VOGONS


First post, by C0deHunter

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Hello all,
I am using my original CD in my system,, and although the games works under pure DOS, the speech plays and cuts off immediately).

If I play it under Windows 98SE, the speech issue is resolved, but I really love to play this game under DOS, with my MUNT feeding the MT-32 music off of my laptop to my real AWE64.

My System specs:
PIII-800E (using SetMUL have disabled L1 cache)
Abit BH-6
512MB SD-RAM PC100
AWE64 Gold

Windows 98SE (but I am using PhilComputerLabs', *pure* DOS option to play the launch the game from a DOS prompt)

Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

PIII-800E | Abit BH-6 | GeForce FX 5200 | 64MB SD-RAM PC100 | AWE64 Gold | Sound Canvas 55 MKII | SoftMPU | 16GBGB Transcend CF as C:\ and 64GB Transcend CF D:\ (Games) | OS: MS-DOS 7.1-Win98SE-WinME-Win2K Pro (multi-OS menu Using System Commander 2K)

Reply 1 of 16, by i2lgames

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Many times 512mb of memory is not handled well in dos. Try using DEVICE=c:\xxx\himemx.exe /max=8194 instead of himem.sys.
You can find it in freedos or here: https://sourceforge.net/projects/himemx/

Reply 2 of 16, by C0deHunter

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I just removed a stick of 256MB, so I am down to 256MB RAM total, the speech issue still remains.

PIII-800E | Abit BH-6 | GeForce FX 5200 | 64MB SD-RAM PC100 | AWE64 Gold | Sound Canvas 55 MKII | SoftMPU | 16GBGB Transcend CF as C:\ and 64GB Transcend CF D:\ (Games) | OS: MS-DOS 7.1-Win98SE-WinME-Win2K Pro (multi-OS menu Using System Commander 2K)

Reply 3 of 16, by i2lgames

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C0deHunter wrote:

I just removed a stick of 256MB, so I am down to 256MB RAM total, the speech issue still remains.

Still too high for dos! Use the himemx and force 8mb of ram, see if it works.

Reply 4 of 16, by C0deHunter

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I just downloded himemx, how do I use it in DOS, just copy over the files, and run the .EXE?

PIII-800E | Abit BH-6 | GeForce FX 5200 | 64MB SD-RAM PC100 | AWE64 Gold | Sound Canvas 55 MKII | SoftMPU | 16GBGB Transcend CF as C:\ and 64GB Transcend CF D:\ (Games) | OS: MS-DOS 7.1-Win98SE-WinME-Win2K Pro (multi-OS menu Using System Commander 2K)

Reply 5 of 16, by i2lgames

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C0deHunter wrote:

I just downloded himemx, how do I use it in DOS, just copy over the files, and run the .EXE?

Copy himemx.exe to the root of your c:
Edit config.sys
Find the line DEVICE=C:\DOS\HIMEM.SYS OR C:\WINDOWS\HIMEM.SYS
Put the word REM before DEVICE=
So you should have REM C:\WINDOWS\HIMEM.SYS
Directly below that line write DEVICE=c:\himemx.exe /max=8194
So the lines should be
REM C:\WINDOWS\HIMEM.SYS
DEVICE=c:\himemx.exe /max=8194

Reply 6 of 16, by C0deHunter

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You are a genius! It works!

Now, what I did was that I created a boot floppy diskette, copied my c: drive's config.sys and auto.exe bat to it, and THEN modified the config.sys!

I am going to try other DOS games that I was unable to play, hopefully I can get them all to play!

Thanks a million again!

PIII-800E | Abit BH-6 | GeForce FX 5200 | 64MB SD-RAM PC100 | AWE64 Gold | Sound Canvas 55 MKII | SoftMPU | 16GBGB Transcend CF as C:\ and 64GB Transcend CF D:\ (Games) | OS: MS-DOS 7.1-Win98SE-WinME-Win2K Pro (multi-OS menu Using System Commander 2K)

Reply 7 of 16, by derSammler

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Problem is that some DOS games start to behave odd when there's more than 16 MB of memory. Syndicate and Hi-Octane are two other examples. And HIMEM.SYS does not allow to restrict the amount of memory if you have more.

Reply 8 of 16, by oeuvre

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aww yes... btw if you want to further optimize your AUTOEXEC.BAT and CONFIG.SYS feel free to share it

HP Z420 Workstation Intel Xeon E5-1620, 32GB, RADEON HD7850 2GB, SSD + HD, XP/7
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Reply 9 of 16, by i2lgames

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C0deHunter wrote:
You are a genius! It works! […]
Show full quote

You are a genius! It works!

Now, what I did was that I created a boot floppy diskette, copied my c: drive's config.sys and auto.exe bat to it, and THEN modified the config.sys!

I am going to try other DOS games that I was unable to play, hopefully I can get them all to play!

