Download Link:
-game-patch-hexedited - Some of these are listed in this document, but there are more files than descriptions.
-game-patch-nocd - These files are primarily to replace the exe in the stock game.

[ GOTO THE MAIN EAWHS PAGE ]

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION
Some EXE's Available | Some Guidance

1.26ec4 (SAW) | 1.26e (7217 Fix) | 1.26e
 
1.2c4vo | 1.1pc4vo

1.2b (LargeFont) | 1.2ac | 1.2a | 1.2.1 (FontChoices)

NoCD INSTRUCTIONS

There are many unofficial hex edited exe versions for EAW. They where made and used primarily for the sake of pro longing the life of the game. Many of them had different approaches to provide solutions to the problems found with the game. Some of those solutions where made different than others. However, today (2015) you will find that you will not need most if any of these hex edited exe's anymore. They are provided here for testing and completeness of what was once used. (Note the MPS EAW source code was obtained by the eaw community in 2005.)

The official MPS versions are v1.0(the CD), v1.1 the first patch and v1.2 the second patch. Both v1.1 and v1.2 have been used separately for a long time. Each of the two official MPS patched versions have advantages and disadvantages. See my Microprose Patches Help Document for more information, with a list of fixes and updates that each patch provides).

Try out one of several unofficial Hex Edited executables. Listed below are just some of the more recent ones.

Some EXE's Available:
The following exe's can be added to the stock game. Remember you probably should have a clean and full install before applying any of these upgrades (where noted), especially if you use the NoCD fixed exe (typically this is included with all hex edits).

• Jaeger's v1.2.1(FontChoices) With readable HUD font update used during higher screen resolutions.
• DaveS's Famous v1.2a enhancement and NoCD replacement exe
• King Rat's v1.2b(FontHUD) enhancement and with HUD font updates used during higher screen resolutions.
• Andy's v1.2c4vo enhancement and Cockpit fixes.
• Sydbods's v1.26e hex edited replacement exe and files (installs over a v1.0 EAW CD install)
• Pod's v1.26ec4(SAW) hex edited replacement exe
• VonBeerhofen's FXEXE Special Effects and enhancement. See the FXEXE Patches Help Document for more updated information about this last one. This one has several fixes and improvements.

Some Guidance:
Overwhelmed by all the different hex edited exe's available? I have some suggestions below for you to read. All these exe's listed should include a NoCD option, check the readme's to make sure and read how to set them up. Also make sure you have a backup of your games original eaw.exe and eaw.ini files before applying any of these new archives.

If you have a hard time reading the HUD Fonts at higher resolutions, try the following:

• If you installed the official 'v1.2 MPS patch' and just want to play the stock game at higher high resolutions but your having a hard time reading the in game HUD, you may want to try version v1.2.1(FontChoices) out. It has several larger readable fonts for the HUD to choose from.
• If your using the unofficial 'v1.2a enhancement' and are playing in the higher high resolutions where its hard to read the in game HUD, you may want to try version 1.2b out. It contains all the enhancements that are in v1.2a plus larger readable fonts for the HUD.

If your vision is good and you can read the HUD just fine, try the following:

• Another option is if you install the official v1.2 MPS patch, then apply the '1.2c4vo version'. It contains all the official fixes plus many other changes including a garbled cockpit fix.

If you interested in a v1.2 exe with some fixes and changes included to run on more modern Windows with a little less set of problems, try the following:

• Try out the v1.26e self installing unofficial patch. It is equal to the official v1.2 patch, however it has a few Windows NT fixes. These fixes are not important if using a Wrapper Program.

Hex Edit Released (May-30-2007)
by Sydbod, Andy and SAW fix by Pobs

This is primarily for use with the SAW add-on campaign/theater, to give it some adjustments that where needed for the planes and game. (I'm not 100% sure but I think it can be used without the SAW add-on).

INSTALLATION:
1) Install EAW 1.0 CD as usual,
2) patch it to the unofficial v1.26e. (see the section below on v1.26e)
3) Unzip this SAW 1.26e zip file and put the new exe in your EAW directory.
4) Delete your old exe and rename the new one to eaw.exe.
5) Run this new exe.

Changes for the "C4 version SAW" (these are in addition to the orginal 1.26 changes)

• tmod table for SAW; Spanish Air War tmods have adjusted hitbubble for TMods(22,40 and 42)
• SAW area( convoy placement and length)
• the groundobject damagemodel. (This new exe doesn't always fit to the default EAW Worlds, cause other groundobjects are used in SAW.)
• Andy's garbled cockpit fix; based on Von Beerhofen's work hex editing the EAW.EXE.
• forces the game to only use hires terrain tiles and textures thus saving space in memory.
  (Not all cards take advantage of this, but most do!)
• contains Knegel's cannon fix and Dom's early years fix...
• a no-CD fix.
• the german AI now always uses their cannons
• some ground targets are made tougher to destroy, especially trucks, tanks and small buildings.
• the viewing distances of some ground targets are slightly increased.
   

NOTES:

For SAW users:
... the default exe in the SAW set up is a modded 1.2, BUT in the 'exe versions' folder there is a 1.26ec4 modded exe if you have installed to a 1.26e base set-up... that should include all of the original 1.26E fixes ... but it wont work in a base-1.2 set up as it needs several other files from the 1.26e patch for the exe to work ... so if you have XP and the ini Target keys keep resetting to default problem then install SAW into a basic 1.26e patched eaw folder.. and then copy the SAW 1.26 exe over from the 'exe versions' folder...
 

Other:

Regarding the tougher ground objects: All these can still be destroyed by gun-fire but you will need much more hits now.

...it does not turn off the garbled cockpits completely. It just offers more texture memory to the game. So you can use more high resolution objects before the garbled cockpits (re)appear.

...edits to the tmod table are made inside the exe, the MPS programmers forgot to take the tmod table out before releasing the game...

