Old Game Emulation Tutorial

This tutorial by Magic began as an attempt to help people play old games, but evolved into containing links to various Abandonware websites since such sites are important to finding those games. It's possible and likely that many of them have closed since the time of writing. Regardless, the overall aim is to help you find and play 'elderly classics'. In section two, I go through some sites and then the actual application programs that can be used to play them.

1. Introduction: So You Want to Play Old Games?

Old games are great but you probably know that, having accessed a tutorial about playing them. I guess that saves me a rant where I would go on about how the younger generation, as well casual gamers and close minded people, foolishly appreciate pure graphics and flashy effects over actual gameplay and intellectually challenging games (And a mention of the time when a friend of mine could not believe the graphics in the squad combat of UFO: Enemy Unknown...!).

Let's get started then - I'm going to go through the applications I use to play old games, since some don't run well with Windows. Running most 'old' games in Windows do not run absolutely perfectly - like speed, sound and music may not be optimal. Most of the following programs work for the majority, but I'm not guaranteeing anything as some games can be very fickly runts that just don't like anything (Ultima 7 being a good example, though see 5.1 if you want to run it).

I have used Windows XP for all of this, so my methods will naturally vary depending on your own platform and Operating System. If you're not using XP and are running into problems then I suggest try the links to the sites for Home of the Underdogs and the Very Old Games on New Systems and politely ask on their forums.

All applications are freely available and, as far as I'm aware, legal so there should be no need to turn off the lights when you download them. As for the games themselves ... that's are another matter which is covered in section 2. The bottom line is that there are old games which are unsupported which makes them free to share, and then there is abandonwarez which is in a grey area of legality.

Finally, there is one simple method you can try first - go to the Properties of an exe file for the game you want to play and check out the Compatability tab. There is a Compatability mode where you can set it to work for different Windows systems. While this rarely works, though, it still is a method, but it's a good thing I've wrote this tutorial for the others. :)

2. Website Links

Like sexy women, it's fun playing with old games provided that you can find and get them. :P

While some people have the ancient floppy disks to install old games, not everyone was so careful or had the opportunity. When you pay for a game, most of the money is for the *right* to play the software. If it's ten years later, don't you still have it even if not the actual disks? So surely downloading that game is acceptable? Perhaps, but even then most people just download old games out of boredom or to appreciate them since it doesn't harm a publisher's sales. However, some games ARE still sold on budget labels, such as like Monkey Island 1 and 2 - despite both being over a decade old, to put them on the net is illegal and will annoy the developer, LucsArts. Anyway, the legality is quite fiddly - on your own conscience be damned if you're fully aware that you're taking money away from a hard working games developer.

Whilst I do NOT support blatant warez whatsoever - it's lazy and irresponsible - it seems that 'abandonwarez' is coming into the light for many people and as an acceptable medium to let people appreciate 'classic trash' (As one such site once had its name). Sites like Home of the Underdogs have taken away the more dubious aspect by having what I consider honour and decency (Strong moral fibre - there's not enough of it these days!), since they only host freeware or unsupported games that are legally available for download. This is as opposed to supported ones, which mean they have a publisher and are possibly on sale in a shop. HOTU take down such games as soon as they are aware that the game is supported or if the publisher asks. Some sites don't adhere to that and put up some games since it's next to impossible to acquire them games in shops. Like I said, it's a grey area and up to you to make up your mind.

Where to begin looking? A good place to start for Abandonwarez sites would be The Ultimate Oldgames Linkpage (TUOL), since it's the biggest listing of AW sites that I know of. http://tuol.org

It's essentially a huge listing of sites with information on what they have, when it was last updated and a rating on the quality of their games (e.g. if they are rare or common - you probably don't want to visit ten sites with identical content). TUOL is definitely worth a visit, but it can be time time-consuming to go through all of those sites (Some of which have closed down or have faulty downloads). If you really want to save time, then below is a selection of my bookmarked favourites that have great downloads for most genre's.

Download sites:

• Home of the Underdogs. Mentioned above, it's one of the very best AW sites, due to its brilliant style, content, well-wrote reviews, friendly forum and honour of sorts for not hosting games that are still being sold. Plus they actively try to make people aware of 'underdogs' with an award for such games that were unvalued in the past so that people can find and enjoy them today. http://www.the-underdogs.org/
  
• Abandonware France. Brilliant website, like HOTU. The only problem, obviously, is the language (That would be French) so you can't understand the news and reviews if you don't know it. If you know what you're after, however, then you'll be in heaven - the content is superb. Tip for getting downloads: 'telecharger' means 'download' (I presume), so click it when you're on the page of the game of your choice to get it.
  http://www.abandonware-france.org/
  
• BHLegend. Another great site. Bosnian, but in English, with superb content. http://www.bhlegend.com
  
• Ping Games. Formerly Classic trash. Yet another great site. http://www.pinggames.com/
  
• Funghus Warez. A huge amount of of games, presented as a simple and effective list. http://funghus.nihilist.nl/
  
• Full Version Games. Some of the links are to other sites downloads, which could be blatant file leeching, though in some cases the links are to pages instead. Hmmm. Regardless, there is a great selection available. http://www.angelfire.com/me2/derek/games.html
  
• GameBird. http://gamebird.dk/
  
• Abandon 5000. http://www.abandon5000.com/

Link and review sites:

They don't have downloads, but they some contain reviews and links for where to find them.

