Tweaking dosbox configuration (better music, graphics and keyboard layout) - Realms of Arkania series - Forum -

divide

New User

Rep: 5

Registered: Jun 2009

From Poland

Posted December 12, 2009

To get potentially much better music (depending on your system MIDI configuration, nowadays it will be most possibly your wavetable synthesizer; use timidity or fluidsynth on Linux) in RoA 1, comment out lines starting with "intro" in dosboxrealms1.conf. Then run RoA1 as usual; it should drop you into the command line. Use 'sound' command to enter sound setup; then choose LAPC-1 and Sound Blaster Pro (default settings). You can uncomment the lines afterwards.
In LAPC-1 mode RoA should use your system MIDI to play music; this is not perfect, most synthesizers are GM, so there is some mismatch expected. Still, it sounds a lot better than the default AdLib emulation, at least to my ears.
While you're at it, you can change 'scaler' to 'hq3x' (or whichever you like, you have a list above so you can experiment) in the .conf file. This will make graphics much smoother.
If you have other keyboard layout than US, change 'usescancodes' to 'false' to get your layout to work in RoA.

Post edited December 12, 2009 by divide

wargnthoi

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wargnthoi

New User

Rep: 28

Registered: Mar 2009

From Japan

Posted December 14, 2009

2

Thanks for the tips.
Setting the scaler to hq3x' triples the resolution and smooth the aliasing pretty well. So from a 320x240 (the game original resolution) I get a neat 960x720 resolution. But can't I get higher resolution than that! I have modified the resolution settings, but it appears it only works if the scaler is set to 'none' or 'normal2x'...

Faithful

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Faithful

Brain Freeze

Rep: 844

Registered: Sep 2008

From United States

Posted December 14, 2009

3

OK, for people like myself, I need step by step instructions on how to do these things.
Also, does the sound fix work for Windows systems?
If you two do not mind can you give the steps to make these changes, please?

Bio2hazard

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Bio2hazard

Level Up!!

Rep: 33

Registered: Jun 2009

From Germany

Posted December 15, 2009

4

wargnthoi: Thanks for the tips.
Setting the scaler to hq3x' triples the resolution and smooth the aliasing pretty well. So from a 320x240 (the game original resolution) I get a neat 960x720 resolution. But can't I get higher resolution than that! I have modified the resolution settings, but it appears it only works if the scaler is set to 'none' or 'normal2x'...

Hello.
Simply select a different output= mode.
Selecting ddraw will allow you to run higher resolutions while still using the hq3x scaler for instance.
As far as the other poster;
Locate the dosboxrealms1.conf ( or 2, or 3 ) in your directory.
Open it with Editor / Notepad , do not use Wordpad or Word.
It has exhaustive descriptions of what everything does, but a quick rundown of things to pay attention to:
fullscreen=true/false
do you want it to run fullscreen or windowed?
fullresolution=original/value
what resolution do you want to use for fullscreen?
windowresolution=original/value
what resolution do you want to use for windowed?
output=surface,overlay,opengl,openglnb,ddraw
Default is overlay, and should work fine, opengl or ddraw might give you more performance and allow you to use different resolutions
autolock=true/false
Mousefreedom, when autolock is set to false you can move your mouse in and out of the game window freely when it is windowed. I prefer it at off to quickly switch to other windows, but this is a matter of preference.
under [render]
scaler allows you to set filters.
I personally think normal3x looks best, even if it is a very "pixelated" mode, hq3x has many supports, and super2xsai is also a classic.
Once you have changed those, go to the very bottom where you see
@ECHO OFF
mount c"."
c:
cls
intro
bladem
exit
Now, you want to:
Replace intro with sound
Save the file
Start the game,
sound setup will pop up, select ROLAND LAPC-1 first, then select Sound Blaster Pro 16
once you exit the setup, the game should start.. verify that sound works, if it does:
Exit game, go back to the config file,
delete "sound".
And you are done. ( with the added bonus of not having to watch the intro everytime you start the game. )
hope that helped!

Faithful

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Faithful

Brain Freeze

Rep: 844

Registered: Sep 2008

From United States

Posted December 16, 2009

5

Bio2hazard: Hello.
Simply select a different output= mode.
Selecting ddraw will allow you to run higher resolutions while still using the hq3x scaler for instance.
As far as the other poster;
Locate the dosboxrealms1.conf ( or 2, or 3 ) in your directory.
Open it with Editor / Notepad , do not use Wordpad or Word.
It has exhaustive descriptions of what everything does, but a quick rundown of things to pay attention to:
fullscreen=true/false
do you want it to run fullscreen or windowed?
fullresolution=original/value
what resolution do you want to use for fullscreen?
windowresolution=original/value
what resolution do you want to use for windowed?
output=surface,overlay,opengl,openglnb,ddraw
Default is overlay, and should work fine, opengl or ddraw might give you more performance and allow you to use different resolutions
autolock=true/false
Mousefreedom, when autolock is set to false you can move your mouse in and out of the game window freely when it is windowed. I prefer it at off to quickly switch to other windows, but this is a matter of preference.
under [render]
scaler allows you to set filters.
I personally think normal3x looks best, even if it is a very "pixelated" mode, hq3x has many supports, and super2xsai is also a classic.
Once you have changed those, go to the very bottom where you see
@ECHO OFF
mount c"."
c:
cls
intro
bladem
exit
Now, you want to:
Replace intro with sound
Save the file
Start the game,
sound setup will pop up, select ROLAND LAPC-1 first, then select Sound Blaster Pro 16
once you exit the setup, the game should start.. verify that sound works, if it does:
Exit game, go back to the config file,
delete "sound".
And you are done. ( with the added bonus of not having to watch the intro everytime you start the game. )
hope that helped!

