Questions from a new player

[KFM2]

Hi,

having played (and liked) RS I a lot, I have decided to try RS II. It looks really great! Thanks to all involved for their work! Unfortunately, some things are still unclear to me:

1) I'm not sure whether I have installed it correctly. No matter what I do, I cannot get the RS movie/intro to show when using BI or Alex. With RTW it works. I guess it's like that because the directory /bi/data/fmv only contains the BI intro and no other wmv file. Should it be like that or is something wrong with my installation?

2) What is the recommended resolution for RSII? I use 1920x1080 and the city buildings (in the lower middle bar when clicking on a city) are very coarse. Is it supposed to be like that?

Thanks for any input on these issues and thanks again for this great mod!

Regards, KFM2

[stackero]

While I'm not the best qualified here to advise you, I would advise you give out more info on the specs of your pc and os system. This will allow those more knowledgeable than me to help you out more when they come around to your thread.

Someone will come along sooner or later.

Good Gaming.

[SD_Man]

Yes maybe some screenshots would be helpful but as to your questions:
1) I experience the same thing with my game but the intro really isnt all that special. I like to skip it anyways as it just slows down the loading process, type in "-nm" into the game parameters to autoskip the movie.
2) Being that RTW is an old game for old monitors, 16:10/4:3 resolutions, it is recommended to disable widescreen in preferences/settings if you dont like the coarse textures. I honestly dont mind and they eventually grow on you but whatever.

[High Fist]

Who cares about the intro?

[KFM2]

Thanks for the replies!

I don't really care about the intro (I can watch it by using RTW), I'm just wondering whether my installation is ok (from some other posts I got the impression that it shouldn't be like that).

Regards, KFM2

[KFM2]

The '-nm' switch is not there. I can see the original BI intro, but not the RS intro (but I can see the red/orange RS loading screen).

[KFM2]

Some more questions:

1) What is the recommended adviser level? I want to disable the adviser, but it seems that in this case I sometimes cannot activate the script.

2) Is there somewhere a description for all the settings in the preferences menu?

3) I'm not playing with an administrator account in Win 7. Thus, I always have to enter the admin password when starting the launcher. Is there any way to avoid this?

Thanks for your help!

Regards, KFM2

[Primative1]

Some more questions:

1) What is the recommended adviser level? I want to disable the adviser, but it seems that in this case I sometimes cannot activate the script.

2) Is there somewhere a description for all the settings in the preferences menu?

3) I'm not playing with an administrator account in Win 7. Thus, I always have to enter the admin password when starting the launcher. Is there any way to avoid this?

Thanks for your help!

Regards, KFM2

1) The status of your adviser shouldn't affect this. You activate the script by clicking on one of your cities. The adviser should then pop out and you click on the portrait which activates the script. You should have 1 denarii added to your cash when you do this.


2) Haven't seen one.

3) Right click on your RS2 shortcut and choose 'properties'. Go to the 'security' tab. Click on 'edit' and give yourself full control in the tick boxes on the bottom. That should do it.

[TsagamPhalcon]

Hello, I tried googling my problem but there seems to be no thread on it

Installed RSII by copying and pasting it into rome gold folder then did the same thing again with 2.5 now the game starts okay. When I press the start campaign button it shows "select item from the list"

Once I quit the game error message: play/Gallaeci/data/maps/campaign/imperial_campaign/descr_strat.txt, at line 12, column 1. Expected start date of campaign or battle.
So I checked it out:
; Campaign file generated by the Trivium independant Map Editor (TiME) © MrHide - The Trivium Organisation
; Forums: http://www.thetrivium.org/php
; Contact: MrHide@thetrivium.org
; Expanded for Roma Surrectum by SquidSK and Northern Ranger, terrain by Tone and DVK901
; Roma Surrectum Version 8.0 (RS2) Mundus Gigantus, Rev. 17


campaign imperial_campaign
options bi
playable
spain
end
unlockable




end
nonplayable
britons
thrace
slave
romans_julii
romans_scipii
romans_brutii
egypt
seleucid
carthage
parthia
gauls
boii
greek_cities
macedon
pontus
armenia
dacia
scythia
germans
numidia
end




start_date 536 summer
end_date 853 summer


;;gladiator_uprising_disabled
night_battles_enabled
brigand_spawn_value 30
pirate_spawn_value 70


It seems like a small problem that newcomers like me don't know how to handle

[KFM2]

3) Right click on your RS2 shortcut and choose 'properties'. Go to the 'security' tab. Click on 'edit' and give yourself full control in the tick boxes on the bottom. That should do it.

Thanks for the help, Primative1!

