Fire Fight™ Shareware Version 1.0

This ReadMe file is designed to help users troubleshoot any problems they may be having with the game. Below is some valuable information regarding how to maximize system performance.

DIRECTX™  INSTALLATION NOTES

READ THIS SECTION COMPLETELY BEFORE PLAYING FIRE FIGHT OR INSTALLING THE DIRECTX DRIVERS

If  you already have DirectX™ on your system, select "No" when asked if you would like to use the DirectX drivers provided with Fire Fight. In some cases, reinstalling DirectX will downgrade the video drivers and may corrupt them. If this happens, you will need to reinstall your video driver or reinstall the Windows® 95 operating system. Please consult your computer vendor before attempting to reinstall your video card drivers or Windows 95.

Running Fire Fight if you have an STB powergraph 64 video card with the S3 Trio64V+ Chipset may result in the corruption of the video driver and may require that Windows® or the drivers be reinstalled. If you have this video card, it may still be possible to run Fire Fight depending on which driver is installed. To determine which driver you are using:

1.  Right click on the MY COMPUTER icon and select properties.
2.  Click on the DEVICE MANAGER tab.
3.  Double click on DISPLAY ADAPTERS.
4.  Check to see which video driver is installed for your card.
      
Note: If you are using the S3 Trio64V+ driver you must update the driver before running Fire Fight. Check for driver updates at the following URL: s3 Drivers: http:www.s3.com/support/enduser/swlib.html

5.  If you are using the s3 Trio64V+ PCI driver you may already have the updated driver in which case Fire Fight should run, but DO NOT INSTALL DIRECTX.

Please continue to check with your video card manufacturer for driver updates. STB Systems: http://www.stb.com

Do not install DirectX if you have a card that uses the S3 Trio64V+. Installation of DirectX with this chipset may result in video driver corruption. If this happens, you may need to reinstall Windows 95 to restore the video driver. Please consult with your computer vendor before attempting to reinstall your video card drivers or Windows 95. Users of this chipset may still run Fire Fight, but without DirectX. Please continue to check with your video card manufacturer for updated drivers. S3 Drivers: http:www.s3.com/support/enduser/swlib.html

Do not install DirectX if you have a Number Nine GXE Video Card or a Number Nine Imagine 128. Installation of DirectX may result in video driver corruption. If this happens you will need to reinstall your Windows 95 video driver or reinstall Windows 95. Please consult with your system vendor before attempting to reinstall your video card drivers or Windows 95. Please continue to check with your video card manufacturer for updated drivers. Number Nine: http://www.nine.com

NOTE TO USERS: DirectX is a games API designed to provide an excellent games interface as well as hardware compatibility. At this time, there are still many hardware manufacturers whose products do not support DirectX. If any of the hardware you are using does not work properly with DirectX, please check with the manufacturer of your hardware about obtaining updated drivers that fully support Windows 95 and DirectX.  If you do experience problems with the DirectX drivers, you can restore your original drivers by running DXSETUP, which is located within the DirectX folder, in the Fire Fight folder.  

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS

Minimum Configuration
•	Windows 95 operating system
•	60 MHz Pentium™ processor 
•	8 MB RAM
•	40 MB of hard drive space available for Windows swap file
•	SVGA video card capable of 320x200 with 256 colors (512K or more video RAM)
•	CD-ROM Drive

Recommended Configuration
•	90 MHz (or faster) Pentium processor
•	16 (or more) MB RAM
•	Mouse/Joystick
•	Quad-speed CD-ROM drive
•	Sound Blaster 16™ or 100% compatible sound card
•	SVGA video card with two or more megs of video RAM

BEFORE YOU PLAY

IMPORTANT: Before installing Fire Fight, it is a good idea to run Windows 95's ScanDisk and Disk Defragmenter utilities to insure that your hard disk is functioning properly (see your Windows 95 documentation for instructions on using these utilities). If you do run ScanDisk, be sure to disable it before loading Fire Fight.

LOADING THE GAME

Insert the Fire Fight CD into your CD-ROM drive. The Fire Fight Loader menu will appear automatically.
To select a menu item:

1.	Press UP ARROW or DOWN ARROW to highlight your selection.
2.	Press ENTER to accept.

NOTE: These same controls are used to select menu items throughout Fire Fight—so learn 'em here and use them everywhere.

