How do I get rid of the menu bar in MTM1 software mode?

[Nazxul360]

Hi everyone,

So I was feeling nostalgic and decided to fire up MTM1. Got it installed and running okay, even used dgVoodoo2 and it looks glorious.

But I kinda wanna play in software mode for old time's sake. Y'know, feel like a kid again. Only problem is the menu bar up top shows ALL the time. Even during races and videos. Pretty sure it didn't do that back in the day, and I've seen footage of the game on YouTube running in software mode without the menu bar. Also, I can't be certain but I feel like the colours are kind of messed up which I think is related to that menu bar. Almost as if the game is running in a maximised window, rather than actual fullscreen mode.

I've tried running in Win95 compatibility mode, 256 colours, forcing 640x480, disabling fullscreen optimizations, running as administrator. I've removed the dgVoodoo2 files from the game folder, I've tried messing with the in-game graphics settings and pressing F4 to toggle fullscreen mode in-game. I've even tried tinkering with setting in NVIDIA control panel, but no luck.

Anyone have any ideas? Thanks, all!

[Fila]

You can't get rid of it due to Win10. I think nGlide was able to hide the bar but I don't know if nGlide works with MTM1.

[Nazxul360]

Hi Fila. Yeah, I figured as much. All good, I resigned to using dgvoodoo2. Thanks! And thanks for your work on the patches. Great stuff.

While I've got you, and rather than start a new topic, I hope you don't mind if I pick your brains about a couple of other things.

Firstly, I'm trying to rig up MTM2 to play the correct music tracks for the stock MTM1 tracks. So I made a custom CD image containing all the music tracks from both games, with the MTM1 tracks placed after the MTM2 ones. Then I found the .SIT files in the WORLD folder of GAME.POD which specify the rebook audio CD tracks used for each track, so I extracted it and edited them accordingly, then recompiled the pod. Using my custom GAME.POD and CD image with MTM1 works flawlessly, but MTM2 seems to have some safeguard where any track wanting to use a CD track past track 10 gets redirected to a CD track between 2 and 10. Is there any way to bypass this so my little project works correctly?

Secondly, is there any way to remove trucks from the game or disable them? I really love the HD trucks in the community patch. But what I don't love is having to manually remove the old ones from the AI roster and add the HD ones every time I do a race. I'm also not a fan of the wrestling trucks and would like to remove those, too. I've found the .TRK files in TRUCK2.POD and tried deleting them, removing them from the list file and recompiling the pod. The removed trucks no longer show up in the lists in-game, but when I try to start a race, the game crashes saying it can't find bigfoot.trk, even though I'm not even trying to use stock Bigfoot. Again, any ideas?

Thanks again.

[Fila]

Regarding the bar: Now I remember what it was. Both nGlide and dgVoodoo2 will make the bar disappear as long as you run it in 3dfx. Due to windows10, if you run it in direct3d the bar will appear because Win10 changed the way it interprets the code and thus the command to hide the bar is never triggered by Win10 (and I tried looking into changing the code for that and it's a pain, it will only work with a full graphical overhaul).

Re music: I am going to take a look at the music code and see what's in there.

Re truck: I am going to have to refresh my memory as I don't remember exactly how this worked. Have you tried downloading the HD standalone trucks and just rename the file to truck2.pod ?
It can be done as there were truck packs that did not have any of the stock trucks but I have to go through them to remember how it worked.

[Cale]

Re: the trucks - I came to the conclusion that it's a result of the .SIT files requiring specific .TRK files for the truck starting points. Most track builders probably don't change the names in Traxx, but they all default to the stock MTM2 truck files, so you need to keep those trucks mounted in game to make it work. I could probably go through and change all of the HD truck .TRKs to the stock equivalents, but I want to fix other things on them first before trying that.

[Fila]

Oh yes that is what it is. And I am not sure Traxx allows you to change that. I think it's hardcoded into MTM2 code that a .trk file has to be associated with the starting positions (that then randomly gets overwritten by the .trk file of the truck that is actually selected but there is always the same default 8 .trk files at start up).

[Fila]

There is a chance next year I will have more time again and so hopefully more time to start going through the code again. It's all up in the air now with the current state of the world so it might change.

[Nazxul360]

Hey guys, thanks so much for the info. Much appreciated!

