Hi guys, I have a problem with Freespace. I downloaded and installed it today, and it boots up and runs just fine, for about five minutes. Then the whole screen begins to jitter, in horizontal stripes. If I click something or open a menu it stops for a split second, and then begins again. After about ten seconds of this, the computer hangs and requires a force restart unless I quickly CTRL-ALT-DEL out of Freespace and end program.

I have all the newest drivers and got the June '10 directx package from the general games help link. Any ideas what's going wrong? This is really frustrating for me; the game looks like a lot of fun.

I haven't played GOG FS1 yet. Try running in XP SP3 compatibility mode and disabling composite desktop effects. Is there an option to run in window?

Or, if you plan on playing FS2 afterward, you might just purchase it now so you can use the much improved Freespace Open engine. There is a mod that allows playing the FS1 campaign inside the Freespace Open engine (it's named FSPort).

I do own FS2 as well; I just wanted to play them in order.

Is it a stable mod? I already run XP SP3, by the way. Behind the times, me.

'told ya ! :-)
I just hope you won't encounter the game breaking bug in the last mission, it would break the sense of achievement a bit.

Now that you have FSOpen installed, it would probably be a good idea to play Silent Threat Reborn after FSPort and before FS2, so you play all canon campaigns chronologically. STR is basically a remake of the original FS1 extension (Silent Threat) by the same team that created FSPort. However, where FSPort is totally faithful to the original campaign, Silent Threat Reborn takes much more liberties, and that's a good thing since the general consensus is that the original Silent Threat sucks (it was rushed to the game shelves far too soon). After installing FSPort, you probably noticed the Silent Threat campaign in the campaign room : this is the original Silent Threat, just a bit modified so it uses the improved FSPort assets. The real Silent Threat Reborn, however, is a separate download.

Now have fun ! The Freespace series has been my favorite game series for more than 10 years now, and you're about to discover why ;-)

I got ST:R off the site as well. Just figuring out all the extra downloads (voices, movies, etc) I need to get everything to work, but it's very stable so far. Seems I don't actually need to have FS1 installed, though.

Just to clarify, ST:R is to be put in a separate mod folder? Will it still be able to access the hi-res FSPort models, or do I have to put it in the folder with FSPort itself?

Yes, you don't actually need FS1 to install FSPort. From a legal/ethical point of view, though, I think it's better to own it, since FSPort is based on game data extracted from FS1.

As for ST:R, I actually installed it quite long ago using Turey's automated installer (see here). It seems a bit outdated though (at least, its wiki page is, since it indicates a 3.6.10 build, whereas the latest version of FSO is 3.6.12).

I don't have my install with me right now, so I can't check, but I'm pretty sure ST:R is supposed to be installed in its own folder inside the main FSO directory. You'll need FSPort installed too. Then, in the launcher, select the mod Silent Threat Reborn, and it will automatically grab some data from the FSPort directory and, if you have them installed and activated, the mediaVPs directory. To do so, the mod uses the file mod.ini in the mod directory, which tells him where to search for data. It seems that ST:R (and probably FSPort too) is designed to use the 3.6.10 mediaVPs, which should be located in the mediavp directory. If you want to use the newer and improved 3.6.12 mediaVPs, which should be installed in a dedicated directory (mediavp_3612) you can alter FSPort and/or STR mod.ini files to replace mediavp by mediavp_3612. You can find an example at the end of this thread : on HLP.

This is a bit complicated so the bottom line is : STR should be installed in its own mod directory, and you will need FSPort installed as well. Everything should run fine just like that. But if you want improved graphics without too much hassle, install the 3.6.10 mediaVPs as well, in a directory named mediavp, and that's it, no manual file editing required. If you want even better effects, install the 3.6.12 mediaVPs in a directory named mediavp_3612 and edit the mod.ini files of the mods you want to play with those newest mediaVPs.

I've done that and it all works beautifully.

And now I can uninstall FS1 in the name of freeing up some space.

Thanks, man.