How to play DOS games in Windows?

BiggusGeekus

That's Latin for "cool"

• Aug 25, 2004

• #1

My home computer is WindowsXP. My work laptop is Windows NT. I would like to play Privateer and Ultima 6 on these systems. But the faux-command promt laughs at me like this: "BWAH-HAHAHAHAHAH! LOOOOOSER!!! LOOOOSER!!!!"

So, how can I change this and play the games?

 

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Henry

Autoexreginated

• Aug 25, 2004

• #2

History Lesson Time:

Privateer used a special memory manager called the Voodoo Extended Memory manager. You often had to create a special configuration to load it, separate from your other programs. Windows XP won't let you do this by itself; this program would have to be able to run natively in at LEAST windows 95 in order to run on XP.

Ultima 7 used the same thing, but Ultima 6 should run. The only Reason I can think it wouldn't is if it doesn't think you have the bottom 640K of RAM free - nowadays, there IS no "bottom 640K of RAM", as far as XP is concerned. Windows 95 and 98 could have run these with special configuration setups in the shortcut properties, but ever since windows ME that option has not been available, to my understanding. (I had little experience with ME).

 

Henry

Autoexreginated

• Aug 25, 2004

• #3

There is one other piece of info - IF your hard drive is formatted in FAT or FAT32 file system instead of NTFS, you could set up a special DOS boot disk, assuming you have Windows 98 or DOS handy on a friend's machine or such) and set up a special config to run these games. If you are using an NTFS file system, however, you're out of luck - NTFS is not readable by conventional older boot disks.

 

BiggusGeekus

That's Latin for "cool"

• Aug 25, 2004

• #4

I had hoped there was a magic emulator thingie.

Hmmm. I may, in fact, be boned.

Thanks for the heads up though!

 

Kid Charlemagne

I am the Very Model of a Modern Moderator

• Aug 25, 2004

• #5

*shudder*

High mem, low mem... nasty flashbacks. I had a job once with Konami in customer service, trying to talk kids through high mem/lo mem issues.

It would not surprise me if someone out there has created some kind of program that would allow you to do what you are looking for, but I've no idea where to look.

 

C

Chorn

First Post

• Aug 25, 2004

• #6

Try DOSBox for Ultima VI. You're out of luck AFAIK for Privateer due to that damnable Voodoo memory manager. Speaking of, you _can_ get Ultima VII to run in Windows thanks to U7Run despite the same Voodoo memory manager. A similar utility also exists for Ultima VIII. Furthermore, the Exult project might be of interest for those looking at U7.

Finally, once you get U6 up and running you'll want to check out DOUG the Eagle Dragon's "walkthrough" for the game. You can find it along with his other adventures HERE.

 

C

cybertalus

First Post

• Aug 25, 2004

• #7

You might also try these messageboards. I haven't looked them over closely, but they seem to be dedicated to running old DOS and Windows games using a variety of emulator type products (including the DOSBox one that Chorn mentioned).

With all the other retro stuff that's constantly popular, I'm very surprised that someone hasn't released a commerical DOS emulator for XP.

 

C

Chris Tavares

Explorer

• Aug 26, 2004

• #8

You might want to try grabbing a copy of either VirtualPC or VMWare. You can create a virtual machine that runs on your box, with whatever drive geometry and memory configuration you want. Then just install DOS on the thing and you're off and running... at least in theory, anyway.

VPC and VMWare will run more slowly than a "native" setup, but those old games were built in the days when a 486 was state of the art, so I doubt you'd notice a difference.

Hmm, I have to go back and see if I can get Star Control 2 to run under VPC...

 

Hand of Evil

Hero

Epic

• Aug 26, 2004

• #9

Chris Tavares said:

You might want to try grabbing a copy of either VirtualPC or VMWare. You can create a virtual machine that runs on your box, with whatever drive geometry and memory configuration you want. Then just install DOS on the thing and you're off and running... at least in theory, anyway.

VPC and VMWare will run more slowly than a "native" setup, but those old games were built in the days when a 486 was state of the art, so I doubt you'd notice a difference.

Hmm, I have to go back and see if I can get Star Control 2 to run under VPC...

Click to expand...

Second this.

 

J

JamesL85

First Post

• Aug 26, 2004

• #10

I'd be happy to figure out how to run the current version of MAME without having to go back several versions to get WinMAME.....