Bootable USB drive for playing dos games

[the123zach]

Hey I am creating this bootable usb boot disk for playing DOS games that is a public disk i am making called Retroplay and I thought i'd share it with Dosgames.com forums.

This is based off DOS 7.10 for playing old DOS games.
This isnt any old boot usb stick though its a whole new os like experience with a driven menu system and the ability to take the os from computer to computer for the ability to portability play the games.

The games work like this there are 8 game slots for installing games into and to install a game you download it off of a website and put the downloaded file into the game slot.
all games are freeware/shareware/commercial games released as freeware

I already have a public preview of it available for download.

Retroplay is under development and if interested in beta testing upcoming betas post here http://www.betaarchive.co.uk/forum/view ... =21&t=8961

All suggestions and questions welcome.

Information about this public preview

Ok i have gotten to a pretty good point in development.
I have gotten 1 beta tester from else where and I thought i would make a public preview build.

The code in this preview is pretty stable but not 100% compatible with some other computers.
this preview contains some new nifty features since the first beta

The preview can be downloaded here http://zachinator.deceifermedia.com/preview1.02.zip
Games can be download here all games are shareware/demo/freeware http://zachinator.deceifermedia.com/gamedisk

If you encounter any problems or miscompatibilities please report them.

I encourage everyone to try Duke Nukem 3d slot 1 and Doom slot 2 to see if they are compatible with running on your computer.

Also if you get any errors from any of the games etc. please report them.

Enjoy using Retroplay public preview 1.02.

To install games just put a downloaded game file into one of the numbered folders in the games folder.

To install Retroplay preview run the usbinst.bat file note that your usb drive will be formatted when installing.

If all goes well a 1.00 release can be expected by November

[Wally]

Quick question, how do you plan on slowing certain games down?

[the123zach]

Quick question, how do you plan on slowing certain games down?

I don't all the games i plan on releasing as game disks dont need to be slowed down and if your talking about the Runtime error 200 error on some games i have found a workaround by patching the exe files using a program i found off the net.

Also i forgot to mention about the mouse support that in order for a mouse to work in Retroplay it has to be a PS/2 mouse or a serial mouse as USB mice dont work unless through an adapter or by having legacy usb set in your bios

[the123zach]

I am currently looking for Beta testers to test beta versions of Retroplay if interested in testing post in this topic with the following info

How much Ram do you have?
What is your favorite dos game?
MSN/E-Mail/other that i can contact you besides this forum:
How much experience do you have being a beta tester before if any:
What kind of sound card(s) do you have:

[dosraider]

I can't help wondering what the advantages of a dosboot USB stick could be.

[the123zach]

one advantage is that most people don't have floppy drives now a days.

another advantage is that you can start playing a game on one computer and then take it to another computer and continue playing where you left off.

It can be easily used by people who don't even know what Dos is since it has a menu driven interface as opposed to one thats command line based.

It is small and lightweight its less then 10mb without any games.

[dosraider]

Ahem, dosbox runs flawless from an USB stick.
Nothing needs to be installed on the host PC, nothing needs to be changed in the BIOS.
No reboot needed.
Dosbox can mount floppy images from the USB stick.
Dosbox can mount CD images from the USB stick.
Sound works flawless regardless of the sound device present on the host PC.
Runs probably more games with less problems then dos 7.1(Forget the 'probably, it simply does so).
Memory config is an easy (.... now yeah, somekind of, some people never get the hang of this stuff)
Speed regulation is an easy.
...
And I can go on and on and on.


So, once again, (and maybe a 'sorry' for that, but I really really wonder, it's a serious question from me, not some kind of gag)
I can't help wondering what the advantages of a dosboot USB stick could be.

And I have ane more question, I'm afraid.
You claim to use dos 7.1, are you talking about MSdos 7.1?
If yes, do you have permission from Microsoft to distribute this freely?
Or do you talk about FreeDos?

[the123zach]

It goes one better. It's used inside of the box, hence the name.

What does Retroplay do that DOSBox doesn't, and how would it be beneficial?

Well for starters its portable so it can be used on a usb stick and used from computer to computer and it can play games that dosbox cant like games that require Himem and Emm386 extended memory and with retroplay theres no need to have extra software on the pc and no need for difficult editing of the config file just to make a game work.

One of the things i dont like about Dosbox is its inabillity to play alot of the games that need extended memory.

