tfx 040 patch
charlie dev
don't blame me, blame hunkwiz.
Angus Manwaring
>http://www.charliex.net/TFX.LHA
>don't blame me, blame hunkwiz.
Has anybody tried this out? I had a quick go, but on an 060 I wasn't sure
that it ran any quicker than the TFX.FPU executable. It's very nice to
see an update for this game, but it would be cool to have a readme file
too.
All the best,
Angus Manwaring. (for e-mail remove ANTISPEM)
I need your memories for the Amiga Games Database: A collection of Amiga
Game reviews by Amiga players http://www.angusm.demon.co.uk/AGDB/AGDB.html
charlie dev
a 060 patch isn't impossible, but its unlikely since i dont have one
available
the readme would just say , recompiled with 6.58 and hunkwiz no
longer used to strip out the debug info (since it breaks it)
"Angus Manwaring" <angus@angusm_ANTISPEM_.demon.co.uk> wrote in message
news:590.740T852T14074099angus@angusm_ANTISPEM_.demon.co.uk...
Angus Manwaring
>"Angus Manwaring" <angus@angusm_ANTISPEM_.demon.co.uk> wrote in message
>>
>> Has anybody tried this out? I had a quick go, but on an 060 I wasn't sure
>> that it ran any quicker than the TFX.FPU executable. It's very nice to
>> see an update for this game, but it would be cool to have a readme file
>> too.
>>
>it won't, its meant just for 040, stops that "instant guru"
Oh, okay - thanks for clearing that up. :)
>a 060 patch isn't impossible, but its unlikely since i dont have one
>available
You've got a beta tester! :)
>the readme would just say , recompiled with 6.58 and hunkwiz no
>longer used to strip out the debug info (since it breaks it)
Do you envisage the source ever becoming available Charlie, so maybe
somebody could do a PPC version. I'll bet Hyperion would be up for it if
you were willing?
charlie dev
> >available
>
> You've got a beta tester! :)
>
>
> Do you envisage the source ever becoming available Charlie, so maybe
> somebody could do a PPC version. I'll bet Hyperion would be up for it if
> you were willing?
>
Doubtful, DID were bought out by rage, and some of the others went off to
form their own dealy, i moved to the states. I'm not sure if copyright and
stuff is owned by ocean, which was bought out by infogrammes or if
DID kept ownership, so then rage would own it =) or if martin k. kept
it and it now belongs to evolution studios ( their new company )
i asked colin a long time ago if it was ok if i release a patch for it, while
DID was stil intact, and he was cool with that, but other than that theres
no way i would release anymore than exe's since i own none of the rights,
i can only do it through their favour, and i'm not sure who *they* are now.
theres a smackload of assembler in the game, so it'd have to be all converted
over, i heard of a tool that converts it for you, but i'm no sure how well it'd
work or if it'd be optimal.
i did get the ppc beta version of the compiler to play with, but it'd be a lot
of work, and i only have my 040 4000 with me.
charlie.
Dante Mendes De Patta
> Do you envisage the source ever becoming available Charlie, so maybe
> somebody could do a PPC version. I'll bet Hyperion would be up for it if
> you were willing?
Hi Angus. :)
Speaking in flight sims source code, Rowan's Mig Alley source code has
just been released after a lot of requests by the mig alley playing
community...
The download link:
http://www.simhq.com/simhq3/sims/downloads/migalley/migalley.exe
(12.5 mb)
I don't know exactly if it's a suitable source code for a full port,
or just one to enable 3rd party modifications and add-ons. Anyway, a
friend of mine is studying a full Linux port of Mig Alley right now.
I'm downloading the file now, to take a closer look...
Anybody curious to see how Mig Alley looks like:
http://www.simhq.com/simhq3/sims/previews/mig_alley/mig_alley_p2.shtml
Seppo Typpo
> "Angus Manwaring" wrote in message
> > >a 060 patch isn't impossible, but its unlikely since i dont have one
> > >available
> >
> > You've got a beta tester! :)
> >
> yeah unfortunately i'd need a litlte more that that =)
This may sound silly, but maybe the Patchers could help - they are
highly competent people in fixing this kind of things and could offer
some useful pointers :-)
> > Do you envisage the source ever becoming available Charlie, so maybe
> > somebody could do a PPC version. I'll bet Hyperion would be up for it if
> > you were willing?
