OpenGL ICD, version 1.1.

Other files, like the ones involved with Direct3D, appear to use a  file called 3dfxvs.dll (or some similar name), and then I think there's two other files called "3dfxvs16.dll" and 3dfxvs32.dll", but I have a feeling I've totally misnamed those three files, so I'll have to get back to you on that.  It's largely because their names are so similar to each other, my memory is running their names together or something.

I'm curious of something... Did you notice an empty string value called "DriverPath" while you were messing with the registry?

IIRC, that key was empty on mine as well.

Voodoo is most likely the _only_ card that used these driver .dll-files that could be just copied into the game folder (or system folder), and that makes me think that this 'DriverPath' string value might be there for some kind of proprietary 3dfx support. Whether it's actually working support, or even existing support, I have no idea. (But one of the early demos _supposedly_ had Glide support)

If you mean in a general sense (for all games of that time period), that may be correct when it comes to the V2/Banshee/Rush, etc.  I believe it was part of the whole "3dfx-miniGL" miniport fiasco, in which you needed to dump game-specific 3Dfx dll files into a specificed place in the game's install folder, that the miniport was for, in order to run OpenGL type games, because at the time 3Dfx felt that they didn't need to spend the money on licensing a proper OpenGL ICD for their drivers, and thus used these "mini-GL" drivers to wrap the OpenGL calls to the Glide API.

Would you mind trying the following: fill that string value with a path that points to your glide.dll, wherever that might be and then try different options for driver, like 2 (or even 3 or more, although normally these just turn on software rendering).

I have no idea whether the idea is to just input a path to the directory, like (C:\windows\system\) (or wherever the glide stuff normally lives), or path with filename included, like (C:\windows\system\glide.dll), so try both.

I don't really expect it to work, but who knows, maybe it will produce results of some kind.

Sure, I'll look into it when I get the next chance to use my comp, which should be later today.

[Goku7]

Update!!!

Jari, you ARE right about FF7 having some sort of propriatry support for FF7.  The irony of it, though, is that the answer is actually given in the owner's manual for the PC version.

You know the phrase, "A picture is worth a thousand words"?  The pic on page 7 of the configuration program is what gives it away.

If you notice, on the picture, it shows "3Dfx Interactive DirectX Driver" for the "Display" entry.  During FF7pc's release, the Voodoo2 was still a viable card, and this listing is unique to using that card; because from the V3 onward, it lists "Primary display driver" as the Display entry, which is what ALL video cards, 3dfx and non-3dfx, have for that entry.

Why is the V2 so unique?  Simple, really.  If you'll remember, the Voodoo2 was mainly a DAUGHTERBOARD based design, requiring it to be attached to another, standalone card, usually a 2D-only card.  Because of this, telling FF7 to use "Primary Display Driver" wouldn't be possible (unless the V2 was attached to a card that already had 3D hardware), and you NEEDED the separate entry to get FF7 to use the "secondary" hardware that consisted of the Voodoo2 daughterboard-card thing.

Now, to relate this to the registry entry:

The "Driverpath" key must be the means thru which FF7 targets the Voodoo2 driver, in order to tell windows to switch output from the main 2D card onto the Daughterboard, which then sends its own output thru a passthru cable to where-ever it needs to go (I've never studied in particular the passthru cable aspect of a Voodoo2 set up; so whether it goes simply back to the 2D card it's attached to, or a type of monitor Y-Cable direct connection is pure speculation on my part.)

Now if you would excuse me Dr. Watson, I must be---

*snaps out of Sherlock Holmes routine*

 

Whew!!  That was a lot of writing.  Still, that almost felt like some good old detective work, if I do say so myself.

[Anonymous]

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[Threesixty]

.....

riiggghhttttt

The only thing I remember, is that FF7PC worked with the Voodoo 2 ....but, it didn't use it's Glide mode to do it. It was using Direct3d.

