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Installing VanillaTD

Toni Spets edited this page Aug 7, 2021 · 9 revisions

For best results, create a new empty directory to install VanillaTD into. Copy the build artifacts of your platform into this like the game executable (vanillatd.exe, sdl2.dll and openal32.dll on Windows).

The paths in the first column are relative to the root directory of your VanillaTD executable. Filename casing doesn't matter on case sensitive filesystems.

We currently do not support the unofficial v1.06c patch by Nyerguds.

Demo

The Command & Conquer demo comes in two zip archives (cc1demo1.zip + cc1demo2.zip) and the required files can be extracted from them directly.

It only contains low resolution assets which means "DOS mode" is enforced by Vanilla Conquer. The three demo missions and movies work like with the original demo executable. Skirmish is available but has no playable maps.

File Source
demo.mix cc1demo1.zip: DEMO.MIX
demol.mix cc1demo1.zip: DEMOL.MIX
sounds.mix cc1demo1.zip: SOUNDS.MIX
speech.mix cc1demo1.zip: SPEECH.MIX
demom.mix cc1demo2.zip: DEMOM.MIX

Retail

If you have physical retail CDs you can copy some of the files directly from them when the CD is mounted. If you are using the freeware release you can use something like 7-Zip to directly extract the necessary files from their respective ISO images.

You also need a tool to extract files from SETUP.Z. It's an InstallShield archive.

NOTE: You must use the CCLOCAL.MIX from the SETUP.Z archive and not any that you find loose in the INSTALL folder. Some discs were released including the freeware disc images that contain a German version of CCLOCAL.MIX which will lead to all kinds of confusion if you were not expecting your installation to be that language.

File Source
conquer.mix GDI or NOD disc: CONQUER.MIX
desert.mix GDI or NOD disc: DESERT.MIX
temperat.mix GDI or NOD disc: TEMPERAT.MIX
winter.mix GDI or NOD disc: WINTER.MIX
sounds.mix GDI or NOD disc: SOUNDS.MIX
cclocal.mix GDI or NOD disc, within: INSTALL/SETUP.Z
transit.mix GDI or NOD disc, within: INSTALL/SETUP.Z
speech.mix GDI or NOD disc, within: INSTALL/SETUP.Z
update.mix GDI or NOD disc, within: INSTALL/SETUP.Z
deseicnh.mix GDI or NOD disc, within: INSTALL/SETUP.Z
tempicnh.mix GDI or NOD disc, within: INSTALL/SETUP.Z
winticnh.mix GDI or NOD disc, within: INSTALL/SETUP.Z
gdi/general.mix GDI disc: GENERAL.MIX
gdi/movies.mix GDI disc: MOVIES.MIX
gdi/scores.mix GDI disc: SCORES.MIX
nod/general.mix NOD disc: GENERAL.MIX
nod/movies.mix NOD disc: MOVIES.MIX
nod/scores.mix NOD disc: SCORES.MIX

Patching C&C95 Gold with Demo for DOS mode

The Windows-only release of C&C95 which is also called "Gold" is the most popular release available. It's also the one that was released as freeware by EA. However, this version does not contain the required assets for DOS mode to work.

If you want to quickly patch it to play in DOS mode, you can use the table below with the Demo version to replace some MIX files:

File Demo file
conquer.mix demo.mix
local.mix demol.mix

Note that you are replacing the existing conquer.mix with the one from the demo so make a copy of it first.

Covert Operations

If you have physical retail CDs you can copy all of the files directly from them when the CD is mounted.

File Source
sc-000.mix COVERTOPS disc: INSTALL/SC-000.MIX
sc-001.mix COVERTOPS disc: INSTALL/SC-001.MIX
speech.mix COVERTOPS disc: INSTALL/SPEECHMIX
covertops/general.mix COVERTOPS disc: GENERAL.MIX
covertops/movies.mix COVERTOPS disc: MOVIES.MIX
covertops/scores.mix COVERTOPS disc: SCORES.MIX

Final Directory Structure

Your final directory structure for a portable install should look like the following. If you ommit conquer.ini (which can be empty), then writable data will go to C:\Users\username\AppData\Roaming\Vanilla-Conquer\vanillatd on Windows and a conquer.ini file will be generated there on first run. WESTWOOD/C&C95 is the path the original installer uses.

WESTWOOD/  
├─ C&C95/  
│  ├─ covertops/  
│  │  ├─ GENERAL.MIX  
│  │  ├─ MOVIES.MIX  
│  │  ├─ SCORES.MIX  
│  ├─ gdi/  
│  │  ├─ GENERAL.MIX
│  │  ├─ MOVIES.MIX
│  │  ├─ SCORES.MIX
│  ├─ nod/
│  │  ├─ GENERAL.MIX  
│  │  ├─ MOVIES.MIX  
│  │  ├─ SCORES.MIX  
│  ├─ CCLOCAL.MIX  
│  ├─ conquer.ini  
│  ├─ CONQUER.MIX  
│  ├─ DESEICNH.MIX  
│  ├─ DESERT.MIX  
│  ├─ LOCAL.MIX  
│  ├─ SC-000.MIX  
│  ├─ SC-001.MIX  
│  ├─ SOUNDS.MIX  
│  ├─ SPEECH.MIX  
│  ├─ TEMPERAT.MIX  
│  ├─ TEMPICNH.MIX  
│  ├─ UPDATE.MIX  
│  ├─ UPDATEC.MIX  
│  ├─ vanillatd.exe  
│  ├─ WINTER.MIX  
│  ├─ WINTICNH.MIX  
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