Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!husc6!purdue!decwrl!
From: res12@snoopy.UMD.EDU (Matthew T. Russotto)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: Survey of Macintosh Game Compatibility with Mac SE/30
Message-ID: <8905041658.AA09072@snoopy.UMD.EDU>
Date: 4 May 89 16:58:04 GMT
References: <8074@fluke.COM>
Organization: University of Maryland, College Park
Lines: 83

In article <8074@fluke.COM> moriarty@tc.fluke.COM (Jeff Meyer) writes:
>When I bought my Mac SEx (a.k.a. SE/30), I had heard that most programs that
>worked with a Mac II worked with my SEx.  And, indeed, this has been true,
>right down to dozens of PD and shareware programs written over five years
>ago that run like a charm.  As expected, though, quite a few game programs
>haven't been working, even ones that work fairly well on a II or IIx.  I've
>assumed that these incompatible games are mostly due to the SEx's VRAM chips
>(as opposed to the SE's use of standard RAM for the video) and the custom
>CRT controller chip that the SEx has.  (Got this information from the
>Microprocessor Report.)  Or perhaps some games check the processor type and
>assume the machine's a Mac II (and thus has a larger monitor) or checks out
>the screen size and assume it's a 68000-based machine like the Plus or the
>SE.
>
>At any rate, I decided to do a quick review of which games worked on the
>SEx, and which didn't.  I also called up the makers of the various
>commercial games I had problems with and asked about fixes/upgrades -- this
>was rather interesting in itself, as I got some diverse impressions of these
>companies through their tech support people.  Both results and company
>feedback are listed below; I've sub-divided games into PD/Shareware and
>Commercial sections.
>
>Test equipment: One Mac SEx, 5 Megs memory, all INITs off, ram cache off, 80
>MB internal hard drive.  If I couldn't get it to run on the hard drive, I
>tried running it from the floppy drive.  
>
>My selection of games was limited to a) which games I'd purchased and b)
>which PD games I enjoyed playing.  None of these games was extensively
>tested -- I played for a few minutes to look for obvious problems.  I've
>attempted to supply version numbers with every game tested.  Oh, and all
>PD/shareware games were checked with Disinfectant 1.1 beforehand.
>
>Here we go....
>
>---------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
><<<PD/SHAREWARE GAMES>>>
>
>PROBLEMS:
>
>    CONTINUUM 1.01:  It's got "Falcon's Disease" (see FALCON in the
>        commercial games), i.e. the screen flickers horribly.  It gives you
>        a message at startup about INITS, something about "Do you have a
>        second graphics buffer reserved?"  I said yes, and then it would
>        start, albeit with massive flickering.
>
>    MEGAROIDS:  Starts game, and then hangs without drawing screen.
>
>    APACHE STRIKE, DARK CASTLE (Silicon Beach):  Problem: Remember when you
>        tried to run Silicon Beach games under version 6.0?  You'd get
>        "something in high memory" even when you had no INITs, no RAM cache,
>        no nuthin'?  It's baaaack!  What is interesting is that BEYOND DARK
>        CASTLE runs fine...
>
>        Silicon Beach didn't say much about DARK CASTLE (I know, they're
>        getting out of the game market -- I've got Super 3D and I've used
>        Digital Darkroom, and more power to 'em), but they said they were
>        working on fixing APACHE STRIKE, and that registered users would be
>        notified.  Very polite.
>
> [All sorts of stuff deleted]
>
>Hope this is of some help to you game-players out there thinking about
>upgrading to a SE/30...
>
>
>                                        Moriarty, aka Jeff Meyer
>INTERNET:     moriarty@tc.fluke.COM
>Manual UUCP:  {uw-beaver, sun, hplsla, thebes, microsoft}!fluke!moriarty
>CREDO:        You gotta be Cruel to be Kind...
><*> DISCLAIMER: Do what you want with me, but leave my employers alone! <*>

The problem with these three games is the lack of the secondary screen
buffer since System 6.0.  Try telling Continuum 'No' when it asks about the
second graphics buffer.  There has supposedly been a new version of the
original Dark Castle around for quite a while, which worked on the Mac ][.

-- 
DISCLAIMER:  Not only does the University not share my opinions,
             they don't want me sharing my opinions.
                "This 'Pnews', what does it do?"
             Matthew T. Russotto
	     res12@snoopy.umd.edu (this semester only)