It's always good advice to be patched up and pristine so begin by downloading the latest Drivers for your Graphics card & Soundcard.

This will give you a good start.

Don't forget to install the latest patch, for SOF2. Again will make sure that problems encountered can more easily traced.

Not only that, it may have additional enhancements.

Install that latest version of DirectX on your system. This can avoid problems with Sound & Input devices.

If you are experiencing lockups & such, they might be caused by overclocking, if which case try lowering the Memory/Core speed of the overclocked device to see if it resolves any problems.

Finally, run Raven's "Installation Verification Tool", which will check the integrity of your game install.

If you do experience problems, this may reveal it to be a corrupted files, in which case re-install or replace the corrupt files.

The tweaks here can be either changed in your sof2sp.cfg (Single player) or sof2mp.cfg (Multiplayer) or you may make your own custom Config file for the Game.

If you want to make you own Config file then simply create a New Text Document, enter in the settings & save the file as All files & name it customconfig.cfg (Replace customconfig with your own title).

Save it in the base subdirectory of where SOF II is installed.

To load your customconfig.cfg in SOF II, bring down the console (Press Shift & Tilde key together) & type exec customconfig.cfg & hit the Enter key.

Note: If you choose to make the settings in your own custom Config file then you can omit the seta (space) from each setting.

In the myconfig there will be a seta followed by a space. E.g. In your myconfig.cfg a setting would appear as follows, seta r_allowExtensions "0", while in your own customconfig.cfg it would appear simply as r_allowExtensions "0".

Should you wish to enter commands during the game bring down the console (Press Shift & Tilde key together) & simply enter the command without quotation marks & hit the Enter key, e.g. cg_drawFPS 1.

Note: Some commands entered this way may not have effect immediately unless you then enter vid_restart or snd_restart which will restart the video & audio subsystems respectively.

Load SOF II Single player, select Options then the Video Settings tab.

Gamma.
This slider is used to adjust the level of RGB colour intensity.

Moving the slider to the right will increase the colour intensity, which can reduce texture detail by brightening textures too much if moved slid too far & vice versa.

Light Flares.
This options sets the detail of the light coronas from light sources, such as lamps, etc.

The screenshots beneath illustrate the effect of each mode available

Note: Images were saved in gif format which has caused some minor artefacts in the coronas themselves which don't exist in the game itself).

Off	Simple	Occluded

As you can see Occluded results in the nicest detail light corona, though while be the most taxing on your CPU/Graphics card.

Off is recommended for those on very slow CPUs (600Mhz or less) or severely fill rate limited Graphics cards (Light coronas are transparent, which costs fill rate).

As regards Simple I personally wouldn't recommend using this given the rendering errors associated with it.

Resolution.
Selecting a lower resolution can improve performance & maintain a stabler, higher frame rate.

Higher resolutions look better (sharper & smaller jagged edges), they also tend to run slower.

This all depends on how slow/fast your system (Particularly Graphics card) is of course.

Full Screen.
Set this to your own preference, though preferably On of course for best performance & largest viewing area.

Texture Quality.
Description: This setting controls the resolution of textures used in the game.

Lower settings: Uses more blurred level textures which require less Video memory.

Medium Setting: 32MB should be sufficient.

Higher option: will enable the use of sharper, more detailed textures, though performance will be lowered particularly on Graphics Cards with low Video memory.

High you should have 64MB of Video memory.

Very High option: Be sure you have an AGP Aperture size of 32MB or more in the BIOS & a Graphics Card with 128MB or more of Video memory.

Detected Video Card.
These 2 options in this section are merely for informational purposes, though should you find that the Graphics card listed doesn't match what you're using you might want to try installing newer Drivers.

Now select the Advanced Options button.

Texture Filter.
Trilinear texture filtering operates by taking 4 samples (texels) from 2 neighbouring Mipmaps, applies a bilinear filter to them & then interpolates the results.

This results in improved image quality, with more seamless transitions between Mipmap levels & enhanced texture detail compared to Bilinear filtering.

Most modern Graphics cards should be able to use Trilinear with little performance problems, except for those (still unfortunately) with 3dfx Graphics cards which should set this to Bilinear for best performance (As they cannot simultaneously perform Multi-texturing & Trilinear filtering).

Vertical Sync.
With this option you can enable/disable Vsync in the Game.

Vsync effectively limits the frame rate to your current refresh rate at any given resolution.

Frame rate can be perceivably increased when set to Off (disabled), as frames are rendered as fast as they can be regardless of refresh rate, although you may experience image tearing &/or controller lag as a result.

With this set to On (enabled) you won't experience either image tearing nor controller lag, although frame rate will be limited to your refresh rate.

As such I'd recommend enabling Vsync for best image quality & disabling it when you intend to benchmark system/game performance.

