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Desert Thunder

From PCGamingWiki, the wiki about fixing PC games
Desert Thunder
Desert Thunder cover
Developers
Brainbox Games
Publishers
Retail Groove Games
Hip Games
Funbox Media
Russia Russobit-M
Engines
Unreal Engine 2
Release dates
Windows November 19, 2003
Taxonomy
Monetization One-time game purchase
Modes Singleplayer
Pacing Real-time
Perspectives Third-person
Controls Direct control
Genres Action, Shooter, TPS, Vehicle combat
Vehicles Tank
Art styles Realistic
Themes Contemporary, Middle East
Desert Thunder on HowLongToBeat
Desert Thunder on MobyGames

Desert Thunder is a singleplayer third-person action, shooter, TPS and vehicle combat game.

General information

GOG.com Community Discussions
GOG.com Support Page
Steam Community Discussions

Availability

StarForce DRM for this game does not work on modern versions of Windows (see above for affected versions).

Game data

Configuration file(s) location

System Location
Windows <path-to-game>/System/*.ini[Note 2]
Steam Play (Linux) <Steam-folder>/steamapps/compatdata/283330/pfx/[Note 3]
DT.ini contains general settings.
User.ini contains camera FOV, mouse, keyboard/controller bindings and other settings.

Save game data location

System Location
Windows
Steam Play (Linux) <Steam-folder>/steamapps/compatdata/283330/pfx/[Note 3]

Save game cloud syncing

System Native Notes
GOG Galaxy
Steam Cloud

Video

Widescreen resolution

Custom resolutions can be set manually. Note that image is Vert-, and FOV should be increased to compensate for the first two options.
Set custom resolution in-game[5]
  1. While in game, open the console with ~.
  2. Enter setres XXXXxYYYY (for example setres 1920x1080).
Edit ini file[6]
  1. Launch the game at least once then close it.
  2. Open DT.ini.
  3. Go to the [WinDrv.WindowsClient] section.
  4. Set FullscreenViewportX and FullscreenViewportY to the desired resolution.

Notes

HUD is stretched.
Use the Widescreen Fix[7]

Notes

Camera FOV is fixed.
Menu elements are no longer cropped.
HUD and menus are stretched.

Field of view (FOV)

Set default FOV in-game[8]
  1. While in game, open the console with ~.
  2. Type fov x, where x is the desired FOV.
Edit ini file[9]
  1. Launch the game at least once then close it.
  2. Open User.ini.
  3. Search for the line 34 and change the line to (change x to the desired value):
    Aliases[27]=(Command="fov x",Alias=SetFOV)
  4. Add SetFOV in front of one of the keyboard letters that says <Keyname>=.
  5. While in-game press the key to activate the new FOV.

Notes

Game could start to randomly reset those values. If so, edit those values in <path-to-game>\System\DefUser.ini too.

Windowed

Edit ini file[10]
  1. Launch the game at least once then close it.
  2. Open DT.ini.
  3. Find the section [WinDrv.WindowsClient].
  4. In that section, find an entry WindowedViewportX= and set its value to your desired window width.
  5. In that section, find an entry WindowedViewportY= and set its value to your desired window height.
  6. Set StartupFullscreen= to False to start the game in windowed mode.

Anisotropic filtering (AF)

Edit ini file[11]
  1. Launch the game at least once then close it.
  2. Open DT.ini.
  3. Change the line LevelOfAnisotropy=1 to any value desired (between 1 and 16).

Vertical sync (Vsync)

Edit ini file[12]
  1. Launch the game at least once then close it.
  2. Open DT.ini.
  3. Change the line UseVSync=False to UseVSync=True.

Input

Keyboard and mouse State Notes
Remapping
Mouse acceleration
Enabled by default. To disable it, see Mouse acceleration.
Mouse sensitivity
See Mouse sensitivity.
Mouse input in menus
Mouse Y-axis inversion
Enabled by default. To disable, set bInvertMouse= in User.ini to True.
Controller
Controller support
Set UseJoystick=True in DT.ini under [WinDrv.WindowsClient].
Full controller support
Controller remapping
Edit in User.ini.
Controller sensitivity
Edit in User.ini.
Controller Y-axis inversion
Edit in User.ini.
Controller types
XInput-compatible controllers
PlayStation controllers
Generic/other controllers
Additional information
Controller hotplugging
Haptic feedback
Digital movement supported
Simultaneous controller+KB/M

Mouse acceleration

Edit ini file[13]
  1. Launch the game at least once then close it.
  2. Open User.ini.
  3. Change the line MouseAccelThreshold= to 0.

