VOGONS


First post, by Mok

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As a fun side project I have written MT-32 GM drivers for Miles Sound System (aka AIL) and for HMI SOS. Yeah it’s 25 years too late and not very useful now but why not? It’s not going to change your MT-32 into Sound Canvas but at least you can play Warcraft II with your MT-32. Try it if you are bored.

While AIL/MSS is designed to allow instruments preloading before every sequence, HMI SOS unfortunately isn’t. That means the driver uses extremely hackish code and it might not be compatible with everything.

Usage:
- AIL2/MIDPAK/MSS2 games: depending on the game, replace MT32MPU.ADV/GENMID.ADV/SC32MPU.ADV with the one in the archive. Some games put selected driver in the game directory with different name (ie. MIDPAK.ADV etc.) Old users of GUS or AWE32 surely are familiar with this as it was the same way with their drivers back in the 90s. Select GENERAL MIDI/SOUND CANVAS/MPU-401 in the sound config. Do not select MT-32.

- AIL2.5 aka AIL2 protected mode: replace A32MT32.DLL with new version. Select GENERAL MIDI/SOUND CANVAS/MPU-401 in the sound config. Do not select MT-32. Some games use AIL2 for config and AIL2.5 for the game.

- MSS3: replace MPU401.MDI with .MDI file from the archive. Sometimes you may need to replace MT32MPU.MDI instead. If the game uses standard Rad Game Tools sound config, you’ll have an option “Roland MT-32 GENERAL MIDI with MPU-401”. If the game uses custom sound config, select GENERAL MIDI/SOUND CANVAS/MPU-401. Do not select MT-32.

- HMI SOS: Protected mode games use HMIMDRV.386 file, real mode games use HMIMDRV.DRV, replace either or both (some games use real mode sound config and protected mode for the game). Select GENERAL MIDI/SOUND CANVAS/MPU-401 in the sound config. Do not select MT-32.
This will not work with extremely old HMI SOS versions (HMI SOS earlier than v3). I’ll consider writing special drivers for such games later. This will not work with 16-bit Windows HMI SOS drivers either. I have no way to test such config at the moment.

That’s it. Simple driver replacement won’t work with games that use drivers read from some custom packed archives without extra game-specific patches.

Unfortunately I’m not a musician and my hearing is mediocre at best. The patchset I stitched together uses some really bad timbres for some instruments and I lack the ability to create better ones at the moment. Similarly I chose to not use CM-32/LAPC’s extra pcm sounds so some sfx are bad.

History:

v0.1 – first test release. Many thanks to Stefan_L for initial tests on a real hardware, as I wrote it using dosbox and MUNT.

Download link:
http://www.mediafire.com/file/lv9s2k28z1slhk2 … mt32gm_v0_1.zip

Examples of some games that might work:

MSS2:
Battle Isle II, Capitalism, Dark Sun: Wake of the Ravager, Delta V, Guilty, Jammit, Lode Runner: The Legend Returns etc.

MSS2.5:
Al-Qadim, Fantasy Empires, Hanse: Die Expedition, Little Big Adventure, Menzoberranzan, Ravenloft: Strahd’s Possession etc.

MSS3:
Albion, Azrael’s Tear, Extreme Assault, Heaven’s Dawn, Heroes of Might & Magic II, I Have No Mouth, Lords of Midnight the Citadel, Primal Rage, Sea Legends, Star Control 3, The Settlers, The Settlers II, Theme Hospital, Warcraft, Warcraft II, Zone Raiders etc.

HMI SOS:
Anvil of Dawn, Battle Arena Toshinden, BC Racers, Cybermage, Descent, Descent II, Dungeon Master II, Fatal Racing, Frontier: First Encounters, Hardball 4, Lands of Lore II, Mad TV 2, Millennia: Altered Destinies, Nascar Racing, Normality, Silverload, Stonekeep, TES: Daggerfall etc.

Some games that have support for MT-32 via a simple instrument remapper may be worth a try ie. Maxis games (MSS2), Gremlin’s games (HMI).

Reply 1 of 4, by d3vilsadvocate

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Thanks for this. Thanks to these drivers I was able to get the old game BC Racers running using midi sounds with DOSBOX. I made a comment here on how this works:

https://www.dosbox.com/comp_list.php?showID=3316&letter=B

Reply 2 of 4, by WhiteFalcon

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What an interesting project and I have only just noticed it, thanks for sharing! Will try on my old PC, I usually use the General Midi option with my SCC-1, but it will be interesting to compare with the MT-32 in game that did no longer had support for it.

Olivetti M4 P75, 32MB RAM, 4GB HDD, SoundBlaster AWE 64, Gravis Ultrasound MAX, Roland SCC-1, Roland MT-32, Roland CM-64.

Reply 4 of 4, by WhiteFalcon

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Tried this with Descent in DOS and my MT-32 and it works great, sounds almost like Sound Canvas.

Olivetti M4 P75, 32MB RAM, 4GB HDD, SoundBlaster AWE 64, Gravis Ultrasound MAX, Roland SCC-1, Roland MT-32, Roland CM-64.