For some reason the porters (programmers) did away with the Glide mode support, that the Demo was using. So, I fail to see any relation, between the key setting you found, and glide mode; with the way your discribing it. The V2 used Direct3d when there was no Glide support automaticly. The game/program didn't have to tell the V2 anything, in order to do this. So, why the Register key?

I think it's just something that they left in there, because it was too much trouble to take it out. It probably activated the Glide Driver, but there were probably too many bugs (clipping, black boxes, or something?) so they disabled it. Probably lack of time and resources. I'm sure they figured, 'Why bother getting this Glide thing to work....the Voodoo can use Direct3D, like everyone else.'

Now weither, the real Glide mode can be turned on? I don't know....I don't have my V2 card anymore, and I would be too lazy to test it if I did. I gave that V2 computer I had, to my parents and have no intention of indian trading it ....LOL  I have no use for a Packard P200mmx PC, anyway.

[Mofokubik]

So it uses direct3d for me even though i have a voodoo3? what a waist. Isnt there a patch that will allow glide or opengl?

Wait, I just thought of something. The FF7XP patch Doesnt use Direct3d because when I use it with FF7 on my Voodoo3 and run in hardware rendering it runs in 32bit color. Voodoo3 cant run direct3d in 32bit, it has to be 16 for direct3d to work.

[Anonymous]

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[Rubicant]

Mofokubik:

Wow, you just figured that direct3d is your only hardware option. Where have you been? Or maybe it wasn't even running in 32bit in the first place.

[Mofokubik]

I guess im running in opengl right now. Because its in 32bit, and d3d on v3 wont go that high. I didnt edit the reg, all I did was patch ff7.


Let me try to be perfectly clear ruby... FF7 _is_ running in 32bit.

[Threesixty]

question:
If a drawing is done with only 16bits of color.....how can anyone see it with 32bits of color? Wouldn't it remain 16bits of color, regardless?

Just because your desktop is "set" at 32bit, it doesn't mean the game is shown at 32bits....especially if it was made with only 16bit....

So if the above is true.....how in the world can you tell, if it's running in 32bit in the first place?

This is just something I was pondering way back when....; when all this, "play FF7 in 32bit mode", came about, a long, whiles back.

[Rubicant]

Did you run the 32bit patch by Ficedula?

[Threesixty]

....I think you know the answer to that  

So I take it, it blended the backgrounds, better or something?

So, did the patch work with the V3? and if so.......how? When Jari just stated it couldn't do 32bits? Something seems amiss here, "if", it worked on the V3.

I don't know if it does or doesn't....I didn't even try it (not that I have a V3, anyway), smoother backgrounds just aren't that important to me. I'm just glad that FF7PC works at all, on my machine.

Maybe, the patch did something else?

[Lord Kane]

question:
If a drawing is done with only 16bits of color.....how can anyone see it with 32bits of color? Wouldn't it remain 16bits of color, regardless?

Gaourod shading looks smoother in 32-bit

Just because your desktop is "set" at 32bit, it doesn't mean the game is shown at 32bits....especially if it was made with only 16bit....

The Voodoo 3 and below DO NOT RUN 32-Bit Full stop, period, end of discussion. They render internaly and 24-bit and dither downto output at 16-bit, IIRC, thus rusulting in the famed high quiality of Voodoos in 16-bit. The first Voodoo chip to do 32-bit was the VSA-100 used in Voodoo 4 and 5's.
If the desktop is in 32-bit, by default OpenGL app will try to render in 32-bit. This is unless the app requests otherwise, or the drivers tell it otherwise. D3D is entirely independant of this feature

So if the above is true.....how in the world can you tell, if it's running in 32bit in the first place?

This is just something I was pondering way back when....; when all this, "play FF7 in 32bit mode", came about, a long, whiles back.

You can tell by the menus. The menus in 16-bit have obvious banding. In 32-bit, this is absent.

[Mofokubik]

question:
If a drawing is done with only 16bits of color.....how can anyone see it with 32bits of color? Wouldn't it remain 16bits of color, regardless?