Thanks very useful :o)

wargnthoi

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wargnthoi

New User

Rep: 28

Registered: Mar 2009

From Japan

Posted December 16, 2009

6

wargnthoi: Thanks for the tips.
Setting the scaler to hq3x' triples the resolution and smooth the aliasing pretty well. So from a 320x240 (the game original resolution) I get a neat 960x720 resolution. But can't I get higher resolution than that! I have modified the resolution settings, but it appears it only works if the scaler is set to 'none' or 'normal2x'...

Bio2hazard: Hello.
Simply select a different output= mode.
Selecting ddraw will allow you to run higher resolutions while still using the hq3x scaler for instance.

I had tried with OpenGL but it didn't worked. With DDraw it works now! Thanks a lot.

derboo

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derboo

New User

Rep: 4

Registered: Nov 2009

From Germany

Posted December 18, 2009

7

It is worth noting that LAPC-1 doesn't work well with every system. For me (Samsung NC-10 Netbook) it turns music into a complete mess of noise.

Red_Avatar

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Red_Avatar

Be vigilant

Rep: 535

Registered: Oct 2008

From United Kingdom

Posted April 01, 2010

8

Yes the Roland music is pretty terrible in places - especially in the starting city in the first game where it's a big jumble of instruments on top of each other. Since it sounds the same on my laptop which has a completely different soundcard, I suspect it will sound this poorly on most computers. It's too bad the MIDI music is so weak.

Humany

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Humany

New User

Rep: 0

Registered: Oct 2010

From Germany

Posted October 21, 2010

9

Bio2hazard: Hello.

Simply select a different output= mode.

Selecting ddraw will allow you to run higher resolutions while still using the hq3x scaler for instance.

As far as the other poster;
Locate the dosboxrealms1.conf ( or 2, or 3 ) in your directory.
Open it with Editor / Notepad , do not use Wordpad or Word.

It has exhaustive descriptions of what everything does, but a quick rundown of things to pay attention to:
fullscreen=true/false
do you want it to run fullscreen or windowed?

fullresolution=original/value
what resolution do you want to use for fullscreen?

windowresolution=original/value
what resolution do you want to use for windowed?

output=surface,overlay,opengl,openglnb,ddraw
Default is overlay, and should work fine, opengl or ddraw might give you more performance and allow you to use different resolutions

autolock=true/false
Mousefreedom, when autolock is set to false you can move your mouse in and out of the game window freely when it is windowed. I prefer it at off to quickly switch to other windows, but this is a matter of preference.

under [render]
scaler allows you to set filters.
I personally think normal3x looks best, even if it is a very "pixelated" mode, hq3x has many supports, and super2xsai is also a classic.

Once you have changed those, go to the very bottom where you see
@ECHO OFF
mount c"."
c:
cls
intro
bladem
exit

Now, you want to:

Replace intro with sound
Save the file
Start the game,
sound setup will pop up, select ROLAND LAPC-1 first, then select Sound Blaster Pro 16
once you exit the setup, the game should start.. verify that sound works, if it does:

Exit game, go back to the config file,
delete "sound".

And you are done. ( with the added bonus of not having to watch the intro everytime you start the game. )

hope that helped!

Faithful: Thanks very useful :o)

I got Windows 7 and with "sound" is starting nothing on my pc and the game starts. how can i start the soundmenue?
ok have fix it with "start as admin"

another question, can i install the original soundtrack from my old original cd to the gog.com version?

Post edited October 21, 2010 by Humany

fooziex

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fooziex

New User

Rep: 0

Registered: Aug 2010

From United States

Posted November 16, 2010

10

While I've set up RoA 1 to use Soundblaster and General MIDI, RoA 2 has what looks like support for Gravis Ultrasound cards. DOSBox emulates Ultrasound cards, and I've used GUS emulation on other DOSBox games (with the same executable / configuration). However, I've not been able to get RoA 2 to use Ultrasound for either MIDI music or digital audio. There are some strange quirks in the Ultrasound sound setup for RoA 2 (no options as far as port, DMA, IRQ; listed as Gravis Ultrasound on the music section and Forte Ultrasound on the digital section), but it seems like I should be able to get it working. Anyone got it working, or have any tips?