Something to play all those old DOS games on! Yay!

Post by **bicostp** » Sat Apr 15, 2006 6:54 pm

Late last fall my school dumped a couple old Pentium boxes, and I managed to get one. I just got around to loading it up to make a DOS game box! I also managed to get some install floppies to add to my collection (I already had a bunch of them, but now they're put to good use!). (The best one was a complete, 16 floppy set for Office 4.0, pulled out of a box of floppies someone donated to be formatted)

Hardware:
166 mhz Pentium processor
128 MB RAM (4x 32mb 72 pin SIMMS) (it had 4 4MB sticks in it before, but I had some 32s lying around and my dad needs 4MB sticks for routers. win-win!

)
2 GB Quantum HD (4 512 mb partitions)
S3 Verge 64v+ graphics card (or something like that)
Turbo button

24x Creative CD ROM
2x 1.44 MB 3.5" floppy drive
SoundBlaster 16 compatible ISA card
Serial mouse (the green Microsoft Home one)

Software:
MS-DOS 6.22 complete installation (EVERYTHING, including DOS Shell, EDLIN, and some diagnostic tools)
Windows 3.11 for Workgroups
Microsoft Entertainment Pack
Microsoft Office 4.0

When I got it it had 95 installed on a 3 gig Seagate HD, but I wanted 3.1 for some reason.

Getting some of the hardware configured properly was a bugger. Since it's not plug and play like XP/2k/9x, you have to tell it what to do for everything manually. The drivers and executables need to be added to CONFIG.SYS and AUTOEXEC.BAT through Edit or Notepad, and then you have to install the drivers through Windows. (It took FOREVER to track down the drivers for the video card!) All the port settings, interrupt numbers, and other such details must be entered into the system files and the Windows control panel. No hardware settings appear to be automatic!

Pretty soon I'll start loading it up with some other stuff I have like Storybook Weaver and other games I remember from back "in the day" (playing on Hewlett Packard desktops in elementary school, for example)

Anybody have any suggestions for software? (free legal downloads preferred

) Since Home of the Underdogs' domain expired I'm kind of at a loss for older games. (I've already gone through www.dosgames.com )\

If you want to gawk at PC stuff that has been around longer than some of you have been alive, I could post screenshots. (only if it's requested

)

HomicidalBarber · Post by **HomicidalBarber** » Sat Apr 15, 2006 7:10 pm

I don't know about any other sites, but as for the games, try the hugo series, those were unreasonably hard for kids and I still can't do them without a walkthrough.

vb_master · Post by **vb_master** » Sat Apr 15, 2006 7:17 pm

You could play like every DOS game with DOSBox.

blackbox_dev · Post by **blackbox_dev** » Sat Apr 15, 2006 7:23 pm

Ha, lucky! I'd kill for a 486 box that would be reasnable to load all my vintage OSes on!

*Vintage OSes include:
MS-DOS 4.01-6.22
Windows 3.1/WFW 3.11
OS/2 Warp 3
OS/2 Warp 2.1

As for games, load it up with the shareware DOOM!
As you can see, I'm a huge DOOM fanatatic/fanboy.
John Romero/Carmack is/are my hero!

gamemasterAS · Post by **gamemasterAS** » Sat Apr 15, 2006 7:29 pm

dose anyone know of any good dos gamemakers

well i have a old crapy laptop then runs 95 could i use this as a dos box ???????.......... and i dont know anything realy about dos if you guys know a good informative page about it tell me for now i will go to a wiki

blackbox_dev · Post by **blackbox_dev** » Sat Apr 15, 2006 7:33 pm

I'd say your best bet is to learn BASIC and program in QBASIC 1.0 or QuickBasic 4.5, or learn C/C++ and program in Borland Turbo C which recently (or not, I'm not sure when it did) became a free download.

I don't think there's anything like Game Maker for Windows though, does anybody care to prove me wrong on this point?

Metroid fan · Post by **Metroid fan** » Sat Apr 15, 2006 7:37 pm

Well theres gamemaker and rpgmaker but i dunno about a dos game maker.

Post by **Triton** » Sat Apr 15, 2006 7:38 pm

im gonna learn Fbasic! lol

blackbox_dev · Post by **blackbox_dev** » Sat Apr 15, 2006 7:45 pm

Somebody should make a object oriented BASIC compiler like C++ or Java, except in the BASIC langauge. We could call it 1337Basic!

Post by **marshallh** » Sat Apr 15, 2006 7:54 pm

Heh, I have like half-a dozen of those kinds of machines in my basement

Some good games are
Hi Octane
Prince of Persia
Novastorm
Chuck Yeager's Air Combat
Pinball Construction Set
Of course, Nethack

Also, Hover! is a Win95 game but still worth a look.

HK-47 · Post by **HK-47** » Sat Apr 15, 2006 8:10 pm

http://www.abandonwarering.com/?Page=Listing

Theres lots of stuff there.

I like http://www.agamesroom.com/ , as they have a lot of the old lucasart games.

blackbox_dev · Post by **blackbox_dev** » Sat Apr 15, 2006 8:24 pm

Doesn't Hover! come on the original Windows 95 CD?

NES_fanatic · Post by **NES_fanatic** » Sat Apr 15, 2006 8:25 pm

Wait, you got the Entertainment Pack? That should have Chip's Challenge on it! *faints in nostalgia*

blackbox_dev · Post by **blackbox_dev** » Sat Apr 15, 2006 8:31 pm

No, Hover just came on my Windows 95 upgrade disk. *shrugs*, although I do have the Windows 95 Games Sampler disk as well.

Post by **marshallh** » Sat Apr 15, 2006 8:32 pm

Hover! came on my original Windows 95 OEM CD. I still have it. It runs fine off a hard drive, only takes 16MB