Thanks for the report. I need to get an ESS card and see what's up.

I actually ordered what I thought was one off eBay but when it arrived it was another YMF card - doh!

Still haven't had a chance to set my retro stuff up after a house move but I'm aiming to be up and running by Christmas. Too much 'real life' stuff going on.

if anyone has other EA games from this period it would be great to test them with SoftMPU. Keep an eye out for buffer overflow as Populous has this problem.

Lakers vs Celtics and the NBA Playoffs behaves exactly the same way as Budokan: when launched as "BBALL.EXE MT32" without having intelligent mode control, it freezes the PC. You can add another game to hall of fame... 😎

Awesome, added 😎

SoftMPU 1.7 is out now and has SB-MIDI support. I've tested it with my SB Pro 2 CT1600 but would be great to know if it works with the other SB cards.

Great job, again!

I suspect either an SB Pro II or a "stronger" card is the minimum spec for this version with games that provide both MIDI and speech. On a CT1330A (SB Pro I), the sound effects are slightly distorted and the speech is strange - stutters rapidly, sometimes it sounds like skipping about 200 ms out of 1000 ms data...
Ah well, Admiral Ackbar never sounded more Calamari 😀

Then again, speech is a rare thing in games before 1991.

Yep, I noticed some distortion on my SB Pro 2 with Lands of Lore. It wasn't as bad as what you describe though.

It looks like the SB-MIDI DSP commands disrupt sample playback somehow. Don't think there's anything that can be done to fix it. Maybe this is part of the reason we don't see more games with SB-MIDI support.

Oh well, at least it doesn't crash 😀 It should still be useful for non-speech games.

Added SB Pro 1 to the compatibility list.

After further thought the speech stuttering is probably caused by the same thing that messes up intelligent-mode interrupts. Basically it seems like the SB-MIDI DSP commands either prematurely acknowledge interrupt requests from the DSP or cause some interrupts to not happen in the first place. Intelligent mode interrupts with SB-MIDI work fine on Bochs' SB emulation. Maybe it's an undocumented behaviour of the real SB hardware.

Were it so, I would not be surprised at all. I have been "testing" dozens of Creative cards for years, there really is no perfect all arounder, just better models for specific purposes.
All those quirks...
Did you know that Dune 2 has different memory requirements for 1st gen. and PnP Blasters ? A PnP Blaster can do SB Pro speech + effects + MT32 (or General MIDI) with 617 kb conventional RAM (rare crashes) whereas a 1st gen Blaster like the CT1740 wont cut it all - the game will terminate instantly with a low RAM msg...

For the scope of hardware and games in question, SoftMPU v1.7 already covers the vast majority of games that are sensible to run on 386 with a Pro or Pro 2.

Games tested with QEMM 9.0:

Star Wars TIE Fighter: Works with the program without issues, crashes when using the Adlib/OPL3 Synthesizer (making a comparison video to put on YouTube)
Wing Commander 2: Speech and music crashes, and terminates unexpectingly
Lemmings 1 and Lemmings 2: Slower than my laptop and big desktop and crashes.
Frederik Pohl's Gateway 1 and Frederik Pohl's Gateway 2: Homeworld: Run great, doesn't crash
Police Quest 1: VGA, 2, and 3 run tremendously without crashing (PQ1 is slow when using the MT-32 Synthesizer)
DOOM: Works without a problem, but crashes when using the Sound Blaster/Adlib Synthesizer
Earl Weaver's Baseball 2: Crashes and slows down.

Games tested with Microsoft EMM 4.46 (optimized memory, 610KB conventional memory free):

All of the games listed above using either the Roland MT-32 Synthesizer (with SoftMPU v1.7 loaded during system startup) or not listed works and never crashes, hell, they start faster and run pretty fast.

For those who are using QEMM 7.03 and higher, Wing Commander and others would have sound issues in both speech and music and will crash; and will tell you to restart or terminate the game.

Just tried Wing Commander II under QEMM 7.03 and it worked fine here (Speech and Midi using SoftMPU on an ESS 1868). Maybe your QEMM config is a bit too aggressive. I just have DEVICE=QEMM386.SYS RAM and nothing else.

There seems to be missing music in Frederik Pohl's Gateway using the Roland MT-32 at the beginning.

