Gunrunner

And the right door is door number... *drum roll* 3. IIRC nose_gear_door1 is the main door. nose_gear_door2 is the part attached to the gear. nose_gear_door3 is the frontmost part, the one we're interested in.

And that's when we realised we had MiGs on our tails. Our "escort" didn't fare much better.

Yes, you can. The Knowledge Base is your friend. http://forum.combatace.com/forum/176-adding-terrains/ Edit : Yeah yeah, I know, it's for SFP1, yet it works as long as you are converting any GroundObject, putting things in the proper folders and don't mind the "Oh ! I can see through mountains !" bug that seems to affect SF1 terrains ported to SF2. Most terrains are a case of dropping the terrain in the right place. In SF2 your terrain folder is in C:\users\[username]\saved games\Thirdwire\[gamename]\Terrains .

While we're on preloading, it would be great if the engine didn't flush video and system memory after each mission, that would save some time at the start of the next mission. As it is, the engine reads ressources from disk to load them in video/system memory at the start of a mission (with video memory updates during the mission) and flushes everything afterwards. If you use the same ressources in the next mission, it loads it again in memory having to read from disk again. With an index of loaded ressources and no flush, it would be easy to keep the needed ressources (cutting on disk reading time) and replace the others by the needed ones (suppression/replacement in memory has virtually no time cost), cutting load times. And yes, even with SSDs, it takes way too long on a heavily modded install.

Have you thought of using Lexx_Luthor's method for generating auroras and cirruses instead, that may prove a better way to do it (of course my stumbling block with that approach is that it doesn't work only for inclement and I ran out of time to experiment).

Another point, keep in mind that you can't upgrade a 7 x86 installation to a 7 x64 one, you have to replace it (well, in theory you could do it but it requires knowledge and, above all, a lot of time to do it properly). Otherwise it's pretty straightforward, everything 32bit just works, plus everything that has a 64bit version benefits from more RAM and performance. The only things NOT working with a 64bit version are old hardware with no 64 bit driver (for usb peripherals you can use the Windows XP Mode), 8 (but they never worked on any WinNT) and 16bit apps (but I think they are deprecated in the 32bit version as well, and you can, once more, use the XP mode to use them). Also keep in mind that despite having more RAM, you won't benefit from it with 32bit apps, as all 32 bit apps won't address more memory and they share the same memory pool (meaning that even if you have 12Gb RAM you wont be able to use more than 2Gb per app or 4Gb among all 32bit apps). Last point, if you have a fairly recent (and decent) DX10 or 11 graphic card, you really should think to transition to SF2, on Vista/Seven systems it actually performs better than SFP1 with DX9. Be also sure to have SF automatically deactivating Aero to get better performances.

Stock terrains are "special", since you don't need a directory for them to show up, the engine reads the CAT files in the program directory, for all 3rd party terrains, the "local" behaviour still applies. In fact, you can deactivate stock terrains by creating a directory with the right name and an empty [TerrainNAME].ini. P.S. : And that apparently won't stop the engine to read the ressources of the deactivated terrains to be read if they are called by a 3rd party terrain.

Alt + D ? Alt + D cycle through the different overlay data, including basic data, basic + FPS count, complete debug information, no info displayed.

Well, were does the "real" Saved Games folder point to ? The "real" Saved Games folder is only symbolic, it points wherever you tell it to. Some programs write to that symbolic (it is neither a true junction nor a true symlink, mostly because it uses some tricks for multilanguage support) representation (or Windows translates it), meaning the files are written to wherever it points to (ie. to d:\saved_games), others seem to write statically to c:\users\#user\Saved Games, properly using #user as a variable but not the rest (apparently the case of ThirdWire's installer). What must have happened is that the target of your Saved Games folder had been changed, while the game itself reads from the symbolic representation, thus not finding your modded install.

Try to manipulate the files not through the Enda Curtin pseudo-hierarchy but by manipulating directly from c:\users\enda curtin\saved games. If that doesn't work, can you tell us how the directory appears from the command line ? (Win key, type command, Enter (should do the trick and put you at the right place), type dir, Enter, and tell us if you still see 2 saved games directories and how they appear). P.S. : Damn, I forgot about that, have you tried to right click on the Saved games special folder (the one with the special icon) the 4th tab gives you a path, what does it read ? If it reads anything else than C:\Users\Enda Curtin\Saved Games, try setting it to that (of course you should make a copy of both directories just in case something goes horribly wrong)).

