If you are getting "Network out of sync" or "Lost a packet" errors, go to the "Errors" section at the end of this document for explanations and hints on fixing these problems.
For information about the Advanced Options settings, see the "Errors" section at the end of this document.
Duke Nukem 3D Macintosh supports several multiplayer options to let you play against other Mac and PC players. To start a network game, run the "Duke Net Startup" application. You can then select the type of network game and options before having Duke Nukem 3D started for you in network mode.
A couple general hints:
- If you are playing a network game, and at some point the game seems to lock up and not let you do anything, its probably because some network problems caused the game to become out of sync. If this happens, you can press Option and ESC at the same time to quickly abort the network game and quit. You should do this rather than hitting the reset button on your Mac or force-quitting Duke Nukem 3D.
- When playing against PC's (or PC's and Mac's), be sure to set the "PC Compatible" checkbox in the Net Startup application. This disables some Mac specific optimizations to make the game play correctly against PC's. If you are playing against just Macs, leave this option unchecked.
- If you are having the game slow down a lot (especially on 040 Macs), there are a few things you can try. Play the game with no monsters or monsters on one of the first couple skill levels. The higher the skill level (and thus the more monsters) the slower the game runs, since it has to keep track of more things. It is not recommended that you play a net game with 040's on the highest skill level. Which game level you play on also affects the speed of DukeMatches. Many of the later levels are much more complex than earlier ones in Episode 1, so they slow the game down. Also try changing the "moves per packet" to 2 or 4 in the Net Startup application(see the following hint for more info on this). Finally, a two player game will play faster than a 3+ player game.
- In the options for each network game type, there is a setting for "Moves per packet". This tells the game how many player moves to put in each network packet before sending. The higher the number, the fewer packets will need to be sent. Over the Internet or on slow network connections, you may get better performance by setting moves per packet to 2 or 4. This also helps on slower machines, particularly 68040's. Everyone playing in a net game must have the same setting for moves per packet. The moves per packet option corresponds to the /f1, /f2 and /f4 options on the PC. Note- when moves per packet is set to 4, only one player in the game can start a new game or save/load games.
- The user map button in the Net Startup application lets you select a 3rd party user level to be available for net play. Everyone in the network game must select the same user map(with the same name) to be able to play on that user level. You can also start a net game with a user map by dragging the map onto the Net Startup application.
- Duke Nukem 3D allows you to save the game during network play. The names you choose when saving the game are very important, since they tell the other players which game to load and save. If all the players in a net game don't load the same saved game, the network game won't work correctly. The easiest way to save is to just leave the default name (Net Game-00) when you save. Always save or load from this game and everything will work fine. If you want to save multiple network games, change the first 0 to another number (1-9), i.e. "Net Game-20" or "Net Game-50". The second 0 in the net name is the player number that saved the game originally. So if you were playing a net game and player #2 saved the game, you would find a save file on your disk called "Net Game-02". Any games you save yourself will be saved as player #0. The first number corresponds to the save slot number on the PC.
AppleTalk hints
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- The Unique ID setting under AppleTalk Options lets you have more than one Dukematch game going at the same time on a single network. Everyone who wants to play in the same game must have the same Unique ID setting.
- The zone(s) you select under AppleTalk Options tell Duke where to look for other players. To select multiple zones hold down the shift or command key while clicking in the zone list.
IPX hints
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- When playing against any PC's, make sure you select the "PC Compatible Mode" check box in the Net Startup application. If you don't select this option, the game will get out of sync easily.
- The socket number setting under IPX Options lets you have more than one Dukematch game going at the same time on a single network. Everyone who wants to play in the same game must have the same socket number.
TCP/IP hints
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- You must enter the absolute IP address of each player you want to be in your network game in the TCP/IP settings dialog. The first player address is not editable, and contains your current address. If you need to tell other players what your address is, use this address. Remember if you are playing over the Internet, with a PPP connection, your IP address may be different every time you connect to the Internet with your modem, so other players may need to update your address frequently.
Network Errors
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"Network out of sync" - this occurs when the position your machine thinks each player is at doesn't match the position other machines think each player is at. You can continue to play while the game is out of sync, but strange things may happen (damage might not be counted, people won't really be where they appear on screen, etc.). If you are getting out of sync errors, first make sure everyone playing Duke has the same "Moves per packet" settings and the same setting for "PC Compatible Mode".
Normally out of sync errors happen because of network errors(lost packets). If you get an out of sync error, you can try to start a new game (press Esc and then select New Game), which should reset everything. If you continually get errors, it may be because one of the machines you are playing against is very slow, and can't keep up. See the "general hints" section above for hints on how to speed up play on slower machines.
"Lost a packet"- this messages shows up when your Mac was too busy doing something else to be able to service all the packets coming in from other players. Lost packets can lead to out of sync errors. If you get lost packets and no out of sync errors show up, you can keep playing the game without any problems. If you constantly get packet losses, you may want to try setting the "moves per packet" option in the Net Startup application to 2 or 4. See the general hints section above for more information on the "moves per packet" options.
Advanced Options
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To improve reliability of AppleTalk and TCP/IP games, there are several advanced settings you can tweak to get the best game play. When changing these values, it is important that all players in a game have the same settings. These settings should not need to be changed to play up to 8 player Appletalk games on normal networks or head to head games over the Internet. They should only need to be changed on unreliable networks or 3+ player Internet games.
Non-move oversend: This option tells the game to send multiple copies of important game setup packets, in case the network is losing packets. The default is 2, which means two extra copies are sent for each setup packet. If the game seems jerky and you have a reliable network connection, you may set this option to "off". If you have problems with some machines getting stuck "waiting for players", turn this option on.
Non-move delay: The amount of time to delay between sending extra setup packets. Default is 10, which should be correct for nearly all networks. Higher numbers reduce chances of packet collisions, lower numbers make the game pause less betwen packet sends.
Move oversend: Number of duplicate packets to send for in-game move packets. This defaults to zero and shouldn't be changed unless you are on a very unreliable network.
Out of order queue for 3+ players: This option is only applicable on 3+ player TCP/IP games. Due to the nature of the Internet, it is common for packets received from several other players to be received in incorrect order. This option attempts to save out of order packets and recover the correct sequence at a later time. For 3+ player Internet games it may be necessary to have this on.
