Oh, it is a paradigm shift, to say the least... Even after 30 years, I still miss aspects of the old Macintosh II machines. Then again, I miss my C-64... :har:

Any time...:up:
As I dig for info, I post things I would be trying, if I was sitting in front of the computer.
Appologies if that get tiresome.


Also a possibility...
I was about to suggest hex-editing it by hand, but he might think we are crazy and run away screaming.


Sounds like a viable solution, even if it is just for running nothing but mod tools.

I have a few WINE 'prefixes' (aka "bottles") configured for the sole purpose of running mod tools, save editors, etc.

I should be around my PC this weekend, if you need any more "help" lemme know.

A lot of good it's been so far!:doh:



Barracuda

Success!! (Sort of).

Since I have no idea about how Wine runs or where it's installed or anything about this stuff (and computers in general) at all, I downloaded Wine off WineHQ and installed in a logical location. In order for it to run, it requires XQuartz also installed.

Well, well, well, the 4gb Patch didn't work, but LAA did. And it did indeed modify the SH4 exe. And SH4 FOTRS indeed appears to be functional. It does not appear to freeze up - I ran Battle off Samar, which had previously killed it instantly and it seems to be ok. That said, the performance is not exactly impressive and not confidence inspiring. Good enough to play, but I wouldn't be surprised to see it freeze up every so often either. It'll need more testing.

Knowing that Wine and LAA do indeed work, I'm thinking that I could try to a reinstall this weekend not using the porting kit I had used, just to see if that could improve the performance. I also am curious how it compares with a Windows install.

And then of course there's the open question about what happens when the newest Mac OS comes out in the next couple months.

Thank you once again Gentlemen!

Congratulations on the partial success of at least getting the bits in SH4.exe flipped to show that it can address over 2gig of RAM. As for "efficiency" with the game, one big thing is to empty the Save folder. The game installs in the Silent Hunter folder, but actually runs mostly off of the data that is transferred to the Save folder automatically when you run the game the first time. If you don't clear the Save folder, the old data in that folder is still used, even though you might have newer data in the game folder now, such as a new mod activated. Very frustrating aspect of the older games.

For the video display with Windows, you want to match the monitor to Windows to the game. In other words, if you have a 1980x1024 display, set Windows to that same 1980x1024 display setting. Once in the game, scroll down the list of settings for the same display resolution. That way, you've got a one-to-one ratio and no conversions. Also, those other settings in the "Options - Graphic Settings" in the game can make or break your "efficiency". I am on an i7 laptop with onboard Intel graphics, with a 1600x900 display (Windows set the same), so shared memory with the 8gig of RAM in the beast, and this is what it will run:

https://i.imgur.com/bGM76Of.jpg

my old i3 (may it rest in peace) was similar. I also have sober's anti-lag now running on the laptop as an experiment, with the the cfg file set to "RenderAheadLimit=2" and "FPSlimit=30", to see if I can control its framerate. You do not need over 30fps in the game, since it doesn't use anything over that, and all you do when it runs higher, is throw the game's internal "clocks" out of whack, taking them out of sync with each other, as Front Runner discovered. I am going to have to change my game resolution settings to the 60Hz choice though, because I am getting a steady 25fps in the game right now with the above settings at 40Hz. Previous to putting in anti-lag, it would run at 45-70 fps, depending upon what was happening around my boat. :salute:

Where is the Save folder located? I don't see a folder called Save, but I do see a file called Settings.sav and that was modified last night.

And in terms of screen settings: my display is 4k and the OS is set to that. When I've run SH4 in 4k, it made the game controls too small to read. Is there a setting or mod for that perhaps?

Good to hear. (I know that feeling!)


SH4 saves in Windows are usually in "My Documents"...
Which means with WINE it'll be 1 of 2 places...

In Linux when the Distro (such as Fedora) has WINE set to do the 'desktop integration'...
It uses the "Documents" folder...

Should be either:

1: ~/Documents/SH4

or in the .wine folder,

2: ~/.wine/drive_c/users/[user-name]/My Documents

"~" is usually /home/[user-name] (on Linux/BSD/UNIX)
I'm not exactly sure if MacOS changes that, and in UNIX a "." means it's 'hidden'.


Barraucda

I have a ~/Documents/SH4/data/cfg folder, inside are:

some .cfg and .tmp files, and:

/SaveGames
/UPCInitial
/UserPlayerContext
/UserPlayerContextGE

Could I just delete or empty the entire ~/Documents/SH4 folder?

I'm also going to try a fresh install without opening it prior to running LAA and installing FOTRS and compare how they run.

Yes, SH4 will create all needed files.



Barracuda

The 4k resolution is 4096x2160, which is basically a 1.9:1 resolution, so you could do a divisible of that, such as half at 2048x1080, or 2k, and you should see a definite size improvement, and not end up with a distorted image. :salute:

Cleared out that folder and it does indeed help - noticeable improvement in performance. Not perfect, but fully usable. I'll probably try the Windows installation at some point and will report back on how it goes, but right now at least I have a fully functioning game.

With regard to Mission Editor and Wine, what do you suggest? Should I make a wrapper for that as well or just open it in Wine? I've already been working on a few missions over the past couple weeks (and would love to contribute them to this site once they're in good shape).

Good to know it's working.



Try the one that you are using for SH4.
I have the Steam version of SH4 1.5, and I can only get the mission editor to run in the same prefix/bottle that SH4 runs in.


Barracuda