Update 12-19-18
Here's some videos about the setup and beginning play. This does work on the latest versions of Virtualbox and React OS.
https://www.virtualbox.org/
https://reactos.org/
Update 3-21-18
Futzing around with ReactOS. Seems pretty stable. Played all the way through the intro and past Lewton and Carlotta's office banter with no crashes. AT FULL SCREEN! Now trying to figure out how to get the sound work consistently. Unfortunately on the rare occasion it does there's what sounds like a reverb on the voices.
I spent some time in the past week loading up Windows 10 and trying out Discworld Noir. It was pretty frustrating at first because my test machine for some reason doesn't like DWN. I did everything. Even went into the registry to reroute all the paths and rename the file on the C drive. Let me tell you what, Windows 10 is not easy to learn for people who have been using Windows for about 15 years. (Any particular reason why Accessories needed to be renamed and moved to the bottom of the Start menu?) The test machine was a failure.
During the weekend I loaded Windows 10 on my main machine and Discworld Noir worked about as well as you'd expect. On a new game you have to play in windowed mode until you have control of Lewton then you can go back to full screen. An interesting tidbit for loading saved games I learned is that when you are on the title screen you can press F1 to bring up the menu and load a game that way. No crashing at full screen.
I did do some checking into the Debug Mode I heard about and couldn't find any results other than a forum of people more devoted to this game than I. No specifics on how to enable Debug Mode. I'll be honest, while I do like the game, the only real reason I continue to do such research on it is because it is the number one draw to this blog. Far surpassing sprites, foxgirls, magical frauleins, and bipolar vampire chicks.
Update 10.5.14
Ran a couple of tests on a tech preview of Windows Ten. Don't bother trying to install Discworld Noir. It is now too unstable to play for long. The only way I could get it to go is by clicking the "tin3_dxd.exe" file on the CD. Then it would crash randomly. The Playstation version does seem to work fairly decently. Just have to figure out how to properly configure the plugins.
I have no plans to mess with it beyond that. Maybe after the retail version of Windows 10 goes on sale I'll try to see if I can get Discworld Noir to work through a virtual machine.
Update 8.10-21-13.
Turns out I have been over thinking it the whole time. (Never thought I'd see the words "I" and "over thinking" in the same sentence.) All you have to do is install it normally. Here is the catch: each and every time time you want to play it you have to click on "New Game." On top of that you need to hit Alt and Enter to put it Windowed Mode. Then hit Esc until you have control of Lewton. Now you can go back to full screen and press F1 to load a game. So far I have had only one crash to desktop, but that was totally my fault. I was trying to look up the Registry values in my Windows 8.1 test machine and compare them to the ones on my Win 7 machine.
You see I have been having an issue now for years trying to get Discworld Noir to run on my particular Win 7 rig. Turns out I needed to fix the entries in the Registry. Since I run 64 bit the keys are in a different place.
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Perfect Entertainment\Discworld Noir
After adjusting the "Paths" the game played fine, almost. Had to do the same process as detail above. (Note "Wow6432Node" Also note that this may (will) not represent your setup. I got involved in trying out the L-Space fix. On top of that I used ISOs I downloaded instead of the original disks I used on the 8.1 machine. I don't have the foggiest idea why it is this way in Win 7. I always test the 64 bit version of Win 8 and never had a problem with the game in that sense.)
On another note: I kinda sorta suggest getting the Discworld Noir no CD patch. I scanned it as it was downloading, I scanned it after downloading, I scanned it after unzipping, I scanned it after patching tin3_dxd.exe. So far nothing bad has happened. Makes the game much less of a hassle to play and I swear makes it a little more stable.
UPDATE! UPDATE! UPDATE! 6-23-2013!
Now back to your regularly scheduled and very wrong blog post.
What in the world ever made me think that I could play this game on Windows 7 and Windows 8? Well, the fact that I am playing it on Win 7. Now I'm not talking about the PlayStation version. That works on Win 7 and 8. Surprising since the emulator I use is about seven years old. However, while the PSX version is a more polished game, the PC version is more fun and easier to play. It was designed for a mouse not a controller.
Here's some videos about the setup and beginning play. This does work on the latest versions of Virtualbox and React OS.
https://www.virtualbox.org/
https://reactos.org/
Update 3-21-18
Futzing around with ReactOS. Seems pretty stable. Played all the way through the intro and past Lewton and Carlotta's office banter with no crashes. AT FULL SCREEN! Now trying to figure out how to get the sound work consistently. Unfortunately on the rare occasion it does there's what sounds like a reverb on the voices.
