iZ3D game profile tweaking advice

[iondrive]

Hello iZ3D fans,

OK, I think it's about time someone starts a topic about tweaking iZ3D profiles. So if you figure something out, please post it here. Maybe I'll make a table of contents in this post if we cover too much ground.


First up: General Profile info.

General profile info is in the iZ3D "Help Document" found with the "Description" button on the "About" page on the iZ3D Control Center window. I have a hunch that may change to something easier to find in the future. Anyway, once you're there, you can find 3 sections on profiles: one under "Control Center", one under "Additional Features", and one under Appendix 1. That should get you started with your own investigation. Sharing user profiles is explained here:

http://www.mtbs3d.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=5900" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;


Second: learn by example.
(open these files by right-clicking on the name, choosing "Open with..." and selecting Wordpad)

Study the real-world examples in your UserProfile.xml and BaseProfile.xml but only edit your UserProfile.xml since that's the way iZ3D wants it and that file's data takes precedence over the other when they have different data for the same entries.

For XP users, UserProfile.xml is in:
C:\Documents and Settings\"windows login name"\Application Data\iZ3D Driver\UserProfile.xml

and for Vista---> C:\Users\"windows login name"\AppData\Roaming\iZ3D Driver\UserProfile.xml

On winXP, BaseProfile.xml is in C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\iZ3D Driver

You can also look in Config.xml in the same folder but you probably shouldn't change anything there and instead use your UserProfile.xml file for reasons stated above.


Third: examples. Let's put one example in each post.

Ready? Go.

[iondrive]

Tweaking on-screen LaserSight position:

Hmmm, I see from Config.xml that there's a data item called:

<LaserSightXCoordinate Value="0.5"/>
and
<LaserSightYCoordinate Value="0.5"/>

This is the same as the old-school nvidia driver except for a minor difference. These data points let you change the on-screen position of the LaserSight. Like in Starwars Battlefront, in 3rd person view, the game's reticle is not at center-screen and your shots don't go to center-screen. If you have a game like this and manage to shut off the in-game reticle and want to use iZ3D's LaserSight, then you put entries in your game's profile like this:

<LaserSightXCoordinate Value="0.5"/>
<LaserSightYCoordinate Value="0.75"/>

This works except that I could not specify different Y coordinates for different 3d hotkeys. Maybe I'll suggest it to iZ3D someday if I find a game that needs it. Actually SW-BF needs it but I use the in-game reticle for its IFF (identify friend or foe) function. By trial and error, I've learned that the LaserSight "origin" is at the bottom left corner of the screen so that if X is 0.75 and Y is 0.25, the LS will be in center of the bottom right quadrant. Max val is 1.

That's all I want to say about the LS. It's just something simple to start off with. Now for something more interesting. Fixing bad sky depth.

[iondrive]

fixing bad sky depth:

OK, I need someone's help with this one. Specifically, I need someone to tell me how to find the right CRC values for various things. Here's the story...

While troubleshooting Starwars Battlefront, I found a long section in BaseProfile.xml and noticed labels like "Arena red star" and "Temple red star" and I knew these objects were at the wrong depth. I looked at the section they were in and saw there was a "Multiplier Value" associated with them as well as the note "<!-- Fixes wrong depth-->". I saw the Value was 3.0 so I changed it to -1 and it fixed many "bad-sky-depth" objects but not all of them. Still this was a great find and things are much better now. Troubleshooting, if you set the value to 0, then many sky/horizon graphics turn into flat 2d as they should but the red star is still bad so that makes me think that the CRC for the red star is wrong or doesn't work for some other reason. I've notified iZ3D about this.

Question: Can anyone find the right CRC for this and how do you get the CRCs in general?

More details are in the Starwars Battlefront post:
http://www.mtbs3d.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?f=108&t=6945" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

So anyway, if you have a game with a bad sky depth, what you need to do in general is to find the right CRCs for the various sky objects and put them in a "Multiplier" section like this with the appropriate value from trial and error with your preferred 3d settings:

<Multiplier Value="-1.0">
<!--Yavin 4: Arena red star -->
<Texture CRC="0x13F48697" />
</Multiplier>

for newbies "<!--Yavin 4: Arena red star -->" is just a comment line and is not critical but I would still call it important as a useful label.

You CAN have more than one "Multiplier" section, each with a different value applying to those things in each section separately. Just use </Multiplier> before starting another.


I think that's all I have on this subject for now. Good luck with whatever you try.

