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Need for Speed: Underground

From PCGamingWiki, the wiki about fixing PC games
Revision as of 13:23, 30 November 2021 by KainXVIII (talk | contribs) (→‎Modifications: 404 not found)
Need for Speed: Underground
Need for Speed: Underground cover
Developers
EA Black Box
Publishers
Electronic Arts
Engines
EAGL
Release dates
Windows November 17, 2003
Reception
Metacritic 82
Taxonomy
Modes Singleplayer, Multiplayer
Pacing Real-time
Perspectives First-person, Third-person
Controls Direct control
Genres Racing
Vehicles Automobile, Street racing
Art styles Realistic
Themes Contemporary
Series Need for Speed: Underground
Need for Speed: Underground on HowLongToBeat
Need for Speed: Underground on IGDB
Need for Speed: Underground guide on StrategyWiki
Need for Speed: Underground on MobyGames
Need for Speed: Underground on Wikipedia
Need for Speed: Underground
Subseries of Need for Speed
Need for Speed: Underground 2003
Need for Speed: Underground 2 2004

Warnings

SafeDisc retail DRM does not work on Windows Vista and later (see Availability for affected versions).

General information

Official site (archived)

Availability

Source DRM Notes Keys OS
Retail
Disc check (requires the CD/DVD in the drive to play)
CD key
SafeDisc v2 DRM[Note 1]
Windows
SafeDisc retail DRM does not work on Windows Vista and later (see above for affected versions).

Essential improvements

Patches

Skip intro videos

Instructions[citation needed]
  1. Download no_intro.zip
  2. Go to <path-to-game>\Movies\
  3. Replace e3_title.mad, na_boot.mad, and PSA.mad with the 3 movie files in no_intro.zip

Game data

Configuration file(s) location

System Location
Windows %PROGRAMDATA%\NFS Underground\<user-id>.cfg[Note 2]
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\EA GAMES\Need For Speed Underground\[Note 3]

Save game data location

System Location
Windows %PROGRAMDATA%\NFS Underground\[Note 2]

Video

General video settings
General video settings
Advanced video settings
Advanced video settings

Graphics feature State WSGF Notes
Widescreen resolution
Use ThirteenAG's fix.
Multi-monitor
Use ThirteenAG's fix.
Ultra-widescreen
Use ThirteenAG's fix.
4K Ultra HD
Use ThirteenAG's fix.
Field of view (FOV)
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 the glossary page for potential workarounds.
60 FPS
120+ FPS
Locked at 60 FPS. See Unlocking FPS.
High dynamic range display (HDR)
See the glossary page for potential alternatives.

Windowed

Set windowed/borderless[3][4]
  1. Install ThirteenAG's fix.
  2. Create wndmode.ini in <path-to-game>.

Forcing Anti-Aliasing on AMD cards

Instructions[citation needed]
  1. Supersampling must be used, else various objects will not render (wheels, leaves, fences, driver, etc.). Motion Blur might also have to be disabled.

Unlocking FPS

Instructions[citation needed]
  1. Use cheat engine and search for 0.016666666666 as a float in rounded (extreme) mode while speed.exe is selected in the memory search range. Two of the values shown will be FPS related. one for the cap and the other for game speed and logic. change both to 0.00694444 for 144 FPS or to 0.00277777 for 360 FPS (very difficult to achieve due to the game only using a single processing thread). Hex editing these values may be possible on some executables; removing the need of following the above process each time the game is launched. Replace all instances of 89 88 88 3C with 3F 0B 36 3B (360 FPS). This will cause the car's handling to be less responsive and will outright stop functioning if the car reaches a certain speed. This may require a handling value to be changed to fix this.

Input

Input settings
Input settings

A Steam user-made config for DualShock 4

Basically applies full controller support for DS4. Should also work for other controllers. Steam is required.[5]
  1. Download Jodeth's DS4 config for NFSU.
  2. Follow the instructions to install it.

Alternative controller for DualShock 3 and 4

Fix trigger controller ps3/ps4[6]
  1. Install Little-scripts-NFS-GDX.
  2. If you have installed the game on another hard drive you can modify the path Little-scripts-NFS.bat.

Audio

Audio settings
Audio settings

Audio feature State Notes
Separate volume controls
Surround sound
Only Stereo and Mono available. Optimized for Dolby Pro Logic.
Subtitles
Only available in certain language edition
Closed captions
Mute on focus lost
EAX support
Although not advertised as such the game does support EAX, at least reverb effects, but without surround sound. It can be restored with ALchemy.
DirectSound is possible to be restored by wrappers (DSOAL recommended, e.g. w/o HRTF - specific low quality engine sounds).

