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For remakes, we already don't list neither the original developers nor the original publisher in the infobox as remakes don't share code with the original games. For remasters, we list the original developers because remasters are improved (at least on paper) versions of games that keep the same core under the hood, but we don't list the original publisher. For games that are the exact same product but just, for example, change publisher in their digital forms or receive a post launch update from a different dev team, we list all. I truly believe this is already the best way to handle the infobox and i don't think any change to this modus operandi is needed.

Dear PCGamingWiki Team, I hope this message finds you well. I am writing to express my concerns regarding the current state of the mod section on PCGamingWiki pages. While I appreciate the effort to provide a comprehensive resource for PC gamers, I believe that the mod section, as it stands, is messy and convoluted. The primary issue is that this section has become a repository for personal preference mods rather than actual game fixes. This not only dilutes the purpose of the wiki but also makes it challenging for users to find essential fixes and improvements. The inclusion of numerous personal mods has led to bloated wiki pages, making navigation and information retrieval cumbersome. In my opinion, the creation of this section was a mistake. It detracts from the core mission of PCGamingWiki, which is to provide clear and concise information on game fixes and improvements. I suggest a reevaluation of the mod section’s purpose and a possible restructuring to ensure that it aligns more closely with the wiki’s primary goals. I look forward to any changes that can enhance the user experience on PCGamingWiki.

