COGBox 0.3.5 - SYSTEM LINK CO-OP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

⚠️ PLEASE READ: EXPERIMENTAL SETTINGS ⚠️

🎮 NEW: System Link - LAN play (experimental, all four games)

Play the games' System Link modes with other PCs on your network, in the Title Update versions of Gears of War, Gears of War 2, Gears of War 3 and Judgment. Gears of War 2 campaign co-op has been tested; its other modes and the other three games haven't been yet, so please try them and tell us. Huge thanks to HubertFer, whose patch made this possible (#72).

How to play:

1. Every PC needs COGBox 0.3.5 and its own copy of the game.
2. Put the PCs on the same network: the same home router, or a LAN VPN such as Radmin VPN, ZeroTier or Hamachi for friends far away. Internet VPNs like NordVPN don't link PCs, so turn them off while you play.
3. On each PC: the game > Settings > Gameplay > tick "System Link - LAN play" (Gears 2 and 3: Title Update version).
4. On one PC host (for co-op: Campaign > Co-op > Host, then set the party to System Link). On the other PC choose Join and pick that game.
5. If Windows asks about the firewall, allow it. Radmin VPN and Hamachi networks are often marked "Public" by Windows: set that network to Private (Windows Settings > Network) or allow Public too, or the other PC's game won't show up.
6. In Gears 2 co-op, the joining player presses RT ("Press RT to begin") to take over Dom.

If the other PC's game doesn't show up (some VPNs drop the "find games" messages), add a line like --net_peer_ip=26.10.20.30 (the other PC's address; commas between several) to extra-args.txt in the COGBox folder on each PC.

Not yet: voice chat, and hosting from Linux / Steam Deck (joining should work). With the box off, the game works exactly as before. Please tell us how it goes in #72!

Fixes

All games

• Folders with accented letters (for example RECOMPILAÇÃO or Música) now work: the games read and write paths with letters like Ç, é or ñ correctly. Before, the game couldn't write its log or files there.
• Windowed mode works again: "Windowed" in the launcher no longer opens the game full screen (#81, #67).
• Key rebinding: a key bound to just Shift, Ctrl or Alt now works everywhere (also as "accept" in menus when it's bound to A), and holding it no longer stops your other keys (W/A/S/D, mouse buttons) from working.
• Key rebinding on non-US keyboards (AZERTY, QWERTZ and others): the Controls tab now records the key you actually pressed, so a remap lands on the right physical key.
• Graphics card detection under Wine / Proton / Batocera: COGBox now uses the card that actually draws the game, so NVIDIA cards are no longer mistaken for AMD (#59 follow-up).

Gears of War

• Native mouse look: the mouse now turns the camera directly, like in Gears 2, 3 and Judgment, instead of acting as a right stick. No more speed cap, and up/down matches left/right (#82).
• "Spanish (Latin America)" now plays the Latin American Spanish voices instead of Spain's (#76).

Gears of War 2

• 32:9 ultrawide no longer crashes at the main menu (#73, #60).
• Lens flares no longer show through walls in the Deleted Scene (#75).

Gears of War 3

• Mouse aiming now follows the field-of-view setting, so turning speed no longer changes when you change the FOV (#52).
• New logging to catch the "sudden death" / "cursed save" / teammate-kills-you problem (#55, #68, #79, #80). Every save, profile and DLC file the game writes is now recorded in the log, so a problem report from a session where it happens shows us exactly what the game did just before. If it happens to you, please send that report (see Help us test below). Turn it off with --cogbox_save_log=false.
• New logging for Raam's Shadow DLC sometimes not being found (#79). Every time the game looks for or opens its DLC, the log records what it asked for and what it got, so a report from a start where the DLC was missing shows why.

Gears of War: Judgment

• No more 30 fps cap during gameplay after a loading screen (#77). Loading screens still run at 30 fps so the one after Monroe Commons gets through (#54).

Launcher

• A notice on first start (and after each update) explains that experimental settings are for testing, not regular play. "Make a problem report" asks you to turn them off first, and every report now lists the experimental settings that were on.
• New HELP US TEST section on each game's About tab: the open problems we need players' help with, updated with every release.
• More game versions count as tested: the title updates players reported working in #66, #69, #70, #84 and #86 no longer get the "untested version" prompts. Thank you for those reports!
• The level select menu has been removed from the launcher.

Help us test

We're still tracking these down and need players' help. If one of them happens to you, please tell us in its GitHub issue (a problem report from the About tab helps a lot). The same list is on each game's About tab in the launcher.

• Gears 3, sudden death / "cursed" save, or a teammate killing you (#55, #68, #79, #80): play to a checkpoint, save and quit, resume and play on until it happens. Then send a problem report, plus your save files from before and after if you can. This version logs every save file the game writes, so your report shows what went wrong.
• Gears 3, Raam's Shadow DLC not found (#79): if the game sometimes needs a restart or two before it sees the DLC, send a problem report from a start where it didn't. This version logs every DLC lookup, so that report shows exactly what happened.
• System Link, LAN play (#72): try co-op, Horde and versus between two PCs (or over Radmin VPN / ZeroTier / Hamachi) and tell us in #72 what worked and what didn't, with a problem report from both PCs.
• Other versions of the games (regional discs, other title updates): if yours isn't the one COGBox expects, tell us whether it works.

Thanks to everyone who sent reports and logs. They made every one of these fixes possible.