20 replies to this topic

[Bad-Wolf]

EDIT NOTE: I tried to use indentation for organization of what are typed commands and what are instructions but the forum killed them so * means it is a command. Of course the * should never be typed as part of the command.

I got XCOM 3 fully functional, sound, music, and videos without any problems or choppy video. These instructions will tell you how to get the game functioning in XP using DOSBox and Daemon tools. The only things that are not in the instructions yet are how to become completely independent from daemon tools but I will append this later after I am finished with my disgusting chemistry exam later tonight ;p I wrote this verbatim because it will work for ANY XP machine that is able to run the two below mentioned applications.

Specs:
DOSBox .72
Daemon tools 4.10

Verbatim
Instructions:
-Mount the iso for apacolypse into Daemon tools, note which virtual drive letter it was assigned
(If you have the original CD and are unsure of how to get an iso from it for daemon tools to mount, google it, there are many free programs out there that will do this for you. Running the CD virtually through daemon tools is much quicker than running the game from the actual CD, and saves the hassle of keeping up with your CD. If you are new to Daemon tools you may find that you like it so much you will start converting lots of old cds (most are fairly small) into ISO format and just keeping the images on your hardrive to be mounted into daemon tools.)
-Run Dosbox
-Mount the virtual drive into DOSbox(where h is a virtual daemon tools cdrom drive, yours could be different so use yours of course):
* mount h h:\ -t cdrom
-Mount the directory where you wish to install the game
* mount c c:\<whatever directory you want here> -freesize 512
(the freesize will tell the dos shell that you have 512Mb on this drive, it does not matter how much you really have as you need at least 200MB for the complete install)
-type in (again h is an example virtual cdrom drive letter)
* h:\
* install
-it may take awhile for for the game to test your cdrom drive, just wait it out this is to be expected due to our weird setup, don't worry
-ignore any problems that the game will tell you about your computer specifications such as errors with your cdrom drive
-When selecting which directory you are going to install it to remember that you mounted to your C drive under the directory you wish to install it. This means that all you should put is something like C:\XCOMA (where XCOMA is the subdirectory of whichever directory you mounted)
for example if we mounted c earlier as c:\oldgames then installing the game to C:\XCOMA will in reality install the game into C:\oldgames\XCOMA
-you may leave DOSBox running

-Now to get the movies and sound functioning properly in Windows open the directory where you installed the game. Run setup. We are running setup through windows rather than dosbox because dosbox has none issues with many users when running Apocalypse's setup.
Choose these options for sound:
Soundblaster 16/AWE32
Set Port:220
Set IRQ:7
Set DMA: 5
(The readme for dosbox says 1 for DMA but I have found this to be the incorrect setting for Apocalypse through trial and error)
DO NOT CLICK TEST
click ok
SAVE AND EXIT

-Now that the sound is setup properly we will setup the videos
Go to your physical cd or virtual cd rom drive and explore.
Copy the SMK folder to the directory where you installed Apocalypse.

-Now that we have our ducks in a row, How do we play the game?
To run the game open DOSBox and input the following, if you still have DOS box running skip to the last line:
* mount c c:\<directory where XCOMAPOC.EXE resides
where h is the drive of your virtual Apocalypse cd
* mount h h:\ -t cdrom
* c:
* xcomapoc

Cheers, poor yourself a cold one!

Note, the above can easily be automated by writing your own batch file or editing DOSBoxes cfg file. Also, you may want to adjust other DOSBox settings when running the game but I refer you to the aforementioned statement. If anyone knows how to become completely independent from daemon tools feel free to add it below mine or I will fix something up later tonight.
I will probably throw together something that will let you one click install (with your choses int he install like directories of course) and then something that you can one click start eventually.

P.S. If you want me to repost this as a thread of its own just say so and I will that way I can have OP and make changes more noticable when I automate getting Apocalypse to run for XP. , I am currently playing TFTD and won't be playing Apocalypse for some time but I will get a good installer program setup for the community ASAP. It was a hassle getting all the settings correct but it is no biggy to automate it once you know what actually needs to be set etc. Input welcome as well.

Edited by Bad-Wolf, 26 February 2008 - 02:43 PM.

[s87source]

EDIT NOTE: I tried to use indentation for organization of what are typed commands and what are instructions but the forum killed them so * means it is a command. Of course the * should never be typed as part of the command.

I got XCOM 3 fully functional, sound, music, and videos without any problems or choppy video. These instructions will tell you how to get the game functioning in XP using DOSBox and Daemon tools. The only things that are not in the instructions yet are how to become completely independent from daemon tools but I will append this later after I am finished with my disgusting chemistry exam later tonight ;p I wrote this verbatim because it will work for ANY XP machine that is able to run the two below mentioned applications.

