Run All Old WC Games in DOSBox Walkthrough

StormEdfilho said:
Could anyone post a working dosbox.conf file? I wanna doublecheck all options. Thanks.
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The one I posted above is apparently working for WC3, not sure about your game. What I learned by playing around with the dosbox.config was that most options didnt really take effect, no matter what I chose all was the same (except a few like Cycles). Interesting thereby was, that by choosing VGAonly for example I got the message "No VESA Driver found", but that didnt do anything for the game.
--> My question there would be, what exactly is Dosbox using when VESA is said to be not available for a game, that actually is based on VESA? I dont really know much about it, just wondering why it didnt matter or what the dirrerence is that I cant really see.
 
Fritschi said:
The one I posted above is apparently working for WC3, not sure about your game. What I learned by playing around with the dosbox.config was that most options didnt really take effect, no matter what I chose all was the same (except a few like Cycles). Interesting thereby was, that by choosing VGAonly for example I got the message "No VESA Driver found", but that didnt do anything for the game.
--> My question there would be, what exactly is Dosbox using when VESA is said to be not available for a game, that actually is based on VESA? I dont really know much about it, just wondering why it didnt matter or what the dirrerence is that I cant really see.
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Oh, I have all other WC games working, and I had Priv2 working before... I know how to use DOSBox :) (I also have Terra Nova, the 2 Syndicates, Ultimas 7 and 8 and many others). WC3 has different "needs" than Priv2.

Maybe in your case WC3 switched to VGA mode, I don't know, I wasn't there to check. The options usually make a big difference, but not all in all games... Some games need specfic SGVA modes, but most run well on the default S3 mode. The Scaler options make a big difference, so does Double Buffering, and also the Aspect Ratio one. Some games won't run without loadfix, others need EMS off. Some games run fine with default joystick options, others need to have timed=off. OpenGL and DDraw modes are much better (on my PC) than Surface or Overlay.

All those options have some effect and importance on lots and lots of games. Many games run fine with default settings on some options and specific settings on others. Those options are not just thrown there as some sort of joke :)

Anyways, if anyone could post a working priv2 DOSbox conf file, I'd be really grateful.
 
Silanda said:
That looks normal, the video quality in the PC version was pretty crappy. The 3DO and Playstation versions looked better.
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Yup, I think the limitation here is that the game is still running in 256 colors. It's not until Prophecy that WC was bumped up to 65k color support.

StormEdfilho said:
Anyways, if anyone could post a working priv2 DOSbox conf file, I'd be really grateful.
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This one is for dosbox 0.72, but it definitely works with P2.
 

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ChrisReid said:
Yup, I think the limitation here is that the game is still running in 256 colors. It's not until Prophecy that WC was bumped up to 65k color support.
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At least out of the box... The Win95 patch for wing commander 4 lets you do a "true_color" option using a command line switch.
 
AD said:
At least out of the box... The Win95 patch for wing commander 4 lets you do a "true_color" option using a command line switch.
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Ahh yeah, good point. And they did sell a boxed WC4 Win95.
 
I seem to have run into a problem with the WCSav program. Every time I use, it says it is unable to load the savegame.wld file. I am using dosbox to run it, and the exe is located inside the GAMEDAT directory under WING1.

I am playing SM1 and Spirit has gone KIA over a little overrun problem. What can I do to correct this issue. It would be great if I just knew which hex bytes to change to restore the pilot, as I could change those easily.
 
Joystick- and Keyboard-Input issues

I have troubles concerning the Input in WC3/4 - would be awesome if someone knows any hints:

1) Joystick:
I wonder if WC3 and WC4 did/do support a "throttle-axis" on a joystick. I got my joystick fully to work (finally) in Windows including the throttle-lever, but in WC3 its out of order. I tried a Sitecom Joystick with a gameport connection as well as a Thrustmaster USB stick, both with throttle-axis which isnt working in-game. Is there a way to get this supported by these games?

2) Keyboard:
The keyboard controls, as written in the manual, arent working for me correct in WC3. Ok the letters work, but accelerate, break etc. are on different keys or on no keys at all, like its the case for accelerate to max. Sometimes, after pressing a certain key or combination, my keyboard isnt taking orders anymore for a while - not sure how to cause and/or solve it, it just comes and goes. I guessed it must have something to do with other language keyboard setting, so I tried US and UK, without success. What am I doing wrong here? Im using a very basic keyboard (PS/2) without any features btw.