•	To start a single player game, click Play.
•	To start a multiplayer game, click Network Play. See multiplayer Network Play.
•	To customize Player settings, Control options, Video and Sound settings, and view troubleshooting settings, click Options. See Configuring the Game.
•	To view a list of the people responsible for the game, the ReadMe file, or the Fire Fight web site URL, Ordering Information, or License Agreement, click Game Information.
•	To quit without installing, click Exit. Fire Fight closes, and you return to the Windows 95 operating system. To remove the remaining information window from your screen, simply move it to the background by clicking on another window or icon.

SINGLE-PLAYER MISSION SELECT

From the Mission Select screen, select a mission for the single-player game, check mission status, review your current mission description, or scroll ahead to review your agenda.
To select a mission: 

1.   Press UP ARROW or DOWN ARROW to highlight a mission.
2.   Press ENTER to select. The mission loads.

NOTE: When you complete a mission, you return to the Mission Select screen to receive your next orders. You begin the ensuing mission with the amount of ammunition you had at the close of the previous mission, and your shield energy is restored to 100 percent.

NOTE: Below are the default settings for controlling the SHIP. Keep in mind you can customize most Fire Fight controls to suit your specific style of play. (See Configuring the Game.) 

Action	              Keyboard	                                 Mouse	                                     Joystick	

Rotate	              LEFT, RIGHT ARROW          LEFT, RIGHT	                     LEFT, RIGHT
Accelerate           UP ARROW	                 RIGHT-BUTTON 	     UP 
Decelerate           RELEASE UP ARROW          RELEASE RIGHT-BUTTON   RELEASE JOYSTICK
Reverse	              DOWN ARROW		                                                     DOWN
Turbo	              LEFT SHIFT KEY					     JOYSTICK BUTTON2
Turbo-lock          CAPS LOCK KEY			
Strafe left/right   ALT KEY + LEFT, RIGHT	
                              ARROW or Z/X

Shield Energy

The Jagger enters each mission with full shield energy and can increase depleted energy by picking up stray shield packs. 

•	To pick up a shield pack, fly your craft across the gray "+" capsule. The larger the capsule, the more energy your shield gains.

Weapons

Your aircraft is equipped with six weapons. Ammunition packs for each weapon are located throughout single-player missions and net games.

•	To Select a specific weapon, press 1-6.
•	To scroll weapons, press PGUP/PGDN. To be active, the weapon must have available ammunition. Once a weapon is depleted of its ammunition, the next weapon is selected automatically.
•	To pick up an ammo pack, fly your craft across the gray capsule. The number on the capsule (1-6) refers to the weapon it loads; the size (small, medium, and large) indicates the number of rounds it contains.

NOTE: Once a weapon is fully loaded, your craft refuses packs specific to that weapon.

Fire

Although you have six of the best combat weapons, they are only effective in the hands of a skilled marksman. In other words, practice, practice, practice.

Action	Keyboard	                      Mouse	                    Joystick

Fire	SPACEBAR or CTRL KEY      LEFT-CLICK	                    Joystick button 1
Target	RIGHT or LEFT ARROW	      Move mouse	                    Joystick LEFT, RIGHT

Your ship's radar encircles the Jagger with gray panels that turn white when an enemy is near; use these panels to aim your weapons. Your radar can also direct you to the next objective; when coordinates are available, an arrow appears and points you in the proper direction.

NOTE: If using the mouse, a yellow cross-hair appears on the screen. Your craft and weapons follow this cross-hair.

Inventory Items

The inventory items hidden throughout single-player missions and multiplayer net games can make the difference between success and ruin. 

•	To pick up an inventory item, fly your craft across the orange capsule.
•	To scroll inventory items, press +/-.
•	To use an inventory item, press ENTER.

Double Shields: Absorbs half the damage from enemy fire.
Restore Shields: Returns your ship to full power.
Cloaking device: Makes your craft temporarily invisible to all enemies.
Electromagnetic Shock: Destroys everything in sight–except your ship.
Mines: (multiplayer only) Drop these explosive devices behind your craft. They explode upon contact with any ship—including yours, so remember where you dropped them!

Beam Up Objects

Many missions require that you retrieve various personnel, prisoners of war, or havoc-wreaking materials. In order to do this, you must beam them aboard your ship.

Land

Once your mission is accomplished, you are directed to an available landing site. Certain objectives also require you to set down in order to deliver specific items.