So, I've noticed nobody talks about modding old games here, so I'll break the tradition. Many people know old games have many issues running on newer monitors with aspect ratios different from what they used to be designed for, like 4:3 and 5:4, including no support for any kind of widescreen or wider resolutions, or when they do, they have a fixed field of view or it gets reduced with a wider resolution. Many old engines have the option to set a widescreen resolution, but just don't expose it to the user through the in-game settings, so editing through the Registry or external .ini/.cfg/.xml files or other similar kind of files might be needed. Usually when it's not possible to edit settings through external files or through Registry, it's needed to edit executables or other files around it directly (usually it can be DLLs, but not only), usually by using softwares that can edit the code in those files in hexadecimal form, like the so-called hexadecimal editors, or hex editors for short. HOW OLD GAMES STORE VALUES RESOLUTION Usually old games use 4-byte integers to store resolutions, so say a game supports 640x480, 800x600, 1024x768 and 1280x960. Each of those resolutions are stored as pairs of two 4-byte integers as hexadecimal numbers, so it means 640x480 is stored as 80 02 00 00 (640) and E0 01 00 00 (480), it might be represented in the file either one after the other (80 02 00 00 E0 01 00 00) or even inverted (E0 01 00 00 80 02 00 00), or even separated by other non-related bytes. Beware that not all games allow setting a custom resolution due to rendering API or engine's memory limitations, those limits might be hardcoded in certain files and might not be easy to fix those issues without experience. ASPECT RATIO For the aspect ratio, games might use a separate value to determine the aspect ratio or it might be tied with the resolution, it varies for every game. Usually games store aspect ratio just by dividing width by the height, so usually it might be 4:3, 5:4 or 3:2 (the values are 1.333333, 1.25 and 1.5 respectively). Although, some engines might determine aspect ratio from a multiplier, it can be a floating point number like 0.5, 0.55, 0.6, 0.75, 0.8, 1,0, or even a higher number like 20, 25, 30, 35, etc. FIELD OF VIEW For field of view, games usually either determine it from the aspect ratio, or might use a separate and different value for it, by using multipliers like 0.25, 0.5, 0.75. 1.0, setting it in degrees (60º, 65º, 70º, etc.), radians or through another kind of formula. EDITING FILES So to start editing files, a hex editor like it was mentioned above is needed. Usually HxD is a good choice, it's not too hard to learn and has all that's needed for a hex editor. 1. First open the file you want to edit on it either by dragging the file onto the HxD window, or press Ctrl+O and open it from there. 2. Then, when the file is opened, it's time to search for values. First press Ctrl+F, this window will appear, if wanting to find a hexadecimal number, change the datatype to "Hex-values", for integer numbers it's "Integer number" and for floating point numbers like those shown in the "Aspect Ratio" section, change it to "Floating point number". 3. Let's take this example for Lego Racers 2. The game only supports the following resolutions by default: 640x480, 800x600 and 1024x768. 5. To find the right resolution, it's needed to find both width and height values that are close enough to eachother in a file. For that, this program made by myself can be used to determine that: https://github.com/alphayellow1/AlphaYellowWidescreenFixes/releases/tag/utilities 6. Put the downloaded executable in the same folder where the game exe is, run it, put the executable name, write one of the resolutions the game supports, set the byte search range to 15 and type Enter. 7. Since the 800x600 resolution has the least amount of close enough pairs in the executable (just 1), we'll go with it. 8. Go back to HxD, press Ctrl+G and search for the address that was found for the width: 0002A912 (just for info, each pair of numbers or letters represents 1 byte, so the highlighted value below is 2 bytes long). 9. 9. Highlight it, then go to the right side of the window in the "Data inspector" tab, and go to the row where it says Int16. 10. Change it to the desired width, and type Enter. 11. Do the same for the height, highlight the value in the right address you found in the program above and change the value in the Int16 row at the right side. Save the file. 12. Now inside the game, we can see the new resolution that was changed earlier above now appears in the graphics settings, but if it doesn't appear, just set it to the one you changed before (so change it to 800x600 and the resolution in-game will change to the one you set in the file). 13. Now during gameplay we can check the proportions look correct but the camera view looks cropped in relation to 4:3, which means the field of view is reduced with wider resolutions, this scaling behavior is called Vert-, because the vertical field of view is reduced to accomodate the new aspect ratio. This means we have to increase it. 14. For the field of view, it was found the game stores FOV values as degrees, and after some experimentation, it's found the value is 90º. Note that in some games, they might store FOV for different areas of the game in more than one place, it might be either the same value as normal gameplay one, or might be a different FOV value altogether, like using one FOV for menus and another FOV for gameplay, or even different FOVs for each mission. For first-person games, they might store a FOV value for the camera and another one different altogether for the weaponmodel. Also cutscenes might have its own FOV assigned to it (either a universal FOV value for cutscenes, or even different FOV values inside the same cutscene, or each type of cutscene having its own FOV), so beware. 15. In HxD, press Ctrl+F, change the tab to "Floating point number" and type 90, change "Search direction" to "All", and click in "Search all". 16. All the found 90 values are listed below: 15. To edit each value, double click on one of the results below, and then go to the right side, and change the value in the "Single (float32)" row. You can try editing each value to a much higher one like 130, noting in which address the value is before changing it (see the second screenshot below this one), then saving the file, starting the game and going into gameplay, and seeing if the FOV became much higher, then if not, closing the game and coming back to HxD, changing the value back to 90 in the address you noted before, and going to the next value and doing the same process again until the camera FOV changes in-game. 16. It won't take long to find out it's the second value responsible for the camera FOV ingame, highlight it and change the value according to WSGF's FOV calculator: https://www.wsgf.org/fovcalc.php . Leave it as it is, and change the "number of monitors across" to 1, and change the resolution to the desired one above (in my case it's 1920x1080). 17. Copy the value after where it says "New hFOV =", only copy the number in bold. Also note that if the standard FOV isn't 90º but another number, you can change the number that is after "Old hFOV:" to that one to get the correct FOV for your aspect ratio. 18. After copying the number in step 17, go back to HxD and paste it in the "Single (float32)" row of the second address that was found in the first screenshot of step 15. 19. Now going back in-game, we can see the resolution and field of view were successfully changed and the game is fixed! ADVANCED EDITING THROUGH MEMORY HACKING If changing resolution or FOV values in files doesn't change anything in-game, then memory scanning/debugging softwares like Cheat Engine and code disassemblers like OllyDbg and x32dbg are needed. I'll expand on this section later.

Speaking in my capacity as a senior editor for PCGamingWiki, I agree with your opinion that the dedicated mods section of articles is, in hindsight, a mistake for all the same reasons you've already stated. Thus, I am in favor of removing the section entirely except in very specific circumstances, such as Grand Theft Auto 4 thanks to the sheer abundance of minor-yet-critical fixes available beyond the major and mission-critical (e.g. needed to run on modern systems and hardware) ones. With the section gone, the only mods left would be those which are mission-critical, ones which fix objective game issues, and other things which PCGamingWiki has chosen to prioritize over the years, such as fan translations, adding widescreen support to games which otherwise lack it, and so on. All that said, I and other PCGamingWiki staff are having an internal discussion regarding this issue because you took the time to voice your concerns. Thank you!

