Emperor's Tomb hints and tech help

Ironclaw

New member
I couldn't remember this off-hand, so I had to dig out my CD spindle. As it turns out, the "E" isn't just a simple toggle; meaning the game won't automatically detect it and push you against the wall. What you have to do is face the wall you want to "hug", and press towards it with your "W" key while holding the "E" key.

It takes a second or two, but eventually it will recognize what you're trying to and push Indy against it. Interestingly enough, pressing "E" again will bring him back to normal stance.
 

The Tingler

New member
Ironclaw said:
Practice your whip-jumps...you'll need it on one of the infuriating levels near the end of the game.

I don't find that level too bad until one goddamned awful bit near the end of it where you do a whip swing, the floor collapses under you, and if you don't jump forward and whip swing again you're dead - but if you move forward at all after the swing, you're also dead.
 

Lambonius

New member
I can't believe that level ever made it into the game. The rest of the game moves along at a good pace and then you get to that level and the whole game comes to a screeching halt as you die over and over and over trying to pass it. Terrible, terrible game design right there.
 

Stoo

Well-known member
Does anyone know if "Emperor's Tomb" will run on Windows 7?:confused:

I played the demo a couple of years ago on Windows XP but now I want to buy the actual game.
 

Finn

Moderator
Staff member
A 64-bit Win7 didn't cause any hiccups to my copy of ET, and surprisingly enough, neither did my hardware. I know games few years younger that don't really bode well with hyperthreading or modern graphics renderers, and I was honestly expecting it to have issues with my six-core AMD CPU and/or 5-series Nvidia display card. But none whatsoever I could notice.

That being said, while the game's APIs seem to be well suited to scale, its graphics engine is not. There's no widescreen support and the highest resolution available is 1280x960, meaning everything will look pretty stretched, heavily pixelated and full of jagged edges on more sizable monitors at least. And considering the game locks the user out of pretty much every graphics option besides the resolution, there are no known INI tweaks to remedy that either.

So, the bottom line? It runs... but it won't look pretty.
 

Stoo

Well-known member
Thanks, Falcon!:hat: This is definitely good news because so many folks here have played the game and it has always felt like I've been missing out on something special. Another Indy chapter to explore!(y)

I own/owned only a few games (Fate of Atlantis, King Kong, Planet of the Apes and 3 Star Wars games from the '90s). Some worked on Windows XP but not on Windows Vista, which is why I asked about Windows 7.

Not being an avid gamer, I want to satiate the Indy drought with some new visuals. Young Indy kept me going throughout the '90s so I'm glad I saved the video games for a rainy day!:D
Finn said:
So, the bottom line? It runs... but it won't look pretty.
Just saw your reply, Finn. Is there any solution/remedy to that situation? (In layman's terms, please, if you can.:))
 

Finn

Moderator
Staff member
Stoo said:
Just saw your reply, Finn. Is there any solution/remedy to that situation? (In layman's terms, please, if you can.:))
If I was aware of one, I'd mentioned it. All I can think of is running the game in windowed mode.


It's not available from any default options, but can be forced on by navigating into the game install folder and then to gamedata/indy. In there you'll find a file called "default.cfg" which should open neatly in Notepad. Find the line "fullscreen:1" and change the 1 to 0. Save your changes.

Now when you start the game it'll run in a program window scaled to the graphics settings. Some people might dislike the lack of immersion with your desktop showing on the background, but at least there won't be any stretched pixels and Dr. Jones looks as he should instead of the distant, ugly cousin of Gimli the Dwarf.
 

Falcon

New member
I'm running Emperor's Tomb on my Windows 7 (64-bit) computer in 1024x768 resolution and full screen mode. My monitor is standard ratio, and not widescreen. It looks and works just fine. But like Finn said, there may be some issues with widescreen monitors and higher resolutions.
 

Finn

Moderator
Staff member
Yeah. The widescreen stretching is my biggest gripe. I play some older games occasionally and while low resolutions can be an eyesore, I can deal with those when no other option is available. Fortunately though, many old, still-popular classics tend to sport enhancements made by fan community that make 'em look quite decent even by modern standards.

Unfortunately ET is not one of them - quite the contrary, it's one of the most closed products I've laid eyes upon. I really don't get why any game dev would shun moddability anyway, allowing a lot of leniency with tweaks is one of the best means to ensure your product will still be making the rounds several years after the launch date. The only other true winner seems to be a killer multiplayer.

Stoo didn't mention what kind of monitor he's sporting. If it's a 4:3 cube then my complaints shouldn't be a huge issue to him. It'd still be a pixelated, screen-tearing mess especially if the inches go past 20, but at least the aspect ratio will be correct.
 

VP

Moderator Emeritus
Some monitors recognize the aspect ratio and automatically add black borders to the sides, while some will stretch the image to fit the wider aspect ratio.

I still play FoA in full screen on my 1920x1200. :p
 

InexorableTash

Active member
VP said:
Some monitors recognize the aspect ratio and automatically add black borders to the sides, while some will stretch the image to fit the wider aspect ratio.

I still play FoA in full screen on my 1920x1200. :p

Many video drivers have control panel options for controlling how upscaling is done as well.
 