> >
>
> Doubtful, DID were bought out by rage, and some of the others went off to
> form their own dealy, i moved to the states. I'm not sure if copyright and
> stuff is owned by ocean, which was bought out by infogrammes or if
> DID kept ownership, so then rage would own it =) or if martin k. kept
> it and it now belongs to evolution studios ( their new company )
>
> i asked colin a long time ago if it was ok if i release a patch for it, while
> DID was stil intact, and he was cool with that, but other than that theres
> no way i would release anymore than exe's since i own none of the rights,
> i can only do it through their favour, and i'm not sure who *they* are now.
Sounds like really tricky situation :-(
I wonder if anyone in this group has connections which could clarify
things...
> theres a smackload of assembler in the game, so it'd have to be all converted
> over, i heard of a tool that converts it for you, but i'm no sure how well it'd
> work or if it'd be optimal.
>
> i did get the ppc beta version of the compiler to play with, but it'd be a lot
> of work, and i only have my 040 4000 with me.
Many thanks for this new patch, Charlie, it is a life saver. I tried
it today on my 040 machine and while it generally runs well I have
couple of questions:
How do I get rid of fuzzy fonts in arming screen and the flickering
dials in actual game screen? I remember disabling caches is one cure
to the flickering but that slows down the already feeble 25 MHz 040.
The fuzzy fonts is a problem too, it is very hard to select weapons
(well, most of them, I can identify some of the weapons visually :-)
Seppo
Seppo Typpo
you wrote:
> Speaking in flight sims source code, Rowan's Mig Alley source code has
> just been released after a lot of requests by the mig alley playing
> community...
>
> The download link:
> http://www.simhq.com/simhq3/sims/downloads/migalley/migalley.exe
> (12.5 mb)
>
> I don't know exactly if it's a suitable source code for a full port,
> or just one to enable 3rd party modifications and add-ons. Anyway, a
> friend of mine is studying a full Linux port of Mig Alley right now.
Could you report the findings (on your friends permission of course)
here in c.s.a.g? It would be nice to know how portable the game is in
case some daredevil Amiga programmer would like to have a go.
> I'm downloading the file now, to take a closer look...
>
> Anybody curious to see how Mig Alley looks like:
> http://www.simhq.com/simhq3/sims/previews/mig_alley/mig_alley_p2.shtml
I checked the link and the sim looks the business. It looks
ideal for a Amiga PPC conversion - preferaböy with 3D acceleration
(which might enable 060 owners to play it, too).
Seppo
Angus Manwaring
>"Angus Manwaring" <angus@angusm_ANTISPEM_.demon.co.uk> wrote in message
>i asked colin a long time ago if it was ok if i release a patch for it, while
>DID was stil intact, and he was cool with that, but other than that theres no
>way i would release anymore than exe's since i own none of the rights, i can
>only do it through their favour, and i'm not sure who *they* are now.
Understood.
>theres a smackload of assembler in the game, so it'd have to be all converted
>over, i heard of a tool that converts it for you, but i'm no sure how well
>it'd work or if it'd be optimal.
>i did get the ppc beta version of the compiler to play with, but it'd be a
>lot of work, and i only have my 040 4000 with me.
Well either way, its great to see another update of what must surely be the
sexiest flight-sim on the Amiga. I recently found and bought the PC
version of the game so that I'd have full documentation for the Amiga
version.
I gather the 040 and the 060 processors have quite a lot of common ground -
do you see yourself making any further 040 optimisations? ;)
Is the FPU thing with these processors the main issue? Don't they have to
emulate a lot of FPU functions or something?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
In case its of any help to people here are some of the keys for Amiga TFX
followed by a couple of ancient c.s.a.games postings that maybe of
interest:
TFX Contols
***********
Escape Eject/Quit Shift Q Quit
F Keys Views W Wheelbrakes
F1 Cockpit R Radar scale
F2 Virtual cockpit left T Time warp
F3 Virtual cockpit right I Information
F4 Rear view P Pause
F5 Track camera 1 [ Engine 1 on/off
F6 Flyby track camera ] Engine 2 on/off
F7 Track camera 2 Return Weapon select
F8 Missile view A Autopilot
F9 Enemy view S Stealth
F10 Virtual cockpit centre G Landing gear
~ Settings H Hook
1 VDU 1 L Landing system
2 VDU 2 B Air brakes
3 VDU 3 M Map
4 Save game * Max power
5 Auto Stick pressure 9 Cockpit up
- Decrease thrust 3 Cockpit down
+ Increase thrust Help PAL/NTSC
B/Spacebar Ground target
Tab Auto recovery
From: andrew.korn(at)ecm.emap.com (Andrew Korn)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.games
Some quick answers to common questions..
change targets with the c key
hit z to use the laser bomb sites
'040 version is a little buggy, seems to only work on stock A4000s. Use
the FPU version. Processor settings in MCP or use of Oxypatcher make
the FPU code go a lot faster on '040 and '060s.