Thanks a million again!

Glad it worked for you. You are very welcome. HOF is my favorite of the three.

Reply 10 of 16, by C0deHunter

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UPDATE:
Since my last year's original post, I have started using MUNT and SoftMPU, emulating MT-32 sounds for this game.

I am using a boot floppy diskette that has my Config.sys and Autoexec.bat copied from my C: drive to it

And have added this line to my Autoexec.bat file:

LH SOFTMPU.EXE /MPU:330 /SB:220 /IRQ:5

The issue is that, upon booting from this floppy, when autoexec.bat reaches the above line, I get this error message: (see the attached image)

As a result, I don't see MUNT's little pop-up (on the lower bottom-right corner of the task-bar), confirming that it has successfully detected SoftMPU . Funny thing is that when I run the game, it detects the SoftMPU, and I see the name of the MT-32 instruments on the SoftMPU display menu, and the game loads all the sound files, and I can confirm that is correctly emulating MT-32.

I am just curious as to why I get that error message?

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PIII-800E | Abit BH-6 | GeForce FX 5200 | 64MB SD-RAM PC100 | AWE64 Gold | Sound Canvas 55 MKII | SoftMPU | 16GBGB Transcend CF as C:\ and 64GB Transcend CF D:\ (Games) | OS: MS-DOS 7.1-Win98SE-WinME-Win2K Pro (multi-OS menu Using System Commander 2K)

Reply 11 of 16, by i2lgames

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You will have to load a ems memory manager in config.sys.
Edit config.sys and add this line after the DEVICE=C:\%dosdir%\HIMEM.SYS

DEVICE=C:\%dosdir%\EMM386.EXE RAM HIGHSCAN

Softmpu will load after that.

Reply 12 of 16, by C0deHunter

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Once again, thank you SO much for helping me out!

DEVICE=C:\%dosdir%\EMM386.EXE RAM HIGHSCAN

The 'highscan' switch did the trick!

Thanks!

PIII-800E | Abit BH-6 | GeForce FX 5200 | 64MB SD-RAM PC100 | AWE64 Gold | Sound Canvas 55 MKII | SoftMPU | 16GBGB Transcend CF as C:\ and 64GB Transcend CF D:\ (Games) | OS: MS-DOS 7.1-Win98SE-WinME-Win2K Pro (multi-OS menu Using System Commander 2K)

Reply 13 of 16, by C0deHunter

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UPDATE (02/12/2021):

I just replaced my existing RAM with a 64MB stick of RAM, and now I have the exact same issue:

The speech is very rapid, and cuts-off.

Nothing else has changed, I used the exact same floppy (with the same config.sys and HimemX.exe settings pre your recommendation)

Any help would be appreciated.

I even tried SetMUL L2D, L1D, but the game does not start a new game at all.

PIII-800E | Abit BH-6 | GeForce FX 5200 | 64MB SD-RAM PC100 | AWE64 Gold | Sound Canvas 55 MKII | SoftMPU | 16GBGB Transcend CF as C:\ and 64GB Transcend CF D:\ (Games) | OS: MS-DOS 7.1-Win98SE-WinME-Win2K Pro (multi-OS menu Using System Commander 2K)

Reply 15 of 16, by C0deHunter

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Indeed I am using himemx, strange that It was working perfectly with 8194 value.

Update 1:
As I suspected lowering the value to 4096 did not solve the issue. Could it be the RAM stick?

Update 2:
Replaced the older 128GB stick of RAM and still speech issue.

Last edited by Stiletto on 2021-02-12, 22:59. Edited 5 times in total.

PIII-800E | Abit BH-6 | GeForce FX 5200 | 64MB SD-RAM PC100 | AWE64 Gold | Sound Canvas 55 MKII | SoftMPU | 16GBGB Transcend CF as C:\ and 64GB Transcend CF D:\ (Games) | OS: MS-DOS 7.1-Win98SE-WinME-Win2K Pro (multi-OS menu Using System Commander 2K)

Reply 16 of 16, by C0deHunter

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UPDATE 2:
OK, the speech issue seems to be solved, all I did, was instead of choosing option 1, I chose menu option 2 in my DOS menu (Extended Memory + Mouse + CD-ROM)

6532844_orig.png

I am using Phil's Computer's Lab DOS 7.1 Menu

In Kyrandia setup, I have chosen MT-32 as the music option, and the Soundblaster as digital and speech option. The issue seem to be fixed (no cut-off speech).

PIII-800E | Abit BH-6 | GeForce FX 5200 | 64MB SD-RAM PC100 | AWE64 Gold | Sound Canvas 55 MKII | SoftMPU | 16GBGB Transcend CF as C:\ and 64GB Transcend CF D:\ (Games) | OS: MS-DOS 7.1-Win98SE-WinME-Win2K Pro (multi-OS menu Using System Commander 2K)