Red Alert 2 Multiplayer on Vista
Red Alert 2 is one of the best RTS games that has ever existed with some of the craziest most fun multiplayer I’ve seen. We used to play it a lot at LAN Parties until last year when everyone started moving to Windows Vista. It is one of the few games that uses IPX for network games and Windows Vista does not have IPX available.
We thought that this was it and Red Alert 2 was dead, however, Scorpio9a has released a patch. The patch makes Red Alert 2 use IP instead of IPX and I’ve tested it and it’s working under Vista! How to get it working?
- Download the patch: ts_ra2_lanpatch_1_00.zip
- Extract it to your Red Alert 2 directory
- Edit ra2.ini and change the ‘NetCard’ setting in the [Network] section to 0 (If you have more than 1 network card, you may need to try different values)
- Run Red Alert 2 and choose ‘Network’ and you should end up in the lobby!
Some common problems you might come across are:
- Network button doesn’t do anything and just returns to the main menu
You haven’t selected the right network card, just edit ra2.ini in the Red Alert 2 directory and change the NetCard setting in the [Network] section.
- You can’t see any games or connect to someone else’s game
Make sure you’ve allowed Red Alert 2 on any firewall like Windows Firewall or Zonealarm. Also make sure everyone is running this patch regardless of operating system, otherwise they might be hosting an IPX game which your IP broadcast can’t see!
If you find this post helpful or have more problems/solutions, then please post a comment and let me know and if Scorpio9a reads this - if you come to a UK LAN Party, let me know and I’ll buy you a drink!