--- iondrive ---

[Likay]

I remember asking how to get the shadercrc's at the iz3d forums. The answer (can't find the thread) was similar to that this was a quite complicated and manual process. By that time i also had in mind that users could find, add, change and exchange parameters in the xml-files. I also got an answer that they're looking into a way for users to edit objects which visually looks wrong and how to share the parameters. It was quite some time ago though.

The shadercrc's is probably the checksum of the shaderprogram to be able to identify it. When the game loads the shaders the iz3ddriver (in case correction is needed) goes through and calculates the crc for every shader. When a crc matches the crc in the config files the driver also applies the changes to it. To identify shaders you could use a similar way as you do when using "texmod". Having texmod active within a game makes you able to cycle through each and every texture loaded in memory. You'll see which one's selected because it's turned green (in realtime). You can then dump the texture, modify it and then by using texmod load the modified texture when gaming. Texmod is for textures but i think the method might work for identifying shaders as well but instead of green they could be flashing.

[iondrive]

HURRAY FOR LIKAY!!!

That's great info man! Just what I needed. Right now I'm not really that concerned about shaders since I really only needed the texture CRCs, so I found and downloaded Texmod and figured out how to use it and it works great. Thanks to you and it, I was able to fix all my texture problems and anyone else can do the same for whatever game with similar bad-sky-depth problems.


Fixing bad sky depth, Part 2: using Texmod to get the CRCs

Texmod, where:
I got Texmod from bigdownload but there are other Google links to choose from.
http://www.bigdownload.com/games/texmod/pc/texmod/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Texmod, what:
It's a little program that you can use to change textures in a game and that's a really cool idea but we're just going to use it to get texture CRC data. It says it's a beta program and so it might not work with all DX9 games but so far so good. I don't know about texture-modding with this yet and am not really planning on learning it but one thing this might really be useful for is if you have a level in a game with tall grass that hides your enemies. You could change the grass texture to transparent and that could make the game alot more playable and fun.

Texmod, how:
download, unzip, read the Readme.txt if you want to, double-click texmod.exe and select "Logging Mode", then click on the folder icon and browse to your game's main .exe file. In the case of Starwars Battlefront, this program didn't work with the game's launcher "LaunchBF.exe" and I had to select "Battlefront.exe" instead so I think that might be a problem with some other games that also use launchers. If it works like in this case, then just stick with the default checkboxes checked (3 on the left) and select an output folder for the output data. Disable your iZ3D driver before clicking "Run" (because it works faster that way) and see if it works. Go to the level with the bad sky and look at it and hit the numpad * key, then use the numpad + and - keys to find the texture that has the problem. You'll see the textures show up one at a time in the top left corner. What you're doing is cycling through all the textures one at a time but there aren't that many since you hit the * key and that reduces the list alot. Hit numpad "Enter" when you find the texture you want in order to save that texture and it's CRC to the folder you selected before. You can do that with more than one texture from different levels. To help you identify the right sky-thing, it should either turn green or disappear when you've got it selected. It shouldn't take more than 2 minutes for each texture, not counting loading times. You can even do this with the game paused so your guy doesn't get killed if there's no safe place for him to stand. Exit the game and you can right-click-edit on the filenames of the textures you've saved in .BMP format. There's a log file but you can ignore it if you want since the CRCs are in the filenames of the bitmaps. Once you're satisfied that you have the right images, copy those CRCs into your game's profile inside a Multiplier block and you can test your Multiplier Value by enabling the iZ3D driver again and running the game in the normal way. I guess you don't really need to label each texture but it's probably a good idea.

Summarizing:
After disabling iZ3D, run your game using texmod as a launcher, get to the level with the sky problem and use the numpad keys to cycle through the textures until you find the one you want. Hit numpad Enter to save it. Do that with other levels that need it. Exit and edit your game profile with the CRCs you got. Get a good value for Multiplier by trial and error. Try -1 for starters if the thing pops out when it should pop in.


Texmod, advice:
This works with textures so if your sky object is more than just a flat texture, like a big 3d model aircraft in the distance, then I don't think this will work but generally, your sky/horizon objects will be just flat textures.

Starwars Battlefront can easily wind up loading over 900 textures but over 400 get loaded before the level gets loaded so I know that it's probably safe to just skip over the first 400 but really it's the * key that does the job of narrowing down the list for you. Use it and you might only have to search through less than 40 textures if you're lucky. Also, I'm not sure but I think that before you switch levels, you shoudl select a texture that's common in all levels like part of the HUD or something. I just don't know if it can cause a problem if you have a texture selected and the game tries to erase it from memory when you're loading a different level. I would also suggest resetting the texture list by hitting the numpad / key before switching levels just to be safe.