Just because your desktop is "set" at 32bit, it doesn't mean the game is shown at 32bits....especially if it was made with only 16bit....

So if the above is true.....how in the world can you tell, if it's running in 32bit in the first place?

This is just something I was pondering way back when....; when all this, "play FF7 in 32bit mode", came about, a long, whiles back.

I know its 32bit because the color depth of the menu is 16.7 million colors (32bit), not 65,536 colors(16bit) . There is a huge difference between 16 and 32.

Kane could be right about the 24 bit...all i know is that its not 16bit..

[Rubicant]

I believe that Halflife in opengl renders in 16bit, and only that. There are registry keys where you can change the resolution and color depth, but I don't think that when you set it to "32" it even does anything.

Ok, wtf, Mofokubik. You just made me waste this post..
(he deleted a bit about half-life being in 32-bit for opengl)

But Kane is probably right about that one, yeah.

[Mofokubik]

This is a pic of me running TFC with my V3, I guess in 32bit..
Is this 16bit, or 32bit?

HEHE sorry about messing your post up. There where no other posts while I was editing mine, so I must have clicked edit right before you posted...

[Anonymous]

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[Mofokubik]

Ok, that makes alot of sense then. I just didnt understand why the 16 bit looked so good, but I understand now.

[Goku7]

Technically Voodoo 1/2 should work even without 2D card, but naturally using such a setup might prove difficult.

From what I heard about the mainstream models of the V2, it should be practically IMPOSSIBLE due to the complete absence of 2D-capable hardware on it.   That is assuming I'm not mixing this up with earlier 3dfx cards, which I KNOW were definitely daughterboard designs.

I doubt that. Because it doesn't need to do that. Just start a 3D application and Voodoo will switch the inputs automatically (via any API, like Direct3D or Glide, _but_ the application has to select secondary device, of course, if primary is present). I suspect that it knows what card to target via DD_GUID or Options values. FF8 uses similar method, although I can't recall the exact registry value (but it does have a dedicated 'use secondary 3D device setting').

True, but did it work like that back when DirectX5.0 was out?  For all _I_ know, DX5 may have used more primitive, arcane initialization methods which didn't involve the DD_GUID (which frankly, I never even knew existed....maybe I need to start poking around the registry more....).

I suppose the whole idea behind my explaination is that the "driverpath" key must correspond to the "Display" entry in the config program; and that if you select "Primary Display Driver", the key is empty.

Oh, and I retract my statement about the V2 being the only card that has a different "Display" entry in the config program; as I'm pretty sure that if you have two 3D cards in your machine, you can have a different "Display" entry (as you may or may not have already pointed out) when you select your second 3D device.  Still, I believe that the driverpath key is only used when you have a second entry.

Therefore, I have a new, revised theory:

Primary Display Driver selected->"Driverpath" key empty; Game attempts to use the default D3D5 dlls, which by their own defaults would then attempt to interface with the primary card's 3D drivers, if any are there.

Secondary card selected->"Driverpath" key lists path to the 3D-accelerated drivers that card uses, Game then feeds that path to the D3D5 dlls and tells them to use that, similar to how we "mask" the path to the default sgt files in FF8 using our .ini files.  Or:  Game feeds that path to the DD_GUID registry key (possibly getting around your conundrum of "why not use DD_GUID?"), considering that for all we know, "Driverpath" could use a registry path, not a logical drive path.

Passthrough cable is just what the name implies, it is connected from 2D card to Voodoo, and regular monitor cable is connected to Voodoo (so, it's not a Y-cable, that would be technical impossibility anyway due to impedance, and other nice electrical thingies). So the signal passes through the Voodoo, hence the name for the cable. When 3D acceleration was turned on, Voodoo just flipped a relay, cutting off signal from 2D card, and started to send it's own signal. I can send you an image of such cable, if you want.

An image of the cable?  Hey, why not?  I may need it for future reference if I ever for some reason needed to install a V2 on something, LOL.  But seriously, I've been wondering what that thing looked like.  