I believe the mod section was introduced to guide users towards mods that address significant game issues, such as crashes, poor performance, and other critical problems that can hinder the gaming experience. Is my believe PCGamingWiki primary goal is to provide users with reliable information, tweaks, and fixes to ensure they can enjoy their games to the fullest. In my view PCGamingWiki is not intended to be a general repository for all types of mods. For those looking to explore a wide variety of mods, including those that enhance gameplay, add new content, or offer cosmetic changes, people can visit dedicated modding communities such as Nexus Mods and other similar platforms. These communities are well-equipped to cater to the diverse interests of mod enthusiasts and provide a comprehensive selection of mods. I believe the mod section may have been a mistake and I often see it as unnecessary. There are multiple instances where this section is abused, leading to an overwhelming number of entries that do not necessarily cover any essential tweaks and/or fixes that our community often relies on.

Hello mates, first of all I want to state the obvious (I know that this is obvious, but better to specify this for users that don't properly read before pointing their fingers against others): THIS IS NOT A PIRACY FOCUSED TOOL (at all). YOU NEED YOUR ORIGINAL GAME DISC TO INSTALL THE GAME. THIS WILL NOT MAGICALLY GIVE YOU ACCESS TO GAMES, NOR YOU CAN OBTAIN GAME FILES IN ANY WAY USING THIS TOOL!. That said, if mods still want to delete this topic, please do so! Or just contact me with your questions and I'll do my best to reply ASAP. Okay, back on the cool stuff: DiscCheckEmu, is a tool designed to emulate disc checks found in many disc-based games and software without the need for physical media. By intercepting API calls and modifying their behavior on the fly, DiscCheckEmu provides a seamless experience for users looking to enjoy their favorite legacy software without the hassle of keeping CDs or ISOs mounted. As computers increasingly lack CD-ROM drives, accessing old disc-based games and software has become impractical. DiscCheckEmu addresses this issue by allowing users to emulate disc checks, enabling them to run their favorite titles directly from their hard drives, without physically patching the game executable (OR WORST YET: use pre-patched executables from shady places!). As I like playing old games but I hate to live with my desk full of cdroms, I created this tool. Ofcouse you still need original game disc to install the game, then you can keep it in a safe place. While developing this tool, I decided to add support for cheats and hacks/fixes: I prefer to keep the original game executable untouched and instead apply these fixes in-memory during the game startup. Here is a full list of DCE features: Intercept API calls and modify their behavior without patching the executable. File redirection. Directory redirection. Virtual Drive definition. In-Memory Patcher. Cheats support. API Logger (only available in Debug builds). Utilize a generic API hooking engine configurable through YAML files. Easy to use injector for automatically creating the target process and injecting the DLL. Fully open-source and customizable to suit individual needs. So, how to use DCE? It is quite simple: Download the latest release from the download section on github and extract the archive. Copy DCELoader.exe, DCEAPIHook.dll and DCEConfig.yaml to your game/software installation directory. Edit DCEConfig.yaml writing a configuration for your target, then run DCELoader.exe and enjoy. Or you can download a pre-made DCEConfig for your game from the community repository. Remember: DCE is an opensource project and YOU are invited to take part in the development! Feel free to open a PR on the GitHub repository :) Latest release is v0.6.0, grab it here! Please enjoy and share your feedbacks :D

The 1st person mode you're talking about is just a 3rd person mode with camera moved to the player character's eyes level, thus it's very experimental and not recommended for standard gameplay. But if you really want to have it, then follow this guide to extract game's files from the .DAT archives and then look up this topic to know what you should modify in those unpacked files. PS. If you can't access values in the FPP camera topic, then install uBlock Origin and add this custom filter to it: rockraidersunited.com##.ipsEmbeddedVideo

Hello! I was wondering if anyone knows who was the author of the widescreen fix for the 2003 game No Man's Land: Fight for your Rights. The game uses .rda files that are also used in the Anno series from Anno 1701 onward, yet the unpacking tools for those games don't support the version used in No Man's Land. However, someone was able to extract them to make the widescreen fixes (it's an .ini file with the original German developer notes). Does anyone know?

