Alpha Centauri 2

Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri & Alien Crossfire => Modding => Bug/Patch Discussion => Topic started by: LucasQ82 on July 27, 2016, 01:18:56 AM

Title: Resolution Balooned in Fullscreen Mode After Patch of GOG Version
Post by: LucasQ82 on July 27, 2016, 01:18:56 AM

Hey guys, new to the forums, just reformatted my computer with new hard drives, and one of my necessities is of course, SMACX, I have the GOG version, and when I found your website here my heart soared, as I am a longtime lover of the game and it's predecessor, the original SMAC.  Well, long story short, I installed the required official patch, and then the latest Yitzi Patch which includes the PRACX patch inside of it, or so I read.

The problem is that now when I start the game in fullscreen (and fullscreen only) I am only able to view like one third of the actual screen (currently unplayable).  The game works just fine, although the intro video was ripping a bit, which i hope doesn't happen on the Secret Project vids, and in windowed mode, I can play just fine.  I just want to see the whole screen in fullscreen, any help, or whatnot?  I'm running Windows 10.

Title: Re: Resolution Balooned in Fullscreen Mode After Patch of GOG Version
Post by: Buster's Uncle on July 27, 2016, 04:28:22 PM

I'm sorry that nobody who can help with this has been by yet - Plotinus doesn't check in regularly, and Yitzi's --- I don't actually know why, but he's been a little scarce in recent months.  RL happening, no doubt.

-Good chance he'll see this along about Sunday, so keep checking back, and sorry for the delay.  Your problem's way, way over my own head...

Title: Re: Resolution Balooned in Fullscreen Mode After Patch of GOG Version
Post by: BFG on July 27, 2016, 05:43:40 PM

You could always try the old DirectDraw=0 trick in the INI file.  That helped me run it in proper resolution on Windows 10, though I'm using the CD ROM based version.

Title: Re: Resolution Balooned in Fullscreen Mode After Patch of GOG Version
Post by: LucasQ82 on July 27, 2016, 07:41:43 PM

I actually googled all sorts of fixes and tried to search this forum before posting. I tried the direct draw solution but it did nothing for my problem

Title: Re: Resolution Balooned in Fullscreen Mode After Patch of GOG Version
Post by: Yitzi on July 27, 2016, 09:16:31 PM

I have never seen this bug, so I have no clue what's going on.  I do not have Windows 10; anyone who does, your input would be appreciated.

Also, the PRACX patch might help, as that does a lot with graphics.

Title: Re: Resolution Balooned in Fullscreen Mode After Patch of GOG Version
Post by: Buster's Uncle on July 27, 2016, 09:30:33 PM

Could he have not activated PRAX?  He said he had a version of yours -latest, presumably- that included it...

Title: Re: Resolution Balooned in Fullscreen Mode After Patch of GOG Version
Post by: LucasQ82 on July 27, 2016, 09:43:02 PM

How does one go about activating it? I seem to be able to access the functionality it claims to add to it,  like the pracx options menu and the shortcut keys like tab to change to windowed mode...any ideasor tutorials on pracx then?

Title: Re: Resolution Balooned in Fullscreen Mode After Patch of GOG Version
Post by: gwillybj on July 27, 2016, 11:02:35 PM

I am new to Win10 (as of last Friday), and have SMACX running great with Yitzi's latest patch. I fiddled with PRACX a few times enough to know I don't really need it. I'm too used to the original view after playing regularly since 2000.

In "Alpha Centauri.ini" you will find at the bottom a section under [PRACX] like this:

[PRACX]
Disabled=<DEFAULT>
ScreenWidth=<DEFAULT>
ScreenHeight=<DEFAULT>

These are only the first lines; there are 13 options.

If Disabled=<DEFAULT> then PRACX is ON and all of the options will be available.
If you change this to 1 it will be OFF and none of the other settings will apply.

I don't know what the defaults are for ScreenWidth and ScreenHeight, but if you put in your screen's native resolution the game will play full screen.

