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TOW Pt. I 1940-42 is released!

In case it's of any value, I've finally gotten some time to try and dig into TOW, but I crash after a couple minutes into the session. Usually, this is during a mission, but it has occurred while simply going through planes in the GUI. During the only mission I got through (a quick QC one), it crashed as I closed out of the mission. I'm also getting the old 'square flak' thing, only noticeable during the day. All my other installs are working fine.

Perhaps I did something wrong, but I thought I'd report it here in case others had the same issues.
 
Please let me know what missions or if always on the same mission? This seems a difficult one to answer as I don't have that issue, so I need more detailed info.

As for "but it has occurred while simply going through planes in the GUI" that I am at a loss.

Square flak I need to know which ac.
 
Afraid my time is at a premium again, but when I get the chance, I'll try to be more methodical in recording what's going on. I'll check my install again first in case it's something I did.
 
TOW Pt I udate

@ threedp I await your info when available. Meanwhile. due to issues re taking off on certain runways and related bomb+ fuel weights to range issues, plus a few other small things, I hope an update mainly involving some aircraft and missions will hopefully be uploaded some time next month. Any other issues found, please advise me ASAP!
 
Well, several people have made generalised comments about issues with this install, but so far no one has been very specific. I also should mention that I had asked for testers before release and had no volunteers. As we hope to release Tow P.II Sept '42 -May'44 next year, it would be much appreciated if existing issues were solved. This is not the work of one person, as all new aircraft models, their textures, the active radar elements, airbases and IlS assisted landing, etc. are the work of many of the remaining few active program/modelers left in CFS3, so to volunteer for testing installs is the least some could do...
 
I'm sorry i did help in testing . If you need any help,(testing thoroughly ), sorting out this momentous body of work, let me know. By the way, thank you ,and all those involved, bringing TOW to us. Thankful for people like you and those who give all their precious time for this wonderful addition. Will install this weekend again and let you know what problems,specifically, i find. Thanks again ! Regards, Scott
 
My apologies for not being able to get back to this. The only thing I can report now is that I think I forgot to install the radars. I'll do a full on reinstall before I report back again.
 
Life has gotten in the way recently and still haven't installed TOW yet. Will carefully read all the readme files and do it correctly. Sure i did something wrong the first time. Can't be much harder than the ETO or PTO-RS . Can't wait to have the time to install and test it properly. Excited about this part of WW II that you can't find anywhere else but here,thanks to people like you. Regards,Scott
 
So it took having a week off over the holidays to get to do this right, but I've finally done it! So here's my 'report'. Sorry it took so long!

First off, I should note that I had never gotten the 2019 Ankor's shaders working, so I've been using the 2018 ones in my CFS3 installs. I think that's what I did the first time out and, as previously noted, TOW started, but consistently crapped out several minutes in, flying or not. Trashing that install completely, here's exactly what I did this time:

1. In the install files, fixed ACC_city_block_6.xdp to add the missing </DamageBoxes> closing tag at line 11.

2. Copied the TOW directory to my preferred C: drive location.

4. Copied in cfs3.exe and MultiCFS3.exe.

5. Ran MultiCFS3.exe.

6. Copied in Ankor's 2019 shaders.

7. Ran cfs3config.exe.

8. Copied in A.I.Radar.exe.

9. Ran A.I.Radar.exe (successfully).

10. Ran cfs3.exe (failed after splash screen).

Fix attempts:

As I've said, I've never been successful with the 2019 shaders, so I copied in the 2018 ones (overwriting) and then the 2019 ones again (overwriting). Now TOW starts successfully. I am now able to fly the remarkable missions with no apparent problems whether 10 minutes or half an hour.

However, a problem I occasionally suffer with ETO is much more prevalent in TOW. It will crap out either after leaving the mission (before the debrief screen) or when closing the debrief screen (I can look at my stats and such but trying to get back to the main screen is when I almost always craps out).

So my humble conclusion is that it's more of a shader issue (maybe I have something set wrong somewhere?), rather than a TOW issue, although as I said, the issue is much more prominent in TOW. Any advice welcome!
 
First of all, many thanks for that detailed info. I also have always had periodic issues with freezes or CTD with ETO and my 109 era adaptation ( 5 night eras), and it always seems to be an issue working out what the issue is, WRT whether it's what is going on with my PC and my installation of an install, or the install itself. I did also also have crashes with TOW I, but since developing TOW II, I hasve not gone back to actually playing the sim, something I must do before any new install release.
One issue that I have had is the long warps after take off and after bombing, when sometimes it just crashes. I am using a PC with many 10-8 year old components so I am never quite sure how much that is the issue. I also re installed Win 10 Pro after 19 years since installed, and I have yet to fully test the TOW I install since.
If you have any issues WRT specific missions, let me know, Glad to know the sdsbolt app works though. Not sure what to say WRT the shaders issue. I have my own 2019 set up especially for dark.
 