From: "Tony Horgan" <tony....@ecm.emap.com>
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.games
In article <34297995.MD...@stanza.demon.co.uk>, "Dave Nuttall." <da...@stanza.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> As I am completely hopeless at flight simms I thought that I might
> have a real good go at TFX , So I started off at the training missions
> and managed to complete a couple untill I had to land on the carrier,
> I have tried everything but I can't seem to line up properly and end
> up aproaching the carrier at totaly the wrong angle,
Press ALT L to put the plane into auto landing mode. Now go and practice doing
it yourself!
From: "Eike M. Lang" <el...@neuss.netsurf.de>
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.games
Hello everybody,
as getting the TFX-issue of CU Amiga was quite a *big* problem for me,
and I do not want to buy the November issue of TFX as well, I suggest
we exchange some information on the keys supported by TFX.
L - does NOT activate instrument landing, it only repeats the last
message
' - Instrument Landing System
DEL - Toggle mid-air refuel mode
(mid-air refueling is quite easy in TFX, just make sure you approach
the refueller straight from behind and within a reasonable range of
its speed)
alt W - Wind/weather report
(pointless, really, as the wind never stayed on, no matter how often I
toggled it)
the reference in CU Amiga that says '9' and '3' can be used to look
up/down within the cockpit should read 'Numeric Keypad 9' and 'Numeric
Keypad 3'
A - Autopilot
in all autopilot modes, speed can be adjusted in steps of 10 in the
same way engine RPM is controlled
7 - set autopilot to waypoint mode
8 - set autopilot to bearing mode - the plane will keep the preset
bearing and speed, bearing can be adjusted using the cursor left/right
keys
9 - set autopilot to tracking mode - your plane will follow the
currently active air target
\ - switch to targettting camera for the Laser-Guided-Bombs
(you still need to press 'Z' to lock onto a target)
Numeric * - increase after burner stage (RPM will be turned to
maximum, too)
Numeric / - switch off afterburner
left-ALT J - Jettison all air-to-ground weaponry
left-ALT + cursors left/right - rudder control
(changes plane heading without banking, this is only effective at
speeds below 300 knots, great for correcting your runway approach)
Seppo Typpo
> Well either way, its great to see another update of what must
> surely be the sexiest flight-sim on the Amiga.
I fully agree - this patch has rekindled my interest to play the sim -
all over again with a new pilot.
> I recently found and bought the PC version of the game so that I'd
> have full documentation for the Amiga version.
I bought a cheap copy of the PC version, too - I am a sucker for thick
flight manuals. I even did small stickers with the text 'Amiga
version' and clued them to the box (yeah, I know, it is sad) :-)
Seppo
charlie dev
> This may sound silly, but maybe the Patchers could help - they are
> highly competent people in fixing this kind of things and could offer
> some useful pointers :-)
>
Yeah but its hard ot port to a cpu without said cpu, i know what needs
to be done, its just doing it, doing it by proxy would be improbable.
> Many thanks for this new patch, Charlie, it is a life saver. I tried
> it today on my 040 machine and while it generally runs well I have
> couple of questions:
>
> How do I get rid of fuzzy fonts in arming screen and the flickering
> dials in actual game screen? I remember disabling caches is one cure
> to the flickering but that slows down the already feeble 25 MHz 040.
> The fuzzy fonts is a problem too, it is very hard to select weapons
> (well, most of them, I can identify some of the weapons visually :-)
>
> Seppo
I have to rewrite the self modifying code in the font routines, we
intially used a truck load of SMC code, then slowly removed it
over time, a couple of the font routines and some of the object
frustrum culling still uses it.
I'm not sure about the fuzynesss of the fonts, i'd have to take a
look, normally the colours flicker or such.
charlie dev
> I gather the 040 and the 060 processors have quite a lot of common ground -
> do you see yourself making any further 040 optimisations? ;)
>
Its possible, i'd like to get it to promote properly, but that usually makes
it even slower, especially since i don't have a composite monitor and my
a520 doesn't seem to work correctly, bad colours, though its a UK a4000
running on a inverter, i tried changing the ntsc/pal jumpers but it didn't
help ( using a video capture card with PAL or NTSC in )
> Is the FPU thing with these processors the main issue? Don't they have to
> emulate a lot of FPU functions or something?