Hmmm, I think that's it. Do you want to add anything Likay?

Does anyone know how to get CRCs for VertexShaders?

Later,

--- iondrive ---

[iondrive]

Hi all,


How to easily restore your presets:

I just want to mention a little trick I've been using when trying to find good presets. Maybe you've noticed that you never need to save your presets since it does it automatically when you change your 3d settings. But how can you get them back to what they were before you started to monkey with them. Well, you need to copy the values back in to your UserProfile.xml from some backup but here's another idea. If you know beforehand that you're going to be messing with your settings and might want to restore them. Just open your UserProfile.xml with Wordpad, leave it open and play your game. If you screw up your settings and want to restore them, exit the game and hit save in Wordpad. That will restore your settings since that file was in ram and did not change even though the file on your disk did change since you ran the game and changed the settings. BUT, if you're happy with the new settings you've found, then make sure you Don't save in Wordpad and just exit it without saving or else you will overwrite you new settings. Got it? Good.

bye.

--- iondrive ---

[Likay]

Lol! I actually thought you meant the vertexshadercrc's though. I asked about how to get these but it seems to be hard according to BlackQ.

I had a slight alternative idea for texmod and wrongfully rendered models/textures by simply making them transparent (your method by modifying them with the iz3d drivers parameters is way better though regarding flat textures!). Find the thing wrongfully rendered, export by pressing enter. I think it has to be in *.dds format but not 100% certain. Open the files and make them transparent in photoshop or similar. (For dds-files use the nvidia dds-plugin). Save your modded file, load the game through texmod with your modified file loaded and tada. The textures should be invisible or viewed with other modifications you've made. This is only one thing to do with it.
Usually people uses texmod to mod their own costumes, environment etc etc ingame. It's quite cool! Try running Tomb raider anniversary - Lost valley campaign with Zippers Alien-vs-Lara mod
Previews on what some people can do: http://www.tombraiderhub.com/tran/moddi ... ipper.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;.

Edit found youtube tut.

[iondrive]

OK,

Previously, we covered finding Texture CRCs but now let's use Texmod to actually build a mod and use it.

Once again, thanks to Likay for pointing me in a good direction. I wasn't planning on modding with Texmod but then I watched the you-tube video and wound up doing a little Texmodding on Starwars Battlefront. I'll see if I can upload it for anyone who wants to check it out. It modifies your game textures to get rid of all tall grass, bushes, leaves and branches by making them transparent so it's easier to see the enemy from far away... a sniper's target range. But anyway, let's apply what I've learned to s3d issues... a game's targeting reticle.

Let's say you want to get rid of a game's targeting reticle. The first thing you look for is a game menu option to shut it off or make it transparent. If that fails, check the game's config files or the game's console options if it has a console that shows up when you hit the right activation key (usually ~ or `). You'll need to research that online. If that fails, you can try texmod and find the reticle textures (most games have more than one) and hit enter on each one as described in a previous post. You want to make those textures transparent but the problem is that transparency can be handled in different ways unless it's been really standardized via DirectX. I really don't know about that but I do know that some image file formats use magenta for a stand-in for a transparent color but that's a primitive approach and I wouldn't expect any modern or old game to use that. So anyway, I tried using texmod with BMPs, JPGs, and PNGs and none of those could do transparency for SW-BF1 like I wanted so then I tried TGA and that worked. I edited the textures with the GIMP and saw that there's RGB components and a transparency component to every pixel.

So for each image,
Ctrl-A to "select all",
Ctrl-X to delete the RGB data,
Ctrl-S to save,
Ctrl-W to close that image and
Ctrl-O to open the next image.

Then you'll have empty "transparent" textures saved and ready to go.

Texmod's build mode uses the log file created from the previous logging function that you did before. You should look at it and make sure it makes sense and doesn't have unwanted image references. It should list only those image files that you edited. You can delete other references by hand as well as deleting duplicate references to the same image file. Now you're ready to build. Select "Package Build", browse to your logfile (definition file), fill in creator and description and hit Build. If you moved your files to a new folder, you will get an error message. Just go back and make sure that the lines in the log file actually point to the image files. Then you can choose a filename and place for your package file that just got built. It will be a tpf file (Texmod Package File). Now you're ready to try your game with the new textures.