•	To land the Jagger, hover inside the orange guide. The aircraft sets down for a landing. While landing, you are safe from enemy fire. You are not authorized to land unless an orange guide appears above the site.

Display Current Objective

Communications between the commander, the pilot, and his team appear at the bottom of your screen. This is where you learn your objectives. If you forget your objective, you can display it any time during a mission.

•	To display your objective, press F2.

Pause Mission

To pause the current mission, press PAUSE . The screen freezes. Press PAUSE a second time to return to the game.

Restart Mission

If you find you're performing poorly, you can exit and restart the mission. This restores your ammunition and shield energy to their original levels.

To restart a mission:  Press F9. The Restart Mission overlay appears. Highlight Restart Mission and press ENTER. The mission reloads.

Abort Mission

To abort the current mission:  Press F10. An Abort overlay appears. Highlight Abort Current Mission, and press ENTER. The Mission select screen appears.

MULTIPLAYER  NETWORK PLAY

Fire Fight's Multiplayer Network Play mode allows you to meet your so-called buddy on a network, and blow the "dirtbag" away in two different games.

Set Connection Type Menu

1.   Select the appropriate network or modem driver. If you are not sure which type of network connection you have, check with your network administrator.
2.   Join an existing multiplayer game or create a new multiplayer game.

•	To join an existing game, select Join existing game. If you want to automatically join the first multiplayer game found, select Auto-join first found game.
•	To see a list of all multiplayer games found, do not select Auto-join first found game.
•	To start a new multiplayer game for others to join, select Create new game.

Create New Game

When you create a new game, you set the game parameters.

To create a new game:

1.   Choose Create new game. The Create Game Window appears.
2.   Name the game and select the number of players (1-4).

NOTE: The game does not begin until the designated number of human players are connected.

3.   Select either Fire Fight or Base Building and click Next.

Fire Fight

In the Fire Fight net game, you and up to three other Jaggers share the same goal: Blow each other away!

NOTE: Remember, when you create a new game, you select the Fire Fight options. If you are joining the game, you submit to your host's selections.

Fire Fight Network Game Options

Decide between a timed game (1-250 minutes) or a game that ends after a specific number of kills (1-250). Define the amount of artillery present in the game by adjusting the Respawn options. With the Respawn options, you specify, in seconds, how soon each ammo pack and inventory item regenerate on screen. Also, you can increase the difficulty of your game by toggling certain items off.

NOTE: An exceptional Respawn option is the Mega Upgrade. It is a large ammo pack that rotates from 1-6 then "+" (for shield energy). Fly across the large gray capsule when it displays the pack that you want.

Base Building

Locate and gather bricks to build your own base. The winner is the first player who completes a base.

NOTE: A base builds automatically as a player gathers bricks. But when a player  is hit by enemy fire, that player's base loses bricks.

Base Building Network Game Options

When you create a new game, you select the Base Building options. After you've selected the number of players (1-4), set the number of parts required to build a base, and define the amount of artillery present in the game by adjusting the Respawn options. With the Respawn options, you specify, in seconds, how soon each ammo pack and inventory item regenerate on screen. Also, you can increase the difficulty of your game by toggling items off.

Chat with Your Opponent

What fun it is to blow someone's ship up without the satisfaction of laughing in the loser's face? With Multiplayer Network Play, you can get that satisfaction by using Fire Fight's chat feature.

•	To chat outside of the game, press F3.
•	To broadcast a message to all players during a game, press F4.

Choosing a level

Before playing a level with others over a network or modem, you must agree on which level to play. To enter your selection, press ENTER on the level you wish to play.  Since the shareware version only contains one multiplayer map, either hit ENTER on the map or on EXIT.

NOTE: If the game creator leaves the game at any time, all other players' connections will be dropped, and the remaining players will need to start a new game to reconnect.

MODEM PLAY

Modem play rules are the same as multiplayer network games, but the connection process is slightly different.

1.   Select Modem Connection for Direct Play.
2.   Join an existing multiplayer game or create a new multiplayer game.

•	To join an existing game, select Join existing game. If you want to automatically join the first multiplayer game found, select Auto-join first found game.
•	To see a list of all multiplayer games found, do not select Auto-join first found game.
•	To start a new multiplayer game for others to join, select Create new game.