...Dont ask me what the radius of a hitbubble is good for, but setting the height to "1" make me able to fly in 1m above the ground without crashing. The radius is always set to the highest of the three other values, somehow the four values seems to go hand in hand...

...regarding the 4 values for the hit bubble; the radius is always the largest value of all but I had some very strange struggles to get long thin ship hit bubbles for the ships in SAW and in the end stuck with the existing hit bubble in the centre of the ship... I haven't quite worked out how the 4 values interact yet...

This is an alternative solution for v1.26e running under WinXP and video cards that get the 7217 error is to use this fix / workaround combo.

To Install Fix:

1) Install the Full v1.0 game installation.
2) Install Sydbod's 1.26e patch as directed. (See the install directions under the v1.26e in this help document).
3) Follow the directions in this new 7217 fixed patch file.
(copy all of the files contained in the folder named E-12E7217V3  into your main EAW directory).

Changes:

• The 7217 fix (just three bytes modified in graphics routines) tricks the eaw.exe into thinking it is reading 16 bit screens. It actually is reading 8 bit screens, as a result, this will completely screw up the graphics when the selection screens are displayed. New updated screens are included to correct this.
  
• and the name "Europe1.pic" was changed to "Europe2.pic" to allow home base/target selections in Mission Parameters, but to still display the map when you are flying.
  
• These modifications made to Sydbods EAW.EXE only changes the display handling routines for the menu screens and as such the game engine also remains 100% compatible with the standard 1.2 game.

NOTES:

....There is also a separate download that works around the 7217 problem with Jellys Visual Basic program JIM (JIMMSNFL), were it does all the screen handling outside of the game: The map (and other) selections are made and saved in a *.msn file then launches the game directly into the 3D flying mode. It is designed for single missions, but although the career map is garbled that screen is not used for selection, and is much less of a problem. The online mode requires the original 8Bit DirectDraw mode to be working to enable people to join to each other. "Jim" can not overcome this particular difficulty...

....There are many areas in the code that reference the 8/16 bit mode parameter. Only 2 of them are used for setting the screen mode. The others are used to tell routines what mode the screen is in for positioning calculations for mouse pointer, hotspot locating for mouse clicks etc. If you change some of these others it can cause a CTD but in most cases it does not hurt at all. The reason for 2 entries for setting up the screen mode is because of the many rehashes of the code by various programmers.
There is on 8/16 location very early in the code that will set up this mode when the game starts. The second important 8/16 location is the one the switches the 2D screen back to 8/16 mode after exiting the 3D flying mode. As you can see it now becomes very easy to test each of the 8/16 locations within the EAW.EXE file by changing on at a time and seeing which one enables 16 bit at startup of the game and what other one enables 16 bit when leaving the 3D flying....
What I did was to compile two exes with those two changes that you tried, on exe with the 8 and the other with the 16. I found where the compiled exes differed, and read the bytes preceding the "8". Then I looked for the same byte patterns in the 1.2 exe. That's how I was able to locate the two spots...narrowed down to 2 and added a few more screens...Sydbod's 1.26E exe, is modified in the same way...(E-12E7217V3.zip)

....flew online....I was using E-12E7217V3 on my W98 PC with the usual half screens. I was able to read the various multiplayer screens, and make the appropriate selections, and join the game....This new 7217 patched v1.26e exe was fully compatible with the normal 1.26E made by Sydbod. Any modifications that Jelly has made to the EAW.EXE only modifies the screen handling routines for the menu screens and as such the game engine also remains 100% compatible with the standard 1.2 game.


....unzipped E-12E7217V3 to my....folder....EAW will now start without 7217 error. Selection menu screens are very difficult to read....fonts are very small but will manage (better that the alternative).

If no items appear on a selection menu then right click with the mouse. (Fonts have been modified to make text visible.)

The EAW 1.26E patch is 100% game compatible with the old official EAW1.2 patch.
For those of you that may not realize this, the EAW1.26E patch is a complete replacement patch for the Official MPS EAWv1.2 patcher and it provides a number of extra bug fixes in a number of the files, not just the EXE file.

EAW 1.26E replaces the standard US English EAW v1.2 patch from MicroProse, and does the same thing--and more...The 1.26 E is just a Hex edit of the 1.2 EXE file (We did not have the source code at that time.) A lot of what was put into that EXE was based on previous work by many others that discovered how data was being handled by the EXE and all that I did was look for matching machine code that looked like it would do what was previously discovered. Then I just massaged those areas of the code to make the changes that I wanted. It fixes a list of errors, many of which cropped up with the advent of Windows XP. All previous add-on files are compatible, and works in the same way as 1.2 as far as installing add-ons. The "E" in 1.26E meant it was the English version, as Sydbod was going to make a G (German) language version, but it was decided a single English language should be used so everyone has the same game. So 1.26e was the only one released.


To Install:

1) Do a clean full install of EAW v1.0 from the CD, but do NOT run the game yet.
2) Install the EAW1.26E patch. (do NOT need to use the MPS 1.2 patch)
3) Now run the game and set up your joystick and game settings and fly a mission.
4) Your all setup and you have a v1.26e game now which include some extra fixes that are listed below.
EDIT: There is no problems if a person installs the 1.26e patch over the top of the 1.2 version of the game, they only have to be aware that they will have their EAW.INI file overwritten if they do this, meaning you loose all your settings.
5) For the No-CD function. (See the end of this help document for instructions).

Notes: At this point you are ready to install OAWunified if you like, you are not required to do so. OAW is the newest EAW game manager for switching campaigns, aircraft, terrain, joining online play, etc. and is suggested over the older managers available for that reason.
One issue: If you are going to use OAW, you should then realize each time that OAW is loaded it will re-apply whatever eaw.exe you have in the OAW backup folder, and replace the one you put in the games root folder. One solution so that the 1.26e exe stays as the games exe is to copy the 1.26E exe into your OAW folder, making it the back-up. The other is to have the 1.26 exe in an E folder in your OAW folder and load it as needed or when required. See the OAW instructions for more details.
 