Still, quite decent detective work, Mister Holmes.

Thank you for the compliment......*hopes that Jari wasn't being sarcastic for some reason there...*

Wait, I just thought of something. The FF7XP patch Doesnt use Direct3d because when I use it with FF7 on my Voodoo3 and run in hardware rendering it runs in 32bit color. Voodoo3 cant run direct3d in 32bit, it has to be 16 for direct3d to work

Mofokubik, as a fellow Voodoo3 user, I must sadly inform you that the V3 is definitely incapable of handling 32bit rendering.  At all.  Not for textures, Z-Buffering, Stencil Buffering, or any other 32-bit rendering operation.

At best, you can get what some people call a "22bpp Post-filtered output" from the card, but at the end of the day its still considered 16-bit rendering.

If the fact that you can initialize D3D and OpenGL games even though your desktop's colors are at 32bit was leading you to the conclusion that the v3 was rendering at 32bit, then you were being tricked by some safegards put into DirectDraw/D3D initialization.  As soon as you start the program, as far as I know, DirectDraw does the resolution/color depth switching to what the application wants, and then hands control of the card over to D3D.  Otherwise, you'd get an API that gives out some "failure to initialize" messages because it tried to do something that the card can't do.

With OpenGL, I believe it trys to initialize the app by defaulting to rendering at the same res/color settings that the windows desktop uses, and if it can't get that function to work, falls back to a Software Rendered, "SafeGL" mode, which is not a very good thing to use, as even the D3D software renderer is typically FASTER than how OpenGL trys to do things without hardware acceleration.

[Anonymous]

Technically Voodoo 1/2 should work even without 2D card, but naturally using such a setup might prove difficult.

From what I heard about the mainstream models of the V2, it should be practically IMPOSSIBLE due to the complete absence of 2D-capable hardware on it.   That is assuming I'm not mixing this up with earlier 3dfx cards, which I KNOW were definitely daughterboard designs.

Heh, you are not, they are purely 3D-devices.. It was more of a joke anyway.

But if it were possible to get Win9x started without a 2D card (I assume that it's impossible, have never tried), it would be easy: just look (before you remove the 2D card, silly) into your system.ini and replace the shell=explorer.exe (or something like that, can't remember anymore) with shell=c:\games\your_favorite_game.exe. And behold, when Windoze starts, it will start the game instead of Exploder-shell, and game will kick into 3D accelerated mode, and you will have video. Easy, yes?

That shell-trick actually works (but not with all games, some M$ games refuse to run if there's no explorer as shell, Midtown Madness being one such game), and can be used if you absolutely must play something that's just a bit too demanding for your hardware while running Windoze as usual. That way you can get bit more free memory, and stuff. Of course, there's the 'little' problem of exit strategy: when you quit the game. What happens? There's no Explorer running...

As for your theory: I think that you are thinking in too complicated manner.

I'm pretty certain that Windoze has enumerated hardware devices since it has had registry (which would be since 95, or was NT4 first?) and assigned GUID (Globally Unique Identifier) to them. Actually, pretty much every piece of your computer has a GUID assigned to them, some might even have several (if it's visible to system as multiple devices, like some soundcards might be).

I can send you an image of such cable, if you want.

An image of the cable?  Hey, why not?  I may need it for future reference if I ever for some reason needed to install a V2 on something, LOL.  But seriously, I've been wondering what that thing looked like.  

Ok. It's pretty simple gadget, as you can see. Basically a really short VGA-cable with male connector at one end, and female connector at other end. One end goes to 2D card, other to Voodoo. It would be really hard to install it incorrectly. And in a pinch it could be used as 8" long VGA-extension cord.

BTW, that particular cable is really thin, meaning that it most likely sucks. But it's from really cheap Voodoo 1, which pretty much explains why it's so thin. Orchid Righteous had a cable that was easily twice as thick (and really easy to bend. Not.)

Still, quite decent detective work, Mister Holmes.