Before i install TOW pt1, what do we need to do to the shaders d3d8.ini for night use ? Thanks for any help. Regards,Scott
 
Couple of developments to report:

I'm putting together a 'Quick Reference Guide' for TOW1 and am trying to really nail down the basic installation procedure. While doing so:

I've finally successfully used the latest version on Ankor's Shaders (Dec 2019) without the 'help' from the 2018 version (as noted above). However, to do it, I had to set the ShowUIWorld value to false in the game.xml file. This has also seemed to solve the crashing after flying thing. Bit of a drag not being able to see what I'm about to fly, but I'll keep working on it.

Also, I'm getting some strange display behavior, see the striated black patches (which flash) in the lit areas in front of and below the He 111:



I have not ventured into using specialized shader files, as I said, I'm trying to get the basics down first, so the above is with Ankor's defaults. That said, with the 2018 ones in my other CFS3 installs, I fly at night more often than not and have never seen such behavior. Thoughts?
 
Did an extensive compare of my ConfigOverrides files for all my installs (all using Ankor's shaders) with the following results:

Mode val
TOW1 reads '14'
All others read '36'
Does this matter?

aircraftmodels Scale
TOW1 reads '1024'
All others read '0'
This is my doing (driven by my B-29 skins) as the '0' allows any texture size and much better looking aircraft in many cases.

DualPassRender
TOW1 reads 'y'
All others read 'n'
This should be 'n' as 'y' causes display weirdness! Correct?

HighResolutionZBuffer
TOW1 reads 'n'
All others read 'y'
I understand that this should be 'y'. Is that correct?

DisableShadows
DisableTerrainLighting
DisableSceneryLighting
DisableTerrainDiffuseLighting
TOW1 reads 'n' for all four tags above
All others read 'y' for all four tags
What is correct?

CompositeAircraftTextureMaxDim
TOW1 reads '1024'
All others read '4096'
As I understand it, this really doesn't matter if aircraftmodels Scale (above) is set to '0', but setting this to the higher value doesn't hurt. Correct?

CompositeTerrainTextureBudget
BoB and ETO read 'One'
All others read 'Five'
Does this matter?
 
Good to get some feed back., not that I know all the answers!:dizzy:

1, The flashing effects is something that I have noticed and am not 100% sure why that comes. I sort of suspect it might be from the effects in the ETO city facilities, such as ETO_City_target_1.xml which arre in the global layer, but I haven't looked into it in detail. Facilities such as ETO_City_target_1.xml have entries such as ACC_city_block and or ACC_city_block-fs and things like firestorm_small, I sort of suspect the multiple effects in these buildings and 'vehicles' might overload the system (from the effects,xml ?) some how. I was hoping it was just my system, as I have brought up the isue in previous posts with no answers.

2. I have my own variation of the shaders as can be got from "TOW required or alternative files folders.zip" in the mediafire from where the install comes from https://www.mediafire.com/file/q9dc634o79y8l2g/TOW_required_or_alternative_files_folders.zip/file You could play with that. (sixstrings5859 note correct link)

3. The ConfigOverrides file that I use is not as you mentioned, and I am not sure where you got that. After I make an install, I then change the ConfigOverrides file to a version based on MakorMagee's which would seem to be more like yours. Just copy yours in from

<TextureLimits>
<aircraftmodels Scale="0" MaxDim="0"/>
<compositeterrain Scale="0" MaxDim="0"/>
<compositeterrainsource Scale="0" MaxDim="0"/>

on to the bottom



Glad to see someone really analyzing the install!:applause::ernaehrung004:
 
And of course, to keep myself entertained as I sift my way through, I jump to dressing up the 'marketing materials' from time to time. :playful:

 
OK, so I have NO FREAKING CLUE why this works, but the trick I tried in an earlier install just to try to get TOW1 running, seems to consistently fix the flashing ground thing. What I did was install TOW1 as instructed with Ankor's Dec 2019 shaders. That got the flashing. I then copied in the January 2018 ones (overwriting when asked) and then I copied in the Dec 2019 ones again (overwriting when asked again), and voila, no flashing! I even managed to hit Big Ben (just a little ahead of the nose and the port engine).

 
Just as a matter of interest, could you attach the

TextureMagic.ini
and
d3d8.ini

so that I can compare with waht I am using.
 
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