**TL;DR: New Tribes Vengeance installer addressing all known/past issues. Point & click principle; the installer does everything for you (as it should). Download link at the bottom of the post. **

As promised, here is the first of several bigger announcements concerning the game Tribes: Vengeance. For the sake of trying to please everyone and keeping the post readable I will separate the post into three major parts:

1) brief summary
2) in-depth explanations on why, what, changes, ...
3) links to installer, community and support channels

 

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** 1. Brief summary **

 

The installer does not only include more features than ever before, it also does a lot of things automatically. Here is a brief summary (read part 2 for in-depth information):

* Automatically sets CD-Key to registry as well as other information so you can now find the game by browsing your Windows menu and uninstall by using Windows Control Panel
* A ton of screen resolutions have been added to suit nowadays monitors
* Includes all popular map packs
* Includes a ton of commonly used mutator and mod files
* Includes a lot of performance tweaks, such as increasing CacheSizeMegs, setting netspeed to 20000 and uncapping FPS
* Includes a lot of basic fixes, such as redirecting the game to the new master servers, fixing a couple of Quickchat issues, NOCD fix
* Includes a couple of convenience tweaks such as automatically enabled console (if you use the generated shortcut) and updated in game HUD
* Includes a readme containing a brief FAQ should issues still occur
* Includes handy tools such as an external Server Browser and the Tribes Vengeance Cache Manager
* Installation is Windows 10 compatible
* Removed unnecessary and/or broken GUI components

 

Known issues:

* File size can prove to be an issue for some people
* Unfinished downloads result in a corrupted archive, which is why we recommend using a download manager if you have slow internet

 

Installation instructions:

* Download the game, using the link provided below
* Install the game as **administrator**
* Enjoy the game
Note: We are talking about very big file sizes, as of such patience can be required while downloading and installing. Also, we recommend having an internet connection when installing the game, as it will allow more CD-Keys to be fetched.

 

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** 2. In-depth information **

 

In this part of the post I will go over each and every topic concerning the installer. Please note this will be quite lengthy, as I want to provide everyone with complete information and want to try answer as many questions as possible beforehand.

First of, **the installation process itself**. The past installers were actually never full game installers. They were merely big archives containing all necessary files needed to get the game running. So all it did, basically, was extracting the files to said location and that was it. This caused lesser experienced computer users to experience issues playing the game as you were required to browse towards the Program\Bin folder and run the game's executable from there. Not only that, this also meant the user had to manually insert a CD-Key into the computer's registry, by using the tvkeychanger program, and couldn't uninstall through regular windows way (you had to manually delete the entire folder). Shortly put, this caused a lot of unnecessary issues and thus this was put on a front row seat in our "to-fix-list".

When installing, the following process is being run through (ordered chronologically): all files get extracted to chosen location, a CD-Key is generated and put in the correct place in your registry, your screen's resolution gets checked and set as default for Tribes Vengeance. A very, very important note is that the installer has to be run as administrator. Failing to do so will cause the program to be denied access to the computer's registry, causing the CD-key process to fail, ultimately requiring the user to do this manually after all. A thing we did include is an updated QuickChat, which has a couple of extra flag commands, as the default QuickChat was missing these.

The only remaining issue here is people getting corrupted files, because the installer's download wasn't completed successfully. This mainly happens to users with slow internet or those who lack the patience to let the download finish. There is nothing we can do to fix this on our end, as this is because of the user. The only advice we can give is to use a download manager. As the name hints, such a program "manages your downloads" and allows you to pause, resume a download and all that. Using such a program reduces the risk of getting corrupted files tremendously, if not ruling it out completely.

Wrapping this part up, this means that the game can now be installed easier than ever before. Presumably as easy is it can possible get. I would like to add that we have tested the installer thoroughly and no issues were identified. We have tested this on multiple operating systems, including Windows 10 and even Windows Vista.