NOTE: The game creator still sets the game's parameters and respawn options, and waits for the other person to join the game. The person JOINING a modem game is actually the caller (opposite of how many DOS games work) and after proceding byond "Joining a game," the caller must enter the number to call (presumably the number at which the other computer answers).

CONFIGURING THE GAME

From the Fire Fight Loader, select Options, and the Game Settings menu appears. Use the Game Settings Menu to redefine Controls, Troubleshoot, or modify the  Video and Sound Settings.

Game Settings Menu

Game

•	To add a new player, click Add, type in a player's name, and press ENTER.
•	To delete an existing player, highlight the player's name and click Delete.
•	To set the level of difficulty for each player, highlight the player's name and select either Normal or Challenge from the Difficulty box.
•	To delete your saved games and game settings, click Uninstall Fire Fight.

Controls

•	To Choose the method of control for your ship, select Keyboard, Mouse + Keyboard, or Joystick + Keyboard.
•	To customize your control settings, highlight the action you want to change then click Redefine. Now press the key or click the mouse button you would like to use to control the highlighted action.

NOTE: Each configuration is saved separately. If you're using a joystick, be sure to redefine the control settings in Joystick + Keyboard; if you're using the mouse, select Mouse + Keyboard.

•	To reset the controls to the most recent settings or the default settings, click Previous Settings or Factory Settings.

Video

Choose a setting for Low or High Resolution mode. You have the option to switch between Low and High Resolution during the game. Switching to Low Resolution is one way to increase the speed and smoothness of gameplay.

•	To force the game to load in Low Resolution only, select Load Low Resolution Data Only. This will decrease game load time significantly.

Sound

•	To control the overall sound volume with software settings, select CD Volume from the Music Volume Assigned To box. Or, to control the volume from your sound card, select Line In Volume.

NOTE: The shareware version of Fire Fight uses only MIDI music (the full version has a CD-audio soundtrack). You can still listen to audio CDs while playing Fire Fight, however. Simply disable the MIDI music by selecting the Line in Volume or CD Volume and insert an audio CD into your CD-ROM drive - Windows 95 should automatically open CD Player and play your audio disc.

•	To mute the music in Fire Fight, select Disable Music from the Miscellaneous Settings box. If you select Disable Spoken Dialog, communications between the commander, the pilot, and his team only appears on screen as text.

NOTE: To mute all sounds, click on the Troubleshooting tab and select Disable All Sounds from the Sound box.

•	To set the number of sound channels, select either 1, 2, 4, or 8 from the Sound Channels box. Make sure the number of sound channels you select is supported by your sound card. Selecting a lower number of sound channels decreases the number of sounds that can be played at one time, but may help increase the speed of gameplay.
•	To increase or decrease the sound quality, select one of the sampling rates from the Preferred Format of Mixing Buffer box. Selecting a lower sampling rate may help increase the speed of gameplay.

TROUBLESHOOTING

•	To set the number of times the game attempts to make a network connection, click the up/down arrows in the Network box.
•	To disable Direct Sound drivers or all sounds, select Disable Direct Sound Drivers or Disable All Sounds from the Sound box.
•	To disable Direct Draw drivers, select Disable Direct Draw Drivers from the Display box.

NOTE: If you have trouble getting the game to run in certain screen resolutions or with your particular graphics card, disable the Direct Draw drivers.

•	If you deleted the DirectX drivers and would like to re-install them, click Reinstall DirectX Drivers.

NOTE: The DirectX drivers can be automatically installed the first time you run Fire Fight.

•	If your joystick behaves erratically, adjust the Dead Zone Percent from the joystick box. As the Dead Zone Percent increases, so does the consistency of you joystick.

NOTE: If you still have problems with your joystick, see Joystick Trouble.

FIRE FIGHT OPTIONS

In Fire Fight you have the option to customize the look and sound of your game.

•	To modify you Fire Fight options, press ESC from the mission select or Game screen. The Options screen appears.         

Display

•	To adjust the Brightness of your screen, press the LEFT or RIGHT ARROW key.
•	To toggle the resolution or the amount of Detail displayed in the game, highlight the option and press ENTER.

NOTE: You can toggle the resolution, detail, and brightness of your screen without ever leaving the game. Press F5 to toggle high/low resolution, F6 to toggle high/low detail, F7 to decrease brightness, and F8 to increase brightness.

Sound

•	To adjust the volume of Fire Fight's sound effects or music, press the LEFT or RIGHT ARROW key.

