Odd retro gaming request (Blue Bytes's Settlers II)

[huschnu]

Hello

Recently I was stung by the gaming nostalgia bug. I wanted to play Settlers II (1996) without an emulator on my 4:3 T60 (with ATI x1400) but I encountered a strange graphics bug.

I tried to run it on Windows XP and Freedos with the same results. The game starts but the graphics are distorted (see links below). As the same issue appears on Windows XP and Freedos I don't think it is an software or driver problem.

So my plea for anyone with a T60 and an Intel (GMA 950) graphics chip who also owns the classic version of Settlers II (GOG version works as well, it can be run without the dosbox), can you please check if you get the same graphics error?

My love for this game is very deep and if I only have to get a different motherboard to play it, I would do it in a heartbeat.

My suspicion is with the graphics card, as the game runs fine on my T430 (with integrated graphics; Freedos) but it is not the same on the wide screen...

Thank you !
http://imgur.com/pfpE4TQ
http://imgur.com/CtwQuKO
http://imgur.com/UL8cZYu

EDIT:
In the unlikely case anyone will stumble onto this in the future, my findings are:

• 1. The graphics error is common to this ATI graphics chip (confirmed by other users in a german thinkpad forum)

• 2. The error does not exist for motherboards with an Intel graphics chip

• 3. When using an Intel chip & Windows XP, set your desktop color depht to 16 Bit otherwise the game will crash Windows on exit

[RealBlackStuff]

Looks to me like wonky graphics.
I don't have that game, but I can provide you with a replacement T60 mobo.
Your choice of graphics: Intel, ATI X1300, ATI X1400 or ATI FireGL V5200.
But I guess the shipping cost from USA to Germany might be prohibitive...

[huschnu]

Thank you for the offer. But shipping a motherboard around the world might indeed be too expensive (also you can get used boards for <20€ here).

Also, I don't think the graphics chip or board are broken as every other game (windows 2D and 3D stuff) is working fine. To me it looks more like a incompatibility issue. And before taking everything apart I hoped to find someone who can verify my suspicion that it is indeed a problem with the ATI chip.

[zoltan87]

Well, this is bad news . I have just bought a Thinkpad T60 15 inch 4:3, and one of my plans is to use it as a retro game machine. And Settlers 2 is certainly one of my all time favourites, I really wanted to play it on this laptop. Is there any other way to make it work, like running it in dosbox or something? The other game I really want to play is SimCity 4, it would be a real bummer if that ends up being unplayable too.

[huschnu]

If you have an ATI graphic chip I would say the likelihood is high that you will encounter the same issue (but not certain, all feedback I got was from people with 14 inch machines). If you don't want to get an Intel motherboard you can run settlers 2 in dosbox. For me it ran ok without the graphics error, but not perfect. On my T2500 I got high cpu load and laggy scrolling.
I did not test SimCity 4, but as it is not a Dos game I would be surprised if you encounter this problem. For me, All other non Dos games ran great on the ATI chip.

[dr_st]

I can pretty much confirm all the findings reported here regarding Settlers II on both Intel and ATI chips on the T60.

DOSBox is the answer. It may not be perfect, but it's easy, safe and good enough.

[micrex22]

Did you try specifying the '256' colours option? The game is experiencing palette corruption. Usually this is a problem moreso in vista/7 than it is with XP.

You could try putting Win7 and trying this mod someone else did:
https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/9271 ... -palettes/
(of course at your own risk)

Here's a tutorial I googled with someone explaining on how to get the game to run on win7:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGyHiifzlGM

---

Windows 7 is far from an OS for older games though... Ideally you should just get a P233 or Pentium 3 desktop and pop on 98SE.

[wujstefan]

I tried it at my R60 intel unit and T60 intel unit as well - works like a charm.

If you need a mobo w/intel graphics please let me know. I live in the neighbourhood (EU).