The Mercury Game FAQ

Simple enough- A list of games I have tested on my Mercury system, what works and what does not and some work arounds. Please note that this list will apply pretty much to anyone running an Obsidian 2 device under NT4 so it's not as useless as you think ;-)

Please note that getting Mercury to run games isn't the biggest hurdle but NT4!  NT4 is protective of the hardware so some DOS games that access hardware direct are out. Any programs that use DirectX as the main rendering API are out as well as there is no Direct X rendering under NT. Other Direct X issues include programs that use direct sound as NT only supports Direct X 3. 

Exploring a dual boot option with 2000Pro since Mercury does run with W2k and the OS supports DX8 or 9 doesn't look good. Only one beta driver was written by 3dfx for VII and 2000 enabling Direct3D rendering but it had very limited function. Unless I can get Mercury to work under Win9x there will be no DirectX titles for this party (which frankly I'm not too worried about, after all I do have a V5-6000 to play with for DirectX titles ;-).

That leaves OpenGL and Glide titles most of which play nice under NT with a few exceptions. Please note these are just the titles I have tested so far and by no means a complete list.

P.S. Remember Mercury runs 4 x Anti-Aliasing automatically and for the most part maximum resolution is limited to 1024 x 768.

Descent

There is a third party patch that was released for the first "DOS" version of Descent, not only does it add 3dfx acceleration but direct sound too! It works sweet under Mercury and runs at 800 x 600 to boot (with 4 x anti-aliasing of course) 

Install the game, skip the sound setup, apply the 3dfx patch and launch the new 3dfx exe file.

Descent II

Destination Quartzon 3D would not function under NT4, a DOS application. The full version installed but the upgrade patch from version 1.0 to 1.2 won't run under NT! You have to install the game on a Win9x box and them apply the Win95 patch then transfer the game back over to NT. This will get you direct sound and software rendering but the game will not utilize any glide rendering under NT. I have tried the two glide patches floating around and the one OpenGL with no good results to report.

Descent 3

Installs but detects no glide or opengl rendering device. Install on Win98 machine and imported Voodoo setting over via exported registry file.  Game launches now but "glide not detected error" message pops up when 3D rendering is started. I even tried relocating the glide files in different directories, still no Voodoo rendering present. I'm going to try a few other things before throwing in the towel...

Deus Ex

Works perfect right off the V.1002F CD even though the game states Direct X 7a is required!

Half-Life

Install, run, go to options, choose OpenGL rendering, play!

Half-Life: Opposing Force

Install and play, no problems.

Heretic II

No issues at all, runs fine, another Quake/Quake II based game.

Hexen II

Quake based game installs and runs with no *graphics* problems. Only problem noted was player spins around like crazy after loading the game! Making a shortcut to the GL executable and adding the "-nojoy" option to the command line fixes the problem. There might be a patch for this, I have not looked into it since disabling the game looking for the joystick at the command line fixes the issue.

Jedi Knight II Dark Forces

Installs and then laughs at you when you try to run, official FAQ states it uses a Direct X rendering engine.

Jedi Knight II Jedi Outcast

Won't install since it detects NT4 *but* will run since it's based on the OpenGL Quake3 engine! What I did to get this game running on Mercury...

1) Install game on another computer with Win98SE then applied no-CD patch.

2) Copy over network connection to Mercury.

3) Download the last set of 3dfx V2 reference drivers (3.02.02) and look for the file "3dfxVGL.dll." Rename the file "opengl32.dll" and drop it into the Jedi Knight game data directory (same directory as your jk2sp.exe is located)

Download the opengl32 file here.

4) Launch the game.

Max Payne

Direct 3D rendering engine, no good on NT.

Need for Speed II

Installer crashes, will try installing on Win98 machine and transfer over.

Quake

DOS Quake will NOT run under NT4 but WinQuake does no problem. 

Install Quake from the CD, download and install Winquake (if you wish to play in software under NT), download and install the GLQuake patch for OpenGL acceleration and then download and install the 3dfx version 1.49 OpenGL minidriver. This will place a 3dfx "opengl32.dll" file in the Quake directory and you will be playing in no time flat.

Quake II

Works perfect right off the CD. I installed mine, downloaded the last patch 3.20 and was off and running.

Quake III (all versions)

Quake III requires a 3dfx opengl driver to run. I have tried a few different versions of the Wicked3D driver but all seem to crash with an error message and the 3dfx minidriver for Win9x doesn't seem to work either!! 

Lucky for us I have found a solution!

Download the last set of 3dfx V2 reference drivers (3.02.02) and look for the file "3dfxVGL.dll." Rename the file "opengl32.dll" and drop it into the same directory as your Quake3.exe. Launch Quake3.exe and you will be playing in style.

Or download the opengl32 file here.

This has been tested on the Q3 Motion Blur demo, Quake3 demo and the full patched version with no problems under NT4.

Return to Castle Wolfenstein

Supports NT4 right out of the box! But needs a little work....

Install off the CD, reboot, go to the game directory and delete any "opengl" in the "gl" folder. Install opengl32.dll in the same directory as the single-player and multi-player exe files and run the game.  

Sin

Another id software Quake based game, installed but fails to run with "unable to find quartz.dll" error. Investigating the MS driver it turns out Sin requires it as something to do with Microsofts Direct Show. So I copied the two direct show quartz files from my Win98SE system directory and dropped them into the WINNT/system folder and Sin fired right up and I played a few levels.

Soldier of Fortune

Installed off CD, slipped the opengl32 file from last set of 3dfx V2 reference drivers (3.02.02) into the same directory as the sof.exe and we were up and playing like butter.

Download the opengl32 file here.

System Shock 2 

Won't install, installed on Win98 machine, transferred over, crashes with DirectX error.

Thief the Dark Project

Same rendering engine as System Shock 2 and game FAQ indicates Direct X rendering.

Tour of Duty

Won't install off the CD due to NT being detected, will install on another machine and transfer over. It's a Quake3 engine game so there is a chance it will run, but after transfer over doesn't look good. The game looks for something related to DirectX and won't launch.

Unreal Tournament 2003

Based on Direct X8 rendering engine, no function on NT4. The demo is suppose to have some OpenGL rendering options, when I get the chance I'll download it and give it a try.