I could probably go through and change all of the HD truck .TRKs to the stock equivalents, but I want to fix other things on them first before trying that.

My man! That was it! I just just deleted the stock .TRKs and renamed your HD ones to the stock names and bam. It works. You're a legend! And thank you for your work on the HD trucks in general. They're gorgeous. Power Wheels in particular makes me very happy as that was my go to in MTM1 and I was always kinda bummed that it didn't get any love in MTM2.

Regarding the bar

Well it was only in software mode that I wanted to get rid of it, but it's all good. I moved on to dgVoodoo2 and it works flawlessly for me, even in Direct3D. Thanks anyway.

Re music: I am going to take a look at the music code and see what's in there.

Awesome, thank you!


Okay, I have one more for you (last one, I swear). I'm finding the lack of cockpit dashboard... hard to deal with. I've tried to get used to racing without it, but it just feels off. I did notice that it still works running in 640x480 though. In MTM1, I was able to "hack" a widescreen mode by using dgVoodoo2 to set the resolution to a 4:3 aspect ratio where the width was the width of my monitor with scaling to "Centred, keep Aspect Ratio." It would fill the screen and crop the top and bottom, giving me a Vert- widescreen solution and it was exactly what I've always wanted. The dashboard doesn't take up so much of the screen but it's still there. I had hoped the same trick would work in MTM2, and it almost does. If I run MTM2 in 640x480 and use a 4:3 resolution in dgVoodoo2 where the height is the height of my monitor, I can get a nice, high-res 4:3 image centred on my screen with a fully working dashboard. However, if I try the overscan/cropping trick that worked in MTM1, no matter what combination of scaling settings I try in DgVoodoo2 or NVIDIA control panel, either the image gets "stretched" (squished) to fit the screen, or the image appears to render proportionately the way I want, but only the 640x480 pixels in the centre of the screen are actually visible. Everything else is black. Oof. So close!

Honestly, it's not a huge deal. I can still use the dashboard in 4:3 so I'm happy, but it would be super great to have widescreen like I did in MTM1. What's involved in fixing the dashboard for the community patch, anyway? I don't know anything about coding or programming, but if there's like some tedious art stuff required (resizing, tiling, pixel counting, etc), I may be able to help.

Thanks again, guys!

[Fila]

It's tedious art stuff.

The game uses bitmaps to compose the dashboard (several layers of bitmaps btw, not just one) and they are all designed for 640x480. If someone is to take their sweet time to rework those layers for other resolutions, in terms of coding it's relatively simple to make it work.

[4x4EvolutionFan]

It's tedious art stuff.

The game uses bitmaps to compose the dashboard (several layers of bitmaps btw, not just one) and they are all designed for 640x480. If someone is to take their sweet time to rework those layers for other resolutions, in terms of coding it's relatively simple to make it work.

Imagine if all of the dashboards were also designed for a smaller screen resolution of 320x240. That would have been very strange even back then!

[Nazxul360]

It's tedious art stuff.

The game uses bitmaps to compose the dashboard (several layers of bitmaps btw, not just one) and they are all designed for 640x480. If someone is to take their sweet time to rework those layers for other resolutions, in terms of coding it's relatively simple to make it work.

I see. Well I'm keen to have a crack. I don't have the time right now, but when I do, who would be the right person to talk to for a bit of help with getting started? Eg, the .RAW files load up in photoshop all weird, no matter what settings I use. Not sure if I need a plugin or what. And there are the .ACT and .AAI files which I have no idea what to do with.

Imagine if all of the dashboards were also designed for a smaller screen resolution of 320x240. That would have been very strange even back then!

Yep, I'm pretty sure they were. The files are there for 320x200 and 320x400, and the game supports those resolutions.

[Fila]

They are designed for 320x240 as well.

I remember loading them correctly but I don't remember what I did. Will have to look into it again.

For the music thing I am going to look at it in the weekend.

[Nazxul360]

For the music thing I am going to look at it in the weekend.

Cool. Thanks, man.

I remember loading them correctly but I don't remember what I did. Will have to look into it again.

Well, just keep in mind that I'm interested in helping if you ever need a hand with the tedious art stuff.

[4x4EvolutionFan]

They are designed for 320x240 as well.

Oh, I see. I just wasn't certain at first. Thanks for the clarification!