Playing older games with no CD

[dud]

All, I am just now getting back into a bit of "light" gaming. I mean light as in playing some older games (1999 to 2003). I've been out of the hobby for a long time ...

My problem is that some of my ancient ... I mean archived games are getting a bit scratched up after so much use. I am trying to find a method to play some of these older games without the CD. The most obvious option I have are no-cd cracks but their legality is debatable (even though I paid for and own the games) and some cracks are no longer available.

How do you play your games without damaging them via swapping in-and-out of your cd/dvd drives?

Thanks ...

 

[coxmaster]

Make a copy or rip the ISO and mount it?

 

[Chriscross3234]

Make a copy or rip the ISO and mount it?

This. I've used Alcohol 52% (free version) to do exactly as you described.

 

[Schadenfroh]

http://www.free-downloads.net/programs/Alcohol_52__Free_Edition

 

[Schadenfreude]

Another relatively easy (but some would argue more expensive and unnecessary) method would be to just buy the older games on sites like Steam or Gog.com; they're relatively cheap and you wouldn't have to mess with CD-copy protection (but then again it was '99 software so who know what they had in terms of that) or compatibility issues!

 

[dud]

Thanks all for your responses ...

 

[coldmeat]

I use no-cd cracks. I don't care if its "illegal", who really cares?

 

[Lonyo]

I'm not sure which cracks you're finding to be no longer available.
There's a certain website which usually has cracks for almost everything, although I won't mention it here.

 

[El Guaraguao]

I'm not sure which cracks you're finding to be no longer available.
There's a certain website which usually has cracks for almost everything, although I won't mention it here.

is it mega*****.com?

 

[dguy6789]

No-CD cracks aren't illegal. They may or may not be against a game's EULA, but EULA is not the law, it's what the company would prefer you listen to, but there's no obligation.

 

[BladeVenom]

No-CD cracks aren't illegal. They may or may not be against a game's EULA, but EULA is not the law, it's what the company would prefer you listen to, but there's no obligation.

Have you read the Digital Millennium Copyright Act? I believe circumventing DRM can be considered a crime under that act.

 

[dguy6789]

As long as you are not engaging in piracy of any kind, you can not get in trouble. It needs to be for personal use though. Just because something can be used to enable piracy does not mean it will be used for that purpose. Getting in trouble for changing/configuring software that you own would be like getting in trouble for taking off the lock on a door in your house, a ridiculous concept.

 

[shortylickens]

For many older games all you have to do it copy the contents of the disc over and check the game directory for INI files that tell the game where the CD drive is located. Or the registry for the same thing.

I did it for TA:K, and Deus Ex and many others. Its the newer games where the executable actually checks to see if you have a proper disc in the drive. Those require hacks.

 

[Nik]

gamecopyworld.com has loads of fixed exe's. Read the disclaimers.

 

[BladeVenom]

As long as you are not engaging in piracy of any kind, you can not get in trouble. It needs to be for personal use though. Just because something can be used to enable piracy does not mean it will be used for that purpose. Getting in trouble for changing/configuring software that you own would be like getting in trouble for taking off the lock on a door in your house, a ridiculous concept.

So are you saying it's OK as long as you don't get caught? Because it's illegal even if its for personal use and not for piracy.

Even talking about how to bypass DRM is a crime; remember Dmitry Sklyarov?

 

[Zensal]

No-CD cracks violate the letter of the law, but as long as you are using your games and not someone else's, then the spirit of the law is intact.

I think your best option would still be ripping iso's and mounting them on Alcohol or CloneCD.

 

[heymrdj]

I don't know the grey area of it, but me and my bro use lots of No-CD cracks for the games. We each have our own copies of F-22, F-16, Commanche series, Delta Force 1, 2, BHD, Joint Operations/Escalation, DFX, and many other older games where the CD's simply won't hold up to constant use. Our file server also contains iso's of the CD's just in case, along with word pad files of our CD keys.

And yes, to an extent, especially me, we're Novalogic whores.

 

[dguy6789]

So are you saying it's OK as long as you don't get caught? Because it's illegal even if its for personal use and not for piracy.

Even talking about how to bypass DRM is a crime; remember Dmitry Sklyarov?

Apparently you missed this text in my previous post: "Just because something can be used to enable piracy does not mean it will be used for that purpose." The law does not mention anything about it being illegal to use it for convenience purposes. It's a law about piracy; what is being discussed here is not in any way piracy so it does not apply.

I can talk about no CD cracks all I want, and I can even link people to them. The only thing I'm not allowed to do is pirate or help people pirate. Here's a crazy fact: No CD cracks even work on games you own, they don't exclusively work on games that were pirated. Not everyone is a pirate. Only a thief thinks everyone steals.

No-CD cracks violate the letter of the law, but as long as you are using your games and not someone else's, then the spirit of the law is intact.

Exactly.

 

[heymrdj]

Apparently you missed this text in my previous post: "Just because something can be used to enable piracy does not mean it will be used for that purpose." The law does not mention anything about it being illegal to use it for convenience purposes. It's a law about piracy; what is being discussed here is not in any way piracy so it does not apply.

I can talk about no CD cracks all I want, and I can even link people to them. The only thing I'm not allowed to do is pirate or help people pirate. Here's a crazy fact: No CD cracks even work on games you own, they don't exclusively work on games that were pirated. Not everyone is a pirate. Only a thief thinks everyone steals.



Exactly.

This. Some of the older games like DF1/2 and Commanche Gold play excellently on netbooks with Windows XP. I don't enjoy carrying a USB CD drive just to play the game on the go, especially since they negate the purpose of a SSD netbook, complete non-mechanical setup. CD drives are subject to the same vibration and G-force issues that HD's are, and are thus a liability, especially to my older discs, when the netbook is in motion. A No-CD crack fixes this as I don't have to have another memory process running just to mount CD's, or give up very precious very expensive SSD space to store the ISO's on.