Which version of Windows are you using ? If you are using Vista or 7, make sure you have Strike Fighters set to automatically deactivate Aero when it starts, it may make a noticeable difference. To get an idea of where the bottleneck is, use the ALT-D combination in game until you bring up the FPS count, it will indicate both the CPU and GPU FPS, if the CPU one is noticeably higher, then the GPU's your bottleneck (most likely), if both are close, then you're CPU bound. Also try to play with other factors like Anti Aliasing modes and levels, Anisotropic filters and mipmap levels with your graphic driver instead of letting the game decide, you might get a better compromise between quality and speed. Bear in mind that tweaking settings is a more cost efficient method to improve playability, as by purchasing more hardware you'll want to push the settings higher and end up where you started (albeit with a nicer looking game).

Ok, after testing, the only Shader being problematic with the 5xxx series seems to be envCloudLayer. So, there is a fix available without having to deactivate all the advanced shaders. Step 1. Extract environmentsystem.ini from FlightData.cat (in /program files/thirdwire/strike fighters 2/flight). Step 2. Copy it to /users/saved games/thirdwire/StrikeFighters2 Europe|Vietnam|etc.../flight Step 3. Edit it, replacing EffectShaderName=envCloudLayer.fx with EffectShaderName=twColor1.fx in the [CloudLayerMaterial] entry. Ideally, for each new Catalyst release or SF2 patch you should remove this modified ini to test if the problem's fixed, and if it is not after a SF2 patch, repeat the procedure instead of reusing the same file.

There should also be an environmentsystem.ini fix as this problem doesn't happen with NF4+ and a few other mods changing environment parameters (haven't looked into it yet).

You are indeed courageous to try such an endeavour, cornered as you are by O'Brian/Aubrey on one side and Forester/Hornblower on the other... so far so good

It's the trouble of our "modern" civilisation, seems we can't understand anymore that diseases, decay, pain and death are a natural part of life, that diseases can kill the weakest individuals, that an unusually cold winter or hot summer will reduce life expectancy of the oldest by several month... The whole thing is blown out of proportion by the media, the governments trying to prove to populations they are in control and scientists going on record without giving clues on the real meaning of some words and no precise context. Come on, in France, we had a scientist explaining that yes, we might end up with curfews, interdictions to assemble, the whole nine yards... should enough cases be spotted... Yeah right, almost martial law for what ? A nasty flu ? What would it be for anything nastier ? Burn all infected individuals alive with a flame-thrower ? Gah... people are morons -_-

Well, it makes for a better headline than "Government communication SNAFU, idiots panick, mayor takes opportunity to push his own agenda"

One is a phenomenon observed in recent times, documented, happening regularly, the casualties are the inexorable consequence of a known cause, another is one no-one witnessed in recent times, only a theoretical construction backed up by evidences it probably already happened thousands of years ago, but none it happened more recently, at least not on a scale and at such a high frequency as to be a credible explanation for the supposed mystery (can't be bothered to search for it now, but there is a survey of the region by the USGS and an interview of a USGS geologist on that topic online somewhere), it is a cause in search of a consequence, a solution in search of a problem, for it aims to explain something that bloody doesn't exist (the supposed abnormal number of ship disparition in the region) while not helping at all for the part that "might" be mysterious (the supposed freak magnetic field in the region, strangely enough only affecting planes (you never hear of ships having the same problem; probably the Atlants don't need their magnetic guns for ships, as they already have their methane torpedos for that purpose)). The easiest is to follow the money... If there was an abnormal number of incidents in the region, the insurance, financially hurt by such situations, would make it's utmost to either discover and eradicate the reason, or force its customer to change course if they want to stay insured... The insurance doesn't want to lose money. None of this happened, with Lloyds going all the way to check their records... On the other hand, there is money to be made by keeping the mystery alive, by publishing books claiming there are unsolved mysteries and paranormal or exotic explanations to them, ad revenues to be made by producing clever programs demonstrating the latest "scientific" explanation for an inexistant mystery. In short, more money is to be made by playing on the superstitious and stupid nature of humans than by searching and propagating the truth... It also fills the role of being "a place of adventure and mystery", something sorely lacking in our globalized and already well-surveyed world, we no longer can dream of the faraway coasts of africa with strange beasts, people walking on their heads, people with eyes in the back of their heads, people with only one giant leg... we know it's all malarkey, as TV shows us every day and a plane ticket will prove us... so we have to look elsewhere to find fantasy and adventure in this world, and legends and myths survive and are born because of this need to believe in weird things.