Hit "Package Mode" and browse to your tpf file. Don't forget to highlight the package name before hitting "Run" and then hopefully it will work and you will have gotten rid of your 2d game reticles and now you can try the iZ3D LaserSight instead. I don't have much good experience with that but maybe I'll try it more someday. I prefer the game's 2d reticle by using popout since so many games have extra info in the reticle image like ammo or ID friend or foe. Actually, the LS might not work right if the game reticle is still there and simply transparent. Oh well, you can still use this info for other things. Get rid of certain HUD elements you don't like.

A reminder:
I just want to mention again that if your game uses a Launcher then you will probably have to bypass that and select the main game program instead and use Texmod as a kind of launcher.

In short: Use the TGA file format if you want to transparenterize things.

Note I haven't tried this with solid objects, just flat "sprite" textures like foliage. I think that some games use a VertexShader for their reticle so this approach may not work with all games. I don't know how to find VertexShader CRCs yet.

I think that's it for now.

bye.

--- iondrive ---

[iondrive]

I mentioned before that you can have more than one <Multiplier Value="number" > sections so for an example of that, see my 2nd Starwars Battlefront profile:

http://www.mtbs3d.com/phpBB/viewtopic.p ... 909#p42909" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

It uses that idea to make a layered horizon although it's not realistic and some people will not like it. It's just a matter of personal taste but I think it's a little cooler than a normal flat sky. It also makes a distant floating city seem to be in front of the background sky except that it looks weird sometimes. Tweak it yourself if you want. I tried making the giant red sun seem behind the sky but that didn't look good so I left it at the same distance as the sky. It doesn't make sense to put the sun in front of the clouds unless it's an "Alice in Wonderland" or "abstract art" game.

--- iondrive ---

[iondrive]

hi again,

Ready for more Lasersight talk? I just wanted to mention my experience with making a profile for Starwars Battlefront II. The above method using Texmod to make the game's reticle transparent won't work here because it's a complicated reticle and not just a plain texture that you can get a handle on. Basically, if your game's reticle is complicated like this one, it's probably not a simple texture.

In the case of Starwars Battlefront II, the game reticle shows:
IFF-by-color (identify friend-or-foe),
ammo remaining in your current clip,
lock-on targeting indicator, and
damage-by-weapon indicator.

But let's talk about custom LaserSights for a sec. I used one for this profile and you can set the hotkey toggle in the iZ3D control panel or you can set it in your game profile with
<ToggleLaserSight Key="50" /> in between <Keys> and </Keys>. In this case "50" means the number 2 key. You should probably just use the control panel for that assignment.

The other thing you need for a custom Lasersight is a custom Lasersight image file (huh, really?). I chose to use the PNG format and got this from a screenshot of the game. I made it into a 64x64 pixel square and it works pretty good. Just remember to keep most of it transparent when you make yours. I used the GIMP. You should be able to download this Lasersight and use it by setting <CustomLaserSightIconPath Value="" /> to your copy's location. "CustomLaserSightIconPath Value" is in your Config.xml which should be in the same folder as BaseProfile.xml. For winXP, it's in C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\iZ3D Driver\Config.xml.

SW-BF2.png

Unfortunately, I needed to scale-down the image to 64x64 in order to use it so that it's not the same size as the original game-reticle.

OK, I couldn't resist making a LS from the MTBS3D logo. Feel free to tweak it. Maybe put a dot in the center or animate it so it blinks once in a while or changes color. I seem to have trouble giving it 50% transparency. Maybe the png format can't do that?

MTBS3D-LS-eye.png

I think that's it for now.

Oh yeah, I wanted to mention that so far, you can't have different custom Lasersights per game. You have to change the one global custom LS if you want different ones for different games. Hopefully iZ3D will change this in the future. This is for iZ3D driver version 1.10.

--- iondrive ---

PS: I didn't do it here but I think that a LS should have some black and some white. If it's all black, you won't see it against a black background and the same goes for white against a white background.

Oh yeah, for an animated LS, just put each frame of the animation into one long image file "n"x64 pixels wide. I don't think there's any way to control the speed of animation though.

Hmmm, what if you just want a 2d custom LS? Does anyone know how to do that? In case the 3d function isn't working right and it's just bugging you.

