Forum Discussion

JCOMMAND's avatar
JCOMMAND
11 years ago
Solved

C&C ultimate collection Red Alert 2 wont start

Hi I just downloaded Red Alert 2 and Yuri's revenge from the Command and Conquer Ultimate Edition through origin.  When I click Play in origin the window that lets me chose between Red Alert 2 or Yu...
  • Anonymous's avatar
    Anonymous
    11 years ago

    Try to disable the In-Game overlay in Origin settings. This resolved my game launch issues with Red Alert 2 and Generals.

Nyerguds's avatar
Nyerguds
Hero+
10 years ago

@suuus93 You only asked about compatibility mode. The problem you have is indeed one for which you need to edit that ra2.ini file 🤓

Basically, that means that the resolution configured in Red Alert 2 is one your monitor doesn't support. There are two ways around this:

  1. Open ra2.ini, find the [Video] section, and adjust the values under it. If the section doesn't exist, create it:
    [Video]
ScreenWidth=1920
    ScreenHeight=1080
    Though you're better off actually looking in your desktop's Screen Resolution settings what video modes are supported. I'd start with something like 1280x768 instead. These sprite-based games don't scale, so the larger the resolution, the more terrain you see, but also the smaller your tanks and buildings become in the game. If your stuff becomes too small, this is not really an advantage.
  2. Run the game in Windowed mode, by opening its game properties in Origin and adding the "-win" parameter in the text box. This will require you to switch your desktop to 16-bit colour, though. If you're in Windows 10, this is easier, since there should be an option in the properties of the program (as explained in my previous post) to run the program in 16-bit colour mode. This does have the disadvantage that your units will ALWAYS look small in the game, no matter the configured game resolution.
Anonymous's avatar
Anonymous
10 years ago

@Nyerguds

so nw the extensions are showing and i have only 2 files with an .ini extension and non is called ra2.ini ....the pics show all the files for the game that i have 

  • Nyerguds's avatar
    Nyerguds
    Hero+
    10 years ago

    @suuus93 It looks like they're only created on first run. You can create them yourself. This is more or less the standard generated file, for both ra2.ini and ra2md.ini:

    [Intro]
Play=no

[Options]
GameSpeed=3
Difficulty=1
ScrollMethod=0
ScrollRate=3
AutoScroll=yes
DetailLevel=2
SidebarCameoText=yes
UnitActionLines=yes
ShowHidden=no
ToolTips=yes

[Video]
ScreenWidth=800
ScreenHeight=600
StretchMovies=no

[Audio]
SoundVolume=0.700000
VoiceVolume=0.700000
ScoreVolume=0.400000
IsScoreRepeat=no
IsScoreShuffle=no
SoundLatency=9
InGameMusic=yes

[Network]
Socket=65535
NetCard=0
NetID=ffcf,ffdf,ffcf,

    So yeah... make a new text file for each config file, make sure to rename the extension from .txt to .ini, paste that stuff into it, and then adjust the video stuff.

    • Anonymous's avatar
      Anonymous
      10 years ago

      Hi,

      I have exactly the same issue. It have be partly solved by creating the both files with the content you gave and remplacing the resolution with those from my dysplay. Now RA2 works but with the same settings the expansion still encounters the error 'Unable to set the video mode'...

      Anyway thank you for your support.

    • Anonymous's avatar
      Anonymous
      10 years ago

      @Nyerguds

      thank you this works now and it opens but now the game freezes after 5 minutes every time i run it and then i have to start my laptop... so ill read the questions and comments again maybe ill find a solution

About Command & Conquer Franchise Discussion

Chat about your favorite games in the Command and Conquer franchise and get help from the player community.13,560 PostsLatest Activity: 13 hours ago