NOTE: The shareware version playes MIDI music instead of CD-audio included with the full version of Fire Fight.  Some sound cards do not respond to the in-game music volume slider when MIDI music is played.  If this is the case with your sound card, please adjust the sound volume in your Windows mixer settings or with external speaker controls.

Controls

•	To select between Keyboard, Mouse and Joystick control, highlight your selection, and press ENTER.

NOTE: To toggle between Keyboard, Mouse, and Joystick control without leaving the game, press F11.

Mission

•	To exit your mission and return to the Fire Fight Loader, highlight Exit to Loader and press ENTER. The Fire Fight Loader appears.
•	To Restart Mission or Abort Mission, highlight your selection, and press ENTER.

NOTE: The option to restart or abort your current mission is not available when you press ESC from the Mission Select screen.

NOTE: To perform these functions directly from the game, press ALT+X to Exit To Loader, F9 to Restart Mission, and F10 to Abort Current Mission.

EXIT THE GAME

To exit Fire Fight and return to the Windows 95 operating system:

1.   Press ALT+X; an Abort overlay appears.
2.   Highlight Exit To Loader and press ENTER; the Fire Fight Loader appears.

•	To return to the mission, highlight Go Back and press ENTER.

3.   Click EXIT.

TROUBLESHOOTING

If you are having a problem loading the game, please make sure you have read thoroughly: the System Requirements, Before You Play, and Loading the Game sections.  If you have followed those directions and are still having trouble loading the game, below are some hints that may help solve the problem.

Joystick Trouble

Your joystick must be set up properly in Windows 95 before it will work with Fire Fight. If Windows 95 has properly detected your joystick, you should find a joystick icon in your Control Panel Settings.  If you are having trouble getting  your joystick to work correctly, use the Windows 95 joystick calibration utility from the Control Panel to set up the joystick.  For additional information about setting up a joystick in Windows 95, please refer to your Windows 95 documentation.

Modem Trouble

If you are experiencing any modem play slowdowns or disconnection problems, follow the steps below to correct the difficulty.

1. Open the Windows 95 Start menu, point to the Settings option and choose Control Panel. The Control Panel appears.
2.   Double-click the Modems icon.
3.   Select your modem and click the Properties button.
4.   Click the Connection tab, then click the Port Settings button.
5.   Drag the Receive and Transmit Buffer sliders to the lowest setting possible. This makes your 
connections more reliable and can help to speed up gameplay.

NOTE: If decreasing the buffer settings works, you may be able to increase these settings to optimize the speed of data transfer.

6.   If you are still experiencing difficulty, disable the Use FIFO Buffers option. If this does not increase gameplay speed, re-enable this option.

Performance

The game has a performance meter built-in. When the performance is poor, it displays a running "snail" in lower right corner of the screen. The snail is usually invisible, but becomes semi-transparent to opaque when performance is low. 

The game uses a mechanism built into Windows 95 called "virtual memory." Virtual Memory allows programs to use more memory than is physically available. The memory not present but requested by the program is emulated using "virtual memory file" (swap file) present on the hard drive. Usually programs use only a portion of the memory they request from the system; therefore the system can store unused memory in the swap file and load it again when the program tries to access this stored memory. Thanks to virtual memory, Fire Fight can be run on 8 MB machines even though it uses up to 40 MB of virtual memory. Unfortunately, such a large swap file places a high demand on a system equipped with only 8 MB of RAM, and Windows 95 has to spend a significant amount of time trying to fit all memory requested into 8 MB, which affects the game's performance. 

There are methods to reduce the game's demand for memory and other resources and improve its performance on slower machines:

Quit other running applications

Windows 95 is multi-tasking environment and divides its resources and processor power between running applications. Even if Fire Fight is the only active application, other programs can still be running in the background, using processing power that Fire Fight may need. 

Before starting the game, quit all running applications (including DOS based). Even one running application in background may slow down the game.

Use low resolution data only

Use only low resolution data when playing the game. Low resolution data uses less memory and can be displayed several times faster than high resolution data.

It is advised to load only low resolution data to reduce loading time and free the system from managing unused memory. Start Fire Fight and press the Options button. From the Game Options property sheet, select Video and check "Load low resolution data only." Press OK and start the game. Starting the game under these circumstances will result in faster loading and reduced memory requirements. The high resolution game won't be available but Fire Fight should perform far better.