Secondly, I will explain **why the choice was made to include this amount of content**. First of all, the maps. Previous game archives already contained a ton of maps, but only the really popular. Meaning that when a server administrator chose to play another map for the sake of diversity, new users would experience serious issues as they would need to find and install the maps manually, as the in game download system is simply too slow. This is why the decision was made to include approximately 10 to 15 map packs, which basically means almost every map pack currently hosted on the tribesrevengeance.com website is included. It can be safely said that when a user uses this new installer, (s)he has all necessary content to play on the major servers. However, should a user be wanting to install more 'niche' maps, we expect the user to be at least a little bit familiar with the process of extracting files and such. Of course, support will be given to those who ask. Also important to note is that Dicerolla will presumably start work on another map pack in the short future. This obviously means that, unless a new installer is compiled after him completing the map pack, people will still have to download these maps afterwards. If we are going to or not is a decision I cannot make at this point in time, as there are several options available to address this issue.

Furthermore we have player- and weaponskins, sounds, special effects, HUD adjustments and so forth. Concerning these items, the decision was made to leave the game as close to default as possible. As said in the brief summary above, little changes were made to the HUD to increase convenience but that is it. We consider these items to be a great addition to the game, but only to those who are already familiar with not only extracting files, but also with adjusting the necessary .ini configuration files. No need to explain that this can be quite a complicated process and a lot of things can go wrong. This is why we advice this only to the 'advanced user', so to speak. However, once again, support can be asked and will be given.

Continuing, we get to said game **tweaks and fixes**. Concerning the applied tweaks, several things can be said. The basic idea is to adjust a couple of variables and enable a couple of things to better suit nowadays computers (read: assign more resources to the game to increase performance and quality). CacheSizeMegs has been vastly increased to increased loading speed, "smoothing the game out" as some call it. FPS has been uncapped to allow more than 90 frames per second, resulting in a smoother experience overall. Obviously a NOCD-fix was applied, this for obvious reasons (this was also the case in previous archives, obviously). Netspeed has been pulled upwards to 20000, meaning there is more bandwidth assigned for player <-> server communication. The FOV (Field of View) has been set to 120 because the default, 85, was ridiculously low, especially with nowadays monitors.

As far as fixes go, the following can be said. First of all a very minor issue was addressed concerning the "Imperial-2" quickchat, where the "Acknowledged" wouldn't give a sound when played, this has been fixed. Next, a lot of screen resolutions were added from which you can choose in the in game options menu. Resulations have been added for 4:3, 5:3, 5:4, 16:9, and 16:10 aspect ratios (up to 4k and beyond). Furthermore, the updated Engine.dll file, pointing the game towards the correct master servers, has been included. Lastly, the broken or obsolete GUI components are removed, "fixing" this issue for the time being.

Lastly, we get to the **additional content**. Not only did we choose to include a ton of game content, we have also chosen to include a couple fancy things. First of all a Tribes Vengeance Resolution Fixer, which can be found in the Program\Bin folder by the name "TV Resolution fixer". What this does, is check your monitors resolution and apply it to Tribes Vengeance. This purely for user convenience. Next, we have a Tribes Vengeance Key Generator, found in the same directory, by the name "TV Key Generator". This is the program that is being run during the installation. The choice to put it in the said folder is that *should* problems arise concerning CD-Keys (which we don't expect at this point in time), the users have all necessary tools to fix the issue.

Continuing, we have a Tribes Vengeance Server Browser, found in the main Tribes Vengeance directory by the name "TV Server Browser". This is an awesome program which displays the game's server listings without the user having to start to game or browse towards tribesrevengeance.com to check the status' of the servers. This means the user has 3 options to check the server status'. Furthermore, we have chosen to include a program called the Tribes Vengeance Cache Manager, which folder can be found in the main Tribes Vengeance directory. Shortly put, this program turns cache files downloaded through the in game download-system into permanent files. Until we release new content or choose to add some niche stuff to our servers, this program is obsolete, but is there just in case. Lastly we have the said ReadMe file, also found in the main Tribes Vengeance directory. This includes a brief FAQ addressing some issues that may arise, as well as links towards the community.

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**3. Links**

**Installer download**: http://tribesrevengeance.com/downloads/revengeance.php

**Forum**: http://forum.tribesrevengeance.com/index.php

**Facebook group 1**: https://www.facebook.com/groups/tribesVengeance/

**Facebook group 2**: https://www.facebook.com/groups/59114335438/

**Steam group**: http://steamcommunity.com/groups/TribesReVengeance