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Gunship 2000 - Crashes under very specific circumstances.

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First post, by Neville

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One of my favourite DOS games is "Gunship 2000", and I've played it very thoroughly with DOSBox. Using latest version (v0.74) I've noticed it crashes under very specific circumstances.

The circumstances are the following:

- In-mission.

- After fuel runs out.

This are very unusual circumstances, as you rarely run out of fuel in this game, it takes more than 30 minutes (less using time acceleration). It's so rare than I can't say if this crash is specific to this version or it also happened before.

How to reproduce the crash:

- Start "Gunship 2000" (the version I have includes the "Island & Ice Addon", haven't tried others).

- Use default DOSBox settings or optimum ones (core=dynamic, cycles=6000), it doesn't matter.

- Start your mission and take off. (9, then +)

- Accelerate time with ] and return to normal with [

- After a long time you'll see fuel warnings.

- In the end, you'll hear the words "We're going in!" and DOSBox will crash.

Can anybody reproduce it? I'd like to see if it's a problem with my version of the game or if I run into a DOSBox bug.

Reply 1 of 7, by Qbix

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have you tried using the normal core ?
maybe it is some dynamic core specific problem.

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Reply 2 of 7, by Neville

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I've tried both default DOSBox settings and the optimal for the game. I've also tried accelerated time and normal time within the game.

The crash happens 100% of the time, regardless of these options.

BTW, I forgot to mention this, if you run the game using default DOSBox settings, DO NOT READ THE BRIEFING before taking off, the game crashes if you do that.

Reply 3 of 7, by Qbix

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given your optimal settings, I doubt that the default settings result in the normal core being used

core=normal

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Reply 4 of 7, by Neville

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I've forced "normal" core for more testing. It still crashes, but I also found out that the crash doesn't occur if you fly solo, it only occurs in the game mode were you command a group of helicopters. This will make the crash more difficult to reproduce for casual gamers, because this game mode is not inmediately available. However, now the crash is starting to look to me more a game bug than a DOSBox bug.

Reply 5 of 7, by Qbix

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well the crash with default settings after the briefing might be interesting to investigate.

Water flows down the stream
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Reply 6 of 7, by ripsaw8080

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What kind of crash? Do you get a exit to error message in the status window? GS2000 runs into the DMA segbound wrapping problem in 0.74 under various conditions, and you can try disabling SB sound or running under 0.73 for that particular problem. I tried version 469.08 and patched to 469.085 (displayed by SETUP.EXE) with default settings in 0.74 and have no problems reading briefings.

Reply 7 of 7, by Neville

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Silly me, I forgot to look at the console to see what it had to say about the crash. Here it is:

Exit to error: DMA segbound wrapping (read)

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