Shockwave Assault Demo for Microsoft Windows® 95 ------------------------------------------------ Contents: ---------------------------------- 1. System Requirements 2. Controls 3. Video Mode 4. Microsoft Games SDK (DirectX) A. Real Mode Device Drivers: Why they are not compatible B. DirectDraw C. DirectSound 5. Common Problems 6. Game Tips and Hints ---------------------------------- IMPORTANT: If the game crashes inexplicably or there are sound and video glitches, it is probably the result of a bad CD-ROM read or Microsoft Windows® 95 is manipulating the swapfile. If the game crashes, simply restart the game from your latest saved game. The problem will probably not happen again. If it does, you may have a bad CD-ROM disk or your CD-ROM drive may have old device drivers or your hardware may have loose cables, bad SCSI termination or some other problem. If the CD-ROM appears undamaged, check your hardware and/or contact the manufacturer of your CD-ROM drive to obtain the latest software device drivers and/or hardware fixes. ---------------------------------- 1. System Requirements ---------------------------------- Required: Microsoft Windows® 95 486-66 MHz CPU or Higher; 8 MB Ram 1MB SVGA video card 10 Megs min of HD space Double speed (300 K/sec) CD-ROM Drive Natively-supported Microsoft Windows® 95 Soundcard Required for 16bit (65,000) Color: 2MB SVGA video card Recommended: Pentium 90MHz or Faster 16 bit Sound card Quad speed CD-ROM Drive 2MB SVGA video card Supported: Joystick Mouse NOTE: All Device Drivers relevant (CDROM, SOUNDCARD, DISPLAY, etc.) must be Protected Mode (32-bit) drivers. ---------------------------------- 2. Controls ---------------------------------- Shift - Thrusters Ctrl - Lasers Alt - Missles Arrows - Left/Right/Up/Down Esc - Skip Video P - Pause P then Esc - Quit ---------------------------------- 3. Video Mode ---------------------------------- The red, green, and orange colors indicate which graphics modes will perform best on your machine ( red is the worst, orange is marginal, and green is best ). For Example, if you have a 486/66 processor chances are that 320 X 200 256 colors will be your best selection. The Video Mode defaults to the highest green mode, or the lowest orange. This will sometimes be a windowed mode. You can switch to a full screen mode by selecting Video Mode from the launcher. If Video is choppy, try a lower setting in Video Mode. ---------------------------------- 4. Microsoft Games SDK (DirectX) ---------------------------------- Shockwave: Assault is the first Electronic Arts game that uses the DirectX application programming interface (API) for Microsoft Windows® 95 game features. Please bear in mind that even though the MS Games SDK is final, there are still several manufacturer's who do not have DirectX drivers created for their products. --- A. Real Mode Device Drivers: Why they are incompatible --- Using DirectX as a Development environment entails several things for the end-user. First, the end-user needs their hardware to be natively supported by Microsoft Windows® 95. That means that when you go into the SYSTEM properties, every component should be present there. If you have a CDROM, there should be a CDROM driver, etc etc. If there are devices missing from the SYSTEM properties, then this usually means that the device is being controlled by a Real Mode Device driver. (a Real Mode Device Driver is a 16-bit "DOS" driver that is loaded in the AUTOEXEC.BAT or CONFIG.SYS) DirectX APIs use 32-bit code to operate and when certain functions are called during a program exectuion, DirectX will "LOCK" out 16-bit code. This means that during these certain functions, any 16-bit driver will be stalled for that split-second thus causing errors on a CDROM read or garbled sound from a soundcard etc. --- B. DirectDraw --- DirectDraw for the Microsoft Windows® 95 operating system is a software interface which provides direct access to display devices while maintaining compatibility with Windows GDI. It works with Microsoft Windows® 95 and will work with Windows NT. DirectDraw provides a device-independent way for games and Windows subsystem software such as 3-D graphics packages or digital video codecs to access display device-dependent features. DirectDraw works with a wide variety of display hardware, ranging from simple SVGAs to advanced hardware implementations providing clipping, stretching, and non-RGB color format support. The interface is designed so that applications can request the capabilities of the underlying hardware, then use those capabilities as required. All natively supported Display adapters in Microsoft Windows® 95 are supported by DirectDraw. If for some reason your display adapter is not supported by DirectDraw, then Shockwave: Assault will not be compatible either. Please Contact either your Display adapter manufacturer or Microsoft for updated drivers. --- C. DirectSound --- Microsoft® DirectSound API is the audio component of the Microsoft Windows® 95 Game Software Development Kit (SDK) that provides low-latency mixing, hardware acceleration, and direct access to the sound device. DirectSound provides this functionality while maintaining compatibility with existing Microsoft Windows® 95 based applications and device drivers. The Windows game subsystem allows game developers access to the display and audio hardware while insulating them from the specific details of that hardware. The overriding design goal in the Windows game subsystem is speed. Instead of providing a high-level set of functions, DirectSound provides a device-independent interface, allowing applications