USB Joysticks

M

Musashi

Captain
Hi,
I've done a quick search and I can't find a clear answer to this - will USB joysticks work on Windows versions of WC games such as the Kilrathi Saga and WCP? I've just built a new PC and it has no games port. It looks like sound cards don't come with them anymore either.
USB wasn't a feature of Win95 so I'm dubious that the Kilrathi Saga will work with a USB joystick unless the game is just reading the Windows joystick setup.

A brief attempt to run WC3 from the Kilrathi saga showed major problems with the game, even running in Win95 compatibility mode. The PC is running XP SP3. WCP showed video playback issues but these may be solvable with adjustments to the audio acceleration.

If the games won't work with a USB controller, I'll have to try fitting an old PCI soundcard just for the game port. :(
 
On the contrary, Windows 95B and C (Release 2.1 and 2.5, respectively) had built-in USB support, and the earlier versions of 95 had drop-in USB support from Microsoft, but I digress.

I can't vouch for Kilrathi Saga (I've always just played the original DOS versions through DOSBox which maps USB joysticks to virtual gameport devices just fine), but Prophecy and Secret Ops utilized DirectInput which is interface-antagonistic. You just need to have the device working in Windows.
 
USB sticks should have no problem with prophecy or secret ops. Same goes for gamepads (which actually work better that it sounds if you have proper button mapping software).

I can't tell you for sure if Kilrathi Saga will, but it make sense that it would, same as with the windows patch for WC4.
 
The Kilrathi Saga in its entirety, and WC4 Win95 also uses DirectInput, and works just fine with USB joysticks.
 
Thanks

Thanks for the info folks. I've managed to get WCP working with the mouse but the graphics are really disappointing from what they used to be with a 3DFX card.

Looks like I'll have to fit that soundcard to use the existing analogue joystick or think about buying a USB one - good to know it will work! Thanks again!
 
Musashi said:
Thanks for the info folks. I've managed to get WCP working with the mouse but the graphics are really disappointing from what they used to be with a 3DFX card.
Click to expand...

You can still get all the 3DFX effects with something called a 'glide wrapper' which essentially emulates having a 3DFX card. That, coupled with the high-res patch and DVD movies that you can download from this site give the game a pretty great face-lift.
 
AD said:
You can still get all the 3DFX effects with something called a 'glide wrapper' which essentially emulates having a 3DFX card. That, coupled with the high-res patch and DVD movies that you can download from this site give the game a pretty great face-lift.
Click to expand...

OK, I didn't know about the DVD movies. I have installed the Glide wrapper and high res patch to run it at 1280x1024, but it still doesn't look as good as it did on the old nVidia card which supported 3dfx. It's particularly noticeable with that cool expanding circle effect used when things explode. Or maybe it's just so long since I played it that I *think* it looked better.

It does look better than it did in software mode, which was just awful.

I've been playing WCP with the mouse for the first time - the circle for the mouse cursor is distracting when it's actually the blue reticle you need to use.

Thanks for mentioning the movies. I'll have a look for that. The main reason I liked the Wing Commander games was for the movies and storyline. It's a shame that the Wing Commander movie was a failure - with the amount of existing source material, they could just about have made a TV series and not had to film more acting. Just redo versions of combat scenes with movie quality CGI.
 
nVidia card which supported 3dfx
Click to expand...
Nvidia never supported Glide(3DFX standard) mode.

And there also the way you remember it, I remember playing some games and being amezed how they looked on the old sega systems, fire them up now, it's all stere there, but not as great as you remember it. Those once grounbreaking graphics of today are old news to spoiled eyes...
 
Mace said:
Nvidia never supported Glide(3DFX standard) mode.
And there also the way you remember it, I remember playing some games and being amezed how they looked on the old sega systems, fire them up now, it's all stere there, but not as great as you remember it. Those once grounbreaking graphics of today are old news to spoiled eyes...
Click to expand...

My mistake. It must have been that the GE Force 2 (I think) card was hardware supported in WCP, as opposed to the 9600GT I'm using now.

In any case, I'm sure it looked better than this 3dfx emulation though.

Certainly WC3 looked great when I first played it, but that was in 1996. Now it looks a bit pathetic. But then I haven't got WC3 running happily on this PC yet.

For that I really do need to plug in the old sound card or fork out for a USB joystick.
 
My mistake. It must have been that the GE Force 2 (I think) card was hardware supported in WCP, as opposed to the 9600GT I'm using now.
Click to expand...

There was no support other then Direct3D for nvidia cards, and the Geforce series were not even around when Prophecy came out. And the game ran in 640x480, likely it's simply the memory of back-then amazing looking game.

Have you used the prophecy enhancement pack, and are you sure you reconfigured the launcher correctly so it uses your new settings? a little browsing of the forums here will get you all the information you need.
 
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