Solved Confused Over Dos Games

[Dragu]

@voljega said in Confused Over Dos Games:

@dragu how do you escape dos games ? i tried a very simple one but htokey+start didn't exit the game ? do you need a keyboard ?

Hi, voljega,

The Hotkey is under Dosbox nothing that a normal key. As long as you are not back into ES (game title display), your buttons and joysticks function after the definition in the keymap file.
So as example, I put directionnel keys on joystick 1, mouse on joystick 2, select as ESC, Enter on player buttons and so on. So I even definded Shooting in Nukem 1+2 on hotkey button from player 2, because on my bartop, you keep hand lying on the table, very suitable.
But as you are back in ES, again you are in the ES button definition.
Now, for Save Games or special actions, it is sometime tricky, but you arrive.
I just put you an example about Nukem I

[voljega]

@dragu so there is no quick way to quit a game ? you have to escape through the menu of the game ?

[Dragu]

@kaz69 said in Confused Over Dos Games:

@Dragu

Manage to run a quick test for the game and when I select the game Dosbox comes up and the dos screen shows it found the horse.exe file but then stops and goes back to recalbox screen. So I'm guessing it's something on the install.bat command line then?
HI kaz69,

do you already define the dosbox.cfg file in the horde.pc directory. Compare with the description that I made in the link before. There can be memory issues that are defined in the cfg file, not in the bat.

[kaz69]

@dragu

Should I just copy the command line from the two install.bat files and create them as dosbox.cfg?

[Dragu]

@kaz69
You mean dosbox.bat, I suppose.
I am not sure, because I dont know what is Snoop?

In general it seems that it is necessary to unpack part1.exe to part6.exe.
Ok, I think you can make this in a first version of dosbox.bat, putting all part1-6.exe, seems they are just auto-decompressing.
I would try to unpack before by 7zip or something like 7zip on my pc and just copy the result on horde.pc. I guess, its just zip files.

[abunille]

@kaz69

I have seen an 8MB file (1993) and a 500MB file from 1994.
Are you sure you have a good one?
This part1.exe etc..... does not look normal for "me personally".
I have not the time at the moment to check your problem, i try to test this weekend.

[kaz69]

@dragu

Im going to unpack all the files in my folder and then give it another try tonight and let you know how it goes.

thanks

[kaz69]

@abunille

I've had a search for the rom online and the 1993 download is 8mb but the only 1994 one I can see is for the emulator 3DO which is 500mb.

[kaz69]

@Dragu

Done all the unpacking of the files and copied the install.bat to a dosbox.cfg and it's working, but the problem I have now is that the game screen is tiny and is in the bottom left corner of my tv screen.

Not sure why but at least one problem sorted now it's getting the screen sorted

[Dragu]

@kaz69 said in Confused Over Dos Games:

dosbox.cfg

you mean dosbox.bat ?

You need to have a dosbox.cfg local with the datas corresponding to the screen that you use.
Like I told you, if you copy and adapt my version from the posted link, more easy.

[kaz69]

@dragu

Sorry im probable making things confusing.

I have the dosbox.bat file as the location for the horde.exe file
and the dosbox.cfg file I have as all the dos command lines
@echo off
if %1!==! goto USAGE
set COLON=
:VALIDDRIVE
if %1 == goto INSTALL1

these command lines I got from the install.bat file that was from the game after I zipped it, and then copy and pasted it to a text file and made it dosbox.cfg

with the screen details from your link where do I add the fullscreen=true line etc?

I know you said about copying your command lines from your link but as im new Ive tried but not sure im doing it right

[Dragu]

@kaz69
To understand, dosbox.cfg is a local copy of global dosbox.conf that allow you to define local xxxxx.map for local game.

In the sdl section you should have

fullscreen=true
vsync=false
fullresolution=desktop
windowresolution=original
output=texture
renderer=auto
autolock=true
sensitivity=100
waitonerror=true
priority=higher,normal
mapperfile=horde.map

dosbox section

language=
machine=svga_s3
captures=capture
memsize=30

when memory is not enough

All this things should be adapted.

[kaz69]

@dragu

Thanks I have finally got it running to full screen and works perfect (well up to the new game screen anyway). I've learnt a lot in this topic and will try my luck at a few other games and see how it goes.

sorry for the long time this has taken and repeat information but its all clicked with me now (hopefully)

once again thanks Dragu for your time and patience with me

[voljega]

@kaz69 @Dragu

Hello Guys, using this unofficial DosBox main thread to ask for your help : it's time for me to try my big next project : doing an automatic convertor of the ExoDOS game collection to Recalbox. The collection uses the same version of DosBox, 0.74
So first I would like to do one manually to better understand how to work, and I'm gonna start with one my fav from the nineties : Wacky Wheels.

Now first of all, games will be installed either by my convertor or manually on the computer, so there no need to bother with that.

