cd c:\wolf3d\

March 15, 2006 1:04 PM

Classic DOS Games: another great site to be added to the growing list of ancient game repositories. This one has a few you may have missed as well as your old favorites, divided by genre or by publisher - and everything is local. There are some suspicious utilities, and useful ones (use d-fend as a frontend for DOSbox), and even a wiki and some developer interviews. Other classic game sites here previously: Everyvideogame, Abandonia, Home of the Underdogs and its subsidiary, the Macintosh Garden (for fruit lovers).
posted by BlackLeotardFront (23 comments total)

DOSbox is kind of weird to configure right. I set the cycles (in d-fend) to 25000 or 30000, cpu to dynamic, double buffering on, no stretch filters, and play in fullscreen with no hitches in games like Tyrian and Halloween Harry. Just fiddle around with it and you'll get it, it's actually pretty easy.

And can I just say Cave Story? Whoever pointed me in that direction in my last post gets a medal. If you're in DOS mode Cave Story is about as good as it gets. Also, Kenta Cho has an awesome new game although his site isn't responding at the moment.
posted by BlackLeotardFront at 1:09 PM on March 15, 2006

I'd love to be able to run old DOS demo-scene demos, particularly the ones that all used the Gravis Ultrasound...
posted by delmoi at 1:10 PM on March 15, 2006

I'm no DOSbox expert- does it not do a good job of running demos? Just games for which it's been specifically tuned?
posted by rxrfrx at 1:16 PM on March 15, 2006

I don't suppose any of you guys have been able to track down Flightmare or Starglider?
posted by cellphone at 1:26 PM on March 15, 2006

The freely distributable X-com game, a CPU slower-downer, and an utility that seems to increase the stability of X-com while running in WinXP.

All that in one zip file here.

You'll have to:

Rightclick desktop --> properties --> settings --> advanced --> troubleshoot and put the slider to the 3rd tick from the left (disable all directX and direct3D acceleration)

Run:

turbo (you can also change the speed settings in-game)

Run:

RunXComW.bat

ps: That X-com is a microprose-authorized release, from a CD that came with PCGamer.
posted by PurplePorpoise at 1:33 PM on March 15, 2006

Flightmare
Starglider

Man, that was easy.
posted by skryche at 1:36 PM on March 15, 2006

I don't think any site will ever top Home of the Underdogs.

It's nice to see a new contender, but Underdogs is truly the best-of-the-web in this category.
posted by WinnipegDragon at 1:38 PM on March 15, 2006

What? No Roadwar 2000?? Mutants, caches, driving around the country battling other gangs - those were the days!

Alex Soft has it - not sure about the legality of the site though ...
posted by farlane at 1:59 PM on March 15, 2006

Man, that was easy.
posted by skryche at 3:36 PM CST on March 15 [!]

thanks, I was TLTG.
posted by cellphone at 2:01 PM on March 15, 2006

Cool... Thanks for the DosBox config suggestions. Of course, I'm sure I'll have a better go of it now that my processor is 3 Ghz instead of 1 Ghz like the last time I installed it too. =)
posted by idontlikewords at 2:59 PM on March 15, 2006

Ahhh. My fingers still have muscle memory from typing "cd games" several hundred times. I'm a big fan of the old Apogee and Epic (or rather, "Epic MegaGames") titles.
posted by danb at 3:01 PM on March 15, 2006

I was disappointed that there was no "Nibbles"
posted by pithy comment at 3:05 PM on March 15, 2006

Anyone know of an easier Mac emu to use than BasiliskII (for OSX)? I lost my haxor skills with this stuff back in Dubya Dubya Two.
posted by rollbiz at 3:36 PM on March 15, 2006

rollbiz: SheepShaver, maybe?
posted by unmake at 3:44 PM on March 15, 2006

I'm not seeing druglord...
posted by Smedleyman at 5:35 PM on March 15, 2006

Thanks a lot! Descent (the demo) was my favorite game back when I was a kid and my mom would only buy me math games.
posted by Citizen Premier at 5:46 PM on March 15, 2006

SheepShaver is almost impossible to get up and running; I've yet to succeed after putting a few hours into it. BasiliskII is just about as easy as it gets.

Oh. Except for mini vMac.
posted by majick at 6:58 PM on March 15, 2006

(sudden urge to stay up all night playing Autoduel)
posted by Afroblanco at 7:46 PM on March 15, 2006

The C64 and Apple II versions of Autoduel are way the hell better than the IBM version.

Don't thank me -- you'll be bleary-eyed in the morning.
posted by majick at 8:38 PM on March 15, 2006

Thanks unmake and majick. I didn't have any luck with SheepShaver, I'll give vMac a try tonight!

*has been dreaming of playing 'Vette again ever since back in the LC days when my cool uncle had it. It was the first game I ever played where you could hit pedestrians!*
posted by rollbiz at 8:37 AM on March 16, 2006

I'm dying to find an old game, somewhat similar to Roadwar 2000. It's an apocalytic-type dealie, but you can only travel from city to city, picking up "prestige", or maybe "reputation." In the cities, you can visit chop shops to improve your vehicle, or go grab a mission (usually courier missions). There were also arenas in each of the cities where you could fight for cash.

I think I played it on my C-64. Any ideas?
posted by Samsonov14 at 7:47 PM on March 16, 2006

You've just described Autoduel, which I linked to above.
posted by majick at 8:54 AM on March 17, 2006

majick, you are so right about the Apple verison of Autoduel. The IBM version has crappy graphics and cheats at poker.

Man, what a game. Wouldn't that be cool if someone made an updated version? I could totally see a 3D first-person version of the driving sequences.
posted by Afroblanco at 10:02 AM on March 18, 2006