Commandos

[AzazelHD]

Hello. Thanks for making this tool.

Im trying to use it along Commandos 1 and its expansion.

What should i notice ingame after installing it? I cant really notice it, so i dont know if im doing something wrong

[FunkyFr3sh]

you could press Alt+Enter to check if it switches to windowed mode. Or you can press Ctrl+Tab and check if that unlocks your cursor.

Or use cnc-ddraw config.exe and enable windowed mode in there, then start the game and check if it's windowed.

[AzazelHD]

So, this is tool is mainly to allow old game (those that use directdraw) to be displayed in windowed or borderless mode?

[FunkyFr3sh]

Yeah, borderless and windowed mode are two things people usually like about cnc-ddraw. But it does also add support for shaders that improve the image quality or add some retro CRT/scanline effects. It can also fix your mouse sensitivity (needs Borderless/Fullscreen upscaled enabled).

But it does fix compatibility issues as well, some games don't even start without cnc-ddraw (or run very slow). There are also games that crash on Alt+Tab without cnc-ddraw.

[AzazelHD]

I see. Thanks so much ^^

[AzazelHD]

Sorry for coming here again. Im having some issues. Without cnc, mouse works right, but i cant use borderless mode. With cnc, i can use borderless, but mouse goes weird. Like if it had lagg. I tried enabling and disabling adjust the mouse sensitivity, but i cant make it go like without cnc.

Do you have any ideas?

[FunkyFr3sh]

There are all kinds of reasons for a slow cursor:

1. You enabled v-sync
2. Boderless does also add some delay to the cursor, that's normal in games that have a software cursor
3. You chose a shader that's too heavy and your hardware can't handle it

Also, make sure you never enable v-sync and boderless at the same time.

[AzazelHD]

vsync is off. And idk how to disable shaders. There is no "none" option. Simply remove folder? I am not sure, but cnc is doing something with resolutions. The resolutions (in game) with and without cnc are totally different

[FunkyFr3sh]

If you didn't change the shader then it's probably fine, "nearest neighbor", "bilinear" and "bicubic/Catmull-rom" are not going to lag

What if you use "Fullscreen upscaled" instead of "Borderless", does it feel normal? "Fullscreen upscaled" does the same as "borderless", both upscale the game. But "Fullscreen upscaled" is real fullscreen so it doesn't add any delay.

[AzazelHD]

So, im on windows 10, and i have on that feature called "night light" (sorry my OS isnt on english), which applies like a yellow filter to the screen. If i use fullscreen upscaled, that filter is gone. I dont know why, but i dont like it playing at night without that filter.

[FunkyFr3sh]

Yeah, that's fine, it was mainly just meant to be a test. Does the cursor feel normal with "Fullscreen upscaled"?

[AzazelHD]

Nop, cursor is still laggy. I dont know how to describe apart from saying that it is not as smooth as without cnc.

All the other settings are by default. Only changed the window mode

[FunkyFr3sh]

Alright, I'll try to set the game up and do some tests just to make sure it's still working as intended (been long time since I last tried it)

[AzazelHD]

I dont know if it will matter, but I have the GOG version. Thanks for your time

[FunkyFr3sh]

Yeah, there are multiple bugs. it does run better with the game speed limiter disabled, but I'll have to do some more debugging (Will do that tomorrow, getting late here)

[AzazelHD]

Yeah i tried that too. It is smoother, but not as smooth as without cnc. Thanks so much, and sorry for troubles.
Take your time lol, dont worry ^^

[FunkyFr3sh]

Did you disable "Adjust Mouse sensitivity"? It seems to run same as original for me with that off and no speed limiter.

BTW, this problem only happens in the menus (The gameplay is fine). In Beyond The Call Of Duty they've fixed it.

[AzazelHD]

Even in game i have lagg.
Look, maybe u could try this and hopefully find the issue. Do u have afterburner + rivartuner? if not, download them, and on afterburner settings, click on frametime - show on screen display - graph (it is on text by default)
And then make RTSS to show ingame. When ever u move the cursor, frametime varies a lot. Idk if this is the "lagg"

[FunkyFr3sh]

I have a FPS overlay in cnc-ddraw, but what you see there is normal. Old games only redraw the screen if something changed. So if you don't move the mouse or move it slow it will show a low fps.

2023-09-09.18-19-39.mp4

[AzazelHD]

Mmmm ive noticed that your ddraw.dll is bigger than mine, and i dont have those dxwrapper files. I googled it and i got another github repo. Could be that?
Also, u running it windowed mode. Should i?

