Ahoy, sailors.
Everyone (susceptible) knows that the games based on the ancient HoI 2 DD Arma engine (meaning: AoD, IC and DH, plus the first mentioned itself) crash on loading for an AMD graphic card users (I am one). Apparently AMD cleaned up their DirectX code for any version up to 9.0c and wrapped up stuff referring to those libraries, in the latest driver packages. Anyway, after Crimson v15.7.1 or so, issues began to occur.
Exactly two files, supplied with the each game's installation, are responsible for that behavior:
That's because they exceed the cap for any size dimension of 8192 pixels for a "texture", of any DirectX before 10 (including DDraw, on which the games' engines are based), venturing themselves into the almost 11000 pixels territory. Previously that worked by accident on AMD drivers. And it apparently still works by accident on nVidia/Intel graphic drivers.
I simply and decisively cut down those nuisances by half, to 5310 pixels (to maintain the pixel ratio for the each "frame" in the graphic file; the firing animations and their frames are repeated sequences, anyway, so it was logical to reduce by 50%) and the game loaded with no fuss. In every single title, mind you. And this way one can retain the original sprites. Works for Windows XP/7/8/8.1/10 and even for Wine emulation for Linux, plus all versions of AMD drivers.
INSTALLATION:
1. Download the edited .BMPs from here.
2. Unpack the stuff into the X:\Your AoD or IC or DH or HoI 2 DD Arma Installation Directory\GFX\MAP\UNITS\BMP\ and overwrite.
3. You're done and can now play the game.
OPTIONAL:
You can change the corresponding .SPRs files (they contain animation codes for the engine) now, but it's not required. If you wish to, open them up (Windows Notepad will be enough) and change the "Frames" value from 79 to 39 (in both files), then save. Do that if you want to match the amount of displayed frames (by the engine) with the amount of actual frames (of the edited .BMPs); otherwise you will see the animation being faster, but it's rather passable. Files (use "Search" function in your OS):
ATTENTION!!!
If you beforehand applied any other solutions fixing this problem by changing any of the .BMP or .SPR files - you NEED to install fresh! Otherwise it WILL NOT work properly if you don't know what you're doing and/or have still any leftovers from the other fixes. You can always move saves between the installations.
That is all, comrades.
CREDITS: @Zsar1 for the very important information and collaboration.
Everyone (susceptible) knows that the games based on the ancient HoI 2 DD Arma engine (meaning: AoD, IC and DH, plus the first mentioned itself) crash on loading for an AMD graphic card users (I am one). Apparently AMD cleaned up their DirectX code for any version up to 9.0c and wrapped up stuff referring to those libraries, in the latest driver packages. Anyway, after Crimson v15.7.1 or so, issues began to occur.
Exactly two files, supplied with the each game's installation, are responsible for that behavior:
- T-carrier a-fire c-min d-ne.bmp
- T-carrier a-fire c-min d-sw.bmp
That's because they exceed the cap for any size dimension of 8192 pixels for a "texture", of any DirectX before 10 (including DDraw, on which the games' engines are based), venturing themselves into the almost 11000 pixels territory. Previously that worked by accident on AMD drivers. And it apparently still works by accident on nVidia/Intel graphic drivers.
I simply and decisively cut down those nuisances by half, to 5310 pixels (to maintain the pixel ratio for the each "frame" in the graphic file; the firing animations and their frames are repeated sequences, anyway, so it was logical to reduce by 50%) and the game loaded with no fuss. In every single title, mind you. And this way one can retain the original sprites. Works for Windows XP/7/8/8.1/10 and even for Wine emulation for Linux, plus all versions of AMD drivers.
***
INSTALLATION:
1. Download the edited .BMPs from here.
2. Unpack the stuff into the X:\Your AoD or IC or DH or HoI 2 DD Arma Installation Directory\GFX\MAP\UNITS\BMP\ and overwrite.
3. You're done and can now play the game.
OPTIONAL:
You can change the corresponding .SPRs files (they contain animation codes for the engine) now, but it's not required. If you wish to, open them up (Windows Notepad will be enough) and change the "Frames" value from 79 to 39 (in both files), then save. Do that if you want to match the amount of displayed frames (by the engine) with the amount of actual frames (of the edited .BMPs); otherwise you will see the animation being faster, but it's rather passable. Files (use "Search" function in your OS):
- T-carrier a-fire c-min d-ne.spr
- T-carrier a-fire c-min d-sw.spr
***
ATTENTION!!!
If you beforehand applied any other solutions fixing this problem by changing any of the .BMP or .SPR files - you NEED to install fresh! Otherwise it WILL NOT work properly if you don't know what you're doing and/or have still any leftovers from the other fixes. You can always move saves between the installations.
That is all, comrades.
***
CREDITS: @Zsar1 for the very important information and collaboration.
Last edited:
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