EXE Changes:
"...the EXE file which has a heap of changes in it..."

• The High-altitude contrail smoke lengthened by 4X and doubled the time interval by 2X between generating new contrail sprites behind aircraft. (half contrails are produced not full contrails, that is why you will see a larger gap behind aircraft producing them...the Bomber contrails are shorter than the fighter contrails because the bombers are flying slower and the contrail length is basically a time function rather than a distance function...the assumption would be that there can be about 1,000 half standard contrails in total in the game...without a CTD because of not enough allocated memory.)
   
• The ground smoke from damaged objects and crashes has had its duration time greatly extended.
   
• The changes that are present in Andy's German AI now use cannons vs fighters mainly. *NOTE: DOES NOT HAVE KNEGELS AI VS BOMBER CANNON FIX 2 IN IT. *NOTE2: Nothing regarding the FM/DM's have been changed.
   
• EAW.INI Default changes: The entries for the following are now the default when the EAW 1.26e patch is used.
  Width=800
  Height=600
  Windows Joystick=1
  JoystickDeadZone=3
  Debug Path=.\
  (The new Joystick dead zone works best with a well calibrated joystick or modern digital one and makes the aircraft easier to adjust for small movements.)
   
• A noCD modification has been added to the EXE so not to have any sort of problems with a CD in the drive. (See the end of this help document for instructions).
  
• WinXP save Career Fix; I'm (MarkEAW) writing this (Jan 2024). There must be some Campaign/Career Mode save fix for NT machines, as the usual stock error for Career saves doesn't have an issue with this game exe. The fix may address other Campaign errors...
   
• Other changes are made to make EAW more realistic and easier to use...??
   

Other Fixes:
"...it provides a number of bug fixes in a number of the files, not just the exe..."

• A CD mitigation modification has been added to the EXE file for convenience of game play. This patch should now also allow the game to play under Win2000 in single player mode only (multiplayer problems under Win2000 still exist), by removing the OS version check that the executable file performs. Avoids the "eaw.exe is not a valid win32 application"   This patch is still compatible with EAW 1.2. *NOTE: THIS GAME EXE DOES NOT INCLUDE A 7217 FIX OR WORKAROUND.
   
• The errors as discovered by MrJelly in the 3D.CDF, producing garbled cockpits in some of the Spits have also been included. *NOTE: DOES NOT HAVE ANDYS GARBLED COCKPIT FIX IN IT. (There are LDRS (instruction sets to modified the exe) included with OAW which do these cockpit fixes. They can be run by OAW or a small program called VBHexy, and they will work on 1.26E as well.)
   
• A Rocket-Freeze graphical workaround has been implemented by modifying the smoke from the back of rockets.
   
• WinXP Control Rest Fix: Part of the eaw.ini entries would get get reset to default values in the standard game each time one would close the game down. Particularly the 'target' keys. This has been fixed for TARGET NEXT ENEMY =T, TARGET PREVIOUS ENEMY =SHIFT T, TARGET CLOSEST ENEMY =CTRL T, TARGET NEXT FRIENDLY =Y, TARGET PREVIOUS FRIENDLY =SHIFT Y, TARGET NEXT GROUND =E
  
• WinXP Text Fix; XP does not handle some of the text errors in the original "Text_eng.cdf" file well, the few corrupted characters in one of the internal text files is now corrected. (This should solve the corruption problem which causes certain lines of the .ini file to become mis-stated and results in the loss of joystick settings, programmed button assignments and keyboard assignments as well as repetition of these lines at the end of the eaw.ini file.), and the included replacement is considered to be essential for the Win2000/XP user. You should be-able too for an example, assign "target next enemy" (Default `T`) to a joystick button now.
  

v1.26e Patch Files List:

3D.CDF 		4,895,593 	11/22/2005 07:46
d3d.dll 	130,560 	11/22/2005 07:46
DATA.CDF 	1,433,420 	11/22/2005 07:48
eaw.exe 	1,430,016 	12/18/2005 12:40
eaw.ini 	84 		11/22/2005 07:49
EXTRA.SPT 	3,924 		11/22/2005 07:49
FLT.CDF 	39,540 		11/22/2005 07:49
FONTS.CDF 	1,067,664 	11/22/2005 07:51
grb_031.snd 	105,644 	11/22/2005 07:51
Menu_eng.cdf 	37,876 		11/22/2005 07:51
TEXT_ENG.CDF 	168,743 	11/22/2005 07:51
V1.1 Details.rtf 16,801 	11/22/2005 07:51
V1.2 Details.rtf 44,954 	11/22/2005 07:51
V1.26 Details.rtf 2,588 	12/18/2005 01:06

NOTES:

...There are many bugs in the standard v1.2 eaw.exe. Some of these went un-noticed until people started using XP, Whether XP related or not, a number of these bugs where simply fixed by changing values in the eaw.exe. So, where possible, Sydbod edited the standard v1.2 eaw.exe by inserting the correct values. All sorts of things were fixed, and the exe was made XP 'compatible'. There were errors in some of the "cdf" files also. So the corrected cdf files and the corrected eaw.exe were re-packaged as Sydbods 1.26e...

The EAW1.26E PATCH automatically removes any EAW.INI file that already exists and installs a new preconfigured version with certain updated entries. Things like 800x600 resolution, more sensitive joystick settings, No-CD configuration, etc. This was done so that a novice who knew nothing about the EAW.INI file could install the CD game, then install the 1.26E patch, and have a reasonably configured game straight from the start (rather than have it configured to settings that were appropriate years ago). The rest of us should be able by now to update any entries within the new dummy EAW.INI file to make IT (this dummy file) do what we want it to. The safe procedure is always to update/modify the new dummy EAW.INI file rather than just copy across another premade EAW.INI file, unless you know what you are doing.

