Woah. I've cleaned up the thread a bit. Please don't attach a bunch of Clipper stuff just because it *might* have some reference to the linker in question. That's not really helpful.

What I'm interested in knowing about *specifically* is RTLink/Plus published by Pocket Soft, and the "smart vectoring" feature of that linker in particular.

This seems like a good way to start the search, but of course there's no guarantee the info is laying around somewhere on the net: https://www.google.com/search?&q=rtlink+pocket+soft

Apologies and I have no idea. I am not technically savvy (I am a finance guy) so tech (and old tech) is beyond me. However, I do have a passion for old games so really appreciate your help and your shared curiosity on this issue. Appreciate all you help you can provide!

Edit: Not sure what I am looking for but there is a blog on another person trying to dive deeper in the the old adventure games using RTLink/Plus

https://dm-notes.blogspot.com/2015/11/the-int … assembling.html

Hi Ripsaw, Sorry to be a bother but just wondering if you have a chance to take a look? I don't have the technical skill and appreciate all the help you can provide! Thanks

Resurrecting this thread because I, like RobAllen and epcdaddy, very much want to get this game running in it's v1.08 incarnation. That version is necessary to get Rules of Engagement 2 (the ship simulator) to call Breach 3 (the marine boarding party game).
1. @epcdaddy - I still have my original floppies and hardcover manuals of the developers kit
2. @epcdaddy - One thing that epcdaddy mentioned that is new is that they got V1.08 working on dos box with sound and voice but no music. Does anyone here know how they did that? That's a first-on-the-net as near as I can tell.
3. @ripsaw8080, the original patch notes for v1.08 indicate that the only thing that patch did was allow Rules of Engagement 2 to work with Breach 3. Given your description of RTLinker above I imagine they needed that code to get RoE2 and B3 linked back up.
4. By the way, I have tenuous contact with one of the original devs at Omnitrend. They're still around. So if someone around here can formulate the technical questions I might be able to get answers...

Would love to get this thing working and actually PLAY Rob Allen's campaign which is still up. As of right now I can't even get it running with no sound.

v/r
Threndos Feld

threndos feld wrote on 2020-08-20, 03:18:

the original patch notes for v1.08 indicate that the only thing that patch did was allow Rules of Engagement 2 to work with Breach 3. Given your description of RTLinker above I imagine they needed that code to get RoE2 and B3 linked back up.

A linker does not refer to linking the games together. The 1.08 version includes some feature of RTLink called "smart vectoring", which is not included in the 1.07 version, and that feature appears to be the sticking point. So, if you can contact the developer, ask if they can link the game code without that feature or provide some info on how to disable the feature at runtime.

ripsaw8080 wrote on 2020-08-20, 05:26:

A linker does not refer to linking the games together. The 1.08 version includes some feature of RTLink called "smart vectoring", which is not included in the 1.07 version, and that feature appears to be the sticking point. So, if you can contact the developer, ask if they can link the game code without that feature or provide some info on how to disable the feature at runtime.

Got it. Will (try to) comply.

Thanks!

I'm still interested in this, but I don't use DOSBox for this anymore since I managed to find an old laptop on sale and got all the games running in Windows 95 on it. I've been slowly building a ROE2+B3 campaign over the years with it. Transferring the files is a bit fiddly since I have to use cd's for it but it works well enough. I would definitely like to see a modern update to these games if the dev is interested.

If anyone is interested, I am maintaining a ROE2 Campaign repository here: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B5VSO … c203NnE5b2ExWDQ

If you build any campaigns and want to share them, let me know and I can host them there, or host links to your own repositories if you like.

Apologies for this being another resurrection of this thread, but I am slowly attempting to get ROE2 1.08+B3 to run in 86Box... They appear to work fine - ROE2 1.08 certainly runs with sound with no issues. My only problem is getting the squad commanders in B3 to be read in ROE2 1.08. I've tried specifying the location of B3, but every time ROE2 says "Invalid path or no Squad Leaders found."

It turns out there is a bug in ROE2 1.08 causing instability under DOSBox's internal DOS emulation. It was not easy to find the bug, but I was put on its track after noticing that the program is also not stable in real DOS when no interrupt stacks (STACKS=0,0 in CONFIG.SYS) are used. However, protection against stack overflow is not the issue, particularly in DOSBox where the internal callbacks cause relatively little stack activity. The issue is that the DOS stack handler changes the value of the BP register before calling the IRQ 0 (timer) handler, and the program's INT 1Ch handler apparently depends on the value of BP, which is buggy or weird behavior for an interrupt handler.

The attached program will work around the problem; unarchive it in the ROE2 folder and run it in DOSBox to start ROE2.

Edit: added a fix for the loading BREACH2 vs. BREACH3 issue to the workaround program.
Edit 2: small technical fix for the workaround program, but you might not notice its effect.

Thanks ripsaw8080, that is a very useful fix.

In testing v1.08 I have found some odd behavior.

Tested and the linking with Breach 3 is working as intended. There seems to be one drawback though, it now tries to load Breach 3 even when the ROE2 module is supposed to link to a Breach 2 module which causes Breach 3 to load with no actual mission data and essentially kills your game.

My understanding is it should be able to launch Breach 2 for ROE2 modules that use Breach 2.

The mission load screen definitely implies that both Breach 2 and Breach 3 should work side by side as both buttons are down the bottom. But the game always loads Breach 3 when boarding, no matter the selected option.

This can be tested by doing the following:

- copy below file into roe2\campaign (unzip it first)
- start the game
- select "Assume Command"
- select "Test B2", then "Make". Give it a name in the pop up dialog box, then "ok", then "play"
- Click through intro vid & briefing. Select "waypoint", "add" in the new window, then "ok". Select "captain", highlight "Andreas...", then "assign", then "ok". Now select "deploy", then "yes" in new window
- Now we are in the game. Left click the orange square and select "Tacfir", then back on the central control column select "2", then the orange square again and select "tacman".
- In tacman click "typ" once, then "lok". Select "calista", then "posit", then the "-" next to "range" till its a number lower than 1,000 but higher than 200.
- At the bottom of the central control bar use ">>" to speed up time until "tacfir" shows the range you selected next to "R:", then use "<<" to bring speed back to normal.
- Almost there, now just need to destroy outpost shields. In "Tacfir" select "focus", then "pinpoint shields". Power your beams up by pressing the "+", then select "auto ebw". You can also press "Fire Msl" a couple times to speed this step up, but not too many or you may blow up the station before you can board it.
- When the "S" is black with a dark blue "S" you can select "board" in the "tacman". Here is where it loads the linked module. As I linked to a Breach 2 module it should load Breach 2, but as you will see it loads Breach 3 which I'm assuming doesnt work with Breach 2 modules as everything is blank. If you do the same process on a mission that is linked to a Breach 3 module it loads correctly and lets you play the Breach 3 mission.

The problem with not running BREACH2 is in fact an issue with DOSBox's emulation of DOS, unrelated to ROE2's IRQ 0 bug. However, I must say that the 1.08 version of RULES2.COM is relying on byproduct behavior of DOS, and the developers very likely did that by accident. In any case, I added a fix for the issue to the workaround program, and I hope no more hiccups appear.

Edit: the issue of BREACH3 loading instead of BREACH2 occurs under real DOS as well, so it does not appear to be a fault of DOSBox. I'm not sure what to make of it, but perhaps after adding the ability to link to BREACH3 the developers assumed BREACH2 still worked and never tested it.

thank you much!