Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow buffer shadows question \ VOGONS

Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow buffer shadows question

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First post, by lmttn

Posted on 2025-07-30, 15:55

lmttn Offline

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Hi. I haven't played Pandora Tomorrow on period hardware since it was new (on a GeForce4 Ti 4600) but I am considering replaying it on my XP machine soon. However, I have a question about its use of buffer shadows, which now seems to be the source of many of the game's technical problems. Does the game display correct shadows on Windows XP out of the box, similar to how some games like Far Cry lost effects in post-XP versions of Windows without manual fixes? Or are the correct shadows tied to the hardware GPU and/or graphics driver? I have an 8600 GT in the computer now, but it's not in great shape so I have a replacement GT240 on the way. Are either cards too new to run the game properly?

Reply 1 of 2, by Joseph_Joestar

Posted on 2025-07-30, 16:02

Joseph_Joestar Offline

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lmttn wrote on 2025-07-30, 15:55:

Does the game display correct shadows on Windows XP out of the box

Sadly, no. Pandora Tomorrow will only display shadows and lights correctly up to GeForce 7 and Radeon X1900 series cards. Anything newer than that won't work natively.

However, there's a fix which you can apply to make (mostly) everything work fine on newer cards under WinXP. I've used it with my GTX 970 and had no problems completing the game. Also, if you're playing the game on Win7 and up, you can use the dgVoodoo2 wrapper instead of that fix.

PC#1: Pentium MMX 166 / Soyo SY-5BT / S3 Trio64V+ / Voodoo1 / YMF719 / AWE64 Gold / SC-155
PC#2: AthlonXP 2100+ / ECS K7VTA3 / Voodoo3 / Audigy2 / Vortex2
PC#3: Core 2 Duo E8600 / Foxconn P35AX-S / X800 / Audigy2 ZS
PC#4: i5-3570K / MSI Z77A-G43 / GTX 980Ti / X-Fi Titanium

Reply 2 of 2, by lmttn

Posted on 2025-07-30, 16:11

lmttn Offline

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Joined: 2019-08-02, 22:25
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Oh, sweet, I knew about dgVoodoo2 as a possible fix but I didn't know there was also a fix that works on XP. Thank you for the info! I guess that means the shadows were using a hardware feature rather than a (long since cut) driver feature.

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