1First music that plays: Prospector Theme Part 1
2Second music that should play: Random theme
3Third music that should play: Prospector Theme Part 2

When I play the game using the Sound Blaster OPL3 chipset, all of the music plays perfectly.

For the Roland MT-32, I have to press Master Volume and Rhythm to reset all instruments, and song #2 plays after typing in music off then music on, not #3 though.
Not sure if it's a bug or if my sound card hates me. Does anyone else have this issue?

Other games tested that works:

1A10 v1.5 --> works with any IRQ (2, 5, 7, 9)
2Earl Weaver's Baseball II --> works with any IRQ (2, 5, 7, 9)
3Frederik Pohl's Gateway --> works with any IRQ (2, 5, 7, 9) missing music: requires a 100% compatible Roland MPU-401 card
4Gateway II --> works with any IRQ (2, 5, 7, 9)
5LucasArts TIE Fighter --> works with any IRQ (2, 5, 7, 9)

:::Note:::

SoftMPU only works with the following MPU port #s:

1300
2310
3320
4330 <-- default depending on your sound card
5340

OK, got my new MPU-IPC-T up and running and tested a few things out 😎

- In Gateway the second piece of music plays fine with the Roland card, so this is a bug with SoftMPU. The same problem happens with Dosbox too (and of course SoftMPU's high level logic uses the Dosbox code). I will probably raise a bug with the Dosbox devs and see if srecko or anyone else bites 😀
- Confirmed keropi's report of /DELAYSYSEX not working with Roland cards. Need to look into this more, but in general even without SoftMPU I can see that the Roland card generally transmits faster than the soundcard MPU interfaces.

I've also revised the timing logic so that the 'slow' parts of SoftMPU are only active when needed (i.e. when playing a game that needs MPU interrupts, or when /DELAYSYSEX is active). This means that the performance hit for the majority of games should be less noticeable on 386 class machines.

bjt wrote:

OK, got my new MPU-IPC-T up and running and tested a few things out :cool: […]
Show full quote

OK, got my new MPU-IPC-T up and running and tested a few things out 😎

- In Gateway the second piece of music plays fine with the Roland card, so this is a bug with SoftMPU. The same problem happens with Dosbox too (and of course SoftMPU's high level logic uses the Dosbox code). I will probably raise a bug with the Dosbox devs and see if srecko or anyone else bites 😀
- Confirmed keropi's report of /DELAYSYSEX not working with Roland cards. Need to look into this more, but in general even without SoftMPU I can see that the Roland card generally transmits faster than the soundcard MPU interfaces.

I've also revised the timing logic so that the 'slow' parts of SoftMPU are only active when needed (i.e. when playing a game that needs MPU interrupts, or when /DELAYSYSEX is active). This means that the performance hit for the majority of games should be less noticeable on 386 class machines.

Ah, good to know. Figured it wasn't my sound card, because all of the Gateway II: Homeworld music plays without missing a beat.

Plus, I revised my system's boot up (autoexec.bat) to the following and made a new file to let me choose which game to play (games.bat):

1autoexec.bat
2-----------------------------------------------
3:::Output omitted:::
4@echo off
5echo Y - Play games
6rem calls the games.bat file (if Y is pressed)
7echo N - continue with MS-DOS
8rem if N is pressed (or within 15 seconds), MS-DOS continues
9echo.
10@echo off
11choice /C:YN /T:N,15 "Do you want to play games "
12IF ERRORLEVEL 2 GOTO END
13IF ERRORLEVEL 1 GOTO GAMES
14
15:GAMES
16call games.bat
17rem opens the games.bat file
18
19:END
20
21:::Output Omitted:::

