Other Spiderweb Game, on Android, right now!

[promethean]

This isn't a lame misleading post about how you can actually kind of sort of play games through something like RDP or Logmein or VNC. This is actually running a few of the older Spiderweb games, on your Android.

 

The playable are are all of the original Exile series, including Blades. Here's how:

 

First, this was all done on the Kindle Fire, so you're mileage may vary, but as Android hardware goes it's fairly middle of the road, nothing too cutting edge, so most higher end phones and any of the major tablets should work about as well. My recommendation is for a tablet, but if you can manage to enjoy playing on the smaller screens too, well, good on you.

 

What you'll need:

1. Dosbox on PC. You'll do your setup here, for no other reason than I assume your PC is faster than your Android device. There's no reason you couldn't otherwise do it all native in Android.

 

2. Windows 3.11 install disk images. Dig out your closets and raid the garage, we're going old school. You'll be playing Exile on windows 3.11 on dosbox on android. I've read SciFi novels (Rainbow's End) which predicted this type of embedded recursive emulation and thought, "Why wouldn't they just use all their technology to find an easier way?" Well, the future's here, and it's just as kludgy as predicted, but in this case it works, and it works really well. There is no significant lag, stuttering, sound artifacts, or anything.

 

3. Prepare an empty directory to install win311 into, boot up DosBox, mount the install media in one virtual drive and you directory on the C:\ drive, keep ALL of the default drivers and settings the installer recommends, and let loose on the nostalgia because here comes the only decently stable consumer Windows system until XP hit the shelves.

 

4. Visit this page for links to a few necessary drivers and other useful goodies. In particular, I recommend the S3 video drivers and the SoundBlaster audio drivers. Everything else is unnecessary, but if you want to do anything else in the win 3.11 environment, I recommend Win32S for some basic 32-bit support and WinG for some basic pre-DirectX support: http://vogons.zetafleet.com/viewtopic.php?t=9405

 

5. On Android you need DosBox Turbo. I tried aDosBox, which is free, but it significantly under performs compared to Turbo and was too slow to be usable. anDosBox is another choice, and their speed is probably about the same as Turbo, but it's interface is not as friendly or configurable.

 

6. Assuming your Win311 is complete, just transfer that whole directory structure over to your Android device to wherever you choose to run things from.

 

7. Last, make sure your dosbox.conf is properly attuned to your win311 install. I have removed all the comment lines (for space) from my own and pasted it below as an example. It mounts an additional directory to the D:, but that is not really necessary if you don't want that. Otherwise, it allows you to easily access anything on your device. Beware though: Windows 3.11 didn't have much in the way of file protections to prevent accidental mishaps with your file structure, and it was not uncommon for poorly written programs to ruin or even delete entire disk volumes. So, some sandboxing is prudent.

 

8. That's it, you're ready to go! Download the demos of any of the Exile series, install, realize they're awesome, and purchase full copies!

 

LAST: You'll be tempted, as I was, to reach too far. To want the Exile remakes, Nethergate, maybe a Geneforge. Near as I can tell, it's simply impossible in 3.11 unless you want to rewrite drivers and perhaps additional work as well. They really seem to require a real version of DirectX, WinG is not enough, and that means Win95. Win95 will run, and run decently, at least on the Kindle Fire. But I spent days tracking down fixes for problems, and while the ultimate result was a usable Win95 system w/ basic DirectX 1 support (yes, version 1 only: 2 & 3 made things unstable) the result was still that Nethergate & Geneforge ran too slow to be at all playable, as in 10 second to move space, and Avernum wouldn't start at all.

 

Good luck!

 

Example dosbox.conf:

 

[sdl]

fullscreen=true

fulldouble=false

fullresolution=original

windowresolution=original

output=overlay

autolock=true

sensitivity=100

waitonerror=true

priority=higher,normal

mapperfile=mapper.txt

usescancodes=true

 

[dosbox]

language=

machine=svga_s3

captures=capture

memsize=63

 

[render]

frameskip=0

aspect=false

scaler=normal2x

 

[cpu]

core=auto

cycles=max

cycleup=500

cycledown=20

 

[mixer]

nosound=false

rate=22050

blocksize=2048

prebuffer=10

 

[midi]

mpu401=intelligent

device=default

config=

 

[sblaster]

sbtype=sb16

sbbase=220

irq=5

dma=1

hdma=5

mixer=true

oplmode=auto

oplrate=22050

 

[gus]

 

[speaker]

pcspeaker=true

pcrate=22050

tandy=auto

tandyrate=22050

disney=true

 

[joystick]

 

[serial]

 

[dos]

xms=true

ems=true

umb=true

keyboardlayout=none

 

[autoexec]

mount d ./sdcard/

mount c ./sdcard/dbgames/win31/

c:

cd windows

echo type win then return to start

 

[The Loquacious Lord Grimm]

Great! Now I just need an android-running device with a screen larger than eight square inches... and isn't my wife's cell phone...

