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DOSBox Feature Request Thread

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Reply 60 of 298, by truth_deleted

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I am not aware of any DOS games which require 1920x1200 resolution. If full screen is desired, then the scalers are more than adequate. OpenGL-HQ is especially adapted for very high resolution with little performance penalty. Another one is output=openglnb, but you would have black bars around the viewing area, at least for "integer" scaling among VGA modes.

Perhaps Quake 1 or its ilk would take advantage of the newer VESA modes, but it would be as slow as molasses.

Reply 61 of 298, by freecrac

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truth5678 wrote:

I am not aware of any DOS games which require 1920x1200 resolution.

Not all applications are games and a chioce for to use a higher resolution is not an implicit requirement, more a feature for to become the native resolution of the current monitor.

If full screen is desired, then the scalers are more than adequate.

But how many content of a picture with a 1920x1200x32 resolution will be lost, if we let downscale this picture using a videomode with a lower resolution and with an other aspect ratio for to show this picture in fullscreen?

OpenGL-HQ is especially adapted for very high resolution with little performance penalty. Another one is output=openglnb, but you would have black bars around the viewing area, at least for "integer" scaling among VGA modes.

Perhaps Quake 1 or its ilk would take advantage of the newer VESA modes, but it would be as slow as molasses.

I never play Quake and i do not want to use only VGA modes and i do not want to become black bars around the viewing area, because this is too much far for to become an adequate view.

Dirk

Reply 62 of 298, by Dominus

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DOSBox is for games only. Don't bother with feature requests that are not for games.

Windows 3.1x guide for DOSBox
60 seconds guide to DOSBox
DOSBox SVN snapshot for macOS (10.4-11.x ppc/intel 32/64bit) notarized for gatekeeper

Reply 63 of 298, by freecrac

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Dominus wrote:

DOSBox is for games only. Don't bother with feature requests that are not for games.

Ok no problem, now i have started to programm a little puzzle game for placing some cutted picture on the screen that uses a resoution of 1920x1200 pixel. So now my feature request is for a game.

A solid answer that DOSbox does not going this way is not very helpfull and it is also well known that all new features must be first implemented before we can use it. So it make no sense to remenber that we can not use a not implemented keyword-value inside of the configuration file for a feature that does not exist in this moment now.

So i continue wishing to know what is exactly the greatest problem for to let us use the video parameter from our video card instead of using the S3-parameter for to switch to a VBE-mode maybe with a different resolution?

Dirk

Reply 65 of 298, by Dominus

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First good luck convincing the devs that your game is a valid reason to code differently.

The main hurdle is that the graphics card is emulated to be the most compatible for dos games.
That's why your real graphics card is of no great importance.
Your wish is thus not really possible without recoding Dosbox and then losing compatibilty with great many real games.

Windows 3.1x guide for DOSBox
60 seconds guide to DOSBox
DOSBox SVN snapshot for macOS (10.4-11.x ppc/intel 32/64bit) notarized for gatekeeper

Reply 66 of 298, by freecrac

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Dominus wrote:

First good luck convincing the devs that your game is a valid reason to code differently.

Not only my own game can be use a higher resolution and if DOSbox become those new feature too, then more programmers becomes the possibility to use those higher resolutions also with widescreen support for using modern display devices.
Once a day the older hardware does not exist ever more, so we have to use widescreen in the future and we have to going this way to use the features of those hardware to become an adepuat functonality and not black bars around the visible view.

The main hurdle is that the graphics card is emulated to be the most compatible for dos games.

But what is exactly the most problem for to emulate the video parameter of the current display adapter on the same way?

That's why your real graphics card is of no great importance.

I believe it becomes only more importance, if DOSbox get the capabilities of the current display card and if it emulate just that capabilities like the capabilities of the S3-chipset too.

Your wish is thus not really possible without recoding Dosbox and then losing compatibilty with great many real games.

Using a new feature only with an optional keyword and allways with a choice for to use it, how can it decrease the great compatibilty for to play games example with the emulated S3-chipset configuration?

On the other side it would be increase the compatibilty for to bild newer games with the new capabilities of modern grafic cards and modern monitors that we can use these present days.