Quincunx Multisampling.
Setting this to Off will disable the use of Quincunx FSAA (Available with GeForce 3 & newer Graphics cards) which will provide improved frame rate & sharpest image.

On will enable Quincunx FSAA in the game, which provides improved jaggy smoothing over 2X FSAA, reduces texture aliasing & performs better than 4X FSAA though blurs the image more than 2X/4X or no FSAA would.

Don't bother setting this On if you've currently got a low frame rate & if you can afford to enable FSAA you would be best served using 2X or 4X FSAA instead.

Anisotropic Filtering Level.
This slider determines the anisotropic filtering level to be used in the game.

This provides greatly reduced texture aliasing & maintains texture sharpness over greater distances as compared to regular texture filtering methods.

By default this is set to the maximum level your Graphics card supports, i.e. fully to the right which can cause a great frame rate hit on the majority of Graphics cards.

Try setting this to the far left & get a good idea of regular game performance before you consider enabling this. 

For image quality reasons it would generally be preferable to use this before considering FSAA.

UI Texture Quality.
This option sets the resolution of the textures used for the UI (User Interface) in the game, only on very Video memory limited Graphics cards should you need to set this to Low.

Leave it at High on all other Graphics cards.

Colors.
Set to Medium (16 Bit) for best performance, but with more apparent color banding.

Set to High (32 Bit) will provide best visual quality with less apparent colour banding & reduced rendering errors as it uses a higher Z-Buffer precision for performing depth calculations, although performance will be reduced, especially on older Graphics cards.

Auto will use the regular Windows desktop colour depth, just select an option instead.

Recommend: Given the use of transparencies & fog in the game it is highly recommended you use High (32 Bit) if your Graphics card supports it.

FSAA.
This option allows you to select the FSAA mode to use in the game, with options available being Off, 2 Samples & 4 Samples.
Similar to the Anisotropic Filtering Level option you'd be best leaving this set to Off unless your current frame rate warrants the frame rate hit enabling FSAA will cause ? with 4 Samples providing greater jaggy smoothing than 2 Samples does, though performance will be much lower in this mode.

Alias Shaders.
Setting this option to On will reduce the variety of textures used within the game, which will provide memory savings/ improved performance on most systems. Selecting Off will enable the use of the full variety of textures as intended within the game, which is recommended for Graphics cards with 32MB or more of Video memory.

Advanced Texturing.
When set to On this enables rendering of detailed textures, which can further image detail in images though can also lower frame rate a bit. If you have a Graphics card older than GeForce 1 class then you'd probably be best setting this to Off instead for optimal performance.

Curve Subdivisions.
This setting controls how detailed the scenery/architecture is in the game.

Selecting a higher detail option will allow the use of increasingly more complex meshes for the landscape/architecture, which will yield a more realistic appearing environment, but this will require increasingly higher amount of polygons rendered as a result.

Using a lower detailed option will use less complex meshes for scenery, which will give less detailed scenery shapes, although this can improve performance especially if your Graphics card can't handle rendering a high amount of polygons.

This will have a greater effect in more outdoor levels though.

Image Format.
Description: Use this to select the format for textures used in the game.

Options available being: Default, 16 Bit, 32 Bit, S3TC Compressed, DXT1 Compressed & DXT5 Compressed.

Default allows the Graphics card driver to choose the most appropriate mode, which isn't really recommended.

16 Bit is recommended for those whose Graphics cards do not support any of the compression options available, nor have great enough Video memory to warrant using 32 Bit.

32 Bit will provide best texture quality & fastest loading times, though is not recommended unless you have a Graphics card with 128MB Video memory & a similarly fast CPU with over 128MB RAM.

DXT1 Compressed is recommended only for those with Kyro & ATI Radeon Graphics cards given the excellent DXT1 quality of those cards & the high compression ratio, do not select this for NVIDIA Graphics cards which have rather horrid DXT1 support.

DXT5 Compressed is recommended for NVIDIA GeForce/ATI Radeon Graphics cards as it will compress textures with a good reduction in size & little compression artefacts.

S3 Compressed should be tried if you have any other Graphics card.

Alpha Image Format.
Description: Use this to select the format for transparent textures used in the game. Options available being: Default, 16 Bit, 32 Bit & DXT5 Compressed.

Default allows the Graphics card driver to choose the most appropriate mode, which isn't really recommended.

16 Bit is recommended for those whose Graphics cards do not have great enough Video memory to warrant using 32 Bit.

32 Bit will provide best texture quality & fastest loading times, though is not recommended unless you have a Graphics card with 64MB Video memory.

This is the recommended option if you can possibly use it & it doesn't affect frame rate too much.