1games.bat
2-----------------------------------------------------------------
3@echo off
4echo Which game do you want to play?
5echo.
6echo A - A10 v1.5                               J - Lemmings 2                                      S - NHL Hockey 97
7echo B - Sid Meier's Civilization           K - Lemmings                                        T - Pac-Man
8echo C - Champ Kong                          L - Mario                                               U - Police Quest: VGA - Adlib
9echo D - DOOM                                   M - Mario Bros.                                      V - Police Quest: VGA - Roland
10echo E - Dark Queen of Krynn              N - Monkey Island Adlib                         W - Police Quest II - Adlib
11echo F - Earl Weaver's Baseball II         O - Monkey Island Internal Speaker        X - Police Quest II - Roland
12echo G - Galagon (Galaga)                   P - Monkey Island Roland                       Y - Police Quest III
13echo H - Frederik Pohl's Gateway         Q - Ms. Pac-Man                                    Z - Taco Bell Tasty Temple Challenge
14echo I - Gateway II: Homeworld           R - NHL Hockey 95                                 --------------------------------
15echo 1 - TIE Fighter                             2 - Wing Commander II                          0 - Exit
16echo.
17@echo off
18D:
19choice /C:ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ120 /T:0,15 "Which game do you want to play "
20IF ERRORLEVEL 29 GOTO END
21IF ERRORLEVEL 28 GOTO WC2
22IF ERRORLEVEL 27 GOTO TIE
23IF ERRORLEVEL 26 GOTO TEMPLE
24IF ERRORLEVEL 25 GOTO PQ3
25IF ERRORLEVEL 24 GOTO PQ2
26IF ERRORLEVEL 23 GOTO PQ2-A
27IF ERRORLEVEL 22 GOTO PQ
28IF ERRORLEVEL 21 GOTO PQ-A
29IF ERRORLEVEL 20 GOTO PAC-MAN
30IF ERRORLEVEL 19 GOTO NHL97
31IF ERRORLEVEL 18 GOTO NHL95
32IF ERRORLEVEL 17 GOTO MPAC-MAN
33IF ERRORLEVEL 16 GOTO MONKEY-R
34IF ERRORLEVEL 15 GOTO MONKEY-I
35IF ERRORLEVEL 14 GOTO MONKEY-A
36IF ERRORLEVEL 13 GOTO MARIOBRO
37IF ERRORLEVEL 12 GOTO MARIO
38IF ERRORLEVEL 11 GOTO LEMMINGS
39IF ERRORLEVEL 10 GOTO LEMM2
40IF ERRORLEVEL 9 GOTO GATEWAY2
41IF ERRORLEVEL 8 GOTO GATEWAY
42IF ERRORLEVEL 7 GOTO GALAGON
43IF ERRORLEVEL 6 GOTO EWB2
44IF ERRORLEVEL 5 GOTO DQK
45IF ERRORLEVEL 4 GOTO DOOM
46IF ERRORLEVEL 3 GOTO D-KONG
47IF ERRORLEVEL 2 GOTO CIV
48IF ERRORLEVEL 1 GOTO A10
49
50:A10
51cd games
52call a10.bat
53goto end
54
55:civ
56cd games
57call civ.bat
58goto end
59
60:d-kong

61cd games
62call d-kong.bat
63goto end
64
65:doom
66cd games
67call doom.bat
68goto end
69
70:dqk
71cd games
72call dqk.bat
73goto end
74
75:ewb2
76cd games
77call ewb2.bat
78goto end
79
80:Galagon
81cd games
82call Galagon.bat
83goto end
84
85:gateway
86cd games
87call gateway.bat
88goto end
89
90:gateway2
91cd games
92call gateway2.bat
93goto end
94
95:lemm2
96cd games
97call lemm2.bat
98goto end
99
100:lemmings
101cd games
102call lemmings.bat
103goto end
104
105:Mario
106cd games
107call Mario.bat
108goto end
109
110:mariobro
111cd games
112call mariobro.bat
113goto end
114
115:monkey-a
116cd games
117call monkey-a.bat
118goto end
119
120:monkey-I
121cd games
122call monkey-i.bat
123goto end
124
125:monkey-r
126cd games
127call monkey-r.bat
128goto end
129
130:mpac-man
131cd games
132call mpac-man.bat
133goto end
134
135:nhl95
136cd games
137call nhl95.bat
138goto end
139
140:nhl97
141cd games
142call nhl97.bat
143goto end
144
145:Pac-Man
146cd games
147call pac-man.bat
148goto end
149
150:PQ-A
151cd games
152call pq-a.bat
153goto end
154
155:PQ
156cd games
157call pq.bat
158goto end
159
160:PQ2-A
161cd games
162call pq2-a.bat
163goto end
164
165:PQ2
166cd games
167call pq2.bat
168goto end
169
170:PQ3
171cd games
172call pq3.bat
173goto end
174
175:temple
176cd games
177call temple.bat
178goto end
179
180:TIE
181cd games
182call tie.bat
183goto end
184
185:WC2
186cd games
187call wc2.bat
188goto end
189
190:end
191echo.
192@echo off
193echo Exiting...
194echo.
195@echo off

Sorry for the long list... That's my actual MS-DOS games collection (downloaded and acquired from floppies and CD-ROMs).
All of the goto end in the games.bat file tells the game after I either click exit or hit ALT+X the games quit instead of going to the next one.

