I'm trying to run it better on Windows 10 not Win 98 machine, VM or otherwise.

BEEN_Nath_58 wrote on 2023-10-07, 19:03:

gaffa2002 wrote on 2023-10-07, 14:01:

VirtuaIceMan wrote on 2023-10-05, 18:11:

Yeah I can get into the gameplay which will be fine, but I cover the intros too, which makes it problematic, without just using the AVI files and pretending it's working 😁

Is there a halfway house at all? I'm happy running the CD in a drive with original CD audio, just need a workaround to get videos playing.

If the Win98 PC you have is a powerful one (1.3ghz or more), then the game should run fine with the AVIs working.

@gaffa2002 Are you planning to check out the game's behaviour on Win11 22H2 since you have to make stuffs work without the Win98 compatibility part

Sorry, no plans for fixing it as this is not a trivial thing to do. As far as I know, fixing this game would require some heavy reverse engineering to fix all of its problems. The best way for running it would be one of that odd Win98 builds with very fast CPUs, or maybe using Wine…

VirtuaIceMan wrote on 2023-10-07, 20:29:

I'm trying to run it better on Windows 10 not Win 98 machine, VM or otherwise.

Being realistic, this game is one of those released at a time when hardware accelerated games were not common and 10fps was considered acceptable, not to mention it uses very old video modes like 320x240 8 bit color and uses CD audio. Compatibility will only get worse over time 🙁
This game needs a modern port, or at least some very heavy reverse engineering work to make it use hardware acceleration and have better framerate control, audio files instead of CD tracks, save game data in a file instead of the registry and play its FMVs in more modern resolutions (my guess is that the crash is due to it trying to change the video mode to 320x240 8 bits to play FMV).

VirtuaIceMan wrote on 2023-10-07, 20:29:

I'm trying to run it better on Windows 10 not Win 98 machine, VM or otherwise.

Did you see my post above? I've explained how to get gaffa's patch to work with videos on W10.

gaffa2002 wrote on 2023-10-08, 00:59:

VirtuaIceMan wrote on 2023-10-07, 20:29:

I'm trying to run it better on Windows 10 not Win 98 machine, VM or otherwise.

Being realistic, this game is one of those released at a time when hardware accelerated games were not common and 10fps was considered acceptable, not to mention it uses very old video modes like 320x240 8 bit color and uses CD audio. Compatibility will only get worse over time 🙁
This game needs a modern port, or at least some very heavy reverse engineering work to make it use hardware acceleration and have better framerate control, audio files instead of CD tracks, save game data in a file instead of the registry and play its FMVs in more modern resolutions (my guess is that the crash is due to it trying to change the video mode to 320x240 8 bits to play FMV).

320x240x8 is a supported video mode on my machine. Or if I have to be more realistic (rather than DWM8AND16BITMITIGATION), DxWnd enumerates too, but still crashes there.

For me the better way would be the console port after all

Update: The movie crash doesn't seem to be happening from any kind of video mode changes.

BEEN_Nath_58 wrote on 2023-10-08, 03:55:

320x240x8 is a supported video mode on my machine. Or if I have to be more realistic (rather than DWM8AND16BITMITIGATION), DxWnd […]
Show full quote

gaffa2002 wrote on 2023-10-08, 00:59:

VirtuaIceMan wrote on 2023-10-07, 20:29:

I'm trying to run it better on Windows 10 not Win 98 machine, VM or otherwise.

Being realistic, this game is one of those released at a time when hardware accelerated games were not common and 10fps was considered acceptable, not to mention it uses very old video modes like 320x240 8 bit color and uses CD audio. Compatibility will only get worse over time 🙁
This game needs a modern port, or at least some very heavy reverse engineering work to make it use hardware acceleration and have better framerate control, audio files instead of CD tracks, save game data in a file instead of the registry and play its FMVs in more modern resolutions (my guess is that the crash is due to it trying to change the video mode to 320x240 8 bits to play FMV).

320x240x8 is a supported video mode on my machine. Or if I have to be more realistic (rather than DWM8AND16BITMITIGATION), DxWnd enumerates too, but still crashes there.

For me the better way would be the console port after all

Update: The movie crash doesn't seem to be happening from any kind of video mode changes.

