1.1: Stranger in the DOS land
It's time you got yourself acquainted with DOSBox. You're going to spend a lot of time with it.
Go to Start Menu **** Programs and the new DOSBox menu entry. Run DOSBox.
Now, where are we? This blinking thing on the bottom is called a command prompt. From here you can enter commands for DOSBox to execute.
In order to run a game, you will have to make DOSBox "see" the directory you put it in first.
Type in the following:
MOUNT C C:\oldgames
What does this command do? First is the word "MOUNT" which tells DOSBox to "read" one of the directories on your computer as its local hard drive. The letter that goes after that indicates one that is assigned to that drive. Finally, the third part is describes where is the directory you want DOSBox to mount.
NOTE 1: if the path to your target directory contains spaces, you must enclose it in hyphens, like that:
MOUNT C "C:\Documents and Settings\Harvey\My Documents\Games for DOSBox"
NOTE 2: If a game's config file needs its location on the hard drive specified, when the game is ran in DOSBox that location has to be adjusted to where the game is located under DOSBox. For example, if you unpacked Alien Virus to C:\Oldgames\AV and mounted that C:\Oldgames as the C drive in DOSBox, the reference in the config file should be to C:\AV (as this is how DOSBox "sees" it).
Press Enter to execute the command (you need to do that to confirm every command you enter).
You got a message: "
Drive C is mounted as local directory C:\Oldgames",
but the prompt didn't change.
You're still in the virtual drive Z:.
Next command you need to input is "
C:" This tells DOSBox to "move" the command prompt to that drive.
Now let's try displaying what your "
C:\" drive stores. Type in "
DIR". You will get something like that (with the obvious difference that my directory with the game is called
DOLLS and yours
PDOLLS):
