The 3DO Company High Heat(TM) Major League Baseball(R) 2004 February 2003 Version 1.0 Thank you for purchasing the High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 game. We recommend that you read this file to get the most up-to-date information about installing, running, and maximizing performance of the High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 game. This document contains information you might find useful, and we think it will help you to get as much enjoyment out of this game as possible. This game was developed for use with English (United States) versions of Windows(R). Use of the game on other language versions of Windows may result in errors that can render the game unplayable on your system. Note: The information within this document is accurate as of the date of the release of this product. ...........................Table of Contents........................... 1. Installation 2. System Requirements 3. Gameplay 4. New Features 5. Video Card And Other Hardware Drivers / DirectX(R) 6. Troubleshooting Installation Issues Problems Running the Game General Solutions 7. GameUpdate(TM) 8. Purchasing 3DO Software 9. Contacting Customer Support ........................... 1. Installation We strongly recommend you close all programs before installing the High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 game (please refer to the Troubleshooting section below for instructions on how to close hidden programs). If the Operating System you're using is Windows 2000 Pro or XP Home/Pro, you must be logged in as an Administrator or have Administrative privileges in order to install the game properly. Insert the High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 CD into the CD-ROM drive. If you have Autoplay enabled, the installation screen appears. Follow the on-screen instructions to complete installation of the High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 game. If you have disabled Autoplay within Windows: Select "Run..." from the Start menu. Left-click on the BROWSE button. Left-click on your CD-ROM drive in the list, then open the "_autorun" folder on the CD, and right-click on the file called "autorun.exe" and then left-click on OPEN. Left-click OK to begin installation. Follow the on-screen instructions to complete installation NOTE: Before installing a new version of DirectX, please check to make sure that your sound and video card drivers are compatible with the version that you're about to install, or compatible drivers are at least available from your computer/card manufacturer(s). If you are unsure, please check with your computer manufacturer (or sound and video card manufacturers for custom-built systems). ........................... 2. System Requirements Operating System: Windows(R) 98/Me/2000 Pro/XP Home/XP Pro CPU: Pentium II 400 MHz (Pentium III 800 MHz recommended) Hard Disk: Approximately 300 MB minimum free space Memory: 64MB RAM; 128 recommended CD-ROM Drive: 4X speed or better Video Card: Supports DirectX(R) 8.1* compatible with at least 16MB VRAM) Sound Card: DirectX 8.1* compatible 8-bit(16-bit recommended) Peripherals Supported: Keyboard, mouse, all DirectInput-compatible** game pads and joysticks * If you already have a later version of DirectX (8.1, 9.0, etc.) installed, your sound and video cards' drivers will need to be compliant with that version. ** Again, compatible with DirectX 8.1 or whichever later version of DirectX is installed in your system. ........................... 3. Gameplay We strongly recommend you close all programs before running the High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 game. Do not remove the CD-ROM while the game is running. Converting High Heat Baseball 2003 Save Files - Save files from the High Heat Major League Baseball 2003 game can be converted into a format compatible with the High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 game. The High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 CD contains a program called "SaveConverter.exe", which is located at the root of the CD. To run SaveConverter.exe, insert the game CD into your CD drive. Then double-click "My Computer" on the Windows Desktop, RIGHT-click on the CD drive's icon, and select "Explore". Double-click the SaveConverter.exe icon, and the program will start. After starting the program, a Windows applet will appear. Choose your High Heat 2003 save file as the input file. Make sure to select the file of type '.sea'. Then choose a location and enter a file name for an output file, which can be your High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 save folder. This needs to be a file of type '.sav', which is the High Heat 2004 save file type. If you want your new season to include Franchise Mode features, be sure to check the appropriate check box. If you don't, your new season will be Career Mode only and not include these new features. When everything is all set, click "Convert" and the utility will convert this file to High Heat 2004 format, and save it. Note that due to differences in AI logic and feature functionality for High Heat 2004 as compared to High Heat 2003, players may be reshuffled within each team's roster. Players may change roster levels, and lineups and rotations are likely to change as well. There will also be slight numerical differences in some ratings, and a some data will be lost in the conversion. However most data will come through cleanly and be correctly preserved. (Note: There are 27 pitch types in High Heat Major League Baseball 2004, while there were only 9 in previous versions. When you convert a season, all existing players will retain the same pitch types that they had in the past. Therefore new pitch types won't come into play until new rookies are generated in future years of the Career or Franchise Mode.) ........................... 