[FunkyFr3sh]

Oh, you can ignore those files, I just wanted to try some other ddraw.dll wrappers and check if they also have the same issue (they do). It did even happen on windows xp without any ddraw.dll wrapper.

You could try to play around with the settings a bit, but I guess it's the best you try it with all on default first (until we figured out the issue). Keep it on Fullscreen and make sure game speed limit is off

[AzazelHD]

Thanks for ur time ^^

[AzazelHD]

Hi. Little update. I tried dxwrapper (https://github.com/elishacloud/dxwrapper) And mouse runs smoother. Do u think i could use the ddraw.dll from there with ur cnc? or it will crash?

EDIT: It crashes

[FunkyFr3sh]

No, that's not possible. You can use only one at a time. And BTW, dxwrapper is disabled by default (just dropping the ddraw.dll into the folder isn't enough to activate it), you need to enable it via the settings file

[elishacloud]

I tried dxwrapper (https://github.com/elishacloud/dxwrapper) And mouse runs smoother.

What settings are you enabling in the dxwrapper.ini file?

[FunkyFr3sh]

Okay I can reproduce it now on windows 10. Don't have a solution yet, but I'll post here once I made some progress

[AzazelHD]

No, that's not possible. You can use only one at a time. And BTW, dxwrapper is disabled by default (just dropping the ddraw.dll into the folder isn't enough to activate it), you need to enable it via the settings file

Yeah, i read the instructions and the settings. Their readme has the reqs for it. For commandos they say to enable FullscreenWindowMode and ColorMode (or something similar) to 16. But dxwrapper does something weird, cuz the resolution on rivatuner is not the same as with cnc

[FunkyFr3sh]

You also need to set this, otherwise the other settings are doing nothing. It does not run well with dxwrapper though, at least for me it's unplayable atm

[Compatibility]
Dd7to9 = 1

[AzazelHD]

Ye ye, i didnt mention but sure, i enabled dd7to9 ^^'

[FunkyFr3sh]

Here's a test build @AzazelHD , I'm getting a 60 fps cursor now with it:

cnc-ddraw_Commandos_5.7.0.4.zip

[AzazelHD]

OMG it goes super smooth <3 <3 <3

Thank you so much, i really appreciate it

[SilentMRG]

Hello everybody!

Enjoying the topic to ask a question... Could someone please tell me how I can make the videos (I'm referring to those historical videos) appear? There are none of these videos and no videos with company logo appear when starting the game. I'm using the GOG version of Behind Enemy Lines. Of course, I'm using the latest version of cnc-ddraw.

Thanks in advance!

[Funky-Fr3sh]

Hello everybody!

Enjoying the topic to ask a question... Could someone please tell me how I can make the videos (I'm referring to those historical videos) appear? There are none of these videos and no videos with company logo appear when starting the game. I'm using the GOG version of Behind Enemy Lines. Of course, I'm using the latest version of cnc-ddraw.

Thanks in advance!

Does it work without cnc-ddraw? If it also doesn't work without cnc-ddraw then my guess is a problem with the codec, you might need to run the game in compatibility mode Windows XP SP2 (This way windows enables some older codecs)

Edit: just tested, works fine for me using the "comandos_w10.exe" in the game folder. Tested on Win7 and win10

[SilentMRG]

I haven't tested it without cnc-ddraw yet. As soon as it's on my PC I'll test it. Regarding the codec, I don't think this is the problem, as I have installed the latest version of "K-Lite Codec Pack Mega", and I can watch the videos by accessing them directly from the folder; however, in the game no video will play, and instead I get a black screen with some dots that flash quickly. Other than that, the game works very well and I even finished it. I'm going to play Beyond the Call of Duty for the next few days and see whether or not videos will be play.

[SilentMRG]

Edit: just tested, works fine for me using the "comandos_w10.exe" in the game folder. Tested on Win7 and win10

Wait a minute... Does "comandos_w10.exe" work on Windows 7?! I thought about using this executable but I thought it wouldn't work because I'm on Windows 7 and the executable is for Windows 10. I'll test this later too. Thanks for the tip!

[FunkyFr3sh]

Yes, it does work fine on windows 7, I always use the _w10 one

[SilentMRG]

Unsuccessfully! I tried "comandos.exe" with and without cnc-ddraw and got the absence of videos, then I tried "comandos_w10.exe" also with and without cnc-ddraw and the same problem occurred. I don't understand... I can watch the videos through the folder, but in the game, they don't work. Anyway, I'm using the latest version of the K-Lite Codec Pack in its default configuration. Another suggestion of what could be causing this? I also tried various compatibility modes and no videos to watch. =/

Thank you for your attention!