Thank you for the compliment......*hopes that Jari wasn't being sarcastic for some reason there...*

No, I wasn't being sarcastic. It was pretty decent, considering that you have never had Voodoo 1 or 2.

[Lord Kane]

I would think so too, Kane is kind of a Voodoo authority here, and pretty visible person at ngemu forums. Even though I don't always agree with everything he says, I don't doubt his knowledge for a second.

Thanks for the vote of confidence! You registered on the boards then?

From what I heard about the mainstream models of the V2, it should be practically IMPOSSIBLE due to the complete absence of 2D-capable hardware on it. That is assuming I'm not mixing this up with earlier 3dfx cards, which I KNOW were definitely daughterboard designs.

Goku7 is right here. They are accelerator devices, not graphics cards. If you notice, rather than under display devices, a Voodoo/2 will appear under 'Sound, Video and Game controllers'. There are, of course, variants that do both. There is the Voodoo Rush, a 2d/3d Voodoo 1 card. Ill fated as the glide support (pretty much essential then, and the only real reason you'd use a Voodoo now) was quite poor. UltraHLE, Screamer 2 and Screamer Rally never properly supported this card (to the best of my knowledge), and I'm sure there are more apps like that. Then there was the Banshee, the Voodoo 2 all in one card. Far better than the Rush (which IMO was aptly named ) but still not without it's issues. Even with that card, you were far better off with a seperate 2d card and a Voodoo accelerator board. 3dfx dropped the seperate board idea subsequently and we are left with what we have now.

True, but did it work like that back when DirectX5.0 was out? For all _I_ know, DX5 may have used more primitive, arcane initialization methods which didn't involve the DD_GUID (which frankly, I never even knew existed....maybe I need to start poking around the registry more....).

I'm pretty certain that it did work I'm not sure of the mechanics of it however.

Oh, and I retract my statement about the V2 being the only card that has a different "Display" entry in the config program; as I'm pretty sure that if you have two 3D cards in your machine, you can have a different "Display" entry

Yes, but not all apps support this. For instance, when I had my Voodoo 5 in my machine, some apps reported the second card, but others didn't see it, and thus refused to use the card.

Mofokubik, as a fellow Voodoo3 user, I must sadly inform you that the V3 is definitely incapable of handling 32bit rendering. At all. Not for textures, Z-Buffering, Stencil Buffering, or any other 32-bit rendering operation.

True and yet untrue. It will do 2d rendering in 32-bit, but the 3d pathway won't allow it. Just had to revise that. OpenGL screensavers, if the desktop is in 32-bit mode, will slow to a crawl as they will use Microsoft's 'software' OpenGL rendering.

But if it were possible to get Win9x started without a 2D card (I assume that it's impossible, have never tried), it would be easy: just look (before you remove the 2D card, silly) into your system.ini and replace the shell=explorer.exe (or something like that, can't remember anymore) with shell=c:\games\your_favorite_game.exe. And behold, when Windoze starts, it will start the game instead of Exploder-shell, and game will kick into 3D accelerated mode, and you will have video. Easy, yes?

Well..... what would happen is your app would start up. That's it. When you quit, I think that Windows would either log off or shut down.... or you'd simply be shafted.

Right anything else to add? Not as far as I can think, but I'll be sure to keep tabs on this thread

[Rubicant]

Jari, I tried out the shell-replacement trick and it seems that it doesn't want to work for me (win98). Whenever I run the game, it always has a path error. I've tried editing "SET PATH" in autoexec.bat to make sure that the paths are there, but it doesn't work out..at all. I've tried 3 games so far, each with naught of results.

But the question is.. Why would Eidos take out glide/opengl support? They clearly gave 3dfx credit in the game...besides direct3d support, what's the point?

Another thing:

Try using ff7 version 1.00, but have the game set to run in direct3d (in the registry, at least). You may be surprised by the results. At least in this version the transparent/translucent models work. The only drawback is limited ff7music support, so it's basically pointless. But it's interesting to see if it works.