SUBSIM Radio Room Forums - View Single Post - Fighting Steel troubleshooting/compatibility issues roll call

FightingSteel1 · 08-28-14, 03:48 PM

Well, I received a response from the main programmer for the FSP at NWS. I'll link to it and quote it here:

http://nws-online.proboards.com/thre...-compatibility

Per williammiller at NWS:

"I was the primary developer of the Fighting Steel Project. While we did patch the graphics engine to run better in DX8+ the (rather serious) root issue was that the game engine was originally programmed using an alternate graphics mode (a subset of the old 'Retained' 3D mode) in Direct-X. Unfortunately, support for this mode was dropped by Microsoft less than 18 months after the game was released (starting with DX 7) and later DX updates have rendered that mode even more un-useable/unstable.

It would have required a 100% complete re-write of the game engine to have solved this issue, the best we could do was to patch the code to make it as compatible as possible - however, given the very serious issue of the dropped support and the massive changes in DX over the last few versions, the game simply is not going to be stable, even when running on some virtualization machines - be aware that such machines may *still* have DX overlay issues that can cause serious corruption to the graphics with retained-mode engines such as FS, while older engines that use other modes may not suffer those issues at all."

That pretty much explains where the game is at, and why it has not made it into modern day tech like other games of it's time period. I mean, you can play WW2 Fighters, Panzer Elite, and all sorts of stuff from the late 90's/Early 2000's on a Win 7 machine, but not Fighting Steel. Those other games also have a string of mods and work done on them by others.

Anyone interested in the game and unable to play please check in when you see this thread. Also, anyone with AMD/ATI cards please tell us how the game works for you.

I'm not sure where I'm going with this, but as someone stuck hanging on to FS because there is nothing else to play instead (World of Warships isn't going to be the answer IMO), I'm hoping an update or work around can be achieved.

08-28-14, 03:48 PM	#3
FightingSteel1 Bosun Join Date: Mar 2010 Posts: 63 Downloads: 60 Uploads: 0	Well, I received a response from the main programmer for the FSP at NWS. I'll link to it and quote it here: http://nws-online.proboards.com/thre...-compatibility Per williammiller at NWS: "I was the primary developer of the Fighting Steel Project. While we did patch the graphics engine to run better in DX8+ the (rather serious) root issue was that the game engine was originally programmed using an alternate graphics mode (a subset of the old 'Retained' 3D mode) in Direct-X. Unfortunately, support for this mode was dropped by Microsoft less than 18 months after the game was released (starting with DX 7) and later DX updates have rendered that mode even more un-useable/unstable. It would have required a 100% complete re-write of the game engine to have solved this issue, the best we could do was to patch the code to make it as compatible as possible - however, given the very serious issue of the dropped support and the massive changes in DX over the last few versions, the game simply is not going to be stable, even when running on some virtualization machines - be aware that such machines may still have DX overlay issues that can cause serious corruption to the graphics with retained-mode engines such as FS, while older engines that use other modes may not suffer those issues at all." That pretty much explains where the game is at, and why it has not made it into modern day tech like other games of it's time period. I mean, you can play WW2 Fighters, Panzer Elite, and all sorts of stuff from the late 90's/Early 2000's on a Win 7 machine, but not Fighting Steel. Those other games also have a string of mods and work done on them by others. Anyone interested in the game and unable to play please check in when you see this thread. Also, anyone with AMD/ATI cards please tell us how the game works for you. I'm not sure where I'm going with this, but as someone stuck hanging on to FS because there is nothing else to play instead (World of Warships isn't going to be the answer IMO), I'm hoping an update or work around can be achieved.