DOS games testing list

[DSN9990]

I will now continuously update this list related to DOS gaming, so I updated my config file anyway.

Config (as of 0.83.13):

[sdl]
output=direct3d
autolock=true

[dosbox]
machine=svga_s3
memsize=24

[video]
vmemsize=2
allow low resolution vesa modes=true
allow 32bpp vesa modes=true
allow 24bpp vesa modes=true
allow 16bpp vesa modes=true
allow 15bpp vesa modes=true
allow 8bpp vesa modes=true
allow 4bpp vesa modes=true
allow tty vesa modes=true
ignore extended memory bit=true

[cpu]
core=dynamic_x86
cputype=pentium
cycles=max

[dos]
ver=5.0

[autoexec]
MOUNT C D:\C_DRIVE
C:

[DSN9990]

@joncampbell123 Can you test/reproduce this?

[joncampbell123]

@DSN9990 If I can find the game online, I'll try.

However first... did you run LOADFIX before running the game?

[DSN9990]

No. But I tried now and it did not work also. Same problem.

Here it's the link to the game: (https://www.old-games.ru/game/download/5701.html)

Edit: For Screamer Rally it's here: (https://archive.org/details/msdos_Screamer_Rally_1997)

[Wengier]

I have checked the game "Formula Karts" from the link you posted. Looks like it is a problem with the downloaded MDF image itself, not a problem with DOSBox-X (BTW: it happens in vanilla DOSBox too). The game installer tries to open the file DOC\README_E.TXT, which cannot be found in the MDF image, and thus the error. If I manually add the DOC\README_E.TXT file to the MDF image, then the installation will succeed. So there is nothing to fix from the DOSBox-X side.

[DSN9990]

Where can I download the file README_E.TXT to add to my image, like you?

[DSN9990]

You checked Screamer Rally? It's working?

[Wengier]

The content of the README_E.TXT file does not matter - just create a text file named "README_E.TXT" and add it to the DOC folder of the image (as I did), then it should work.

As for Screamer Rally, both the installer and the setup program worked for me. I just need to wait for a few seconds before the graphical interface of the setup program showed up.

[DSN9990]

It now showed this:

I ran with the ISO mounted, but has no effect also.

[DSN9990]

For me the Screamer Rally setup program freezes with a blinking cursor when running it.
Even setting cycles=100000 before running SETUP it does not work at all.

[Wengier]

Formula Karts apparently requires the real game CD, and I don't think the downloaded CD image is a genuine game CD, or required files such as README_E.TXT won't be missing from it.

The Screamer Rally setup program also shows a blinking cursor when running it on my computer in the beginning, but after a few seconds (up to ~10s) the graphical interface will show up. I tried with the default setting too. Please check your configuration if this is not the case.

[DSN9990]

It still did not work, I waited more than 10s and it did not work also.
What is your config?

Description: Instead of showing ST in the DOSBox-X title bar when running it, it shows COMMAND anymore.

[Wengier]

The default config file works for me too:

[DSN9990]

It still hangs with the default config showing COMMAND in the title bar:

[Wengier]

@DSN9990 I think you selected the 3D version during installation. In your case, after you run "SETUP", try to keep typing the "Y" key until DOSBox-X title bar shows "ST". Hope this helps.

[Wengier]

The 3DFX version of the game apparently requires DOSBox-X 0.83.5 and the setting "glide=true" in order to work. A 32-bit SDL1 Windows build of the current DOSBox-X 0.83.5 code is available from:

Link: dosbox-x-update.zip

You can find 3dfx Voodoo setup guide from the Wiki page (the glide2x.dll file is required to work):

https://github.com/wengier/dosbox-x-wiki/wiki/Guide%3ASetting-up-3dfx-Voodoo-in-DOSBox%E2%80%90X

[DSN9990]

@joncampbell123 Can you give me an alternative link to download Formula Karts?

[Wengier]

I don't currently own a copy of this game either, and I think there are relatively few download sites for this game online.

[DSN9990]

So which other website contains this game instead of Old-Games.RU?

[DSN9990]

Grand Theft Auto sound setup does not work, shows this:

And then shows this after exiting:

Additional problem: If I run INSTALL.BAT on the CD after installing the game, it hangs when it tries to install again after selecting language and path, showing
COMMAND in the title bar, much like Screamer Rally:

[Wengier]

Where did you download the game? Also, have you tried it and Screamer Rally with the latest Windows build I posted above? Screamer Rally certainly works fine here with the latest build.