Reduce detail level

Reducing the detail level when playing Fire Fight also helps improve the game's performance. Set to low detail level, Fire Fight does not display weather effects (snow, rain, night, clouds, etc.), light effects, flying debris, and multiple scrolling backgrounds (the parallax scrolling background planes will be displayed as a one color background).

Disable spoken dialogs

Spoken dialogs use another portion of available memory.  Disabling them further reduces the program's demand for memory.

To disable spoken dialogs, start Fire Fight and press the Options button. From the Game Options property sheet select Sound and check "Disable spoken dialogs." Start the game and you will see mission objectives displayed instead of spoken dialogs.

Reduce number of sound channels

The game's sound effects are mixed by the software: the more sounds playing simultaneously, the more CPU time is devoted to this process instead of processing the game's other tasks. Reducing the number of sound channels for sound effects will reduce the time the CPU has to spend processing them.

To change the number of active sound channels, start Fire Fight and press the Options button. From the Game Options property sheet select Sound and press a  radio button to your desired setting. Every sound effect in the game has a certain priority, so you won't miss any important sounds even if the number of channels is set to a low number.

Network performance

Most of the advice presented above will help increase the speed of Fire Fight, whether you're playing a single player or network game. 

It is important to know that the slowest machine connected in the network game can slow down all of  the other machines. Unless all of the players use sufficiently fast (or equal) machines, it is advised to play network games in low resolution with low detail to achieve the best performance. It is also important to note that even a fast machine running a high resolution network game can slow down other machines set for low resolution and low detail.

Network traffic greatly impacts the speed of the network games being played. At peak traffic times, Fire Fight may display lower frame rates than at times when a network is not as busy. If you experience problems, try changing to an alternate protocol (from IPX to TCP or vice-versa). Playing at times when your network is not busy yields the best results.

Saved games are not lost when difficulty level is changed

Every game configuration has 2 slots for saved games. One slot is active when "Normal" difficulty is selected, the other when "Challenge" is active.  If you change from "Normal" to "Challenge" and notice you are starting the game over, don't panic. Difficulty changes don't delete any saved games-- you can return to your previous saved game when the difficulty is changed back.

DirectX issues

Disabling DirectX drivers

Fire Fight has been designed to take advantage of DirectX technology. Unfortunately, this technology is quite new and many Windows  95 users may have problems with installing the DirectX drivers and running them correctly. To help users reliably play Fire Fight and avoid any inherent problems they have with DirectX technology, the game can be run using standard Windows 95 drivers at the cost of poorer performance and quality.

Fire Fight allows you to disable either Direct Draw or Direct Sound. Direct Play can't be disabled as it is required to play network and modem games.

To disable a particular DirectX component, start the game and press the Options button. From the Game Options property sheet, select Troubleshooting and check the "Do not use Direct Draw" and/or "Do not use Direct Sound" boxes.

When Direct Draw is disabled, the game will cover the desktop with a black background, and center the game on screen. The size of the active area is fixed despite the resolution selected and desktop size, therefore on large desktops (1024x768 and higher), the game display can be quite small. For best results, the desktop resolution should be changed to the closest possible resolution to 640x480. In addition, switching to "256-color mode" will dramatically improve the performance of the game when running without Direct Draw drivers.

When Direct Sound is disabled, the game will use standard multimedia drivers for the sound card installed. This reduces the sound effects to monophonic, single channel sounds. The player may notice longer gaps between actions and sounds when playing with Direct Sound disabled. 

DirectX installation problems

DirectX's setup and install are supplied by Microsoft® and does not check whether or not your system requires these drivers. For example, if you have newer version of display drivers than those supplied on Windows 95 CD-ROM (or disks) they will be replaced by the DirectX setup version that comes with Fire Fight. This type of overwrite may lose some of the features present in the drivers running previous to the install. You can reinstall these drivers, which will overwrite DirectX. If you want to have all of the new features of updated drivers and have Direct Draw support you have to ask the manufacturer of your hardware for updated drivers with Direct Draw support.

Direct Sound issues

Long sound latency

If your sound card is not natively supported by Direct Sound, the game will still run and play sound effects but it will use standard multimedia drivers to emulate Direct Sound features. This may result in increased sound latency, i.e. longer gaps between actions and sound effects that correlate with those actions. To improve this situation, you may wish to replace the current drivers with updated versions of Direct Sound. Contact your sound card manufacturer for information on obtaining these drivers.