to take full advantage of the capabilities of the audio hardware. The final release contains DirectSound versions of all sound drivers included in the Microsoft Windows® 95 product. This includes the following: - Sound Blaster: 8-bit cards, 16-bit cards, and the AWE32. - ESS: 488, 688, 1488, 1688. - MediaVision: PAS 16, PAS Studio, PAS Plus, Pro 3D, and Blue Lite Special. - Aztech: Nova 16, Washington 16, Rocky 2. - Microsoft: Windows Sound System. Sound cards which do not have DirectSound drivers can still be accessed through DirectSound. If no driver is available, DirectSound will use its emulation layer to communicate with the device through the standard Wave driver interface. This provides full DirectSound functionality, but increases latency significantly and prevents access to hardware acceleration. We have also encountered faults in certain situations on the Roland Rap 10 and the Gravis UltraSound MAX. Shockwave: Assault NOTE: The latency that Microsoft is describing will cause all movies to play incorrectly or not play at all. We also encountered problems with the MediaVision Thunderboard. ---------------------------------- 5. Common Problems ---------------------------------- Q: Why must I have a 2MB SVGA adapter for 65,000 colors (16-bit color)? A: DirectDraw uses the video memory of the SVGA adapter to manipulate the surfaces of an image. If it cannot fit all of the data into video memory, then it uses the main memory of the computer which is much slower. A 16-bit color (65,000) surface usually uses, at a minimum, 1.2MB of video memory. Q: Why can't I use my soundcard? I know it's not supported with a native Microsoft Windows® 95 driver; but I still hear sound in Microsoft Windows® 95. A: Sound cards which do not have DirectSound drivers can still be accessed through DirectSound. If no driver is available, DirectSound will use its emulation layer to communicate with the device through the standard Wave driver interface. This provides full DirectSound functionality, but increases latency significantly and prevents access to hardware acceleration. Unfortunately, this "latency" that Microsoft mentions is severe. It is possible to use an unsupported soundcard, unfortunately, the latency causes the movies to play incorrectly and also causes severe pausing in gameplay. Q: When my machine is running Profiler, after several of the screen tests my machine will lockup causing me to reboot the computer. What is going on? A: During our test cycle, we encountered one instance where a certain video card (S3 Trio 32/64) would not ever complete the Profiler program. We tested several of this same video card and it was isolated to a single one of these. If this happens, please contact the manufacturer of your system or Microsoft for an updated video driver, and possibly an updated DirectDraw driver. Q: When my machine is running Profiler the screen will occasionally stay black for a long time. Is the program locking up? A: No, certain video cards cannot display some of the resolutions that Profiler tries to test. If for some reason you choose a resolution in Video Mode, and during flight you hear sound effects but see no graphics; then switch do a different resolution in video mode. The situation we encountered during the test run was with a #9FX Motion 771 video card configured with either 2mb or 4mb of VRAM. In resolution 320x200 either stretched or windowed with 256 colors, the game would show movies correctly but not show gameplay as in the above situation. Q: All of my hardware is supported by Microsoft Windows® 95 natively, but I still can not get the game to load (or I am getting an error in the install). What is wrong? A: Certain manufacturers are pre-installing Microsoft Windows® 95 on their retail machines. Unfortunately, some important drivers, called CODECS, are being left out. To see if this may be your problem, try playing one of the .AVI files on the Shockwave CD. These movies were compressed using the Microsoft IMA ADPCM Audio Codec; and if this driver is not installed on your system, the movies will not play correctly. To check if this driver is installed: 1. go to CONTROL PANEL 2. go to the MULTIMEDIA properties 3. go to the ADVANCED tab, click on the AUDIO COMPRESSION CODECS. 4. If the Microsoft IMA ADPCM Audio Codec is not present, then follow these directions to install it: 1. close the MULTIMEDIA panel 2. go to the ADD NEW HARDWARE panel, 3. click on NEXT, then on the next screen click on NO 4. use the Scroll bar to find and double-click on OTHER DEVICES, 5. use the Scroll bar to find MICROSOFT AUDIO CODECS under Manufacturers. 6. choose IMA ADPCM Audio Codec. The only manufacturer's machines we encountered this problem on in our testing phases was Packard Bell. Q: What specific ways have we found to improve game performance when accessing the disk drives? A: Use a Disk Defragmenter to defragment your harddrive. Also, install to the same drive letter that Microsoft Windows® 95 is installed to. ---------------------------------- 6. Game Hints and Tips ---------------------------------- 1. Basics The Radar display shows a dotted line representing a safe zone in which you can fly. When you leave this zone you will receive a message "OFF PATH". Outside this zone the Omaha is using Orbital Lasers and Missiles to kill the aliens. You will be hit by friendly fire if you stray out of the safe zone. The refueling drones will not always give a full load of everything, and stop rotating when empty.When approaching a field of energy, use thrusters and a left or right arrow key to initiate a roll, chances are the field won't touch you.