...I have mentioned it on a few occasions and in a number of posts at the code group location, there is a package that I have put together that has everything in it for making new EAW patches. It has the full discrete files as well as all the documentation to enable any member to grab the EAW1.26e source package and upgrade it from this starting point to make a new package. Should you want to, please feel free to use it and release a new patch.
JUST PLEASE make sure you document the changes as I have and remake a new starting package, so that others have a new point to develop further from. Remember EAW1.26e patch belongs to the EAW community and not to any one particular member or members...on a serious note, all the files and programs are there. Provided you only want to edit the EXE file, it is virtually as easy as editing with a hex edit program the locations in the exe. Change the revision number on the game main screen. Change the color of the icon or a new icon of the same name. Update the readme files. Then run the packing program. Nothing to it...... it has been made so very easy for people to use, as I was not sure how much longer I would be around with this community. Regards Sydbod

Rocket Freeze...We are fairly certain it is a timing problem with the smoke from the rockets. (Knegel had suggested moving the "special effects" slider to "low". This did seem to fix the rocket freezing.) Some thing to be aware of is that the "Rocket_Freeze" problem manifests it self slightly differently, on different machines. Any small changes may just make the difference between a person having a problem and not having a problem. This is why the worst case testing was developed for this problem: All my tests are done under worst case conditions. The worst case condition is when only one sprite is set to be used in the smoke trail for the rockets. That is when location 85062 of the EAW.EXE file has a 00 (1 sprite) in it and not the 02 (3 sprites) as standard...Grab a HexEditor and modify location 85062 Hex in you EAW.EXE file to a "00" from its current "02" value. Now try launching rockets. You will find your machine locks up under every single launch...

...A smoke column requires much less memory than a contrail run. The only problem with the smoke is that the sprites making it up are actually 3 sprite elements each used at different parts of the column. The sprites are all bunched up together to give that billowing effect and therefore the video card has to process all of them at the one time while they are visible. This puts a much heavier load on the video card graphics processor and therefore causes a larger hit to the FPS of the game.

EAW1.26e doesn't include Andy's latest garbled cockpit fix (see v1.2c4): When 1.26e patch was being released, there was substantial discussion about what one of the garbled cockpit fix would be included if any. For the Glide cards, for the D3D cards, for the early TNT cards. They are not all the same, and one fix would work against the other fix, so it was not possible to include a universal garbled cockpit fix...... it would also require renaming of terrain textures under one of the implementations. If I remember correctly, the final decision was to let the garbled cockpit fix be activated by the OAW program or by a special setup program (still to be developed at the time) rather than include something that does not work for all video cards, and may itself cause even bigger problems for certain users.

...The second file that is changed is the EAW.EXE. It has a heap of changes in it, but if ever any one has suspicions that this EXE file is causing problems, then all that they have to do is replace it with a stock standard EAW.EXE ver 1.2 file , delete the EAW.INI file so that the now EAW1.2 version of the EXE recreates its own INI file, and all should be basically as a default 1.2 install....

Although I created that patch, I was standing on the shoulders (information) of some very bright other people to do what I did...There were a number of interesting people who contributed input to the 1.26e patch, from Knegel all the way to VBH ... and others, see the readme.

INSTALLATION:
1)Install EAW as usual,
2) patch it to V1.2.
3) Unzip this zip file and put the new exe in your EAW directory.
4) Delete your old exe and rename the new one to eaw.exe.
5) For the No-CD function. (See the end of this help document for instructions).
6) Run this new exe.

Note: MPS v1.2 exe is the base for this new exe, so it uses the 'dumbed' down A.I. routines built from it. You can have ground starts and the extrasquad setting that is supported in v1.2 executables.

Changes

• AI now often uses their cannons, that means cannon equipped planes are more deadly now (especially German AI). They use cannons during regular sweeps, unfortunately they still avoid to use them while intercepts versus strait flying Bombers.
   
• some standard ground objects have been improved to fit to Knegels new gun settings. They are harder to destroy now. Buildings and tanks can still be destroyed by gunfire but you need lots of ammo.
   
• some improvements on some ground object's hit-bubbles.
   
• you can use the No-CD-Option. That means these exes can be used without having the EAW CD in the CD-drive. (See the end of this help document for instructions).
   
• the garbled cockpit problem fix is included:
  Although it seems to work for many users I cannot guarantee it for everyone. Just try it and you will see. If EAW crashes you are unfortunately one of these unlucky guys. Sorry for that in advance.
  Note: This fix does not totally get rid of the garbled cockpits completely. It just offers more texture memory to the game, thus you can use more high resolution objects before the garbled cockpits (re)appear.
  This fix has two modes, it can be turned on and off. To turn it ON you have to set the terrain detail level in the configuration menu to MEDIUM. Don't worry, I changed the exe in a way that the terrain detail will NOT be affected by this switch (In fact the terrain detail is even higher than in 'High detail mode').
  That's why it may be necessary to switch the garbled cockpit fix OFF on low speed computers. To do so, choose
  HIGH terrain detail. The game should be running faster now, but you loose the fix.
  How it Works: All entries are BN, BN, BN, which was ColG's hack for the screwed cockpit issue. Andy came up with the deleted "S" TPC's, which also saved memory, and then Andy combined the two methods.
   
• vonOben's new ground objects and destructible trees are included.
   
• Does NOT have Paulo's changes he did with v1.1.
   
• The allied open truck now has AA capability.
   
• the viewing distances of some ground targets are slightly increased. This helps keep them from appearing or popping up in front of you, and do so farther away. I think this includes the Trees and City Buildings.

NOTES:

These exe files can be used with ANY EAW installation, except an add-on package that contains its own exe-files. So it can be used with any campaign or even with stock EAW. You can use any exe with Microprose's 1.2 update, including the 1.1 exe...

Thanks to Chris Coon (MPS EAW programmer) that more knowledge on the exe was provided by him and has led to these 'C' enhancements, When Von Beerhofen and I found out how to get rid of the 'garbled cockpits' I had to update these C-Versions again...

...official 1.2 was replaced by 1.2a, 1.2a was replaced by 1.2C, this was then updated to 1.2C4...

