Incompatibility with older games - Nvidia vs. ATI

[BenSkywalker]

This is all well and good but like I said earlier it has nothing to do with palletized textures. That and the X1950 series is still getting certified drivers and runs the game fine.

It may be the same calls the hosed palletized textures hosed the ditering. Also, while the x1950 may work fine it appears that nothing newer from ATi does.

And again Timeslip, the guy who has analyzed the DX calls to make his wrapper, has stated it?s not a palletized texture issue but rather nVidia driver issues related to dithering.

What particular call is it using for dithering? I see that apoppin mentions that he remapped a call that is the same one that hosed palletized texture support, if that is the case then perhaps the issue should be taken up with MS. Both ATi and nVidia have the same problems on every piece of hardware they have in production, so this obviously goes beyond a simple driver bug.

 

[Zap]

C&C Generals is another game that doesn't work with newer Nvidia drivers. Tried on a 7900GT by reverting to older drivers and the game magically worked again. Newer drivers, game dumps on splash screen.

Crimson Skies can't run in hardware acceleration mode on Nvidia drivers for last couple years.

Of course ATI stuff gets to me as well, with other annoyances. Lack of the ability to turn of picture scaling is one (though with Nvidia it doesn't always work). Another thing is that CCC likes to add itself as the first item under the File menu in Windows Explorer - annoying!

 

[BFG10K]

well i really don't know for sure but it sure looks like MS deprecated DirectDraw, probably around DX9c

Depreciated doesn't mean stop working otherwise thousands of 2D titles such as Starcraft would stop working.

Anyway DirectDraw isn?t the issue here. Thief uses Direct3D as DirectDraw is a 2D API that does not support 3D hardware acceleration.

 

[BFG10K]

It may be the same calls the hosed palletized textures hosed the ditering.

Dithering calls weren't remapped though; he simply forced a 32 bit render depth.

Also, while the x1950 may work fine it appears that nothing newer from ATi does.

But it?s enough to debunk your theory about it being a DirectX issue that appeared because of driver certification. The GeForce 5 stopped working long before the X1950 even existed, yet the X1950 is still getting certified drivers and it?s still working with modern DirectX versions.

What particular call is it using for dithering? I see that apoppin mentions that he remapped a call that is the same one that hosed palletized texture support, if that is the case then perhaps the issue should be taken up with MS.

He didn?t remap a DirectX call, he remapped a load library call.

Both ATi and nVidia have the same problems on every piece of hardware they have in production, so this obviously goes beyond a simple driver bug.

Except GMA doesn?t have any issues, is in production, and has certified drivers. Clearly this is not a DirectX or driver certification issue.

It?s obvious nVidia?s drivers broke with the GF5 while ATi?s broke when they moved to a unified architecture.

 

[Edge1]

Hey guys - you're way ahead of me in the knowledge dept on this stuff. My very basic question is: does Timeslip's solution with Thief 2 work w/System shock 2? That is, if I apply his directions, only to a SS2 install, will it work with my 8800GTS 512 (G92)? Currently the 8800GTS (FW 169.XX) crashes to desktop after loading. Not so with older vid cards/drivers.

 

[apoppin]

i really am not expert like you are ... and i am just scratching the surface, BFG10K

HOWEVER, why is it then that the Timefix patch modifies the executables ability to call the DDRAW.DLL (directdraw) routines?
A lot of the directdraw commands that were deprecated were directly related to color palettes

It appears to me that IF the palettizing commands in directdraw are present but not correctly implemented you will get those funky colors - like on modern GPUs with old drivers. And if the palletizing commands have been removed totally, then the game will crash.

i do not know the modification details, but Thief/2 and SS/2 use the same Engine.

 

[BFG10K]

HOWEVER, why is it then that the Timefix patch modifies the executables ability to call the DDRAW.DLL (directdraw) routines?

To be honest I'm not sure about this as I don't have the game. If DDRAW.DLL is inside the game's directory it could be a custom DLL, not a Microsoft one, but again I would need to check this.

What we do know is that everyone is running the game with 3D hardware acceleration which is something DirectDraw doesn't support (it's a 2D API, think something like Starcraft).

And again if it's a DirectX and/or driver certification issue then the X1950 and GMA should be having issues too, yet they run the game perfectly and have certified drivers for modern DirectX versions.

 

[apoppin]

i really think we need to delve into this ... if something is being overlooked

ANY help you need ... LMK

i only have Thief2 ... not the original .. i think there are demos.

 

[Member]

That review is poo poo at best.
Please list the game with the screenshot so others can test.

And your inability to read is simply too funny. I have attached screenshots with very detailed explanation as to what is happening. READ And just incase you still can't see it, here is the direct link to Aliens vs Predator on HD3870 Battlezone Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II
BTW, Here is another thread that is talking about the very same problem that I was having with my HD3870 card.


The problem that BFG and others are talking about is that NVIDIA and ATI have broken Direct Calls in the driver itself. It has nothing to do with MS DX update. As I have demonstrated earlier Older Win98 games are broken not only on WinXP, but experiencing the same problems on Win98. Games instantly become unplayable right after the driver update. Here is a good example of a broken NVIDIA driver. NVIDIA broke DX6 Z-buffer calls making Aliens vs. Predator totally unplayable (Black Screen) Aliens vs. Predator Gold/Normal is a DX6 Win9X game and yet it fails to work on Win98 with GeForce 4, FX and 6 cards with drivers above 6X.XX series. It took years to get NVIDIA to fix it, only to break it yet again with 169.XX and up drivers. Another game BattleZone was also broken by NVIDIA driver update, this game became unplayable with very early 9X.XX drivers and it was confirmed and fixed by NVIDIA in later driver update. Here is a yet another example of NVIDIA broken drivers And one more Problems with BZ2 and a 9600GT
And it is not just the games mind you, how about Quicktime crashes.

