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General Information ******************* comp.sys.amiga.games FAQ $VER: csag_faq 2.11 (26.2.97) New this version ================ * New cheats site. Introduction ============ If you're new to this group, READ THIS. All of it. Please. This FAQ provides the answers to the most Frequently Asked Questions on this newsgroup; readers new to this group should read it before posting. It is posted on or about the 25th of each month to comp.sys.amiga.games, comp.answers and news.answers. New users of Usenet news should be sure to read all of the articles in news.announce.newusers to familiarise themselves with the general etiquette of communicating on the net. How to get this FAQ =================== Listed below are possible methods of obtaining the latest version of this FAQ. Unless noted it comes in an archive containing AmigaGuide, ANSI text, and postscript formats. FTP --- Usenet FAQ Archive: ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet/comp.sys.amiga.games/games_FAQ Text only. MSOR FTP server: ftp://msor.ex.ac.uk/pub/amiga/games_faq.lha Aminet: ftp://ftp.doc.ic.ac.uk/pub/aminet/docs/help/csag.faq.lha Games Domain: ftp://wcl-l.bham.ac.uk/pub/djh/faqs/C.S.Amiga.Games.lha WWW --- These are HTML versions of the FAQ MSOR WWW server: http://msor.ex.ac.uk/Staff/ken/faq_toc.html Games Domain: http://www.gamesdomain.co.uk/ E-mail ------ Usenet FAQ Archive Mail mail-server@rtfm.mit.edu with the line send usenet/news.answers/amiga/games-faq in the body. Aminet Mail Server Mail ftpmail@doc.ic.ac.uk or ftpmail@ftp.luth.se with SEND pub/aminet/docs/help/csag.faq.lha in the body. Me :-) Mail ken@msor.ex.ac.uk with Games FAQ in the subject line. This is not a 'bot answering so you could also say hi! Correspondence ============== Corrections, suggestions, comments and cash bribes :-) are welcome, please send them to Ken Powell at ken@msor.ex.ac.uk. Copyright ========= This document copyright (C) 1995-1997 by Ken Powell. It may be placed on Aminet (including Aminet CD) and Fred Fish (any format he wants). Mail me for permission to use in any other material. Some terms used in this document are trademarks and registered trademarks of their owners, these are not necessarily indicated in the text but are acknowledged. Credits ======= Thanks to Christina Schulman (schulman+@pitt.edu) for letting me use her comp.sys.mac.games FAQ as the basis for this FAQ. Nick Ridley (nick@mentaur.demon.co.uk) for the CivAGA patches. Suggestions and additions to this FAQ have been contributed by: * ML Hewitt (u3f88@cc.keele.ac.uk) * Rowan Crawford (dljar1@giaeb.cc.monash.edu.au) * Mikali (u9162828@uow.edu.au) * Geoffrey Newman (grn@alcove.apana.org.au) * Nicholas Fisher (kau10@central.sussex.ac.uk) * Elliott Mitchell (ehem@cyro.cryogenic.com) * Bill Bennett (bill.bennett@zoology.oxford.ac.uk) * dEN (ma3dhcy@midge.bath.ac.uk) * Nigel Hughes (ngh94@aber.ac.uk) * Jan Ellgring (mozart@orgasmatron.ppp.lrz-muenchen.de) * Peter Olafson (Peteroo@aol.com) * Jason Murray (59507594@minyos.its.rmit.edu.au) * Alex Amsel (alex@teeth.demon.co.uk) * David Kinder (kinder@teaching.physics.ox.ac.uk) * Markus Castren (slice@xgw.fi) * Mark Knibbs and Paul Doherty (h0142kdd@rz.hu-berlin.de) * Nicholas Stallard (Snowy@studbox.uni-stuttgart.de) Thanks! A Word About Flaming ==================== Every now and then some moron posts something along the lines of "Amiga games suck!!!!! Get a real machine!!!!!" And immediately 30 or 40 people take the bait and post long, vitriolic replies and exhort everyone to mail-bomb the perpetrator. Please, please, please don't waste your time and our bandwidth replying to this kind of idiocy. More often than not it was posted as a practical joke from the account of some