Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!pacbell!rtech!squid!edg
From: edg@squid.rtech.com (Ed Goldman)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.atari.st
Subject: Re: Dungeon Master
Message-ID: <2491@rtech.rtech.com>
Date: 17 Oct 88 17:19:37 GMT
References: <56354JJL101@PSUVM> <685@unh.UUCP> <3043@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV> <62@usl-pc.usl.edu>
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Reply-To: edg@squid.UUCP (Ed Goldman)
Organization: Relational Technology, Inc.
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A couple of items on DM hints:

1) FTL does have a hint book out on DM, I've seen it at a local atari dealer.
2) There's also another hint disk out which has graphical maps of all the levels
   and hints.  Can't remember who makes this, but this was also seen at dealer.
3) Latest issue of ST-action (mag from UK on st gaming) has special section on
   DM hints.

Now to refute a previous posting:

The posting mentioned that DM was uncrackable and cannot be copied.  I've talked to
someone who claims to have a cracked version which by-passes the copy protection.
I haven't verified this, so I guess you can assume its a rumour.  Secondly, there's
a bitcopy package called "acopy" which will make perfectly good backups of the DM
master disk.  NOW WAIT!  I do not advocate piracy nor have I obtained an illegal
copy of DM.  But this copy protection stuff is infuriating for people who want to
make legitimate backups of thier software.  PLUS, I'm having *major* problems with
running DM at present.  Maybe someone can offer a suggestion to the following
problem:

I've been playing DM for a couple of months now on my 1040st.  1 day the damn thing
would not boot.  This now occurs both in trying to resume a saved game and in 
starting a new one.  After pressing the "enter" dungeon button on the 1st screen,
the game continues loading from the disk.  At some point the drive makes a slightly
louder noise.  Previously, the game would start soon after this "noise".  Now, it
just seems to be in a loop where it continually makes this noise and the game never
starts.  My guess is that it's the copy-protection scheme that causes the noise.
I've tested software, including games with copy protection, on my drive and every-
thing else works OK.  I've taken the DM master disk to a dealer and booted on the
1040st there and it boots fine!  Needless to say I am pissed off.  My guess is that
a slight alteration in my disk's timing has thrown off DM copy protection scheme.
Copy-protection just goes to far when it inhibits one from using ligitimately
purchased software.  If anyone has any suggestions, I'd appreciate hearing.  In
the meantime I'm going to try obtaining the cracked copy out of self-defense, even
if I have to slink about in the night, trading cash for something in a brown paper
bag, to get it.

-edg-