Crowthistle in Hi-Rez
Posted: Sat May 03, 2014 5:28 am
For those of you who bought the book with the demo cd in it, you have surely noticed you can't run Crowthistle in any other resolution than fullscreen 800x600. Also, the game forces 2x AntiAliasing, which is quite demanding for some computers, and too low for others. You could play it on Complete Chronicles after conversion, but a few things like NPCs and dynamic reflections will be bugged (and you won't be able to use a 16/9 screen). However there is a way to fix the Crowthistle demo.
First, if you can't start the demo at all, make sure you have the Crowthistle - Vista Patch. It is also required for any version of Windows above Vista: W7 and W8. Hopefully everyone is aware of its existence (by the way, there is a similar patch for Myst V on the same page).
Now, the version of Plasma used by Crowthistle simply won't read graphic settings, which means we must change it in-game by installing Myst V's options menu.
This will allow us to change not only resolution and antialiasing, but also anisotropic filtering, dynamic reflections, sound volume, and key mapping. Additionally, this will provide a faster way to exit, and remove the useless "CT" icon in the lower right-hand corner of the screen.
To do so: open both Myst V and Crowthistle's installation folders. Copy these files from Myst V to Crowthistle:
Start the game, load either of the environments, and change the settings to your liking.
HOWEVER:
The game will still reverse to the default 800x600 resolution once you restart it (as will most other options). The only way around it is to use Myst V's version of Plasma, but this would probably destroy any save from Myst V, and causes a bug in Rowan Green, in which most of the village isn't loaded, and you fall through the floor. Couldn't find a way around it.
Also: don't bother with Classic and Classic Plus navigation modes, since Cyan didn't bother putting navigation nodes they are useless.
Oh, and as ever, don't forget you have a nice camera ride available by pressing "T", which is only written in the demo's readme, but who bothers reading readmes anyway ?
First, if you can't start the demo at all, make sure you have the Crowthistle - Vista Patch. It is also required for any version of Windows above Vista: W7 and W8. Hopefully everyone is aware of its existence (by the way, there is a similar patch for Myst V on the same page).
Now, the version of Plasma used by Crowthistle simply won't read graphic settings, which means we must change it in-game by installing Myst V's options menu.
This will allow us to change not only resolution and antialiasing, but also anisotropic filtering, dynamic reflections, sound volume, and key mapping. Additionally, this will provide a faster way to exit, and remove the useless "CT" icon in the lower right-hand corner of the screen.
To do so: open both Myst V and Crowthistle's installation folders. Copy these files from Myst V to Crowthistle:
- in the DAT folder, anything beginning with "GUI"
- in the DAT folder, any ".loc" file beginning with "Global"
- in the DAT folder, the file "Fonts.pfp"
- in the SFX folder, all three files xOptionScreenSFX01.ogg to xOptionScreenSFX03.ogg
- in the SFX/streamingCache folder, all three files xOptionScreenSFX01.wav to xOptionScreenSFX03.wav
Start the game, load either of the environments, and change the settings to your liking.
HOWEVER:
The game will still reverse to the default 800x600 resolution once you restart it (as will most other options). The only way around it is to use Myst V's version of Plasma, but this would probably destroy any save from Myst V, and causes a bug in Rowan Green, in which most of the village isn't loaded, and you fall through the floor. Couldn't find a way around it.
Also: don't bother with Classic and Classic Plus navigation modes, since Cyan didn't bother putting navigation nodes they are useless.
Oh, and as ever, don't forget you have a nice camera ride available by pressing "T", which is only written in the demo's readme, but who bothers reading readmes anyway ?
