Free camera and FOTRSU 1.8

erahmig · 06-09-23, 06:40 PM

Hi everyone,

I'm having a weird issue with the free camera and SH4 1.5/FOTRSU 1.8.

According to the in-game help, F12 is the free camera short cut.

However, pressing F12 does nothing (as far as I can tell).

Here is a list of things I have checked/tried:

I verified that the Steam screenshot shortcut is set to None (used to be F12)

I verified that "No external view" was OFF/not checked prior to starting my fleet boat campaign.

EDIT: I verified that my F12 key actually works

I'm honestly not sure what to check next. Does anyone know of any issues with the free camera and FOTRSU 1.8?

Aktungbby · 06-09-23, 07:37 PM

erahmig!

KaleunMarco · 06-09-23, 07:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by erahmig

Hi everyone,

I'm having a weird issue with the free camera and SH4 1.5/FOTRSU 1.8.

According to the in-game help, F12 is the free camera short cut.

However, pressing F12 does nothing (as far as I can tell).

Here is a list of things I have checked/tried:

I verified that the Steam screenshot shortcut is set to None (used to be F12)

I verified that "No external view" was OFF/not checked prior to starting my fleet boat campaign.

EDIT: I verified that my F12 key actually works

I'm honestly not sure what to check next. Does anyone know of any issues with the free camera and FOTRSU 1.8?

very good checking on your problem.

here is one more, actually two more:
browse to \data\cfg\Commands.cfg
open that file with a text editor such as Notepad or Notepad++
on the first screen you should see a parm named: MaxKeyCommandsNb=
what is the numeric value?

secondly, perform a "find" for F12 (ctrl+f).
reply with the result.
you should see:

[Cmd9]
Name=User_free_camera
Ctxt=1,2,9,11
MnID=0x3F02000B
Key0=0x7B,,"F12"

erahmig · 06-09-23, 08:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by KaleunMarco

very good checking on your problem.

here is one more, actually two more:
browse to \data\cfg\Commands.cfg
open that file with a text editor such as Notepad or Notepad++
on the first screen you should see a parm named: MaxKeyCommandsNb=
what is the numeric value?

Thank you for helping!

Here is the line from my \data\cfg\Commands.cfg file:

Code:

MaxKeyCommandsNb=170; Keys number shoud be smaller than this value (in order to accelerate the loading)

Quote:

Originally Posted by KaleunMarco

secondly, perform a "find" for F12 (ctrl+f).
reply with the result.
you should see:

[Cmd9]
Name=User_free_camera
Ctxt=1,2,9,11
MnID=0x3F02000B
Key0=0x7B,,"F12"

Here's what i found when searching that file for the string "F12":

Code:

[Cmd9]
Name=User_free_camera
Ctxt=1,2,9,11
MnID=0x3F02000B
Key0=0x7B,,"F12"

erahmig · 06-09-23, 08:44 PM

This is very strange. I thought I had turned OFF "No external view". I even tried deleting Documents\SH4, restarting the game, re-doing the realism settings again and ensuring "No external view" was off, restarting a campaign, saving the game, quitting the game, restarting the game, loading my saved game, and ... free camera was still disabled.

So, i poked around inside Documents\SH4. It turns out that all instances of GamePlaySettings.cfg somehow had

Code:

NoExternalView=true

instead of

Code:

NoExternalView=false

I changed all instances of GamePlaySettings.cfg so that "NoExternalView" was set to false, restarted the game and ... voila, free camera now works.

Now, if the guy who keeps saying "Passing thermal layer" while we are sitting in port, depth 0, speed 0, waiting to start the 1st patrol would be quiet I would be happy

...

propbeanie · 06-09-23, 10:10 PM

There are two menus to choose your camera behavior from. The obvious one is the main menu, Options, Gameplay Settings, and tick the box for "No external view" so that it is cleared. That controls your Single Missions, Quick Missions, Submarine School, and Multi-Player mission runs. When in the Career modes though, you have to be in the Captain's Office on-base prior to sailing. On the US side, you look to the left and click on the wooden radio console, and get a very similar Options menu, and choose the same Gameplay Settings, which do default to "No external view" being turned on. Clear that and Apply Changes, confirm, and then exit the menu and go on patrol. The German office has the Options menu in the 4 drawer file cabinet by the Exit door...

KaleunMarco · 06-09-23, 10:17 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by erahmig

Now, if the guy who keeps saying "Passing thermal layer" while we are sitting in port, depth 0, speed 0, waiting to start the 1st patrol would be quiet I would be happy

...

glad you figured it out.

regarding the repeat of orders...that can happen when a player uses very high time compression (tc) and also shelling out to windows during play.