The game was released at a time when some tasks could be done outside of directX . Some early games used other older APIs provided by microsoft to do things like changing the video mode to 320x240.
Its just a guess, but Last Bronx seems to use directdraw for most of its graphics, but some other older API to change the video mode specifically for the FMVs.
So it doesn’t matter what you change in your video driver settings or in dxwnd as it happens in a lower level 🙁
BTW: Did you convert the AVi files to a larger resolution as already explained?

gaffa2002 wrote on 2023-10-08, 15:51:

The game was released at a time when some tasks could be done outside of directX . Some early games used other older APIs provid […]
Show full quote

BEEN_Nath_58 wrote on 2023-10-08, 03:55:

320x240x8 is a supported video mode on my machine. Or if I have to be more realistic (rather than DWM8AND16BITMITIGATION), DxWnd […]
Show full quote

gaffa2002 wrote on 2023-10-08, 00:59:

Being realistic, this game is one of those released at a time when hardware accelerated games were not common and 10fps was considered acceptable, not to mention it uses very old video modes like 320x240 8 bit color and uses CD audio. Compatibility will only get worse over time 🙁
This game needs a modern port, or at least some very heavy reverse engineering work to make it use hardware acceleration and have better framerate control, audio files instead of CD tracks, save game data in a file instead of the registry and play its FMVs in more modern resolutions (my guess is that the crash is due to it trying to change the video mode to 320x240 8 bits to play FMV).

320x240x8 is a supported video mode on my machine. Or if I have to be more realistic (rather than DWM8AND16BITMITIGATION), DxWnd enumerates too, but still crashes there.

For me the better way would be the console port after all

Update: The movie crash doesn't seem to be happening from any kind of video mode changes.

The game was released at a time when some tasks could be done outside of directX . Some early games used other older APIs provided by microsoft to do things like changing the video mode to 320x240.
Its just a guess, but Last Bronx seems to use directdraw for most of its graphics, but some other older API to change the video mode specifically for the FMVs.
So it doesn’t matter what you change in your video driver settings or in dxwnd as it happens in a lower level 🙁
BTW: Did you convert the AVi files to a larger resolution as already explained?

Umm I couldn't use your patch actually. First the patcher did nothing so I followed feda and then it actually created a LB_PATCHED.EXE but it has a invalid PE header so Windows has no idea if its a Windows file so I get the "This app can't run on your PC" error.

BEEN_Nath_58 wrote on 2023-10-08, 19:56:

Umm I couldn't use your patch actually. First the patcher did nothing so I followed feda and then it actually created a LB_PATCHED.EXE but it has a invalid PE header so Windows has no idea if its a Windows file so I get the "This app can't run on your PC" error.

Did you try the patched exe I posted?
Bspatch is old and indeed behaves oddly.

feda wrote on 2023-09-14, 07:39:

Here's a mirror of the patched executable and the other files (except music and avis): https://mega.nz/file/a4A1jRpY#vviWtd2tQbgW-kA … rAkhFTN00Rx_U34

feda wrote on 2023-10-09, 08:19:

Did you try the patched exe I posted? Bspatch is old and indeed behaves oddly. […]
Show full quote

BEEN_Nath_58 wrote on 2023-10-08, 19:56:

Umm I couldn't use your patch actually. First the patcher did nothing so I followed feda and then it actually created a LB_PATCHED.EXE but it has a invalid PE header so Windows has no idea if its a Windows file so I get the "This app can't run on your PC" error.

Did you try the patched exe I posted?
Bspatch is old and indeed behaves oddly.

feda wrote on 2023-09-14, 07:39:

Here's a mirror of the patched executable and the other files (except music and avis): https://mega.nz/file/a4A1jRpY#vviWtd2tQbgW-kA … rAkhFTN00Rx_U34

I followed your steps. Without that LB_PATCHED.EXE isn't even generated

Frustrated with BSPATCH, I decided to set up WIndows 7 where gaffa2002 originally tested the patch. Unfortunately, the bspatch.exe does nothing here too. I followed the other instruction to use a different bspatch.exe, but just like Windows 11, it proceeds to create a corrupted executable (can't validate Win32 environment).

So yes, I am probably alone out here with this game. I will try to see what else can be done on 11.

My only guess is that there may be different releases of LB.EXE available (retail, XPlosiv, Expert and Fair Game for what I could find online).
Maybe you can try using LB.EXE from other releases of the game… FYI, the one I used was the Brazilian retail one.

gaffa2002 wrote on 2023-11-14, 16:04:

My only guess is that there may be different releases of LB.EXE available (retail, XPlosiv, Expert and Fair Game for what I could find online).
Maybe you can try using LB.EXE from other releases of the game… FYI, the one I used was the Brazilian retail one.

Not that I can get the brazillian release for download either... on a Sega fansite: https://forums.sonicretro.org/index.php?threa … e-2#post-996974

So following that instruction based on your discovery. On Windows 10, I got the videos to play in the same behaviour (losing focus). On Windows 11, the game just crashes before starting. If I disable Win98 mode/EmulateHeap, the game will crash at the video as usual, but the game runs. With EmulateHeap + DxWnd Handle Exceptions the game runs with a black screen. If I wait long enough in the menu for the video to play, it won't play but all the sound will disappear.