>
Yup mainly, the loss of some commonly used FPU operation is the biggest
deal. That seems to be why its slower on a 060 than a 040
the flight model is very complex math and it'd take a lot to rewrite it, it
was written by one guy and pretty much only he knows how it works,
and i've lost touch with him, though i could probaby cut down a lot
on some of the emulated instructions..
charlie
charlie dev
to bump into them at lunch and so on =), i believe some of DIDs staff came from
there early on, not 100% sure though
Angus Manwaring
>> dials in actual game screen? I remember disabling caches is one cure
>> to the flickering but that slows down the already feeble 25 MHz 040.
>> The fuzzy fonts is a problem too, it is very hard to select weapons
>> (well, most of them, I can identify some of the weapons visually :-)
>>
>> Seppo
>I have to rewrite the self modifying code in the font routines, we
>intially used a truck load of SMC code, then slowly removed it
>over time, a couple of the font routines and some of the object
>frustrum culling still uses it.
Blimey! :)
>I'm not sure about the fuzynesss of the fonts, i'd have to take a
>look, normally the colours flicker or such.
Its kind of like the text has been written 2 or 3 times and then slight
shifted out of registration - if that makes sense?
In the game, the instrument panels flash quite a bit - here at least.
Charlie - I've been attempting to optimise things here (in a very low tech
kind of way) :) . Is there any means by which I can get a comparative
performance figure - like a framerate?
Fastexec seems to make an improvement, then there's
Cyberpatcher/Oxypatcher etc. But its quite hard to estimate how much
difference (if any) I've made.
Angus Manwaring
>Thats cool they did that, rowan used to be round the corner from DID, we used
>to bump into them at lunch and so on =), i believe some of DIDs staff came
>from there early on, not 100% sure though
(Checks his review own review of Falcon on the AGDB)
Yes, Russell Payne and Martin Kenwright were both credited in the
Rowan/Spectrum Holobyte classic Falcon.
Angus Manwaring
>I bought a cheap copy of the PC version, too - I am a sucker for thick
>flight manuals. I even did small stickers with the text 'Amiga
>version' and clued them to the box (yeah, I know, it is sad) :-)
Sad? Nahhhhhh.
.......Tragic maybe. ;)
When you were making the stickers, were you mumbling, "I'm gonna make the
shitter pay. All of 'em."
Just wondering.
:)
Jan-Erik Karlsson
the 10 Dec 2001 23:08:58 GMT you said about Re: tfx 040 patch:
>
> > I gather the 040 and the 060 processors have quite a lot of common ground -
> > do you see yourself making any further 040 optimisations? ;)
> >
>
> Its possible, i'd like to get it to promote properly, but that usually makes
> it even slower, especially since i don't have a composite monitor and my
> a520 doesn't seem to work correctly, bad colours, though its a UK a4000
> running on a inverter, i tried changing the ntsc/pal jumpers but it didn't
> help ( using a video capture card with PAL or NTSC in )
is it currently at all possible to promote tfx to run on a gfx-card
(I'm currently using a Voodoo5 5500 :-) on my mediator
> > Is the FPU thing with these processors the main issue? Don't they have to
> > emulate a lot of FPU functions or something?
> >
with phase5's libraries they contain the functionality of the
cyberpatcher and should therefor run just as fast as a 68040 (at
least) when using the 68060.library
> Yup mainly, the loss of some commonly used FPU operation is the biggest
> deal. That seems to be why its slower on a 060 than a 040
--
With Kind Regards,
Jan-Erik Karlsson
Email: t...@nospam.privat.utfors.se.invalid
WWW: http://hem.fyristorg.com/TRG/
UIN: 54667153
---
%t
charlie dev
> Its kind of like the text has been written 2 or 3 times and then slight
> shifted out of registration - if that makes sense?
>
> In the game, the instrument panels flash quite a bit - here at least.
>
probably cache related, again SMC code =) its all over i may have
missed some,
> Charlie - I've been attempting to optimise things here (in a very low tech
> kind of way) :) . Is there any means by which I can get a comparative
> performance figure - like a framerate?
>
i'll measure mine and post it.
> Fastexec seems to make an improvement, then there's
> Cyberpatcher/Oxypatcher etc. But its quite hard to estimate how much
> difference (if any) I've made.
yeah i'll add a FPS counter, there is one in there already but its disabled in
the release build, its been a while since i switched it on.
i have a hard time with at the moment, since i can barely see the screen with
the crap a520 and no promotion going on, i'm trying to locate a composite
monitor locally, should be easy enough in hollywood , lots of ex toasters
lying around...
charlie
charlie dev
> (Checks his review own review of Falcon on the AGDB)
>
> Yes, Russell Payne and Martin Kenwright were both credited in the
> Rowan/Spectrum Holobyte classic Falcon.