DXT5 Compressed is recommended for those with lower Video memory models of ATI Radeon, NVIDIA GeForce, etc. Graphics cards as it will compress textures with a good reduction in size & not too noticeable compression artefacts.

Now scroll down the menu further.

Generic
This setting can be left set to Yes by pretty much everyone, unless you are having severe problems trying to run the Game.

This will more than likely only be a problem for those with an out-dated Graphics card (Driver) installed or those with poor OpenGL support.

On such Graphics cards you should set this to Off if you are having problems with the Game, otherwise leave this set to On.

This shouldn't be required for anyone with any sort of gaming oriented Graphics card, e.g. Kyro, GeForce, Radeon. This option alters the r_allowExtensions cvar.

Nvidia Specific
Set this to Yes if you have a NVIDIA GeForce 256 (Or any of the newer models, including those not yet released presumably) AGP Graphics card, this will enable the use of NVIDIA OpenGL extensions which can provide improved performance through optimised use of the AGP bus & better image quality using register combiners.

Set this to Off if you have any other Graphics cards, e.g. TNT 2, ATI Radeon, etc. or experience problems with it enabled on your GeForce card (This might be a potential issue with motherboards with poor AGP implementations).

ATI Specific
Similar to the above option, Set this to Yes if you have an ATI Radeon (Or any of the newer models: including those not yet released presumably) Graphics card, this will enable the use of extra ATI OpenGL extensions which will enable Truform support, which provides improved polygon counts on terrain in levels created by the Random Mission Generator, which should make them look better.

Set this to Off if you have any other Graphics cards, e.g. GeForce 3, Kyro 2, etc. or experience problems with it enabled.

Model Detail.
Selecting a Higher detail option will allow the use of increasingly more complex meshes in the game, which will yield more realistic appearing models, but this will require increasingly higher amount of polygons to be rendered as a result.

Using a Lower detailed option will use less complex meshes, which will give less detailed shapes, though this can improve performance, especially if your Graphics card can't handle rendering a high amount of polygons, perhaps most noticeable during larger fights or where you have a greater viewing distance.

Shadow Quality.
Description This setting defines the LOD (Level Of Detail) used for shadows cast by models. The images beneath illustrate 2 types available.

Selecting Off will provide best performance by disabling shadows, which is recommended for older Graphics cards.

Selecting Blob will enable the rendering of simple circular shadows beneath a model which shouldn't have a noticeably adverse affect of frame rate on all but older Graphics cards.

Selecting Projection will enable the rendering of more detailed shadows though I'd not really recommend selecting this unless you have a Graphics card with a T&L unit and/or the frame rate is already running smoothly, that and the volumetric shadows are fairly error prone and subject to being miscast, for performance reasons Kyro Graphics cards should not enable this.

Blob Shadow	Projection Shadow

Fog.
This option controls fog rendering in the game.

When set to Off no fogging is used in the game which will provide (oddly enough) greatest performance for those whose Graphics cards have a low fill rate (Being transparent to a point fog tends to waste fill rate on such Graphics cards).

Cull Fog enables the rendering of distance fog in the game on levels which use this to drop off detail in the distance, e.g. used in all the random mission generator maps.

On less fill rate limited Graphics cards this should allow for improved performance over Off.

All enables the rendering of all fog types in the game, cull fog & weather/ambient fog, e.g. as seen in the Seaward Star & Kamchatka.

On GeForce 2 Ultra class or newer Graphics cards this is the preferred mode to select & provides best visual quality in the game.

Shell Casings.
When set to On this enables the rendering of bullet casings ejected from weapons.

A fairly cosmetic feature you can safely leave this Off should you want to ensure a good frame rate.

Number Of Decals.
This options controls the maximum amount of bullet holes, explosion scars, knife marks, etc. to be rendered in a level.

Once this limit is reached the oldest decal will be removed & replaced by the newest, & so on.

Try lowering this option should you have a slow CPU so as not to waste resources on this cosmetic feature. See also the cg_numMarks cvar.

Image Longevity.
This option sets how long images are stored in a temporary cache, which can provide improved loading times & such as they need only be loaded from this cache - options available being None, Short & Long. If you have beneath 128MB RAM set this to None, 256MB RAM or more try Short & 512MB or greater select Long.

Sound Longevity.
This option sets how long images are stored in a temporary cache, which can provide improved loading times & such as they need only be loaded from this cache - options available being None, Short & Long.

If you have beneath 128MB RAM set this to None, 196MB RAM or more try Short & 512MB or greater select Long.

Model Longevity.
This option sets how long images are stored in a temporary cache, which can provide improved loading times & such as they need only be loaded from this cache - options available being None, Short & Long.

If you have beneath 128MB RAM set this to None, 256MB RAM or more try Short & 512MB or greater select Long.