Notes

[Engine.PlayerInput] entries are created upon inverting mouse y-axis or adjusting sensitivity.

Mouse sensitivity

[Engine.PlayerInput] entries are created upon inverting mouse y-axis or adjusting sensitivity in the game settings.
Set custom sensitivity in-game[14]
  1. While in game, open the console with ~.
  2. Enter setsensitivity x (for example setsensitivity 5).
Edit ini file[15]
  1. Open User.ini.
  2. Change the line MouseSensitivity= to the desired value.

Audio

Audio feature State Notes
Separate volume controls
Music, Effects.
Surround sound
Up to 7.0 output with DirectSound3D restoration software or OpenAL. See Surround sound.
Subtitles
Closed captions
Mute on focus lost
EAX support
EAX 3.
Royalty free audio

Surround sound

By default the game ouput to stereo on modern versions of Windows. This will force the game to use the system OpenAL device as ouput and restore surround sound.
Forcing the game to use system OpenAL device may lead to audio dropouts, missing and substituted audio samples.
Restore surround sound[16]
  1. Launch the game at least once then close it.
  2. Open DT.ini.
  3. Set Use3DSound=True and UseDefaultDriver=False, and save.

Localizations

Language UI Audio Sub Notes
English

Issues fixed

Game's Vsync doesn't work on Windows 8/8.1/10/11

Install dgVoodoo2.
Use crosire's d3d8to9 wrapper
  1. Download d3d8.dll from here.
  2. Place it in <path-to-game>\System.

Poor performance on Windows 8/8.1/10/11

Install dgVoodoo2.
Use crosire's d3d8to9 wrapper[17]
  1. Download d3d8.dll from here.
  2. Place it in <path-to-game>\System\.

Run the game at screen refresh rate

Maximum selectable refresh rate is 60 Hz. This does not limit FPS, but may set your monitor's refresh rate to 100 Hz, which may result in screen tearing on a 120 Hz or 144 Hz monitor.
Set fullscreen refresh rate[18]
  1. Launch the game at least once then close it.
  2. Open DT.ini.
  3. Find the line DesiredRefreshRate=60.
  4. Change the value to set your monitor's refresh rate. For example, 120 or 144.

Notes

Modifying any video options will undo the custom refresh rate.

Other information

API

Technical specs Supported Notes
Direct3D 8
Executable 32-bit 64-bit Notes
Windows

System requirements

Windows
Minimum Recommended
Operating system (OS) 98
Processor (CPU) Intel Pentium III 750 MHz
System memory (RAM) 128 MB
Hard disk drive (HDD)
Video card (GPU) 32 MB of VRAM
DirectX 8 compatible


Notes

  1. This version of StarForce DRM does not work on Windows Vista or later.[1][2][3][4] For supported versions of Windows the StarForce driver may need to be updated manually using SFUPDATE.
  2. When running this game without elevated privileges (Run as administrator option), write operations against a location below %PROGRAMFILES%, %PROGRAMDATA%, or %WINDIR% might be redirected to %LOCALAPPDATA%\VirtualStore on Windows Vista and later (more details).
  3. 3.0 3.1 File/folder structure within this directory reflects the path(s) listed for Windows and/or Steam game data (use Wine regedit to access Windows registry paths). Games with Steam Cloud support may store data in ~/.steam/steam/userdata/<user-id>/283330/ in addition to or instead of this directory. The app ID (283330) may differ in some cases. Treat backslashes as forward slashes. See the glossary page for details.

References

  1. Windows Vista support - StarForce Support
  2. Windows 7 support - StarForce Support
  3. Windows 8.1 support - StarForce Support
  4. Windows 10 support - StarForce Support
  5. Verified by User:AlphaYellow on 2023-07-24
  6. Verified by User:AlphaYellow on 2023-06-07
  7. Verified by User:AlphaYellow on 2023-07-15
  8. Verified by User:AlphaYellow on 2023-07-24
  9. Verified by User:AlphaYellow on 2023-06-07
  10. Verified by User:AlphaYellow on 2023-06-07
  11. Verified by User:AlphaYellow on 2023-06-07
  12. Verified by User:AlphaYellow on 2023-06-07
  13. Verified by User:AlphaYellow on 2023-07-24
  14. Verified by User:AlphaYellow on 2023-07-24
  15. Verified by User:AlphaYellow on 2023-07-24
  16. Verified by User:AlphaYellow on 2023-06-07
  17. Verified by User:AlphaYellow on 2023-06-07
  18. Verified by User:AlphaYellow on 2023-06-07