 

On a more serious note, I'm not sure how Management will react to this topic, and so I would like to say Thank You for trying that out, and sharing it with us, while I still have the chance.

 

Here's to the day a year or two from now when we can take BoA with us wherever, without the bulky hardware. Assuming that 19" tablets don't become vogue.

 

_________________________

The Silent Assassin has been up in a tree for the past two days, muddling one of the greatest existential questions of our age.

And at this point, I'm refusing to bring the ladder back until he can get it through his head that being human and dancers are not mutually exclusive.

[promethean]

Really? Why would management mind? This ability is inducing me to purchase copies of the Exile trilogy, even though I already own the Avernum series. I can see how they might see it as a little odd, maybe not want it to take away sales of newer games, but given that it is most likely to appeal only to people who are already SpidWeb fans and game owners, I hope they don't see it that way.

[ex post slarto]

It seems to me that the Exile games are not great targets for tablets simply because of the interface: there are a lot of commands that can't be accessed by clicking (or at least not easily) and others that involve clicking on really tiny things.

 

Did you find those to be problems?

[Randomizer]

I tried to find the topic once before, but there was a similar one on playing Spiderweb games on the iPad before Avadon came out.

 

I don't think Jeff minds because you are allowed to play the games on any computer that you own and the license doesn't restrict you to a single computer like some companies *cough* Microsoft *cough*.

[promethean]

Not yet, at least not for clicking on small things, but the display on the Fire is as small as I'd want to go. Full disclosure though, I only played about 10 minutes of these, realized it worked much better than I had expected, and then came here to post about it.

 

It was actually quite ironic for me: I expected to post to the board about being able to play Spiderweb games on Android, only to find that Spiderweb had beaten me to the punch by releasing Avadon for the platform! It's my third time around buying Avadon, but certainly worth it

[promethean]

Oh, regarding keyboard issues, the Hacker's Keyboard (available in the android marketplace) offers a much more fully-featured keyboard w/ function, cursor arrows, and numbers pad options. This has made many otherwise unplayable dosbox games quite enjoyable.

[nikki.]

*applauds*.

 

I'm not a pm Android user, but this is seriously awesome. Kudos, sir.

[Actaeon]

Originally Posted By: Randomizer

...the license doesn't restrict you to a single platform like some companies *cough* Apple *cough*.

FYT

[MaximB]

It's the same as saying that you can run all Spiderweb games on Linux using Dosbox or/and Wine.

Sure, they would run - but that doesn't make them a Linux games and most Linux users won't pay for them.

 

On that note, we LOVE to support those who support our OS, I bought many games that I didn't play (more then an hour) just to support the developers.

[promethean]

Not quite the same: Android is a new(ish) platform, and dosbox on android is something of an unknown, new itself in terms of support & stability. So, if this is at all like your linux/wine comparison, it is like when Wine was still new & unknown, and someone came a long and said, "Hey, I figured out that we Linus folks can run Baldur's Gate!"

 

Yes, it is obvious to anyone familiar with the state of those tools as they exist now that it could be possible, but it was not obvious in the case of Spiderweb games on android via dosbox. Or let me rephrase that: It was not obvious to me, and after a fair amount of effort, it turns out that it is in fact not possible for some games, not at this moment on the current crop of Android hardware & dosbox software. Speed & Stability are still major issues on Android for any Spiderweb game beyond the Exile series. And, should you find yourself thinking, "Yes, but even that was fairly clear to me." Consider this: It was not clear to me, and there may be others to whom it was not that bennefit from this.

[Dintiradan]

I, for one, would never have thought about using Dosbox on a mobile computer. It's not that I don't know about Dosbox, it's that I would have never thought of using it on something other than a desktop computer.

 

So, thanks! Something to think about if I ever get a Kindle/tablet/whatever.