[iondrive]

Hello fellow tweakers,

I wanted to mention some odd quirks I ran across while profiling recently. Basically it's got to do with the way iZ3D v1.10 has it's profiles named. It turns out that you can't just name profiles whatever you want unless you edit both UserProfile.xml and BaseProfile.xml.

if the game is in both files under different names:
If BaseProfile.xml and UserProfile.xml both contain profiles of the same game with different profile-names, then the name in UserProfile.xml will be changed to match BaseProfile.xml automatically the next time you tweak your 3d settings in that game. You can change the name. You just need to do it in both files or else BaseProfile.xml has priority in this case. Also you must exit the iZ3D driver and restart it to see the profile-name in the drop-down list in the profiles section of the control window.

if the game only exists in UserProfile.xml:
in this case, you have no choice about the profile-name because after you run the game and change some setting, UserProfile.xml will be changed so that the profile-name matches the game's executable filename. In other words, if you don't have "StarWars Battlefront II" in BaseProfile.xml and you put this in UserProfile.xml:

Code: Select all

    <Profile Name="SW-BF2">
        <File Name="BattlefrontII.exe" />
        .
        .
        .
    </Profile>

Then run the game and change some 3d setting, exit the game and look in your UserProfile.xml, you'll see this instead:

Code: Select all

    <Profile Name="Battlefront">
        <File Name="BattlefrontII.exe" />
        .
        .
        .
    </Profile>

Your profile-name has changed to match the filename. In this case as well, if you want to rename your profiles, edit both BaseProfile.xml and UserProfile.xml. I think an empty profile in BaseProfile.xml should be good enough but I haven't tested this yet for lack of need. It should be something like this in BaseProfile.xml, then put the rest of your settings in UserProfile.xml under the same profile-name.

example empty profile for BaseProfile.xml:

Code: Select all

    <Profile Name="SW-BF2">
        <File Name="BattlefrontII.exe" />
    </Profile>

This all seems fine but there's a potential problem here. What if two different games use the same executable filename? The xml files don't contain paths so if there's two different games that both use "Game.exe", I think only one profile's settings will be used for both games. This is an actual problem that old-school nvidia drivers had too. I'll have to post this on iZ3D's forum to see what they say about it.

--- iondrive ---

UPDATE: it turns out you can use another tag in the case where the game is not in BaseProfile.xml and is in UserProfile.xml. This tag prevents your game profile from being renamed to match the filename, otherwise this game profile would be renamed to "Game".

Code: Select all

<Profile Name="Marvel Ultimate Alliance" UserChangeProfileName="1">
      <File Name="Game.exe" />
   </Profile> 

I haven't tested this with driver version 1.10 but it does work with 1.11b1-2.

[iondrive]

Hi all,

Using the GIMP to make your Lasersight semi-transparent:

I figured out how to use transparency in the GIMP (free image editor). You need to use the eraser tool on the transparency layer. There's a slider for changing the amount of erasing it does as well as another slider for eraser scale. Choose a big square eraser shape and then slide the scale up so the square gets bigger than your Lasersight. Slide the Opacity slider to get different levels of transparency and test them out. Ctrl-Z undoes things of course so you can try different levels repeatedly. I don't want to do a whole tutorial on layers and such so you have to find that elsewhere if you want/need. I find that 75% to 85% is usually good for Lasersights. The funny thing is that if you use the eraser twice at 50%, then you'll be at 25%. I guess that's how an eraser is supposed to work but I would prefer to set it to a number and not have it change after that. Because of this, you should save your 100% opaque version and use that as a starting point if you ever want to do multiple transparencies. Hmmm, neat idea, you can use the animation feature to make a Lasersight that varies in transparency over time so that it slowly pulses in and out. Neat, maybe I'll try it some time. Anyway, here are my new versions. You can guess my favorite. I'm really happy with that one.

75-percent-SW-BF2.png

50-percent-MTBS3D-LS-eye.png

85-percent-nuclear-LS.png

[iondrive]

Hi all,

I've learned a couple new things lately.

One is about profile naming quirks and I updated the above post about naming quirks already. It shows how to use the UserChangeProfileName="1" tag.

fixing the crashing launcher problem:
The other thing is just to tell y'all about the "Disable driver" profile. It's in the BaseProfile.xml and includes an entry called <File Name="Spider-Man Launcher.exe" /> so that was the clue I needed when I saw that the launcher for "Starwars the Force Unleashed" was crashing even though I could run the game with the game's exe directly. I put an entry for it in there and it worked. So this is the thing to do when a game's launcher is crashing on you when iZ3D is enabled and not crashing when it is disabled. Most launchers are OK and don't need this but we shouldn't really edit BaseProfile.xml so do this instead: just use the iZ3D control panel and add your launcher to the Exceptions list and that will include a "Disable driver" profile with your game launcher in it into your UserProfile.xml file. Then this entry is effectively appended to the "Disable driver" profile entry in BaseProfile.xml. Got it? Good. By the way, the magic tag in this profile is <RouterType Value="2"/> and that makes the iZ3D driver disabled for those filenames.

