Good day,

probably wrong section, but I hope I can help.

Try editing file Dosbox.conf using your notepad (create a backup first, to be sure). Check what you have in:

cycleup=xxx

Default is 10, and this is the number of cycles you increase by pressing Ctrl-F12. Probably this value is too low and you cannot see any speed increase. I had this issue when I played Alone in the Dark 2. Try changing it to a much higher value and see what happens when you use Ctrl-F12. Just experiment a bit.

If you want to get back exactly to the previous cycle value, also check:

cycledown=xxx

This should have the same value of cycleup, so you can get back pressing Ctrl-F11 once.

You should also try checking the line:

cycles=xxxx

By default is "auto", but you can also try finding a better solution by using the following:

cycles=fixed xxxx

where xxx is the number of cycles you want at startup. Experimenting a bit, you can find a good cycle value. I never used cycleup and cycledown with cycles=auto so I am not sure if this can also be a problem. You can try for example

cycles=fixed 3000

and see if this is ok, too fast or too slow.

Always ask DOSBox questions in the DOSBox forum.

blainedeyoung wrote:

I think Crtl-F12 should do that, increasing the cycles of the emulator or something. But I tried it in-game and it didn't seem like anything was happening.

It's possible that the game isn't actually speed-sensitive, and will run at the same speed no matter how much you increase the cycles. But that's a little unlikely.

Nonetheless, if having this control is of a particular concern to you, you might want to consider emulating a version of the game on some other platform, such as the original Apple II; other emulators may be more flexible in that regard. However, I have no idea how the various Bard's Tale ports compare to one another.

Thanks, guys. I looked and there's no .config file in the dosbox folder. So I copied one I use for another program and dropped it into the folder. I don't think it worked. It definitely add the functionality I want to the game.

I'm pretty sure it's possible to speed it up because some of the walkthroughs I've read mention being able to do that, and I one of them mentioned that they were using the Apple emulator. Switching to that may be necessary, but I consider it a last resort.

blainedeyoung wrote:

Thanks, guys. I looked and there's no .config file in the dosbox folder.

No one said anything about a .config file. Mr. Lonekiller was referring to Dosbox.conf, which is not necessarily even located in your dosbox folder; the easiest way to get to it is using the "DOSBox 0.74 Options" shortcut that should have been created in your Start menu upon installation.

That's funny. I actually found the Dosbox Options file and thought it might have our config settings. So I right-clicked and chose "edit with notepad++," but all that comes up is one line of nonsense. But when you double left click on it, you get the settings. So I changed cycles to 'fixed 3000' and cycleup to 1000, but it still didn't feel like the game was getting faster.

blainedeyoung wrote:

So I right-clicked and chose "edit with notepad++," but all that comes up is one line of nonsense.

If I understand you correctly, that causes notepad++ to open up the shortcut itself (the .lnk file located somewhere in C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\ ). The same thing happens with most things in your start menu; it is thus inadvisable to start right-clicking shortcuts. Left-clicking on it will "run" the shortcut and open the file.

So I changed cycles to 'fixed 3000' and cycleup to 1000, but it still didn't feel like the game was getting faster.

As per the aforementioned post, changing "cycleup" won't do anything on its own. That value just changes how quickly the cycles change when you press Ctrl-F12.

blainedeyoung wrote:

So I changed cycles to 'fixed 3000' and cycleup to 1000, but it still didn't feel like the game was getting faster.

Try keeping this configuration and press Ctrl+F12 several times. Each time you press, you increase cicles by 1000 (due to cycleup=1000).

Count the number of times you increase speed and when you are satisfied simply modify cycleup accordingly. For example, you pressed Ctrl+F12 8 times, you can set cycleup=8000

It always worked for me.

When the game is windowed, rather than fullscreen, there's a readout of the number of cycles. When I press Ctrl-F12, I see the number of cycles increasing but nothing changes in the game. It still takes 30 seconds to regenerate a spell point whether it's at 3,000 cycles or 4,000 cycles or 6,000 or 12,000 or 60,000.

You might need to set core=dynamic in your DOSBox options as well.

Otherwise, well, why not try contacting the authors of those walkthroughs you mentioned? If it turns out they're using something else entirely, then there's no point in wrestling with this any further.

*moved to dosbox*

If you mean the message scrolling speed, you can change that in game using > (speed up) and < (slow down)

Dagar wrote:

If you mean the message scrolling speed, you can change that in game using > (speed up) and < (slow down)

Thanks. The message scrolling speed is important and I didn't know there was a separate control for it.

What I was really concerned about when I wrote this was Spell Point regeneration which happens once every 30 seconds and continues to happen once every 30 seconds regardless of what I do. But that doesn't matter much anymore. It would have been really useful at low levels, but now I can afford to recharge at the magic shop.

Don't use Ctrl+F12, press & hold Alt+F12 instead. As soon as you stop pressing Alt+F12, the game will return to normal speed.
That's Dosbox's Warp Mode, and should do exactly what you're looking for.