Wing Commander 3 on xp with dosbox prob

  • Thread starter Thread starter SoNiC
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SoNiC

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hi,
yes yes yes im a newb, i have wing commander 3 heart of the tiger for the pc, i got it with my old pc and well it just about ran ok on it, i have a new one now and recently got the urge to play WC3.
I tried a normal game install but the game just ran slow, i then cam across this website and forum (which i must say is pretty cool and ya all seem to know ya stuff) and so i thought with the tutorial i would be able to run my WC3........but i wasnt and yea once again im a noob, not to computers but to emulation and DOSbox...

my problem is i have no idea how to get WC3 working on my comp.
These are my specs, hope this helps:

AMD Athlone 2200xp @ 1808Mhz
partitioned 120GB HDD
Windows XP SP2 up to date installed on D:
Windows 98SE on C: not up to date
1 Gig fo RAM (2x512's)
ATI AIW 9800 Pro 128mb Gfx card
All latest drivers installed incl catalyst

i really wanna get this old game working again, its a classic in my opinion of the mid 90's
 
WC3 is pretty demanding on DOSBox and your computer, but it should be playable for you. The key is opening your dosbox.conf file and changing core=normal to core=dynamic. I'd set about 12-15,000 cycles or so. You might have to lower some engine detail to play smoothly on a 1.8 GHz computer. Make sure you reset the core to normal if you're going to play most other games in DOSBox later.
 
yup ok done that but the thing is im unsure how to START the game, as in boot it up using DOSbox, i have the original CD and the cd drive is E: but i also went and made an image of the game and so i can mount it on virtual drive J:

so erm what command do i err use to like umm play it?
 
i dont know how to switch to the Cd drive in dosbox, i have no idea whatsoever and i tried what you said but to no avail....

im totally new to the program and i find the readme unhelpful in my circumstance.
 
How did you manage to get the game running in the first place? There are many tutorials here and at the DOSBox site about how to get the basics going. https://www.wcnews.com/news/update/6042 You need to mount your hard drive and mount the CD-ROM. You should look up a list of the most common DOS commands in order to navigate the interface.
 
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i got it working in the first place cause my old pc came with it preinstalled and all i had to do was boot into DOS mode in Win95 and that was it i could paly all be it extremely slow.

thanks for the link i will try the shown method now and hopefully it will work :)
 
Oh, it sounded like you just recently got it going. DOSBox operates very similarly to DOS mode in Windows 95. You'll need to do the actual mounting. mount c: c:\ and mount d: d:\ -t cdrom if your CD drive is D, and then you navigate normally. Type C:, D:, etc to switch drives at the prompt. When you have the CD drive selected and the WC3 disc in the drive, type WC3 and enter.
 
yup thanks got it working.......to a certain extent ~~~


i got it all installed properly then an erm......error appeard as i went to run the game im guessing tis soundcard related as in i chose the wrong one but thing is i dont know whcih i should choose, i got a crappy onboard VIA AC 97 methinks..


http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y37/FDC/error.jpg
anyway this is a link top the error i get, i appreciate your help so far ChrisReid and its good to actually having DOSbox running the game hopefully the above problem can be overcome with your help.
 
Relaunch into the installer by typing wc3 -i Make your sound card one of the sound blasters (pro or 16 is best), and reset the specific options. You might have a crappy onboard sound card, but DOSBox translates that into a Soundblaster with IRQ7, Port 220, DMA1 (and DMAHigh 5 if something asks). Most WC games default to IRQ5, so at the very least you should check that. And just for general reference, simple low-color/straight-line DOS and Window box messages like that come across cleaner and even have smaller file sizes when saved as gifs.
 
DOSbox now randomly closes, i tried the normal way (deleted the installation beforehand) ofinstalling then the wc3 -i method but on all the ocassions i tried DOSbox just closes without warning
 
There's not really any need to bump since your post won't slide very far down the page in this forum. It sounds like you should register though.

As Karl pointed out in the other thread, the dynamic CPU core option is inherently unstable. It sounds like that's exactly the type of problem you're brushing up against. Dynamic core is necessary to play the game on a 1.8 GHz machine, but you increase the liklihood of getting random crashes like that. The good news is that these should go away once you switch back to normal core, but you might have to wait until you upgrade for that.
 
Cant upgrade CPU cause my mobo can only support up to an AMD 2800 which in the beginnign i wanted but money was the determing factor....


Anyway you think i should switch the core back to normal?

i did that and got the following error >.<
http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y37/FDC/error3.png

i dont really care if the game runs slow as long as i get a half decent fram rate im not too bothered. would you tihnk that if i ran the game in windows xp but in win95 compatability mode?
 
You can try it in Windows. It cuts out right away for a lot of people. To get rid of the error, set ems=true to ems=false in your dosbox.conf. You can try the game on normal, but like I said, a 1.8 GHz machine just really isn't fast enough to run WC3 in DOSBox without turning on dynamic core, which decreases stability.
 
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