Title: Re: Resolution Balooned in Fullscreen Mode After Patch of GOG Version
Post by: LucasQ82 on July 28, 2016, 04:41:40 AM

Thank you everyone so far for the advice, messing with these settings has been fruitless for me so far.  It's like only the upper left corner of the screen is visible for some reason.  My screen that I game on is actually a 4k television, and I normally run things on the computer in 1900 x 1080 or 1900 x 1200. The setting are doing something, in windowed mode I can tell they have an effect, but this is all for naught any way I cut it with the fullscreen.  Settings turned off or on for the PRACX seems to not matter and entering both my actual television's resolution or my usual 1900 x either 1080 or 1200 doesn't help either.

Title: Re: Resolution Balooned in Fullscreen Mode After Patch of GOG Version
Post by: LucasQ82 on July 28, 2016, 05:01:11 AM

Here is a picture of what it ends up looking like

Title: Re: Resolution Balooned in Fullscreen Mode After Patch of GOG Version
Post by: BFG on July 28, 2016, 04:59:38 PM

It almost looks to me like it's being drawn in the expected 1920 x 1080 resolution, but only displaying 1024 x 768 (the highest resolution that was available in the original game) on-screen.

Assuming that you have a dedicated graphics card, have you tried adjusting resolution or windows settings in it specifically for this game?  I'd also wonder if you're running in a Windows compatibility mode or something of that nature that could be affecting the output.  Really, I'm grasping at straws here - these don't seem too likely.

Title: Re: Resolution Balooned in Fullscreen Mode After Patch of GOG Version
Post by: gwillybj on July 28, 2016, 05:07:44 PM

There used to be in Alpha Centauri.ini a line under [Alpha Centauri]

Display Mode=1024 (or 800)

If that's in your ini file you can delete the line with no ill effects and it might help your situation.
Guessing again :dunno:

Title: Re: Resolution Balooned in Fullscreen Mode After Patch of GOG Version
Post by: LucasQ82 on July 29, 2016, 09:40:01 PM

Thank you both for continuing to help me out, I'll look into the thing about compatability,  as far as that line in the .ini, i actually already scoured it looking for something like that to no avail. ;zak; ;ulrik;

Title: Re: Resolution Balooned in Fullscreen Mode After Patch of GOG Version
Post by: jroussey on April 24, 2018, 11:08:00 AM

Quote from: LucasQ82 on July 27, 2016, 01:18:56 AM

Hey guys, new to the forums, just reformatted my computer with new hard drives, and one of my necessities is of course, SMACX, I have the GOG version, and when I found your website here my heart soared, as I am a longtime lover of the game and it's predecessor, the original SMAC.  Well, long story short, I installed the required official patch, and then the latest Yitzi Patch which includes the PRACX patch inside of it, or so I read.

The problem is that now when I start the game in fullscreen (and fullscreen only) I am only able to view like one third of the actual screen (currently unplayable).  The game works just fine, although the intro video was ripping a bit, which i hope doesn't happen on the Secret Project vids, and in windowed mode, I can play just fine.  I just want to see the whole screen in fullscreen, any help, or whatnot?  I'm running Windows 10.

I know that this is a pretty severe necro, AND I'm posting here for the first time, but as no one ever posted a possible fix/workaround for this issue, I wanted to briefly stop by since I'm sure we're not the only 2 people who have had this issue. I had the exact same issue as the OP; his screenshot was spot on. After scouring Dr. Google for answers without luck, I started playing with a few basic compatibility settings. The later poster suggesting an issue with a compatibility mode seems to have been correct.

Under the compatibility tab for the modded terranx.exe, no boxes are checked by default. All I did was check the box marked 'Override high DPI scaling behavior. Scaling performed by:" and I chose 'application' under the corresponding drop down box. After that the game displays correctly in full-screen mode (and windowed of course), both on my laptop screen and on the monitor I use to play games. Both are at 1920 x 1080 and it looks fantastic.

Surely a fairly random post, and although I have very little time due to RL (3 kids... oldest of which is only 3 1/2), I will try to post and support this community in whatever tiny ways I can. I remember getting this game back in... 4th? grade, and being very confused by whatever on earth (planet?) a probe team was, but the game still holds my attention a couple of decades later.

Title: Re: Resolution Balooned in Fullscreen Mode After Patch of GOG Version
Post by: Hagen0 on May 15, 2020, 04:09:50 PM

LucasQ82's solution worked. Thanks. I never would have found that on my own.