Secondly I would like to achieve a non dependant path installation, so I want to be able to specify in dosbox.cfg and dosbox.bat if possible, only relatibe path to the game folder (here WackyWhe.pc). The game should then work exactly the same if it is in /recalbox/share/pc/WackyWhe.pc or /recalbox/share/pc/Race/WackyWhe.pc
Is it possible ? It should be I think but I'm not sure where DosBox /EmulationStation is positioned as a folder when it starts

a note on the exoDOS collection architecture, after installation games are found like that :
in eXoDOS_Collection_v2.0\Games!dos\WackyWhe you will find the dosbox.conf and bat file to launch the game
in eXoDOS_Collection_v2.0\Games\WackyWhe are stored the files of the games itself (this folder will be transformed in WackyWhe.pc)

So normally i would copy the folder eXoDOS_Collection_v2.0\Games\WackyWhe as WackyWhe.pc and put inside the dosbox.conf file and the dosbox.bat files both copied or based from/on eXoDOS_Collection_v2.0\Games!dos\WackyWhe

The dosbox.conf is a regular one, so I will show only the autoexec part :

[autoexec] 
cd .. 
cd .. 
mount c .\games\WackyWhe  
imgmount d .\games\WackyWhe\cd\wackywheels.iso -t cdrom 
c: 
cd wacky
cls 
@ww
exit 

Here we can see that the game folder has two children folder, one named cd where the iso of the game is located and one named wacky where the game's installed files are, including main executable ww.exe. We should be able to get rid of the cd.. if we manage to use relative paths ?

The bat file (Wacky Wheels (1994).bat) from exoDOSCollection mainly handles installation which will be already done :

@echo off 
@set var=%cd%
cd .. 
cd .. 
cd .. 
IF NOT EXIST ".\games\WackyWhe\" goto none 
".\dosbox\dosbox.exe" -conf ".\games\!dos\WackyWhe\dosbox.conf" -noconsole -exit 
del stdout.txt 
del stderr.txt 
if exist .\games\CWSDPMI.swp del .\games\CWSDPMI.swp 
goto end 
:none 
cls 
echo. 
echo Game has not been installed 
echo.
echo.
echo Would you like to install the game?
echo.
choice

if errorlevel = 2 goto no
if errorlevel = 1 goto yes
:yes
cd %VAR%
call install.bat
goto end
:no
goto end

:end

The dosbox command is useless here as it is already done by Recalbox configgen.
So to me this correspond to dosbox.bat for recalbox, but as the main executable ww.exe is already launched by the [autoexec] part of the dosbox.conf file, my dosbox.bat should be empty ? Can it be empty ?

So my main questions are :

• how to clean/modify the autoexec part to only keep relative path to the game folder ?
• should the dosbox.cfg [autoexec] keep the execution of the ww.exe file (what does the @ in @ww command mean by the way ?) and my dosbox.bat then be empty ?
• or should i remove the call to ww.exe from dosbox.conf and use that in my dosbox.bat file once again using only relative path if possible ?

Thank you for your help

[Dragu]

@voljega
"The game should then work exactly the same if it is in /recalbox/share/pc/WackyWhe.pc or /recalbox/share/pc/Race/WackyWhe.pc"

Dosbox awaits the game directory .pc in /recalbox/share/roms/dos/ xxxxx.pc
So, I am not sure that you can change this. I never tried (you will ) if you put the game start in the autoexec section of dosbox.cfg and nothing in dosbox.bat, if this works. But I can try this out. My experience, if nothing in dosbox.bat, he enter the dosbox prompt.

[Dragu]

I just tried it out, it dont work for me with game start in dosbox.cfg (local .conv) and empty dosbox.bat.

[voljega]

@dragu "Dosbox awaits the game directory .pc in /recalbox/share/roms/dos/ xxxxx.pc"

Dosbox or EmulationStation ?

And regarding handling of relative path in dosbox.cfg and dosbox.bat, is dosbox start directory the same as inside xxx.pc or /recalbox/share/dos ?

[Dragu]

Important in all this, ES mount as local game directory. I suppose that it is ES.
If you mount a virtual CD-ROM, in dosbox.cfg Autoexec section it's about
imgmount d "/recalbox/share/roms/dos/abcd.pc/abcd.DAT" -t iso
But anyway, who cares ?

[voljega]

@dragu who cares ? me

according to this post, it should be perfectly possible to use relative path in dosbox.bat at least :
https://forum.recalbox.com/topic/9178/aide-avec-le-ms-dos

so if is mounted by default on local directory, it might also be used in dosbox.cfg AutoExec part I'll have to test

"My experience, if nothing in dosbox.bat, he enter the dosbox prompt."

Is it an interactive dos prompt ? it might come handy for testing and debugging.

I checked configgen and see nothing which could prevent the use of subdirectories, I will check es_systems.cfg

[voljega]

@dragu managed to make anything work relatively by moving the whole [AutoExec] code to dosbox.bat :

imgmount d .\cd\wackywheels.iso -t cdrom
c: 
cd WACKY
WW.EXE

so that's it

But just creating a Race folder and putting WackyWhe.pc into it makes ES crash at boot ! and thus Recalbox doesn't start... @substring ?

On a further notice the game seems to allow the use of joystick but i wasn't able to change to it and only A button seems to work. I didn't use any map file
EDIT : doesn't work in Windows either so let's say it's a bug, i'll try with Tyrian

But one strange thing is that on Recalbox, game isn't displayed on original ratio (4/3) nor fullscreen, it's between the two with borders but a little bit scretched on the horizontal ? Did you notice that ?