One thing to add with the 1993 floppy release of X-Wing is that it contains the original MT-32 tracks and GM tracks whereas the CD version only has the GM tracks... which can be played in MT-32 mode. I had read this on the GOG forums but also there was a website somewhere that had the comparisons and it the floppy version did sound better with the original tracks rather than the CD version with MT32 doing GM.

Interesting.. of course the flip point if I remember correctly, is that TIE Fighter was GM from the outset.

Note that TIE Fighter DOS is quite possibly the worst game I have in terms of getting it to work. There's an irritating pause bug where the game pauses for a second at times if an AWE32/64 is in use, it's outputting to an external MIDI device, and you're using joystick. Others have used different work arounds, but I resorted to a separate Soundblaster 16, purely to drive external MIDI.

That's it, you're only potentially missing TIE Fighter 95 as part of the X-Wing Collector's Series. Those were Win95 re-releases using the X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter engine, though I'm surprised if they did any form of acceleration. D3D hardware acceleration was only added to XvT itself in the expansion and later update as a pretty minor cosmetic effect. Any Voodoo runs that game fine, several newer cards (~GeForce FX on) have some compatibility issues.

ynari wrote:

There's an irritating pause bug where the game pauses for a second at times if an AWE32/64 is in use, it's outputting to an external MIDI device, and you're using joystick. Others have used different work arounds, but I resorted to a separate Soundblaster 16, purely to drive external MIDI.

That sucks! I just bought an AWE64 Gold and I thought this would work well with my Sound Canvas. From what reading I did it seemed like the AWE64 was a versatile choice -- work with SOFTMPU for MT32, external midi and good FM compatibility (if not authentic).

With 2 ISA slots, it sounds like I should get a different card for external MIDI/Joystick and get a better FM card -- getting rid of the AWE64 since it excels at neither.

firage wrote:

That's it, you're only potentially missing TIE Fighter 95 as part of the X-Wing Collector's Series. Those were Win95 re-releases using the X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter engine, though I'm surprised if they did any form of acceleration. D3D hardware acceleration was only added to XvT itself in the expansion and later update as a pretty minor cosmetic effect. Any Voodoo runs that game fine, several newer cards (~GeForce FX on) have some compatibility issues.

That's the X-Wing Collector's Series that was listed. It used the XvT engine and it was D3D accelerated. While I like the graphical updates, I instead use the collector's CDs to play these games. I really need iMuse to get the feel of playing TIE Fighter when it came out.

To the OP's questions: Your list is correct. I have owned (and still own most) every version of these games since they came out (floppy to Collector's series). I have not played the Collector's Series on VooDoo2, but I have on Voodoo3 and they work great. I don't imagine you'd have trouble running it on VooDoo2 at all. I used to run the Collector's Series on a Pentium 200 in software just fine back in 2000.

appiah4 wrote:

TIE Fighter Collector's CD (1995): MS-DOS, 640x480 VESA Mode

Speaking of which, is there a way to replay recorded gameplays in 640x480?
It seems that the hi-res player is only available immediately after mission end, and once you exit you can only re-open low-res player.

nekurahoka wrote:

firage wrote:

That's it, you're only potentially missing TIE Fighter 95 as part of the X-Wing Collector's Series. Those were Win95 re-releases using the X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter engine, though I'm surprised if they did any form of acceleration. D3D hardware acceleration was only added to XvT itself in the expansion and later update as a pretty minor cosmetic effect. Any Voodoo runs that game fine, several newer cards (~GeForce FX on) have some compatibility issues.

That's the X-Wing Collector's Series that was listed. It used the XvT engine and it was D3D accelerated. While I like the graphical updates, I instead use the collector's CDs to play these games. I really need iMuse to get the feel of playing TIE Fighter when it came out.

To the OP's questions: Your list is correct. I have owned (and still own most) every version of these games since they came out (floppy to Collector's series). I have not played the Collector's Series on VooDoo2, but I have on Voodoo3 and they work great. I don't imagine you'd have trouble running it on VooDoo2 at all. I used to run the Collector's Series on a Pentium 200 in software just fine back in 2000.

Are you sure hardware acceleration is D3D? I thought the game was a glide title?

Yes. 3dfx was synonymous with 3D acceleration at the time, but in several cases the only API was D3D.

The Win95 re-releases felt a lot less polished than X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter itself. The presentation is a little hacked together, and I recall having joystick issues that didn't happen with XvT.

The DOS Collector's CD release of TIE Fighter is definitely the best representation of the game.

Well I was considering trying the Win95 versions because I thought they were glide so there is little need to install them at the moment I will install the CD versions of each though lack of 640x480 or a TF engine port of XW is a shame.

Final question: Does anyone know if the DOS CD versions will work with a Microsoft Sidewinder 2 (USB) under Windows 98? If they won't play nice with my joystick it might be a reason to grudgingly go for the Collector's Series..

Is there a comparison video of the versions mentioned above?
i personally would go for a win9x version like the kilrathi saga (wc), because for wc1 you still need the ideal machine, not too fast and not to slow.
wc2 matches this machine not any more, so the win9x versions are best in my opinion. (but very hard to find)

This can be solved with DOSBox or a highly flexible slowdown machine (C3 Ezra/K6-2+/P5 with TR12 registers).

appiah4 wrote:

Final question: Does anyone know if the DOS CD versions will work with a Microsoft Sidewinder 2 (USB) under Windows 98? If they won't play nice with my joystick it might be a reason to grudgingly go for the Collector's Series..

I can't speak for that particular joystick, but I have used a USB joystick under Win98 with the DOS X-Wing and Tie Fighter collector's CDROM versions. You might not get all the buttons working, but the essentials should be ok.