3) Joysticks & Windows:
Not quite the main topic this one, but I thought I'd just ask, maybe some of your experiences can help me: My 1st PC is all working fine. On my 2nd computer (both run WinXP), when plugging in either Joystick, WinXP adds the 2 things "HID-compliant gamecontroll" & "USB-HID" to my control-panel and "USB Game COntrollers" to my "Gamecontrollers" (so far the same for both PCs), but when I check the installed drivers I see that Windows didnt install a driver for "HID-compliant gamecontroll", although not showing a yellow sign for a fault (can see this by clicking on driver details). Further when clicking on my "USB Game COntrollers" for calibration and inspecting Windows returns an error claiming support files would be missing. Now on my 1st computer however WinXP shows the driver "gameenum.sys" where there isnt one on the 2nd computer and also I can calibrate the Joystick perfectly without error message aswell.
I was thinking I could just download the "HID-compilant game controller"-driver and install them manually on my 2nd machine, but I couldnt find it nowhere, although there is shown to be plenty, which are all fake downloads so far. I dont know why but my 2nd comp. doesnt seem to have those standard-drivers. Any ideas why, how I could solve this and where I could get those standard-gamecontroller drivers (those manufacturers dont have seperate ones since they say they're using windows standard ones)?


I so want to play those awesome games of my youth again, but with properly working steering. I hope for your wise advice :)
 
>>> edit for above post <<<

1st of all I couldnt find how to edit my previous post, so I just write news in a new one - sorry if Im just to dumb to do so ;)

--> 2) Keyboard:
Its just 1 key that freezes my Input: After pressing the key [?ß\] my keyboard seems to be frozen since its not taking orders anymore until I repress that key - what is causing that and why? Its only in WC3, not it WC4 though.

--> 3) Joysticks & Windows:
Apparently I need an .inf file when I want to manually install that driver (WinXP doesnt accept other formats), although WinXP then places a .dll file for the needed infos. So .inf file, but which one? Maybe I can even find this on my WinXP-CD?


Besides: Thanks very much for all your effort and infos here, this Forum rocks!! -as do the games its for :D
 
Fritschi said:
1st of all I couldnt find how to edit my previous post, so I just write news in a new one - sorry if Im just to dumb to do so ;)

--> 2) Keyboard:
Its just 1 key that freezes my Input: After pressing the key [?ß\] my keyboard seems to be frozen since its not taking orders anymore until I repress that key - what is causing that and why? Its only in WC3, not it WC4 though.

--> 3) Joysticks & Windows:
Apparently I need an .inf file when I want to manually install that driver (WinXP doesnt accept other formats), although WinXP then places a .dll file for the needed infos. So .inf file, but which one? Maybe I can even find this on my WinXP-CD?


Besides: Thanks very much for all your effort and infos here, this Forum rocks!! -as do the games its for :D
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A suggestion: If windows detects your Joystick and it callibrates ok in Windows, Dosbox *should* detect it ok. The exception is if you have more than one USB controller plugged in. For whatever reason the games (and dosbox) don't seem to recognize the primary controller. So if you have any gamepads or anything, try unplugging them when you go to play WC3 etc in dosbox. It's a glitch in windows since this happens with the windows versions too.
 
ChrisReid said:
Yup, I think the limitation here is that the game is still running in 256 colors. It's not until Prophecy that WC was bumped up to 65k color support.



This one is for dosbox 0.72, but it definitely works with P2.
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Still didn't work here, therefore it must be something with this particular installation. I'm gonna restart the whole process. Thanks for the file, it helped me troubleshoot.
 
WC3 dosbox-cannot pitch

Recently found a copy of WC3 (PC/DOS) at the local resale chain and got it running in D-Fend. [Windows front-end for DOSBox. Works fairly well for other DOS games.] Videos were a bit choppy but livable.

Long story short: If I fly a Hellcat, TBolt, or Longbow (I think the Excal as well but have not been able to test it thoroughly) the pitch controls jam up* after about 25-30 degrees. This has made Ariel 2 practically impossible. Any thoughts?

*As in you pull up, the in-cockpit stick pulls back, and the Thunderbolt goes straight, rather than (say) pulling up. For some reason the Arrow seems far less vulnerable to this breakdown.
 