• The Old Games Linkpage. Mentioned above, for being the biggest and best start for finding AW sites, but not the games themselves. http://tuol.org
  
• Free Oldies. Information on a great many games with links to the AW sites that have them. http://www.freeoldies.com/
  
• Abandonware Search Page. http://sorry.vse.cz/~xvanm16/aban.html

And for general game information and documentation, I heartily recommend MobyGames which contains reviews and information for thousands of games. http://www.mobygames.com/


So go and find some games you like from the sites.

Once you've downloaded some zips and unzipped them (If you don't know what zips are, ask on the SA forum or go to www.winzip.com and figure it out), you will probably find that some may work like a regular Windows game (since some may be made FOR Windows or work ok in it), but some may not or some games won't operate perfectly (Usually sound, music and speed). If you're having difficulties and want a nostalgic buzz with an old game, or are very curious about one, read on for the methods to play them.

3. Applications

The apps I shall be covering are Dosbox, an emulator for Dos, VDMS, a program that runs Windows soundcards for games, and ScummVM, which can run certain adventure games.

3.1 - DosBox

It's a little tricky to get it started, but once you have it working you can play a *lot* of old games - since, as you the title suggests, DosBox actually emulates a Dos environment and settings. Begin by downloading it and installing it from its website.

Link: http://dosbox.sourceforge.net/

Don't go running it yet (The application itself, not the download) as you need to configure it a little to use it best. DosBox mounts a hard drive for it to emulate things. We could mount a drive manually when we run the program, but it would be easier to set a config file to do so automatically. It's easy, relax. Open up 'dosbox.conf' (Use Notepad) in its directory to find various settings for it. Go down to the bottom where '[autoexec]' is. The below is what I have and will depend upon your PC setup (You may have a different letter for your C drive).

mount x c:\
x:
cd games\dosgames

The above mounts the virtual drive X with drive C, then I ask it to change to that directory, and then to go to my main games dir to save me typing it. Personally, I keep all my dosgames in that directory for easy access. You may be different, depending on which drives your games are located, in which you may have to mount several drives.
(Note: By default, Dosbox launches itself in Z:, which you can not mount since it's used for the emulator's read-only files)

Quick DOS Usage notes:

Skip this section if you know how to use Dos. These are basic notes for beginners to get a grasp of it so they play games with DosBox.

• If you've never used Dos before, don't worry - it's very easy, especially just for loading games. Think of it as a text based version of Windows, i.e. no mouse or an interface, with 'directories' instead of folders and you're practically there. It's a simple and useful skill to have too (e.g. If you learn C Programming you'll probably use Unix, the dos equivalent for the Linux operation system).
• Once you enter a DOS prompt, you'll be at the root of a drive (Usually - if you start a Dos Prompt in Windows it usually goes to your user account folder - e.g. 'c:\documents and settings\bob'). Here you can type in commands to do things, such as change directories and run files.
• Directory names in DOS aren't supposed to be very long. You can have long ones for windows since its more advanced, but DOS wasn't built to cope with really long names so it shortens them by default when it's viewing them. Since you're using both Windows and DosBox, you should to be aware of this.
  For example, the dir 'wackywheels' becomes 'wackyw~1' in DOS. I'd have to type 'cd wackyw~1' to get into the directory. Therefore it's quicker if, for your DOS games, you rename them to something short. I have 'PQ1' for Police Quest 1 since it's much quicker to type - and saves having to work out where the annoying '~1' goes!
  
• Type in 'CD [directory name]' to enter it, which is the equivalent of double clicking a folder in windows. e.g. Let's say I start in c:\ and want to go into my 'games' directory. I would type 'CD games' and would now be in c:\games and able to do things there.
• Type in 'CD ..' to go exit one dir down (Like the 'up' button in Windows XP) and 'cd \' to exit them all and go to the root (i.e. No dir's). Type in 'dir' to list the files in that directory ('Dir /p' displays them page by page instead of all at once). Type dir *.exe to list all files with a .exe extension.
• You can change drives by 'X:' (That would take me to X drive, x:\).
• As you may know from windows, .bat and .exe files are the main files used to run programs. In Dos, you simply type in their name, e.g. 'run' or 'batman' if there is a run.exe or batman.bat.

That's the basics of it. If you've mounted your drive correctly, you can enter the directory you want, run the relevant bat or exe and you're away!

