Windows XP - part of game not visible

[HeGGe]

The game works perfect, except for the fact that the right and bottom side drop off at the side of my screen. This makes it a bit difficult to accept missions, etc. What can I do to fix this?

[Atomic Mitten]

Which game ?

[HeGGe]

Sorry, Dune Emperor

[Timenn]

Do you play Emperor in a different resolution then your normal desktop setting is?

In other words: What is your screen resolution in Emperor, and what is it normally (in windows itself)?

[HeGGe]

Desktop setting are 1024 by 768 pixels and 32 bit color. I can't see (or control) the settings for Emperor due to the fact that these options are dropped from the screen (otherwise, my problem would be solved)

[Timenn]

Ok, try to change your screen size on your monitor (works different with every monitor, sometimes it is a menu, other times you have all kinds of buttons on it) and adjust the size (and screen position) that way that you can see all.

I believe Emperor has a default resolution of 800 x 600, so that is different then your normal resolution. And when your monitor must display a other resolution, it might mess up the screen position and size. And if I'm right, then your monitor will "remember" the settings you did for that resolution.

So when you change the settings, your normal desktop shouldn't be affected

[HeGGe]

I managed to solve the problem. But not by messing with my desktop settings. In the game I searched for the option tab (using the clicking sound you get when you scroll over it, because it was situated somewhere on the screen that was dropped). Once I found that it was easy, I just set the resolution of the game (which was not standard placed at 800*640 but 1152*864) to 1024*768, closed the game, restarted it and problem solved.

Now my guess is that there is a file somewhere in the directory which stores your settings for the game. And maybe you can change it there (like you used to do in the old days with messin' with the config.sys files etc. or when you had a setup.bat to configure sound, etc.) ? Because I think I was just lucky to find the options button and managed to click it too.

Anyway, thanks for the help already, but if somebody knows if you can change it directly in one of the files, people with the same problem will be helped.

[Timenn]

Not that I know of. And I have searched for it quite deeply, because I once messed up my Emperor by setting the resolution to high for what my monitor could handle, and I couldn't change it in-game, for the monitor showed absolutely nothing. (I restored it by connecting another monitor to it and that one showed at least something to look at)

But good that your problem is solved. :)

[Atomic Mitten]

You could have fixed it in safe mode using F8 key.

[Timenn]

You mean that if you press <F8> in game that the game will return to safe-mode settings??

Or do you mean that I should have entered Windows Safe Mode, and then run the game, which would appear in a normal resolution?

[Atomic Mitten]

Neither, if you resolution is wrong as you said Timenn and you can't start windows and see anything, you don't need a second monitor, just enter safe mode at BOOT UP !

Here you can reset your desktops resolution.

[Atomic Mitten]

Also if your running Win XP OS simply right click on the shorcut for the game on your desktop (if you have one ) then you can set the game resolutions, for how you want the game to run.Using the properties tab.

[Timenn]

I could start windows, that was not the problem. The problem was that I set up the wrong resolution for Emperor, meaning that my monitor prompted that the resolution was too big once I was in the game.

Windows has a nice feature for preventing such things, it shows you the new settings, and puts them back after 15 seconds if the user hasn't clicked the "yes" button.

I didn't know about the properties-thing. Could have done that, but I will probably not make that mistake again...

[Atomic Mitten]

If you find yourself in that situation again, just press the Windows key on your keyboard, even in game it will return you to the desktop.

[Timenn]

Yeah, but that wasn't the problem. The problem was that I wasn't able to play the game anymore.

If I couldn't get out then I wouldn't start the game in the first place :)

[Atomic Mitten]

Not that I know of. And I have searched for it quite deeply, because I once messed up my Emperor by setting the resolution to high for what my monitor could handle, and I couldn't change it in-game, for the monitor showed absolutely nothing. (I restored it by connecting another monitor to it and that one showed at least something to look at)

But good that your problem is solved. :)

Really !

[HeGGe]

I did try it with changing the file properties of the .exe file. But that still didn't make it work. I tried compatibility mode to 98, tried with 256 colors, 640*480 resolution, but still nothing. The game probably looks at a file to get info on the resolution for the game itself. It doesn't get it from the desktop settings.

So knowing which files the game uses at startup would be a great starter.

[Timenn]

Run the game, and then only change some settings, then exit the game.

Now check the Emperor folder if there are any files last modified on the time and date you made that change and exited Emperor.