------------------------------------------------------------------------ Leadfoot version 0.50 (demo) Copyright + 2001 Ratbag, Pty Ltd. www.ratbaggames.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 1. Notes 2. System Requirements 3. Graphics Configuration 4. Input Configuration 5. Multiplayer 6. Multiplayer Commands 7. Command Line Options 8. Performance Issues 9. Troubleshooting 10. Notes ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 1. Notes ------------------------------------------------------------------------ This is the demo of Ratbag's new title Leadfoot. Check out our website www.ratbaggames.com for updates and information. Please note that in order to minimise the size of the demo, the textures and in-game graphics have been JPEG compressed. This may result in reduced image quality. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2. System Requirements ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Minimum System Requirements OS: Windows 95/98/ME/2000 CPU: Pentium II 266MHz, or Celeron 300A RAM: 32MB VIDEO: High Colour (16-bit colour) capable video card (DirectX 6 compatible) SOUND: Any DIRECT X compatible Card DISK SPACE: 40 Mb CD-ROM: 4X Recommended System Requirements OS: Windows 95/98/ME CPU: Pentium II, Pentium III, Celeron or AMD Athlon, 300 MHz or higher RAM: 64MB VIDEO: nVidia GeForce, TNT2, ATI Rage 128, 3dfx Voodoo 5 SOUND: DirectSound, DirectSound3D, Aureal3D or EAX compatible sound card DISK SPACE: 120 Mb CD-ROM: 8X CONTROLLER: DirectX compatible force feedback device AMD K6-2/Athlon 3DNow! optimisation supported Pentium III (Katmai) optimisation supported This demo requires DirectX, but does not include it for reasons of size. If you do not already have DirectX 7.0 or newer, then download it from: http://www.microsoft.com/directx/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 3. Graphics Configuration ------------------------------------------------------------------------ When Leadfoot is run, it will first prompt you for which Graphics driver you wish to use. Selecting 'Autodetect' will select the optimum graphics driver for your system. Select 'Glide' if you have a non-Banshee 3DFX video card. This will be selected automatically by 'Autodetect'. Select 'Banshee' if you have a Banshee 3DFX video card. This will be selected automatically by 'Autodetect'. Some older drivers for the Voodoo Banshee video card contain a bug, in that they do not properly support certain texture management functions. Selecting the 'Glide' driver if you have a Voodoo Banshee may result in a corrupted display. If you have problems with the game in this mode, try updating your drivers and selecting 'Glide' or 'Direct3D'. Select 'Direct3D' if you have a Direct3D compatible video card, or wish to run Direct3D on your 3DFX card. This will be selected automatically by 'Autodetect', unless you have a 3DFX card. For optimum performance under Direct3D with an AGP video card, you should ensure that you have either Windows 98 or Windows 95 OSR 2.1 or newer. If you have Windows 2000, you may be prompted to select your video card from a list. Select 'Software' to use the software renderer. This will be selected automatically by 'Autodetect' if you have no 3D hardware. To change your graphics driver after starting the game, you must exit and restart it. If you have a 3D video card, you should ensure that you have the latest drivers for it. You should also set your gamma level to 1.0 for correct colour reproduction. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 4. Input Configuration ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The input options section of Leadfoot allows you to setup your keys or other input device. If you have a joystick, wheel or gamepad, before running Leadfoot ensure that it is properly setup and calibrated in the 'Game Controllers' application under the Windows 'Control Panel'. You should then calibrate the device in the input options of Leadfoot. It is only necessary to calibrate a particular joystick once. The default keys for control are: left, right - Steer. up - Accelerate. down - Brake. space - Change camera view. left shift - Half lock steering. X - Change gear up. Z - Change gear down. Other keys you can use when in a race are: escape - In multiplayer, quits the race. In single player, pauses the race and provides a few options, such as exit, resume, and replay. F3 - Toggle display of race information. F4 - Toggle display of the rear view mirror. F5 - In multiplayer, toggle display of player names. F12 - Take a screenshot (useable when in a race and when in the interface). Screenshots are saved to c:\snap*.tga. When watching a race in multiplayer, the tab key can be used to switch between the free camera mode and following each of the cars in turn. While following a car, the normal change camera view key (space by default) can be used to change views. When in the free camera mode, use the mouse to aim the camera. Hold down the left button to accelerate in the direction the camera is facing, and hold down the right button to slow down. If you wish to pause the rotation of the car meshes in the interface, hold down the right mouse button. The rotation will resume when the button is released. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 5. Multiplayer ------------------------------------------------------------------------ From within the interface, you can create a new game by selecting 'new game' on the multiplayer server list screen. Other players on your LAN will then be able to see the server in their server list, and will be able to connect to your game. For Internet play, the simplest way to connect to other games is to use GameSpy Arcade. You can download it from the GameSpy Arcade web site - click on "Play Leadfoot On-line with GameSpy Arcade" in the Leadfoot folder on the Start Menu. Alternatively, you can specify the IP address of the machine to connect to. This can be done by selecting 'join IP' on the multiplayer server list screen. The player who hosts the game can determine their IP address by selecting Run from the Start menu, and then typing in 'winipcfg' (without the quotes). Leadfoot only supports TCP/IP, so in order to play on a LAN each machine will need to have TCP/IP networking for the network card set up. To set up TCP/IP networking, follow these steps: 1. Open My Computer -> Control Panel, then run the Network application. 2. If TCP/IP for your network card is not in the list, then: a) Click Add. b) Double-click Protocol. c) Select Microsoft on the left hand side, and TCP/IP on the right hand side. d) Click OK. 3. Select the TCP/IP item in the list, for your network card (not for dialup networking, if you have that installed). 4. Click Properties. 5. Select the IP Address tab. 6. Click 'Specify an IP address', then enter an IP address of 192.168.0.xxx, where xxx is 1 for machine 1 on your LAN, 2 for machine 2 on your LAN, etc. 7. Enter a Subnet mask of 255.255.255.0. 