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Homeworld

From PCGamingWiki, the wiki about fixing PC games
Homeworld
Homeworld cover
Developers
Relic Entertainment
Publishers
Sierra Entertainment
Release dates
Windows September 28, 1999
Homeworld on Wikipedia
Homeworld
Homeworld 1999
Homeworld: Cataclysm 2000
Homeworld 2 2003
Homeworld Remastered Edition 2015
Homeworld 2 Remastered Edition 2015
Homeworld: Deserts of Kharak 2016
Homeworld 3 2024

Key points

Windows 8 users need a fix for hardware acceleration support; see Windows 8 hardware acceleration.
Mod tools come bundled on the disk
Small but dedicated community
The audio settings include an equalizer (!)
HUD doesn't scale on higher resolutions

General information

Relic Entertainment Official site
Encyclopedia Hiigara - A wiki for everything Homeworld related
Homeworld Shipyards - A fairly old but big Homeworld fan site

Availability

Template:Availability Table

Homeworld is not available digitally. The retail version was re-released by Sold Out Software.
The included serial key is only required during setup.

Essential improvements

Patches

The latest patch is Homeworld 1.05.

A full list of all available patches can be found here.

Command-line parameters

The following command-line parameters may improve quality on newer systems, or enable extra functionality:

Argument Description
/triple Enables OpenGL triple buffering, improves graphical quality and removes flickering at higher resolutions. Use unless it causes problems.
/enable3DNow Enables the 3DNow processor instruction set if available. Use unless it causes problems.
/enableSSE Enables the SSE processor instruction set if available. Use unless it causes problems.
/disableAVI Disables the intro movies when the game starts.
/nofastfe Disables the fast graphical frontend. Use this only when having graphical problems like flickering
/noglddraw Don't use DirectDraw to setup OpenGL renderers. Try this is you're having problems getting OpenGL to work.
/safeGL Don't use possibly buggy optimized features of OpenGL for rendering. Try this if you're having problems getting OpenGL to work.
/pilotview Enable pilot view. Focus on single ship and hit Q to toggle.
/heap BYTES Allows the game to use up to BYTES bytes RAM for the heap since by default the game isn't allowed to use much.

256 MB should suffice:

/heap 268435456

but if you have more, try raising it to 1 GB:

/heap 1073741824

Game data

In-game general settings.

Configuration file(s) location

Template:Game data/row
System Location

Save game data location

Template:Game data/row
System Location

Save game cloud syncing

No save game cloud syncing information; you can edit this page to add it.

Video settings

In-game general graphics settings.
In-game advanced graphics settings.

Template:Video settings

Widescreen resolution

Widescreen can be enabled by changing the ScreenHeight and ScreenWidth registry keys in HKLM\Software\Sierra On-Line\Homeworld

Instructions

Windowed

Add -window to the game's path. For borderless fullscreen windowed mode add -noBorder as well. If you do not use -noBorder you must run the game at less than maximum screen resolution or it will crash.

Input settings

In-game key map settings.

Template:Input settings

Audio settings

In-game audio settings.
In-game speech settings.

Template:Audio settings

Issues fixed

"Invalid or missing Homeworld CD - Please insert CD"

Installing the 1.05 Patch will fix it.

Hardware Acceleration

Using OpenGL or D3D (in the video options) enables hardware acceleration, which gives you 32-bit colour, and the ability to use graphics techniques invented since the game's release. Hardware Acceleration works best on Windows XP or later when the game is run using compatibility mode for Windows NT 4.0. For Windows 8 a workaround is required to set this mode; see Windows 8 hardware acceleration.

Windows 8 hardware acceleration

On Windows 8 the "Windows NT 4.0" compatibility mode is no longer listed, and no other modes manage to get OpenGL working; D3D mode works, but bugs out at non-default resolutions.
Instructions

System requirements

Windows
Minimum Recommended
Operating system (OS) 95, 98, NT 4.0
Processor (CPU) Pentium II 233
System memory (RAM)
Hard disk drive (HDD) 80 MB
Video card (GPU) 4 MB PCI Video Card (16-bit color, Direct X compatible)

References