WiR/Pac Display Modes

[DeadInThrench]

Hmmm... I had played Second Front some many years ago (still have it on my computer) and also Western Front which was one of the few strategy games that I ultimately played from beginning to end and thoroughly enjoyed... but been out of War/Strategy Games but getting back into it recently.... found WiR and Pac out on an abandonedware site and DLed... and just a couple of days ago found the updated versions of both here and DLed.

Now.... I had actually started a Second Front scenario some months ago (had won the 1941 winter scenario years ago with great difficulty and was now taking on the Stalingrad scenario) but with the new versions decided to do some experimenting... to see if I could get Pac and WiR to come up... in a window (no problem with the games running... come up in fullscreen normally but... still would be nice in a window).

And... using DOSBox.... I was able to do this. However... a problem..... when both originally come up... they are in 640x400 display mode... then... for the matrix credits screen.... they go to 640x480. Then.... they drop to 640x348 for the game and.... 640x348 is... kinda small. My display otherwise is 1024x768 and... I guess it is still playable but... again... kinda small.

One of the nice things about DOSBox... is you can go from windowed to fullscreen just by entering CTRL-Enter... but what happens here... is when you go to DOSBox with these games... it puts the 640x348 on a 640x480 display.. by putting the 348 in the middle and the top and bottom parts of the screen are... black.

This is not necessarily bad... and it appears that on the normal fullscreen (without DOSBox)... on my system it looks like my monitor doesn't actually support 640x348 and so the thing is faked and... I can kinda see black space between each line and thus.... what I get is readable but not as much as you would like. With the DOSBox fullscreen.... crunched a bit but more readable (I believe my monitor fakes the 640x480 as well, will only support down to 800x600 normally under control panel... but less faking needed for 640x480 compared to 640x348 and thus... crunched a bit but more readable).

Yeah... with the DOSBox fullscreen kinda looks like a movie seen on TV where it has not been edited to fit the screen... and there is black space on the top and bottom. What is interesting here... is with this... the flags in Pac and the units in WiR... become rectangular and... the more I look at them.... the more I wonder if this is how they were originally intended to look.

In any case... with the quality of these two games given the subject and the attention to detail... one might just believe that there need not ever be any other games on this subject (assuming you are disposed to handle the level of detail provided). But, the graphics could surely stand an upgrade to fit into the more modern environments but... I guess we are not gonna see that happen, no?

Whatever, just thought I'd post my experience here in case anyone found it interesting or otherwise had any comments.

Thanks,

DiT

[delatbabel]

Having been a graphics programmer under DOS many years ago, I can give you some of the story. I haven't seen inside the code of course.

WiR and SF use a very old graphics toolkit from Borland called BGI. It didn't have a VGA mode when it was first released, its highest resolution was for the EGA which is 640x350. VGA came later at 640x480 but at first VGA was only supported in EGA resolution of 640x350. So a lot of graphics programs that used BGI even in VGA mode only worked at 640x350 and not 640x480. 640x350 was a fairly important resolution in the pre-HIMEM days because it was the highest resolution at which a memory mapped card could effectively support two simultaneously updating screen buffers (which is required for basic animation), which is another reason for BGI's continued support for that resolution even after 640x480 became more common.

What you're seeing on your screen is really an artifact of using DOSBOX, which assumes you are running at VGA resolution of 640x480, when the display is in fact 640x350. If you had a DOS machine with an EGA card and display actually running at 640x350 then you'd see something quite different. I have a 20" Dell widescreen monitor and my home PC runs Linux, and WiR running under DOSBOX in Linux on that display in fullscreen mode I get a 640x350 screen neatly covering the entire display. Generally in Linux the monitor runs at 1600x1050 so it's a bit of a step-down. The monitor has a minor hiccup as I switch into or out of full screen mode with DOSBOX, and takes a second or two to recover, but other than that it's fine. So no black bars for me at the top and bottom, but I do see them on my laptop which runs at 1024x768.

Back in the DOS / BGI days they didn't have 1024x768 resolution on anything, so you wouldn't have gotten game designers coding for it.

[JagdFlanker]

this took me hours and hours and hours of fiddling over 2 years to finally figure this out, but if you want a nice big windowed version of WiR (or any game) with d-fend front end of dosbox (edited - oops!) here are the video settings:

[DeadInThrench]

OK, thanks for getting back to me on this! I sorta figured it was something along the lines of what you are saying but it is always nice to know for sure.

I brought up WiR again and compared the fullscreen display that you get normally, with the one I get with DosBox with the black space on top and bottom and.... the one with DosBox.... is definately more readable. Text is more contiguous and thus easier to read, and the icons and stuff are also more contiguous and thus easier to see as well.

So... once I start playing WiR again.... and also re playing PW (I haven't played that yet) and also re other games along these lines (Carrier Strike, etc) guess I will be using the DosBox fullscreen with the black space on top and bottom.

Maybe it is just my monitor/graphics card that makes the normal 640x350 difficult to read but... the DosBox version is fine (can also go to windowed mode if I want). The only thing I could want beyond that is the rows of hexes extended to the top and bottom but.... don't think I will be seeing that (can't have everything).

Again, thanks for getting back to me on this!

DiT

[DeadInThrench]

Hmmm... am curious. The version of DosBox that I have is 0.65 and doesn't have anything like the profile editor you are showing. Is that something that comes with the newer 0.70 version, one of the downloadable front ends they have, or something else?

I was editing the profiles by hand or putting the profile entries into the DosBox command line in the command file... and fiddling with things couldn't change to 2x rendering. Of course, if I was able to, twice 640 would be 1280 and would not fit on the 1024x768 that I use normally.

DiT

[Mad Onion]

ORIGINAL: DeadInThrench

Hmmm... am curious. The version of DosBox that I have is 0.65 and doesn't have anything like the profile editor you are showing. Is that something that comes with the newer 0.70 version, one of the downloadable front ends they have, or something else?

You can dowload D-Fend from http://members.home.nl/mabus/

[IGAKFB]

Flanker Leader,thank you for your time to help me!(Everyone else also for posting.)I figured Dosbox ).70 out and am playing WIR and one of my favs.Panzer General,but not D-fend yet!I am working many hours on it,though.Also I am trying to get fullscreen and sound.I have a DVI 1280 by 1024 flatscreen,do you think(or know offhand )if my monitor will will cause me problems?Or will I have to connect it via VGA cable instead?The game being old and all.The forementioned games have nice graphics,just too small!It is a LITTLE bit overwhelming,me being a rookie and all!I WILL NOT give up.Any help IS appreciated![&o]

[Mad Onion]

Never surrender[:D]

WiR is worth all effort.

I guess monotor type does not metter, it should be ok.

[IGAKFB]

I've got it!ALT+ENTER at the options screen,VOILA!(Panzer General game)

[IGAKFB]

After I started using the"ALT+ENTER" for fullscreen trick,I've been experiencing desktop icon troubles:1-dosbox icon is,I'm geussing a "windows icon?Program icon?(small white square w/blue border on the top of it,3 small white squares in the top right corner).2-Intenet Explorer desktop is choppy and faided !3- start menu program directory dosbox 0.70 icon is the same as my desktop shortcut icon.They both uses to be the pretty little icons[&:](smileys not working anymore either! ...oh no....Strike that.that's odd,smileys function properly again!?........

[JagdFlanker]

at worst you may have to reboot after going full screen, but it's very odd you are getting problems like that. if you run d-fend and right click on the profile you can edit some settings in there like having it start full screen automatically and so forth. play around with the settings and see!