Observations thus far
SlySoft's GameJackal is finally upon us, and I've messed around with it on my laptop for an evening. How is it looking in the hands of the new owner?
Well, firstly I was glad that my profiles didn't need to be redone. All the profiles appear to be functional. One thing to bear in mind with regard to the shortcuts to the profiles is that SlySoft have changed the name of the binaries. To point the old shortcuts in the right direction, go into the properties of the shortcut, and in the target section, change the part of the link that says "Maplom_sc.exe" to "GameJackal_cl.exe" and all will be well.
I've also noticed that the profiles themselves seem to kick in considerably quicker. My C&C3 profile, which previously took around 7 seconds to get going, now seems to start within one second. Quite a difference.
While I'm talking about shortcuts, there is, as many have encountered, a problem with creating desktop shortcuts. It just does that "List index out of bounds (-1)" thingy. For now, you can create your own shortcuts to get around this problem as follows:
All being well, you should have yourselves a working shortcut. It sounds a bit long-winded, but it's actually not too bad a workaround for now. As an example, my Oblivion shortcut's target looks like this:
Finally, it seems to suffer the same level of SecuROM annoyance as the last version. I was expecting this, as efforts thus far will have been focused on the transition of the software to the new owner. No mean feat. The good news is that the HideJack plugin still works (sort of), and I can successfully run C&C3 1.04 using the same method as described previously (it may be luck, but the method seems more reliable with this version).
So there we have it. A few teething troubles (unsurprisingly), but nothing that can't be ironed out relatively painlessly. As I said, it seems to me to be more of a transition than a big update. I think it has ended up in good hands.
Death to DRM, long live GJ!
SlySoft's GameJackal is finally upon us, and I've messed around with it on my laptop for an evening. How is it looking in the hands of the new owner?
Well, firstly I was glad that my profiles didn't need to be redone. All the profiles appear to be functional. One thing to bear in mind with regard to the shortcuts to the profiles is that SlySoft have changed the name of the binaries. To point the old shortcuts in the right direction, go into the properties of the shortcut, and in the target section, change the part of the link that says "Maplom_sc.exe" to "GameJackal_cl.exe" and all will be well.
I've also noticed that the profiles themselves seem to kick in considerably quicker. My C&C3 profile, which previously took around 7 seconds to get going, now seems to start within one second. Quite a difference.
While I'm talking about shortcuts, there is, as many have encountered, a problem with creating desktop shortcuts. It just does that "List index out of bounds (-1)" thingy. For now, you can create your own shortcuts to get around this problem as follows:
- Create a new shortcut in the location you want it (like the desktop).
- Point it to "C:\Program Files\Maplom\GameJackal_cl.exe" (or wherever you installed GJ to).
- Name the shortcut appropriately and hit "finish".
- Now you will need to open GameJackal and bring up the properties of the profile in question (do this by right-clicking the profile in GJ and selecting "Edit profile"). The item of interest here is the number in the "Game Jackal Profile" box.
- Meanwhile, back at the shortcut, bring up its properties. In the target box after link, you will need to add a space, then the following:
...where xxxxx-xxxxxxxxxx is the Game Jackal Profile number, and Profile Name is the exact name of the profile in GJ. Yes, you include the quotes. The weird character separating the two is the vertical line with a gap in it on your keyboard. If you're not sure, you can copy and paste the character from the above example. - If you wish (and you probably will), change the icon to the appropriate on e for the game. Hit "Apply" on the shortcut when done.
All being well, you should have yourselves a working shortcut. It sounds a bit long-winded, but it's actually not too bad a workaround for now. As an example, my Oblivion shortcut's target looks like this:
Finally, it seems to suffer the same level of SecuROM annoyance as the last version. I was expecting this, as efforts thus far will have been focused on the transition of the software to the new owner. No mean feat. The good news is that the HideJack plugin still works (sort of), and I can successfully run C&C3 1.04 using the same method as described previously (it may be luck, but the method seems more reliable with this version).
So there we have it. A few teething troubles (unsurprisingly), but nothing that can't be ironed out relatively painlessly. As I said, it seems to me to be more of a transition than a big update. I think it has ended up in good hands.
Death to DRM, long live GJ!
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