Prior to DirectX 10, DirectX was considered backward compatible, which means that newer versions supported the older versions. For example, if one had DirectX 9 installed on one's system and ran a game that was written for DirectX 6, it would still work. The game used what was called the DirectX 6 "interface". It is up to the driver to provide such interface. Every version of DirectX supported every previous version of DirectX. This is a positive consequence of the COM model used for this API.

 

[BFG10K]

Yep, it looks like ATi are dropping the ball with legacy compatibility on their unified parts too.

This is bad news for consumers all round. :thumbsdown:

 

[b1k3rdude]

UPDATE

With each new graphics driver release from nVidia and Ati, more and more old games are breaking. The dark engine games (i.e. Thief 1, Thief 2
and System Shock 2) have long been a victim; Thief 2 first lost its stars, had issues with fogging and then lost all colour detail in shadows. On
contemporary (DX10) hardware from both nVida and Ati, it appears to be rendered in 8 bit colour due to removed dithering support. And since
the 169.xx(nVidia) & 7.5(Ati) driver revisions Thief(1,2)/Ss(1,2) have become completely unplayable. nVidia or Ati are utterly uninterested in
spending manpower on fixing older games, so it's seems its fallen to the fans(I am of course refering to one phenomal fan in particular, the dude behind Oblivion mod manager, Timeslip) to get thief looking like its old self again (Fog & Stars are back).

Behold DDfix

The current list of fixes include:

• 
  *Worked around broken dithering by forcing rendering to a 32 bit render target
  *Fixed the issue with missing star textures
  *Removed the resolution switching between the game and menus
  *Fixed the texture corruption and crashes caused by nvidia forceware drivers newer than 169.xx
  *Fixed the issue with multi core processors
  *Fixed the issue with the video codec becoming unregistered
  *Adds options to use a higher bit depth z-buffer or to disable the windows key

This patch is mainly designed to support Thief 2, and when used with the standard v1.18 exe some additional features are available.

• 
  Fixes any issues with the driver incorrectly reporting free vram
  • 
    *Adds a 32 bit texture loader, to allow the use of 32 bit textures instead of the usual 8 bit paletted images
    *Adds the option to use fullscreen resolutions that are normally unsupported by Thief, such as 1280x960 and 1440x1050
  
  Requires windows 2000 or above and a graphics card that supports 32 bit render targets. The GUI requires .NET 2.0 or a recent version of
  mono. Using the patch without the GUI requires the use of a hex editor, or using a prepatched exe. Copy protected versions of the games
  cannot be patched automatically and will require downloading a prepatched exe, PM either Bikerdude or NamlessVoice @ ttlg to get a prepatched exe.
  
  biker

 

[apoppin]

Originally posted by: b1k3rdude
UPDATE

With each new graphics driver release from nVidia and Ati, more and more old games are breaking. The dark engine games (i.e. Thief 1, Thief 2
and System Shock 2) have long been a victim; Thief 2 first lost its stars, had issues with fogging and then lost all colour detail in shadows. On
contemporary (DX10) hardware from both nVida and Ati, it appears to be rendered in 8 bit colour due to removed dithering support. And since
the 169.xx(nVidia) & 7.5(Ati) driver revisions Thief(1,2)/Ss(1,2) have become completely unplayable. nVidia or Ati are utterly uninterested in
spending manpower on fixing older games, so it's seems its fallen to the fans(I am of course refering to one phenomal fan in particular, the dude behind Oblivion mod manager, Timeslip) to get thief looking like its old self again (Fog & Stars are back).

Behold DDfix

The current list of fixes include:

• 
  *Worked around broken dithering by forcing rendering to a 32 bit render target
  *Fixed the issue with missing star textures
  *Removed the resolution switching between the game and menus
  *Fixed the texture corruption and crashes caused by nvidia forceware drivers newer than 169.xx
  *Fixed the issue with multi core processors
  *Fixed the issue with the video codec becoming unregistered
  *Adds options to use a higher bit depth z-buffer or to disable the windows key

This patch is mainly designed to support Thief 2, and when used with the standard v1.18 exe some additional features are available.

• 
  Fixes any issues with the driver incorrectly reporting free vram
  • 
    *Adds a 32 bit texture loader, to allow the use of 32 bit textures instead of the usual 8 bit paletted images
    *Adds the option to use fullscreen resolutions that are normally unsupported by Thief, such as 1280x960 and 1440x1050
  
  Requires windows 2000 or above and a graphics card that supports 32 bit render targets. The GUI requires .NET 2.0 or a recent version of
  mono. Using the patch without the GUI requires the use of a hex editor, or using a prepatched exe. Copy protected versions of the games
  cannot be patched automatically and will require downloading a prepatched exe, PM either Bikerdude or NamlessVoice @ ttlg to get a prepatched exe.
  
  biker

• 
  
  isn't this what i was asking about? i didn't look at it anymore - maybe we should have explored it .. i remember posting this:
  :Q
  

  it looks like MS deprecated DirectDraw ... maybe around DX9c timeframe with a patch that hexedited a reference to DDRAW.DLL to DDFIX.DLL

  if so, it is a pretty easy fix

 

[TheSlamma]

Old thread, but I was gonna update I can get Thief 2 to play now with the beta drivers for my 8800GTS.

Problem is a few minutes in I get a hardlock on the game version 1.18 of T2