Update 1-18-15
I spent some time in the past week loading up Windows 10 and trying out Discworld Noir. It was pretty frustrating at first because my test machine for some reason doesn't like DWN. I did everything. Even went into the registry to reroute all the paths and rename the file on the C drive. Let me tell you what, Windows 10 is not easy to learn for people who have been using Windows for about 15 years. (Any particular reason why Accessories needed to be renamed and moved to the bottom of the Start menu?) The test machine was a failure.
During the weekend I loaded Windows 10 on my main machine and Discworld Noir worked about as well as you'd expect. On a new game you have to play in windowed mode until you have control of Lewton then you can go back to full screen. An interesting tidbit for loading saved games I learned is that when you are on the title screen you can press F1 to bring up the menu and load a game that way. No crashing at full screen.
I did do some checking into the Debug Mode I heard about and couldn't find any results other than a forum of people more devoted to this game than I. No specifics on how to enable Debug Mode. I'll be honest, while I do like the game, the only real reason I continue to do such research on it is because it is the number one draw to this blog. Far surpassing sprites, foxgirls, magical frauleins, and bipolar vampire chicks.
Update 10.5.14
Ran a couple of tests on a tech preview of Windows Ten. Don't bother trying to install Discworld Noir. It is now too unstable to play for long. The only way I could get it to go is by clicking the "tin3_dxd.exe" file on the CD. Then it would crash randomly. The Playstation version does seem to work fairly decently. Just have to figure out how to properly configure the plugins.
I have no plans to mess with it beyond that. Maybe after the retail version of Windows 10 goes on sale I'll try to see if I can get Discworld Noir to work through a virtual machine.
Update 8.10-21-13.
Turns out I have been over thinking it the whole time. (Never thought I'd see the words "I" and "over thinking" in the same sentence.) All you have to do is install it normally. Here is the catch: each and every time time you want to play it you have to click on "New Game." On top of that you need to hit Alt and Enter to put it Windowed Mode. Then hit Esc until you have control of Lewton. Now you can go back to full screen and press F1 to load a game. So far I have had only one crash to desktop, but that was totally my fault. I was trying to look up the Registry values in my Windows 8.1 test machine and compare them to the ones on my Win 7 machine.
You see I have been having an issue now for years trying to get Discworld Noir to run on my particular Win 7 rig. Turns out I needed to fix the entries in the Registry. Since I run 64 bit the keys are in a different place.
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Perfect Entertainment\Discworld Noir
After adjusting the "Paths" the game played fine, almost. Had to do the same process as detail above. (Note "Wow6432Node" Also note that this may (will) not represent your setup. I got involved in trying out the L-Space fix. On top of that I used ISOs I downloaded instead of the original disks I used on the 8.1 machine. I don't have the foggiest idea why it is this way in Win 7. I always test the 64 bit version of Win 8 and never had a problem with the game in that sense.)
On another note: I kinda sorta suggest getting the Discworld Noir no CD patch. I scanned it as it was downloading, I scanned it after downloading, I scanned it after unzipping, I scanned it after patching tin3_dxd.exe. So far nothing bad has happened. Makes the game much less of a hassle to play and I swear makes it a little more stable.
UPDATE! UPDATE! UPDATE! 6-23-2013!
NEW ROSENKREUZSTILETTE SLIDESHOW IS NOW
UP AND RUNNING!
In other news: Discworld Noir is now up
and running on Windows 8.
Here is what you need:
Windows 98 SE (Boy have those prices gone up.)
direct_x_9c-redist (Optional. I got the
game to work without it.)
(I made sure to save copies if they
should ever disappear off of the live web.)
Step 01: Install VMware Player.
Step 02: Set memory to 64MB and HDD to
5GB. (You can set it higher if you want.)
Step 03: Install Windows 98 SE on the
virtual machine.
Step 04: Place VBE9X and SBPCI on Win
98 Desktop.
Step 05: Right click My Computer,
Properties, Device Manager tab, Display adapters, double-click listed
adapter, click Driver tab, Update Driver, Next, make sure “Search
for a better driver...” is selected, click Next, deselect
“Floppy...” and select “Specify a location,” click Browse,
navigate to VBE9X folder and select “Uni,” click OK, keep clicking Next
until done.
Step 06: Restart. (I forgot how much
Win 98 loves to restart.)
Step 07: Double-click SBPCI and
install.
Step 08: Restart, again.
Step 09: Install Discworld Noir.
Playing Discworld Noir:
When you start a new game you will need
to hit Alt+Enter immediately after clicking on “NEW GAME.” For
some reason during the opening sequences the game will crash to
desktop. The graphics will be screwed up, but this is the only way to
get past the crash zones. Once you see (if you can) Lewton standing
in his office hit Alt+Enter again to go back to full screen.
(Press
the Esc key often to warp past all of this.)
