Loading Uae4all Games With Multiple Disks


skaboy

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Mar 10, 2006
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Dear all,

I've just taken delivery of Amiga Forever and am having problems loading games with more than two disks. I know this isn't an emulator, Kick ROM (I've got 1.3, 512kb) or Workbench issue as I've got some two disk games working.

Pinball Dreams, for example is on two disks. I insert disk 1 into DF0 and disk 2 in DF1 and it runs fine with settings adjustments. When I try to load a game with more than two disks though, I run into problems.

I'll use Pinball Fantasies as an example:

I'm trying to Load the Pinball Fantasies image set: (1992) (21st Century) (disk 1 of 3), (disk 2 of 3), (disk 3 of 3); all ADF files. There are other Pinball Fantasies image sets on the Amiga Forever DVDs, with suffixes like [cr SKR], [PDY], [HCC], [AGA] etc: am I just using the wrong set? I don't believe so as Pinball Fantasies works up to a point. Here's what happens:

I load UAE4all and do the following within the menu:

Load image disk: L (I press "L")

Select ROM: within my ROMs folder, I select Pinball Fantasies disk 1 and place it in drive DF0 by pressing B. I then load (press L) disk 2 into DF1 by pressing X.

Back at the menu, I enter the following settings:

Emu Bias: CPU
Frame skip: 2
GP2X overclock: 250mhz
Sound: off
Status ln: off (what is this anyway?)
Drive LED: on

I've found these to be the best settings for runnning Pinball Dreams (thanks to Critical).

I press R to run and Pinball Fantasies loads.

After the 21st Century and Digital Illusions flash screens, I'm given two tables to choose from by pressing F1 or F2. I press R to activate the virtual keyboard and Y to press F1, which is highlighted.

The screen turns black and the battery light is on, even though I'm running from the mains and have removed the batteries. I assume that the battery light is emulating the drive LED as I left this setting on in the menu?

I wait for up to ten minutes, long after the battery / drive light has gone out and the screen just remains blank. I expect a prompt to insert disk 3 but nothing happens.

I've further tried inserting disk 3 anyway:

I press Select to return to the emulator.

I eject the disk in DF1 by pressing Y, then load disk 3 in DF1 by pressing X.

I hit R to run but get a blank screen again.

Help!

I've also tried loading Pinball Illusions (4 disks) but just get the Workbench screen with disks 1 and 2 in DF0 and DF1 respectively.

Am I using the wrong set of disk images or doing something else, equally obvious, wrong?

Amiga Forever has cost me and I'd like to get some games running from it.

Apologies for length but I figure a detailed account will help to identify where I'm going wrong.

Many thanks in advance for any help.
 
I just found and read the wiki on game compatibility with the UAE4all and it would appear that Pinball Fantasies and Illusions haven't been tested on the GP. Maybe they'll never work or maybe they will with some UAE4all development.

If I've answered my own question with "it's not possible to run these games", then case closed. If I'm missing something though, please let me know.
 
It's been a long time since I last played Pinball Fantasies and my memory is crap so this could be wrong, but I've got a feeling that 2 tables are on disk 2 and another 2 are on disk 3 (if you insert just the first disk then it should ask you to insert either of the other 2 I think). This doesn't really help you get it working on the gp2x, but if I'm right then it means that you shouldn't be trying to swap disks after you've selected a table and your problem is in another area.
 
woogal posted on Apr 3 2006 at 03:03 PM said:
It's been a long time since I last played Pinball Fantasies and my memory is crap so this could be wrong, but I've got a feeling that 2 tables are on disk 2 and another 2 are on disk 3 (if you insert just the first disk then it should ask you to insert either of the other 2 I think). This doesn't really help you get it working on the gp2x, but if I'm right then it means that you shouldn't be trying to swap disks after you've selected a table and your problem is in another area.

Now that you mention it, I have the same recollection; and indeed, inserting just disk 1 in DF0 does lead to a prompt screen: "Please insert a course disk in any drive".

Inserting disk 2 into DF1: Tables 1 and 2 appear; select either, then black screen.

Inserting disk 2 into DF0: "Please insert course disk 1 into any drive" briefly, before tables 1 and 2 appear; select either then black screen.

Inserting disk 3 into DF1: Tables 3 and 4 appear; select either then black screen.

Inserting disk 3 into DF0: "Please insert course disk 2 into any drive" briefly, before tables 3 and 4 appear; select either then black screen.

I noticed that after selecting a table, there is no activity from the battery light / disk LED: it seems that it just won't load the tables. With Pinball Dreams, the tables load with the game, so maybe this is the issue.

Perhaps we should report this in the wiki compatibility table, to save others' time?
 
Last edited by a moderator:
I was just looking at Pinball Fantasies on Hall of Light:

http://hol.abime.net/1056

The table selection screen shows all four tables, under the legend "Welcome to Pinball Fantasies AGA". Maybe I need to be loading the [AGA] version as it would appear to load differently?
 
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