Twinworld

Hi there,

I have just downloaded RISC OS Pi (RC14) SD card image for my Raspberry Pi 2 and have managed to get this setup.

I remember playing an old game from years ago called Twin World… I was wondering if his game was available for RISC OS on the Pi 2 and if so, could someone show me where I could get it from please?

Thanks.

Twinworld

You may want to look at JASPP too

Not sure whether these run natively under the Pi2 or not. You may need to use ADFFS.
I can run twinworld using Aemulor
on a pandaboard without issues.

Sorry, please forgive me, but is ADFFS and how does it work?

I don’t use ADFFS, so I don’t really have a good grasp on how it works.
My understanding is that it is an emulator (it’s not strictly an emulator) that allows you to run older RISC OS games.
There is also ArcEM
, which will boot you into an old RISC OS desktop running 3.1×.
Most of the old games will run in that, I’ve had fun with those.
In case your wondering why all this pain is needed, in the “good old days” RISC OS was 24bit and the games were written for that hardware.
The Pi v1 allowed a “compatibility” mode, the Pi v2 does not.

Twin World works natively on the Raspberry Pi, no emulator is needed.
The AWESOME ADFFS is not needed for this one either.

All you need is this 32bit patch:

https://sites.google.com/site/jeffreyadoggett

Download the game here an apply the patch:

http://www.acornarcade.com/downloads

Enjoy!

I’ve just got myself a Raspberry Pi and this was my go to game. My sister and I absolutely loved playing this game. In Acorn Mode it runs but with incorrect colours. I’ve downloaded the game and patch from the above URL’s but I’m not sure how to apply the patch. When I double click !Run it says “Please find the Twin World directory”. I tried replacing the orginally !Run file with the file from the patch but that didn’t work either. I’ve gone back to the unpatched version. Do I need to manully change the !Run script to specify the TwinWorld folder that I have installed it to?

Many thanks

Darren

I believe I have now succesfully applied Jeffrey A Doggett’s Iyonix patch but I was only able to apply the patch whilst in AcornMode. When I tried to run the patch from the default desktop I got an error. I am currently using the latest RISC OS Direct build but I also have the latest RISC OS Open build on another SD card.

When I run the game in AcornMode the title and menu screen does not show but the game starts and plays pefectly except for incorrect colours.

When I run the game from the default RISC OS Direct desktop the colours are good but the game plays far too slow and the screen is squashed. I have tried changing to a 320×256 screen mode as recommended on the following page but this did not help with the speed issue.

https://www.riscosopen.org/wiki/documentation/show/Software%20compatibility%20list

Does anyone know how to get this game running perfectly on a Raspberry Pi 4 using either RISC OS Direct or RISC OS Open?

Many thanks

Darren

I don’t have an rpi 4, so not able test this.

All my patch does is remove the 26 bit only code. Anything else is beyond the scope.

All my patch does is remove the 26 bit only code.

The patch does work here on an RPi4B here but with the slight oddity that on first run if fails in the unsqeeze section, a second run does complete and saves a 32bit application.

*!Run
Word at &0000CCF4 was &E1A0F008 altered to &EF000011
Internal error: undefined instruction at &00012B84
*!Run
Word at &0000CCF4 was &E1A0F008 altered to &EF000011
Byte at &00008002 was &00 altered to &A0
Byte at &00008003 was &FB altered to &E1
...

When I run the game from the default RISC OS Direct desktop the colours are good but the game plays far too slow and the screen is squashed.

The game runs at a satisfactory speed but the aspect ratio is wrong.

I don’t have AcornMode.

HTH.

A quick test on RPCEmu 4.02 ran just fine with the correct aspect ratio. With RPCEmu 5.29 all good also and the 32bit patch runs fully without error.

Many thanks @David Pitt. When I ran Jeff’s patch for the second time it did seem to run to completion. The game still however runs slightly too slow with the screen squashed.

I have tried running the game via Aemulor but this does not seem to make any difference to the speed issue or the squashed screen.

@DavidS: Can !ArchiEmu be ran from RISC OS direct or is it meant to run under Windows? I found a download of this but it just contained a !Boot folder, an EXAMPLES folder and an OTHERS folder. Can I use this to run TwinWorld from RISC OS Direct? I wasn’t sure what to do with it.

I looked into AnyMode but when I read the readme I found that this was already installed on Bootup (under RISC OS Direct) because it can be found in directory $.!Boot.Choices.Boot.PreDesk

The file placed in this directory had the same size and date as the version that I downloaded.