Installing games with retroplay is easy by just using a program on the usb drive as opposed to dosbox where you have to edit the config file for each game.

also from the old Retroplay website the following

Retroplay is portable

It is very easy to use

Everything Retroplay is 100% free

No hard disk usage used by Retroplay

There are more than 20 games for Retroplay

You can save your progress on games

There are highscores on some games

There is sound and music in most of the games

You can see information about the games before downloading or playing them

It is compatable with most computers

There are no difficult commands to type in

and thats why using Retroplay is a better choice than using the difficult to use DosBox and besides Retroplay can run on a computer with a lot less ram and cpu than using Dosbox since theres no cpu intensive emulation.

for the time being Retroplay is based off of a Windows 98 boot disk which can be freely downloaded from www.bootdisk.com so no legal worrys there.

I might end up switching to FreeDOS later on towards release

[dosraider]

Let's start ....

Well for starters its portable so it can be used on a usb stick and used from computer to computer and it can play games that dosbox cant like games that require Himem and Emm386 extended memory and with retroplay theres no need to have extra software on the pc

Same goes for dosbox 0.73. You can run it from an USB stick from PC to PC, I do it all the time.
Dosbox 0.73 handles himem and emm386 perfectly (sometimes even better then the ol'dos ... really).
When ran from USB dosbox doesn't need anything stored on the HD.

One of the things i dont like about Dosbox is its inabillity to play alot of the games that need extended memory.

Dosbox is on 0.73 now, you should try it, what you state is total crap.

Installing games with retroplay is easy by just using a program on the usb drive as opposed to dosbox where you have to edit the config file for each game.

No, not really.
Most games run fine on the default dosbox config.
And for the rare games that need some special settings you can create easily an adapted config file, save it in a batch that runs dosbox with the the adapted settings.

It's in fact much worse with your dosboot USB, how do you handle the different IRQ settings on each PC? Soundsettings? If you even will get sound, most modern soundchips can't produce any sound whilst in full dos.

also from the old Retroplay website the following

Retroplay is portable

Dosbox also.

It is very easy to use

I encounter more problems in real dos then in dosbox.

Everything Retroplay is 100% free

Same for dosbox.

No hard disk usage used by Retroplay

Same for dosbox when ran from USB.

There are more than 20 games for Retroplay

20? Are you joking? I have a pile of probably 2000-3000 or even more dosgames. 20...? LMAO.

You can save your progress on games

Same for dosbox.

There are highscores on some games

Some games? What does this mean?

There is sound and music in most of the games

Nope, not on modern hardware, forget it.

You can see information about the games before downloading or playing them

Same here on dosgames.

It is compatable with most computers

Sorry friend but this is total crap, most modern compies won't run half of the games without complete system crash, most modern LCD monitors will refuse to work in low graph res, on most modern computers you will get NO sound.
Here dosbox wins on all points.

There are no difficult commands to type in

I guess that depends on who you are.
Once you set up the automount for the virtual C: you have to input in dobox:
cd folder
name

Yeah, that's pretty complicated, it's true.
Even all kinds of other mounts, ev floppy, CDs, you can write a simple batch that does it all for you. Yeah, pretty complicated.
And even more: 95% games that doesn't need a floppy or CD mounted can be ran by simply drag/drop the exe (...or bat...com...) on the dosbox icon.

and thats why using Retroplay is a better choice than using the difficult to use DosBox and besides Retroplay can run on a computer with a lot less ram and cpu than using Dosbox since theres no cpu intensive emulation.

That's a point, dosbox won't run on a crappy PC, and not all have a powerful PC at hand.
On the other hand I challenge you to get any dosgame running in plain dos with sound on a modern system with a Realtek® ALC650 soundchip.
And things certainly won't improve with time, be sure of that.
With dosbox it's pretty simple, if your OS (and that will be mainly Windows) has sound set up properly, dosbox will play the games with sound.

All by all I still don't see any reason to use a dosboot USB stick.
The more you must ask the *ahem* n00bs to fiddle with the BIOS settings, as most PCs won't boot by default from an USB.

Anyway, even if dosbox isn't heaven, it's certainly better and easier for -most- n00bs to get their dosgames running.

Now yeah, that's my point of view, each his own, as usual, and we're all happy, isn't it?
A bit of diversity can't harm.
And your stuff can indeed be helpful for those on low end systems.

On high end, modern systems it's a bad idea to run plain dos.
And I even haven't mentioned wireless mouse and keyboards ...... have a nice day setting those up in dos 7.1.

[the123zach]

You have some valid points but overall I wouldn't call Dosbox n00b friendly especially when it comes to people who have never even used Dos before.

well anyways I have made a trailer and put it up on Youtube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lbiso0BBXys

[dosraider]

People who are afraid of the dosprompt won't go in their BIOS to set an USB bootable, no sir, they won't.

And you have dosbox frontends that become slowly pretty mature, even if they once in a while have their own specific problems.

BTW, don't get me wrong, I can appreciate this dosboot USB stick, but you really can't say it's good on modern up-to-date hardware, (explained in my previous post, so I will not repeat myself here).