[DSN9990]

Yes, I used the latest version you provided. Screamer Rally works fine now in the latest build for me, but GTA1 does not. I downloaded these two games from Old-Games.RU.

Can you test GTA1 and give me the results?

[rderooy]

I just tried to run the installer of my GTA copy, and it also gets stuck on the "Installing Files".

I already had GTA installed, and it seems to run fine, so the issue is with the installer.

As to the sound setup, if I run GTA, and select "Configure Sound Details" from the main menu, I can select a sound card just fine.
p.s. I have it setup with GUS.

[bob12111]

Commander Keen 4-6 are very sluggish, even when I try to speed up the CPU...

[Wengier]

I can also select a sound card just fine from GTA's sound setup. There is no need for me to do anything special.

As for the GTA installer get "stuck" on second-install (with “COMMAND” shown in the titlebar), I believe I have already fixed the issue. The updated Windows SDL1 build is available from:

Link: dosbox-x-update.zip

[Wengier]

If the GTA installer gets "stuck" with "XCOPY" (instead of “COMMAND”) shown in the titlebar on the second install, then it is the built-in XCOPY (from FreeDOS)'s fault. You have to explicitly set COPYCMD=/Y before the install runs in this case, or use MS-DOS's XCOPY.EXE instead.

[DSN9990]

@joncampbell123 Can you fix the no sound issue in Desert Strike/Jungle Strike reported here in #1600?

[DSN9990]

Grand Theft Auto still doesn't save sound config for me, please check here: (https://www.old-games.ru/game/download/197.html) (comes in MDF/MDS format, but for some reason it did not work for me, shows an error saying "MSCDEX Failure: Invalid file or unable to open.". As such, please use Daemon Tools to mount and ImgBurn to convert the image to CUE/BIN)

[Wengier]

I have already fixed the issue of mounting Grand Theft Auto MDF image. The updated Windows build is available from:

Link: dosbox-x-update.zip

As for the issue of saving sound config, I believe you are installing the game to a mounted local drive instead of a mounted disk image. And this reveals another bug of FreeDOS's XCOPY: it copies ALL attributes of the source files to the destination including the read-only attribute, and as a result, you cannot write to the DIG.INI file in the mounted local drive because it is read-only. The solution is to either use MS-DOS's XCOPY during installation, or manually remove the read-only attribute of the file C:\GTA\GTADOS\DIG.INI by using the command ATTRIB -R C:\GTA\GTADOS\DIG.INI, or install the game to a mounted disk image instead. Hope this helps.

[DSN9990]

@Wengier I tried now with -defaultconf switch and it crashes the same way, and as I mentioned above it does not work anymore even with 0.83.14 for some reason, since this is the version I used before to run the game. So I'm thinking there may be a bug in the game itself, which causes it to crash sometimes (or not). @joncampbell123 As you mentioned you got it to crash only once, but for me this is not the case. Even starting the game for the 2nd/3rd time the game still crashes anyway (at least for me?), so the game seems to be simply buggy in any case.

[DSN9990]

Regarding the GUS, it is completely disabled for my config, as I rarely use it, so it may be useful mainly for demoscene, as stated in the wiki guide there are lots of demoscene productions that only support the GUS though.

[DSN9990]

@Wengier I am still experiencing random crashes in the game with the latest version, sometimes it works fine, but not always. Not sure why.....

[DSN9990]

@Wengier I always get this error when starting Carmageddon 3DFX on low-level Voodoo mode:

Is there a way to fix this? Which DLL is needed to run the game? GTA 3DFX also has this same error when starting in LLE mode, but, for some reason, Tomb Raider 3DFX works fine even without a external DLL file on low-level mode.

[Wengier]

@DSN9990 For low-level Voodoo mode, you will need to use the original 3dfx GLIDE2X.OVL instead of the one provided by DOSBox-X, or else the high-level 3dfx emulation will be assumed and you will need GLIDE2X.DLL in the OS. Hope this helps.

[DSN9990]

@Wengier Ok, it seems to work fine now but the only major issue I have is that the game runs too slowly in this mode, unlike Tomb Raider 3Dfx. Can the Voodoo hardware emulation be further optimized?

[DSN9990]

I used the 3Dfx glide2x.ovl driver included with the GTA CD in the /3DFX directory as well.

[Wengier]

My suggestion is to try the OpenGL mode for the Voodoo hardware emulation rather than the software emulation. Or use the high-level Glide mode. Hope this helps.

