This week’s tip is not very groundbreaking, but the question it addresses seems to come up again and again in forums I frequent. (I have a longer topic that I just didn’t get around to finishing for this Wednesday.) Besides, strategy gamers love them some windowed mode!
All of the Paradox games have lengthy documentation, but who uses paper manuals any more? Having the strategy guides or documentation open while playing these games is often useful, especially if you have the real estate on your monitor to do so. Unfortunately, the expected “Full Screen” toggle is not present in the options screen. While windowed mode is not “officially supported” (as per the manual) by Paradox, it’s easy enough to enable:
How to Activate Windowed Mode
- Navigate to the game’s installation directory. (This will vary from system to system, depending on whether you use Steam, GamersGate, etc.)
- Locate the “settings.txt” file and open it with your favorite text editor. I would not recommend doing this while the game is running.
- Change the “fullscreen” value from “yes” to “no”.
- Enter a resolution small than your current system resolution. For example, if your current system resolution is 1920 x 1080, enter 1440 x 900. This will give enough room to play the game and still read through the manuals. I suggest sticking with known height/width combinations.
- Play game and read manual simultaneously.
Czechoslovakia 1936 - what can go wrong?
This will work on the current EU engine Paradox games, EU:Rome, EU3, HoI3, and Vic2. You could tweak some other settings while editing the text file, but I would recommend against it. Anything else you might want to futz with is available in the Options menu in-game and editing them yourself increases the opportunity for error.