Saturday, November 27, 1999

UT Linux installer update -- 10:11 pm CST, Update by The Master

Brandon Reinhart of Epic updated his .plan indicating he's working on a fixed UT Linux installer. Here's the skinny:

I'm working on an updated Linux installer now that will fix all known installer problems. Here is a brief synopsis of each problem and the solution:

Problem: Installer says "This installation doesn't support glibc-2.1"

Solution: Install libxml and libglade.

Problem: UnrealTournament quits with the message "Can't find file for package WinDrv" or something similar.

Solution: Make Default.ini writable and then untar the file LinuxGlideSystem.tar.gz in your UnrealTournament directory. Delete UnrealTournament.ini and then run UnrealTournament.

Both of these are related to sloppy oversights on my part. Please spread the word about these. I hope to have the updated installer out tonight. The problems above are fixed, but I want to try and include an optimized light merging function as well.

The Mesa renderer works under Mesa-Glide. All that's left to dois work out some windowing issues with standard Mesa.

DGA mouse input is in and working, but DGA support is broken under the 3dfx X server. I'm talking to a few people to find workarounds for the 3dfx X server DGA problem, if there is any.

GreenMarine on UT for Linux -- 1:38 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Brandon "GreenMarine" Reinhart updated his .plan with information on working around some bugs in the UT Linux client. Here's the low-down:

A few people are reporting that the UT linux installer is telling them "this installation doesn't support glibc-2.1 on x86" when it does. You can get around that by either copying the files listed in setup.xml by hand and then opening the tarballs into the UnrealTournament directory, or by calling the X installer directly:

./setup.data/bin/x86/glibc-2.1/setup.gtk

I hope to release a new version of the Linux stuff soon and I'll fix the script that wraps around the installer.

Also, John Drohan points out that the installer needs libglade and libxml installed. I, being the quintessential Linux newbie, thought these were standard. Of course not! Nothing is EASY in Linux. Well, I'll include those libs with the next distribution, which should be coming around soon.

If you have render error messages, delete Default.ini, and UnrealTournament.ini. Then copy LinuxGlideSystem.tar.gz into your UnrealTournament directory and open it. Then run the game again. It appears the permissions are wrong on the original Default.ini, so installing as a non-root user fails to overwrite the file with the glide config. I haven't confirmed this, since I just got back from Thanksgiving and haven't looked into it.

Heh, reading this stuff is giving me flashbacks to the old DOS 2.x days!

UT D3D Problems -- 1:35 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

The official Unreal Tournament page was updated with information on fixing that bug that causes the installer to fail to detect Direct3D support in your video card. It is essentially the same information as I posted yesterday.

Friday, November 26, 1999

UT Patch News -- 11:21 pm CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Voodoo Extreme pointed to this news on Barry's World regarding an upcoming patch for Unreal Tournament which will lower CPU utilization for servers. Here's the deal:

The server patch posted a couple of weeks ago approximately halved server CPU utilization compared to unpatched demos. Since we went gold, I`ve been working on further optimizations and have halved server CPU utilization again. We`ll release a patch with these optimizations and other enhancements shortly.

Based on my testing:

Patched demo server with 16 players takes about 60% CPU utilization on a P2-400.

The new code with 16 players is about 30% CPU utilization on a P2-400.

More details to follow, no doubt.

D3D Problems with Retail UT -- 10:40 am CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Several people around the 'Net have been complaining about substantially worse performance in the full version of Unreal Tournament than they had with the demo. Epic's Mark Rein addressed this issue on the GT Interactive forums. Since it will be a slow news day, I'll post the whole thing:

There were NO differences in the D3D code between 348 and 400. What happened unfortunately is that the Safedisc copy protection, that GT added to the master disk after we gave it to them, caused our very good D3D configuration detector to time out, therefore assuming that D3D wasn't present and not setting the various quality and resolution settings to match the performance of users' PCs. This was noted in an insert GT put in the UT box. This has since been fixed in masters now in production but unfortauntely the first batch of UT's had this problem. The Safedisc process also introduced some sort of application error on exiting UT on Windows NT and Windows 2000 systems. I don't know if we've found the cure for that one yet but it's just an error message you have to cancel and doesn't cause any problems. Neither of these problems happened in the demo of course because they're not problems in our code.

Once again, copy protection only serves to screw legitimate customers. At any rate, the newer copies of UT are fixed in this regard, but if you got one of the original pressings with this error, make sure to look for the little insert from GT.

Steve Polge (also of Epic) posted a workaround for people with the original, problematic disks:

The installer for the full version fails to detect D3D for some configurations. It sounds like you are using software rendering. To change to D3D, go to options/preferences/video menu and hit the change video driver button. When UT restarts, click on select all video devices to display D3D as an option, and choose it as your driver.

Good luck! Despite these problems, I may try to pick a copy of UT up today if I can find it anywhere amongst the maddening crowds.

Final Q3A Character Shots -- 10:15 am CST, Update by A.T. Hun

Redwood has posted the final three Q3A character renderings he was given by id software. The final three are: Gorre, Wrack, and Xaero who is your final opponent in the Q3A single-player ladder. For a listing of all the shots he's posted, click here.

Past Two Days' News

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