As i understand that some people may be puzzled by some explanations on how to increase the Daggerfall beyond the view distance from the ingame options, i decided to write this little step by step tutorial that should be very beginner friendly.

STEP 1
-Download the free hex editor named : http://www.chmaas.handshake.de/delphi/freeware/xvi32/xvi32.htm#download

On your desktop create a new folder and name it by example "xvi32"
EXtract the content of the downloaded xvi32.zip into this xvi32 folder.

STEP 2
-Now in Daggerfall, start it, create a new character and save it when you are in the cave.
Be sure in the Daggerfall options you have not touched to the "DETAIL" bar, so it is always full.
quit the game
http://img406.imageshack.us/img406/6305/a00.jpg

STEP 3
-go to the folder you have installed Daggerfall into, you will see several sub folder named SAVE0 SAVE1... SAVE5 , go into the folder that correspond to your saved game and take the file named SAVETREE.DAT
Put that SAVETREE.DAT into the xvi32 folder you created (and in which you have extracted the xvi32 program)

STEP 4
-in the xvi32 folder, launch the hex editor by double clicking on XVI32.exe
-click on File then on Open
select SAVETREE.DAT and click Open
it should now look like this :
http://img509.imageshack.us/img509/5581/a02o.jpg

STEP 5
-click on Search then Find
Type

like this
http://img118.imageshack.us/img118/5126/a03j.jpg
And click OK

It will find the string and will automatically select the first 7F
http://img200.imageshack.us/img200/4328/a04xdk.jpg

STEP 6
As it is the 7F we want to replace and it is already selected, do nothing else but only type


As a result :
http://img238.imageshack.us/img238/9535/a05.jpg

That's all, now click File then click Save
You can now close XVI32.

STEP 7
Now take the modified SAVETREE.DAT and put it back into the SAVE folder from your Daggerfall install.

Example with Daggerfall by default :
http://img521.imageshack.us/img521/9811/a06n.jpg

After modifying with XVI32 :
http://img148.imageshack.us/img148/3882/a07d.jpg

Note that i used XVI32, i prefered it as it does not need to be installed, but you can use any kind of hex editor that would work better for you.

IF you tinkered with the Daggerfall options before, you may not have the DETAIL bar set to the maximum, as mouse precision in this case could not have it really to the maximum.
So instead of the 7F 7F 00 in the search of STEP 5, you may want to search for a 7E 7F 00

Finally, DO NOT TOUCH ANYMORE the "DETAIL" bar in the options, or it will reset it to 7F the next time you save (and so you will have to hex edit it again)

(I'm mostly quoting myself because I'm hoping someone can help me out - as I'm quite eager to try a higher view distance!)

I'm going to try this now. One question: Can it be used with my existing save?

I assume it can be used with any save, and that he only tells you to make a new character so that you can ensure the detail bar is maxxed out (volume, control, and detail settings are part of each individual save file and not a global configuration used by the game).

Well then I'm gonna go ahead and do it now.

EDIT: Created a new save game and wandered a bit. Exited the game, the SAVE5 folder is empty. I saved this game in the 5th slot. The other folders have stuff in them (they have the game I've been previously using).

EDIT2: Fixed.

The only problem with this is that the slider has to be at a certain setting, and if you've changed it then it's changed the hex values. I'd like to do this again, but I'm just too lazy to deal with it. The results are nice, though.

It works.

Thank you

One question: If I delete that new game save file, will I lose this distance change?

Even though you fixed it, this might not be obvious for everyone: the numbering of the folders starts at 0. Slot 1 is SAVE0, slot 6 is SAVE5.

I can't find 7F or 7E bitvalues for my pre-existing saves. Will just modifying this new save carry the improved view distance over to the others? I'm assuming it would because volume settings carried over from my primary saves, but this may not be retroactive and maybe only new games acquire the settings of older ones.

It only affects the saved game you edit. Anything new you save from that game will retain that view distance.

Yes unfortunately it only works only for a save slot, if you want every of your saved game slots to benefit from the increased view distance, you need to do that for each saves specific SAVETREE.dat.

But once you modified it for a saved game slot, each next more advanced saves you will make on this same slot will keep the upgraded view distance, as long as you don't touch the DETAIL bar before saving.


Yes, as said by StoneFrog, i was taking as an example a new character only because it was making sure the DETAIL bar in the option was in its maximum.
But you can do that even for more advanced saved games, years ago i was making that for my saved games that were already dozen hours into the main quest.

The only thing to make sure is that the DETAIL bar in the option is always set to the maximum.


That's because you have certainly modified the DETAIL bar at some point of your game in your pre-existing saves.
You need to load them again, go into the options, and try to get the DETAIL bar to the maximum, like i showed in the ILLUSTRATION1 screenshot.
That's not easy, as mouse precision in the daggerfall menu is not very accurate. On a very old saved game i had, i managed to get the setting back to maximum after several attempts.
And as it is a very sensible value , you really need to be at the maximum to be sure the beginning of the hex string to look for will be 7F or 7E

Once you did it, resave the game, then you should be able to find the string starting with 7F or 7E.

I see. I noticed my other save games have max view distance now, even though I only modified the save from the new game.