Retro Gaming with DosBox
Dug out a load of dos games the other day and couldn't figure out how to use Dos with XP. However, here's a nice tutorial on how to use DosBox to play old games that you enjoyed on your new gaming rig.
Requirements:
A processor about 333mhz is good enough
64mb RAM
4mb Graphics Card
Keyboard, Mouse
I guess the above is a bit of a joke. The point I'm trying to get across is that you don't need a high end machine to enjoy good quality games that are fun!
In this tutorial "\>" represents the start of something entered into the commandline.
Installing DosBox:
Dosbox is an open source attempt at an MS-Dos emulator. It is cross platform running on pretty much any platform you can think of : Windows (XP or Vista), Ubuntu, Mac OSX. To install it, simply download your relevant package and execute it. On Windows, you run the exe file. On other systems, you have to extract the package using a package manager or (if you are an Ubuntu User try
sudo apt-get install dosbox). There is even a version that installs on your USB key drive available from:
http://portableapps.com/
Getting hold of Dos Games (free and legal!)
The term abandonware is used to describe software that is no longer supported and making money for the developer(
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abandonware). Therefore, the developer has agreed to release the software for free to the user. Many DOS games are classified as abandonware and can be downloaded from abandonware archives on the net such as
http://www.abandonia.com/ and
http://www.xtcabandonware.com/
Visit one and download something that looks interesting. Lots of Old favourites can be found for free and perfectly legitimately from these sites. If you still remain unsure, here are a list of software titles that have been explicitely released as freeware:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...ed_as_freeware
Configuring DosBox:
First, you need to make a directory on your drive where you will store all your dos programs. I use C:\dosprog on Windows and /home/username/dosprog on ubuntu butr its best if you find your own way. Next, start up DosBox and you will be presented with a command prompt. The program does not know where your stuff is stored at this point so you need to tell it by using the mount command to set where on your
real drive your
emulated drive will be. You will need to do this every time because dosbox does not store this data.
Enter the following command:
\>mount C: /path/2/dosprog
The above will map the virtual C drive to your data directory. If you need CD support, you can do the same for a cd with one small difference. You must use the cdrom option to tell dosbox to treat the directory as a cd drive. On my system I use the following command:
\>mount D: D:\ -T cdrom
The above maps the virtual D drive to the real D drive and the "-T cdrom" part tells it that my D: drive is a CD.
In ubuntu, mac or other Unix/Linux variants the commands above would be similar to below:
\>mount C: /home/username/dosprog
\>mount D: /media/cdrom -T cdrom
Installing your game:
If you have downloaded a game, use your windows/ubuntu archiver to unzip it to your dosprog directory. Games often have install.exe files with them so figure out what the path to that file would be in your
virtual system and run:
\>cd C:\path\2\parent\directory
The above will set dosprog to that directory (for people unfamiliar to the commandline, this is like using windows explorer to browse to that directory and cd stands for change directory). Now run
\>install.exe
You will probably be presented with a windowed GUI presenting you with options for configuring your game.
If your game was bought and is on a cd, browse to the install.exe on the disk (probably D: if you used the above advice) using cd command and install it to your virtual C: drive.
Running your game:
To run your game you need to find out where the main executable file (something.exe) is stored so that you can execute it via dosbox. Go to your dosprog directory and find the path of the installed game. Use the cd command to get to this path virtually:
\>cd C:\path\2\game\directory
Now, actually run the game exe
\>exampleGame.exe
You will notice that the game will run in the dosbox window. However, you can run it fullscreen by pressing alt + enter, a toggle command which also turns fullscreen off.
I hope this guide has proven useful to you. If you are not a member, please register with us here and support our community
Yours truly,
Cabal
[Tutorial]Retro Gaming with DosBox, Posted 06-16-2008 at 06:17 PM.
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