[FunkyFr3sh]

We could try to use a different codec for testing, just to see what happens. I re-encoded one videos for you, try to extract the files into your game folder (Make a backup of your original video first!) and run "enable-xvid-vfw.reg" to enable the xvid codec.

commandos-video-test.zip

[SilentMRG]

This is one of the codecs installed by K-Lite Codec Pack Mega. I received an error related to this codec every time I tried to play Ys I & II Chronicles+, and after installing K-Lite the problem was resolved. So, in my humble opinion I believe it is not a problem with the codecs.

Honestly, this is a mystery, worse than the videos not being displayed is the lack of a warning related to the error. At least Ys warned that there was an error about missing codec.

[FunkyFr3sh]

Hm, I don't really know what else the problem could be. The game plays the videos just fine and there seems to be nothing unusual about them (cnc-ddraw also fulyl supports them, including upscaling). The codec is also nothing special, it's just the old "Cinepak Video" one that a lot of other old games are using as well.

[SilentMRG]

I just installed Beyond the Call of Duty and I'm not getting any videos either. I installed the latest version of K-Lite: https://codecguide.com/

And I did a fresh install, and left all the settings at their defaults. So, I don't know what could be causing this. I took a look in the System32 folder and there are the dlls from the package you uploaded, the same dlls that were reinstalled by K-Lite. To give you an idea, the creation date of the dlls in your package is the same as the one that K-Lite installs. That about the videos not appearing doesn't make sense... Anyway, at least I can watch the videos through the folder.

And sorry for posting these things here, it's just that for me, this wasn't a problem with cnc-ddraw, that's why I didn't open an issue.

Thank you for your attention and help!

[FunkyFr3sh]

Yeah, the dll files in my .zip are just the original xvid ones from the official installer. I only included them just in case you don'T have them yet.

BTW, the video in my zip is the only one that needs these dlls. The original videos are using "iccvid.dll", maybe you don't have that one?

[SilentMRG]

I just searched the System32 folder for iccvid.dll and didn't find anything, so I guess I don't have it. Could this be the problem?

[FunkyFr3sh]

I guess that might be the problem yeah. I do have the file on my win7

[SilentMRG]

Surely this is the problem. And now? How to install this dll? There is a program that installs it? K-Lite does not install it.

[FunkyFr3sh]

I think it's part of windows installation, that's probably also the reason why mine is german (Deutsch). I also tried to delete the file it doesn't let me delete it so it probably is a windows component.

Maybe in your country the file wasn't included in the windows installation due to license issues? Windows installs different files on different languages.

I don't know if there is a official download link for it, you'll have to google for it.

Here is my file and the registry key to enable the codec:
cinepak-codec.zip

[SilentMRG]

Man, I really thank you for all your help! You wouldn't even have to care about it, but you did and tried to help me in the best way possible. BUT, unfortunately it didn't work, I tried several ways: I threw the dll in the game folder and registered it, then I deleted the keys and threw the dll in the System32 folder, finally, I found this: http://www.probo.com/cinepak.php

I downloaded the 32-bit version and used these keys:

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\drivers.desc]
"iccvid.dll"="Cinepak Codec by Radius Inc."

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32]
"vidc.cvid"="iccvid.dll"

With your file header, in this case, "Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00". And guess what? Nothing happened! Holy shit... And of course, when doing these tests I deleted the keys and dlls to avoid generating conflicts. I think my PC is cursed and not even black magic will solve it! I've never seen an invisible error like this where no solution works. Anyway, I'm from Brazil, and I think that MAYBE it's a region lock or whatever!

I was irritated by this game! I'm going to uninstall it and try Commandos 2 another time. They say it's better than the first one anyway, so I'm wasting time with this stupid game.

Again, thank you for all your help and apologize for any inconvenience.

