The Unofficial VSK FAQ

Version 1.7a
Last updated: April 16, 2002

Copyright © 2001, 2002 Keith Suderman

Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.1 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections with the no Front-Cover Texts, and with no Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license can be found at http://www.gnu.org/licenses/fdl.html.

Introduction

These questions have been asked over and over in the forums so I thought that it was about time the answers were collected together in one place for easy reference. There are plenty of questions that are not answered here and I'll try to update this faq as I come across the answers. If you know the solution to a problem that has not been answered here please let me know.

Most of the answers here have been collected from the forums and from personal experience. I should likely cite authors, but many of the sources for these answers have been lost to antiquity. I will try to do better in the future.

The English version of the FAQ can be found online at http://www.suderman.com/vskfaq.html

The Questions

Q:Does Virtual Skipper work with Internet Explorer 5.5 or 6??

Q:Does Virtual Skipper work with Netscape?

Q:Does Virtual Skipper work with Windows 2000/XP?

Q:Why can't I host a race?
Q:Why can't I join password protected races?

Q:Why are the points not being recorded?
Q:Why did I just get a few billion points?

Q:Why is the rudder so slow to respond to the keyboard?
Q:Why does the camera pan so slowly and why is its movement so jerky?
Q:Why is it so difficult to type messages in chat?
Q:What can I do to increase the frame rate? Mine seems kind of low?

Q:Why do the boats sometimes jump around or move sideways?

Q:How do I ping the VSK server?

Q:Why doesn't the start line turn green for me when the race starts?

Q:Why does no one join the races I start?

Q:After using ALT-TAB to return to the desktop I don't see VSK in the task bar, how do I get back?

Q:Why is my country not shown correctly in the list of logged on skippers?

Q:Why does the keyboard stop responding to my input!?

Q:Where can I find that patch that lets me play without the CD in the drive?

Q:How do I play Multiplayer LAN races?

Q:How can I play if I am behind a firewall?

Q:Why won't the game let me take my penalty turn after the message comes up that I only have 60 seconds left to take it?

Q:A better way to start the game

Q:Why does the sound break up?
Q:Why do I get crackling in my speakers?

Q:Why do I get the German flag and an Orange boat even though I selected a different flag and a different boat colour?

Q:I can't seem to get my flag changed on screen. In my profile, I have chosen USA, but it always shows France.

Q:Why are some yachts still able to race after I see them get hit by a ferry?

Q:What are the cheat codes for Virtual Skipper?

The Answers

Q: Does Virtual Skipper work with Internet Explorer 5.5 or 6??

A: YES! Finally!

Simply join a race with IE and you will be prompted to install a new pilot program.

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Q: Does Virtual Skipper work with Netscape?

A: NO! It seems the new plugin for IE doesn't work with Netscape browsers...sigh.

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Q: Does Virtual Skipper work with Windows 2000/XP?

A: Yes. VSK runs like a charm under both operating systems. You do have to be logged in as an administrator to play however.

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Q: Why can't I host a race?
Q: Why can't I join password protected races?

A: If you are getting as far as the password prompt the fix is simple. Click in the text box for the password (as if you were going to enter one) and hit the enter key, et voila!

From some reason clicking on the Vaid button doesn't work. You have to enter an empty password rather than none at all.

If this doesn't fix your problem I have no idea what's wrong. Let me know if you find the answer!

NOTE : This answer is essentially moot now with the new plug in. However, I thought I would leave it here just incase in the future someone has troubles with the password box. Bugs have a nasty way of reappearing and this is something to try.

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Q: Why are the points not being recorded?
Q: Why did I just get a few billion points?

A: The scoring system in Virtual Skipper is one of its weakest points. Sometimes the server just doesn't keep track of points. This may be only an occational race that gets missed or it might go on for weeks. However, you don't need no stinking points. Race for the thrill, excitement, and cameraderie that you will find online.