Are you using a joystick? It's possible that if you have some non-joystick USB devices plugged in, they could be confusing the input interface and causing this to happen. Tweaking your DOSBox Joystick settings should almost certainly resolve this. Change the joystick type, timing, autifre, swap34, etc. settings and see what works for you.
 
WC2 deluxe, dosbox installation issue

followed all instructions, tried installing from diff loctions, my cd drive or my c drive itself (just copied files off the cd to a dir on my c drive.

went into wing2 and typed install, followed everything then it asks install from which drive in a little black box with (answer c) in it, no matter what i press it wont go beyond this, and pressing escape just brings up an "insert wc2 disk2 into drive" error

any help appreciated
Ta :)
 
jimdove said:
followed all instructions, tried installing from diff loctions, my cd drive or my c drive itself (just copied files off the cd to a dir on my c drive.

went into wing2 and typed install, followed everything then it asks install from which drive in a little black box with (answer c) in it, no matter what i press it wont go beyond this, and pressing escape just brings up an "insert wc2 disk2 into drive" error

any help appreciated
Ta :)
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Do all this, but don't run "install". run "winstall" instead to set up sound and then run the game from that directory.
 
jimdove said:
followed all instructions, tried installing from diff loctions, my cd drive or my c drive itself (just copied files off the cd to a dir on my c drive.

went into wing2 and typed install, followed everything then it asks install from which drive in a little black box with (answer c) in it, no matter what i press it wont go beyond this, and pressing escape just brings up an "insert wc2 disk2 into drive" error
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Common issues in this case are that the read-only attributes (from copying over from the CD) are still set. You need to right-click into Properties and uncheck those marks. Alternately, you may also have a mounting problem. What exactly did you type to mount your drive(s)?
 
wonky pitch, cont'd

[Was at a conference and unable to check on forum. Sorry for delayed response.]

ChrisReid said:
Are you using a joystick? It's possible that if you have some non-joystick USB devices plugged in, they could be confusing the input interface and causing this to happen. Tweaking your DOSBox Joystick settings should almost certainly resolve this. Change the joystick type, timing, autifre, swap34, etc. settings and see what works for you.
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Right. Odd thing is that, before getting out of the simulator, I gave up on the idea of using my gamepad as a "joystick" since I am not currently up to messing around with every setting, and instead used a 3d party program called XPadder to map keyboard keys to my gamepad. I am playing as "Keyboard/Mouse". XPadder worked well enough for other DOSBox/D-Fend games.

Further, I do not see what sort of interface screwup would get the game's cockpit-graphics routine to acknowledge that I am pulling up, but simultaneously decline to carry that pulling up into the player-craft's movement. I thought that if the pad/keyboard (remember, gamepad stick is translated as cursor keys thanks to xpadder) was garbled it would cut out entirely.
 
KA101 said:
Right. Odd thing is that, before getting out of the simulator, I gave up on the idea of using my gamepad as a "joystick" since I am not currently up to messing around with every setting, and instead used a 3d party program called XPadder to map keyboard keys to my gamepad. I am playing as "Keyboard/Mouse". XPadder worked well enough for other DOSBox/D-Fend games.

Further, I do not see what sort of interface screwup would get the game's cockpit-graphics routine to acknowledge that I am pulling up, but simultaneously decline to carry that pulling up into the player-craft's movement. I thought that if the pad/keyboard (remember, gamepad stick is translated as cursor keys thanks to xpadder) was garbled it would cut out entirely.
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Eek, yeah. I wouldn't know the specifics behind why the game is responding as it does, but I could certainly belive that gamepad->xpadder->keyboard->dosbox produces some unpredictable results. For starters, keyboard control in WC3 relies heavily on being able to press down the shift button to adjust the pitch rate. I could see a gamepad posing as a keyboard not being able to simulate that correctly.
 
understood

ChrisReid said:
Eek, yeah. I wouldn't know the specifics behind why the game is responding as it does, but I could certainly belive that gamepad->xpadder->keyboard->dosbox produces some unpredictable results. For starters, keyboard control in WC3 relies heavily on being able to press down the shift button to adjust the pitch rate. I could see a gamepad posing as a keyboard not being able to simulate that correctly.
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Odd part was that I tried using the cursor keys directly and (IIRC) got the same results as on the pad. Knowing about using Shift is useful information, though. Will keep at it.

Thanks much.
 
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