Localizations

Language UI Audio Sub Notes
English
Traditional Chinese
French
Italian
German
Russian
Slovak
Fan translation, download.
Spanish

Network

Multiplayer types

Type Native Players Notes
Local play
Console versions only.
LAN play
4 Use NFS U LAN Mod.
Online play
4 Online has been shutdown[7]

Connection types

Type Native Notes
Matchmaking
Only user-created lobbies with user-created races.
Peer-to-peer
A server is always required.
Dedicated
A developer-hosted server was available until it's shutdown. An unofficial server software (NFS U LAN Mod) is available.
Self-hosting
Not supported.
Direct IP
Not supported.

VR support

3D modes State Notes
Nvidia 3D Vision
Use Helix's 3D fix
vorpX
G3D
User created game profile, see important setting hints in the vorpx forum profile introduction.

Issues fixed

Custom bindings lost on game restart

Windows Vista and later lack a file needed for the game to remember custom mappings.
Download dimap.dll[citation needed]
  1. Download dimap.dll.
  2. Extract it into the installation folder.

Can't install both NFS Underground and NFS Most Wanted (2005) on the same PC

This problem occures because both games use the same name for their main executables (speed.exe). After installing one game and attempting to install the other, its autorun program assumes it's already been installed.
Workaround[citation needed]
  1. Install the first game. It doesn't matter whether it's Underground or Most Wanted.
  2. Go to the installation folder.
  3. Change the name of speed.exe to anything else.
  4. Install the other game.
  5. Restore the original name of the first game's speed.exe.

Controller deadzone issues

Fix left stick deadzone[8]
  1. Install ThirteenAG's fix.
  2. Deadzone can be adjusted in NFSUnderground.WidescreenFix.ini.

The game occasionally freezes on loading screen or after race

Install latest patch (or binary) 1.4 or 1.3.4

Copying proper .exe for EU or US version should enough.[9] Although patcher also extracts filter.efx (possibly NOS black screen effect fix) to the patch exe folder if proper game binary or registry entry is not found. Widescreen patch compatibility not tested. If all above fail, reinstall the game, and use e.g. 1.0 version (afterwards, replacing exe and filter.efx should enough). The problem can happen e.g. after Samantha Time Trial 2:07 (hard), on 1.4 binary version, and is gone on 1.3.4.

Background of magazine covers are black

Use ThirteenAG's fix[10]
  1. Install ThirteenAG's fix.
  2. Make sure that the option BlackMagazineFix in scripts\NFSUnderground.WidescreenFix.ini is set to 1.
Disable Motion Blur and Light Trails[10]

Other information

API

Technical specs Supported Notes
Direct3D 9
Executable 32-bit 64-bit Notes
Windows

Modifications

Archie Goldmill's Cheat Engine table

Unlocks hidden vinyls and rim sizes

HD Reflections

Adds higher quality reflection.

Visual Reputation Remover

Makes it possible to progress through the game without ricing the car.

Various NFS ASIs

Let's you use debug features, such as the debug camera (AKA freecam)

Free Roam Mod

Let's you freely explore Olympic City
Extremely rare traffic
No option to explore the Drag mode tracks, use the old version of the mod for that (notice: you won't be able to explore the full city with the old version)

Winter Olympic City

Gives the games a winter overhaul
Does not require Texmod
Make sure to disable road reflections
Archived download link

Need for Speed Underground Definitive Edition

Adds 4K world textures, 8K skyboxes, rain puddles, improves the lighting, etc.

Need for speed Underground - Redux 2017 (Graphics mod) AMTxDRxRL

It adds new lighting so that it better reflects the atmosphere of street racing at night.

Nightbreath Mod by BojanV03 (SweetFX + texture & FX mod)

Improves the visuals and exaggerates the night time feeling

Need for Speed Underground - Midnight Light

Alternative graphics

Need for Speed: Underground - PlayStation 2 Mod

A mod features PlayStation 2 effects not found in the vanilla PC version:

Additional motion blur if you want Orange fog (black on main menu and car select if you want) More transparent textures Bright and heavy car windows Black "Need4Speed" on license plate Compatible with DualShock 3 Also compatible with Redux mod!

Fix TexEd 1.1 beta and newer not opening Eclipse's VINYLS.BIN file

Fix broken Eclipse vinyl archive[citation needed]
  1. Download fixed VINYLS.BIN.
  2. Copy the file to the <path-to-game>\CARS\ECLIPSE\.

System requirements

Windows
Minimum
Operating system (OS) 98, ME, 2000, XP
Processor (CPU) Intel Pentium III
AMD Athlon 700 MHz
System memory (RAM) 128 MB (98, ME)
256 MB (2000, XP)
Hard disk drive (HDD) 2 GB
Video card (GPU) Direct3D compatible
32 MB of VRAM


Notes

  1. SafeDisc retail DRM does not work on Windows 10[1] or Windows 11 and is disabled by default on Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 8, and Windows 8.1 when the KB3086255 update is installed.[2]
  2. 2.0 2.1 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).
  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.

References