The few billion points bug is caused by a bug in the server that occassionlly lets in more boats that there should be. If you count 9 boats in an 8 boat fleet, or 7 boats in a six boat fleet you can expect a few million or billion points when you finish (and you may get more points that the winner! Duran usually fixes this situation in a few days.

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Q: Why is the rudder so slow to respond to the keyboard?
Q: Why does the camera pan so slowly and why is its movement so jerky?
Q: Why is it so difficult to type messages in chat?
Q: What can I do to increase the frame rate? Mine seems kind of low?

A: These are easy problems to fix; get a faster computer! Having a ton of ram helps, if you have less than 256MB go get more. Now! With ram prices dropping to pennies a megabyte there is no reason that people should be short of ram. Go on, blow twenty bucks, and run out for a 256MB stick. You won't regret it.

However, there is only so much memory can do. If you have anything slower than a PIII you should really think about upgrading your CPU as well. Nothing cuts it like Megahertz.

I found that the video card has almost no effect on the game. As long as your card has at least 8MB and supports DirectX you're all set. I upgraded from an old 16MB Voodoo Banshee to a 64MB DDR nVIDIA GeForce 2 Pro and didn't notice an appreciable difference.

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Q: Why do the boats sometimes jump around or move sideways?

A: In a word, Lag. Lag is the delay between your computer sending a message to the server and receiving a response back. You can measure this delay by pinging the VSK server. A long delay means that your computer is not receiving timely updates about the boats correct position. This phenomena can also caused be caused by a large number of lost packets (usually caused by congestion on the internet). Lag seems to be worse if the host has a bad connection.

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Q: How do I ping the VSK server?

A: Ping is a simple program used to test network connections. It simply sends a series of ICMP (Internet Control Message Protocol) packets to a specific computer. When a computer receives a ping it responds by sending one packet back to the originating computer. The Ping program then prints displays how long it took to receive a response.

To ping the VSK server open a DOS prompt and type:

ping www.virtualskipper.com

You should see something like the following (of course your numbers will be different

Ping times over 500ms are generally considered to be unplayable. Hosts should have ping times under 250ms. In North America users with 56k modems should get ping times around 200-300ms. Cable and DSL players in North American should achieve ping times in the low 100's (anything under 100ms rocks). Europeans, being so close to the server, typically have blindingly fast ping times regardless of their connection type (the loweset I've seen is 35ms!!!)

Of course, the suggestion for ping times for hosts is simply a rule of thumb. Don't think that you shouldn't host races just because you ping the server at 350ms. The quality of the host is determined by many factors, of which the ping time is just one. If you have a fast machine and packets aren't being lost then by all means, try hosting a race.

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Q: Why doesn't the start line turn green for me when the race starts?

A: This happens when you join the race late. The race has already started by the time you've joined and the server is not counting you as a part of the fleet. If you see the other skippers typing things like 90, 120 or other numbers into chat they are actually reading off the countdown clock for you. If you don't see the countdown clock you have two choices, sail off the course and quit to find another race (no one will call you a quitter, we've all been there and we've all done that, and we all hate when it happens to us) or you can try your best in the race you are already in. (Timing that start line will be tough!)

Note, if you decide to keep sailing in the race you will never be given right of way, even when it should be yours. Remember, you are not officially a part of the fleet, so the server will never give you the red sail. Don't be too upset with others that seem to barge in on you. They've likely forgotten (or don't know) that you aren't being given right of way correctly and since your sail isn't red are assuming they have the right of way.

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Q: Why does no one join the races I start?

A: This is a known problem with Virtual Skipper. Sometimes when a race is started it does not appear on the list of races. If no one has joined your race after several minutes use ALT-TAB to get back to the Windows desktop and go to the list of available races. If your race is not listed then no one is joing because no one can join! You will have to quit your current race and try again. Whenever this has happened to me I've been able to host again after racing in someone else's race.

If your race does show up on the list you'll just have to go back to the course and wait. Someone should be along shortly. It may be difficult to find opponents if there aren't many skippers logged on to the web site. The number to the right of the set of binoculars in the top bar of the web site shows how many skippers are online. If you click the number a list of logged on skiper's will be displayed.