Dirk

Reply 67 of 298, by Dominus

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How many games are being programmed for real Dos (not the Windows command prompt) these days? And how many of those are aiming for higher definitions? So far you have claimed to do that. Let us know when you've finished.
In reality Dos has not been the gaming platform for almost two decades, so please get real again

Windows 3.1x guide for DOSBox
60 seconds guide to DOSBox
DOSBox SVN snapshot for macOS (10.4-11.x ppc/intel 32/64bit) notarized for gatekeeper

Reply 68 of 298, by freecrac

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Dominus wrote:

How many games are being programmed for real Dos (not the Windows command prompt) these days?

I think we all know only a few user use a real DOS today, but DOSbox will be used more.

And how many of those are aiming for higher definitions?

Most of them can not aim higher definitions, because they use DOSbox and it do not provide higher definitions.
So the dependence between the population of those games is regarding with the providing of the feature for that.

So far you have claimed to do that. Let us know when you've finished. In reality Dos has not been the gaming platform for almost two decades, so please get real again

The sticking point is to know which problems exist for creating an additional DOSbox-modul with a configurable choice for to emulate the capabilities of the VBE bios of the current video card.

Dirk

Reply 69 of 298, by Dominus

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It's not about DOS users it's about game developers targeting DOS. How many are there and why would there be more if DOSBox would do what you think it should do? Yes there are always few demo makers and people that develop targeting DOS for fun but there are few and fewer.
And NOT because Dosbox doesn't do your great feature idea, but because in the last twenty years other platforms became much more interesting for gamers and game developers. Not to mention the lack of audience since there are not that many Dos machines in the wild...
So the sticking point is not that feature, the sticking point is that no one would use that feature and what is not needed doesn't go into DOSBox.
BUT nothing prevents you from forking Dosbox and add that feature yourself, so your game works with what you want.

Windows 3.1x guide for DOSBox
60 seconds guide to DOSBox
DOSBox SVN snapshot for macOS (10.4-11.x ppc/intel 32/64bit) notarized for gatekeeper

Reply 70 of 298, by collector

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If you need features beyond what is best for old DOS games, perhaps you should look onto a VM with DOS or FreeDOS installed into it. DOSBox is designed by and for retro gamers and will always be so. Of course it is also open source, so if you wish for things outside of its goal, it can always be altered. If this is beyond your capabilities or more effort than you are prepared for, then your only option may well be a VM.

The Sierra Help Pages -- New Sierra Game Installers -- Sierra Game Patches -- New Non-Sierra Game Installers

Reply 71 of 298, by freecrac

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For me there is no problem for booting MSDOSS 6.22 (in a very short time) with my Core2quad-board from a BootCD or from a 2GB-USB-Stick. This DOS maschine work for me like a very fast 80386-board with 4 integer pipelines and additional SIMD instructions.

And additional there is no problem for to use the VBE 3-bios of my radeon 7950 card with all VBE-modes on this card under pure DOS without a VM. Additional i can use the VBE hardware tripple buffering for to become no tearing, if i move very large objects across the screen. But testing an (other) application (without tripple buffering) inside of a VM, then the performance is visible going down. So without an OS like Windows or Linux... it make no sense to use a VM for to use only a DOS.
..
Using linux maybe only booting a LIVE-CD it is also possible for to use the fb0-device for to write directly to the mapped framebuffer.
..

I think it is beyond my capabilities for to forking Dosbox by myself. So i think if DOSbox do not provide a larger resolution maybe in the future, then i do not need DOSbox never more, because i do not want to play old DOS games with a low CGA/VGA/SVGA resolution and only with a few colors.

In the past at the time of those old cards and slower CPUs there was no alternative, but today i do not want to see only a view of a posting stamp and with a color of a transfer picture from a childrens bubble gum automat for to become an eye cancer. But i know this is only my own personal view of this old DOS games, so i can not really understand the retro gamers and how it can be funny to play with this old crappy view nowadays. And if we are scaling up this view, then it views stil more uglier, comparison with the view of an old small SVGA monitor from this time in the past. (Same with mobil phones, i also do not like it to watch to this small views, so i do not need one, also i do not like to comunicate and talk to a bone in my hand, because i am not a dog.)

At last i have to say thank you very much to all of you, for to answer my questions.

Dirk

Reply 72 of 298, by Dominus

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Just for the record, you tried Qbix post? Because you won't get higher resolutions in real dos with old games than with dosbox. It's just that your monitor scales them up. Same as dosbox does with the right setting... It seems you are confused about how things work, both in Dosbox and in real dos on your machine. Good luck getting old games to work with your machine, speed and sound wise...