Note: If playing the game for a prolonged amount of time you should try toggling these options every hour or hour & a half to ensure you don't start running out of memory or other performance drops.

Curve Detail.
This option determines how rounded the curves of certain objects/models are (Or aren't). This is a fairly cosmetic option so if your frame rate isn't too good you won't lose much visual quality by setting this to Low or Medium, those with newer Graphics cards &/or fast CPUs should be able to set this to High without any adverse affects.

Effect Overdraw.
This slider adjusts the amount of pixels rendered in effects before culling them out. The further you slide this to the right the more detailed effects can be, e.g. explosions, however performance can be lowered as detail increases, particularly on lower fill rate Graphics cards.

Low End Machine.
When set to True this disables certain features, e.g. shadows, for improved performance, no options that aren't already available to modify however. As such you'd be best leaving this set to False & adjusting the various options to your own specifications.

Gore Quantity.
This option sets how visually realistic weapon damage is in the game. Well, one of the main attractions of the game is the gore so, you?ll probably want to leave this set to Excessive unless you really need to improve frame rate during fights. The other available options won't have the desired effect if you're looking to tone down the game violence.

Maximum Image Quality.
According to the game this option is here to ensure that you don't set configuration options too high based on your system/graphics cards ? with this option also limiting the Texture Quality option in the Video tab, i.e. if this is set to Medium, then you won't be able to set the Texture Quality to High/Very High. If you're fairly confident with changing options then just set this to Very High as we?ve covered other options available, which should have helped you set them correctly for your system.

Now open the appropriate Config file & add/edit the following entries (Note: some commands listed here may be cheat protected).

r_allowExtensions "x".
This setting can be left set to 1 by pretty much everyone, unless you are having severe problems trying to run the Game. This will more than likely only be a problem for those with an out-dated Graphics card (Driver) installed or those with poor OpenGL support. On such Graphics cards you should set this to 0 if you are having problems with the Game, otherwise leave this set to 1. This shouldn't be required for anyone with any sort of gaming oriented Graphics card, e.g. GeForce & Radeon.

r_allowWglExtensions "x".
When x is set to 1 this allows the Graphics card to be queried for FSAA support with the relevant options becoming available, or not, in the in-game menus as a result. If you want to ensure FSAA can't be set in the game set this to 0 instead. Should this be set to 1 though & the FSAA options in the game are greyed out despite your Graphics card supporting FSAA then you should try updating your Drivers to resolve this.

r_detailtextures "x".
A detail texture is a very small, fine pattern that is faded in as you approach a surface, for example wood grain, or imperfections in stone. Setting x to 1 will improve visual quality by enabling the use of detail textures, although it will cause a performance hit, particularly on older Graphics cards. Set x to 0 to disable the use of detail textures for improved performance, although with reduced visual quality as a result.

r_displayRefresh "x".
With Vsync enabled your monitor refresh rate limits your maximum frame rate to whatever the Refresh rate is, e.g. With a monitor refresh rate of 60Hz, your maximum frame rate with Vsync enabled in 60. As a result you should set x here to whatever the maximum refresh rate your Monitor is capable of at the resolution you intend to use, this may not improve your frame rate though more importantly can reduce eyestrain while playing. For most users maximum would be defined as 85 ? 100 so as not to strain your monitor.

r_ext_compiled_vertex_array "x".
Setting this to 0 may fix a problem with flickering textures in the game. Ignore this setting if you experience no such artefacts & leave it set to 1 for best frame rate.

r_ext_multitexture "x".
Setting x to 1 will enable multi-texturing support in SOF II, which will provide optimal performance on all Graphics cards. Some older Graphics cards cannot simultaneously perform multi-texturing & Trilinear filtering however & on these Graphics cards you?ll need to disable one if you wish to use the other, e.g. 3dfx Graphics cards.

r_ext_nv_multisample_quality_avail "1".
This option determines the availability of the Quincunx mode of FSAA, with 0 indicating it is unavailable & 1 indicating it is supported (Available with NVIDIA GeForce 3 & later Graphics cards). You shouldn't need to modify this option at all, certainly not if your Graphics card doesn't even support Quincunx FSAA.

r_ext_nv_multisample_quality "x".
Setting this to 0 will disable the use of Quincunx FSAA (Available with NVIDIA GeForce 3 & later Graphics cards) which will provide improved frame rate & sharpest image. 1 will enable Quincunx FSAA in the game, which provides improved jaggy smoothing over 2X FSAA, reduces texture aliasing & performs better than 4X FSAA though blurs the image more than 2X/4X or no FSAA would. Don't bothering setting this to 1 if you?ve currently got a low frame rate & if you can afford to enable FSAA you would, in my opinion, be best served using 2X or 4X FSAA instead.

