Homeworld: Cataclysm

Homeworld
Homeworld	1999
Homeworld: Cataclysm	2000
Homeworld 2	2003
Homeworld Remastered Edition	2015
Homeworld 2 Remastered Edition	2015
Homeworld: Deserts of Kharak	2016
Homeworld 3	2024

Key points

Re-released on GOG.com as Homeworld: Emergence due to "Cataclysm" being a registered trademark of Blizzard Entertainment.^[1]

General information

Encyclopedia Hiigara - A wiki for everything Homeworld related

Homeworld Shipyards - A fairly old but big Homeworld fan site

GOG.com Support Page

Availability

Source	DRM	Notes	Keys	OS
Retail		SecuROM 4 DRM.
GOG.com

Essential improvements

Patches

A full list of all available patches can be found here.

Skip intro videos

Delete intro videos^[2]

Navigate to <path-to-game>\Movies
Delete or rename the following files:

sierra.bik (Sierra logo)
bdogintro.bik (Barking Dog Studios logo)

Use the launch argument /disableAVI^[2]

Notes

Despite the name of the parameter, mission briefing cutscenes are still functional while using this method.

Game data

Configuration file(s) location

System	Location
Windows	HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Sierra On-Line\Cataclysm^{[Note 1]}

Save game data location

System	Location
Windows	<path-to-game>\SavedGames^{[Note 2]}

Separate folders are used to store Singleplayer saves, Multiplayer saves, Recorded games (replays), and saves from the Training mode.

Save game cloud syncing

System	Native	Notes
GOG Galaxy

Video

Video settings.

Effects settings.

Graphics feature	State	Notes
Widescreen resolution		See Widescreen resolution.
Multi-monitor
Ultra-widescreen
4K Ultra HD
Field of view (FOV)		Determined by the aspect ratio. See Widescreen resolution).
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)		Use the command line parameter `/triple`
60 FPS and 120+ FPS		No frame rate cap. Ships and other elements move and update at a locked framerate.
High dynamic range display (HDR)		See the glossary page for potential alternatives.

Widescreen resolution

Modify the game registry keys^[3]

Navigate to the Configuration file(s) location using RegEdit.
Change the ScreenHeight and ScreenWidth registry keys to the desired width and height.

Notes

On 64-bit versions of Windows, the configuration files may be in a different location if the game is not run in Administrator Mode.

See the Game data article or the Configuration file(s) location tooltips and notes for more information.

Windowed

Use launch arguments

For Windowed mode, Use the launch argument -window.
For Borderless fullscreen windowed mode, use -window -noBorder.

Notes

For standard windowed mode, the game must be set to less than the screen resolution. Otherwise, the game will crash.

Alternatively, use the borderless command.

Input

Gameplay settings.

Keyboard and mouse	State	Notes
Remapping
Mouse acceleration
Mouse sensitivity
Mouse input in menus
Mouse Y-axis inversion
Controller
Controller support

Controller types

Action keybinding options (1/6).
Special action keybinding options (2/6).
Tactics/Formation keybinding options (3/6).
Camera/selection keybinding options (4/6).
Views/Misc. keybinding options (5/6).
Grouping keybinding options (6/6).

Audio

Audio settings.

Audio feature	State	Notes
Separate volume controls
Surround sound
Subtitles
Closed captions
Mute on focus lost

Advanced settings (Audio).
EQ custom settings.

Localizations

Language	UI	Audio	Sub	Notes
English
German				Retail only

Network

Multiplayer types

Type	Native	Notes
LAN play
Online play

Connection types

Type	Native	Notes
Matchmaking
Peer-to-peer
Dedicated
Self-hosting
Direct IP

Issues fixed

Black screen/game window not appearing in GOG.com Re-release

Some users may find that the game window will stop rendering correctly as the video intros end, with only the desktop visible as the menu is supposed to appear.

The issue appears to be an incompatibility with nGlide.^[4]

Remove and/or replace nGlide^[4]

Remove or move the following files:

glide.dll, glide2x.dll, and glide3x.dll (nGlide related DLLs)
nglide_config.exe (nGlide configurator)
3Dfx (folder, contains a DLL that links 3DFX OpenGL support to nGlide)

Optionally, the following files can be removed as well:

nglide_readme.txt (readme file for nGlide)
3DfxSpl.dll, 3DfxSpl2.dll, and 3DfxSpl3.dll (3DFX animated splash screens)

Notes

After removing these files, the game may default to Software mode. This can be changed in options. The OpenGL renderer(s) are recommended.

