Last Year for XT Games?

[AlexC]

I usually use SIMCGA except for games that switch in and out of text mode (e.g. Elite). Might just be a quirk of my machine, but it doesn't work well under those circumstances so I use HERCGA instead.

There are loads of others, though. I've just discovered two called 'mono.com' and 'scr.com' on a machine I picked up recently. Never used them before but both seem quite effective.

 

[tempest]

Is Monochrome CGA the same as Hercules (or at least compatible)? I see some games like Journey, Shogun, and Arthur by Infocom say they require at least Monochrome CGA and I was wondering if my Hercules card would work with that.

 

[Xacalite]

Is Monochrome CGA the same as Hercules (or at least compatible)? I see some games like Journey, Shogun, and Arthur by Infocom say they require at least Monochrome CGA and I was wondering if my Hercules card would work with that.

Monochrome CGA usually means the 640x200x2 mode of CGA, so it's not the same as Hercules.
But yes, CGA emulation on Hercules supports this mode as well.

 

[tempest]

But I need to run that SIMCGA program first right?

 

[Xacalite]

But I need to run that SIMCGA program first right?

Exactly, SIMCGA or any other CGA emulator.

 

[tempest]

Where can I get those simcga files from?

 

[Trixter]

Well, now you're just being lazy. http://ftp.freenet.de/pub/ftp.simtel.net/pub/simtelnet/msdos/screen/

 

[tempest]

Thank you so much, this helps. I guess I'll need to play around with it and see how good the emulation is. I imagine the less movement and stuff going on on the screen the better.

 

[Half-Saint]

I played a lot of games on an 8Mhz V20 with hercules graphics:
- Police Quest I and 2
- Space Quest I and II
- Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
- F-19 Stealth Fighter
- Popcorn
- Street Rod 1 and 2
- Leisure Suit Larry 1-3
- Zeliard
-Test Drive
- Tetris
- Prehistorik
..and more

 

[tempest]

Well I'm used to Sierra games moving like molasses, I grew up playing them on an Apple IIe. I think that was the slowest platform they were ported to.

 

[SpidersWeb]

Space Quest I was quite playable on my 5150 with Hercules/MDA and my IBM PC-JX (16 color).
Leisure Suit Larry felt a bit more painful though.

Elite should run quite nicely too, very small, lots of gameplay. Friend of mine used to play that for hours most days.

 

[kyodai]

The CGA driver would dither the 320x200 16-color EGA graphics down to 640x200 black-and-white CGA graphics, which is easier to manage than coming form the full 256-color sources, so that's why that driver only works with 16-color sources. That said, a few games managed to do this with 256-color sources too, and some are even are playable at 4.77MHz. Mean Streets and Chuck Yeager's Air Combat come to mind. Both talk through the speaker as well



I think that's true, but they might not be solvable -- if they didn't test with CGA, there are likely screens where something that is visible in EGA is not visible in CGA, so you would miss things to click on

Actually - pretty surprising - i solved all games i played in "hacked" CGA. While this was for sure not the way they were intended to be played it was possible. Sierra never had "1 pixel hotspots", so even very small stuff like the elevator button is fairly easy to click.

But yeah especially for some late 256 color games it drives the presentation to a ridiculous level if you compare a bit.


Police Quest 3 as it was meant to look:

Police Quest 3 as it looked at the lowest possible standard (EGA):

Police Quest 3 as it looked on my screen (Monochrome CGA on a HP 100LX):

 

[tempest]

Didn't PQ3 support Tandy graphics somehow? I thought it did. How did you hack the game to support CGA?

 

[kyodai]

Didn't PQ3 support Tandy graphics somehow? I thought it did. How did you hack the game to support CGA?

Yeah the EGA versions (all of them i think) also supported Tandy. To use CGA you will need to copy the CGA driver from a different game, i think i got it from Kings Quest IV or so.

 

[tempest]

Yeah the EGA versions (all of them i think) also supported Tandy. To use CGA you will need to copy the CGA driver from a different game, i think i got it from Kings Quest IV or so.

Once you copy the driver file how do you get the game to recognize it? I imagine it must be a command line thing since the game shouldn't even know CGA exists.

Looking in my KQ4 (SCI version) director I see two driver files for CGA: CGA320BW.DRV and CGA320C.DRV. I imagine one is CGA monochrome and one is CGA color. Which do I want? I'd be using this with a Hercules card and SIMCGA (which I'm sure will make it too slow to be playable, but I want to see this work!).

 

[Trixter]

I see two driver files for CGA: CGA320BW.DRV and CGA320C.DRV. I imagine one is CGA monochrome and one is CGA color. Which do I want? I'd be using this with a Hercules card and SIMCGA (which I'm sure will make it too slow to be playable, but I want to see this work!).

You want the monochrome one, because of the SIMCGA/Hercules requirement -- you will get better visual results rendering a 16-color SCI game to B&W that then gets translated to more B&W.

 

[fs5500]

I run shareware (nearly freeware) game of Clone Invader (1986).
It supports CGA graphics and works on 8088 CPU over 8Mhz, but it is slow on 8088CPU 4.77MHz.

Clone Invader was updated as 4.0 in 1989.
It supports CGA/EGA/VGA and works wel on 8088 4.77MHz with VGA card.
The speed is improved on v4.0.

*Original version (1986)

*version 4.0 (1989)

 

[tempest]

You want the monochrome one, because of the SIMCGA/Hercules requirement -- you will get better visual results rendering a 16-color SCI game to B&W that then gets translated to more B&W.

You mean I want the color one then right?

So how do I get the game to use the CGA driver?

 

[fs5500]

*Invaders 1978 (1996)(James Eibisch) [Action]

This is also freeware and first version was released in 1996.
It doesn't work on 8086/8088 CPU. (It works on 80286 or higher)
I think this game was for 80286 CPU or higher with VGA graphic card.
(No support CGA/EGA)

But the upldated version 02 supports to run 8086/8088 CPU and runs well with 4.77Mhz.

I don't know the fact that original version in 1996 was bug or not considered to run on 8086/8088 CPU.
Anyway updated version 02 (in 2000) runs IBM PC/PC XT with VGA card.


(Original release 1996)

(v02 update 2000)

 

[Trixter]

You mean I want the color one then right?

You want the monochrome one