Paulo Morais released his modified version of the the V1.1 exe in the past. It was called V1.1P (for Paulo). It introduces a more realistic AI because the AI now also uses the complex flight model and can't make these impossible maneuvers anymore. The better AI has nothing to do with Paulo's work, its original MPS programming that Paulo switched the game to use at all times. Nevertheless it is still a V1.1 and does not have the extra squads setting in the eaw.ini or ground starts.

A new set of modified exes done by Andy where made later on. Some of the EAW community members had gotten some info on the exe from a MPS programmer and so he was able to make some more improvements. These improvements were done to all exe version known so far at that time. He simply added a 'C' to the version number (because 'A' and 'B' were already in use.) So V1.1P turned into V1.1PC (V1.1 with Paulo's and Andy's modifications)

Finally this last 4th release was made.

INSTALLATION:
1) Install EAW as usual,
2) patch it to V1.2. (A General Note: Once a game is officially patched up to v1.2 you can replace just the exe with a v1.1 exe for offline play if you prefer)
3) Unzip this zip file and put the new exe in your EAW directory.
4) Delete your old exe and rename the new one to eaw.exe.
5) For the No-CD function. (See the end of this help document for instructions).
6) Run this new exe.

Changes

• AI now often use their cannons, that means cannon equipped planes are more deadly now (especially German AI). They use cannons during regular sweeps, unfortunately they still avoid to use them while intercepts versus strait flying Bombers.
   
• some standard ground objects have been improved to fit to Knegels new gun settings. They are harder to destroy now. Buildings and tanks can still be destroyed by gunfire but you need lots of ammo.
   
• some improvements on some ground object's hit-bubbles.
   
• you can use the No-CD-Option. That means these exes can be used without having the EAW CD in the CD-drive. (See the end of this help document for instructions).
   
• the garbled cockpit problem fix is included:
  Although it seems to work for many users I cannot guarantee it for everyone. Just try it and you will see. If EAW crashes you are unfortunately one of these unlucky guys. Sorry for that in advance.
  Note: This fix does not totally get rid of the garbled cockpits completely. It just offers more texture memory to the game, thus you can use more high resolution objects before the garbled cockpits (re)appear.
  This fix has two modes, it can be turned on and off. To turn it ON you have to set the terrain detail level in the configuration menu to MEDIUM. Don't worry, I changed the exe in a way that the terrain detail will NOT be affected by this switch (In fact the terrain detail is even higher than in 'High detail mode').
  That's why it may be necessary to switch the garbled cockpit fix OFF on low speed computers. To do so, choose
  HIGH terrain detail. The game should be running faster now, but you loose the fix.
  How it Works: All entries are BN, BN, BN, which was ColG's hack for the screwed cockpit issue. Andy came up with the deleted "S" TPC's, which also saved memory, and then Andy combined the two methods.
   
• vonOben's new ground objects and destructible trees are included.
  
• The allied open truck now has AA capability.
   
• the viewing distances of some ground targets are slightly increased. This helps keep them from appearing or popping up in front of you, and do so farther away. I think this includes the Trees and City Buildings.

Paulo's changes (eaw11mod.zip) from Jan 17 2003 release are:

• The complex flight model previously an exclusive to users in offline mode is now enforced in every case. The AI pilots offline and all human and AI pilots online share this same advanced flight model now. The AI use the complex flight model all the time therefore it can't make impossible maneuvers anymore. Dogfights become more realistic with this version but you don't have the extra squad option. Further more the AI is more accurate at aiming and thus more challenging.
  
• 30mm cannon damage can be set to 36 (decimal) in the FLT data files instead of original 24 without strange side effects with onscreen strings. This requires modified FLT files to behave properly.
  
• Quick missions set to dusk produce night missions instead. The internal data table for this purpose was adjusted for one hour later.
  
• A quick hack was made to allow for a somewhat random number of additional fellow pilots (but not commandable) in Instant Mission (the one directly accessible from the main EAW menu, pitching you and your wingman against endless waves of enemies).

NOTES:

These exe files can be used with ANY EAW installation, except an add-on package that contains its own exe-files. So it can be used with any campaign or even with stock EAW. You can use any exe with MicroProse's 1.2 update, including the 1.1 exe...

Paulo Morais 1.1P exe forces the use of the complex flight model for everything and everyone. It was done by changing the address of the the calls to the simple flight models (yes there are two of them) to point to the complex one. Fortunately this set of calls are located in the same place inside the code and share all the other calculations. Paulo pointed out that the reason for the simple flight model in the first place is to save computer power. Now that he has modded 1.1 to use the complex model for all occasions, it will require more processor power and probably more bandwidth online. You may have to increase the intervals in the update rates in the .ini file to compensate...perhaps on modem connections only...ISDN/Cable connections may perform better...

Paulo made these changes to v1.1 instead of more recent v1.2 because it behaves much better in many aspects IMHO. The AI performs better, more aggressive but in a balanced way. The damage model was modified beyond recognition in v1.2, returning to an airbase with 4 plus kills is satisfying but hardly realistic. The flights dynamics also got changed for the worse in v1.2. The only thing that is lost in v1.1 is the 'extra squads' option. Try the 'old AI' and see for yourself if you need the extra opposition.

A set of optional work in progress modified data files where made (eaw11dat.zip) to better support some of the changes in Paulo's v1.1P patch. This set of data includes tiny little bits that Paulo have found to improve things without any FM mods. The provided data it is not meant to be a new FM of any sort. It is only the one Paulo was currently using with the modified v1.1P executable. (eaw11mod.zip) This is just part of a work in progress, with a far from finished status. Due to real world commitments it was placed on hold since the beginning of last year(2002). I don't know when I will be able to proceed again.
So you get:
- Enlarged (a small bit) virtual movement of head inside cockpit
- Correction of AI Mosquito cruise speed
- Assorted corrections of flags: like style of fight, automatic leading edge slats, gear retraction direction
- resized, repositioned hit bubbles
- adjusted hit points.
- corrections to armament. If someone care to have a look will notice that guns muzzle velocity is still set to 80% of real world values. The reason is simple, EAW bullets don't suffer speed reduction from drag. 80% is more less a good value for bullet speed at effective guns range.