Specs:
DOSBox .72
Daemon tools 4.10

Verbatim
Instructions:
-Mount the iso for apacolypse into Daemon tools, note which virtual drive letter it was assigned
(If you have the original CD and are unsure of how to get an iso from it for daemon tools to mount, google it, there are many free programs out there that will do this for you. Running the CD virtually through daemon tools is much quicker than running the game from the actual CD, and saves the hassle of keeping up with your CD. If you are new to Daemon tools you may find that you like it so much you will start converting lots of old cds (most are fairly small) into ISO format and just keeping the images on your hardrive to be mounted into daemon tools.)
-Run Dosbox
-Mount the virtual drive into DOSbox(where h is a virtual daemon tools cdrom drive, yours could be different so use yours of course):
* mount h h:\ -t cdrom
-Mount the directory where you wish to install the game
* mount c c:\<whatever directory you want here> -freesize 512
(the freesize will tell the dos shell that you have 512Mb on this drive, it does not matter how much you really have as you need at least 200MB for the complete install)
-type in (again h is an example virtual cdrom drive letter)
* h:\
* install
-it may take awhile for for the game to test your cdrom drive, just wait it out this is to be expected due to our weird setup, don't worry
-ignore any problems that the game will tell you about your computer specifications such as errors with your cdrom drive
-When selecting which directory you are going to install it to remember that you mounted to your C drive under the directory you wish to install it. This means that all you should put is something like C:\XCOMA (where XCOMA is the subdirectory of whichever directory you mounted)
for example if we mounted c earlier as c:\oldgames then installing the game to C:\XCOMA will in reality install the game into C:\oldgames\XCOMA
-you may leave DOSBox running

-Now to get the movies and sound functioning properly in Windows open the directory where you installed the game. Run setup. We are running setup through windows rather than dosbox because dosbox has none issues with many users when running Apocalypse's setup.
Choose these options for sound:
Soundblaster 16/AWE32
Set Port:220
Set IRQ:7
Set DMA: 5
(The readme for dosbox says 1 for DMA but I have found this to be the incorrect setting for Apocalypse through trial and error)
DO NOT CLICK TEST
click ok
SAVE AND EXIT

-Now that the sound is setup properly we will setup the videos
Go to your physical cd or virtual cd rom drive and explore.
Copy the SMK folder to the directory where you installed Apocalypse.

-Now that we have our ducks in a row, How do we play the game?
To run the game open DOSBox and input the following, if you still have DOS box running skip to the last line:
* mount c c:\<directory where XCOMAPOC.EXE resides
where h is the drive of your virtual Apocalypse cd
* mount h h:\ -t cdrom
* c:
* xcomapoc

Cheers, poor yourself a cold one!

Note, the above can easily be automated by writing your own batch file or editing DOSBoxes cfg file. Also, you may want to adjust other DOSBox settings when running the game but I refer you to the aforementioned statement. If anyone knows how to become completely independent from daemon tools feel free to add it below mine or I will fix something up later tonight.
I will probably throw together something that will let you one click install (with your choses int he install like directories of course) and then something that you can one click start eventually.

P.S. If you want me to repost this as a thread of its own just say so and I will that way I can have OP and make changes more noticable when I automate getting Apocalypse to run for XP. , I am currently playing TFTD and won't be playing Apocalypse for some time but I will get a good installer program setup for the community ASAP. It was a hassle getting all the settings correct but it is no biggy to automate it once you know what actually needs to be set etc. Input welcome as well.

Hey, I'm still having trouble using your guide. I already have the game mounted through daemon tools. But the whol dosbox has me confused. It's my first time using dosbox and it's been ages since I've even touched any dos commands at all.

I have it set to drive E but do I use the name it says in my computer wich is (XCOM APOC E:) or what daemon tools says wich is Device 0: [E:] C\Documents and settings\Asheed MaPants\Desktop\X-Com Apocalypse Collectors Edition .rar\X-Com Collectors Edition CD2 by Zahadom.ccd) ?

[Bad-Wolf]

Please kill the quote as it is HUGE. As the guide says you use whatever device drive letter daemon tools is using. In your case replace h with e and follow everything verbatim. The long directory you posted is most likely the place where daemon tools actually stores the data that it is virtually represented as a physical cdrom drive.

Edited by Bad-Wolf, 27 February 2008 - 02:46 PM.