TC should be limited to no higher than 1024 or some unexpected things can happen and none of them are good for play.

shelling out to windows is just bad, bad, bad. don't do it. if you accidently alt-tab out to Windows or if it happens on its own (yes, virginia, microsoft can do it to you), the only fix is to stop, save, exit. wait a second or two and then relaunch and reload.

i forget if you stated that you are using a 4 GB memory utility. it is highly recommended that you use one. i believe FOTRSU has Large Address Aware in its download package. check out the Extras folder for not only the exe but also some documentation on usage.

good luck!

erahmig · 06-09-23, 10:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by propbeanie

There are two menus to choose your camera behavior from. The obvious one is the main menu, Options, Gameplay Settings, and tick the box for "No external view" so that it is cleared. That controls your Single Missions, Quick Missions, Submarine School, and Multi-Player mission runs. When in the Career modes though, you have to be in the Captain's Office on-base prior to sailing. On the US side, you look to the left and click on the wooden radio console, and get a very similar Options menu, and choose the same Gameplay Settings, which do default to "No external view" being turned on. Clear that and Apply Changes, confirm, and then exit the menu and go on patrol. The German office has the Options menu in the 4 drawer file cabinet by the Exit door...

That's got to be what happened! Thank you - I did not know that.

Quote:

Originally Posted by KaleunMarco

glad you figured it out.

regarding the repeat of orders...that can happen when a player uses very high time compression (tc) and also shelling out to windows during play.

TC should be limited to no higher than 1024 or some unexpected things can happen and none of them are good for play.

I head read about high TC elsewhere - glad to have it confirmed. I was still in port so no TC had happened yet. However, I will limit it to 1024 - thank you.

Quote:

Originally Posted by KaleunMarco

shelling out to windows is just bad, bad, bad. don't do it. if you accidently alt-tab out to Windows or if it happens on its own (yes, virginia, microsoft can do it to you), the only fix is to stop, save, exit. wait a second or two and then relaunch and reload.

This is really too bad. There are some utilities I was going to try to use but since I only have 1 monitor it would require Alt+Tab to access the external utilities

.

I guess I won't be trying those for now.

Quote:

Originally Posted by KaleunMarco

i forget if you stated that you are using a 4 GB memory utility. it is highly recommended that you use one. i believe FOTRSU has Large Address Aware in its download package. check out the Extras folder for not only the exe but also some documentation on usage.

Thank you - I had read up on FOTRSU prior to trying it and I came across the stuff about Large Address Aware. I did use LAA on SH4.exe prior to starting play so that should be taken care of.

Thanks very much all of you for helping.

smm · 06-13-23, 03:21 AM

Interesting. I alt-tab to windows (10) extensively due to video capture (I have OBS stop recording on ctrl-alt-S, but SH4 ignores the alt and interprets it as emergency surface, as I found, luckily not in combat), and I haven't seen any problems yet in-game (and all the problems with replay are known issues w/o tabbing).

I had about three CTDs so far as well (fingers crossed).

Only other problem I tend to run in is CO2 not resetting on surfacing, where I have to save/reload.

propbeanie · 06-13-23, 07:39 AM

The CO2 not re-setting is one of the primary symptoms of shelling-out to the desktop, along with a "steam" trail that might follow your boat, or a stuck external sea noise. There are all sorts of little anomalies that point to shelling-out, whether animation timings, audio, transparency, stuck weather, etc. Anything in the game can and will go wrong when shelling-out. You can somewhat minimize the issue by pausing the game and then using the Windows key, but you will still eventually encounter issues. The more RAM and the stronger the CPU of the computer, the better it deals with the issue, but you will still eventually run into issues. The game was written to the WinXP paradigm, and knows nothing about sharing resources or that Windows might move it around in memory.

I would recommend changing the hot key for OBS recording so that you do not have to shell-out for that task. I would also suggest investigating whether or not OBS is overloading your CPU and causing the CTDs you are experiencing, even when not recording and it is just sitting in the background. There is all kinds of info online about that. Also, always run SH4 and OBS as Administrator. You might also see if maybe the Windows GameBar, or the capture utility for your video card can do a more efficient job of capturing for you.

smm · 06-14-23, 03:47 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by propbeanie

The CO2 ....

Thanks!

TBH, I've lots of RAM and spent my last money last Xmas on getting a new CPU (because using OBS + daVinci effectively killed my old CPU) no money left for video card

, so I rarely see any of the issues you mention - and I always pause before OBS.

It's made easier that once I switched to story mode for the videos, I mostly record in replay, where the main issues are the retained steam/explosions/weather/night day effects, and that seems to be there regardless of tabbing out or not - with the solution mostly being "just wait a bit".

EDIT: Actually, my _MAIN_ issue is that on load the sub goes to all stop, and even if I get it to return-to-course, unless I speed up manually, it will happily sit on all stop for days..

EDIT 2: Hah, I spoke too soon.. My last save CTDs three seconds after load.. Just as well I am an obsessive saver here (after the past experience..)

