Anyone have any success slowing down older games to play on WinXp ?

[Greyshoe]

My system is an Athalon 64 3200+ running WinXP

I have moslo installed in both directories but even using the tag line "moslo /1 ultima.com" doesn't seem to help at all. I can play Ultima 4 ok without slowing it down, the moon cycles are just fast but I can deal with it. But I can't seem to slow Ultima6 down at all making it unplayable currently. I have even messed with a bunch of the "Properties" settings for the .com and .exe files as recommended in the How to run dos games in win xp article but nothing seemed to help.

Anyone out there playing older games like this in Win Xp, have a solution?

Edit : I'm able to run it nicely so far in Dosbox. Just trying to figure out how to make a shortcut for each game so I don't have to enter dosbox manually each time and punch in the same command lines over and over. If I'm unable I'll be back looking for help. Thanks for all the help.

 

[lxskllr]

I've never tried, but how about running DOS in a vm, and installing the old games in there.

 

[Greyshoe]

ultima 4 actually has to be run from virtual dos as it won't boot up from basic windows but moslo doesn't slow it down any that I can tell. Ultima 6 can be loaded either way but the speed is no different.

 

[lxskllr]

Well, since I'm throwing out suggestions I haven't tried... How about Dosbox?

 

[Greyshoe]

I just installed an tried Dosbox and thank you it works like a charm (for Ultima6 anyway, haven't tried on u4 yet).

Soon as I figure out how to make a shortcut so that it opens everything without my having to type commands through Dosbox everytime I'll be set. If not I may be back.

-thanks again

 

[CP5670]

You can make a bat file in Notepad to load all the necessary commands and just run that in Dosbox each time. If you have some global commands that all of your games need (like mounting the C drive), they can be added into the autoexec section of the dosbox.conf file. I would recommend changing a few things in that file anyway, as the default settings for many of the options aren't very good.

 

[Ika]

Or you could drag the .exe or whatever onto Dosbox, which will make the program load in Dosbox. At least, it works for Raptor... not really sure of the specifics here.

 

[Brule]

I've used DOSBOX for awhile now and it's a great program. I still use it for master of magic/master of orion and a few other games. Oddly enough, before I got dosbox I'd boot to Linux to run any old DOS game....

I had that speed issue trying to play the Art of War. (was unplayable) Days fly by in x-com too but it's somewhat managable if you're familiar with the interface.

 

[Tifosi248F1]

You could grab one of the Front Ends for DOSBOX to get avoid all the typing. I use D.O.G [ http://www.freewebs.com/erikgg/ ] and everything works fine. It takes a bit of time to set up all the games, but it's relatively easy. I run U6, Kings Quest 5 & 6, The 7th Guest, Syndicate, Monkey Island, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, SimCity 2000 without problems. The only game I've tried so far that I just can't get to run smooth enough is Theme Park. It's either way to fast or too slow and jerky, dunno why. I've got a bunch of games I haven't tried yet. You can find a ton of old games at http://abandonia.com that you can DL. I think the whole Ultima series is there.