I(Knegel) also took notice that it seems like the Ju87 slot(I'am not sure about the other bomberslots right now)only use the simple AI FM, even if i use Paulos.exe-patch.
The problem (more like a feature) does not lie with the executable but with the data files. It was already discussed in the past, a good search in the archives may help you. The solution pass through changes to PLANES.DAT flags (a plane must be marked as ATTACK PLANE to be escortable) and another change is to MISNxx.DAT files. I urge you to have a look at Charles EAWNOTES.DOC. There is a section regarding this files. Each file (there are three, one for each campaign) is divided in three sections. First sets which plane and corresponding probability to be an escort/sweep; second section unescorted attack plane; third section escorted attack plane. By attack I mean bomber interdiction something with offensive payload.
I was referring to Charles' notes to look after file structure only. On what regards precise meaning of variables I am based on personal observation and confirmation by some Chris Conn notes someone sent me recently (Emil I think).
If you look at the data for 1940 you will notice that Ju87 is on attacker's section but not on bombers. That was a much discussed characteristic in the distant past of unpatched EAW to get turkey shoots in BoB campaign everytime it involved Ju87.
Also during 1944 campaign I(Paulo) used to get interceptions on bomb laden P47C escorted also by P47C. Something you can't get on Quick Missions unless you play with slots and create a duplicate.
These and other small observations from my initial modding time for 42TPE lead me(Paulo) to conclude that all the blame must be put on MISNxx.DAT files.
To force a good test situation is enough to set only one option available with 100% probability for each one of the sections. For example taking the 1940 file remove the entries for the Spitfire and the 109E in the first section; remove the He111, Ju88 and Ju87 but leave the unused Hurricane to avoid 'problems'; Remove the He111 and Ju88, introduce the 110C just for fun . I hope this works. It used to work...
Good news. It seems you are right (thank good ). I(Andy) had the Ju 87 in the second section in misn**.dat but not in the third. I changed this et viola I get escorts when flying the Stuka in campaign mode. Maybe these three sections should be labeled: (escort ???) fighters (unescorted) fighter bombers (escorted) bombers

Thanks to Chris Coon (MPS EAW programmer) that more knowledge on the exe was provided by him and has led to these 'C' enhancements, When Von Beerhofen and I(Andy) found out how to get rid of the 'garbled cockpits' I had to update these C-Versions again...

...official 1.1 was replaced by 1.1P, 1.1P was replaced by 1.1PC, this was updated to 1.1PC4...

In general I recommend to use V1.1PC for most realism (especially together with Knegel's Realism Patch). AI is deadly then...

I have managed to crack the HUD text positions to permit larger characters.

INSTALLATION:
1) Install EAW as usual,
2) patch it to V1.2.
3) Unzip this zip file and put the new exe and the two font files in your EAW directory.
4) Delete your old exe and rename the new one to eaw.exe.
5) For NoCD,  (See the end of this help document for instructions).
6) Run this new exe.

The only changes beyond 1.2a are:
==========================

• files to increase the heads up display font size. This is useful for higher screen resolutions for which the default font gets very small. Higher than 800x600 preferred.
   
• HUD screen display text position data values
   
• and the font name used.
   
• Plus v1.2a changes included. (No code instructions have been changed, added or deleted.)
   
• bumped the version field so you will see it as 1.2b on the main screen. As in regular EAW, the revision characters will become blobs after running a mission. I don't know why that is.

NOTES:

 
Also available in a separate download are medium fonts sizes. A few others have a variety pack of fonts available for use with this exe. They just need to be named: LARGEHUD.FNT and LARGEHUD.FSP.

For real high resolutions, KR's fonts are really perfect. At 800x600 the Large HUD Fonts are a bit excessive. Also some computers will only display the fonts as little blocks instead of a formed font. You may need to use the v1.21 (Font choices) and pick a font that's best for your resolution.

INSTALLATION:
1) Install EAW as usual,
2) patch it to V1.2.
3) Unzip this zip file and put the new exe in your EAW directory.
4) Delete your old exe and rename the new one to eaw.exe.
5) For NoCD,  (See the end of this help document for instructions).
6) Run this new exe.

Changes

• The German AI now always uses their cannons (That's why V1.2A is obsolete now).
   
• some standard ground objects have been improved to fit to Knegels new gun settings. They are harder to destroy now. Trucks, Buildings and tanks can still be destroyed by gunfire but you need lots of ammo.
   
• the viewing distances of some ground targets are slightly increased
   
• Includes all v1.2a changes as well.
   
• Does NOT have the garbled cockpit problem fix.
   
• Does NOT have vonOben's new ground objects and destructible trees.
   
• Does NOT have Paulo's changes he did with v1.1.
   
• Does NOT have The allied open truck have AA capability.

INSTALLATION:
1) Install EAW as usual,
2) patch it to V1.2.
3) Unzip to your EAW game folder, The new version is named EAW12A.EXE.
4) Move and Backup your stock Official MPS eaw.exe.
5) Rename EAW12A.EXE to eaw.exe.
6) For the No-CD function. (See the end of this help document for instructions).
7) Then your ready to run it.
(To uninstall, simply delete the v1.2a eaw.exe and copy in an original stock v1.2 exe.)

THE CHANGES MADE:
1) AI is more aggressive and use cannons at farther range
2) Friendly and enemy flights start out closer to each other
3) Sound is more vivid with taper distances increased to realistic levels
4) Better chance of getting closer airports if you use the StartOnGround option in net play (I think).
5) Some minor intended (and not intended) small changes I can't remember, but they are for the better.
6) You can see the version number in the lower left of the main menu screen (1.2a).
7) Can be set so EAW no longer requires the CD (See the end of this help document for instructions).

