Games running too fast in DOSbox?

Zombiemambo

There are a few old DOS games that run a lot faster than they should, usually to where they are unplayable. I believe there's a way to slow it down, but I don't know how. Any help is appreciated.

Spoit

It was ctrl + one of the F keys, I want to say F7 or F11, but I don't remember

Zombiemambo

Cool, thanks

Zxerol

CTRL+F11 decreases the amount of emulated CPU cycles, CTRL+F12 increases it. CTRL+F8 increases frameskip and CTRL+F7 decreases it. These keys are global and works when the DOSbox session is active, in-game or not. The frameskip and emulated CPU cycles are displayed on the title bar of DOSBox when it's a window.

I found that if you have DOSBox set to use max CPU cycles in the config file (which I believe is now the default), decreasing emulated cycles on a burly computer really doesn't do much. So, to run super old games that are sensitive to fast clockspeeds, you should run DOSBox with the normal (or simple) emulation core and don't set cycles to max or auto.

core=normal
cycles=3000

in dosbox.conf, for example. A frontend would definitely help in managing different configs for different games.

Zombiemambo

Thanks!

TVs_Frank

Zxerol wrote: »

A frontend would definitely help in managing different configs for different games.

I really recommend D-Fend Reloaded. It makes setting up games very easy.

Viscountalpha

Now if I could only get zone 66 to run in dosbox Stupid flat protected mode.(which ironically was pretty neat back in the day, now it just sucks)

Also, Sourceforge is like some sort of pillar of the internet now. I've seen such neat stuff come out of that place.

RiemannLives

I was playing Magic Carpet (thank the gawds I kept that CD) last night. It's a protected mode game.

Just set the core to simple and really crank down the % CPU.

Viscountalpha

RiemannLives wrote: »

I was playing Magic Carpet (thank the gawds I kept that CD) last night. It's a protected mode game.

Just set the core to simple and really crank down the % CPU.

Just fyi. I have a feeling i might still have problems, but damn it if I'm not gonna try.

zone66trivia wrote:

Zone 66 was developed on a 386 running at 16MHz. For an action game with full-screen updates, this was a technical achievement. Tran was able to eek more speed out of such a machine because he used a preliminary version of his own 386 protected-mode extender "pmode". Unfortunately, due to the extender being an early version, the game is incompatible with all Pentiums and higher. (Which is probably why it's nearly impossible to take a screenshot of gameplay as well -- that, and the game takes over nearly every interrupt in the system.