Latency problems can also occur on sound cards supporting Direct Sound due to configuration changes. If you encounter such a problem and are sure that your card is natively supported by Direct Sound, you should try to reinstall DirectX drivers (Game Options/Troubleshooting/Reinstall DirectX drivers).

Note that some sound cards are not compatible with Fire Fight's Direct Sound. Gravis Ultrasound,  Max Ace, and Oak Technologies Mozart are not supported by Fire Fight.

The game claims that another application is using the sound card when there's no other application running

This may happen when the system is playing sounds for various events. The most common of these are when a sound is specified for starting applications - this sound can cause problems with the initialization of Fire Fight's sound drivers. To correct this problem, disable application startup sounds from Settings/Control Panels/Sounds in the Windows  95 START menu. After removing this option, the game should run without problems.

Direct Draw issues

One of the high resolution modes (letterboxed or full screen) doesn't work

Not all video cards support both high resolution modes of gameplay. If the chosen mode is not available, the game will display an error message. This can be corrected by switching to the alternate resolution mode (Game Options/Video/Display Mode).

In very rare cases, neither of the high resolution modes will be initialized. If so,  the game should be run in low resolution mode. Only low resolution data should be loaded to free the game from managing unused high resolution data (Game Options/Video/Load low resolution data only). 

Palette shift problems

In rare occurrences, the palette may shift (change to random bright colors) while changing resolution. If this problem occurs, don't panic. It can easily be remedied by hitting any one of the display control function keys (F5 - F8).

Note also that while the Fire Fight Loader is proceeding into the gameplay engine, it is normal to see your Windows  95 desktop background change palettes briefly as Fire Fight initializes it's own palette. 

Direct Play issues

Modem game for 3 or more players doesn't work

The game can't determine which of the network protocols/providers support 3-4 players. Therefore it is possible to setup a modem game for more than 2 players. Do not setup a modem game for more than 2 players because the game will never start.

Improving modem game performance 

Users may experience slowdown or jerkiness in Direct Play via modem. To help remedy this problem, be sure that the modem is set to 14,400 baud or better. Additionally using FIFO and transmission/receiving buffers may affect the speed of gameplay. These controls can be found in the Windows  95 START menu, Settings/Control Panel/Modems/Properties/Connection/Port Settings. To toggle FIFO enabled or disabled, use the check box "Use FIFO buffers."  If enabled, the sliders below this checkbox allow the user to set how large the transmit and receive buffers are. To improve performance, try putting these buffers at their lowest (left) setting. This should fix any jerkiness in modem play.

Direct Input issues

Install joystick in Windows 95 before playing Fire Fight with a joystick

To use a joystick in Fire Fight it has to be properly installed in Windows 95 first. Go to the Windows 95 START menu, Settings/Control Panel/Joystick. Choose the correct settings and calibrate the joystick. Now, the joystick is ready to use. You may use the same procedure to re-calibrate your joystick in the future, if needed.

Setup dead zone for over-sensitive joysticks 

Most PC joysticks are analog.  Fire Fight treats some joysticks as digital ones. This can result in over-sensitivity in joystick movement. To compensate for the problem, Fire Fight allows the player to set a "dead zone" for his joystick. When the joystick is set within this dead zone, its position is always considered to be neutral (center). When the movement is outside this dead zone, its position is equivalent to the maximum movement in one of directions. If your joystick seems to be oversensitive, increase the dead zone.

Start the game and press the Options button. From the Game Options property sheet, select Troubleshooting and enter a dead zone percentage under Joystick. 

CONTACT INFORMATION

The full version of Fire Fight is being distributed by Electronic Arts in retail stores and is also available directly from Epic MegaGames.

Epic MegaGames, Inc.
3204 Tower Oaks Blvd., #410
Rockville, MD 20852

Orders: 1-800-972-7434
Support: (301) 983-9771
Fax: (301) 299-3841

Visit our WorldWide Web site for the latest news on current and coming Epic releases: http://www.epicgames.com

Electronic Arts
PO Box 7530
San Mateo, CA 94403

http://www.ea.com

See the Ordering Information for more details on how to order Fire Fight, and what is included when you purchase the full version.

Enjoy the game!

High Score Entertainment
Epic MegaGames
Chaos Works

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