Observations of undocumented features:
-Only within a certain range will the AI use cannons (unless they are out of MG ammo, of course)
-The wingmen AI are improved alot... Your squadron will attack the bomber formation in a more aggressive and organized way, (just like what you see the enemy does when you fly an escort mission)... In escort mission, you wingmen seem to stay tighter with the bomber formation, (unlike in stock v1.2, which they would all be hanging around)...In conclusion, it is a re-balancing of the friendly and the enemy AI.
-In 1.2a the accuracy of the tail gunners on bombers are very much reduced. In 1.2, your plane can be toasted in one attack run. They can shoot at you even when you dive away immediately. In 1.2a I have an experience of coming out of three successful runs unscratched!!! 5 B17s down in the process, and I am still ok!
-In 1.2a the AI attack longer on to the bombers in an escort mission.
-In 1.2a the flak is much stronger...much stronger than in 1.2.
-In 1.2a your Wingmen stall and spin. They fly more aggressive (especially in intercept-missions) and their planes appear to have the same limitations as the player-plane.
-The Wingman A.I. Responds to your commands more often than in stock v1.2.
-With 1.2a you can have extrasquads in the eaw.ini set above 5; setting it to 6-8 the forces will not be imbalanced, setting it more than 8 you start to get ghost planes.
-Testing the new Doppler and volume levels in 1.2a; (there's more space between the different sound-sources and you can hear the enemy guns when they were close and firing at you.) Fly a interdiction mission in a Tempest escorted by Mosquito's. During the flight from Belgium to Amsterdam, Engage the autopilot, pressed [Crtl F12] which is the "free camera" and place yourself on the ground looking up at the flight formations as they pass overhead at 2000ft and 4000ft. The sound should be rich, luscious, complete with a Doppler effect. It makes it just like really being there.
-the routines which dealt with the engine sounds where changed, the engine of other planes is much louder on far distance cause you can hear a enemy at 1200m.
-Flak sound much louder.
-I have noticed the extra use of cannons, particularly the Bf-109Fs and Fw-190As
-the AI pilots really do their best to evade
 

Drawbacks of using v1.2a:
-The Bf 110, Me-410 and JU-88 fighter spin very easily...Once a twin engine AI goes into a spin, and it happens with unnatural frequency, there's no provision for the AI to recover from a spin. So when the AI or your AI squadron mates spin, they've had it. Note: Remember that the stall changes where done with the exe and not the FM. (You may want to turn off the Spin setting, in game options when using v1.2a)
-Note on net play: You can only play against others with 1.2a. If they don't have it, use the standard
version 1.2 (there's no difference online if all you do is human-versus-human, anyway).
-In 1.2a there seems to be a bug that will sometimes place a couple of airfields on the wrong side of the frontline.
-You experience the 'Unable' bug, where your wingmen start saying "Unable" and/or "Unable to comply" over and over and over, and you can't get through to them on radio commands. Not sure what causes it but if you need to issue orders to your squad hit alt-p to pause the game, you can then use the radio commands and sometimes this will clear up the bug as well.
-The 1.2a exe gives a better Doppler effect, but it can also screw up your sound as well...experiment a bit before you find the engine and gun sounds that work right with the new volume levels in V1.2a...may produce sound, heard in a strange way on some machines...
-complaints about 1.2a making all the enemy planes come straight after you, every enemy plane in the sky sees only you as a target. It's common to have 4 or 5 enemies on your six.
-When blacking out starts to appear or if it is dusk there is a mismatch in the color of the horizon haze. About mid way down the horizon haze there is a sharp border, beneath it is a different tone of color.
-The AI don't conserve ammo and they shoot more from farther out as well
-in a career, your squadronmates will most likely be wiped out pretty quickly! They will not only fire up all their ammo quickly, but will often continue to attack even after running out of ammo, and eventually be shot down.
-the enemy AI also shoot too much, they waste all their ammo, and after a few minutes they run out of ammo, so you can chase them as turkeys
-complaints found that you cannot launch a multiplayer game with the 1.2a version without having enemy AI behind you on the runway and running into you at your base.
-your fighters start landing on enemy airfields because their fuel use is accelerated.
-it seems that v1.2a increases the distance where the engine noise is heard, with the side effect that overall engine noise has increased. It's pitch seems to vary as well, maybe also as a function of distance, but it seems to be random. Every 5th or 6th aircraft sounds like a mosquito ( a real one! ) and it's annoying to the point of distraction.
-AI is more aggressive in the 1.2a patch but their accuracy isn't great, unless three or more planes are on your tail.
-invisible or ghost aircraft with 1.2a - usually a supporting squadron that turns up late in the action. You look in chase view and there's nothing there but the HUD tells you its a Hurricane or whatever, switch to the F12 view and the camera will turn and watch as - nothing - sweeps past. Very odd. Sometimes these aircraft get shot at and you get smoke trails issuing from invisible engines, guns firing from invisible wings
-Non-English versions: 1.2a will have some parts in English and some parts in the correct language.  Everything still works, however.

NO CD INSTRUCTIONS:

(See the end of this help document for instructions).


 

EAW NOTES:

...I'd think carrier landings are do-able without code changes, by changing the airports which seem to lay on top of terrain separately. I didn't look at any of the terrain stuff so somebody else might know more.

...As far as I could tell, the friendly and enemy AI all goes through the same function. But there are numerous bit checks I never fully figured out that probably have to do with the types of aircraft involved or who knows what. But most of the logic checked distance from one to the next, so by messing with the thresholds (and testing and readjusting ad nauseum) they now use further out (by about 3x) the logic that 1.2 used to only use up close.

...increased AI aggressiveness by about 25% by adding more back stick in the turns and damping the oscillations when they try to line up after a turn

...I've so far improved AI aggressiveness about 50 percent by boosting their throttle settings in combat, using more Y stick in the turns and damping the oscillations when they line up for their target.

...The AI logic uses the distances between aircraft a lot, so once I found where the distances were stored I could trace back to all of the other functions that used them including the aircraft placement. I just modified the constants that it compared the distances to until the AI went in for the kill more than turning away.

