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Did anyone manage to run Heretic?

Posted: Sat Feb 27, 2021 2:55 pm
by Dacaskos
Man I even downloaded a pre-installed package to rule out if there was something odd, but whenever I try to boot Heretic it stucks at the loading graphics screen.

If anyone could try it and give a input to see if it's something with the core itself... Thanks.

Re: Did anyone manage to run Heretic?

Posted: Sun Feb 28, 2021 9:13 am
by breiztiger
same here with heretic 1.0

Re: Did anyone manage to run Heretic?

Posted: Sun Feb 28, 2021 12:46 pm
by spicer
Working
installed from cd image its usa cd 1.3 i think (shadow of the serpent riders) full game plus 2 episodes
set music to adlib and fx to soundblaster (this is just what i used, maybe other settings will work)
works fine using "eXoFlynn Top 300" he has done an awesome job on that :D.

edit (rev 1)

Re: Did anyone manage to run Heretic?

Posted: Sun Feb 28, 2021 2:44 pm
by squeeb
Version 1.2 works for me under DOS 6.22 - make sure your clock speed is cranked up and L2 cache enabled. Back before the ao486 overhaul, heretic would freeze for me as well during that initial load.

Prepare to be underwhelmed though. You'll need to decrease the screen size by at least 2 to get what I consider a respectable framerate.

(edit I'm actually running 1.2 as well, not 1.0)

Re: Did anyone manage to run Heretic?

Posted: Sun Feb 28, 2021 3:13 pm
by breiztiger
i have just applied patch to 1.2 and it work

Re: Did anyone manage to run Heretic?

Posted: Wed Mar 03, 2021 3:17 am
by Dacaskos
Tried here the Shadow of The Serpent Riders version (I guess it's 1.3 right) and it worked, Thanks for taking the time and testing.

It's not that bad! Really... at open areas it crawls to a certain degree... but... it's a 486 after all. Back in the day we didn't notice the frame pacing as much... it's funny to think that most of the "recommended" requirements of these games should be actually the minimum, because the minimum back then was horrible performance in most cases, but I guess they wanted to sell more... and... people didn't care much as long as it ran I guess.

There's an unexpected doom port called "Fast Doom" which improves Doom's performance on older machines by a lot. Wonder if someone could do the same with Heretic and Hexen.

Thanks again!

Re: Did anyone manage to run Heretic?

Posted: Wed Mar 03, 2021 4:17 pm
by squeeb
Yea I suppose that's true. We've been spoiled by modern hardware 8-)
Dacaskos wrote: Wed Mar 03, 2021 3:17 am There's an unexpected doom port called "Fast Doom" which improves Doom's performance on older machines by a lot. Wonder if someone could do the same with Heretic and Hexen.

Thanks again!
I've been wondering the same, especially for Hexen.

Re: Did anyone manage to run Heretic?

Posted: Wed Mar 03, 2021 8:36 pm
by FoxbatStargazer
When even Fastdoom chugs at times, I doubt anything can be done for Quake engine games.

Really just wish we had Fastdoom II because Doom II runs a lot worse than I.

Re: Did anyone manage to run Heretic?

Posted: Wed Mar 03, 2021 10:40 pm
by Dacaskos
FoxbatStargazer wrote: Wed Mar 03, 2021 8:36 pm When even Fastdoom chugs at times, I doubt anything can be done for Quake engine games.

Really just wish we had Fastdoom II because Doom II runs a lot worse than I.
I guess even Hexen runs under Doom engine. A heavily modified one, but still Doom. Heretic is basically Doom 2 with Look Up/Down implemented.

But there's a FastDoom 2 port.

Re: Did anyone manage to run Heretic?

Posted: Thu Mar 04, 2021 3:17 am
by flynnsbit
FoxbatStargazer wrote: Wed Mar 03, 2021 8:36 pm When even Fastdoom chugs at times, I doubt anything can be done for Quake engine games.

Really just wish we had Fastdoom II because Doom II runs a lot worse than I.
If you use my latest Top 300 update script it will also pull down Fast Doom, Fast Doom 2, and Fast Ultimate Doom from the official Fdoom github and make a menu option for it in the ao486 launcher... FYI.