Windows 3.1x guide for DOSBox
60 seconds guide to DOSBox
DOSBox SVN snapshot for macOS (10.4-11.x ppc/intel 32/64bit) notarized for gatekeeper

Reply 73 of 298, by karashata

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EDIT: After some discussion over on another thread I originally started related to Jazz Jackrabbit's oddities regarding mode switching between the level loading screens and levels themselves, and the rest of the game's various screens, it seems I may have figured out what's actually going on, so I have to alter my request accordingly.

It seems what Jazz Jackrabbit might doing in legit DOS is having its menus and various other screens set the display mode to the fairly typical 320x200 @ 70Hz mode most DOS games use, while having its level loading screens and the levels themselves set the display mode to 320x240 @ 60Hz, with the game's actual 320x199 video output centered vertically within that display area.

What I'm wondering now is, would it at all be possible to emulate this in DOSBox, having the display area/output set to a given resolution and having the game's actual video output centered within that display area?

Reply 74 of 298, by truth_deleted

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I checked and Jazz Jackrabbit (Jazz) already works in DOSBox: http://www.dosbox.com/wiki/GAMES:Jazz_Jackrabbit.

I also read your thread about Jazz/dosbox/FRAPS compatibility and one solution was to modify the Jazz executable. Since FRAPS (XP through W7 only) software and its features are a FRAPS issue, here is a solution to combining its output files: https://frapsforum.com/threads/how-to-make-fr … e-large-file.23.

Reply 75 of 298, by karashata

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The issue I have with having multiple files recorded is that short sections of the game video and audio, as well as any commentary I might be making at the time, are missed during those transitions when Jazz switches modes, due to Fraps having to stop recording the old file and start recording to a new file every time the game's resolution changes.

On a not-capture related note, this also causes playing in full-screen mode (with or without aspect correction enabled) to freeze briefly every time the game's output resolution changes, due to having to re-render the output to fit the screen.

I feel that having DOSBox respect the intended display mode and draw the game's output into an output at that size would solve both of those problems (albeit only with aspect correction enabled, which would be necessary for an accurate representation of what the game looks like on real hardware in real DOS anyway).

At any rate, I'm totally aware this feature request may never actually be implemented, due to it not at all impacting the ability of the game to be played in what I guess is more typical use cases (windowed mode, likely with 2x or 3x scaling, with or without aspect correction enabled...), and only somewhat impacting the game in full-screen mode at high resolutions, and multiple recordings can be stitched together even if the end result is slightly less than accurate to the actual gameplay (and at less important moments rather than during actual gameplay).

I only brought it up because I thought it was a good idea, and in case anyone else might think it's a good idea.

EDIT: Based on some further tinkering it has come to light that my request may, unfortunately, be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to emulate in software. I hereby rescind my request.

Reply 77 of 298, by FeedingDragon

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More of a convenience request, not necessary for anything really. Some way of setting where the DOSBox window will be on the desktop (in windowed mode.) The console always loads at the same location (where I last had it, I would guess.) But the DOSBox window always loads at a different location, there's probably a pattern to that, but I cannot figure it out. Adding 2 entries to "windowresolution=" might work. For example: windowresolution=800x600x200x100 would create a 800x600 pixel window with the upper left corner located 200 pixels from the left and 100 pixels from the top of the desktop. Alternately, a command line switch such as -window 200x100 would cause the window created (I've notice in Win7-64 at least, that DOSBox creates a window even if it is going to immediately switch to full screen,) to be at the same location.

Again, it's just a convenience thing 😀 I've been getting a little frustrated at time is all (constantly moving the window so I can see it.)

Feeding Dragon

Reply 79 of 298, by FeedingDragon

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collector wrote:

You can set SDL to open the Window centered.

Had to do a search. Only way I could find was with environment variable SDL_VIDEO_CENTERED=1. Can also use SDL_VIDEO_WINDOW_POS=x,y to accomplish what I want. These will effect every window that opens. Which solves my current frustration (still going through literally 100's of pack-ratted games.) I still think being able to specify a window location for individual configurations (ok for each game,) would be "nice". 😀 But, like I said, there's no hurry, rush, or even any real need - I just think it would make a nice feature.

Feeding Dragon