The main changes are just to hardcoded constants in the AI logic...The logic itself isn't changed, just the thresholds. So, I don't think it makes it smarter (or dumber), just more aggressive."

The eaw.exe calculates the distance between planes. If two planes are less than X distance apart, then the AI will engage; if the distance is greater than X, then the AI will not. If the distance is less than Y, then the AI will ONLY use machine guns; if the distance is less than Y, the AI will use cannons too (cannon vs. mg use, of course, only applies to aircraft that have BOTH cannons and machine guns)...

...For the CD I just searched for all calls to kernel32's GetDriveType and changed the comparisons from 0x05 to 0x03 (there were two that I found).

...I've gotten 500+ aircraft at once (about all a PII-450 can handle)...the maximum number of aircraft in apparently just four places (16 bit integers, can anyone say 65,536 aircraft??!!)

...I've also gotten ExtraSquads up to 15, though much above 6 or 7 (about 200 vs 200) makes a PII-450 crawl, you get ghost planes aswell, and above 10 some of them start attacking their own side.

This 'version' was most likely really a source code modification.
DaveS came and went into the EAW community very quickly, leaving us with EAW 1.2a which was the result of a lot of hard work on his part, but he must have had the source code to do it...

1.2a not a 1.2 version at all? This EXE was modified in such a way that it must have been recompiled from the original source code or a compiled version, because it is impossible to hexedit the EXE to produce such a result. It really makes me wonder how this was done, not one single byte is in it's original location, so offsets must have been used for all pointers and jumps within the EXE. The size of the file is entirely different then the original 1.2 version and seems to lie between the 1.1 and 1.2 version. If we can find how parts were removed/modified we may be able to add more, terrain tiles, sprites, objects, planes in fact more of anything we've been wishing for over the years. If the program was written with indirect jumps and pointers, that would mean we could break up the program at any proper location, add things and safe the modified version but it seems very unlikely that this is how it was done.
Food for thought though. This guy must have been way ahead of us is my opinion and this EXE may well be considered to be part of the next modded EXE if proven successful. -VonBeerhofen

DaveS 1.2a's features cannot simply be copied into other exe versions like Andy did it with the 'C-versions'. 1.2a is a completely cracked/hacked exe, that is completely different from all others. The changes cannot simply be tracked down with an hex-editor. So it is unfortunately impossible to take features from it and add them to other exe versions. Also it is impossible to switch some of the 1.2a's features (or bugs) off. Only Dave S could do that and only Dave S knows how he achieved the new AI behavior. -Andy

The reason for this fix is to provide a larger font size for those using higher resolutions during game play or for those of us who have a hard time seeing the stock EAW font while "in-game". The higher the resolution, the smaller the "stock" EAW font becomes, making it difficult to see the course, heading, speed, altitude and so forth.

This exe is based on the official v1.2 version. No code or instructions have been changed, added or deleted.

INSTALLATION:
1) Have a full installation as usual,
2) patch it to V1.2.
3) Take this eaw.exe from this zip and put it into your game folder. Choose yes to replace.
4) Open one of the FONTS VER *** folders and copy a set of files named LARGEHUD.FNT and LARGEHUD.FSP and place them into your EAW game folder.
5) For NoCD,  (See the end of this help document for instructions).
6) Run this new exe.
 

The only changes beyond 1.2 are:
==========================

• files to increase the heads up display font size. This is useful for higher screen resolutions for which the default font gets very small. (Includes King Rat's font and three additional fonts are what I came up with that are different in size and font style.)
   
• and the font name used.
   
• the HUD text position data
   
• and a No-CD function. (See the end of this help document for instructions).

If you want the NoCD option because you want faster load times and better performance, like no typical CD spin up delay interruptions when music and video plays or you no longer have a CD-ROM device and want a portable version of the game, you can use the following instructions. There are a number of NoCD game.exe patched for all the official MPS eaw.exe's available, for download. (Note: Most if not all of the above listed replacement hexedited exe's include a NoCD Fix).

(The following steps won't break anything).

• A) All these hexed patches require you to do a 'full installation' of the game from the CD, so make sure you have a Full Installation of EAW installed on your Hard Drive and patched to whatever version you want to play. (Note: If your using multiable game exe's in the games main folder at the same time, but with different filenames, remember to always have one game exe , preferably from the version your using, to be in placed with a filename, eaw.exe in the games main folder. Example; eaw.exe , eaw12a.exe , eaw12x.exe , etc).
  
• B) Replace the existing eaw.exe with the custom NoCD Fixed exe matching the version of EAW you are running. (There are a few a special CD check remover programs available for EAW, but they are made for DOS. You won't need them anyway).
  

• C) Then the appropriate entries shown below must be added to your eaw.ini file to make the game run without a CD in the drive. Open up your EAW.INI in your EAW game folder. Under the section [Miscellaneous] there should be a setting for "Debug Path=" (if not, type it in). Set this to Debug Path=.\ and save it. It should look like this:
  
  [Miscellaneous]
  Debug Flags=0
  Debug Path=.\

• D) Run EAW without the CD in the drive. If you get an error like "Can't find Movies.cdf", (you need to have a full installation) copy the missing file off your EAW CD into your EAW directory, remove the CD and try again until everything works. (Remember too to have at least one game.exe with a filename eaw.exe in the games main folder, otherwise the Debug path will get blanked out in the eaw.ini file after one launch and exit of the game).

NOTES:
 
The game will still require the presents of a physical CD-ROM Drive Device (with no CD in the drive):
You must have a CD Device installed and turned ON (if its an external) in-order for the NoCD exe to work. (Some Wrapper Programs may have a option too turn on the presences of a CD-ROM Device, even if you don't have one). However I found that EAWPRO, v1.26e and v1.60 have proper MPS hacks or code to remove calls to the cd-rom drive/driver, so they have no problem running without them present (and would not need that Wrapper option to run correctly).

THAT'S IT!

[END]