I have not played the whole game so I
have no idea where else the game may crash. So employ RPG Rule #1:
SAVE OFTEN! Then there is a small issue with sound. The voices just
aren't quite right. On my test machine they sound is if they are
talking into a cup. Then with headphones they had a slight electronic
sound to them. Oh well. It now works.
That is until Windows 9.
 |
| Be sure to click for a larger view to a thrill. |
What in the world ever made me think that I could play this game on Windows 7 and Windows 8? Well, the fact that I am playing it on Win 7. Now I'm not talking about the PlayStation version. That works on Win 7 and 8. Surprising since the emulator I use is about seven years old. However, while the PSX version is a more polished game, the PC version is more fun and easier to play. It was designed for a mouse not a controller.
The PC version of Discworld Noir
presents a very unique challenge to play on modern systems. Hell, it
was a chore to get it to run on Windows 98. Most of the conversation
I found tended to center around running it natively or in DOSBox.
That talk was several years old and didn't discuss newer operating
systems.
So now I come in. I'm having a fun time
playing this game on Win 7 I want to tell the whole world about it.
Now comes a challenge. You see I don't have your standard setup that
most people have. Most just buy their systems off the shelf. The most common version of Win 7 is Home 64 bit.
The most common version of Windows 8 is Windows 8 64 bit. I wanted to
give a clear concise set of instructions that anybody can follow to
play Discworld Noir on their machine.
After about a day or so I gave up. I
did get the game to play, but it ran like crap. I tried many
different setups but each one failed in some way. I'm not going to
bore you and describe each one, I'm going to to skip ahead to the
ones that actually had some success. On Windows 7 using Virtual Box
with Windows 98 installed. On Windows 8 using VMWare and Windows 98.
In both instances I had to use an independent set of video drivers that really do not work all that well. The sound would be
static-y or the video would be choppy. (By the way: VMWare doesn't have audio drivers for Win 98.)
I was disappointed.
Okay, now how am I playing Discworld
Noir on Win 7? You see, Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 does work on Win 7
Pro and Ultimate. It has the drivers you need to run Windows 98.
What is the point in writing about a
failure? Well, I'm hoping that some day someone a whole lot smarter
than me may see this and go “Oh hell, all he needed to do was this.”
Then comment in on how to fix things.
There are some bonuses to having done
this project. I had to work with Windows 8 quite a bit. While it
didn't win me over, I found it to be not as bad as I thought. There's
this myth running around that Win 8 is just Win 7 with a Start
Screen. No. No. I could not get Microsoft Virtual PC, WindowsVirtual PC, or Virtual Box to work on it. (Update: VB does work now on Win 8.) I found that the Start Screen to be really
nothing more than the Start Menu with the functionality of the
desktop.
I got introduced to a nifty little
program called MagicISO. At first it's not obvious how to use it, but
I was able to figure it out after awhile. The free version is fine
for about 99% of everything you need to do. I had to use ISOs because
Win 98 doesn't recognize thumbdrives and I have never been able to
get shared folders to work.
The most important thing I did: After
all these years I finally went out and bought a real copy of
Discworld Noir.
5 comments:
Well that gives me a challenge. I was about to install my old copy to play it again. Looks like I might be having some interesting times
The more the merrier I say. Someone is bound to figure it out. I'll admit this has become an occasional obsession of mine. This past weekend I gave it another try.
For this article one thing I didn't try was just installing the game. So this time I gave that a try. It constantly crashed and usually during FMVs or other cut scenes. Hitting Alt+Enter puts it in a windowed mode and it will play but with superiorly crappy graphics.
Next I tried DOS Box. It wouldn't do anything. DOS Box said the game needed a Win 32 environment or words to that effect. (I don't have my test system set up right now. So I can't get the exact wording.) I found a site that has all kinds of DOS emulators on it and will give them a try at some point.
Zopar's Domain
I know I am working too hard on this. The PlayStation (PS1, PS One, PSX) version will work. (Okay, mostly sure it will work.) But hey, the PC version is much more fun.
By the way: Those DOS emulators don't work. I tried them all. Snuff said.
Hey there,
For future posterity: there's a registry field you can edit to enable debug mode which dramatically improves stability at the cost of certain characters shouting !!NULL STRING!! during conversations.
Hope this helps any future Discworld Noir would-be players.
I have a folder in my Carbonite Folder named "Discworld Noir" where I have been storing everything up to now.
I do have it in the back of my mind to someday completely rewrite this article to make it somewhat coherent.
By the way: For about a year now this particular post has been outpolling the magical frauleins and the bipolar vampire chick. What is it about Discworld Noir that continues to capture people's imaginations? I'm beginning to think that when talking about games of the 90s it should be mentioned in the same sentence as Chrono Trigger, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, and Final Fantasy 7.
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