The Ur-Quan Masters Discussion Forum

I downloaded sc1 the other day off an abandonware site and for some reason it acturly worked under win xp :o . Someone had even included a cracked exe file so I didn't have to answer the copy protection guys questions (by the way the original exe file was there and I tried to answer his questions using your list of answers but whenever I typed in the answer you had listed to his question he said it was wrong. Also the alien jibberish part of his question commonly was different than what you had listed.). Anyway the question I had was; is the meele supposed to be that slow? If I had to estimate the frame rate I'd say it was between 1 and 3 a second :P .The gfx are good (infact they seem better than sc2 :o ) but it's so slow and choppy as to be unplayable. Any help would be apreaceted.

Sc1=bad game
Sc1 isn't necessary to understand Sc2.because it has no real plot.  u just need to know who are  the hierachy and the alliance

SC1 = Good.

Yeah, it's a bit slower than sc2 (not that much slower, but a bit) but it was made to run on 8086x machines. SC2 was optimized for a 286 IIRC.

In-melee GFX for SC2 were ripped directly from SC1, so excepting the new ships those graphics should be exactly the same.

Hmm, maybe XP is making your game run so choppy. Try using dosbox (look for it in sourceforge) and see if that doesn't make a difference.

And fall in love with the stragety game. The 3-d map takes a bit to master, but once you do you feel like the bomb.

Thanks! I got it working good! Of course now I want your help with something else ::) How do I get sc3 to work right on a windows xp computer? The program starts up fine and apperantly accepts mouse commands but the display is all couropeted with the gfx streached out and broken up into little peices that are strewn around the screen. I don't think the program is frozen because by clicking randomly around the screen I found that if you click in the bottom right hand corner the program shuts down (rather a good thing I found that out  because closing the program any other way crashes my computer to a blue screen of death). I tried dosbox on it but it just crashes right away. Any help would be appreaceated!

Woah, post about where to get SC3 will probably be deleted. If not I be surprised.

Um, my first bit of advice about running SC3 is, unless you're running away, don't. It's an okay game, but a lousy sequil to SC2. That aside, SC3 was a windows game, DosBox may not work. Getting it to run in XP may be a case of "you can't. Now bend over again, Uncle Bill's ready for more of you."

Do not post links to warez sites what the hell is the matter with you?

First of all there is no such thing as 'Abandonware' copywrites expire in something like 50 years for software (not sure of the exact year but it is well over 25 years).  It is just stealing from them, now don't get me wrong, I'm hardly Mr.buys-a-lot when it comes to software.

But don't post that crap here, if you want the game go fucking buy it, or at the very least go ask somewhere else.

but, unfonturely many of the old software titles are almost impossible to obtain a copy usually the publisher abandons support for it. You usually have to Ebay it and you probably end up paying a lot for it if you want it badly. By the time it goes into public domain it's unlikey any of the computer hardware can actually play it.
I'm not trying to jusify piracy but, adding a point today many of the old aracde classics back in 80's. Can hardy be played on today's computers without dumb software tricks/emumltion. Just imagine what it would be like in 50 years? Food for Though

No and yes in that order. SC3 is a DOS game, but it uses 386 protected mode, which is not emulated by DOSBox at this stage.

SC3 uses SVGA graphics through the VESA API, so graphics problems are probably related to your graphics card's VESA implementation or lack thereof. You could try using Scitech UNIVBE or Display Doctor (both downloadable here (http://www.scitechsoft.com/products/ent/free_titles.html)),  but I don't have the slightest idea whether they work under XP.

I'm not saying pirating old software is wrong, I'm not saying piracy is wrong (I don't remember the last piece of software I bought), I'm not saying talking about piracy is wrong.  But requesting piracy in some random message board IS, espically when the message board is for fans of particaular peice of software many of which might have bought the same software you are asking for free (yes I did buy sc2&sc3).

Go ahead and pirate, go ahead and request it, but not here.  Go to the newsgroups or IRC or look around kazaa or something.  But don't bother us with it (well, when I say 'us' I mean me, I can't speak for everyone else).

Alright, I do remember that most internet fourms out there greatly discourged discussion of piracy. Due to fear of legal action. Sorry that If I have violated any fourm rules or my what I said which encourges piracy  :-[

I did not request the program. I just asked for help getting it running.

Actually it was in referance to 'Koowluh''s post.

my solution to playing SC1 in Windows XP with full sound, was to download a Sega Genesis emulater and the SC1 rom.

I did it!! I did it!!  :o If you get windows xp to the section where you can sellect to start up in safe mode and instead of safe mode you sellect option 5 which says something about vga mode and start up windows that way sc3 works fine!!  :D Well perhaps not fine (no sound and this "version" I'm using has no anamation in the conversation screens).

Well, what can you expect from "CD-rips".  ;D

You could also just buy it off eBay for 2-5$US...

-=PakoPako=-

A question that might be relevant - how do I run a DOS-only compatible program in windows XP? how do I sort out all the EMS mess in there? I haven't used DOS in years...

For most old DOS-only games, you'll really want to try DOSBox (http://dosbox.sf.net/).  Especially with the newer releases of Windows, which have been doing their best to break backwards-compatibility in recent years..

still working my way around dosbox. how do you get to the part in the beginning of windows where choose the modes (VGA, safe mode etc.)?

I'm not a user of DosBox, so I wouldn't know, but that sounds like you're trying to RESTART Windows in native DOS mode.

I always thought Dos Box was an emulated program, much like console emulations open up their own window of operation. Anycase, to answer your question:

On a Windows 95/98 or WinME machine (grr.. stupid backslash-ME), simply tap, repeatedly, the F8 key above the row of numbers on your keyboard. The window is around 3 seconds, so feel free to start jamming as soon as your computer finishes its RAM check and before the Windows Splash Logo pops up.

For other versions, I don't think they allow you to enter DOS mode (Windows 2000, Win XP, et al) because MS has disabled it or something.

-=PakoPako=-

Correct. DosBox probably won't work very well in safe mode or VGA mode or any other cut-down mode of Windows, and you probably won't be able to run it at all in MS-DOS mode.


Windows ME does not support booting from the hard disk into MS-DOS mode due to changes in the boot sequence. You will have to make a boot disk instead.


Windows 2000 and XP are based on Windows NT, which is actually a completely different operating system. Windows 95, 98 and ME are based on MS-DOS and the original Windows.

I thought that NT still had some of its origins in DOS? (and a chunk of OS/2 throw in sometime down the line)

-=PakoPako=-

"Sort of" and "yes", respectively. Try this site (http://wombat.doc.ic.ac.uk/foldoc/foldoc.cgi?Windows+NT) for more details.

To get back on topic and summarise, Windows 95 and 98 can be booted in MS-DOS mode and run old games like the original Star Control series quite nicely in MS-DOS mode if your hardware is compatible. Windows ME users need a boot disk to get into MS-DOS mode, and NT/2000/XP users will just have to try running under Windows' DOS emulation, DosBox or something like that.

Installing Display Doctor seems to allow you to run SC3 under XP without an emulator at all. The link to it was provided earlier in this thread.

Well, yeah, but SC3 was more modern... what's the issue? And what's the point?
(ok, I back off of that one)