Hotte76 wrote:

All executable files (setup.exe e.g) end with an Win32 error message.

That would suggest you need "Win32s", which Microsoft released near the end of Win 3.x support.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Win32s

I would expect that it would be included on the CD somewhere if it was required.

Yup, some early Win95 games could also be run with Win32s, and some of them even made use of 'WinG', which can be seen as the predecessor to DirectX: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WinG

Both can be installed on top of Windows 3.x, perhaps that makes Jack 3 work.

Yes, try Win32s, you can get it from the Windows 3.x guide.

(And moving this to the Dosbox forums)

Hi, and thanks for the replys.
To be more precise, i get the following error:

Win32S Error - D:\install\setup.exe invalid format

followed by another window:

Cannot run program. Unexspected error 21.

I tried now the following:

- Installed Win32s -> Still the same error (checked it, Freecell is working)
- Installed WinG -> Still the same error (works definitly, because Civilization II is running).

I then found this post, which is about the same error, but even the cpu hint didn´t work.

Win32s error

Any other ideas? 😀

Perhaps there is more than one setup.exe , and you are running the one intended for Windows 9x?

There are indeed more than one....

One is called "Install!" in the main folder of the CD (doesn´t work) and another one is in the INstall folder called "Setup.exe", which comes to the same result. I tried both executables and both did the same problem.

Hotte76 wrote:

One is called "Install!" in the main folder of the CD (doesn´t work)

So it produces an error message?

As i mentioned above:

Win32S Error - D:\install\setup.exe invalid format

followed by another window:

Cannot run program. Unexspected error 21.

So you get an error message about d:\install\setup.exe even when you run "Install!" ?

No, of course not.
I get basicly the same error message but with the executable i tried.

So when i try setup.exe i get the error message with "setup.exe" but when i try "install" i get the error but of course with "install"

Ok, i just received an answer if the gane was playable in win3.x from the american company who one designed the game:

Jackbox Games Support told me it´s maybe a printing error on the CD-ROM.....

It seems to me much more likely that they're just guessing and have no idea how they would get a game from twenty years ago running in Windows 3.x.

That said, if http://stephan.win31.de/w32slist.htm is any indication, this probably isn't a DOSBox problem. I might guess that it would be possible to hack the .exe so that Win32s will accept it, but I would expect a lot more people would be doing that (and be writing guides accordingly) if that was feasible.

Maybe it's just a problem with the installer, so it will work if you install the game in Windows 95 and copy the files to your Windows 3.1 installation.

Yes, i think so too.
I tried to copy an installed game, but the error remains....

So i decided to give up, and re-sell the game on Ebay.
It was a nice try, to get alle 3 YDKJ´s which would run on Win 3.x,
now i can play only 2 of them, which is ok for me... 😎

Thanks for all the help

FYI, "Unexpected error 21", or "DOS error 21" is a common problem with programs that use Win32s in DOSBox. Setting cputype=486_slow or cputype=pentium_slow in the conf will usually avoid such errors. However, it's not necessarily the only problem in the case of YDKJ3.

If the cdrom includes a Win32s installer, whether it is run automatically by the game installer or run manually, it strongly suggests that the game will work with Win32s; but either way it's not proof positive.

The game is sold, case is closed.
I found a second hand re-buying site which payed me more than i paid for the game 😉
Sold some things there months ago, it was good. So i don´t have to mess around with ebay 😉