Durfsurn

So I recently bought a new computer screen with the jaw dropping resolution of 5120×1440 and was looking into getting SimCity 4 to run at something closer to native resolution. It has been known to the community for some time that SimCity 4 is locked to resolutions under 2048ish pixels either wide or high in hardware mode, the source of this limit is DirectX 7 which cannot handle resolutions any higher. This could be circumnavigated by running SC4 in software rendering mode (CPU only) but this caused other issues and notably reduced the graphics. However I have found a fantastic repository which can breathe new life into many games that use DirectX 9 or earlier called dxWrapper which includes a Legacy Hack for removing the resolution restriction, among other tricks. Anyway, with the help of one of the fantastic developers (elishacloud), a configuration was found that enables resolutions such as 4k and beyond! You can follow the Github Issue here but I will provide a summary below; IMPORTANT DO NOT SKIP THIS STEP: Make sure your game is patched with the NTCore 4GB patch! Download the latest release of dxWrapper from this link: https://github.com/elishacloud/dxwrapper/releases Open the .zip in 7zip or WinRar and separately navigate to your SimCity 4 Deluxe/Apps folder. Extract the following files from the .zip: dxwrapper.dll, dxwrapper.ini, Stub/ddraw.dll and copy them into your Apps folder (next to your SimCity 4.exe file). Open the dxwrapper.ini file and paste the code below into it. Use a SimCity 4 Launcher to select any resolution you like! I am hoping to follow up this post with a guide on how to run the game at higher than native resolutions and scale it down to provide the greatest graphical fidelity. - Billy dxwrapper.ini: >;; Config file for DirectX DLL Wrapper [General] RealDllPath = AUTO WrapperMode = AUTO LoadCustomDllPath = ExcludeProcess = IncludeProcess = RunProcess = WaitForProcess = 0 DisableLogging = 0 [Plugins] LoadPlugins = 0 LoadFromScriptsOnly = 0 [Compatibility] Dd7to9 = 0 D3d8to9 = 0 DDrawCompat = 0 Dinputto8 = 0 DisableGameUX = 0 DSoundCtrl = 0 DxWnd = 0 EnableDdrawWrapper = 1 HandleExceptions = 0 SingleProcAffinity = 0 [DDrawCompat] DDrawCompat20 = 0 DDrawCompat21 = 0 DDrawCompatExperimental = 0 DDrawCompatDisableGDIHook = 0 DDrawCompatNoProcAffinity = 0 [ddraw] ConvertToDirectDraw7 = 0 ConvertToDirect3D7 = 0 DdrawOverrideBitMode = 0 [Dd7to9] AutoFrameSkip = 0 DdrawEmulateSurface = 0 DdrawLimitDisplayModeCount = 0 DdrawUseNativeResolution = 0 DdrawClippedWidth = 0 DdrawClippedHeight = 0 DdrawOverrideWidth = 0 DdrawOverrideHeight = 0 DdrawOverrideRefreshRate = 0 DdrawIntegerScalingClamp = 0 DdrawMaintainAspectRatio = 0 [d3d9] AntiAliasing = 0 EnableVSync = 0 EnableWindowMode = 0 FullscreenWindowMode = 0 WindowModeBorder = 0 [FullScreen] FullScreen = 0 ForceWindowResize = 0 WaitForWindowChanges = 0 [DSoundCtrl] Num2DBuffers = 0 Num3DBuffers = 0 ForceCertification = 0 ForceExclusiveMode = 0 ForceSoftwareMixing = 0 ForceHardwareMixing = 0 PreventSpeakerSetup = 0 ForceHQ3DSoftMixing = 0 ForceNonStaticBuffers = 0 ForceVoiceManagement = 0 ForcePrimaryBufferFormat = 0 PrimaryBufferBits = 16 PrimaryBufferSamples = 44100 PrimaryBufferChannels = 2 ForceSpeakerConfig = 0 SpeakerConfig = 6

I'm sure a few people will be able to pick the inspiration for this one!

Durfsurn - YouTube I still post the occasional timelapse video or UDI too! I'm keen to make some more videos over the holiday period!

Cheeky double post but the sequel is out:

This override I believe: Urban Tarsealed Street Modd - Page 2 - Mods & Tools - Simtropolis.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KoDfj4gadxs

Have you correctly installed the 4gb Patch? Run this file on your SimCity4.exe and see if that fixes your issues :). https://ntcore.com/files/4gb_patch.zip - Billy

Installing Java onto your system will allow you to run the installer jar file and select installation options. You can always uninstall Java after. However if you wish not to install Java at all, the jar file included in the download can be opened with 7zip or WinRAR and within this file there is the installation folder with all the NAM files. You could manually copy these to your Plugins directory in a folder called Network Addon Mod to install them also. This video might be of use. NAM 37 & Higher Installer Guide - YouTube. Thats for NAM 37 but it should also apply to 41. - Billy

Boop - Billy

A script has got confused on a missing or incorrectly sized C0/D0 pair according to the output. Its a little hard to read (the script window won't resize horizontally) and doesn't seem to list the affected file.

Hey @rivit, First of all thanks for this amazing program! Getting some great use of it! Just wondering if the so called "Fatal Errors in Pregen encountered" (and other errors I guess) could be made unfatal and just offending files skipped? Thanks again for all the hard work.

Some texture development work on a WIP mod/NAM addition I am working on called the Striped Roads Plugin (SRP). Changes your zoned roads to single yellow striped roads (does not affect non zoned roads). - Billy

Working just as well if not better for me on a 3800X/RTX3080 system. Really amazing work here!

That is some snazzy code Cori! You have far more patience than I for such batch file programming!

Dd7to9 does not work with SC4, this is almost certainly due to the fact the 3D driver calls haven't been fixed/re-mapped. You will always get a DirectDraw error. I'm also not convinced D3d8to9 actually does anything to SC4.

I can confirm this fixes it on my end too. I was going to wait to do a full write up but yes that is the correct methodology. It is also recommended to turn Handle Exceptions = 1. EDIT: After messing with the settings for a fair while, I cannot solve the region preview bug. However there is light at the end of the tunnel, this page here seems to indicate that we may eventually be able to take full advantage of the Dd7to9 = 0 functionality, once the 3D conversion has matured, until then everyone's best option is to run sc4 at a lower than [ * x 1200 ] resolution for saving preview images. Also here is a link to my .ini file however I believe most of the options I have turned on currently have no effect on the game: https://pastebin.com/78bg1e26

Yep, see my reply here: https://www.sc4devotion.com/forums/index.php?topic=18734.msg535641#msg535641

Can you elaborate on this issue? dxWrapper does include some tools around Dinput that I would be happy to look into fixing. A video would be super helpful to understand what the problem is .

Did you download this zip file? https://github.com/elishacloud/dxwrapper/releases/download/v1.0.6387.21/DxWrapper.zip It should be in there. If not you can create an empty text file in Notepad and paste in my code from above - remember to save it with the ini extension.

Probably worth just going through some YouTube reviews of some 4k monitors - all I would say is find a reputable brand so in the off chance you get a dead pixel, you can RMA it easily.