r_ext_nv_vertex_array_range_mem_priority "x" & r_ext_nv_fence_num_fences "x".
Description: With Nvidia Specific OpenGL extensions set to Yes in the in-game menu these commands help optimize performance of your NVIDIA Graphic card through optimized T&L performance & more efficient pipelining.
Recommend: Do not adjust the values for either of these settings. Further information on these extensions can be found at NVIDIA.

r_ext_texture_env_add "x".
When x is set to 1 additive blending is enabled in Multi-texturing. If this isn't supported only multiplicative blending is used. Setting x this to 0 to disable this, you shouldn't be required to do this however.

r_fastsky "x".
When set to 0 in your multiplayer config file (No effect in single player), this enables normal rendering of the sky/scenery background image which provides more realistic imagery in the game & has minimal effect on performance. 1 disables this background texture, which is only really recommended should you have a fairly outdated Graphics card, e.g. NVIDIA TNT, or other Graphics card with under 16MB Video memory (Or basically a system around or below the minimum recommended specs). The screenshots beneath illustrate the effect of this in one of the Columbian maps.

Fast Sky Off	Fast Sky On

r_ignorehwgamma "x".
Set x to 0 to enable the game itself to set the gamma level to be used, which I?d recommend. Set it to 1 to disable the in-game gamma settings & use one set by the Graphics card Driver instead, which may also make the brightness slider in the game menu ineffective.

r_intensity "x".
x determines the overall RGB intensity, higher values will increase brightness although textures will lose some of their quality if set too high.

r_overBrightBits "x".
Increasing the value for x (Default of 1) will make the game brighter & vice versa. The brighter the image the more washed out the textures will appear. Adjust this to suit your own preference.

cg_crosshairRGBA "R,G,B,A".
This option specifies the colour of your crosshair when aimed over anything bar a friendly character. 4 values are be set to determine the RGB (Red, Green, Blue) intensity & the A (Transparency) level of the crosshair. Values for each component can range from 0 - 1, with higher values decreasing the darkness of that particular colour & vice versa, e.g. for a semi-transparent green crosshair you could use cg_crosshairRGBA "0,.4,0,.5".

cg_crosshairFriendRGBA "R,G,B,A".
This option specifies the colour of your crosshair when aimed over a friendly character. 4 values are be set to determine the RGB (Red, Green, Blue) intensity & the A (Transparency) level of the crosshair. Values for each component can range from 0 ? 1, with higher values decreasing the darkness of that particular colour & vice versa, e.g. for a solid red crosshair you could use cg_crosshairRGBA ".5,0,0,0".

cg_drawFPS "x"
Description:
This is a good way to determine the effect changing various settings have on your game performance.  In the top left of the screen should your frame rate dip rather low an animated slug icon will also appear.
Setting x to 1 will enable the rendering of a small frame rate counter in the top right of the screen, which unsurprisingly enough will display your current frame rate.
Setting x to 0 Remove this counter

cg_numMarks "x".
x sets the maximum number of decals that can be rendered in a level (Bullet impacts, knife marks, explosion scars, etc.), with 1000 representing the Excessive option available with the in-game menu. Here you can set this to whatever value you wish from 0 ? 1000. Once the limit set is reached the oldest decal will be removed & replaced by the newest, & so on. If you have a slow CPU you should set this to less than 200 to ensure better use of available resources.

com_hunkMegs "x".
This option has no effect in the Single player game as it uses a completely different memory management system, thanks John Scott (& should be deleted if you had added it to your Single player config file), though is still relevant in the Multiplayer game. At that though you should only try modifying the default value if you receive errors related to it during Multiplayer sessions.

com_introplayed "x".
When x is set to 0 this enables the playback of the Activision & Raven Software movies when you load the game. 1 disables these movies & will result in a faster initial loading time of the game ? which is highly recommended.

com_maxfps "x".
x determines the maximum frame rate that SOF II can run at. It would be best to set this to the Monitor refresh that you use while playing that Game with Vsync enabled. If you have Vsync disabled or are benchmarking performance you should probably want to double this value. In Multiplayer games this also affects how much data gets sent to the game server, on lower bandwidth connections you should try lowering this value to 30 ? 40 for a more stable connection.

sys_cpufeatures "x".
This setting merely for informational purposes, though I?ll mention it here as seemingly some have passed it off as a potentially way to optimize performance. The value indicated here is a calculation based on features supported by your CPU - with 1 point for Time Stamp Counter, 4 for AMD 3Dnow! support, 8 for SSE & 16 for SSE2 support. Changing this total as a result will have no effect on performance (& seemingly SOF II isn't optimised for any instruction set anyway).