Is there a mode I need to switch to before running the game, to prevent it from being stretched? According to the following page it needs to be ran in 320×256 screen mode. How do I do this, and is there any way to automatically enter this mode when the game is launched via the icon? I tried changing the resolution in the bottom right hand corner (monitor icon) without success.

https://www.riscosopen.org/wiki/documentation/show/Software%20compatibility%20list

@David Pitt: I will look into RPCEmu but it would be great if I can get this game running perfectly from my Pi 4 under RISC OS direct.

I feel the game runs slightly too slow under RISC OS direct but it’s still playable, but not quite as enjoyable at the slightly slower speed. Perhaps it will feel faster if the screen isn’t squashed so much. Is there any way of adjusting the speed of the game? I do have a programming background under Windows but I’ve never done any programming for RISC OS.

Many thanks for all the replies.

Darren

I have managed to get it running pefectly. When I opened the !Run file, I found the following settings which I tweaked as shown below.

| Twin World, version 1.60 (30 August 1998)
| Program by James Byrne (jbyrne@gol.com)

Set TwinWorld$Dir <Obey$Dir>
Set TwinWorld$Ver 2
RMEnsure UtilityModule 3.50 Set TwinWorld$Ver 1

I am so pleased to be able to play this game again. The big question now is how do you save the game? I got as far as the dark forest before I fixed the issues but i couldn’t remember how to save. I should have read all the read me’s before playing the game again tonight. I thought you could only save at the main sections of the game.

!ArchiEmu

ArchiEmu is a RISC OS application.

@ Darren

squashed screen.

That is caused by AnyMode (which is why you have the same behaviour on patched and Aemulor). There is nothing you can do about it, AnyMode is not an “up-scaler” and, even if it was, there would be need to upscale maintaining 4:3 ratio (not 16:9) which would lead you to have a square picture in the middle of your screen with big black columns on each side.

In alternative you can use !ArchiEmu (as mentioned by DavidS and others) in a Window. in that case the 4:3 nature of the original screen mode will be surely preserved and to increase playability you can tweak !ArchiEmu to improve performances if needed. Also in my personal experience !ArchiEmu works better than other emulators on RISC OS.

One minor point about ArchiEmu: The zip file has the !ArchiEmu application inside !Boot.Resources, but if you want you can install it elsewhere and run it with a double-click in the usual way.

It’s delivered inside !Boot.Resources (with an instruction to run Boot Merge) so that the supplied examples will run without you having to explicitly start !ArchiEmu. The distribution “helpfully” mentions this inside !ArchiEmu’s !Help file, which you won’t find unless you think to look inside !Boot.Resources in the first place…

That is caused by AnyMode (which is why you have the same behaviour on patched and Aemulor). There is nothing you can do about it, AnyMode is not an “up-scaler” and, even if it was, there would be need to upscale maintaining 4:3 ratio (not 16:9) which would lead you to have a square picture in the middle of your screen with big black columns on each side.

This is curious. When I use KinoAmp in full screen mode without video overlays, if AnyMode is detected, it will use use a screen mode corresponding to the size of the video. 4:3 DVDs are shown with the correct aspect ratio, no problem here (PI3).

Edit: I just changed mode to 640×480 on the desktop and aspect ration was correct with black bars on the sides.

Edit2: Didn’t see discussion moved from Pi to RPCEmu. AnyMode just lets you select any mode for machines that are capable of automatically rescaling the image. The PI graphic’s processor maintains the aspect ratios, I dunno what RPCEmu (or the library it uses) does.

Good point,
not sure, I stopped using AnyMode etc. I just run old software in !ArchiEmu (or on the original Acorn HW) these days, easier and works fine in windowed mode and full screen. So not much need for Aemulor/AnyModes and alike tbh.

I like this game. I seem to remember pressing S when at the score screen saves.

I got the game running perfectly in the end by setting the screen mode to 320×256. More details can be found in my post on 1st September at 8:09 pm.

Graeme: Many thanks for suggesting pressing S on the score screen in order to save. I will give this a try.

squashed screen.

Most widescreen monitors will show 4:3 aspect signals correctly, a few ignore the aspect ratio and display stretched, others may have an option to preserve aspect ratios.

The big question now is how do you save the game?

Try reading the Help, which is in the form of a StrongHelp manual, accessible from the ‘Help’ application menu. This tells you that you can save when you’ve completed a level and the amulet is being displayed on the screen. The default save key is ‘S’, but you can customise all the keys to something else if you want (see the help).

Updating TwinWorld to work properly on modern RISC OS is on my to-do list, but so far down it’s unlikely to happen any time in the forseeable future!

Updating TwinWorld to work properly on modern RISC OS is on my to-do list

I can help you with this, drop me an email (jon at JASPP dot org dot uk) as I’d also like to have a private conversation about potentially making the game available via JASPP.