>
Yep thats right, theres a couple of others as well, Martin was an artist
on it and Russell a programmer, they eventually left to form DID, which
was probably why they were so close together, i'm not sure if colin bell
was there too.
charlie dev
> is it currently at all possible to promote tfx to run on a gfx-card
> (I'm currently using a Voodoo5 5500 :-) on my mediator
>
It half promotes, much better than the first version which uses an old
standard copper list, but not fully since its still using them and at the
time of doing it there was things i didn't know about promoting the
screen to the dbl or such via a copper or hardware programming, i
did attach an intuition screen to it, but it then takes over, hence the
horizontal stretch that usually happens.
i'd like to fix it up , since i'm using a VGA monitor too..
> with phase5's libraries they contain the functionality of the
> cyberpatcher and should therefor run just as fast as a 68040 (at
> least) when using the 68060.library
Thats not what i've been hearing back from 060 owners, unless
they aren't using the phase5 libs, however it may be the pipelining
or some other cache problem going on, as i've said before it
still uses SMC code and flushes the cache more than it should to
get round it, which will kill the performance of any heavily
cache dependant CPU, which i believe where most of the 060
gets is boost.
I haven't ever played with an 060, so i am not upto speed on the
ins and outs of it, i got the list of deprecated opcodes etc, and
see what i can do about that, but a lot of that depends on SAS
6.58, theres not much i can do about it for the time being, i
can only rely on feedback from 060 owners who've tried it
with success.
charlie..
Seppo Typpo
> On 10-Dec-01 22:39:57, Seppo Typpo said
>
> >I bought a cheap copy of the PC version, too - I am a sucker for thick
> >flight manuals. I even did small stickers with the text 'Amiga
> >version' and clued them to the box (yeah, I know, it is sad) :-)
>
> Sad? Nahhhhhh.
>
:-)
> When you were making the stickers, were you mumbling, "I'm gonna make the
> shitter pay. All of 'em."
>
> Just wondering.
>
> :)
Hm, I cannot recall saying anything such - I was just trying to erase
any traces so my friends would never find out that I ( Amiga user)
had bought a <cough> PC game... ;-)
Seppo
Angus Manwaring
>> Charlie - I've been attempting to optimise things here (in a very low tech
>> kind of way) :) . Is there any means by which I can get a comparative
>> performance figure - like a framerate?
>>
>i'll measure mine and post it.
Great, thanks.
>> Fastexec seems to make an improvement, then there's
>> Cyberpatcher/Oxypatcher etc. But its quite hard to estimate how much
>> difference (if any) I've made.
>yeah i'll add a FPS counter, there is one in there already but its disabled
>in the release build, its been a while since i switched it on.
That would be really handy. Cheers.
Angus Manwaring
>I haven't ever played with an 060, so i am not upto speed on the
>ins and outs of it, i got the list of deprecated opcodes etc, and
>see what i can do about that, but a lot of that depends on SAS
>6.58, theres not much i can do about it for the time being, i
>can only rely on feedback from 060 owners who've tried it
>with success.
On the subject of feedback Charlie, in case its of any help regarding the
'smudged' text thing, here's what I found on the 3 available exceutables I
have:
All 3 (68K, FPU, and 040) 'smudge' the text on the weapon load screen, but
not the text at the bottom of that screen, default, clear pylon, okay, etc.
The FPU version smudges the top line of the Pilot loading screen, but none
below that, the other two versions don't do this. There are some other
differences regarding what option is highlighted in red, but that's not a
problem obviously.
I don't know if that's any help at all, but I thought I'd let you know
anyway. :)
charlie dev
> anyway. :)
Sure feedbacks always good, i'm waiting to get a composite monitor
before i play with it more, its too frustrating with a TV in =)
I wonder if this constitutes any kind of record for a late patch
charlie
Angus Manwaring
<Darth Vader>
It is insignicant when compared to the lateness of the game.
</Darth Vader>
Okay, probably not actually, but you know what I mean. :)
arturlewa...@gmail.com
> http://www.charliex.net/TFX.LHA
>
> don't blame me, blame hunkwiz.
xxxx
arturlewa...@gmail.com
Hawk
wrote:
>Mam ogromn? nadziej? ?
Your hopes have been realized, cousin. :)
arturlewa...@gmail.com
xxxx
>
https://archive.org/details/PC98GAMELIBRARY