Be sure to take a look at the NVIDIA GeForce, 3dfx Voodoo 3, 3dfx Voodoo 4/5 or PowerVR Kyro 1/2 Tweak guide for information on how to optimize the performance/visual quality of those cards. These can help you improve image quality/performance even further than in-game/Config file tweaks can.

Now select the Sound Settings tab.

Effects Volume.
Use this to set the effects volume level in the game. Adjust the slider bar for volume as required, with sliding the bar Right increasing the volume & vice versa.

Music Volume.
Use this to set the volume level for music in the game. Adjust the slider bar for volume as required, with sliding the bar Right to increasing music volume & vice versa. Note: Muting the Music will not affect performance beneficially.

Sound Driver.
Setting this to DirectSound will provide basic stereo audio output, which will also provide best performance & is recommended for old Soundcards, or those with poor on-board Audio. None will disable audio playback in the game, unsurprisingly though is only really of use for troubleshooting purposes or if benchmarking Graphics card performance.

Selecting EAX enables 3D Audio support via OpenAL (Open Audio Library), which also enables the use of EAX 1/2 & even EAX Advanced HD on supporting Soundcards. The use of 3D Audio allows for significantly better 3D positioning than plain old Stereo output, particularly more noticeable for those connected to 4/4.1/5/5.1 Speaker systems. On Soundcards which don't provide OpenAL support (Verifiable by the existence of OpenAL32.dll in your Windows system directory, or not) you can get 3D Audio support by running the OpenAL installer in the Setup\Extras\OpenALInstall directory of CD1 for the game. If OpenAL support does exist the installer will also indicate so. OpenAL support in the Driver provides improved Audio & positioning quality & better performance over the OpenAL wrapper available on the CD.

Sample Quality. This option determines the sampling rate to be used for playback of mono spatialised sound, with Low being 11 kHz & High being 22kHz. High would be the best option to select if you have a relatively new Soundcard, e.g. SoundBlaster Live! or Santa Cruz & would provide best audio quality. Those with an ISA Soundcard would perhaps be about the only ones I?d recommend setting this to Low. Note: This option doesn't effect the sampling rate used for the MP3 Soundtrack (44 kHz as it happens), or other stereo sounds.

Music. Selecting Dynamic will enable the playback of dynamically changing Music in the Game, with levels featuring 1 track used during normal exploration & changing to an action track during fights. Setting this to Single will disable the extra track, rather using only 1 for the entire level.

Now open the appropriate Config file & add/edit the following entries.

s_allowDynamicMusic "x".
Setting x to 1 will enable the playback of dynamically changing Music in the Game, with levels featuring 1 track used during normal exploration & an action track during fights. Setting this to 0 will disable the extra track, playing only 1 track for the entire level instead.

s_doppler "x".
x may be used to enable or disable the doppler effect (The sound frequency of fast moving items, e.g. bullets, can change as it moves past your virtual self), with a value of 1 enabling the pitch change & 0 disabling the effect.

s_khz "x".
x sets the sampling rate to be used for playback of mono spatialised sound, with useable values being 11, 22 & even 44 (Though the mono files used in the game only have a maximum sampling rate of 22 kHz so using 44 is something of a placebo). 22/44 would be the best to use if you have a relatively new Soundcard, e.g. SoundBlaster Audigy! or Santa Cruz & would provide best audio quality. Those with an ISA Soundcard would perhaps be about the only ones I?d recommend setting this to 11. Note: This option doesn't effect the sampling rate used for the MP3 Soundtrack (44 kHz, 16-Bit as it happens), or other stereo sounds.

s_mixahead "x".
x defines the sound mixahead value, modifying this can fix audio stuttering with some Soundcards. Should you find this to be the case try lowering this from the default of 0.2 by a few decimals, e.g. 0.16.

You can learn how to further improve your Audio experience in SOF II by taking a look at the Soundcard/Speaker Tweak guide. This?ll take you through positioning your Speakers & configuring Soundcard specific settings for popular Soundcards such as the SoundBlaster Audigy, Philips PSC70x & Turtle Beach Santa Cruz, amongst others.

Now select the Misc Settings tab.

Crosshair, Always Run & Always Jump/Crouch.
Set these options to your own preference.

Mouse Input Method.
This option sets the input method to be used for your mouse. For performance reasons it is recommended to select DirectInput, though should you have problems with your mouse in this mode select Windows instead.

Mouse Force Feedback.
Should you have a force feedback capable mouse, such as those available from Logitech, you can enable force feedback effects in those devices by setting this to On, should you not wish to use these effects in the game set this to Off. Other mice will have this option greyed out. When enabled this can cause a frame rate reduction on some systems however.

