The error exit is the emulated CPU encountering invalid instructions -- usually indicates the game has crashed.

Did you try different allocation sizes with loadfix, or just the default 64K allocation? Have you tried SVN? Tried different sound options and/or configurations?

After you try some more things to troubleshoot the problem, and if nothing seems to help, consider attaching a saved game file (HEXX1.SAV or so) that allows the problem to be reproduced without spending a lot of time playing the game to get there.

Hello,

since he didn't respond anymore, I'd believe he probably gave up. So to continue this thread (instead of creating a new one - don't wanna flood the forum), because issues with Hexx in DOSBox seem to persist: the creator of this thread even got to where he could place the crystal. I couldn't even take it from the first tower - the game just fades to black and stays that way for forever, while music keeps playing normally. So unless there is a cutscene that's more than 8 hours long, I strongly believe it freezes there in some way. How to reproduce: load my attached save-game, walk a few meters forward and right-click the green thingy on the wall.

If this is different for anyone, I'd like to find out differences in the according setup. Just in case something hardware- or OS-related is the primary issue here.

Because it doesn't even crash for me, but just partially freeze, I don't know how to provide any information that might actually help find the cause.

I tried different sound outputs as well as completely disabled sound+music. I tried different machine-settings (the one with svga_s3 as its default value). I tried lots of different amounts of memsize. I tried running it in Win7's XP-Mode with almost all combinations of settings I tried before. I tested DOSBox 0.74 as well as 0.58 (which was supposed to be the first version to successfully run Hexx). The latter didn't even get the game started for me at all.

Is there any way I can provide information (if required) to find the root cause here? Some sort of memory snapshot or something?

My setup:
- Win7 64 Bit
- i5-4670K (4x 3,4 GHz)
- 8 GB RAM
- Asus B85-Pro Board
- Onboard Graphics (Intel HD Graphics 4600)
- Onboard Sound (Realtek)

Kind regards,
c-eagle

Thanks for making the save file.

The game opens a malformed filespec that (barely) works in real DOS but not in DOSBox's emulated DOS. A simple fix is to add 0xf7 to the list of allowed characters in DOS_MakeName(), based on what appears to be a constant data byte, but I'm not certain it is constant. A not-so-simple fix that would be more true to real DOS is to ignore characters past the third character in the extension.

The attached program will work around the problem; put it where Hexx is installed and start the game in DOSBox as usual.

Thank you sooo much for that fix. It works fine now. 😀 Just out of curiosity, because you responded so quickly: is this some sort of general fix, which has just been applied to Hexx in this case? Would I have been able to find this fix somewhere in the forums if I kept looking? Might the issue in some way cause damage to save-files while they're being read/written? Just asking the latter, even though it sounds like it affects filenames only.

I was totally prepared to wait for weeks or even months for this issue to get analyzed (and didn't even hope to get it resolved after all), before I could start playing+recording it again. You totally ruined my plans, and I'm really thankful. 😁

c-eagle wrote:

Just out of curiosity, because you responded so quickly: is this some sort of general fix, which has just been applied to Hexx in this case? Would I have been able to find this fix somewhere in the forums if I kept looking? Might the issue in some way cause damage to save-files while they're being read/written?

I made the workaround program just now for the specific problem in Hexx, and it should have no effect on save files (the malformed filespec is for a data file). As for the turnaround time, your save file made it easy to reproduce the problem, and the cause is easy to spot from warning messages in the debugger about illegal filename characters.

Thanks for the fix ripsaw!

Perfect timing for me as I have just started the game. I've been following this thread, and I was ready to send you a save game in case I had any problems - lucky for me c-eagle did just that.

Your contributions to the Dosbox project, and game fixes (with detailed explanations) are greatly appreciated!

Hi,

I'm a dosbox noob, i must admit. I have this game that i buyed in 1994 and as i found this topic i thinked: hey, it's time to play it and maybe finish it.
Better said than done, because i can't make it work.
In dosbox v0.74, with any kind of sound configuration, the game gives me a black screen and hangs up. However, when configured with no sound i can see the first animation, but then... black screen again (hang up).
Note: I used the ripsaw8080 fix posted here (unzipped hexxfix.zip to game dir), but the problem persists.

Any help is much appreciated! Thanks!