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Q: After using ALT-TAB to return to the desktop I don't see VSK in the task bar, how do I get back?

A: If Virtual Skipper doesn't show up in your task bar use the ALT-TAB combination again to return to the game

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Q: Why is my country not shown correctly in the list of logged on skippers?

A: The country code that appears beside skippers names in the list of logged on players refers to the language of the CD and not the flag or nationality of the skipper.

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Q: Why does the keyboard stop responding to my input!?

A: You have accidently hit either the 'M' key or the 'J' key. The 'M' key turns on mouse control and the 'J' key enables the joystick. When either of these is selected the boat doesn't respond to keyboard steering commands.

Try pressing the 'M' key, if that doesn't work press it again (since you've now turned on mouse steering) and try pressing the 'J' key. You should find that you now have control of the rudder again and can go about getting yourself out of irons. :)

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Q: Where can I find that patch that lets me play without the CD in the drive?

A: The "no-cd" patch can be found at http://www.teamnzl.com. Look at the bottom of the menu on the left hand side.

This patch only applies to the CD version of the game of course, since demo players don't have a CD to not put in the drive! :) This is also not a crack, or a hack for the VSK. It doesn't turn a demo version into the full version of the game.

Note from Talisman: This patch seems to cause problems when skippers with patched versions of the US and French game race together.

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Q: How do I play Multiplayer LAN races?

A: If you don't want to use the VSK server (or if it is down) instructions for connecting directly to other opponents on the internet can be found at http://www.teamnzl.com. (Look under the INFO menu on the left-hand side right under the NO CD patch).

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Q: How can I play if I am behind a firewall?

A: That depends on what kind of firewall you have and if you have access to it. It might not be possible to play behind the firewall at work if the system administrators have shut off incoming ports (which they almost certainly have done).

If you are using ZoneAlarm make sure that you give Virtual Skipper access to the internet and that you let it act as a server. If the game seems to be hanging and you are playing in full screen mode ALT-TAB back to the Windows desktop and see if ZoneAlarm has popped up a dialog asking if it should let VSK access the internet.

I didn't have to do a thing to my Linksys router/firewall to be able to race (although you will have to set up some port forwarding to host an IP LAN race).

If you need to open specific ports (i.e. you are running a Linux firewall) VSK seems to use the following ports:

47624 tcp incoming and outgoing
6073 tcp incoming and outgoing
2300-2400 tcp incoming and outgoing
2300-2400 udp incoming and outgoing

You may also need to open port 1508, but I can't confirm this.

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Q: Why won't the game let me take my penalty turn after the message comes up that I only have 60 seconds left to take it?

A: It's not that the game won't let you take the penalty turn, just that with the 60 second warning on the screen the game won't tell you that you can start taking your penalty turn! But if you look at the penalty icon in the lower right of the screen you will see the 360 turn red when you can take your penalty.

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Q: A better way to start the game

A: This isn't so much an answer to a question, but rather just a handy tip. Right click anywhere on your desktop and select "New -> Shortcut". For the destination enter http://www.virtualskipper.com/pages/index.asp?lang=us&type=CD and give it a meaningful name like "Launch VSK". If you want you can drag this shortcut to the start menu.

When you want to start VSK to sail online simply double click the link on your desktop.If you use an older browser to sail and a newer browser to surf make sure you start the older browser before clicking on the link.

Note: you will likely need to change the lang=us to lang=fr or lang=it depending on the version of your CD.

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Q: Why does the sound break up?
Q: Why do I get crackling in my speakers?

A: This seems to be a symptom of Sound Blaster Live! cards. You can try the following:

• From the start menu select "Run" and enter "dxdiag"
• On the Sound Tab lower the Hardware sound acceleration to Basic

Thanks Talis!

I also noticed an improvement in sound quality with the addition of more ram. This was particularly true for the spoken introduction when racing against the computer.

