How to Run X-COM Collec/PC Gamer in WIN98SE/XP

[Sgt Zimm]

First off, this solution is for the X-Com Collector's Edition (aka "Gold Edition"), which is the same version that was issued on the PC Gamer Classic CD. I'm attempting to tackle two common problems with the XCE 1) garbled graphics 2) the game runs too damn fast

 

Ok, here we go

1) Install the game whereever the hell you please

 

2) Go to this guy's site https://f0dder.has.it/ and download the xcombug fix (its in the misc section).

- This patch fixes the corruption of graphics and sound experienced by those using Radeon cards or Geforce 2+ (?) cards.

- Follow the instructions in the zip file, basically you have to put two files (an .exe and a .dll) from the "xcom1" directory of the zip into your game directory on your comp

 

3) Download "turbo.zip" from this site https://www.xcomufo.com/

- its under the "Downloads" page

- extract the contents of the zip to a directory of your choice. I just threw it into my game directory on my comp

 

4)Before starting X-Com, start "turbo.exe" set the %CPU to an appropriate value (experiment to find the value that works for yours - for my systems 50-65% was good, more on this later)

 

5) Use the .exe you unzipped from the bugfix to start X-Com. Note: if you get some sort of error doing this, just change the original game .exe (UFO.exe ?) to "UFO Defence.exe"

 

6) Dispatch the alien scum with extreme prejudice!

 

Here are the 2 systems I tried this on (and the results)

 

With the xcombug fix, the graphics problem (garbled screen) was eliminated on both comps with no need to adjust the hardware acceleration. Of course, both systems had nearly identical video cards...

 

I) P3 733

384 MB RAM

64 MB ATI 7500 Radeon Direct X 9.1

SB LIVE Value

Win98SE

 

The game runs fine without Turbo. The tactical mode is fine and the speed can easily be controlled with the options screen settings. Geoscape was fast but a player that is reasonably experienced with the game can easily cope. 5 secs runs at speed roughly between 1min - 5min, imagine a button that said "3 min".

 

Turbo.exe setting: 65%

Startup of the game is fine. I occasionally noticed sluggish expanding of the menu windows i.e. transition from language select screen to main menu. The sluggish expanding of the menus were consistently present at a setting of 50%.

The Geoscape was slowed a very relaxed pace of ~1min when the 5sec button was clicked.

The tactical mode was noticable slowed, and it was done quite smoothly. Again, that good'ol 486 feel could be accomplished by playing around with the speed settings in the options screen. I didn't bother trying settings in between 50% and 65% because, well that would take too damn long and the game worked fine to begin with.

 

II) Dell Insprion 5100 (yup a laptop! For when you need to blast sectoids on the go)

P4M 2.4 Ghz

512 DDR RAM

64 MB ATI Mobility Radeon 7500 Direct X 8.1

Generic Intergrated Soundcard

Win XP Professional

 

Without the slow down the game approached unplayability. A Geoscape setting of 5 sec ran like between 5-10min, imagine a button set at 8 min. The tactical mode is where things got bad. Setting the scroll speed to 1 and the fire speed to 1 did not help matters. Moving the arrow to the edges of the screen jumped to the edges of the map. Bullets, Plasma, etc were completely untrackable, you couldn't tell if you hit or not. Movement speeds of the units were also far too fast.

 

Turbo.exe setting: 50%

Simply put, the game runs like a dream. The geoscape when set to 5sec runs ~30 sec give or take. The tactical missions are actually playable. Scroll speeds can be set to a nice slow pan to quick snaps around the map. Fire speeds, mov speeds also have the same range. The addiction is back.

 

The help file of turbo.exe mentions that Turbo is geared towards Win 95 and NT. With regards to 98SE and XP, the program does a smoother job of slowing down the CPU in XP compared to 98SE, though this could be attributed to the much slower CPU in the 98SE system.

 

Happy Gaming, if I find anything else, I'll edit this post.