4. New Features Controllers - High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 now supports two types of controller settings. The default setting, "Combo" retains the same controller characteristics that High Heat Major League Baseball has supported over the years. The "One-Hand" setting more closely resembles what you are likely to find in a console game, wherein one button represents one base on defense and one pitch while pitching. You are able to choose different settings for Pitching and Fielding if you so desire. Pausing the game - This year you will be able to pause High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 at any time by simply pressing the "ESC" key. Dumping Stats - Pressing Ctl-E will allow you to dump the stats on various screens into files in your High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 directory. The files will appear in .csv format. This feature will only work on various stats screens and box score screens. Alt-F4 - This allows you to quit the game immediately to the desktop. This will now only work correctly in Outer Shell menus and during the live game. It will not do anything during in-game menus such as the Pause Menu. ........................... 5. Video Card And Other Hardware Drivers / DirectX The High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 game operates with DirectX 8.1 compatible video cards with at least 16MB of VRAM. Some graphics cards that are not fully compatible with DirectX 8.1 require that the High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 game be run in software mode. Video preferences are determined the first time you run the game. The High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 game requires Microsoft DirectX 8.1 to run. You are given the option to install DirectX 8.1 during the installation of the High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 game. NOTE: If you install a later version of DirectX, your sound, video and input device drivers must be updated to be compatible with that new version of DirectX. Please check availability of compatible drivers before updating DirectX. For further information about the latest DirectX drivers please refer to the Microsoft web site at http://www.microsoft.com/directx. Cards or chipsets tested successfully with High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 include: ATI Radeon(TM) 7200 ATI Radeon 8500 ATI Radeon 9000 Matrox Millennium G550 nVidia(R) GeForce(TM) GTS nVidia GeForce2 nVidia GeForce3 nVidia GeForce4 Oxygen GVX1 Oxygen VX1 For a full list of supported controllers please check www.highheat.com or our online FAQs for High Heat 2004 at www.3do.com/support. You can alleviate most video display problems simply by going to your video card manufacturer's website, downloading the latest drivers for your card, and installing them to your computer. High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 supports the ability to change certain video resolution and other PC settings. By changing some of these options you may be able to improve game performance on your specific system. These options are in the Outer Shell; From the Main Menu you should choose "Options", then choose "More Options". You will then be able to scroll to the PC Options area. ........................... 6. Troubleshooting Installation Issues Problem: The computer freezes during install, or you receive an error message during install. Answers: 1. Your computer may be using an older 16-bit CD-ROM driver (Does not apply to Windows 2000/XP users). To check if your computer is using an older 16-bit CD-ROM driver: - Right-click on the 'My Computer' icon and select 'Properties'. - Click on the 'Performance' tab. - In the Performance status box, if the File System line says, "Some drivers are using MS-DOS (R) compatibility", you are using a 16-bit CD-ROM driver. If you are using 16-bit CD-ROM drivers: Contact the manufacturer of your CD-ROM drive or the manufacturer of your computer for an updated 32-bit CD-ROM driver. 2. There may not be enough space on your hard drive for temporary files to expand and/or you need to free up resources. To free up Resources: - Close all unnecessary programs running in the Background. (See "Resources and Background Tasks.") - Keep at least 100MB free on the hard drive that the game is installed to, or twice your RAM, whichever is larger. - Clean up your Hard Disk: There are files located on your hard disk that programs are no longer using and are now wasting space. To clean up these files you can use a tool provided in Windows called Disk Cleanup. To run this program in Windows 98, Windows ME, Windows XP, or Windows 2000: 1) Click on the Start button, then click on Programs, then Accessories, System Tools, and select Disk Cleanup. 2) Select which Hard Disk to cleanup. Generally the disk drive letter you want to clean is C: 3) Hit the OK button. For detailed information on how to clear out your temp folder manually check the High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 FAQ, located at: www.3do.com/support 3. The CD-ROM drive might be having problems with how it buffers information (Does not apply to Windows 2000/XP users). To turn off read-ahead on the CD-ROM drive: - Right-click on the 'My Computer' icon and select 'Properties'. - Click on the 'Performance' tab. - Click on the 'File System' button. - Choose the 'CD-ROM' tab at the top. - Change the 'Optimize access pattern for' field to 'No read-ahead'. - Click on 'Apply', then 'OK' and finally click 'Close' (you will be prompted to restart your system). 