Mouse Sensitivity.
Moving this slider to the Right can improve mouse responsiveness along the X & Y-axis (Horizontal & vertical) although may make more accurate movement awkward due to the extra responsiveness. I?d recommend leaving this set to the default position unless you find your Mouse fairly slow reacting to your input.

Invert Horizontal.
Set this to On to invert the X-axis of your mouse. This means pushing left on the mouse will result in turning right & vice versa.

Invert Vertical.
Set this to On to invert the Y-axis of your mouse. This means pulling back on the mouse will result in looking up & vice versa.

Now scroll down further.

Mouse Wheel Sensitivity.
Moving this slider to the Right can improve mousewheel responsiveness although may make any actions bound to the wheel more awkward due to the increased sensitivity, & vice versa.

I'd recommend leaving this set to the default position unless you find your mousewheel to be very slow reacting to any scrolling.

Mouse Filtering.
Setting this to Yes will enable the use of mouse filtering, which averages out mouse movement, which should result in smoother movement of the Mouse, which is strongly recommended.

Selecting Off will disable this filtering.

Mouse Look.
Set this Yes to enable the use of the Mouse for aiming.

Setting it to No will force you to press the Mouselook key if you wish to use the mouse for this purpose.

Obviously aiming with the Mouse is far easier than with the Keyboard so you should leave this set to On at all times.

Confirmation Dialog Boxes & Subtitles.
Set these to your own preference.

Disable Fullscreen Toggle.
Yes disables this key combination.

No enables the use of the ALT-ENTER key combination to switch between Fullscreen & windowed mode.

Mouse Emulation Top Speed.
This slider sets how quickly you turn while using the alt cursor keys to move the cursor.

Adjust this as you feel necessary, with moving to the Right will increase the sensitivity, & vice versa.

Mouse Emulation Acceleration.
This slider sets the level of acceleration used when using the alt cursor keys to move the cursor.

Adjust this as you feel necessary, with moving to the Right will increasing the level of acceleration, & vice versa.

Now open the appropriate Config file & add/edit the following entries.

cl_mouseAccel "x".
You can use this option to set whether or not your pointer moves at a greater rate during periods of faster tracking.

Valid values for the acceleration level are 0 - 10, with 0 being no acceleration, though personally I'd recommend leaving this set to 0.

cl_sensitivity "x".
x determines the sensitivity of the X & Y (Horizontal & vertical) axis of the mouse, with a range of 0 - 10.

Using a higher value improves mouse responsiveness along the X & Y-axis although may make more accurate movement awkward due to the extra responsiveness, & vice versa.

cl_showmouserate "x"
Description: Displays in the top left of the screen, information regarding mouse input to various axis.

The value to the right is the axis sensitivity.

Setting x to 1 Enables the display
Setting x to 0 Disables this display.

in_mouse "x"
Description: x determines the input method to be used with your Mouse.

-1 setting Windows.

1 selecting DirectInput (recommended)

0 to disable the use of a Mouse.

Only select 0 should you not wish to use a Mouse at all in the game & -1 if you encounter problems with using DirectInput.

in_joystick "x".
Setting x to 1 enables the use of a joystick in the game,
Setting x to 0 disables the use of such peripherals which is recommended if you don't use such devices.

m_filter "x"
Description: Averages out mouse movement, which should result in smoother movement of the Mouse
Setting x to 1 Enables the use of mouse filtering.
Setting x to 0 Disables this filtering.
Recommend: Setting x to 1 (Strongly recommended)

r_finish "x".
Setting x to 1 may eliminate lag from Input devices e.g. Mouse, although the frame rate can lower as a result.
Setting x to 0 will give optimal frame rate.
Recommend: If you aren't experiencing such controller lag then leave this set to 0 for optimal frame rate.

If you are using a Mouse (Which you should be) you can find out how to further configure that device in our Mouse Tweak guide.

Die hard Joystick users should check the Raven Software FAQ if you're wishing to use one in the game.

Load SOF II Multiplayer & select Network Settings.

Rate.
The option selected will set a few predetermined settings based on the connection you select.

For better fine tuning of your game connection see the cvars covered further on down.

Max FPS.
The value here sets the maximum frame rate that SOF II Multiplayer can run at.

This also affects how much data gets sent to the game server, on lower bandwidth connections you should lower this value to 35 - 45 for a more stable connection, though those with digital connections should be able to allow higher frame rates without compromising your connection performance.

Show Lagometer.
Set this to Yes to enable the display of the lagometer in Multiplayer games, an extremely useful connection diagnostic utility.

You shouldn't set this to No unless you have no connection performance issues at all.

Further beneath describes how to use this to adjust connection variables for smoothest gameplay.

Impact Prediction.
This option specifies whether the client or game server decides if an object has been collected.

