------------------------------------------------------------------------ Dirt Track Racing Australia version 0.52 (demo) Copyright + 2000 Ratbag, Pty Ltd. www.ratbaggames.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 1. Notes 2. System Requirements 3. Graphics Configuration 4. Input Configuration 5. Multiplayer 6. Command Line Options 7. Final Note ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 1. Notes ------------------------------------------------------------------------ This is the demo of Ratbag's new title Dirt Track Racing Australia (DTR Australia). Check out our website www.ratbaggames.com for updates and information. Please note that in order to minimise the size of the demo, the textures and in-game graphics have been JPEG compressed. This may result in reduced image quality. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 2. System Requirements ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Minimum System requirements: Operating System: Windows® 95, Windows® 98, Windows® 2000 Intel Pentium® 166 or 100% compatible 32 MB RAM 60 MB of free Hard Disk space High Colour (16 bit colour) capable video card (DirectX compatible) DirectX 6 100% Compatible Mouse Recommended configuration: Intel Pentium® 233MMX or better 64 MB RAM 3D Accelerator: Glide® or Direct3D® compatible video card with at least 8 Mb of RAM DirectSound, DirectSound3D, Aureal3D or EAX compatible sound card DirectX compatible force feedback device AMD K6-2/Athlon 3DNow! optimisation supported Pentium III (Katmai) optimisation supported This demo requires DirectX, but does not include it for reasons of size. If you do not already have DirectX 7.0 or newer, then download it from: http://www.microsoft.com/directx/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 3. Graphics Configuration ------------------------------------------------------------------------ When DTR Australia is run, it will first prompt you for which Graphics driver you wish to use. Selecting 'Autodetect' will select the optimum graphics driver for your system. Select 'Glide' if you have a non-Banshee 3DFX video card. This will be selected automatically by 'Autodetect'. Select 'Banshee' if you have a Banshee 3DFX video card. This will be selected automatically by 'Autodetect'. Note that all available drivers for the Voodoo Banshee video card contain a bug, in that they do not properly support certain texture management functions. Selecting the 'Glide' driver if you have a Voodoo Banshee will result in a corrupted display. Select 'Direct3D' if you have a Direct3D compatible video card, or wish to run Direct3D on your 3DFX card. This will be selected automatically by 'Autodetect', unless you have a 3DFX card. For optimum performance under Direct3D with an AGP video card, you should ensure that you have either Windows 98 or Windows 95 OSR 2.1 or newer. DTR Australia will not run in Direct3D under Windows 2000 - you must select 'Glide' (for a 3DFX card) or 'Software'. Select 'Software' to use the software renderer. This will be selected automatically by 'Autodetect' if you have no 3D hardware. To change your graphics driver after starting the game, you must exit and restart it. If you have a 3D video card, you should ensure that you have the latest drivers for it. You should also set your gamma level to 1.0 for correct colour reproduction. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 4. Input Configuration ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The input options section of DTR Australia allows you to setup your keys or other input device. If you have a joystick, wheel or gamepad, before running DTR Australia ensure that it is properly setup and calibrated in the 'Game Controllers' application under the Windows 'Control Panel'. You should then calibrate the device in the input options of DTR Australia. It is only necessary to calibrate a particular joystick once. The default keys for control are: left, right - Steer. up - Accelerate. down - Brake. space - Change camera view. left shift - Half lock steering. X - Change gear up. Z - Change gear down. Other keys you can use when in a race are: escape - In multiplayer, quits the race. In single player, pauses the race and provides a few options, such as exit and resume, F3 - Toggle display of race information. F4 - Toggle display of the rear view mirror. F5 - In multiplayer, toggle display of player names. F12 - Take a screenshot (useable when in a race and when in the game shell). Screenshots are saved to c:\snap-.tga. When watching a race in multiplayer, the tab key can be used to switch between the free camera mode and following each of the cars in turn. While following a car, the normal change camera view key (space by default) can be used to change views. When in the free camera mode, use the mouse to aim the camera. Hold down the left button to accelerate in the direction the camera is facing, and hold down the right button to slow down. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 5. Multiplayer ------------------------------------------------------------------------ From within the interface, you can create a new game by selecting 'new game' on the multiplayer server list screen. Other players on your LAN will then be able to see the server in their server list, and will be able to connect to your game. For Internet play, you must specify the IP address of the machine to connect to. This can be done by selecting 'join IP' on the multiplayer server list screen. The player who hosts the game can determine their IP address by selecting Run from the Start menu, and then typing in 'winipcfg' (without the quotes). Dirt Track Racing Australia only supports TCP/IP, so in order to play on a LAN each machine will need to have TCP/IP networking for the network card set up. To set up TCP/IP networking, follow these steps: 1. Open My Computer -> Control Panel, then run the Network application. 2. If TCP/IP for your network card is not in the list, then: a) Click Add. b) Double-click Protocol. c) Select Microsoft on the left hand side, and TCP/IP on the right hand side. d) Click OK. 3. Select the TCP/IP item in the list, for your network card (not for dialup networking, if you have that installed). 4. Click Properties. 5. Select the IP Address tab. 6. Click 'Specify an IP address', then enter an IP address of 192.168.0.xxx, where xxx is 1 for machine 1 on your LAN, 2 for machine 2 on your LAN, etc. 7. Enter a Subnet mask of 255.255.255.0. 8. Click OK, then OK on the next screen. You will probably need to restart your computer. The 'DTR Network Server' icon installed in the start menu can also be used to start a dedicated server, which other players can connect to. When the server program is run, it will prompt for some values. If desired, you can select to register the server with GameSpy, meaning that other players on the Internet will be able to connect to the server using the GameSpy launcher program. Note that the server executable does not require the data in order to be able to run. Players with the full version of DTR Australia, as well as players with the demo version, can join a demo server. However, only full versions of the game can join full version servers. Demo servers have 'DEMO' as the first part of their name. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 6. Command Line Options ------------------------------------------------------------------------ DTR Australia supports several command line options. These options can be selected using the 'DTR Options Editor' on the start menu. Alternatively, you can enter them when running the game from an MS-DOS prompt, or modify the shortcut you use to run DTR Australia. The options are: -glide2vsync Forces the Glide 2 graphics driver to wait for screen refreshes. This runs slower, but may fix hangs on some Glide video cards, especially Voodoo 2s. -nopersistd3d Causes the Direct3D driver to not retain the same DirectDraw interface when switching between a race and the interface. This may fix problems on certain video cards. -3dsound As in version 1.02 and above of DTR USA (the first patch), DTR Australia does not use 3D sound by default. This is because it causes errors on certain sound cards. Use this option to enable 3D sound if desired. -nocheckhresult Certain sounds cards report fatal errors during initialisation even though the errors are recoverable. Using the -nocheckhresult command line option will cause DTR Australia to ignore fatal errors from the sound card. Use this option if you receive 'HRESULT Error at ...' messages. -disablesound Use this option to disable sound. -nolaunch Stops DTR Australia from asking you which graphics driver to use every time it is run. DTR Australia will use whichever driver was selected on the last run. -nointro Turns off displaying the intro screens. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 7. Final Note ------------------------------------------------------------------------ You cannot modify data - e. g. create custom car skins (paint jobs) - in the demo of DTR Australia. This feature is only available in the full version. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Dirt Track Racing Australia + 2000 Ratbag Pty Ltd. All Rights Reserved. Dirt Track Racing Australia, Ratbag, the Ratbag logo, and the Difference Engine are trademarks.