06-09-23, 06:40 PM	#1
erahmig Watch Join Date: May 2015 Location: USA Posts: 21 Downloads: 88 Uploads: 0	Free camera and FOTRSU 1.8 Hi everyone, I'm having a weird issue with the free camera and SH4 1.5/FOTRSU 1.8. According to the in-game help, F12 is the free camera short cut. However, pressing F12 does nothing (as far as I can tell). Here is a list of things I have checked/tried: I verified that the Steam screenshot shortcut is set to None (used to be F12) I verified that "No external view" was OFF/not checked prior to starting my fleet boat campaign. EDIT: I verified that my F12 key actually works I'm honestly not sure what to check next. Does anyone know of any issues with the free camera and FOTRSU 1.8? Last edited by erahmig; 06-09-23 at 07:04 PM.

06-09-23, 07:37 PM	#2
Aktungbby Gefallen Engel U-666 Join Date: Jul 2013 Location: On a tilted, overheated, overpopulated spinning mudball on Collision course with Andromeda Galaxy Posts: 27,823 Downloads: 22 Uploads: 0	Welcome back! erahmig! __________________ "Only two things are infinite; The Universe and human squirrelyness; and I'm not too sure about the Universe"

06-09-23, 08:44 PM	#5
erahmig Watch Join Date: May 2015 Location: USA Posts: 21 Downloads: 88 Uploads: 0	This is very strange. I thought I had turned OFF "No external view". I even tried deleting Documents\SH4, restarting the game, re-doing the realism settings again and ensuring "No external view" was off, restarting a campaign, saving the game, quitting the game, restarting the game, loading my saved game, and ... free camera was still disabled. So, i poked around inside Documents\SH4. It turns out that all instances of GamePlaySettings.cfg somehow had Code: NoExternalView=true instead of Code: NoExternalView=false I changed all instances of GamePlaySettings.cfg so that "NoExternalView" was set to false, restarted the game and ... voila, free camera now works. Now, if the guy who keeps saying "Passing thermal layer" while we are sitting in port, depth 0, speed 0, waiting to start the 1st patrol would be quiet I would be happy ... Last edited by erahmig; 06-09-23 at 09:33 PM.

06-09-23, 10:10 PM	#6
propbeanie CTD - it's not just a job Join Date: May 2016 Location: One hour from Music City USA! Posts: 9,735 Downloads: 439 Uploads: 2	There are two menus to choose your camera behavior from. The obvious one is the main menu, Options, Gameplay Settings, and tick the box for "No external view" so that it is cleared. That controls your Single Missions, Quick Missions, Submarine School, and Multi-Player mission runs. When in the Career modes though, you have to be in the Captain's Office on-base prior to sailing. On the US side, you look to the left and click on the wooden radio console, and get a very similar Options menu, and choose the same Gameplay Settings, which do default to "No external view" being turned on. Clear that and Apply Changes, confirm, and then exit the menu and go on patrol. The German office has the Options menu in the 4 drawer file cabinet by the Exit door... __________________ "...and bollocks to the naysayer/s" - Jimbuna

06-13-23, 07:39 AM	#10
propbeanie CTD - it's not just a job Join Date: May 2016 Location: One hour from Music City USA! Posts: 9,735 Downloads: 439 Uploads: 2	The CO2 not re-setting is one of the primary symptoms of shelling-out to the desktop, along with a "steam" trail that might follow your boat, or a stuck external sea noise. There are all sorts of little anomalies that point to shelling-out, whether animation timings, audio, transparency, stuck weather, etc. Anything in the game can and will go wrong when shelling-out. You can somewhat minimize the issue by pausing the game and then using the Windows key, but you will still eventually encounter issues. The more RAM and the stronger the CPU of the computer, the better it deals with the issue, but you will still eventually run into issues. The game was written to the WinXP paradigm, and knows nothing about sharing resources or that Windows might move it around in memory. I would recommend changing the hot key for OBS recording so that you do not have to shell-out for that task. I would also suggest investigating whether or not OBS is overloading your CPU and causing the CTDs you are experiencing, even when not recording and it is just sitting in the background. There is all kinds of info online about that. Also, always run SH4 and OBS as Administrator. You might also see if maybe the Windows GameBar, or the capture utility for your video card can do a more efficient job of capturing for you. __________________ "...and bollocks to the naysayer/s" - Jimbuna

06-13-23, 03:21 AM	#9
smm The master Join Date: Jan 2023 Posts: 69 Downloads: 9 Uploads: 0	Interesting. I alt-tab to windows (10) extensively due to video capture (I have OBS stop recording on ctrl-alt-S, but SH4 ignores the alt and interprets it as emergency surface, as I found, luckily not in combat), and I haven't seen any problems yet in-game (and all the problems with replay are known issues w/o tabbing). I had about three CTDs so far as well (fingers crossed). Only other problem I tend to run in is CO2 not resetting on surfacing, where I have to save/reload.