hapless user who left themselves logged in at a public computer cluster. The owner of the account then logs back in a day or two later to find several megs of hate mail and uuencoded core dumps in their mail spool. If you feel that you absolutely have to share your witty, concise flame on the complete superiority of the Amiga above all other gaming platforms, take it to comp.sys.amiga.advocacy, where it will be appreciated. Sources of games and information ******************************** PD and Shareware ================ There are many Amiga games available to try for free. These games go under many labels including freeware, PD, shareware, giftware,... Most of this software is avaliable on the 'net although some is only avaliable from PD Houses which advertise in various Magazines. Aminet ------ The major site for ftp'ing Amiga software is the Aminet chain. There is the mother site at ftp.wustl.edu and mirror sites around the world. (A mirror site is a site that contains an exact copy of the contents of another site, in the hopes of diverting some traffic away from the more popular site. The mirror sites are usually several hours behind the mother site.) It is usually faster to get files from the nearest mirror. A full list of sites (correct at 28/5/96) is below - mirrors are being added all the time so this is subject to change. Location Name IP Address Path USA (MO) ftp.wustl.edu 128.252.135.4 pub/aminet/ USA (WI) ftp.netnet.net 198.70.64.3 pub/aminet/ USA (AZ) ftp.ninemoons.com 165.247.33.6 pub/aminet Australia ftp.livewire.com.au 203.16.26.3 pub/aminet/ Australia ftp.tas.gov.au 147.109.237.5 pub/aminet/ Italy ftp.unina.it 192.132.34.17 pub/aminet/ Scandinavia ftp.luth.se 130.240.18.2 pub/aminet/ Switzerland ftp.eunet.ch 146.228.10.16 pub/aminet/ Germany kelly.uni-paderborn.de 131.234.128.206 pub/aminet/ Germany ftp.uni-paderborn.de 131.234.2.42 pub/aminet/ Germany ftp.uni-stuttgart.de 129.69.18.15 aminet Germany ftp.uni-erlangen.de 131.188.3.2 pub/aminet/ Germany ftp.cs.tu-berlin.de 130.149.17.7 pub/aminet/ Germany ftp.uni-trier.de 136.199.8.81 pub/aminet/ Germany ftp.tu-chemnitz.de 192.108.33.193 pub/aminet/ Germany ftp.fh-augsburg.de 141.82.16.242 pub/aminet/ Germany ftp.uni-oldenburg.de 134.106.40.9 pub/aminet/ Germany ftp.uni-bremen.de 134.102.228.2 pub/aminet/ Germany ftp.uni-kl.de 131.246.9.95 pub/aminet/ Germany ftp.uni-siegen.de 141.99.128.1 pub/aminet/ Germany ftp.rz.uni-wuerzburg.de 132.187.1.2 pub/aminet/ Austria ftp.giga.or.at 131.130.12.58 pub/aminet/ France ftp.grolier.fr 194.51.174.67 pub/aminet/ France sunsite.cnam.fr 163.173.129.5 pub/aminet/ Portugal ftp.ua.pt 193.136.80.6 pub/aminet/ Denmark sunsite.auc.dk 130.225.51.30 aminet UK sunsite.doc.ic.ac.uk 155.198.1.40 pub/aminet/ UK micros.hensa.ac.uk 148.88.8.84 pub/aminet/ Spain ftp.gui.uva.es 157.88.36.190 pub/aminet/ Ireland atlantis.ucc.ie 143.239.1.200 pub/aminet/ Greece ftp.acropolis.gr 193.92.228.7 pub/aminet Portugal ftp.ua.pt 193.136.80.68 pub/aminet/ Hungary ftp.iit.uni-miskolc.hu 193.6.4.31 pub/aminet/ Czech Rep amiga.chemi.muni.cz 147.251.64.18 pub/aminet/ Poland ftp.man.szczecin.pl 193.59.3.9 pub/aminet/ People with only e-mail access can use ftpmail from ftp.doc.ic.ac.uk and ftp.luth.se. Send e-mail to ftpmail@doc.ic.ac.uk or ftpmail@ftp.luth.se with HELP in the body. Commercial ========== If you want commercial games then several companies will sell them to you cheap. National chains in the UK, including Future Zone and HMV, have special offers on at various times (including new releases). Mail order companies also offer good discounts on new and old games. National firms that may ship orders abroad are: * UK * Premier Mail Order : +44 1268 271172 * Special Reserve : +44 1279 600204 (joining fee) * AUSTRALIA * Sigmacom : (02) 524 9846 * Solutions Rendered : (02) 838 0733 Magazines ========= Various magazines either discuss games or are dedicated to them. This is a list of various magazines worldwide. * UK * Amiga Computing £3.95 (2 disks) * Amiga Format £3.95 (2 disks) * CU Amiga £3.95 (2 disks) * CVG £2.75 (multi-format) * GamesMaster £?.?? (multi-format) Hints ===== Solutions and hints for many popular games are available via anonymous ftp at ftp://risc.ua.edu/pub/games/solutions and ftp.uu.net/pub/games/solutions. There's also a large solution site at ftp://nic.funet.fi/pub/doc/games/solutions, but you will need unzip or gzip to uncompress these files. (Avaliable on Aminet as /util/arc/unzip51x.lha and /util/pack/gzip124x2.lha) Aminet has hints in the /game/hint directory. There is also the Games Domain site which has walkthroughs for several popular games at http://wcl-rs.bham.ac.uk/GamesDomain. Most Amiga Magazines publish walkthru's for new games. A new web site with most known cheats is available over the web - http://www.netrover.com/~timt/amicheats.html. If you can't find an answer there, post your question-chances are somebody on comp.sys.amiga.games has gotten farther than you! If someone posts a question for which you also want the answer, instead of posting "Send me the answer too!" send email to the original poster and ask him or her to relay the answer to you. FAQs ==== There are FAQ's for some popular Amiga games, especially if they are multi-platform. A good place to look if you have WWW access is Dave Stanworth's Games Domain, at http://wcl-rs.bham.ac.uk/GamesDomain and by ftp at ftp.wcl-l.bham.ac.uk/pub/djh/faqs. Another good bet is the comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.* newsgroups if there is a PC version of the game. Some are available directly from the maintainers: * Civilization FAQ: * FTP: ftp://wcl-l.bham.ac.uk/pub/djh/faqs/civilization.faq * WWW: http://www.gamesdomain.co.uk/GamesDomain/civfaq1.html * e-mail: send to djh@wcl-rs.bham.ac.uk with the subject Civ FAQ please * Sim City 2000 FAQ: * FTP: ftp://ftp.netcom.com/pub/thx * e-mail: send to thx@netcom.com with the subject SC2K FAQ please * Frontier (Elite II) Hints and Tips: * Avaliable from Aminet as game/hint/frontier.lzh Archivers ========= DMS files are packed with the DiskMasher. This packs whole disks and is the main way to distribute Non-DOS disks over the internet. A copy of DMS can be found on Aminet as /util/arc/dms111.run. To undms to a disk in df0: type dms WRITE file.dms TO df0:. DMS files are now banned from Aminet. For reasons, see the filedocs/misc/dms-sucks.txt. LHA and LZH files are packed with an LHA compatible packer. The main one is LHA which is shareware. A freeware alternative is LZ. Both of these are on Aminet as /util/arc/LhA_e138.run and /util/arc/lz_1.92.lzh (this needs LHA to unpack it however so you'll have to get LHA ...). To unlha to a formatted disk in df0: type lha -a x file.lha df0:. The dms and lha archives are self-extracting files so executing them will leave you with the appropriate files. New Releases ============ Markus Castren provides a list of new releases at http://www.xgw.fi/~slice/month.html. It is also posted to this group at the end of the month. All about... ************ DOOM ==== It's not avaliable. ID Software have stated that there will not be port of DOOM to the Amiga for technical reasons. There are usually one or two threads on comp.sys.amiga.games and comp.sys.amiga.programmer discussing the validity of these reasons. Several demos on Aminet show DOOM-type engines. These demos include: * demo/aga/dentects.lha (updated version of dentwolf) * demo/euro/Pearl.Doomed.lha * dev/misc/wolf3d.lha * game/demo/AlienBreed3D.lha (Playable version) * game/demo/engine.lha * game/demo/fearsnew.dms * game/demo/Gloom.lha * game/demo/walls.lha * game/misc/DamageWolf3DV1.lha * gfx/aga/poom_02.lha * gfx/misc/DamageWolf3D_2.lha * gfx/misc/TextDemo57.lha * gfx/misc/wolf.lha * gfx/misc/wolf3.lha * gfx/misc/bsp1.0.lha I've been informed this shows DOOM .wad files * gfx/misc/dog3d.lha Several commercial DOOM-type games have been released including Alien Breed 3D (1 and 2) from Team 17, Gloom and Gloom Deluxe by Black Magic, Breathless from Power Computing and Fears from Manyk. I'm not going to express a preference, sorry. The TextureMapping FAQ, posted to the newsgroup regularly, has more details of the methods and the games. FTP from Aminet as docs/misc/tmapfaq1.05.lzh. Discussion of the Amiga clones of DOOM, and comparisons of DOOM to similar Amiga games and demos are appropriate in csa.games. Discussion of DOOM gameplay does not belong in csa.games. Try rec.games.computer.doom.playing or comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action instead. Programming =========== The Amiga FAQ posted in comp.sys.amiga.programmer is a good place to start. You can also ftp it from Aminet as docs/misc/AmigaFAQ.lha. You'll need a compiler, assembler or programming language which can cost from a few pounds to over one hundred. You'll also need lots of time and a good idea (or two). Good luck! Releasing Software ================== Do not post binaries to comp.sys.amiga.games. The best way to release your game to the csa.gamers is to make it available at an Aminet site and then post an announcement about it to comp.sys.amiga.games and comp.sys.amiga.announce with a description and the path. People without ftp can email it from an Aminet ftp-mail server such as src.doc.ic.ac.uk. See PD. If you are unfamiliar with FTP then see FAQ: All about Amiga FTP by Urban Mueller posted in csa.[introduction|misc|datacomm] every 2 weeks. A plea - unless your game does not use AmigaDOS directory structures then pack it with an lha type packer. Please only use dms for those files that really need it (and you don't need dms to keep the directory structure intact...) Chess ===== GNUChess has been ported to the Amiga (on Aminet it is game/board/GnuChessBin.lha) with a front end game/board/AmyBoardBin.lha. Amiboard is on Aminet as game/board/AmiBoard_V1_0.lha. There is also UChess which seems to be updated regularly and comes in several versions for different specced machines. You really need at least a 68020 and a few megabytes of RAM though. Aminet has the latest version as game/think/UChess289.lha. Classics ======== So you want to play old Spectrum, C=64 and arcade games on the Amiga? Can you do it? Probably. Aminet is a good place to start (the games directory obviously). You can also use a Spectrum emulator (Spectrum 1.7 /misc/emu/spectrum-1.7.lha and ZXAM misc/emu/ZXAM20b.lha are the best) and play the originals of these programs. There is an FTP site in Norway with freely distributable Spectrum games (ftp://ftp.nvg.unit.no/ or use WWW to http://www.nvg.unit.no/spectrum). An A1200 with FastRAM will be needed to approach Spectrum speeds though. For C=64 freaks, Frodo is avaliable on Aminet as misc/emu/FrodoV1_5.lha. This will need rather more power to approach C=64 speed though. Gurus ===== Many games have not been coded to follow Commodore's guidelines, a lot of these break on Amigas with accelerators (especially 68040s), FastRAM and the AGA chipset. If a new game fails to run, people will usually mention it on csa.games. Nigel Hughes has created the "030+ Compatibility List", try his web page at http://www.dcs.aber.ac.uk:80/~ngh94/comp.html. The main ways to try and get such programs to run are: * Use the boot-menu (KS 3) and turn off caches, hard disks and the AGA chipset. This