The original WSGF page for this game lists the original submitter and another person who updated something there. The first (jackfuste) was quite a regular contributor for a number of games but hasn't been active for a few years now and you may be able to track them down to get in touch but you'll have to use their Reddit or Discord now since their forums are no longer active. I couldn't find a mention for No Man's Land on any old thread sadly. https://www.wsgf.org/dr/no-mans-land/en

Hello, I've been a member of this wiki for a long time. I've always thought this wiki is very helpful, often containing tips, tricks and workarounds for various games. But something is missing. I realized today when my friend was unable to get "The Isle" working and I was curious what version of C++ / .NET it needs to run that this wiki does not contain the information pertaining to which versions the game requires. This would greatly improve the ease of troubleshooting (Repairing/Reinstalling the required libraries) when figuring out why a game is crashing when all other requirements are met. So, I think it'd be cool if we just updated the wiki for all games under system requirements to include: C++ Redistributable Required: YYYY .NET Framework Required: YYYY Additionally, I know we place the "Minimum System Requirements" and "Recommended System Requirements" where the developers place them, but I think we can do better - as theirs is usually a rough estimate.

Tried everything in the game's article, restarted my PC multiple times at different moments of fixing and it doesn't work. I think the game no longer works on newer machines. My PC is Ryzen 5600X and RX 6600 I get this error message and a blank window after closing it. FullScreenEx = false avoids this behavior but it crashes with a different message.

I completely agree! A dark mode option would make browsing much more comfortable, especially for extended periods. Your example in GIMP sounds like a great starting point—just reducing brightness slightly can make a big difference. Maybe adding a toggle option with different darkness levels would cater to everyone’s preferences. Hope the devs consider this!

Have you tried this fix? https://www.pcgamingwiki.com/wiki/Unreal_II:_The_Awakening#Intro_does_not_play_properly_in_Windows_Vista_or_later I know its not specifically for this game, but it does add back DirectMusic related .dlls into newer versions of Windows, so it might work.

The website is too bright and it needs a "dark mode" to make it more comfortable for us. I made a very simple example in GIMP. The white parts are changed to value 95, the availability box to 90 and background is set to 80. Even this minor change makes it more comfortable to look at, while it doesn't impact the overall design. This would be a good enough start, but others may like even darker mode.

Correct, Risen was updated somewhere in 2023, primarily in an attempt to port over some engine improvements that were made when Risen was ported to more modern consoles (it originally came out on PC and X360, but has now been released on PS4, XONE and Switch). This was originally also going to include a DX11 renderer I believe, but that never materialized. Despite wanting to do a replay, I haven't had the time yet to play this new version, so I can't really tell if the improvements are worth it. But yes, the unofficial patch does indeed ship with several .dlls that are not going to be compatible with this new version for several reasons. Here's something you can do however. As you probably know, Steam allows you to download older versions of the game from the depots. It's a bit of a hassle, but you can do it just fine. I believe you should be able to download the following manifest from 2021: 2187120273980209558. You should be able to download this by opening the Steam console and issuing the following command: download_depot 40300 40301 2187120273980209558 You can then copy the downloaded files over the ones over the installed files in your steamapps/common folder, but hopefully you get the idea. Don't shoot me if I made any mistakes in the instructions. You now have the older version of Risen, and the unofficial patch should work with it. I haven't done this myself so I might have made a mistake here. I'm not in front of my home workstation. I would also try and play the two version and see if the 2023 patch is worth it, and if rolling back to the older version makes you lose a lot of the improvement of the patch.

Interesting.. As Windows continues to get updated, trying to use old tools like DT Lite (from 2012) has become more and more of a problem, to the point of potentially bricking the OS with BSOD's or unbootable device drivers. Next time I go to play an old game I'll definitely be trying this out.

Actually no, the game is based on the CPA engine aka Ubisoft OpenSpace. And also no, it wasn't hard to find the right hex-values to change, it's just a little trial and error 🙂I recently released a widescreen fix for it, so PCSX2 is no longer needed to play the game on PC properly 😉