I think that's it for now.

--- iondrive ---

[iondrive]

hi again,

I keep lernin' stuff and I've got to stop sometime.

keycodes:
What if you want to set the Tab key to be a preset hotkey? You can't do it in the control panel because when you hit it, it takes you away from the text box. The same goes for "escape" and "return" keys but if you edit your profile, it turns out that you can use these keys for 3d settings after all. Here are the keycodes for some "odd" keys you may want to use. You can stick this at the bottom of your UserProfile.xml as a reminder.

Code: Select all

    <!-- letters A-Z are keycodes 65-90 -->
    <!-- non-numpad number keys 0-9 are keycodes 48-57 -->
    <!-- "Space" keycode is "32" -->
    <!-- "tab" keycode is "9" -->
    <!-- "esc" keycode is "27" and could be good for ToggleStereo Key="27" -->
    <!-- both "enter" and "numpad enter" use keycode "13" -->
    <!-- "Shift, Control, Alt" are +256, +512, and +1024 respectively -->
    <!-- "Left-Shift" keycode is "272" (256+16) -->
    <!-- "Left-Control" keycode is "529" (512+17) -->
    <!-- "Left-Alt" keycode is "1042" (1024+18) -->

the escape key:
As noted, you might want to consider the escape key as a ToggleStereo key since it's used for menus, your screen would go 2d whenever you escaped to the menu and then back to s3d when you escape back but I think this might cause problems if you get "out of sync" with a double-escape at some point. It's just something to consider for some games where the menu gives you problems if it's in s3d.

Shift, Control, and Alt:
Usually, these are like modifiers but you can use them as isolated hotkeys if you want. The number comes from the keycode + the modifier keycode so Ctrl by itself is more like Ctrl-Ctrl and similar goes for Alt-Alt and Shift-Shift. Get it?

Onward...

[iondrive]

hi again,

OK, what if you sometimes use a projector and sometimes you use a 17 inch CRT and want different settings for the same game for each display. It turns out you can do this, you just have to do a little work. Basically, if you forget how, then look and the hl2.exe entries in BaseProfile.xml and UserProfile.xml and follow their example.

in BaseProfile.xml, there's this:

Code: Select all

	<Profile Name="Counter-Srike Source">
		<File Name="hl2.exe" CmdLine="-game cstrike"/>
	</Profile>

	<Profile Name="Half-Life 2">
		<File Name="hl2.exe"/>
	</Profile>

and in UserProfile.xml, there's this:

Code: Select all

    <Profile Name="Counter-Srike: Source">
        <File CmdLine="-game cstrike" Name="hl2.exe" />
        ...
    </Profile>

    <Profile Name="Half-Life 2">
        <File Name="hl2.exe" />
        ...
    </Profile>

They are two games that use the same filename for their exe. We can follow this example to fix my sample problem. Just use dummy command line options and it works:

in BaseProfile.xml, put this:

Code: Select all

	<Profile Name="my game on projector">
		<File Name="game.exe" CmdLine="-dummy-projector-option"/>
	</Profile>

	<Profile Name="my game on CRT">
		<File Name="game.exe" CmdLine="-dummy-CRT-option"/>
	</Profile>

and in UserProfile.xml, put this:

Code: Select all

    <Profile Name="my game on projector">
        <File CmdLine="-dummy-projector-option" Name="game.exe" />
        ...
    </Profile>

    <Profile Name="my game on CRT">
        <File CmdLine="-dummy-CRT-option" Name="game.exe" />
        ...
    </Profile>

Then copy the game.exe file and paste shortcuts on your desktop. Edit the properties so that the "Target" textbox includes the appropriate -dummy option (I believe it should work with or without quotes, quote the entire thing to be safe), rename the shortcuts appropriately and test it. Each shortcut should start the same game and you should be able to set the settings independently of each other. Neat huh? Now you have too many shortcuts on your desktop so use two folders on your desktop, one for your CRT and one for your projector and put the appropriate shortcuts in each and your desktop will be nice and neat. Of course you can come up with other uses for such an ability. The game should just ignore that option so you just have to watch out for the rare case where "-dummy-CRT-option" is an actual game option that does something. Try at own risk.

I think that's it for now. Later all.

--- iondrive ---