QUICK TROUBLESHOOTING FAQ

- Just to let you know...

- Kyodai was created and tested on two different configurations, using both Windows 95 and Windows 98. I didn't experience any problem, and when I did, I corrected the bugs rather quickly. I believe Kyodai to be safe to use. If you ever have problems with it (lock-ups, ...), it is probably due to your own configuration : outdated drivers, installation problems, missing files... From time to time, a letter pops up in my mailbox, telling me "well, I've got an Access Violation there and there", and after a while, the problem disappears after the person in question has reinstalled Windows or his drivers... (Or upgraded his video/sound cards)

- If you find no way to fix your problem...

- Try to install an older version of Kyodai to see if it works, like v1.21 (a freeware and very quick download -- 67kb). You can find it at http://kyodai.com

- Try to check out my site to see if there's a new version out there. The updates history can be found at http://kyodai.com/kyonew.html

- FIRST, THE THING TO TRY WHENEVER YOU EXPERIENCE A PROBLEM WITH KYODAI...

- Quit Kyodai. Run the explorer and go to your Kyodai directory. You should find there a file named "kyodai.ini". Rename it to "kyodai.bak" or anything else you want. Try to launch Kyodai again. If everything works fine, then check the options, reenter your registration password if you have one, etc.

- I liked the look'n'feel of the versions before Kyodai 8.0 ! How can I go back to this...?

- First, disable the "Stretch Tileset" and "Stretch Background" options in the Configuration menu. Choose the "Kyodai" tileset (or your usual favorite old-format tileset, which you just need to copy to your Tilesets directory), and if you're not in 800x600, double-click on the title bar if the window is maximized (it is, by default), and resize it to the good old 800x600. In case you don't manage to resize it correctly, quit Kyodai, edit the Kyodai.ini file and change the WPos and HPos numbers to 800 and 600. Now Kyodai should more or less look like it used to be in version 7.77 and before. As I said, Kyodai is entirely customizable... ;-) (And I like the previous look'n'feel, too ! I like both, actually...)

- I'm trying to create a tileset for Kyodai, but I can't find ideas for the Seasons and Flowers...

- You don't have to "stick" to seasons and flowers... You can even (and that's the best alternative in this case) make a tile like the others and copy it four times to make a "fake" family... It will then behave like all the other "normal" tiles. Do that for the Seasons and the Flowers (two different tiles copied 4 four times, which makes 8 tiles in total).

- The animations are slow on my computer. How can I accelerate them ?

- For optimal speed, make sure you don't have any other program running in the background...

- The tileset looks stretched. I don't like this !

- The tileset is programmed by default to adapt itself to the size of your screen. You can select the default size by disabling "Stretch Tileset" in the Configuration menu.

- I was used to the previous tileset and tile size ! (before v8.0)

- Select the "Kyodai" tileset in the Tileset menu, and uncheck "Stretch Tileset" in the Configuration menu. It's as simple as that !

- How do I differentiate the Seasons from the Flowers in the Ivory tileset ?

- Granted, it's relatively hard to recognize them. But if you watch closely, the Flowers are accompanied with a red Chinese character on their right, and the Seasons have a Green character on their left. If you have trouble making the difference, you can always choose the MahJongg tileset, the default tileset from Kyodai 1.0 to 7.77...

- How come it takes so long to load a background or a tileset ?

- Kyodai uses a cool resizing technology that gives incredible results. However, to achieve this quality level, the technology uses heavy floating point operations. If you don't have a Pentium II (or better) processor, it may take years... The easy solution is to disactivate Tileset and Background Stretching (Configuration menu, "Stretch Tileset" and "Stretch Background" options). Sorry about that. If you want a "quick resizing" function, I could add it in the future, but the Stretch functions of Windows are extremely limited and the results can vary from bad to awful... I had to make a choice. I hope you can understand.

- What does "Malus" mean in the Hall of Fame ?

- It's the opposite of "Bonus"... It's the time added to your score when you click on Hint or Shuffle. It's included in the final time shown on the left column... If you want to know exactly how much time you needed to complete a board, without the malus, you just need to substract this value from the overall time...

- How can I get back my previous high-scores when I install a new version ?

- How can I be automatically registered when I install a new version, if I've registered earlier ?

- Simply, install it over the previous one... Starting from version 7.21, the program is now installed by default in the "Program Files\Kyodai Mahjongg" directory. You shouldn't have to deal with these problems anymore...

- Why does Kyodai ask me to register again ? I already registered before !

- You probably installed Kyodai in a different directory. You just have to enter the same password again. You can find it in your previous Kyodai directory, in the kyodai.ini file. Always keep a copy of your user name & password somewhere on a floppy disk or anything like that, so you can be sure to find it when you need to re-enter it.