4. The Autorun or DMA settings on your CD-ROM drive could be interfering with the game installation (Does not apply to Windows 2000/XP users). Turn off the Autorun and DMA settings on your CD-ROM drive: - Right-click on the 'My Computer' icon and choose 'Properties'. - Click on the 'Device Manager' tab. - Click on the '+' sign next to the CD-ROM line so that it becomes a '-' sign. - Click on the line that appears under the CD-ROM line to highlight it, and then click on the 'Properties' button. - Click on the 'Settings' tab. - Look for the Auto-insert Notification and DMA lines. If there is a check mark in the boxes next to either of these lines, click on the box to remove the check mark. - Click on the 'Apply' button, and then click on the 'OK' button. - When you are asked if you want to restart your system, choose 'Yes'. Problems With Running the Game: - The game does not launch properly: If the game gives an error message, locks the system, blanks out the screen, or simply returns to the desktop with no activity when attempting to launch: A) Resources and Background Tasks, B) Display Settings, C) Direct X Troubleshooting, and D) Saved Game Options below - During normal gameplay, the game crashes and returns to Windows or locks the system: A) Resources and Background Tasks and C) Direct X Troubleshooting below. - The game runs slow or choppy or with blurry graphics: A) Resources and Background Tasks, B) Display Settings, C) Direct X Troubleshooting, and E) Tune File Extras below. - Sound skips, repeats, or is garbled: A) Resources and Background Tasks, C) Direct X Troubleshooting, and E) Tune File Extras below. General Solutions: A) Resources and Background Tasks: Closing programs running in the background: You may not know it, but chances are that you have many programs running on your computer eating up its resources. Closing down these unneeded programs will help boost performance in your game. This is something you can do before starting the game every time you wish to play. If you are using Windows 98 or Windows ME, close background programs by doing this: 1) Hold the Ctrl and Alt keys down at the same time and hit the Del key once. This will in turn bring up a window called "close programs". The only two applications that you want listed here before running the game are EXPLORER and SYSTRAY. 2) Close all other programs by double-clicking on them. 3) Repeat this process after closing each application until only EXPLORER and SYSTRAY are listed. **Note that some applications may take multiple times before closing. Don't worry that you are permanently changing your system configuration; these applications will return when you restart your system. If you are using Windows XP, close background programs by doing this: Hold the Ctrl and Alt keys down at the same time and hit the Del key once. This will bring up the "Task Manager", follow the steps bellow in order: 1) Click the "Processes" tab. 2) Click on the User Name button to sort by user name 3) Click on anything besides EXPLORER and TASKMGR for this User Name or other user names. Do NOT select anything for SYSTEM, LOCAL SERVICE, or NETWORK SERVICE. 4) Click on END PROCESS 5) Repeat steps 3 and 4 until only explorer.exe and taskmgr.exe are open for this user name. If you are using Windows 2000, close background programs by doing this: 1) Hold down the Ctrl and Alt keys, tap the Delete key. 2) Select Task Manager 3) Click the Applications tab. 4) Click on the name of the program in the list and click on End Task 5) Repeat this process until all the background task are closed You may also want to run Scandisk and the Disk Defragmenter utilities within Windows for basic preventive system maintenance. Consult the Windows help files for more information. Note: Scandisk has been renamed to Error Checker in Windows XP/2000. Some printer drivers are incompatible with High Heat. In these cases, printing may cause the game to become unstable. If you're printing, you should save your games and seasons often. In many screens a workaround solution is available: save information as HTML and then print after exiting the game. B) Display Settings: Many 3DO games require Windows to be set in a certain display mode in order for the game to operate. In your Display Settings (Right-click on the desktop and select "Properties" and the "Settings" tab) make sure that your Colors are set to at least 16-Bit High Color and the screen area is set to 800x600 (minimum). If you are not able to move the slider for your screen area to at least 800x600 pixels, make sure that your monitor type supports this resolution. To do this, click on the "Advanced" button and the "Monitor" tab. If necessary, change the monitor type to "Plug & Play Monitor" under the standard types that Windows offers. "Super VGA 800x600" should also work. If your monitor is already identified as one of these types and you still can't move the slider, your video card may not be capable of supporting a high enough resolution. Consult the video card's manufacturer for more information about supported display modes. C) DirectX Troubleshooting: DirectX: DirectX is a program incorporated into the Microsoft Windows 95/98/2000/ME/XP family that allows various hardware-intensive programs, particularly games, to take direct control of all the hardware components within your system. Nearly all PC games currently on the market make use of DirectX, and Microsoft periodically updates DirectX to allow PC-based games to take advantage of new technologies. A current version of the DirectX installer is always available at . Device Drivers: Many of the hardware components in your computer, such as the video card and the sound card, require software programs called drivers to function properly. Drivers contain vital information about these devices, like the instruction sets the computer uses to call on them. DirectX coordinates these drivers and manages the way that they interface with the Windows environment for running games and programs. How it all works: DirectX interfaces directly with the device drivers to enhance the