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Skipping Intro On Windows 7


Razgriz
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Hi everyone. I actually joined today specifically to share this bit of information. I've recently started playing Rebellion again and have it working on my 64-bit Windows 7 laptop. It's great, but like many of you, I'm annoyed at the fact I can't skip the intro briefings. However, there is hope! (Hopefully, this isn't old news, so sorry if it is. I couldn't find anything about how to fix this issue and the Wiki lists it as a "problem" but doesn't offer a solution.)

 

I'm a computer engineering major, so I'd like to think I know my way around a system at least moderately well at this point so I decided to dive into the Rebellion data files and see what I could find. I started by individually removing MDATA files, as those are media files, but I quickly realized that the briefing isn't a media file. It's just a hard-coded progression of events in the game. Frustrated, I moved on to looking at some of the dll and resource files. Using Resource Hacker, I started examining the images and sounds contained within various DLL files. Thankfully, I didn't have to go far, as I quickly discovered that ALBRIEF.DLL contains the WAVE and BMP files that are used in the Rebels briefing. Looking for it's partner, I found EMBRIEF.DLL does the same for the Empire. Now to go about disabling these without breaking the game. First thing I thought was pretty simple: backup the file and delete it! So I did. I deleted ALBRIEF.DLL and started up the game. Splash videos and texts all appeared fine and the main menu opened without a problem. THen I started up a game as the Rebels. The Rebel cutscene loaded just fine and then the galactic map appeared. Suddenly things started flashing and dinging really quickly, but there was no briefing. I realized that the game was actually just cycling through the highlighting that occurs naturally during the briefing, but since it had nothing to play, there was nothing to slow it down. After about 3 seconds of various sectors being highlighted, the message panel containing advice from C3P0 popped up like it does at the end of the briefing. I closed the window and everything seemed fine! I've played through about 200 days on an Empire game with no problems since doing this.

 

TL;DR? Sorry if this is old news, but I couldn't find it anywhere and it's not on the Wiki so I thought I'd share. Backing up and deleting ALBRIEF.DLL and EMBRIEF.DLL from the installation directory will DELETE the briefings for both sides. It'll cycle through all the highlighting that occurs during the briefing very quickly but the game does not crash and is playable afterwards. If, for some reason, you want the briefings back in, just restore the files from the backups and enjoy a 4 minute lecture from a protocol droid.

 

EDIT: There's absolutely no reason this shouldn't work on any other OS or architecture so Windows 8, Vista, and 32-bit machines can handle this as well.

 

Enjoy!

-Raz

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viewtopic.php?f=3&t=27843

 

Yeah, it's been mentioned before and maybe even before that thread but that's the first one that I found. Welcome to poking around in Rebellion. Happy hunting. :lol:

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"In the future it will become easier for old negatives to become lost and be 'replaced' by new altered negatives. This would be a great loss to our society. Our cultural history must not be allowed to be rewritten." - George Lucas, 1988. [u.S. Congressional hearing testimony on film preservation.]

 

My old Rebellion site (very web 1.0) - Bud's Korner and Rebellion Strategy

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This community was much more active back in the day. You'll find a lot more posts from the 09-10 era, and even more before that.

 

Still, good job figuring it out on your own. If you want another project, I can let you know of some that haven't been solved yet :wink:

Star Wars: Rebellion, A Field Manual

"O be wise, what can I say more?"

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Ultimately the 2005~2007 era will yield you the most posts. That was when Mad, Tofu and I were at our worst as far as time spent on the forums/spamming went. I wonder if E could pull up some forum posts per day numbers....
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Chaos, Panic, Disorder, Destruction.....

My work here is done.

 

Grand AKmiral

Commander-in-Chief of BEAK Forces

(CINCBEAK) BEAK Imperium

"To BEAK is Divine!"

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