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Empires: Dawn of the Modern World

From PCGamingWiki, the wiki about fixing PC games
Empires: Dawn of the Modern World
Empires: Dawn of the Modern World cover
Developers
Stainless Steel Studios
Publishers
Activision
Engines
Titan
Release dates
Windows October 21, 2003
Reception
Metacritic 81
Taxonomy
Monetization One-time game purchase
Modes Singleplayer, Multiplayer
Pacing Real-time
Perspectives Bird's-eye view
Controls Multiple select, Point and select
Genres RTS
Art styles Realistic
Themes Medieval, Industrial Age, World War I, World War II
Series Empire Earth
Empires: Dawn of the Modern World on HowLongToBeat
Empires: Dawn of the Modern World on IGDB
Empires: Dawn of the Modern World guide on StrategyWiki
Empires: Dawn of the Modern World on MobyGames
Empires: Dawn of the Modern World on Wikipedia
Empire Earth
Empire Earth 2001
Empires: Dawn of the Modern World 2003
Empire Earth II 2005
Empire Earth III 2007

Warnings

GameSpy online services have been shut down (see Network for solutions).

Key points

Known as Empires: Die Neuzeit in Germany and Empires: L'aube d'un Monde Nouveau in France.

General information

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

Availability

Source DRM Notes Keys OS
Retail
Disc check (requires the CD/DVD in the drive to play)
CD key
SafeDisc v3.10.020 DRM. Patch 1.2 removes the DRM as well as the disc check.[1]
Windows
GOG.com
DRM-free
Patched to 1.3. Multiplayer key not provided.
Windows
Steam (unavailable)
Icon overlay.png
Windows

Essential improvements

Patches

The newest patch is 1.3. Patches for the game can be found here.

Game data

Configuration file(s) location

System Location
Windows HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\SSSI\Empires\
Steam Play (Linux) <Steam-folder>/steamapps/compatdata/2690/pfx/[Note 1]

Save game data location

System Location
Windows <path-to-game>\Data\Saved Games[Note 2]
Steam Play (Linux) <Steam-folder>/steamapps/compatdata/2690/pfx/[Note 1]
Campaign progress is stored in <path-to-game>\Users\default.

Save game cloud syncing

System Native Notes
GOG Galaxy
Steam Cloud

Video

Video Settings.
Video Settings.

Graphics feature State WSGF Notes
Widescreen resolution
See WSGF entry. The HUD elements are stretched. Also note that enforcing widescreen resolutions can distort the minimap, making it inaccurate.
Multi-monitor
Ultra-widescreen
4K Ultra HD
Any resolution above 1920x1080 crashes the game during gameplay (excluding cutscenes)
Field of view (FOV)
See Adjust Zoom Distance.
Windowed
See Windowed.
Borderless fullscreen windowed
See Windowed.
Anisotropic filtering (AF)
See the glossary page for potential workarounds.
Anti-aliasing (AA)
See the glossary page for potential workarounds.
Vertical sync (Vsync)
See Vertical sync (Vsync).
60 FPS and 120+ FPS
See Run the game at screen refresh rate.

Adjust Zoom Distance

The game's zoom level will be very close on high resolutions such as 1920x1080.
Instructions[1]
  1. Use Empires Dawn Of The Modern World Zoom Changer to increase the zoom limit.

Enable In-Game Clock

The game can display a little clock showing the game speed & map time but the setting cannot be found in any menu.
Instructions[1]
  1. Press F11 in-game.

Alternatively go to Configuration file(s) location and set ClockDisplay to 1.

Windowed

Force windowed[2]
  1. Download and run DxWnd.
  2. Click on Edit, then Add.
  3. Set the path to <path-to-game>\Empires_DMW.exe.
  4. Set the desired window position and size.
  5. Set Desktop for borderless fullscreen windowed.
  6. Click on DirectX tab, set DirectX 8.
  7. Click OK, then File and Save.

Vertical sync (Vsync)

Disable Vsync[2]
  1. Go to the configuration file(s) location.
  2. Double-click on Wait for VSync.
  3. Change the value to 0 to disable Vsync.

Input

Input Settings.
Input Settings.

Audio

Audio Settings.
Audio Settings.

Audio feature State Notes
Separate volume controls
Surround sound
Subtitles
Subtitles only in cutscenes and ingame video sequences.
Closed captions
Mute on focus lost
Royalty free audio

Localizations

Language UI Audio Sub Notes
English
French
Retail only.
German
Retail only; download for GOG.com version
Spanish
Retail only.

Network

Multiplayer types

Type Native Notes
Local play
LAN play
Online play
GameSpy services have been shut down;[3] see GameSpy for workarounds.

Connection types

Type Native Notes
Self-hosting
Direct IP

Ports

Protocol Port(s) and/or port range(s)[4]
TCP 6500, 28900, 29900, 29901, 33335
UDP 13139, 27900, 33321
Universal Plug and Play (UPnP) support status is unknown.

Issues fixed

Run the game at screen refresh rate

Fullscreen mode defaults to 75 Hz, even if the screen refresh rate is set higher than that.
Set screen refresh rate[2]
  1. Go to the configuration file(s) location.
  2. Double-click on Custom Refresh Rate.
  3. Select Decimal and change 75 to the screen refresh rate.

Other information

API

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

Middleware

Middleware Notes
Audio Miles Sound System 6.5e[5]
Multiplayer GameSpy

System requirements

Windows
Minimum Recommended
Operating system (OS) 98. 2000, ME, XP
Processor (CPU) Intel Pentium III 600 MHz
AMD Athlon 600 MHz
System memory (RAM) 128 MB (Online multiplayer: 256 MB)
Hard disk drive (HDD) 1.1 GB
Video card (GPU) 32 MB of VRAM
DirectX 9.0b compatible


Notes

  1. 1.0 1.1 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>/2690/ in addition to or instead of this directory. The app ID (2690) may differ in some cases. Treat backslashes as forward slashes. See the glossary page for details.
  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).

References

  1. 1.0 1.1 1.2 Verified by User:Nessy on 2021-02-02
  2. 2.0 2.1 2.2 Verified by User:Keith on 2017-09-18
  3. Pricing | GameSpy Technology
  4. scribd.com | Official ReadMe
  5. Verified by User:Nessy on 2019-06-15
    Version number found in Mss32.dll in the game installation folder.