Update: If you are still having sound problems I've heard that opening the "15-16 MB hole" in the BIOS can help. I haven't tried this however and your mileage may vary.

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Q: Why do I get the German flag and an Orange boat even though I selected a different flag and a different boat colour?

A: This is caused by your browser not updating the Virtual Skipper cookie when you save your profile (You did rememeber to click on the "Save" button didn't you?). The solution is to delete any cached files, close all browser windows, and delete the VSK cookie(s).

In Internet Explorer

1. Select "Internet Options" from the "Tools" menu and go to the "General" tab.
2. Click on the "Delete Files..." button.
3. Select "Delete all offline content" and click the "Ok" button.
4. Close all Internet Explorer Windows and delete the Virtual Skipper cookie file. The location of the cookie will depend on your version of Windows. On Win 9x systems the cookies should be found in C:\Windows\Cookies, in Windows XP the cookies should be stored in C:\Documents and Settings\username\Cookies. The name of the cookies files will be something like user@virtualskipper[1].txt

In Netscape Navigator

1. Select "Preferences..." from the "Edit" menu.
2. Under "Category" select "Advanced - Cache". If you don't see "Cache" under the "Advanced" option click on the "+" to the left of "Advanced"
3. Click on the "Clear Memory Cache" button and then the "Clear Disk Cache" button and then click on "Ok".
4. Close all Navigator windows and delete the Netscape cookie file. The cookie file should be found in C:\Program Files\Netscape\Users\username. If you can't find it there you can do a search for the file "cookies.txt"

After performing the above steps you will need to go back to your Profile on the Virtual Skipper web site and reselect a flag and boat colour before racing (Unless of course you want to be German with an Orange boat!)

NOTE: This answer is still a work in progress. Please let me know if the above does not work for you

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Q: I can't seem to get my flag changed on screen. In my profile, I have chosen USA, but it always shows France.

A: First, try the solution to the above question. If that doesn't work you may have encountered a known problem with the game (usually in the UK/French versions). You can try the following solution:

1. Download the Flag Patch file from http://www.virtualskipper.com/download/virtualskipper.zip and save it to a temporary location (your desktop is fine). You can delete this file when you are finished.
2. Make a backup copy of the file C:\Program Files\DURAN\VirtualSkipper\VirtualSkipper.exe. The easiest way to do this is to open Windows Explorer, navigate to C:\Program Files\Duran\VirutalSkipper (or wherever you installed the game). Right click on the VirtualSkipper.exe file and select "Copy". Then select "Paste" from the "Edit" menu. You should now see a new file called "Copy of VirtualSkipper.exe". You can rename this file if you want.
3. Now extract the VirtualSkipper.exe file from the VirtualSkipper.zip file you downloaded in step 1. If you don't have a program for extracting zip archives I suggest getting Winzip from http://www.winzip.com. Extract the new VirtualSkipper.exe file to the game directory. Say "yes" if you are asked if you want to overwrite the original file.
4. Delete the Virtual Skipper cookies. You can also delete the VirtualSkipper.zip file if you want.
5. Reboot (likely not necessary for Windows XP)

Thanks to Talisman for the answer to this one.

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Q: Why are some yachts still able to race after I see them get hit by a ferry?

A: There are two possibilities. They really didn't hit the ferry, you just thought they did... In their world they likely cleared the ferry.

Or... under some circumstances it is possible to recover from getting hit by a ferry or submarine. As soon as the collision occurs ease your sails and come head to wind as quickly as you can. If you are quick enough you just might survive. Of course, sitting head to wind for a few moments while your boat recovers won't do much for your position in the race! Unfortunately, it seems that after an encounter with the ferry the game will never you the right of way (red sail) again

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Q: What are the cheat codes for Virtual Skipper?

A: There are none. Seriously. There are enough ways to cheat in Virtual Skipper without needing special cheat codes to do it! What, you need a special key to try cross on port when you don't have right of way! :P

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