Choice MS-DOS Command code:

1choice /C:[choices] /T:[goto choice],X[time in seconds from 1 to infinity] "String of text "
2IF ERRORLEVEL 255 GOTO END
3..........
4..........
5..........
6IF ERRORLEVEL 1 GOTO Label1
7
8:Label1
9[insert commands]
10goto end (mandatory for either games or sets of commands)
11
12:end

:::NOTE::: [choices] range from A-Z, 1-0, and special characters (!@#$%^&*()-_=+[{]};:'",<.>/?\|`~)
:::NOTE 2::: if you're making a games batch file, always add the goto end for each game, otherwise every game would play. Same applies for commands.

Alright. I decided to replace my PCI sound card with an older ISA Sound Card: a Sound Blaster Vibra 16xv PnP ISA CT4170 Sound Card, and the SoftMPU program does work with the system. Doesn't work without it, but TIE Fighter and Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis don't complain if the games operate in either UART or intelligent mode surprisingly.

Those 2 games never needed an Intelligent Mode MPU401 😀

Try Wing Commander, Space Quest 3 or The Heart of China.

Heart Of China doesn't need intelligent mode either 😀

Updated first post with current testing status and added a couple new cards that need testing

ESS ISA support is fixed for the next version btw.

Oh is that right 🤣

Tested Sid Meier's Civilization with SBMPU401 program (found on here with the help of Google) <-- without SoftMPU running, and the music works surprisingly, even with Police Quest I: VGA, the game works with the program listed above... I'll be surprised if NHL Hockey 95 would work with both SBMPU401 and SoftMPU running at the same time, or just with the SBMPU401 program.

The SBMPU401 program allows games to play through the external MIDI/Joystick port on a Sound Blaster ISA Card (surprising).

Got Frederik Pohl's Gateway to work with DOSBox officially after applying new lines of code; works fantastically. Now, if only I can build a new version of SoftMPU to do the same as DOSBox... I inserted the codes/commands in the appropriate files:

1---pic.c---
2void PIC_WriteCommand(Bitu port,Bitu val,Bitu iolen);
3void PIC_WriteCommand(Bitu port,Bitu val,Bitu iolen) {
4		write_command(port,val,iolen);
5}
6---pic.c---

1---mpu401.c---
2		case 0xac:	/* Request version */
3			PIC_WriteCommand(0x20,0x60,1);
4			QueueByte(MSG_MPU_ACK);
5			QueueByte(MPU401_VERSION);
6			QueueByte(MSG_MPU_ACK);
7			return;
8		case 0xad: /* Request revision */
9			QueueByte(MSG_MPU_ACK);
10			QueueByte(MPU401_REVISION);
11			return;
12---mpu401.c---

I get an error in the pic.c file when compiling with my old Ultimate DOS PC:

1PIC.OBJ(PIC.C) ; Error L2029: '_write_command; : unresolved external <-- C:\MASM611\BINR\LINK.EXE /NOI /BATCH /FAR /NODEFAULTLIBRARYSEARCH mpu401.obj midi.obj pic.obj SoftMPU.obj,..\SoftMPU.exe,,,,, command

Is there a way to build the program with Visual C++ 2008 Express Edition, or is that physically impossible?
This will be my second time making a program with patches in the codes. That and I need to fix the keyboard input lockup for the game to work without freezing the computer or locking the keyboard and forcing a system restart.

Edit: I have Microsoft C Compiler 7 for Windows on my Windows 98SE Virtual PC and the one error message went away, now the linker program still gives out the error listed above. Getting close here, and if only I can find a link command that'll work. Might as well install Microsoft C Compiler 7 on a Windows 2000/XP Virtual PC and copy the exact files and folders for the appropriate building method. I'll post back to see whether this will work or not.

Edit 2: Doesn't want to build in Windows XP... gives me the same exact error.