3DFX-enhanced OpenGL mode may be unusable after applying this fix. If desired, it can be restored using dgVoodoo 2; otherwise, standard OpenGL will still be available.

Severe Lag in Menus

Use OpenGL rendering^{[citation needed]}

Set launch arguments
Run the game with the following launch arguments: `/nofastfe /noglddraw`

Enabling OpenGL rendering on Windows 8 and later

OpenGL rendering can solve severe lag problems in menus. However, NT4 compatibility mode is required.

NT4 compatibility mode is no longer offered by default for Windows 8 and 10.

Restoring NT4 Compatibility Mode
Download the Homeworld hardware acceleration fix to apply NT4 compatibility mode. Download the zip file and extract its contents. Follow the instructions in the `readme.txt` file.

Game runs on wrong screen (multi-monitor setup)

Use Windows key shortcuts to move the window

Use ⊞ Win+⇧ Shift+← or ⊞ Win+⇧ Shift+→ to move the game to another window.

Notes

This may cause the game window to render incorrectly/off-center from the screen, or cause the mouse cursor to be caged to the wrong monitor.

Pressing Alt+Tab ↹ and returning to the game should fix mouse cursor bugs.

Change resolutions once to fix off-center screens.

This fix should only be necessary once.

Other information

Command line parameters

The following command-line parameters may improve quality on newer systems, or enable extra functionality:

Parameter	Description
/triple	Enables OpenGL triple buffering, improves graphical quality and removes flickering at higher resolutions. Use unless it causes problems.
/enable3DNow	Enables the 3DNow processor instruction set if available. Use unless it causes problems.
/enableSSE	Enables the SSE processor instruction set if available. Use unless it causes problems.
/disableAVI	Disables the intro movies when the game starts.
/nofastfe	Disables the fast graphical frontend. Use this only when having graphical problems like flickering
/noglddraw	Don't use DirectDraw to setup OpenGL renderers. Try this is you're having problems getting OpenGL to work.
/safeGL	Don't use possibly buggy optimized features of OpenGL for rendering. Try this if you're having problems getting OpenGL to work.
/heap BYTES	Allows the game to use up to BYTES bytes RAM for the heap since by default the game isn't allowed to use much. 256 MB should suffice: `/heap 268435456` but if you have more, try raising it to 1 GB: `/heap 1073741824`

API

Technical specs	Supported	Notes
Direct3D
OpenGL	1.1
Software renderer

Executable	32-bit	64-bit	Notes
Windows

Middleware

	Middleware	Notes
Cutscenes	Bink Video
Multiplayer	Sierra.com, World Opponent Network

System requirements

Windows
	Minimum	Recommended
Operating system (OS)	95, NT 4.0	98
Processor (CPU)	Intel Pentium II 233 MHz	Intel Pentium II 350 MHz
System memory (RAM)	32 MB	64 MB
Hard disk drive (HDD)	80 MB	600 MB
Video card (GPU)	4 MB of VRAM	12 MB of VRAM

Notes

↑ Applications writing to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE will be redirected to other locations based on various criterias, see the glossary page for more details.
↑ 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

↑ Release: Homeworld: Emergence - GOG.com
↑ ^2.0 ^2.1 Verified by User:Cptmold on 2019-07-17
Intro-skip methods were tested with the GOG release.
↑ Reference
↑ ^4.0 ^4.1 Verified by User:Cptmold on 2019-07-17
Method detailed in fixbox was used to fix the game failing to render correctly outside of video intros.

[HKLM-3] Applications writing to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE will be redirected to other locations based on various criterias, see the glossary page for more details.

[gamedir-4] 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).

[1] Release: Homeworld: Emergence - GOG.com

[Intro_skipping_methods-2] 2.0 ^2.1 Verified by User:Cptmold on 2019-07-17
Intro-skip methods were tested with the GOG release.

[5] Reference

[nGlide_menu_glitch-6] 4.0 ^4.1 Verified by User:Cptmold on 2019-07-17
Method detailed in fixbox was used to fix the game failing to render correctly outside of video intros.

[1]

[2]

[Note 1]

[Note 2]

[3]

[4]

Developers

	Barking Dog Studios
Publishers
	Sierra Entertainment
Release dates
Windows	June 30, 2000
Reception
Metacritic	89
IGDB	80