I am new to this forum, although I have been using the website for quite a while. I am running "Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II" on my PC, and I have a problem. I have access to one computer at home, and I want to play multiplayer. I have a Joypad for use for the second player, and I am running two instances of the app in windowed mode using Mzzt's "Uber Jedi Mod Manager" (A great program by the way) and I have set up an "Internet" connection through "localhost" The two instances of the game are able to connect to my fake Internet Multiplayer server, but I have run into a problem that I thought would have a simple solution. It turns out, the problem I have was a sticky one. I can't seem to find a program that will let you have multiple windows active at once, so while one screen is active, the other won't freeze. I need to know if there is a mod or app out there that will let me play this game multiplayer locally in this way, or in any other way. Thank you very much.
- stormdroid23

I can't help you with your problem, but it may be easier to find a cheapo PC and just have two running. JK doesn't take up many resources, I mean, when I first got it, I was playing it on a P1 233mhz with an s3 virge card (in software mode). If you can get a P1/P2 and something even like a voodoo 2 or riva TNT, you'll be golden.

I know what you mean, JK takes up virtually no proccessing power; most any computer can run it fine. I might end up buying a cheapo PC like you said, but I know that my computer can handle another instance. I look at some linux emulation apps that will still run while the window is inactive, and I am sure there is one out there that will make any app do the same, and probably even for JK. ALso, I have another question.
Can I run a mod like JKE (a truly groundbreaking graphics mod for JK) and Saber Battle X or Guardians of the Galaxy simultaneously? When I run SBX, the effect cancels out that of JKE, and I can't figure out how to apply both mods.

I started playing it with a P166 with a 4meg 2D card (really jerky, but it ran).

Seriously, you probably don't need to buy a computer, if you see something on the side of the road, I give it 50% chance of running JK well enough for NF sabers.

i beat all of you i started playing on a P133 with less than 32 meg of ram and a cheap graphcis card oh yea and it had soundblaster 16

P164 with a Voodoo2 for me, if I recall.

Do you have a dualcore processor? I believe my friend from cisco networking had his dualcore rigged so he could either multithread one game, or dual-screen 2 games.

[QUOTE=Andrew L]i beat all of you i started playing on a P133 with less than 32 meg of ram and a cheap graphcis card oh yea and it had soundblaster 16 :P[/QUOTE]

I started JK on a Pentium 120 MHz with 16 mb of RAM, an integrated (non 3d accelerated) graphics card, and a 33.6k US Robotics modem. I played the game online on that system for a long time.

This is 12 different kinds of wrong, but to stick with one kind of wrong, Windows only allows for one window system-wide to have focus at a time.

This is EXACTLY my problem. Windows has a one-window focus system, and while I was able to dual-screen two games, and connect to the localhost, I find it impossible to run both simultaneously, as one or the other WILL lose focus.

[QUOTE=Andrew L]i beat all of you i started playing on a P133 with less than 32 meg of ram and a cheap graphcis card oh yea and it had soundblaster 16 :P[/QUOTE]

that's fnny... I got JK to run on my Palm Zire 71, with minimal resoltution and no special effects, with 16MB of RAM, and 2 GB of SD memory... hehe

It may be possible to make a program which sends the keystrokes between windows.

What you'd have to do is: Make a program to give focus too. (Or, create system wide keyboard hook) Add some buttons to launch JK this way you could get the HWND of each JK window, then use SendMessage() to forward keypresses between windows. Probably the easiest way to do this is to get another program which simulates a key press when a joypad button is pressed.

Using a keyboard hook may be easier. This way you could give the Joypad window focus and just unbind any keys you want to use in the other instance then have your program copy all keypresses to the other (unfocused) window.

That is, of course if JK will respond at all if it's not focused.

I'm 99% sure it won't.

I don't know... If you send a keypress to a window using SendMessage() it recieves it whether it's focused or not. The problem with JK may be that when it's not focused it goes into the menu (like when you press Esc)

If I had JK installed i'd test it.

I said "I believe." I don't know what he did, or how he got it working. I also don't know if he was running linux.

You are correct, JK will not respond when not focused.

THAT's an idea... I wonder if it will run on linux, perhaps with WINE? I thought I tried it years back, but it was unuccesful. JK won't work with that particuklar windows emulator...

When JK is not focused, the screen simply freezes. Howevr, I have gotten JA to work MP, just mind-bogglingly slow. I prefer the MP in JK anyway.

Yes.. but it only wont respond because it's not receiving any key presses.

If it were sent keypresses it should respond.

I just installed JK I can only get it into windowed mode in the GUI. How did you get 2 copies of JK running? Was 1 always in the menu?

or did you manage to get JK running in windowed mode?

He mentioned using "Uber Jedi Mod Manager". Don't know what that is, does it have something to do with it?

yes, i did, I used Mzzt's Uber Jedi Mod Manager , and I enabled "allow multiple instances" in the options dialog under the Jedi Knight tab. I did get it to run in windowed mode using the same program

I tried it, and cannot run JK in windowed mode outside the GUI. I selected allow multiple instances and window GUI but no during gameplay it always goes to fullscreen and I cant get it to go to my 2nd monitor either.

Check the box in the Mod manager that says, advanced display options, then go into the game and under display, click advanced, and find the windowed mode. That should allow the game to run in windowed mode. I just can't figure out how to get both windows focused...

Ah, that uses software mode and does actually stop responding when it's not focused

I think if you could force hardware rendered JK into a window it would still respond (e.g. still work, you could still see what was going on in the game.)

I don't think it's possible to do what you're trying to do.

The short answer is you can't do what you're asking, it would take alot of work to get Windows to focus between both JK windows and respond to keystrokes for both. As suggested earlier, it would be easiest to just get another crappy machine and set up a small home network.

Well, what I suggested would work if JK didn't stop rendering when the windows not focused.