Looking for VERY specific "release" of 4D-Sports Driving (EU Mindscape version)

[TomVDJ]

Hey all,

I signed up to this forum for one very specific reason.

I was going through some old 5.25 inch floppies from my father's archive, and found a few with games. One of them was labeled "stunts". But the disk was corrupt / partially unreadbale, and the only files that were still there were:

- 4-DSPORT.BAT

with the content:

Code Select Expand

@echo off
cd 4-dsport
stunts
and

- STUNTS.BAT

with the content:

Code Select Expand

@echo off
cd 4D
stunts
echo Radical , Chombatta !
I do remember playing the game, and it was the Mindscape version (so "4D Sports - Driving") and not the Bröderbund version ("Stunts").

It was a cracked version for sure, but I'm looking for a distribution / release that also had the two BAT files included. The "Radical , Chombatta !" tagline might give an indication about what release or distribution this was? I know the "Red Sector" release is well known, but I did not find one with the specific BAT files included. What I also think I remembered, was that the "TRAINING" track was included on top of the standard included tracks.

If somebody could help me find this very specific version, that would be awesome! I know the game itself stays identical, but I'd like to "restore" that original floppy disc of my father with the exact same files, pure out of nostalgic reasons. (Hope this makes sense.)

Thanks!

[Cas]

Ah!  I understand that feeling. This has happened to me with some games I've recovered later, but were not the same. I do still keep my original version of Stunts, which is a 1.0 with a stunt.com crack and an alternative Default replay that's played on the Default track and ends with the pipsqueak (in a blue PMIN) shoots up into the sky at the loop. Unfortunately, I have never come across the version you mention. Hopefully one of the guys here has.

[Matei]

Ah!  I understand that feeling. This has happened to me

That's why we don't progress. For Mr. TomVDJ: You seem to have an old computer with DOS on it(?) so the currently recommended version for you is somewhere around here:

https://forum.stunts.hu/index.php?topic=4404.0

[edit] On that computer with 5.25 inch floppies you probably can't copy anything. You can't record any diskette with a new computer and all my diskettes were useless last time I tried them anyway. [/edit]

[TomVDJ]

No, I have an old Windows XP computer where I mounted an old 5.25 inch floppy drive where I cleaned the heads and lubricated the mechanics. That drive works great and most of the 5.25 inch floppies I still have, are perfectly readable. I think about 90% of them are still fine. Others have errors.

I also noticed a great difference in quality 3M floppies for instance, are all still perfect, a certain other brand (don't know which one, but they all have the same labels on them) are ALL unreadable. I think the surface material of that batch was just inferior to the materials 3M used back in the days?

Anyway, all this is a bit off topic, off course.

The point is I'd like to find that "obscure" warez release of 4D driving that had those BAT files included (and based on the content of the BAT files, it seems the game itself was located in a subfolder "4D" or "4-dsport" or both?). I did not find anything in the thread you mentioned, BTW...

[HerrNove]

If you don't have already done so, I suggest also asking in vogons.org, one of the biggest retrogaming forums.

[Duplode]

Hello and welcome, @TomVDJ ! I don't think I have come across a distribution like that. The distribution in the floppy disk I had in the 90s, in particular, used Broderbund rather than Mindscape, as expected given the Americas/Europe divide you allude to (I posted a bit about that one here). Going by the BAT files you found, it seems the distributors in your case did a fair bit of customisation. It looks like they wanted to present 4D Driving and Stunts as aliases for the same game -- maybe it was part of a bigger collection they arranged?   

[TomVDJ]

I know that as a kid we referred to our EU Mindscape version as "Stunts", even though the title screen said "4D Sports - Driving". Also the .exe and bat files I've seen, are most of the time called "stunts".

It's possible that it was part of a bigger collection indeed. It's indeed strange that both bat files change directories, but both to another directory (4D vs. 4-DSPORT).

Good tip asking it on vogons, BTW. Did not to that yet. Also asked the question on the Abondonia forum, but there is not much activity on that one...

[Matei]

Is anyone here who didn't have a version of Stunts in the 90s? I didn't, only found out about it after 200? and initially it didn't seem very interesting because I was using a Pentium II CPU and DosBOX wasn't running fast enough. In the 90s I was playing ZX Spectrum games. This way, my intention was initially not to make a game that looks like Stunts.

https://matei.one/idxscr.html#story

I was thinking more about this:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lotus_III:_The_Ultimate_Challenge

But doing something 3D was easier (and looks better, obviously). Observation:

https://archive.org/details/msdos_Lotus_-_The_Ultimate_Challenge_1993

https://archive.org/details/msdos_Stunts_1990

These games are at archive.org. I wonder if I can put the tracks of Stunts with my game at so*rceforge.net (if Cl*udf*are disappears, by any chance).

[Duplode]

Is anyone here who didn't have a version of Stunts in the 90s? I didn't, only found out about it after 200? and initially it didn't seem very interesting because I was using a Pentium II CPU and DosBOX wasn't running fast enough.

Indeed, it could be awkward to run Stunts in early-to-mid 2000s. The native DOS emulation of XP didn't work very well (you needed an extra tool to get sound, and there was a noticeable framerate drop), and computers often weren't fast enough for DOSBox.

(While I had first played Stunts in 1996, in that time frame I came back to the game a few times after relatively long breaks, in 2002, 2004, and finally in 2007.)