ScummVM, Linux & Mac

[LucasFan]

Ok, just a few questions, people ask us all the day:Ã, 

1. Will there be a chance that AGS-games can be played with ScummVM one day? Or at least a way that certain AGS-games can be used by ScummVM?
2. Will there be Linux-port that supports plugins?
3. Is it possible to make a Mac-port?

[Rui 'Trovatore' Pires]

1. Will there be a chance that AGS-games can be played with ScummVM one day? Or at least a way that certain AGS-games can be used by ScummVM?

I'm not really qualified, but isn't that up to the makers of ScummVM? And I read something in their website, about how they didn't plan to add any more non-LEC games to their repertoire, something about having to check a whole new system of code, or something...

[LucasFan]

I'm not really qualified, but isn't that up to the makers of ScummVM?

That's true, but they blame AGS for this. So it's some kind of Ping Pong.Ã, 

[SSH]

They say its becuase AGS is closed-source... Yeah, like SCUMM was open-source was it?

[Gilbert]

1. I see no point to (apart from the possible open source multi-platform part of course). AGS is still actively in development, and is very different from some of the more restrictive old commercial engines, I'm not sure but I think the main point of ScummVM is to bring back old games so they can be played with modern computers.
2. I think the Linux port was ready for plugins already, don't know whether the distributed one can use plugins or not though. The problem is that if you use plugins for the Linux port, you need to have these plugins to have a linux compiled version, which is not the case now. I'll say scrape plugins completely if you really want your game to be compatible and run on different platforms, most of the time you don't really need them, and I'm serious.
3. This had been discussed for many times already, do a forum search. For example you get this.





SSH: Scumm was not open sourced but I think ScummVM is.

[Ieremiou]

I like SCUMMVM but I like DOSBox better since it can emulate more than SCUMM and if you really wanted to you could possibly get DOS versions of AGS games to run in DOSBox but I have not confirmed if this works or not. Personally why make a DOS version? It is pretty much wiped out.

Use DOSBox, overall its better than SCUMMVM but only because it doesn't hinder itself to emulate only a specific area of games.

And I'm refering to the CVS version of DOSBox which I hope will be released soon (I compile it for Win32 users on a weekly basis @ http://mypixels.dk/forums)

Yep did a quick search for an old AGS DOS game version. Here is were i got a couple.
http://home.swipnet.se/~w-29465/asylum/games.html tested Sam Monkey which used the old AGS 2.21 version.

It seems to work. I had to use a copy of CWSDPMI for it to work but it does run in DOSBox. Like the DOS port of ZSNES sorta works in DOSBox but crashes at random moments while using it. *shrugs*

[Gilbert]

Well because old versions of AC/AGS didn't have a window$ engine, so some of the games are stuck forever in their DOS forms.

I'll say as DOSBox is a general emulator and ScummVM is a game resource interpreter, if the game is supported by ScummVM I think it's better to run it via ScummVM.

I agree that DOS is like faded out in most areas, but still there are happy pure DOS users (like me) and DOS affiliates who would like to play a game under DOS whenever possible (like me). Whether a DOS version of a game should be made is up to the creators, it's his personally decision, personally I'll only test my games thoroughly under DOS and make sure they work there, I won't care much how well they'll work under window$. The good thing is, if you can make sure that an AGS game runs perfectly under DOS, it'll probably also run without any glitch with the window$ engine, but not teh other way round.

[Ieremiou]

True, I wasn't saying anything bad about DOS. I love DOS I wish it was still supported. Alas, it is not really. And I suppose in some ways ScummVM "might" be better but I've found that like for instance there is a bug somewhere in SCUMMVM that the inventory arrows don't show in Simon the Sorcerer 1 Dos Version. But they do work in DOSBox for instance. Just differences that I can point out.

In fact right now. Out of boredom, I dug up a DOS MOD player called CUBIC and playing some of my old MOD formats through it. It's quite nice . I just find that ScummVM is OK. I just think DOSBox has already surpassed it.

And now with Frontends like D-Fend it is very simple to get a DOS game running through DOSBox if it DOSBox can run it.

[Hollister Man]

I been playing Ultima 8 (gasp, an RPG) in DOSBox for several days now.  It works pretty good, but its a little jumpy (I've seen it is a symptom of the original game, not db)  Never tried an AGS game though.  My next candidate is Lord of the Rings Vol II from InterPlay

[Pet Terry]

[offtopic]
I've bunch of old Sierra games and most of the VGA-games doesn't work because of memory problems... so I thought DOSBox will solve my problems. I downloaded it, and installed. I ran the program and DOS window popped up. I thought "DOS eh? Well, I can handle it, I know the commands." and what happened? I couldn't run any games because I couldn't mound (or whatever the command was called) any of my drives, AND I couldn't type "\" at all. Now how cool is that? It seems that I'll never be able to play those games again... :
[/offtopic]

[scotch]

if you get a frontend for it, like D-Fend (link on dosbox download page), you won't have to type anything, makes things much easier.

I haven't had any luck running ags does games in Dosbox though, if anyone has could they explain how?
I may finally get to play Novo Mestro

[strazer]

I haven't had any luck running ags does games in Dosbox though, if anyone has could they explain how?

Have you tried
http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/kbview.php?id=22
and
http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/kbview.php?id=39
?

Get the required ACWIN.EXE here:

ags_215_sr3.zip
ags_221.zip
ags_231.zip