Setting this to On can lead you to believe you've collected/hit an object incorrectly & so is best left set to Off, particularly if you have a digital internet connection, e.g. DSL, though those on slow dial-up connections might find this to resolve some potential visual weirdness due to high latency.

SOCKS5.
Adjust the settings available here if you need to.

Now select the Misc. Setup tab.

For the most part you can set the options here to your own preference.

Defer Players.
When set to No new player models are loaded immediately upon that player joining the Game, when set to Yes this is postponed until your death in the game, which is recommended as the game can pause/stutter while the new model is being loaded otherwise not a good thing when you're still actually fighting.

Brightness.
Use this slider to set the glare level in the game.

Sliding the bar to the Right will increase the glare level, though can also make textures appear more washed out if slid too far & vice versa.

Now open the appropriate Config file & add/edit the following entries.

cg_lagometer "x"
Description
This is essentially split into 2 sections - top & bottom.

As regards the Top half, this displays information regarding world updates.

Blue bars indicate world updates are being received & no frames dropped, whereas Yellow bars indicate such updates aren't being received (Or are corrupt) & frames being dropped as a result.

Ideally you?ll have Blues top section the vast majority of the time & if you get yellow a good deal you should consider changing Server.

Information here should be used to adjust the snaps "x" option, described later.

As regards the Bottom half; this displays information as regards data packets received (Well, hopefully anyway).

Green bars indicate data packets being received. Red bars indicate lost data packets, while Yellow indicates corrupt data packets being received (The net effect of red & yellow is the same however).

Similar to the Top section, if you are receiving a good deal of red & yellow it would be a good idea to change Server.

Information here should be used to adjust the rate "x" option, described later.

Set x to 1 to enable the rendering of the lagometer in Multiplayer games, a useful diagnostic utility.
Set x to 0 to disable it.
Recommend Set to 0 when playing on a LAN where latency shouldn't be an issue otherwise set to 1.

snaps "x".
x sets the maximum amount of packets that are sent from the game server to you, the client, per second.

The default amount is 20 (For 56k connections), though if you have a better, or worse, download bandwidth you should change this value accordingly.

Those of you with Cable/DSL or other similarly bandwidth excessive connection should try setting this to 35 or greater to receive a greater number of world updates.

As per the previous information, use the Top half of the lagometer to determine a more suitable value for this, should you get a good deal of Yellow bars try lowering the value though.

rate "x".
x determines the maximum number of bytes that the game server can send to the client per second.

The default value for 56k connections is 4000. Similar to the snaps "x" option, the greater your download bandwidth the more you should be able to increase this value.

Cable/DSL users should be able to set this to 10000 or perhaps more without issue, though should you find latency increasing or a good deal of Red & Yellow bars in the Bottom half of the lagometer then lowering this value by several hundred should help resolve it.

Don't set this too high however, other players need bandwidth too you know.

cl_maxpackets "x".
x specifies the maximum number of packets that get sent to the game server, by you.

The default is 30 for 56K connections, though much like the rate & snaps settings if you have greater upload bandwidth then try increasing this value, or vice versa.

Upload bandwidth is generally a bit more consistent than download bandwidth, so this shouldn't require too much changing.

cl_packetdup "x".
When x is set to 1 this enables the re-transmission of lost data packets, which is recommended for Internet multiplayer games, though on LAN multiplayer games this shouldn't be an issue, no data should be getting lost.

cg_predictItems "x".
This option specifies whether the client or game server decides if an object has been collected.

Setting x to 1 can sometimes lead you to believe you've collected an object incorrectly & so is generally best left set to 0, except perhaps for those with slow dial-up connections so as to minimize visual weirdness that can be caused by high latency.

cg_smoothClients "x".
When x is set to 1 this enables more predictive code to be used for interpreting player movement, which is most useful when playing with those with less than perfect Internet connections & will result in less model warping from position to position, though as you may be aware prediction isn't faultless & at times the location may be incorrect.

You should only really consider setting this to 0 if you're playing the game on a LAN only (No external connections to the game server).

A good idea for further fine tuning gameplay is to bind keys to different options, allowing you to easily change your rate value & so on.

This easy enough to do. In the Config file add/edit the following as you require.

bind key "command x"
Description
Replace key with the keyboard button to use & command x with the desired command to be used upon pressing that key, e.g. bind H "rate 5500".

You should do this with a few variations on commands, e.g. several rate binds ? this could allow you to easily increase/decrease rate values, useful should you find latency starting to rise, or perhaps to toggle the lagometer on/off.

You should also take a look at our Modem tweak guides for Windows 9x, Windows Millennium Edition, Windows 2000 & Windows XP or ISDN tweak guides for Windows 2000 & Windows 9x for how to optimize your Internet connection & reduce ping times further in Multiplayer SOF II.