Re: Your idea of the perfect game

Posted on 2025-02-04, 11:50

by

by firage

in Milliways

in Milliways

It’s all just good writing and game mechanics, even in simulation type games — not emergent gameplay or procedural generation. You need a number of decisions to feel a degree of freedom, and then you need those decisions to reshape things in a way that they matter. Considering the vast resources …

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Re: ASUS VLI-486SV2GX4 Turbo ON/OFF Question

Posted on 2025-01-30, 12:36

by

by firage

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

What I can say is that the slowdown with turbo is insufficient to be really useful for the things I want it for. I recall having some other issues with turbo on that CPU, too. Ended up going from Am586-133 to DX4-100, which is still fast with turbo. For my DX4, Doom demo3 full graphics does 41.6 fps …

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Re: Patches and updates for games

Posted on 2025-01-11, 11:56

by

by firage

in Marvin \ Software

in Marvin \ Software

The official patch is available from https://web.archive.org/web/20020927154957/ht … es/shkpatch.exe It seems to all be the same. Whether 2.03, 2.23, or 2.3, they refer to the same patch.

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Re: Orpheus II soundcard thread *** LT board now available ***

Posted on 2024-12-30, 09:09

by

by firage

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

Here's a shot of my Orpheus II from the last batch, arrived just before Christmas. It's quite something!

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Re: Moments in computing history when you felt that the future had arrived

Posted on 2024-12-04, 11:07

by

by firage

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

CD-ROM was the most incredible thing and I don’t think another innovation quite compares to the wonder it was at its introduction. Multimedia, music, massive capacity for software and games, FMV, the PlayStation.

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Re: Headers on Aureal Vortex 2 SQ2500

Posted on 2024-11-16, 00:57

by

by firage

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

There was a little confusion, yeah. I don’t remember it taking longer than 10 minutes to figure out, so I’m not much help without access to my 98SE build at the moment. I reckon you want the external MPU interface selected, but see if there’s another option, aside from the soft onboard wavetable. …

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Re: Are PS/2 compatible mechanical keyboards already gone?

Posted on 2024-10-27, 13:15

by

by firage

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

The Xtrfy K2 is a recent mechanical gaming keyboard that came with a PS/2 adapter - not tenkeyless though. I think Leopold was the manufacturer, actually. They didn't have PS/2 for most of their other stuff.

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Re: No sound in pure DOS (Windows 98) - SB AUDIGY

Posted on 2024-10-09, 22:49

by

by firage

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

Are you not loading EMM386? It could be a prerequisite under DOS. I’ve had an Audigy 1 in some interesting DOS configurations, but don’t recall much about the emulation driver setup.

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Re: No sound in pure DOS windows 98 - SB AUDIGY

Posted on 2024-10-09, 13:21

by

by firage

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

Probably not the primary issue you're having, but yes the environment variables should match. Apparently you edit CTSYN.INI to pick what you want the driver to use. Also I guess you edit the "SBESET.EXE -A220 -I7 -D1 -H5 -P330 -J200 -j1 -d0 -w0 -c" line within LIVESET.BAT. I would just rather try to …

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Re: Sound Canvas (and related) comparison project (UPDATED: 22nd March)

Posted on 2024-08-22, 16:00

by

by firage

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

I mean depending on your synth's reset behavior one game will sound as designed and another will not. The original SC-55 behavior was de facto standard for a couple of years.

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Re: Sound Canvas (and related) comparison project (UPDATED: 22nd March)

Posted on 2024-08-22, 15:54

by

by firage

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

I read that it's not fully GM compatible, because it interprets the GM reset command as GS reset, like the other early SC-55s, can you confirm? I think that this is a problem for all firmware prior to 2.xx. I'll have to re-check whether it flips Rx.NRPN on GM reset, but I'm quite sure it's just a …

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Re: Sound Canvas comparison project

Posted on 2024-08-22, 10:02

by

by firage

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

Sounds very interesting. I'd be happy to participate with my SCC-1 sound card in any way that's helpful. :) Recording gear and methods will impact the audio samples, so it'll be good to attach some of that information to all the recordings. I did not read through this whole thread, so I apologize …

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Re: CRT... is 120Hz the answer?

Posted on 2024-08-18, 23:43

by

by firage

in Marvin \ Video

in Marvin \ Video

Too high of a refresh at a high resolution will also blur the picture on a CRT. Really noticeable on my big CRT at 1600x1200.

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Re: Hella fast Magic Carpet

Posted on 2024-07-22, 15:59

by

by firage

in Marvin \ Software

in Marvin \ Software

Yeah, it's one of those Goldilocks speed sensitive games. You can try your luck switching to high-res mode with the R key.

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Re: Wing Commander is flying like hell

Posted on 2024-07-03, 15:39

by

by firage

in Marvin \ Software

in Marvin \ Software

I don't know if there's a patch, but the Windows re-releases from Kilrathi Saga fixed the CPU speed sensitivity. A patched DOS version would probably be preferable, though.

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Re: Sound Blaster AWE32 + Roland SCC-1- How do I use them together?

Posted on 2023-05-02, 14:35

by

by firage

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Roland sounds great, it's the real deal and glitch free by comparison. The price premium over something like the X2GS is the only reason I'd even consider anything other than the Roland option. AWE32 by itself is hit and miss, some great titles.

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Re: "Noisy" Sound Blaster 16

Posted on 2023-04-24, 09:51

by

by firage

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

CT1600 isn't just one card either, there are revisions.

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Re: Pentium 75 - Windows 95 or 3.1?

Posted on 2023-03-17, 01:59

by

by firage

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

in Marvin \ General Old Hardware

Not much sense in another slower Win9x machine. Win 3.1x is occasionally interesting and simple to keep out of the way.

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Re: Sound Blaster 16 Bugs and Deficiencies Summary

Posted on 2023-03-08, 00:05

by

by firage

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

It's not much of a practical issue, though. Essentially, games that lacked SB16 stereo support didn't use stereo. Is that true? Then why did so many games that didn't support the SB16 still have separate "Sound Blaster" and "Sound Blaster Pro" options to choose from in their install/setup programs? …

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Re: Sound Blaster 16 Bugs and Deficiencies Summary

Posted on 2023-03-05, 22:02

by

by firage

in Marvin \ Sound

in Marvin \ Sound

It's not much of a practical issue, though. Essentially, games that lacked SB16 stereo support didn't use stereo.

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