8. Click OK, then OK on the next screen. You will probably need to restart your computer. The 'Multiplayer Server' icon installed in the start menu can also be used to start a dedicated server, which other players can connect to. When the server program is run, it will prompt for some values. If desired, you can select to register the server with GameSpy, meaning that other players on the Internet will be able to connect to the server using GameSpy Arcade. Note that the server executable does not require the data in order to be able to run. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 6. Multiplayer Commands ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Leadfoot contains multiplayer commands which can be typed in the chatroom entry box. Note that some of these commands do not work unless everyone is chatting. These are: /gethost [password] If a dedicated server is setup with a password, you may obtain host status with this command. Note that password is case sensitive. /listids Displays a list of players and their IDs. /givehost [id] Makes the specified player the host. This command can only be issued by the host. /setplayerlimit [limit] Prevents more than [limit] players from joining the server (can be 1-10). This does not kick out existing players if there are already more than the limit. The limit is reset to 10 when the server empties of all players. This command can only be issue by the host. /resetlimit Resets the player limit to 10. This command can only be issued by the host. /playerlimit Displays the current player limit. /resetpoints Sets all currently connected player's points to zero. This command can only be issued by the host. /setplayerpoints [id] [points] Gives player [id] the number of points specified by [points]. This command can only increase the player's points, and you can not assign points to yourself. This command can only be issued by the host. /setgridmode [gridmode] Specifies the way the cars are ordered on the starting grid. Grid modes are "random", "rank", and "reverserank" (don't include quotation marks). e.g. /setgridmode reverserank will make players with the least points start at the front of the pack. The default is random. The grid mode is reset to random when the server empties of players. This command can only be issued by the host. /gridmode Displays the current grid mode. /kick [id] Removes the specifed player from the server. However, the player can connect again immediately. This has the same effect as clicking the kick button alongside the player in the chat room. This command can only be issued by the host. /kickban [id] Removes the specified player from the server and prevents that player from connecting to the server again until bans are cleared or the server empties of players. You can not kickban yourself. This command can only be issued by the host. /clearbans Allows any banned players to connect to the server again. This command can only be issued by the host. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 7. Command Line Options ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Leadfoot supports several command line options. These options can be selected using the 'Options Editor' on the start menu. Alternatively, you can enter them when running the game from an MS-DOS prompt, or modify the shortcut you use to run Leadfoot. The options are: -glide2vsync Forces the Glide 2 graphics driver to wait for screen refreshes. This runs slower, but may fix hangs on some Glide video cards, especially Voodoo 2s. -nopersistd3d Causes the Direct3D driver to not retain the same DirectDraw interface when switching between a race and the interface. This may fix problems on certain video cards. -selectd3dw2000 Forces the game to bring up a video card selection dialog box in Windows 2000, rather than automatically detecting the card in some cases. The game will always automatically detect your video card in Windows 95, 98 and ME. -3dsound Leadfoot does not use 3D sound by default. This is because it causes errors on certain sound cards. Use this option to enable 3D sound if desired. -nocheckhresult Certain sounds cards report fatal errors during initialisation even though the errors are recoverable. Using the -nocheckhresult command line option will cause Leadfoot to ignore fatal errors from the sound card. Use this option if you receive 'HRESULT Error at ...' messages. -disablesound Use this option to disable sound. -nolaunch Stops Leadfoot from asking you which graphics driver to use every time it is run. Leadfoot will use whichever driver was selected on the last run. -nointro Turns off the introduction screens. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 8. Performance Issues ------------------------------------------------------------------------ If Leadfoot is running slowly on your system, there are a few things you can do to speed up its performance. If the game is running in Software mode, and you have a 3D video card, try updating your drivers and running in Direct3D or Glide. If this is successful, you will notice a significant improvement in the performance and appearance of the game. On the game's video options menu (from the main menu: Options -> Video), several graphical effects can be turned off or decreased in detail for an improvement in frame rate. The water detail setting is particularly important - the lower settings will only draw the water, while the higher settings will simulate wave movement at increasing detail, which can decrease performance noticeably. Always make sure you have the latest drivers for your video card, and the latest version of DirectX. Manufacturers often improve the performance of their drivers in newer versions. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 9. Troubleshooting ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The following points may assist you if you are experiencing problems with the game. Ensure that you have the latest drivers for your hardware - including video card and sound card - as well as the latest version of DirectX installed. Reinstalling DirectX may help in some cases. Some virus checkers - particularly older ones - have been observed to cause the game to crash. If you encounter problems with the game, particularly blue screen crashes, try disabling any virus checkers while the game is running. It can also be helpful to close down any unnecessary applications before running the game. Look through the options available in the Options Editor. Some of them may help you fix specific problems with the game. If you have a Yamaha sound card, look through the FAQ for Leadfoot on www.ratbaggames.com for a number of things you can try to fix game crashes. If you edit your original game files, we cannot predict what might happen. We highly recommend that you do not do so. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 10. Notes ------------------------------------------------------------------------ In the demo version of Leadfoot, you can only select one of two cars (a sport truck and a stadium lite) in single player races. In multiplayer mode, you can only race with the truck. You cannot modify data - e. g. create custom car skins (paint jobs) - in the demo. This feature is only available in the full version. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Leadfoot + 2001 Ratbag Pty Ltd. All Rights Reserved. Leadfoot, Ratbag, the Ratbag logo, and the Difference Engine are trademarks.