Is there something wrong with old WHDLoad games?

[Retro-Nerd]

LOL, 69 games and then all the fuss about it?

[Amiga1992]

Life is hard on a 33.6k modem.

[DamienD]

Originally Posted by Retro-Nerd

LOL, 69 games and then all the fuss about it?

...just like all the fuss about configurations:

a) two installs of WinUAE
b) Can I use 3.2.2 UAE configs with 3.3.0?

Foebane has sooooo many to worry about that clearly it's a huge issue and am not really sure how he manages to sleep at night i.e. a grand total of, wait for it, wait for it... 6

Anyway, that's enough out of me on the subject... Sorry Foebane; I couldn't help it

[Foebane]

DamienD, I DO apologise for not clarifying everything at all in my OP, and I did post that in a rush and then later edit it, but not add enough information. If I had, it would've saved a lot of trouble.

Sorry!

[Foebane]

As for the configurations, I also apologise for "bashing you over the head with my six configs" and seeming all smug about the little work I have to do about them. We have different way of organising stuff, and I didn't mean to come across as snobbish. You have every right to be sarcastic about it.

[StingRay]

Originally Posted by Foebane

I don't care that much about changes to games, but I was outraged when I tried WHDL demos and noticed how much they'd been butchered, so I refused to use WHDL for those.

Care to elaborate? Seeing that most demo patches are made by me I'm extremely interested to learn how I "butchered" them all, please tell me, I'm all ears!

Originally Posted by Akira

There's a shit ton, and I do mean a SHIT TON of games showing slowdowns in many setups because of blitter waits. Especially true if you want to run WHDLoad games on a 68000 system.

A lot of patches have been updated to disable blitter waits on 68000!

Originally Posted by Akira

Also not sure which demos you refer to, but most demos will not run properly on anything but their intended narrow hardware spec.

Demos are not different to games, they can be fixed and patched to work on (almost) any system!

[Foebane]

Originally Posted by StingRay

Care to elaborate? Seeing that most demo patches are made by me I'm extremely interested to learn how I "butchered" them all, please tell me, I'm all ears!

Hyperbole on my part, Stingray, never mind. At best, "modified". I can understand why someone with real Amiga hardware would appreciate the modification, but I was just thinking about how, with WinUAE and all the ROMs, I can just run the original demos as ADFs or whatever under what Amiga model I like, so that's me being short-sighted again.

[Foebane]

As it is, I've had another think about the games situation across all of my retro platforms, and have decided a total re-download is needed.

For most disk images, I download from TOSEC, as it has all that useful information in the filename, but I've usually stripped it all out just down to the game name, and stuck with that. Unfortunately, TOSEC files are usually different between files for the same game, and I need to know which version I downloaded, so by stripping all that I then have no idea what version I've got. So I figure if I simply download the original file, leave the name as is, but give a simple name to the zipped version, that will be the best of both worlds.

Same for WHDLoad: If I could see directly, at a glance, what version number or even which file I downloaded, that would simplify things immensely. So it looks like a complete re-download is in order anyway, and I may as well finally ditch WHDownLoad.com.

[DamienD]

Originally Posted by Foebane

For most disk images, I download from TOSEC, as it has all that useful information in the filename, but I've usually stripped it all out just down to the game name, and stuck with that. Unfortunately, TOSEC files are usually different between files for the same game, and I need to know which version I downloaded, so by stripping all that I then have no idea what version I've got. So I figure if I simply download the original file, leave the name as is, but give a simple name to the zipped version, that will be the best of both worlds.

Again; for .ADFs just use the 100% verified ones that are in GameBase Amiga. Will save you loads of testing / trial-and-error

...you'll like these too as they are renamed / shortened to just the game name.

[Foebane]

Originally Posted by DamienD

Again; for .ADFs just use the 100% verified ones that are in GameBase Amiga. Will save you loads of testing / trial-and-error

...you'll like these too as they are renamed / shortened to just the game name.

I actually have only five ADFs for games (not counting the 69 WHDLs) and they are not exactly mainstream, so GBA doesn't have most of them. TOSEC does, but my Firefox cries out for mercy every time I load up the file index for Amiga there, because there are so many tens of thousands of files.

EDIT: Nothing against GBA, but I used those files from TOSEC months and months ago, when I also got the files from WHDownLoad.

Along with the re-download, I will also change my bookmarks to feature the EAB File Server, which has got both GBA and the WHDLoad stuff.

[Amiga1992]

Originally Posted by StingRay

A lot of patches have been updated to disable blitter waits on 68000!

Exactly my point! And that's why newer versions of patches are better patches.
There's a lot more to work on, but there's only so many patchers (ie almost just you :P) and so many people reporting.

Demos are not different to games, they can be fixed and patched to work on (almost) any system!

Yeah it's exactly what I meant, that WHDLoad makes them more compatible and fixes them. The OP was suggesting the unpatched demos ran better or that patched demos were crippled. I disagreed.

Originally Posted by Foebane

I actually have only five ADFs for games

You like living life at the edge, don't you?
I really don't understand your angle at all. You have such a small quantity of games, that downloading them all again one by one by hand seems like the easiest and most painless process ever.

[DamienD]

Originally Posted by Foebane

I actually have only five ADFs for games (not counting the 69 WHDLs) and they are not exactly mainstream, so GBA doesn't have most of them.

Can you list the 5 games for me?

...I may have added then into my WinUAE collection and would have found / tested the best files to use.

[Foebane]

Originally Posted by DamienD

Can you list the 5 games for me?

...I may have added then into my WinUAE collection and would have found / tested the best files to use.

AMBER (RISK-style game)
E-MOTION
LITTLE BEAU (AKA Kid Gloves 2)
MOONSHINE RACERS Rolling Demo
VAXINE

All except E-Motion and Vaxine exist just for the music, which I like.

[Foebane]

I've just re-downloaded the WHDLoad games, again, and this time I've decided not to alter the names or anything, except maybe remove the underscores from the original .lha filenames, as I find they hinder readability. I now have the games with their original names, and with little effort on my behalf (aside from picking the right files to d/l).

I have to ask something, though: In Retroplay, each game has a name and accompanying version number, and the commercial games have a third number, like 0960 for Agony or 0643 for Damocles or 0124 for Gloom. What do these numbers mean? They were present in WHDownLoad as well, I noticed.

[DamienD]

Originally Posted by Foebane

I have to ask something, though: In Retroplay, each game has a name and accompanying version number, and the commercial games have a third number, like 0960 for Agony or 0643 for Damocles or 0124 for Gloom. What do these numbers mean? They were present in WHDownLoad as well, I noticed.

I could swear that you've also asked this question before

This number relates to the SPS / IPF file used to create the WHDLoad package: http://www.softpres.org/games

[Foebane]

Maybe I did, Damien. I can't remember.