No Mutants Allowed

Tannhauser · Posted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 1:24 Post subject: Fallout2.exe Patcher

jdoe407 has created a Fallout2.exe patcher, which allows users to change Fallout 2's resolution and the speed of the World Map. From jdoe407's thread on our forums:

This has been designed for the 1.02d us executable and I can't guarantee that it will run on anything else. There are still many bugs with fallout2 when running with a higher resolution.

The patcher is run in the same directory as Fallout2.exe. What it does is it takes the original executable, makes a copy of it and then applies a few patches to it depending on what information you give to it via the gui.

The slider bar in the "World Map" section determines how much you want to slow the world map down by. The higher the bar, the slower it will get. To enable or disable it, just simply check or uncheck the "Slow Down World Map" check box

The way I patched the file this time did require the removal of error checking functions. All that the patch changes are the destinations to some jumps/calls. The patch also re-writes the resolution picking function into a much more compact system.

Most of the interfaces are in the upper left corner because I'm not too sure on how the mouse events work just yet. The larger the resolution... the more errors you will have when loading different areas. For those who wanted crazy resolutions, you can have them.

Fallout2Patcher_V2 binary: http://www.jdoe407.com/cpp/precompiled/win32/Fallout2Patcher_V2.zip
Fallout2Patcher_V2 source: http://www.jdoe407.com/cpp/cpp-win32/Fallout2Patcher/Fallout2Patcher_V2.zip
The development of the resolution/mapspeed hacks can be seen in the thread here.

At this point, the largest issue with higher resolutions seems to be somewhat screwy dialogue screens.

Great work jdoe407, and to all the other modders in our forums that made this possible! We all look forward to further releases.

Thanks to Ozrat for spotting this.

Edit: Uploaded to the NMA server also.

Maphusio · Posted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 3:27 Post subject:

Bitchen' I always wanted to dink around with a set up like this.
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"When it comes to Fallout fans, ignorance, stupidity and arrogance is bad combination, because this is a community that has all of those. Since I've already opened the door there, they're loathsome human beings, who I hope really get a horrible disease and die." -Alan "Delsyn" Rausch

Mad Max RW · Posted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 4:13 Post subject:

Shame it's practically unplayable at anything above the default 640x480 resolution. But what you can see looks really good.

Jagasian · Posted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 6:27 Post subject:

Simply awesome! Hopefully it gets polished to perfection. Right now it is simply a proof of concept, but not really playable, right?

Maphusio · Posted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 7:19 Post subject:

I guess thats the concensus
_________________
"When it comes to Fallout fans, ignorance, stupidity and arrogance is bad combination, because this is a community that has all of those. Since I've already opened the door there, they're loathsome human beings, who I hope really get a horrible disease and die." -Alan "Delsyn" Rausch

Bet · Posted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 8:52 Post subject:

Hah, this looks pretty awesome. I'm saving a Fallout 2 playthrough for summer (don't want it tainted by a semester from hell), but heck, now that I've seen part of New Reno at 1600x1200, I want to take shots of all the locations at that res. Looks like Fallout Tactics...nice and clean. Unplayable, but sure is cool to look at. The Fallout world has always blown me away with the painstaking detail put into the environmental. Fallout Tactics most of all, but without F1 & 2, there would be no pretty Tactics maps.

The world-map slow-downer is intriguing, though. I used the program Turbo to make the world map go at a manageable rate before, but the bad thing is that it increases the load times (no separation between world map and everything else that uses the CPU). I guess this might work with the same method, but hell again, it's worth trying.

Fez · Posted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 18:10 Post subject:

Odd, I never had any problems with the world map travel being too fast. I didn't realise that it was such a common complaint it required modding.
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"Any hole's a goal."

Silencer · Posted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 18:21 Post subject:

It varies with machines. I never got it either.
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dude_obj · Posted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 18:48 Post subject:

Phil · Posted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 20:08 Post subject:

Now THAT's some frickin' amazing work ! I still remember how great it was to see IanOut using those high resolutions.

Awesome !
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'Mundus vult decipi, ergo decipio ..'

Wild_qwerty · Posted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 20:51 Post subject:

Yea, the only other problem is that the maps were only designed to be viewed at 640x480 res, so at higher resolutions you can sometimes see blank areas of the map. But this is an easy fix, the maps jsut need updating to fill in those blank areas Smile

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dude_obj · Posted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 21:02 Post subject:

Wild_qwerty · Posted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 22:36 Post subject:

would this set work for 640x480 as well? In other words would the higher res maps be backwards compatible with the low res mode?

So in theory you could make a 1024x768 version that would work for 800x600 as well.

Not that it matters as I only have a 15" monitor and will play 800x600 Smile

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agris · Posted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 23:39 Post subject:

If the community where to produce maps that fill in the blank spots and scroll-blockers for their respective resolution, couldn't the program be made to insert the appropriate map for the selected resolution?

So if A. decides he wants to play in 800x600, it would load dude_obj's 800x600 maps, or if B. wants to play in 1024x768 they would load different maps, optimized for that reso.

dude_obj · Posted: Mon Mar 07, 2005 23:48 Post subject:

Wild_qwerty · Posted: Tue Mar 08, 2005 0:08 Post subject:

I suspose if some artists were foudn to extend those custom tiles, it would help. But of course the smaller the res, the less new art that will be required.
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Maphusio · Posted: Tue Mar 08, 2005 0:13 Post subject:

scatman839 · Posted: Tue Mar 08, 2005 17:09 Post subject:

ahhhhhhh, increasse resolution, weeeeee
*runs around like a giddy schoolgirl*
*thump*

hvkasteren · Posted: Wed Mar 09, 2005 22:01 Post subject:

macke · Posted: Fri Mar 11, 2005 15:24 Post subject:

Will there be support for widescreen resolutions?
I'm currently running 1600x1024. Perhaps, if possible, have a button that runs FO2 at desktop resolution (which in my case would indeed be 1600x1024). I would assume that to be the most prominent option for less common resolutions.

If possible at all that is. Very cool work anyways!