- Kyodai doesn't accept my password !

- Make sure you entered the user name and password correctly... The user name is case-sensitive. If your name is John Smith and you received the user name "John Smith", you can't type "john smith", it won't work... You should use the Copy & Paste functions to enter this information, especially for the password. Two other reasons why your password is not accepted : you enter a Kyodai 2.88 password (you need to upgrade (it's only $5) and you'll receive the new password), or you simply didn't register yet... Some people may think that they need to enter a password before they register. It is not the case. The password is assigned to you when you register (for example, by visiting the link in the Registration dialog box). Finally, some people think that the user name they receive from GetSoftware (something like "1234-MyLastName") is to be used in Kyodai. Not true. It is used to connect to GetSoftware's protected areas. Don't mistake it with Kyodai's user name and password.

- I can't launch Kyodai ! It says something like "MMSYSTEM275 File not found"...

- Check out your \Kyodai\Musics\ directory to see if you have all your MIDI files there. If you can't find any *.mid file there, just put a new MIDI file into that directory.

- I can't launch Kyodai ! It says something like "Access Violation..."...

- There are several reasons why this could happen. The main one is that you have not enough memory left. If you don't have a lot of memory, make sure to close all your other running applications before launching Kyodai.

- I can't launch Kyodai ! It says something like "is not an integer value"...

- Remove the "hallfame.ini" file in your Kyodai directory. It should happen only in earlier versions of Kyodai, if you don't enter any name in the Hall of Fame when you win.

- I can't launch Kyodai ! It says something like "MCI driver not found"...

- I found out that, most of the time, this problem can be resolved by simply replacing the "kyodai.ini" file with a new copy (see earlier in this doc). I have no explanation why this "MCI Driver not found" problem pops up. I think it has nothing to do with drivers anyway. In Kyodai 3.01, the problem happened sometimes when I tried to show a dialog box with ShowMessage instead of MessageBox before the main window was shown. Microsoft, please ? What's the problem ? I've noticed that, on certain configurations, the problem is still present even if I use the MessageBox function. Gosh...

- If the problem is related to your soundcard, try to create (or modify) a "Kyodai.ini" file in your Kyodai directory, and add the line "PlayMusic=0" (without the brackets). If you already have such a line, make sure its says "0" and not "1". Then run Kyodai. If it still doesn't work, try to do the same thing with "PlaySounds=0" and "StartMusic=0".

- I can hear the sound effects, but not the music !

- Check out your audio configuration... More exactly, the "MIDI" tab in the Multimedia section (Configuration Panel). Try different outputs and restart Kyodai. Also, make sure the "Play Music" option in the Configuration menu is enabled... ;-)

- My colors are all messed up !

- I can't distinguish the tiles in the Clicks, Slider and Hashira games !

- Are you in 8-bit (256 colors) mode ? Try to click on the right button and select "Redraw". If it doesn't work, minimize then maximize again your window. If nothing works, make sure you're not running another application at the same time. If the colors are messed up only when you move your mouse on a tile, try to select "None" in the Highlight section of the Options menu. Anyway, try to switch to another resolution with more colors (Control Panel > Display > Configuration, or "Switch to High-Color" in the Kyodai menu), and then Kyodai will work perfectly.

- A quick solution to avoid color problems in 256-color mode : Background "None", Tileset "Few Colors", and disable the Manga Girls ("View" menu). It should solve all your problems. In the Clicks / Slider / Hashira etc. games, there is no solution so far. The only way you can play them is to switch to 16 or 24-bit color modes...

- If you don't know how to switch to a higher color depth resolution : right click on an empty area of your Windows desktop, select "Properties", then the "Settings" tab, and change the "Colors" settings.

- I'm in 640x480 and I can't see the end of the menu !

- Open any menu, and access the rest of the menu by pressing the right arrow key.

- I can't see the tiles on the right !

- How can I remove the purple panel on the right ?

- You're playing in 640x480 mode, aren't you ? So, you have the choice : either you choose "Stretch Tileset" in the Configuration menu (recommended method), or you remove the Hall of Fame panel (disable the "Show Hall of Fame" feature), or you switch to 800x600 or more. In the third case, check the related feature in the Configuration menu. Or simply, press <Ctrl+F>, quit Kyodai and launch it again. You're done.

- I can't see the Hall of Fame panel, even if I specifically ask Kyodai to show it !

- Well that's a reported bug I haven't been able to reproduce in Kyodai 8.0... Neither did my beta-testers... So I guess it's not related to Kyodai itself. If you experience it, send me a mail.

