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SWAT 3 - LAST RESORT GAME MODIFICATION


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7 years 9 months ago #92 by Bounty2k3
2D Menus was created by Bounty2k3
Sorry, but you closed the other topic I wanted to reply to.

I've been doing some testing on this on different set ups.

*** Last Resort Mod Off***
800x600
Using no mods in windows mode. All 2D menus work fine.

Again, no mods, full screen, all menus work fine.

*** Last Resort Mod On***
800x600
Windowed mode. All 2D menus work fine.

Fullscreen. This is when the game shows lag after opening a couple .con files.


In widowed mode using last resort, I can use all Last resort sizes, 800x600 1024x768 etc...
No issues.

Once in fullscreen I have lag after 2 con files are opened. I'm wondering if it's because Last Resort is using 59hz frequency instead of 60hz? In windowed mode windows has it set to 60hz. But once you go to fullscreen
Last Resort takes over and uses 59hz which may be causing the lag as well.

Just a thought, I don't know how you tested it though.

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7 years 9 months ago - 7 years 9 months ago #93 by Slippery Jim
Replied by Slippery Jim on topic 2D Menus

I'm wondering if it's because Last Resort is using 59hz frequency instead of 60hz?


Last Resort mod doesn't change the frequency. There is nothing in the coding of the launcher or in the Swat 3 config files that changes the frequency of your monitor.

The only thing the mod does is allow you to choose the resolution (800x600, 1024x768 etc). Swat 3's executable handles everything else.

I assume you are Windows 10? The problem is related to the fact that Windows 10 only emulates 16 bit colour mode in 32 bit colour. It doesn't support legacy games very well.

Nvidia had drivers that used to work great with Swat 3 even with Windows 8/10 but they got lazy and changed something in them. Now we end up with slow frame rates on games that go full screen in emulated 16 bit colour mode.

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7 years 9 months ago #95 by Bounty2k3
Replied by Bounty2k3 on topic 2D Menus
Yes, Windows 10. Good info to know, I will try a bunch of stuff to get it working then. But, the lag only happens when Last Resort is enabled. Otherwise, there is no lag in full screen mode using the original swat.exe file.

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7 years 9 months ago #97 by Bounty2k3
Replied by Bounty2k3 on topic 2D Menus
Hey SJ,

I've done quite a bit of testing on this.

All mods off - Last resort mod off - All aspect ratios - Windowed.... No issues

All mods off - Last resort mod off - All aspect ratios - Full Screen.... No issues

All mods off - Last resort mod ON - All aspect ratios - Windowed.... No issues

All mods off - Last resort mod ON - All aspect ratios - Full Screen.... This is when the lag occurs after opening a con file in the game.

My belief, and you can correct me here which I'm sure you will, is that the call to M3NU.dat instead of MENU.dat is what is causing the issue as the con files are interlinked with MENU.dat and not M3NU.dat

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7 years 9 months ago - 7 years 9 months ago #98 by Slippery Jim
Replied by Slippery Jim on topic 2D Menus

he call to M3NU.dat instead of MENU.dat is what is causing the issue


I would say no, that isn't the problem. There are only two places in the .executable that calls Menu.dat and none of the .con files reference it by name. Swat 3 loads it into memory and the actual filename shouldn't matter.

Part of the lag could possibly be because a lot of Swat 3's graphics were originally reduced to 256 colours by using 8 bit colour mode. The Last Resort mod uses 24 bit colour bitmaps (menus and textures).

The Last Resort mod also uses textures as large as 1024x1024 (originally the max allowed was 256x256). If you don't have a lot of video memory on your video card I could see that being an issue. Right now though the biggest texture that is used is usually 512x512.

Let me test things again on my end. When I got the typical Windows 10 lag it didn't matter if the Last Resort mod was activated or not. The lag happened the same amount. Since Nvidia stopped properly supporting legacy games with their drivers I have had that lag with Windows 10. The only way to fix it was with DgVoodoo or one of the other fps fixes .

PS: I am always interested in improving and fixing the Swat 3 experience and the LR mod. I appreciate you posting no matter what.

PPS: On a side note...you may wonder why I hacked the executable to use M3NU.DAT instead of leaving it alone. Some people in the community included custom main menu graphics in their mods. I wanted to allow people to continue using those mods but disable their main menu graphics. It was important for my main menu graphics to over-ride theirs since the Last Resort mod uses more than just the default 800x600 graphics.

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7 years 9 months ago - 7 years 9 months ago #99 by Slippery Jim
Replied by Slippery Jim on topic 2D Menus
Just did a quick test. I worked 14 hours today so I am a little sleepy and might have made a mistake.

You are correct about something in the LR mod causing the fps problem in 800x600 fullscreen. This is interesting. A pain in the ass, but interesting lol. Before Windows 8/10 this wasn't a problem and I never saw any fps issues. Why does dgVoodoo or WineD3D fix this? Why is it only a problem full screen?


LR mod activated:
With dgVoodoo disabled on the Swat 3 main menu I had 60 fps and 5.1 fps when I clicked on the callup screen.

LR mod disabled:
With dgVoodoo disabled on the Swat 3 main menu I had 60 fps and almost 60 fps when I clicked on the callup screen.

I will need to experiment this weekend about what is causing this. Here are the theories:

* m3nu.dat (not ruling this out without properly testing it first)
* 24 bit colour bitmaps are too much for Swat 3. Might have to reduce to 8 bit textures.
* The cracked executable from Gamecopyworld that the LR mod uses is faulty. Maybe when they stripped the copy protection it messed with the performance of the executable
* Texture sizes too big. It may not like 512x512? Considering I have a 4GB video card I doubt this is the issue unless it has to do with how Swat 3 is coded.

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