Saving shadowgate
 

I will admit, I'm new to dosbox - just wanted to start off saying that. However, I'm not a jerk, and I did my research before deciding to post here.

I'm having a serious problem with Shadowgate. I got it mounted just fine, and I'm playing it with ease, I just can't save.

Essentially, if I try and save, I'm told to insert a formatted disk and name my savefile. Following this route, I cannot enter text or even press "return" to abort. Attempting to change the path is a similar problem.

Shadowgate is a save-heavy game, as death comes often. I need to be able to save, or there's very little point in playing. Someone have any ideas?

Did you mount Drive A and if so, how?

That seemed like a logical move, so I tried that before my first post, I'm just hoping I did it wrong.

Z:\>mount a C:/(games folder)

If I mount a C Drive and run sgate.exe it starts right up. However, running the same executable from an emulated a drive brings up a screen:

"Insert disk 2 / press any key when ready"

Pressing any key runs the game as usual, so aside from that first screen all is the same. However, I still can't save to drive A. I can't tell if it's an input problem from my keyboard, but I'm assuming that's the case.

I also tried mounting Drive A in the shadowgate subfolder, which worked, just to see if I could run install.exe - hoping that it would make some kind of difference. Alas, nothing will allow me to run install.exe, it tells me "command aborted. Installation diskette must be in Drive A."

Just fired the game with DOSBox 0.72, and it froze right there at the start.

Did you try using lower versions of DOSBox?

digitalgrampa, shadowgate runs only on dosbox 0.63 and lower

however, older dosbox was kind of slower and you might need to tweak it up a bit. keep in mind that old dosbox versions didn't support direct command input and you had to re-edit the dosbox.cfg file (except the f-12 and other f-thingies)

my shadowgate (which runs ok on the newest dosbox, except for the saves) ran on dosbox 0.63 with dynamic core on about 35000 cycles but it differs on different machines, just play with your cycles

also, wtf is it so much darker in old dosbox?

Just a guess Russ, but I'm guessing it have to do with the native resolution which was tweaked to prevent people from having problems with new LCD monitors. While "normal" old monitors were all the same by default, most LCD monitors are very dark.

that's kinda weird, from my experience almost all the lcds that i've seen were really bright, sometimes even too bright

I am using 0.72 and aside from this save issue it runs perfect at about 1500 cycles for me (otherwise it's WAY too fast), but I will take both of your suggestions and try it on 0.63.

r.u.s.s., I assume it's saving just fine for you on that version? Otherwise I suppose you wouldn't have mentioned it.

And as a new dos box user, should I anticipate this problem in the future? I mean that downgrading is a solution? That seems a bitty funny to me.

0.63 worked! Sadly, you're right - it's much darker and the sound isn't as crisp.

But, I can save now, so I'm incredibly happy.

My mom and dad had this game on their Macintosh SE back in the 80's. I guess they used to play together for hours trying to figure it out, but eventually had to send out for a guide because they couldn't beat the last puzzle. My dad wants me to play through this game now, and see if I can do what he couldn't.

Thanks for the help guys, much obliged.

Well, the whole point is that there is no "standard" in LCD brightness like there was back in the days with normal monitors.

I went to a store once and there was over 20 computer monitors all lined up on the wall. They were set up there on purpose, the first one on the left was so dark I could barely see if it was plugged in and the last one on the right was so bright I didn't want to look at it...

Emulating DOS is not as easy as one would think. In the last few versions, DOSBox upgraded it's running operation so it would be able to run more demanding games well. For that they had to make a new engine or tweak the old one so much that some special cases don't work with it anymore.

I have several versions installed on my computer myself. It starts from 0.61 to 0.72. When a game don't work with one then I try another. And DOSBox being usefull and well built as all the good programs are, you can simply have a different version in a different folder and have no problem with having multiple versions running at the same time. :)