A big plus point for your USB stick is that systems that are to 'low end' to run dosbox (or VPC) properly usually are also not build around the latest gen hardware..... so you have a chance to get the games running and to get sound working.

But alas not on up-to-date hardware, no way.

And we won't even talk Mac here .... @#@#@#@#Macs.

[Edit]
Just took a look @your vid. Doom ... hehe.
Also: that seems to be real low end hardware, isn't it?
Just to say, my (fried now) latest CRT was full 23", you really don't want to play those dos games in full screen on a 23" CRT, you really don't want, believe me, really not, it makes your eyes bleed .......

[the123zach]

Actually all iv been using my USB boot disk on is latest hardware that trailer their was shot using latest dual core 2.7ghz amd with 2gb of ram.

I don't know where you get this idea about it not running on the latest systems and have you ever heard of the boot menu press esc or something select the usb stick and away they go. No messing around in the bios necessary.

I generally don't use LCD monitors i prefer the older CRT monitors in my opinion they produce a clearer picture than lcd.

the crt in the trailer is a 13"

I'v also been using it on a pc that has a 19" lcd screen.

[dosraider]

*sigh* Whatever.

Still wants to see a n00b booting into dos on a modern system.
And still wants to see you get sound in dos through an AC.... whatever soundchip.

[Dogbreath]

http://dosgames.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=13440

Your response to all this, dosraider?

[dosraider]

Nope, is an update, there was one for dosbox 0.72 but some things are changed, (now you must do a 'writeconf').

Did you never saw that there always was one of them dosbox on USB key?

[Dogbreath]

Prolly read it and forgot you wrote it. (I've seen similar posts on other forums, and they're all jumbled - I normally don't read in a linear fashion like most people, I glance at a post and get the gist of it in a second or two, and then move on. It has it's downsides) When I saw the new one I thought of this discussion.

[the123zach]

Sure Dosbox is cool but since its an emulator and not the real thing it doesn't have 100% compatibility and it is anything but n00b friendly.
So Retroplay will be a great alternative to DosBox and will even be able to be used by people who get scared off by Dosbox's complexity and even by people who don't know a whole lot about computers in general
Of course it will also be great for those who are power users since it includes features DosBox does not and the fact it doesn't require a compatible OS like how Dosbox does.

So all in all both are great but Retroplay is all around easier and a good choice.

Just a quick update this project is still kicking and very much alive its just behind the scenes alive.

What will hopefully be the last public preview will be coming out by the end of November and the promised release date has been delayed as I am now a little short when it comes to beta testers.

I'm not going to be revealing too much about this upcomming preview but I will say this it will contain alot of features and more compatibility then the first preview in September and it will also be much more user friendly too.

I have come up with a pretty good idea and would like to know what others think
This idea is to include some Game creation programs so users can easily create their own games without any programming required.

[Dogbreath]

dosbox? Complex? It's about as easy to use as a toaster. I can't really think of too many ways to make it *more* N00b friendly.

[the123zach]

dosbox? Complex? It's about as easy to use as a toaster. I can't really think of too many ways to make it *more* N00b friendly.

Maybe for someone who knows what they are doing, great.
But for those that dont know anything when it comes to Dos and old computers than they will have a hard time with DosBox, even with a frontend you still gotta set the proper options and thats something a newb wont be able to do cause they dont know the proper options.

Also Dosbox is an emulator and like any emulator it has its pitfalls.

Retroplay and Dosbox are both good to use products to use with each having their own pros and cons.

Retroplay is native as opposed to emulated so its more accurate and more compatible with PCs. Sound isnt much of a problem for Retroplay either.

Emulated requires much more CPU than what native non emulated Dos needs so again dont need a good computer to play dos games where as in Dosbox the cycles has to be turned way up in essance eating up CPU so again retroplay is more compatible for older computers and newer computers alike.

People that dont know dos or old computers dont want to mess with all kinds of options where as in Retroplay everything is menu driven and installation of Retroplay and games are as easy as can be and much easier than Dosbox.

All in all both are good products Dosbox is more for people that know dos and know comouters and what options to use and have good computers (Emulation rule of thumb generally is at least 10x/100x more CPU than the real thing when it comes to emulation) and emulation is not 100% accurate either so all in all both are equally good but one is for advanced users and one is for non advanced users although their are things in the newest behind the scenes Retroplay that is also attractive to the advanced power users too.

[dosraider]

...... seems you try to reinvent what's already exist, the123zach:
http://geekdos.weebly.com/

And the stuff runs pretty good I must say.
Not that I would run it on a modern PC, but if you have an older PC or laptop laying around gathering dust it's a good applic to blow new life in it.