will work with a lot of games. * Only start games from a PAL or NTSC workbench with mode promotion turned off. Some games assume a PAL/NTSC WB and get confused if there isn't one. * Use Degrader (/util/misc/Degrader.lha on Aminet) or similar programs such as KillAGA (/util/misc/killaga2.lha) to turn your A4000 into an A500 - ain't progress wonderful :-/ * Consult Mark Knibbs' Amiga Patch List at http://www2.rz.hu-berlin.de/inside/angl/people/pdd/amipatch.html Ask the publisher if there is a patch avaliable - sadly, most software houses only make patches for the PC versions of their games. Finally, Gerald Yuen has a WWW page with tips on it. Try http://www.aber.ac.uk/~gcy3/gamesfixes or mail gcy3@aber.ac.uk. Civilisation AGA ================ Civilisation AGA is very slow, luckily it can be sped up dramatically. There are three speed ups, the first moves the game into FastRAM (so you must have FastRAM for this to work), the second stops the pointer being changed and the third removes the screen fades; these work on all Amigas. To perform these patches you need a binary file editor (like AZap, FileX - there are lots avaliable on Aminet) and a program to decrunch PowerPacker 4 files (either PP4 or DLD which is in the VirusZ distribution on Aminet /util/virus/virsz307.lha). Unpack the main program and load it into the file editor and change the following: * Move to FastRAM: * At offset &14 change &40 to &00 * At offset &1C change &40 to &00 * At offset &20 change &40 to &00 * Stop the pointer changing: * At offset &2D17C change &4EAEFEF2 to &4E714E71 * Remove the screen fades: * At offset &2CCF2 change &6728 to &66B0 * At offset &2CE60 change &59466002 to &4E714E71 Resave the file (and recrunch if you want) and start as normal. M.U.L.E. ======== Is M.U.L.E. avaliable? No, but Subtrade (a M.U.L.E. clone with changed graphics) is. It takes place on the ocean ground of Irata with near identical gameplay. "It is a commercial game by a German company. I don't think it's available in the shops anymore." - Jan Ellgring There is also a similar game on Aminet called FutureTrade, game/demo/FutureTrade_[1|2|3].lha. Traders, a game by the Swiss firm Linel (distributed by Merit in the USA), is also meant to be similar. Infocom ======= Most Infocom adventures, including those not released for the Amiga, can be played if you buy the PC version and transfer the datafiles to the Amiga (using CrossDOS or similar) and then use a PD interpreter to run the datafiles - Dave Kinder's Frotz is reported to be good (on Aminet as /game/role/Frotz201r5.lha). It can even play the Level 6 (graphics) adventures such as Shogun. Dungeon Master I and II ======================= A sequel to the original Dungeon Master WAS released some years ago - this was called Chaos Strikes Back and was much like DM I. DM II was released at the begining of November and has a, supposedly, much better game engine. It needs an 020 or better and ECS/AGA chip sets to run. If you want to play the originals (DM and CSB), Psygnosis released a double budget pack in 1992 which should still be avaliable. These versions have been patched to run under OS 2.04+ and can be installed on a hard-drive using game/patch/csbhd.lzh from Aminet. CD³² ==== CD³² games are talked about in csa.games and there are also two CD³² specific newsgroups which are ideal for talking about technical aspects of the CD³² versions. These groups are comp.sys.amiga.cd32 and rec.games.video.cd32, the latter is most appropriate for games related talk. HD Installable games ==================== There is a list of games on the WWW that shows what is needed to install various games on HD. Thanks to dEN for providing this. Point your browser at http://www.bath.ac.uk/~ma3dhcy/hd.txt and have a look.