WC1 Problems (slowdown)

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I'm trying to run WC1 using DOSBox. Everything seems to work just fine, however when i'm in the actual missions I suffer SEVERE slowdown whenever there's a lot of ships on screen. I'm not sure if this is DOSBox's fault or if the actual game had this slowdown (it's been years since I played it). On missions with a cruise ship and a bunch of fighters it slows down to a crawl.

I tried the Kilrathi Saga version and there was no slow down whatsoever. However, the victory fanfare kept repeating over and over and it got very annoying (is there any fix to this?) so I went back to the DOS version.

I am running the game at 3500 cycles using the dynamic core. I have an Athlon 64 2800+ processer and an ATI Radeon X800 Pro. I have 512MB of RAM.

I'm running Windows XP SP1 (had nothing but problems with SP2).

I'm running on DOSBox v0.63. I tried 0.65 and had the same problem.
 
Also, the music isn't slowing down, just the action (ships moving, rate of fire) which makes me think it could just be the game itself? I don't know why the KS version wouldn't have it though if it was built in slowdown.
 
Don't use dynamic core. It makes the game unstable like that. Also do use 0.65 if you can. Your computer is plenty powerful to run core=normal at 3500 cycles.
 
I switched over to normal core and it did the same thing.

I guess it's just part of the game, though I don't remember it being this bad.
 
Unregistered said:
I switched over to normal core and it did the same thing.

I guess it's just part of the game, though I don't remember it being this bad.
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Did you try to increase the cycles a little while playing? Did it help? 3500 should be enough cycles but what happens at 4000?
 
AD said:
Did you try to increase the cycles a little while playing? Did it help? 3500 should be enough cycles but what happens at 4000?
Click to expand...

When I increase the cycles, it DOES improve the framerate in close combat, however, when i'm not in close combat (or on board the tiger's claw) everything runs too fast. It basically raises the slowdowned parts to normal speed and everything else to too fast speed.

I read on the "How to get Old Games to work in DOSBOX" thread that someone else had the same problem in WCII, but DOSBox 0.65 fixed it. I upgraded to 0.65 but I still have the same problem. I'm just playing through the game anyway, as it kind of makes it easier since I have more time to line up my shots. :) It is kind of annoying though when I'm taking on a crusier and it takes like 10 seconds for the missle lock to lock on.
 
Unregistered said:
When I increase the cycles, it DOES improve the framerate in close combat, however, when i'm not in close combat (or on board the tiger's claw) everything runs too fast. It basically raises the slowdowned parts to normal speed and everything else to too fast speed.

I read on the "How to get Old Games to work in DOSBOX" thread that someone else had the same problem in WCII, but DOSBox 0.65 fixed it. I upgraded to 0.65 but I still have the same problem. I'm just playing through the game anyway, as it kind of makes it easier since I have more time to line up my shots. :) It is kind of annoying though when I'm taking on a crusier and it takes like 10 seconds for the missle lock to lock on.
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The dos version of WC2 has a frame limiter. So it may seem fast, but that is probably how it's supposed to be. My slowed down old 386 seemed normal way back when too.
 
I found this on another forum.

And of course back then I didn't have DOSBox, which lets me combat the annoyance that the speed of the game depended on the processor resources available... which vary according to how many enemies, asteroids, etc. there are in the game just now!
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So it is a part of the game then. Basically I have it set at 3500 which runs everything else at normal speed, however it's not enough power to run the game when there's a lot of stuff going on. If I give it more power, it speeds everything else up since there is no frame rate limiter on WC1.

Ugh. I wish I could get that stupid fanfare glitch in KS fixed. At least there it played smooth. ;)

Oh well, I'll take what I can get. :)
 
It shouldn't be a "severe" difference though. I only seem to need to tweak the cycles up during a few of the larger battles. There is another trick you could try. Set cycles=auto in the .conf file and see how that goes.
 
Set it to "auto". The game ran way too fast with that on. Very strange, considering how well the "auto" setting works in other games (King's Quest series for example).

I moved my saved game over to the KS version and am playing it through on that. The last few sections of the game (Rostov, etc.) have so many asteroid fields that it was simply unbearable to play. The fanfare glitch is ultra-annoying however I just try my best to tune it out.

Thanks a lot guys for your suggestions. I don't blame DOSBox for the problem, but Origin for not introducing some kind of frame limiter way back when they coded it. ;)

It's interesting to note that no matter how high I set the cycles, the barracks and bar screens stay the same frame rate. I wonder why Origin didn't use similar coding tactics with everything else (talking, cutscenes, flying).
 
Unregistered said:
Thanks a lot guys for your suggestions. I don't blame DOSBox for the problem, but Origin for not introducing some kind of frame limiter way back when they coded it. ;)
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They did starting with The Secret Missions 2: Crusade. It's possible to rename your savegames to load there and use that game's limiter. Be aware that Dralthis will be replaced by Dralthi IIs, and you'll have Jazz's head replacing Bossman and such.
 
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