My setup:
- Win7 SP1 32 Bit
- Pentium Core 2 Duo E4200 1600 MHz
- 4 GB RAM
- Asrock G41 socket 775 Board
- nVidia 8600GT 256Mb card
- Onboard Sound (Realtek)

My dosbox config file:
[sdl]
fullscreen=false
fulldouble=false
fullresolution=original
windowresolution=original
output=ddraw
autolock=true
sensitivity=100
waitonerror=true
priority=normal,lower
mapperfile=mapper.txt
usescancodes=true

[dosbox]
language=
machine=svga_s3
captures=capture
memsize=16

[render]
frameskip=0
aspect=true
scaler=normal3x

[cpu]
core=auto
cycles=auto
cycleup=500
cycledown=100

[mixer]
nosound=false
rate=22050
blocksize=2048
prebuffer=20

[midi]
mpu401=intelligent
device=default
config=

[sblaster]
sbtype=sb16
sbbase=220
irq=7
dma=1
hdma=5
mixer=true
oplmode=auto
oplrate=22050

[gus]
gus=true
gusrate=22050
gusbase=240
irq1=5
irq2=5
dma1=3
dma2=3
ultradir=C:ULTRASND

[speaker]
pcspeaker=true
pcrate=22050
tandy=auto
tandyrate=22050
disney=true

[joystick]
joysticktype=auto
timed=true
autofire=false
swap34=false
buttonwrap=true

[serial]
serial1=dummy
serial2=dummy
serial3=disabled
serial4=disabled

[dos]
xms=auto
ems=auto
umb=auto
keyboardlayout=none

[ipx]
ipx=true

[autoexec]
mount c .
c:\
cd hexx
# setup
wizard
exit

Your configuration is from a version prior to 0.74, so please use an 0.74 configuration file, although it might not be the cause of your problem.

The fix program is for a problem that appears well into the game, so it isn't going to help when you can't even get started.

In the version of Hexx that I'm familiar with, you run HEXX.BAT to start the game. What kind of file is the "wizard" in your [autoexec] section referring to?

Thanks for your reply. When i arrived from work i tried with a different conf file from 0.74 version, but the problem persists. 'wizard' stands for WIZARD.BAT file. I think it's an european/uk version, as i am from Portugal.

My WIZARD.BAT file:
@ECHO OFF
IF EXIST M00.PAC GOTO INSTALL
GOTO RUNNIT
:INSTALL
MD PACS
MD DATA
XCOPY *.PAC PACS\ /V
XCOPY *.BIN DATA\ /V
XCOPY *.PCM DATA\ /V
XCOPY DUMSCR.LBM DATA\ /V
XCOPY ALFAPIC.RBM PACS\ /V
DEL DUMSCR.LBM
DEL ALFAPIC.RBM
DEL *.BIN
DEL *.PAC
DEL *.PCM
:RUNNIT
EMSTEST
IF ERRORLEVEL 1 GOTO EXIT2
ANIMPLAY
IF ERRORLEVEL 2 GOTO NEWGAME
IF ERRORLEVEL 1 GOTO PLAYGAME
GOTO EXIT
:NEWGAME
CHARGEN
:PLAYGAME
WIZ
:EXIT
ECHO Thanks for playing Wizard!
:EXIT2
@ECHO ON

My new config file:
[sdl]
fullscreen=true
fulldouble=false
fullresolution=original
windowresolution=original
output=surface
autolock=true
sensitivity=100
waitonerror=true
priority=higher,normal
mapperfile=mapper-0.74.map
usescancodes=true

[dosbox]
language=
machine=svga_s3
captures=capture
memsize=16

[render]
frameskip=0
aspect=false
scaler=normal2x

[cpu]
core=auto
cputype=auto
cycles=auto
cycleup=10
cycledown=20

[mixer]
nosound=false
rate=44100
blocksize=1024
prebuffer=20

[midi]
mpu401=intelligent
mididevice=default
midiconfig=128:0

[sblaster]
sbtype=sb16
sbbase=220
irq=7
dma=1
hdma=5
sbmixer=true
oplmode=auto
oplemu=default
oplrate=44100

[gus]
gus=false
gusrate=44100
gusbase=240
gusirq=5
gusdma=3
ultradir=C:\ULTRASND

[speaker]
pcspeaker=true
pcrate=44100
tandy=auto
tandyrate=44100
disney=true

[joystick]
joysticktype=auto
timed=true
autofire=false
swap34=false
buttonwrap=false

[serial]
serial1=dummy
serial2=dummy
serial3=disabled
serial4=disabled

[dos]
xms=true
ems=true
umb=true
keyboardlayout=auto

[ipx]
ipx=false

[autoexec]
mount c .
c:
cd wiz\
# setup
wizard
exit

Please post a directory listing of the main game directory, including file sizes, to help identify the version of the game that you have. An easy way to do this is to use the DIR command in DOSBox and then capture the screen with Ctrl-F5, which puts a .png file in the capture folder that you can attach here.

Problem solved, at least for now, i will try to setup sound correctly when i have the time (now must go to work). I found that the PACS directory was empty, so i manually copied the files to it and the game now works, although without music. Anyway, attached 'png' file with directory listing, as you request. Also attached file 'Hexx.jpg' from windows system, who have all the main game directory files, as the other from dosbox don't show all of them. Thanks!

It appears you've figured out what is wrong, good for you, but please understand that illegally downloaded copies of games are not supported here. ANIMPLAY.EXE should be much smaller; yours has a warez group intro hacked into it.

Understood. I have the original disks but can't use them because my actual machine doesn't have a physical disk drive. Thanks for your help, ripsaw8080!

You can get an USB disk drive for pretty cheap.