Unfortunately, the launcher still needs admin rights, i.e., with active UAC I always have to enter the admin password. I hope there is a solution to avoid this without deactivating UAC (It seems the Application Compatibility Toolkit 5.0 does also not work on the launcher ).

Is it possible to start RS II without the launcher after setting the preferences in the launcher?

Regards, LGN1

[dvk901]

The '-nm' switch will disable intro movies, so yes, check the Launcher to see that that switch isn't in there.

As for the grainy look of icons, RTW was designed for a 1024x768 screen resolution, so anything bigger tends to stretch the textures (which acn't be any bigger).
I would suggest a 1024x768 resolution for the Strat map, and your bigger one for battles.

[Primative1]

Check this thread for UAC issues:

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...Store-Problems

[KFM2]

Check this thread for UAC issues:

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...Store-Problems

Thanks for the link, Primative1.

I have done exactly what is described there, but still the launcher always asks me for the admin password.

Regards, LGN1

[dvk901]

If you have gone into the properties for the Launcher and told the OS to run it as an Admin, and you are asked for a password, then YOU are not running an Administrator profile account. I would suggest creating a new account in which you are an Administrator, then it wouldn't ask you all the time for a password.

[KFM2]

Hi dvk901,
yes, my standard/regular user has no admin rights (and I don't want to change this for playing RS II). I don't understand why the launcher should need these rights As long as you have RS II outside of the programs directory, everything (except the launcher) seems to work fine without admin rights.

What does the launcher do when I start it and only press 'Play Roma Surrectum II' and nothing else? Does it just start the correct RS2_*.bat file with the correct parameters? If yes I can just call the correct *.bat file myself and avoid the launcher (and use it only for changing settings).

Regards, KFM2

[ur-Lord Tedric]

@KFM2 - RTW/RSII changes files, certainly from the Launcher and in game when it saves (this is one of the reasons that AV/AM s/w doesn't like it) - you have to play with Admin rights. Even more so if you play on Steam as you can't change where it's installed (iirc); and a great reason to go buy the discs for £10 or less.

[KFM2]

@KFM2 - RTW/RSII changes files, certainly from the Launcher and in game when it saves (this is one of the reasons that AV/AM s/w doesn't like it) - you have to play with Admin rights. Even more so if you play on Steam as you can't change where it's installed (iirc); and a great reason to go buy the discs for £10 or less.

Hi,

I can play unmodded RTW/BI/Alex fine without any admin rights (just make a local copy outside of the 'standard' programs directory). And since RSII uses the same executable, I don't see why one should need admin rights for RSII... However, I agree that admin rights can help to avoid problems for some users.

Anyway, it would be great if someone could answer my question about what the launcher does if nothing is changed, but only 'Play Roma Surrectum II' is pressed. This would already help me a lot.

Regards, LGN1

PS: The mod is really great! Just defeated Hannibal and it was a great fight. I can't remember having such tense moments in RS 1.6!

[dvk901]

The Launcher is essentially a compiled script......Windows detects this and doesn't like it. That's a good thing, because a ton of malware and spyware are exactly the same thing. Anti-Virus software will also see the Launcher and not like it much. There are batch files in the RS2 folder (with the exe's) that can be used to run RS2 as well, but they are very basic and without options. You may run into the same thing with them as well....but it's worth a try.

[Boriak]

I hope no one will mind that I borrow this thread instead of making my own. I would like to give Roma Surrectum a shot and I'm choosing which version of the game to download and install. I see the latest version is 2.6 but I see reports of difficulties and bugs. What is the recommended version to download right now and why?

Thanks.

[KFM2]

The Launcher is essentially a compiled script......Windows detects this and doesn't like it. That's a good thing, because a ton of malware and spyware are exactly the same thing. Anti-Virus software will also see the Launcher and not like it much. There are batch files in the RS2 folder (with the exe's) that can be used to run RS2 as well, but they are very basic and without options. You may run into the same thing with them as well....but it's worth a try.

Thanks for the reply, dvk901!

Currently I'm starting RSII with the correct *.bat file and I haven't noticed anything bad... It seems to work fine. And if I want to change something I just use the launcher and enter the admin password.

In my game I'm now controlling whole Italy and I must say RSII is just awesome. It's really great! The only drawback is the missing documentation (having to search the forum a lot, read old posts, not knowing whether the information is still up-to-date,...). You must find out a lot by yourself. Which of course is not that unrealistic because back then people also did not always know what helpened them and what was worth building But I can imagine that the missing documentation scares some potential players away. That's a pitty since RSII is a real jewel.

Regards, KFM2

PS: Is it planned to have a small patch which just fixes the reported bugs (no new content)?