[mazice]

Hi!,
I followed exactly step by step and got my apoc working; but...
it shows the video intro, and when it launches the game, it suddenly stops; and returns to dosbox prompt.

I think it stops when it tries to launch ufo2p

I have wXP SP2 on my sytem, and an ISO image of an original copy of the game;
have any clues?

Thanks!

Update 1: Also tried IMGMOUNT with same result
Update 2: Tried to change compatibility properties of every .exe involved in the game, unsuccessfully
Update 3: Solved!
Extra actions done beside this tutorial:
++Download x3cdfix from xcom3 download sections;
++Applied it in the xcom3 directory;
++Instead of runing xcomapoc.exe in DosBox, run xcom3.bat;
++Enjoy!

P.S: DAEMON TOOLS STILLS BEING NEEDED WITH THE IMAGE MOUNTED IN THE N DRIVE!
NOTE: MUSIC WILL BE VERY SCRATCHY (anyway you can turn it to minimal level), but sound its OK

Update 4: Anyway, in this way, touching any button in the Options menu will stuck DosBOX , so, I'm back at start :/
Update 5: Setting Sound options to NO SOUND makes game work. But playing without sounds its a crap , any ideas about this?
Update 6: Its that x3cdfix that makes the game crash (exactly, the xcom3_cd.com file its bad). Gona have to find another way to crack the CD check (As said, mounting an image doesn't work)
Update 7: Finally! I found what is F****d in this game. It's the 1.0 DOS version TACP.EXE and UFO2P.exe who just DISLIKE windows xp. Try to find these files from a collector's edition version and replace them.

In my case this its a crap, because I have found 1.0 DOS in spanish (my language), but C.Edition's version en english But wth... it all works! Just by running it with dosbox. No extra steps.

Update 8: Well, something strange happened now. I found a way to run this 1.0 spanish version. I just followed this tutorial as it says, but mounted an image of a collector's edition; BUT in a CCD format. ISO format apparently doesn't work very well with DOSBox, and the game doesn't really checked it as a real cdrom unit.

++Note: If the sound/music its a little cutted when they both play or when game makes heavy movements, try editing the .conf file of DOSBox in sound section. I setted blocksize to 512 (higher than 2000 makes a bad lag in game) and prebuffer to 90 (less than 60 makes sound to fail, but higher than 90 makes lag too). I also set memsize to 128.

FINAL Summary, steps done, and final info:
+Not a single crack works. I tried them all and no one did their correct function or made the game's sound to fail.
+I didn't install the game. I just copied the XCOM3 folder of the CD, the SSETUP, BG2.RAW, MUSIC and SMK folder.
+I checked that maps 59 and 60 exists, and created the xcom3.cfg file, editing the first line like: " N:\". Please note the space at the first character of the line, and without the " ".
+Installed DOSBox and DAEMON Tools.
+In DOSBox conf, i modified what i said in the last note, and set "core" line to "auto".
+Mounted an IMAGE IN .CCD FORMAT OF THE GAME IN MY VIRTUAL DRIVE LETTER N:\. This images consists of 3 files: a .ccd file of ~1kb, a .img file of ~590mb (or less if its ripped) and a .sub image of ~24mb.
+Finally, in DOSBox conf once again, i wrote at end this:
mount d D:\games\xcom3 -freesize 512
mount n M:\ -t cdrom
d:
xcomapoc
The -freesize 512 of the first line its just for prevention of memory lacks and save games.
And it fully works. I'm playing an spanish version. With spanish voices!, at least at intro, it rocks haha.
One last thing, to set the sound setup, you must enter the ssetup.exe with DOSBox. I use:
Soundblaster 16, port 220, irq 7, dma 5. Both music and sound works.

I sincerely thinks that i won't read this forums too much again, that if I don't have some kind of amnesia and need to install this game again, so if you need to contact me, just email or PM me.

Cheers! I'm out to blast some aliens!
I hope my experience helps some one.

PS: I would really pay millions for this game, but its virtually impossible to get it in south america ><!

Edited by mazice, 28 February 2008 - 11:40 PM.

[Kharim]

you are my god! after about 6 hours of trying various methods to run this game on XP,I tried your "how to..." and it works! many,many,many thanks!!!

[The_Reckoning]

I've registered here just to thank you. Awesome help, cheers!

[Unknown Incindence Officer]

people you have missed quite an important peice of information, is this 'guide' for the CE of DOS version of x-com? i have tried this so called fix whereby you install VDM Sound, some mouse emultaion thing and something else in a zip folder. it worked ok for about 10 mins, then it froze. the sound was constantly choppy too which was annoying. but it worked albeit slowly, until it came to a halt during the battlescape. does this method for fixing x-com give better results?