[DSN9990]

I used OpenGL mode but it still runs slower compared to Tomb Raider. Is the OpenGL mode "really" faster than software?

[DSN9990]

Some time ago I've tried HLE mode as well but I noticed many graphic glitches in Carmageddon 3DFX anyway, but Tomb Raider/GTA 3Dfx worked fine for me in this mode too.

[Wengier]

@DSN9990 It is supposed to be faster than software, but there may be exceptions for certain games (I have not confirm this myself). But the high-level Glide mode is definitely the fastest.

[DSN9990]

@Wengier As I said above, Carmageddon 3DFX runs very, very poorly for me in Glide mode. There is a lot of annoying flickering in the movies/menu screens and in game, fonts/elements are totally missing from the panels:

dosbox-x.2021-07-18.14-45-06-14.mp4

dosbox-x.2021-07-18.14-46-04-32.mp4

Is it supposed to be this way???

[Wengier]

@DSN9990 What Glide wrapper are you using? Perhaps try a different one?

[DSN9990]

As you can see, there's also no ingame music in this mode, since it plays properly on the software rendering version.

[DSN9990]

Oh forgot. I used DgVoodoo x64 with MinGW64 SDL2 DOSBox-X. Maybe this will help? I'm not 100% sure though.

[DSN9990]

@Wengier One more question, which is the recommended host CPU for running software low-level Voodoo emulation? The wiki page says that it needs a very poweful CPU clock to run properly.

[Wengier]

@DSN9990 Maybe you can try nGlide with 32-bit DOSBox-X build and see how it works? For the question of host CPU, perhaps @rderooy can answer for this question.

[DSN9990]

@Wengier I have also tried nGlide with 32Bit MinGW SDL2 DOSBox-X in the last hours and I got some different bugs/glitches which I will post a short video soon. @rderooy Can you explain me the minimum CPU requirements needed to run software LLE 3dfx emulation when you have time? Despite being very CPU-demanding, it seems to be more accurate than OpenGL or Glide modes, too.

[rderooy]

I cannot be clearer on it. Just that a higher clock frequency will help more than core count as the code does not really take advantage of more cores.

[DSN9990]

@Wengier I want to try the latest changes in DOSBox-X, so give me a updated MinGW64 SDL2 build. Thanks!

[Wengier]

@DSN9990 Please try the updated MinGW 64-bit SDL1 build for now:

• dosbox-x-mingw64.zip

Hope this helps.

[grapeli]

@DSN9990
For me, Carmageddon under DOSBox-X with voodoo_card=opengl (or glide) reaches 20fps. Much less when viewed from the cockpit. It is completely unplayable without 3dfx. With the glide under SDL2, the same symptoms you described occur.

It works great under Wine. A short video.

carmageddon.wine.webm.mp4

[krixkrax]

hello, recently i'm messing with mechwarrior 2 and the game runs fine on dosbox-x.
i decided to make small cue/bin/ogg package of the game.
surprisingly the game doesn't recognize the mounted image.

i made such images many times before, they all work fine. so no problem with the cue sheet or the mounting.
it's more like dosbox missing something from the raw bin image, i dunno...
anyone experienced such thing before?

[DSN9990]

@Wengier As I said above, it is stuck on fullscreen mode forever (at least on Carmageddon) and there are some missing elements on the HUD. Remember, I have recorded this video with nGlide 2.10. See below:

dosbox-x.2021-07-19.12-47-48-32.mp4

[DSN9990]

I will close this issue for now.

[grapeli]

This is what Carmageddon 3dfx looks like under dosbox-x 0.83.26-git. Using internal 3dfx emulation (not glide).

carmageddon-dosbox-x-0.83.26-git.mp4

There is a lot of progress. First of all, the additional graphic elements do not disappear, the second important change is the ability to scale the window. In the latter case, I undone the 1624f04 commit that made it impossible. Scaling additional graphic elements is far from perfect (in my case it is not an integer multiple).
Due to screen capture for video, the average fps drop is about 6-7 frames. In fact, the average is higher, around 21fps. My laptop is very weak.
Core i5-450M 2.4GHz (turbo 2.6GHz) with GPU Intel Gen5 Architecture (Ironlake)
On normal hardware, this should run smoothly enough.

[grapeli]

Dethrace is an open clone of Carmageddon. Not everything works yet, but it's worth running and testing.

Under wine, the original works better for me.