Nice guide Darth Marsden 😀 One small change:

You don't need to copy the DOSBox files to the DW2. The only file that you really need to copy somewhere is your game-specific dosbox.conf file with the mounting and call instructions, and then make sure that you start DOSBox with something like

dosbox.exe -conf \path\to\DW2\dosbox.conf

And - you don't need to make it a complete configuration file. You can reduce it to just the changes from the default dosbox.conf. In your example, it should suffice to create a small dosbox.conf with just these lines:

1[sdl]
2fullscreen=true 
3
4[autoexec]
5mount C "."
6imgmount D ".\CD\Disc1.bin" ".\CD\Disc2.bin" -t iso
7C:
8call DW2.BAT
9exit

Using such a minimal configuration file has 2 major advantages:

1) It is easy to see what game-specific settings you have applied to DOSBox.
2) You minimize the risk of creating a configuration file with errors in it (hint: There is no section called bios any more. In 0.72 it is called joystick).

Thanks for the praise.

The reason I did things the way I did was to avoid the whole kerfuffle* with shortcuts and different conf files. This way, if you should so desire, you can just make a backup of the whole directory so you can uninstall and reinstall it again at a later date without having to worry about altering shortcuts and suchforth. It's just a tad more user-friendly, I feel.

That said, I wasn't aware you could shorten the conf file. You're right though, what you mentioned really is all you need. I've edited my original post as a result. Good call.

And I was using a conf file from an older version of DosBox, which explains the [bios]. Hey, it worked. I wasn't really that bothered with which version I was using! :p

*Bet you haven't heard that word in a good long while, eh?

DOSBox has more tricks up its sleeve if you want to avoid messing with shortcuts and still have an easy way to backup the game:

Create a small BAT-file (let us call it AUTORUN.BAT) and put it in the DW2 folder. Create it with the following lines (stolen from your dosbox.conf):

1config -set sdl fullscreen=true
2
3imgmount D ".\CD\Disc1.bin" ".\CD\Disc2.bin" -t iso
4C:
5call DW2.BAT
6exit

Remove the dosbox.conf file, and drag AUTORUN.BAT onto the DOSBox icon on your desktop 😀

Now be honest... you're purposely trying to make things more complicated then they need to be, aren't you? 😉

Thanks for this, currently in the process of trying it out...will inform of results as they come in. I've needed to play this game for a long time now 😎

EDIT: YES...IT'S WORKING!!! I can't thank you enough 😁

Thought I'd add a bit of help to vista users:-
If you're doing this in the "Program Files" directory you need to run SETSOUND.EXE, ImgBurn and notepad (to change dosbox.conf) as an administrator or else vista won't let you save any of the files so nothing will happen when you do this.

This is a nice guide.The biggest problem with this game was to make it run directly via Windows XP using VDMSound.The recomended solutions do not work with all computers, because of the direkt access to the graphic cards and more stuff of the new systems.The bigest problem are the vesa drivers.The game runs fine with DOSBox, i played it too using DOSBox.

One more tip: For optimal speed and game playability set the core and the cycles to "auto".

I'm having some problems with the conf file. I can't edit it. If I try to double click it, I get the error message "the system cannot find the path specified" and I can't go to notepad and open it there either, so I'm kinda stuck here.

Can anyone help?

It should be in (XP):
c:\Documents and Settings\yourusername\Local Settings\Application Data\Dosbox\
or (Vista)
c:\users\yourusername\Local Settings\Application Data\Dosbox\

Or just search for a file: dosbox*.conf

Well I found it but I still can't open it to edit it. I don't think I need to now though, I'm doing MiniMax's method of the bat file and it works about the same I think.

Now I'm just having more problems. If I run DOSBox with the Autorun.bat with the commands DarthMarsden said to put in, it goes through a bunch of things and exits and nothing happens and Discworld 2 doesn't do anything.

If I take exit out from the command line, to see what happened. It goes through the same things and says "Discworld cannot find the Discworld CD, and it also says something about it not being able to find the image file either, and I know it's there cuz I put it right where DM said to put it.

I managed to load the first image file by typing in the exact file path where it was. I tried going to my C drive and opening dw2.bat but it still said "insert cd1"

When I load it through my F drive, Univbe decides to test my video modules and I have to turn my monitor off while it does it, afterwards, Discworld 2 is playing the opening credits but there's no sound and it still has the "insert cd1" thing.

And I can't load both bin files at the same time with the command DM put up, it says "the image must be on a host or local drive"

I know I'm doing something wrong, I have to be, I've tried at least two other methods, and they've all failed. Ripa can you keep helping me, or someone else? I've been at this for almost five days, and the "insert cd1" and "discworld cannot locate the discworld cd" is starting to drive me mad. And what's worse is I've gotten Discworld 2 to work before, I'm not sure if it was on this computer or my last one but I remember all I had to do was find out the command line to mount the cdrom and navigate to it.

So anyway, can someone help me?

David999999 wrote:

and I know it's there cuz I put it right where DM said to put it.

So you've put them in C:\Discworld\Discworld II ?

Well not exactly where, my path is:

C:\Discworld\DW2\CD

Did you put dosbox.exe and so on into C:\Discworld\DW2\CD or C:\Discworld\DW2 ?

Yeah I put in everything he said to put in. The AILDRVR, DW2.BAT, DWB.EXE, RM.DRV, SETSOUND, SBLASTER and DOSBox. conf (even though I can't use it) are all there.

My question was whether you put dosbox.exe there. Or is this something else that's "not exactly" ?

Oh sorry, I misunderstood what you meant. Yeah DOSBox.exe is in the same folder.

Yes, but which folder? C:\Discworld\DW2\CD or C:\Discworld\DW2 ?

It's in C:\Discworld

Then you haven't followed the instructions! Nothing should be in C:\Discworld except for the DW2 folder. When Mr. Marsden says "our main folder", he means the directory that contains the CD folder.

Ok I put all the files in the dw2 folder and ran the command DM said to run. It found the image files this time and mounted them, but it still says insert cd1. 😕

And sorry for being a bit vague and slow with all this, Jorpho. I'm not that good with computer stuff. Thanks for helping me 😀