[Xelnaga]

I will thank you for the instructions.
Finlally i can play xcom apoc with mine original version (in italian ROFL )
Many many thanks
bye!

[Caley]

"I wrote this verbatim because it will work for ANY XP machine that is able to run the two below mentioned applications."

Apparently not. It still does goes blank at the intro (SMKP) and then drops to prompt at UFO2P.

Not with the Collectors Edition anyway. I had to download some rip.

Edited by Caley, 06 January 2009 - 02:12 AM.

[Aiki-Knight]

YES! After a year of no XCOM 3, I've got it running on my XP machine! Rejoice! Let the smashing of evil resume!

Ah, yes - commando time.

AK.

[Trepach]

With your permittion, I've red many forums and tries and finally I got to the common conclution - the Bad-Wolf's instructions are right, but he misses something. So
1) Install the game, better mounted with Daemon Tools.
2) Setup the game sound to the settings listed above.
3) From the main directory of the disk copy the "MUSIC" file to the main dir of the game.
4) From the subfolder "XCOM3" copy folders "MAPS" and "SMK" and paste them in the main dir of the game. Copying the "MUSIC" file gets rid of the choppy sound. The "MAPS" folder contains the last two maps, these of the alien dimention.
5) Copying the "MUSIC" file busted the sound setting so set it up AGAIN!
6) Every time you want to play, you need to mount the disk with Daemon Tools BEFORE you start the DosBox.
7) Enjoy! I hope I helped

Edited by Trepach, 14 June 2009 - 02:49 PM.

[Alertminotar]

Thanks! After a lot of trying this finally worked.

Just have one question, is there a way to play the game Full Screen? Cause on the DOSBox it plays on a square 30% the size of the screen...

Thanks!

[Branes]

HI alt-enter to get to full screen.

[firebomber]

Hi there,

I am using daemon tool lite 4.12.3 with dosbox 0.73

i did everything written on this thread, managed to install the game/ configure sound with sound runs properly/ copied "SMK" folders and "MUSIC" File...

mount the iso disc into daemon before running...

But unfortunately, the game still wont run...it prompt some error for SMKP.exe (as attached) ?? Really dont have a clue...

Attached Files

•  error.bmp   829.47K   139 downloads

[Tkwiget]

I can't even find step by step instructions that tells me how to mount the iso. So I can't really say that these instructions of his work.

Could someone explain to me how to even mount the iso? Cause I've searched the internet and there's to much confusing crap out there. Lots of search results.. very little actual information that helps me.

EDIT: Ok, so I some how got the thing to work..

New question: how do I get it to be full screen?

Edited by Tkwiget, 12 October 2009 - 09:57 PM.

[j'ordos]

Hit alt+enter to go fullscreen, or find the Fullscreen=False line in Dosbox.conf and change it into fullscreen=true

[Neo Enigma]

I've followed your steps, however my Xp won't run the setup once I've installed the game. I've also tried to do so in DosBox with the same conclusion. Any ideas?

[Mustang]

This worked perfectly, thank you very much for posting

[inbredhill]

For windows:
Z:>imgmount d "C:\imagename.iso" -t iso

For Linux:
Z:>imgmount d ~/imagename.iso -t iso

And if you add that to the autoexec section at the bottom of the dosbox.conf file you won't have to type it again.

In linux it is located at /home/(your username)/.dosbox/dosbox.conf


I have gotten all 3 xcom games to work in linux using dosbox. And it runs better in linux for some reason.

[Istrebitel]

I must say the help is VERY MUCH appreciated but i think some formatting could help
Since right now its kinda hard to read... Still thank you very much.

I must add:

1. If setup wont run for you in windows, run it in dosbox. If it wont run for you in dosbox, retry until it does. Up cycle count or something. I did try numerous times and finally got it through. You can also probably setup the game right after installation of it, at least for me it offered such option (But i declined since i was following OP post).

2. It seems that you MUST have the CD letters be the same on install and on play. I installed manually like OP suggested by launching dosbox, but i am playing the game using a D-Fend frontend. And i added CDROM in D-Fend on a different letter. And it crashed after intro movie on me when entering menu ("typical windows problem" as it is said in the faq topic). So, make sure your Cd rom letter is consistent between installation and play

3. Dosbox 0.74 is out. D-Fend reloaded is also out which has DosBox 0.74 bundled. That would be the best choice since its a very nice frontend which is very easy to use and it prevents you from doing console work yourself (most people like GUI's over consoles)