[elishacloud]

Those codecs should be installed as part of a Windows component. Have you tried removing with "Media Features" component and then adding it back in? See here: https://www.dummies.com/article/technology/computers/operating-systems/windows/windows-10/how-to-add-or-remove-parts-of-windows-7-195288/

[SilentMRG]

Those codecs should be installed as part of a Windows component. Have you tried removing with "Media Features" component and then adding it back in? See here: https://www.dummies.com/article/technology/computers/operating-systems/windows/windows-10/how-to-add-or-remove-parts-of-windows-7-195288/

Thanks for the tip... And by the way, I lost my system installation disc. I gave up on this game, many juggles to make a game work is not good. If it worked the first time or with minimal adjustments, that's fine, if it didn't work, I'll just delete it. I'm an old guy who doesn't have time to waste. XD

Edit: Just for the record... I installed Commandos 2 just to see whether or not the videos would show up, and they all did, I didn't see any errors or anything weird. And I also used the latest version of cnc-ddraw. Anyway, I don't know if C2 videos use the same codec as C1, what I know in short is that it worked like a charm. I don't understand these things... PC games are definitely a Pandora's box! hehe

[AzazelHD]

Hi. Sorry for coming back again. I have realised game freezes every few seconds.

Is like... if it was lagging. Do i have something wrong on the cnc settings?
ddraw.txt

[FunkyFr3sh]

Hi. Sorry for coming back again. I have realised game freezes every few seconds. Is like... if it was lagging. Do i have something wrong on the cnc settings? ddraw.txt

I still don't have a proper solution for this game, but you can try these two here, maybe one of them will work better:

cnc-ddraw_Commandos_5.7.0.4_sleep4.zip
cnc-ddraw_Commandos_5.7.0.4_sleep3.zip

[emxd]

The game seems to slowdown only if you move the mouse. Wouldn't filtering WM_MOUSE messages help?

[FunkyFr3sh]

The game seems to slowdown only if you move the mouse. Wouldn't filtering WM_MOUSE messages help?

The game should not be slowing down with the main release of cnc-ddraw. Only the test builds here have that issue. The game expects a certain delay when refreshing the screen, if there is no delay (like in the main release) then it would redraw the cursor multiple times in a row and it appears like the game runs at a low framerate. If you add too much delay then the game will freeze sometimes.

[FunkyFr3sh]

TBH, I think I'll never be able to get this working properly - It's just pure luck and it will behave differently on each system. (Other ddraw wrappers fail as well)

It's playable at least with the current default settings - closing this here now, sorry

[RebelliousX]

Man, I really thank you for all your help! You wouldn't even have to care about it, but you did and tried to help me in the best way possible. BUT, unfortunately it didn't work, I tried several ways: I threw the dll in the game folder and registered it, then I deleted the keys and threw the dll in the System32 folder, finally, I found this: http://www.probo.com/cinepak.php

I downloaded the 32-bit version and used these keys:

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\drivers.desc]
"iccvid.dll"="Cinepak Codec by Radius Inc."

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Drivers32]
"vidc.cvid"="iccvid.dll"

With your file header, in this case, "Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00". And guess what? Nothing happened! Holy shit... And of course, when doing these tests I deleted the keys and dlls to avoid generating conflicts. I think my PC is cursed and not even black magic will solve it! I've never seen an invisible error like this where no solution works. Anyway, I'm from Brazil, and I think that MAYBE it's a region lock or whatever!

I was irritated by this game! I'm going to uninstall it and try Commandos 2 another time. They say it's better than the first one anyway, so I'm wasting time with this stupid game.

Again, thank you for all your help and apologize for any inconvenience.

@SilentMRG and others who have same issue:

I know it is a bit late to answer this, but I am running the Steam version of the game without any modifications. I didn't use CNC-DDraw yet. I am using latest Windows 11 here.

But to fix the playback issue, if you installed K-Lite Codec Pack, then search from the start menu "LAV Video" program, it should be installed with K-Lite Codec Pack. Then go to formats and disable CINEPAK video decoding. Then videos will start playing in all 4 Commandos games { BEL, BCD, 2 MoC and 3 DB }.

[RebelliousX]

Oh, I just downloaded the GOG version, videos work there too.

I really don't like the GOG version, since it is kind of outdated compared to the Steam version. The GOG versions of BEL and BCD has max resolution of 1024x768 while the Steam version have 1280x720 wide screen support out-of-the-box.

But regarding videos playback, the above fix should do it for both versions. I think Commandos 2 Men of Courage and 3 Destination Berlin games don't need this since they use different codec.

Sorry for the double posts.

[SilentMRG]

But to fix the playback issue, if you installed K-Lite Codec Pack, then search from the start menu "LAV Video" program, it should be installed with K-Lite Codec Pack. Then go to formats and disable CINEPAK video decoding. Then videos will start playing in all 4 Commandos games { BEL, BCD, 2 MoC and 3 DB }.

Thank you for that! I'll try as soon as I reinstall these titles. I also have black screen with audio in Expendable (1998) videos, maybe the problem is the same as with Commandos. Strangely, they are the only games where videos are not shown.