[Sir John]

My praise and thanks for MG. This is one of the most interesting and innovative apps I have seen around.

I am trying to install an old Dos Prog which is based on the German board game ‘Catan’. It is simple; in principle I only need, with the exception of a few F keys which are not important, the Esc Key to exit and the left click of the mouse to action – a bit like a card game.

I worked out how to create a widget for the Esc key and I have assumed that I need to set an absolute mouse.

The Esc Key works, although I always land in the DOS mask and I would like to return to the main MG level.

The absolute mouse also works in principle. The mouse normally starts ‘center’ and then everything works fine. But the often mouse starts elsewhere on the screen and movement or clicks cause Catan to exit. So how can I ensure that it starts correctly?

I trust someone can give me a tip.

I am using a Nexus 7 tablet (1st Gen.) with 5.1.1.

Thanks
Sir John

[admin]

Hello,

thank you very much for question. Unfortunately, absolute mouse may and may not work for MS-DOS game. Problem is that games can change mouse position to custom location and may not report this change to ms-dos. In this case cursor gets desynchronised for absolute mouse. It’s because dosbox only guess where cursor currently is. If game reports this change or does not manipulate with cursor at own then absolute mouse works fine.

In many cases you can fix desynchronisation with “Special” widget set to “Mouse reset”.

Diablo 1 has similar problem and one guy Alex did nasty hack for that. He closes inventory with “Deadly strike” (macro) widget. This macro has 3 actions :

1. Key action set to letter “esc”
2. small delay (90ms)
3. mouse reset

He made similar macros for various actions like close invertory, close menu, …and mouse is in good state for major part of time.

Please can you post name of this game? I will check it.

Best regards,
Tony

[Sir John]

Hi Tony,

Many thanks for this.

I will anyway take a closer look at widgets, ‘Deadly strike’, macros and try out some Function Key widgets.
But appreciate any help you can give.

This DOS-game was forbidden by the author and distributors of ‘Siedler von Catan’ and one has to look around for it. I found this side http://tripalot.com/games/catan/ its the first item you are looking for – ‘Jens Willibald’.
This is in fact an english adaption, but I have found no differences to the original version.
The game ran nicely in a standard win-window. Under Windows 7 one required DosBox – again no problem.
Its worth looking at – if one is into board games. ‘Siedler’ is now a bit long in the tooth, but still cult under the so called “German Games”.

Thanks again
John

[admin]

Hello,

I downloaded the game and tried. Yes absolute mouse works, but after several click starts to be a bit desynchronised. Place “Special” widget on the screen and configure it to “Mouse reset”. This gets it back. But I can’t simulate exiting to dos command line. Can you help me?

Best regards,
Tony

[Sir John]

Tony,

Once again my thanks.
The ‘Special’ widget works perfect.

The command line was not a problem for me, (I have been around for a long, long time) but my wife likes to play!
When I exit with Esc then I was on the command line, I tried various settings in the main menu, without sucess.
However you already gave me the answer ! I have made another Special button with ‘Quit’ ! Then it is just one click to return to main menu.

I have in the meantime a deeper understanding of the handling and the possibilities, it is all very exciting and gives me just the challange I require. I shall start digging through the ‘floppy’ boxes in the cellar!

Regards
John

[admin]

Thank you, I am happy;)

Best regards,
Tony

[Author]

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