SDR - NoRH Competition

[zaqrack]

Mark has made the breakthrough we were all longing for

http://digilander.libero.it/stunts.SDR/norh_rules.htm

It's the first NoRH competition where the usage of RH can be checked.
All thanks to the video capture function in DosBox.

We all know the positive sides of this... finally a norh competition which is not based on honesty.

The cons:

-dosbox needs a stronger computer to run flawlessly, but as 1000Mhz does the trick, I think it's a problem which can be easily solved
-setting up the game in dosbox may be confusing for a newbie, but can be learned easily.
-the game flow will never be the same in dosbox as in native mode. the car handling always stays a bit jerky.
-this method only works with a limited number of competitiors and replays, and a very motivated competition manager. I can'T imagine a competition manager who can handle and check 90-120 replay videos/month (ZS gets this amount in average monthly)

still, my deepest congratulations fly out to Mark.

[Mark L. Rivers]

Zak, thanks for your words. I'm happy if my initiative arouses appreciation from who really loves Stunts.  
I really hope that the system that I have individuated can be OK and that it can be used from every Stunts pipsqueak!  

[BonzaiJoe]

This is so great! Good job Mark. Now I'm only fearing if my computer can run it, and exactly how jerky the handling is :-)

[CTG]

I have Pentium IV with 1.3 GHz - but DOS-BOx is not fluent. And if I start 'Snag it' video capture then I becomes even worse (2 or 3 pics/seconds, steering in one second late). I'm afraid I can't try this but I still say WSM LIVE RACE is the only original and real noRH contest (video files can be modified easily...). Another problem: the video files are too big.

[Paleke]

Wow! :shock:  I think it's an excellent idea and I can't wait to try it. Unfortunately, my computer is slow, and more important, it is broken, and I don't know when I'm going to be able to fix it.  

As soon as I get my computer back, you'll receive a replay from me... :wink:

[Krys TOFF]

I'm not sure DosBox is running properly with Win 9x or Win Me. This program is made for Win XP.
I don't have XP, and I'm not the only one here.

But I can ask one fo my children to hold my camera and then make a small movie of me racing. Problem will be file size of the video. Numerous Mb for sure... Too much to send it by mail.

Only solution : upload it to a share website. Most known is RapidShare but for Mark this will be a mess with this website due to the download limits.

I suggest then to use another one like MegaUpload, or HemenPaylas, or another...
Even YouTube or Google video could be useful.

But again, people do not always have a digital camera. I was lucky winning one at my job's X-mas lottery 1 year and a half ago.

But there's no other solution : Win 9x allows game to run in pure Dos mode, and so no any video capture can be done.

[Mark L. Rivers]

Hi Krys,

reading the "DOSBox site" http://dosbox.sourceforge.net  I didn't read that DOSBox is made for WinXP or that it's not compatible with Win9x. Maybe it's simply necessary to change DOSBox settings to run it fluently under own O.S.

These are two links where it's possible to find useful informations:

http://dosbox.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php?page=RunningResourceDemandingGames

http://dosbox.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php?page=dosbox.conf%2Fcpu

[Krys TOFF]

Ok, I'll test DosBox.
But in the meantime I made a replay of my own.
Check it there : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dT1qJZLq57Y (beware : 23 Mb)
Time is 1:04,55 and not 1:03,55 as written in title.
Enjoy too the marvelous music of Nightwish I was listening during racing (I know, Akoss won't like it as "women are not made to sing heavy metal" as he said :lol: ).

[JTK]

Great video! Nice race, also. I like to hear your keyboard while driving and to see the typing of your name!  

[Mark L. Rivers]

Great Krys!  

[SuperBrian]

I have 2 wierd problems, when I drive the dosbox 0.65!

Problem 1:) It says I shall mount C, before I can use the directory C.
So I wrote mount c, and then it says that the c-directory doesn't exist, which I why I thought I should mount it...

Problem 2: Then it says it can be fixed, if I press:
mount c c:\dosprog\(something I can't remember)\
but the thing is, that I can't use the symbol \, when I wrote it, the dosprogram jumps into the next line, here is an example:

mount c:\
dosprog\

- See, that's how it jumps into next line, if I use the symbol, can anyone fix my problem? :shock:

[Mark L. Rivers]

Well SuperBrian, I haven't unterstood very well what kind of problem you have meet and I' don't know which OS you have, but I try to explain how you can mount a virtual drive with DOSBox 0.65 with Windows OS.

1) Which is the directory on your PC where you have stunts.exe and all the others files (tracks, car, replay, ecc)? If it's C:\STUNTS then you have to write:

mount C C:\STUNTS  (press Enter)

The first "C" is the name that you assign at the virtual drive. It could be "D" or "E" or any letter you want, indipendently if you are only a drive C in your PC.

2) After that you have mounted the virtual drive you have to type the letter that you have choosen (C in the example) and : (two points). Then press Enter

3) When your prompt is C:\> you can type STUNTS_K (or the name of the exacutable file corresponding at STUNTS) and press Enter


I don't understand which is the symbol that you use that makes an automatic Enter, and I don't know why you have to use it. I don't use any symbol, simply I mount the virtual drive as I have wrote before. I think that if you succeed to mount the virtual drive in this way, you have no need to type other symbol.

[Krys TOFF]

I tried DOSBox just a few moments ago. My main problem is that Stunts runs a little bit slower than normal...

About the "\" problem, this is because DosBox keyboard is US, not your Danish keyboard SB.
My Stunts game is installed on a directory called "jeux" (means "games" in French) and sub-dir "D4D".

On DOSBox menu on start menu, open DOSBox.conf file and write the following lines at the end of it :

mount c c:\jeux\d4d
c:
stunts_k

1st line : replace "c:\jeux\d4d" with the name of your own Stunts directory, this is easy as the DOSBox.conf file is just a text file you can modify easily, and doing it will avoid you to do it every time you use DOSBox. Then typing "c:" at DOSBox prompt (originally "Z:") will lead you directly to your Stunts directory.
You can mount one directory for each game you would like to use with DOSBox : C for Stunts, D for another game, E for another game again...

2nd line : going to tunts directory as said just above.

3rd line : launch Stunts.

I added the 3rd line as I'll use DOSBox only for SDR noRH replays. I have Win 9x and a real DOS installed on my computer, so I don't need DOSBox to run any pure DOS program. So, I decided to launch automatically Stunts when starting DOSBox. :wink:
I hope this will help.

[Paleke]

The symbol "\" is the one that makes an automatic "Enter", and he obviously has to use it.

[SuperBrian]

Extremely well articulated, paleke, that's exactly what happens..

Mark:

My problem is as Paleke discribed.
My directory is C:\stuntcar\stunts_k, but the problem is that I cannot type the \-symbol, so I cannot go further than to write: c: :!:

Krys:

It's right, I'm using the danish keyboard, and therefore I spend 10 minutes with finding the colon, with pressing shift+?, and 2 minutes more with finding the opposit slash pressing Ctrl+?, but as Paleke discribed for me, is this opposit slash making an automatically "enter", so I cannot write the right code:

Mount C C:\stuntcar\stunts_k