- Games often end with two tiles of the same type ontop of each other. This way, the game never ends...

- No, you can end it... <Back> then <Shuffle>. That's all !!! :) And it's four tiles and not two, press <Back> twice and then <Shuffle>...

- Kyodai hangs up when I press <Shuffle>

- This bug is supposed to have been removed in v5.36. If you still experience the problem, please notify me. (So far, no one ever did.)

- What does "Canvas does not allow drawing" mean ?

- You may not have enough resources or memory left. Please close your other applications and everything should go back to normal. There is also one situation where Kyodai is very resource-demanding (and can result in such an error message) : whenever you change the tileset, resize the window or call the "Cool Tile Borders" option.

- I can't hear the sound effects when I'm playing a MOD music file !

- There's nothing I can do about it... Both use the wave output of your sound card... And I don't have access to the ModPlug code so I can't mix them. Sorry about this... Please note, however, that if you have a recent sound card capable of playing several distinct digital channels, you'll hear the sound effects. The Sound Blaster Live is one of them. (I can confirm this since I have one and it rocks !)

- I can't see any MOD file in the music menu !

- I'm unable to play MOD music !

- First, make sure you've installed the ModPlug DLL in the Kyodai directory... The name of the file is npmod32.dll and you can download it on my website (mod.zip file). Now, check your Kyodai\Musics subdirectory and verify the MOD music files are there. Run Kyodai, and check the "Enable MOD music" in the configuration menu (if it wasn't already checked, relaunch Kyodai). Finally, make sure the "Random Music" menu item is disabled. If there is any problem, it is probably due to your configuration. The ModPlug DLL (which was not written by me) doesn't seem to be compatible with all sound devices and operating systems. (That's why I removed it by default from the Kyodai package)

- Can Kyodai play another digital music format ?

- Kyodai uses the ModPlug DLL and can play any music recognized by this cool program. If you have a XM music file, for example, you just need to change its extension to MOD and Kyodai will recognize it...

- Sometimes when I play Hashira, my computer becomes incredibly slow...

- I've experienced this problem myself once (and only once). Apparently, it comes from the way Windows calls threads. I have checked the timer's source and there's no apparent bug in it... So, I guess if it happens to you, it's bad luck... Quit Kyodai and relaunch it... I'm thinking of another way to program the timer... It seems like Windows NT doesn't allow the same timings and thus makes the game extremely fast... (!)

- Hey, I've found a way of cheating in [insert the name of your favorite game] !

- Well, there are indeed a few ways to cheat, especially to stop the columns from falling in Hashira... But my question is : what would be the point in cheating ? You're playing for fun, aren't you ? You're playing to try to beat your best score, maybe ? Or you're just trying to impress your friends with your high score ? So, well, why not simply open the Hallfame.ini file and change the scores directly in it... That's one of the reasons why I've never crypted the Hall of Fame data. I don't want to install a competition between users. Kyodai is an artistic relaxation game. Nothing more...

- How do I add/remove tilesets, backgrounds and tilesets in the menus ?

- They are stored in your Kyodai directory, in the subdirectories Tilesets, Backgrounds and Layouts, simply ! Run your Windows Explorer, go to these directories and deal with the files as you want !

- I found another bug that isn't mentioned in this FAQ !

- Please drop me a mail, including details about your configuration, a copy of your Kyodai.ini file, and the way to reproduce the bug. I'm doing everything I can to find all the possible bugs during the beta-sessions, but I'm alone, and sometimes these bugs are related to a specific configuration, not a programming mistake.

- Why don't you answer my e-mail ?

- I'm getting a LOT of e-mail in my box. Many of them are related to Kyodai. I can't answer to ALL of these mails without causing Kyodai to be delayed a bit more each time. I think I reply to about 75% of the mails I receive. So if you really need an answer, make sure you registered, and enclose in your e-mail your user name and your registration date (or order ID). And if I still don't answer your mail, feel free to re-submit it after 24 hours. I'm doing everything I can !

- What's with these strange version numbers...?

- I don't like these unoriginal "8.01" version numbers.. ;-) I tend to use these ones : x.21 (my age when I started making Kyodai, and one of my favorite numbers), x.28 (Gemini Saga's age in my favorite anime, Saint Seiya), x.42 (read some Douglas Adams to figure out... And it's also 21 multiplied by two), x.52 (taken from Helene's address ;-)), x.75 (my birth year) and x.xx (because it looks cool ;-)).

Kyodai Mahjongg is © Copyright 1997, 1998, 1999 by René-Gilles Deberdt.

All rights reserved.