Finn

Moderator
Staff member
InexorableTash said:
Many video drivers have control panel options for controlling how upscaling is done as well.
That is indeed a possibility, but I intentionally avoided mentioning it since I've got no idea what kind of hardware Stoo has available. It seems to be a staple on modern Nvidia drivers at least.

VP said:
I still play FoA in full screen on my 1920x1200. :p
FoA is 2D, and due to that scales beautifully. Throw in some ScummVM filters, and it possibly looks nowadays better than ever.
 

Stoo

Well-known member
Firstly, thanks a lot Finn, Falcon, Tash and VP. You guys are being very helpful and I really appreciate it.:hat:
Finn said:
That is indeed a possibility, but I intentionally avoided mentioning it since I've got no idea what kind of hardware Stoo has available. It seems to be a staple on modern Nvidia drivers at least.
My monitor is a 17 inch widescreen. Highest res is 1600x900. (Not as good as my Sony VAIO but that thing is almost dead!:dead:). The operating system is the 64 bit version of Windows 7.

I do have an Nnvidia driver and it could be a "modern" one because I bought the laptop only 6 months ago. For 'Display' it says NVIDIA GeForce GT 330M and for 3D I remember the product name being NVIDIA CUDA 3.1.1 (can't recall where I found the info for the latter). The Nvidia Control Panel has a lot of options for 3D settings, etc. (including 3 options for 3D anti-aliasing).

One of the Indy DVD releases has an "Emperor's Tomb" demo. Would it suffer the same stretching issues as the actual game? If the demo will behave the same way and can be tweaked, I could install it and do some fiddling. Yes? No?
 

InexorableTash

Active member
Stoo said:
One of the Indy DVD releases has an "Emperor's Tomb" demo. Would it suffer the same stretching issues as the actual game? If the demo will behave the same way and can be tweaked, I could install it and do some fiddling. Yes? No?

Almost certainly yes; demos are usually the full final (or almost-final) code, but only include the data for one or two levels.

That said, video driver support is often one of the last tweaks made to a game before (or even after) release, so it's possible that the demo may not work well but the actual game would - that's the sort of thing the 1.01 patch at http://www.lucasarts.com/support/update/indyet.html would fix.

Your video card is pretty recent. Make sure you have the latest drivers (go to NVIDIA's site). In the control panel, look for Display, then Change Flat Panel Scaling and pick Use NVIDIA scaling with fixed aspect ratio

(While googling about I found instructions from someone trying to do the opposite for a different older game - stretch it to fill their widescreen monitor. Ugh, kids today not caring about aspect ratios! Get off my lawn!)
 

Finn

Moderator
Staff member
Stoo said:
I do have an Nnvidia driver and it could be a "modern" one because I bought the laptop only 6 months ago.
It's likely factory installed and therefore not the most recent version available, but I'm almost sure it's not too outdated either, especially when playing a game as old as ET.

To force on resolution-dependent aspect ratio, go to "Nvidia Control Panel" by accessing the right-click menu on desktop and look what you can find under tab "Adjust desktop size and position" - it should be pretty self-explainatory from there. That, or do what Tash suggested. One of them or either (or both simultaneously) should do the trick.

Stoo said:
One of the Indy DVD releases has an "Emperor's Tomb" demo. Would it suffer the same stretching issues as the actual game? If the demo will behave the same way and can be tweaked, I could install it and do some fiddling. Yes? No?
If you can make the demo behave in a desirable way and not look like an eyesore (whatever that might be by your standards) then yes, the exact same tweaks will work on the full version.

InexorableTash said:
Your video card is pretty recent. Make sure you have the latest drivers (go to NVIDIA's site).
Not really necessary, if the option is there in whatever version he's got currently installed. As long as they've been released after the release of the game (which is pretty much guaranteed) there shouldn't be any hiccups. Besides, fiddling with drivers on closed-loop OEM laptops can sometimes lead to more trouble than they're worth due to manufacturer restrictions. Not likely in this case, but like I said, if the game's smooth on whatever Stoo's got, then he can safely skip this step.

InexorableTash said:
(While googling about I found instructions from someone trying to do the opposite for a different older game - stretch it to fill their widescreen monitor. Ugh, kids today not caring about aspect ratios! Get off my lawn!)
You sure he wasn't merely looking for a tweak that would somehow enable "true" widescreen resolutions? Many older, popular games have fan-made patches that allow them to run on larger resos (and different aspect ratios) than initially supported.
 

Guido89

New member
How to use debug camera?

Hello, sorry for major bumping an old thread but I really don't know where else to look for a solution.

A long time ago, I made an Indy movie based upon the Indiana Jones and the Emperor's tomb game. Result is an alternate version of IJET main story where some levels and plot elements where changed in order to properly telling "my" story (e.g. Indy will have a perilous fight against Von Beck in the top of gondola as a worty scenario for their showdown (y)).

Main problem of my movie, however, is camera: yes, camera is a big pain in the neck for those who wants to implement cinematic feeling to gameplay because IJET is a 3rd person action game with camera being mainly sticked to main character. And this is where it comes up my request for help: inserting "debugCamera=true" in the "vars.cfg" file seems to unlock a sort of developer camera in game but I am unable to control that camera. Is there anyone who already experienced this and can tell me how to control that camera? If I am able to use this "special camera" in the PC version, I am available to build again the whole movie in the same way I did in the past and share it with you all. Any hints are very very welcomed :D
 
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