Three important notes on running games in DosBox:

• You may need to run a games setup file (Which is nearly always 'setup.exe' or 'install.exe') to tell the game which graphic and sound cards to use, though it's not always necessary.
• The speed can vary and depends upon all sorts of factors, but you can speed things down and up with CTRL and F11\F12, respectively. A number will appear in the background window of DosBox.
• To quit, press CTRL and F9.

The less said the better.



Ahh, the chaingun - overkill at its best.

3.2 - VDMS

What is it? Straight from the documentation's mouth:

"VDMSound is a program that overcomes what has probably been the most exasperating limitation of DOS boxes since Windows NT — sound support. VDMSound is an open, plug-in oriented platform that emulates an MPU-401 interface (for outputting high-quality MIDI music), a SoundBlaster compatible (SB16, SBPro 2, SB2, SBPro, etc.) implementation (for digital sound effects and FM/AdLib music), as well as a standard game-port interface (for playing games with joystick support). In development are improvements to the existing joystick emulation, and possibly VESA support."

The Virtual Dos Machine Sound doesn't exactly help games run but moreso their *sound*. Music and sound effects can be a huge part of the experience and immersion of most games, so it's worth using VDMS if DosBox doesn't play them. It's very easy to use and much quicker than DosBox, though it doesn't work with as many games from my playing (Which is why I covered DosBox first). Go ahead and download VDMS from its homepage:

Link: http://ntvdm.cjb.net/

Once installed, it's easy to use. You don't run a file to load it - you actually right click a file (exe or bat) in Windows and select 'Run with VDMS'. It will then do its best to run the sound settings properly in Windows. That's it!

3.3 - ScummVM

For many old adventure games, ScummVM is the main application to use. All elderly LucasArt adventure games can be played with it, as well as several others like Flight of the Amazon Queen, Simon the Sorcerer and Revolution titles (Broken Sword, Beneath a Steel Sky, etc). It's very easy to use too. ScummVM even have Beneath a Steel Sky and Flight of the Amazon Queen available to download at their site - speech versions too - since they're now freeware! :) I recommend both games, especially for beginners interested in playing adventure games as they're fun to play and not excessively difficult to play or work through.

Link: http://www.scummvm.org

Download and install it and run the scummvm exe. All you have to do is add each game (which have to be supported by ScummVM as stated on their site, of course) by selecting the directory, check the options and then run whichever one you wish to play. Yes, that's it - it's that easy. :)


No polygons, but some old games still had, uh, finely created artwork from time to time.



And another fantastic, uh, example of ... What? :P



Ah, Simon the Sorcerer 2. What a game. Despite the absence of Chris Barrie voicing Simon and that stupid ending. Ahem.

4. Specfic Solutions

I have found several solutions for certain games - of which some of the above programs don't work, or not particularly well, so I thought I'd share my findings\frustration. Always try the above applications (And Windows itself) before confirming that you're stuck. Try asking on the HOTU and VOGONS forums (Links are in section five, below). I plan on forming a large list of these someday, compiled from people's posts from the two forums.

4.1 - Ultima 7

A very difficult game to run in Windows itself and I get an extended memory error in DosBox, but fortunately a program called Exult was created specifically to run it and does so perfectly.
Link: http://exult.sf.net/



"Name! Job! Join! Bye!"

4.2 - UFO: Enemy Unknown.

There's a windows version available out there but it doesn't like graphic accelerators and messes up the graphics. To fix it... Go to Control Panel> Display> Settings> Advanced> Troubleshoot and turn the Hardware Acceleration bar down to None and then ok\apply, then try the game (The ufo.exe with the icon). You may as well just click Apply and leave the window open so you can change it back as soon as you have finished playing.



As that old saying goes "Always plan your attack, lest ye be obliterated by yonder things with big teeth or plasma rifles."

5. Conclusion

Please don't email me if you can't play a game, thanks - all I've done here is relay how I learned to use the above programs. However, feel free to ask on Samod's Help Wanted forum if you need help with anything in this article. We don't have 24/7 support or a hundred technical guru's, but we can point you in the right direction, I bet. :)
Link: http://www.samods.org

For an even better place for help, I also rercommend that you try the Very Old Games on New Systems (VOGONS) forum, who can probably help since they specialise - as the name suggests - in helping people to get old games working. They actually have forums for running Dos and windows games, plus DosBox and VDMS themselves, so it's surely the best place to try if you have any queries or problems.
Link: http://vogons.zetafleet.com/index.php

Also try the Technical Help forum at the Home of the Underdogs forum as another great alternative to ask at:
Link: http://www.the-underdogs.org/forum/viewforum.php?f=4

And in a topic there at HOTU they have a huge list of solutions for specific games, like section 4 above but far bigger, though it's not ordered perfectly.

Link: http://www.the-underdogs.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2600


In conclusion, I hope this tutorial has helped you get reacquainted with some old friends or made some new ones, as it were. :)
Have fun.

-Ben 'Magic' Brown