SCUMM source code

[john_doe]

True, but different games have different requirements. Some may need other video drivers than others, some are 16bit-games that need XMS/EMS drivers set up correctly. If you'd run it under ScummVM you wouldn't have to fumble around with your config.sys/autoexec.bat for different games but only adjust them for ScummVM to work.
Also, afaik some games had bugs in their original DOS versions that have been fixed/worked around in ScummVM.
Also, it's more or less easy to just use the SDL backend/windows fs and port it to DOS. You could, for example, just write some SDL interface-compatible wrappers around the Allegro (or some other lib) functions, and try to keep as much of the SDL backend untouched. You'd be more or less implementing a small subset of SDL for DOS

[timofonic]

That seems more messy than writing an Allegro backend.

I found the following DOS Extenders...

• * HX - It seems an interesting DOS Extender, includes Win32 PE file format support and a Win32 API emulation layer.
  * DOS/32 - It's an open-source DOS Extender which can be used as a drop-in replacement for the popular DOS/4GW DOS Extender and compatibles.
  * WDosX - It's a free 32 bit DOS extender with a fair subset of DPMI 0.9 functions as well as an extended DOS INT 21 API. It features a true flat (zero based) memory model and support for DLLs as well as executable compression.
  * X32 and X32VM - are DOS extenders based on the DOSX extender that was shipped with the Zortech and Symantec compilers. Built to be small and fast, thse 32bit DOS extenders offer new capabilities such as protected mode TSR support. X-32VM adds a virtual memory manager to the package to provide powerful 32bit capabilities to DOS programmers.

And...
http://www.talula.demon.co.uk/freebe/

[PsYcO]

True, but different games have different requirements. Some may need other video drivers than others, some are 16bit-games that need XMS/EMS drivers set up correctly. If you'd run it under ScummVM you wouldn't have to fumble around with your config.sys/autoexec.bat for different games but only adjust them for ScummVM to work.
Also, afaik some games had bugs in their original DOS versions that have been fixed/worked around in ScummVM.
Also, it's more or less easy to just use the SDL backend/windows fs and port it to DOS. You could, for example, just write some SDL interface-compatible wrappers around the Allegro (or some other lib) functions, and try to keep as much of the SDL backend untouched. You'd be more or less implementing a small subset of SDL for DOS

i thought that was the whole point of svcummvm...

[timofonic]

True, but different games have different requirements. Some may need other video drivers than others, some are 16bit-games that need XMS/EMS drivers set up correctly. If you'd run it under ScummVM you wouldn't have to fumble around with your config.sys/autoexec.bat for different games but only adjust them for ScummVM to work.
Also, afaik some games had bugs in their original DOS versions that have been fixed/worked around in ScummVM.
Also, it's more or less easy to just use the SDL backend/windows fs and port it to DOS. You could, for example, just write some SDL interface-compatible wrappers around the Allegro (or some other lib) functions, and try to keep as much of the SDL backend untouched. You'd be more or less implementing a small subset of SDL for DOS

i thought that was the whole point of svcummvm...

Yes, and DOS can be a possible platform for it. Probably a DOS port using Allegro can have less computer requeriments and it could be a nice way of recycling old hardware for playing the ScummVM supported games

Remember there are communities of DOS users over the internet and still people use old computers with some DOS variant as their main machines. You can use DOS for connect to internet: chat, email, ftp, nfs, ...

http://home.arachne.cz

http://vogons.zetafleet.com
http://dos.skillreactor.org

[md5]

btw arachne = spider in Greek nice name for a browser