quality of graphics and sound in multimedia programs. To give a rough idea of how game software works, all the instructions originate from the game and are then passed to DirectX. Then, DirectX gives them to the driver software and the driver software ultimately interprets those commands for the hardware to execute the operation. Because Microsoft periodically updates DirectX, games are usually written for the latest version available and shipped with it. However, when you update your version of DirectX, in order for your hardware to interface with it properly, it is sometimes necessary to obtain updated drivers for your hardware. The hardware manufacturers usually provide updates as a free download. What to do: DirectX includes DXDIAG, a very complete and comprehensive tool for DirectX troubleshooting and settings. To use it, follow these directions: ·Press the 'Start' button on the Windows 95/98/2000/ME/XP-task bar and select 'Run'. ·Type "dxdiag" (do not include the quotes) then click on the 'OK' button. This will run the DirectX Diagnostics Tool. ·To make sure all your files are DirectX compatible, select the 'DirectX Files' tab to ensure that there aren't any exclamation points next to the file names. If you find exclamation points under this tab you will probably need to reinstall DirectX by either reinstalling the game, or visiting and downloading their latest version of the game installer. ·By clicking on the Display and Sound tabs, make sure all of your drivers are DirectX compatible. Select the 'DirectX Files' tab and make sure there are no exclamation points next to any of the file names. If you find exclamation points under this tab, you will need to update your drivers by contacting the manufacturer of the hardware through their phone support or through their website. You can get more information on which version of DirectX is supported by your version of the device drivers. Contact either the original manufacturer (such as ATI, Hercules, etc.) of the component, or the maker of the entire system (such as Compaq, Dell, etc.) that uses the component. D) Saved Game Options: When High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 is about to first bring up the Main Menu, it will automatically load your previously-saved Game Options. These are saved in file hh2004.sav, in directory Stats/Saves. If you want to restore the default options, or are seeing other weird behavior while first launching the game, you should try deleting or renaming this file. Be warned: this file may contain saved Season, Roster, or Playoff data in addition to the Options. If you want to preserve this data, do not delete the hh2004.sav file, but rename it instead. Your Season, Playoffs, or Roster data will be available for loading, and will not interact with the options in that file. E) Tune File Extras: You can try to enable, disable, or modify certain features by modifying the tune.txt file (which can be found in the same directory as this ReadMe). The tune file contains many variables and their associated values; in general, changing these values will alter how the game plays or looks (similar to the tuning menu in the game). So if you don't like something about the game, you might be able to change it by changing values in this file. Note that certain variables give you the ability to bypass problems with your system; for example, if the rain special effect doesn't work correctly with your video card, you can ensure it never rains in the game by changing the "rain percentage" variable from 1.0 to 0.0. Or if audio is not working well on your system, you can disable it by changing the value of the "audio" variable from 1 to 0. 3DO does not specifically support problems that arise when using anything other than the original tune file. Nor can 3DO Customer Support specifically explain or support the use of all tune file variables. However many users are often very savvy at manipulating the tune file, and can often explain how to use the tune file to customize the game the way you want. Try looking at High Heat-related internet message boards if you need advice; you should start at www.highheat.com and click on Community or Links. ........................... 7. GameUpdate(TM) GameUpdate is a program that will search the 3DO website for game updates. You must be connected to the Internet for GameUpdate to function. -Connect to the Internet -Go to Start | Programs | 3DO | High Heat Major League Baseball 2004 | GameUpdate (Note: For some newer versions of Windows, you will need to choose "All Programs" in place of "Programs"). -Follow the instructions when the GameUpdate window opens Please note: If a newer version of GameUpdate exists, then only the GameUpdate program may be updated. You may need to reboot your system, reconnect to the Internet and run the new version of GameUpdate to update your 3DO game. ........................... 8. Purchasing 3DO Software You can order other 3DO software directly from 3DO through the order webpage at , or you can call the 3DO Direct line at 800-336-3506 (Monday through Friday 9AM-12Noon and 2PM-5PM Pacific Time.) (if calling from Canada, please dial 650-385-3187). ........................... 9. Contacting Customer Support For technical problems or questions within United States or Canada: 3DO Customer Support Website: http://www.3do.com/support E-mail: customer-support@3do.com Fax number (Please include your email address): (650) 385-3181 Mailing address: The 3DO Company ATTN: Customer Support 200 Cardinal Way Redwood City, CA 94063 ........................... Copyright 2003 The 3DO Company. All Rights Reserved. 3DO, High Heat, High Heat Baseball, GameUpdate, and their respective logos, are trademarks or registered trademarks of The 3DO Company in the U.S. and other countries. All other trademarks belong to their respective owners.