QFG1 VGA crashes in DOSBox

[joebro]

I have an interesting problem. Using the latest version of DOSBox, I start QFG1 VGA and I noticed that when talking to characters and hitting the ESC key to back out of the conversation (rather than clicking on the "Enough already" option) causes the game to crash. The game also crashes sometimes when repeatedly hitting the ESC key. I have received messages like "28526.v56 not found" and "Out of heap space". It's weird. I haven't played long enough to determine if this is going to pose a problem with finishing the game but I hope not.

I used the fantastic QFG Anthology Installer. Check out the screen captures if you're interested.

[Collector]

Download this

DiagnosticTool.exe

(205.04 KiB) Downloaded 421 times

and run it from the game's folder. Post the results here.

[joebro]

Sorry, haven't checked the forums in a while and just read your post.

I ran the diagnostic tool and the .txt file should be attached. I actually enjoy the original EGA version of QFG1 much more so I'm not really concerned with the crashes in the VGA version. I played it for quite some time and didn't experience any crashes other than that I described above.

Enjoy!

[Collector]

I am not seeing anything off hand that would indicate a problem. Does it crash with "Enough already" or only with the Escape key??

[joebro]

I tested out the crash by talking to several of the game characters including the sheriff, the centaur girl, the healer, Zara, and the guildmaster. I click the mouth icon on someone to speak to them and bring up the conversation options, then hit the Esc key to exit the conversation. Then, if you hit the Esc key again it brings up the menu items at the top of the screen; hitting the Esc key yet again causes the crash with the "Oops" message (see screen captures).

If you speak to someone and choose options to go deeper into the conversation, then back out and end the conversation using the Esc key, the game immediately crashes and either gives "Out of heap space" or some code like "28526.v56 not found".

I experimented by backing out of the conversation with the Esc key but ending the conversation by choosing the "Enough already" option and everything seems OK. It looks like ending a conversation with the Esc key sets up the program for a crash.

Pretty weird...

[Collector]

I've tried to replicate this, but cannot. What class are you using? Are you starting from saved games? If so, does it happen with a new hero/game?

[joebro]

I just start a new hero character and I think I randomly picked the fighter character. I have DOSBox installed in the Program Files folder and the game is in my SIERRA folder in the root directory (C:\). I haven't tested it out with saved games or anthing.

By the way, I'm plying from the Anthology version.

[Collector]

As I said, I cannot replicate this error. This is with version 2 of the game (same as the Anthology's version) and with a new fighter. I looked through the resources of the game and there is no 28526.v56 view resource used in the game. The out of heap error is a memory issue that can sometimes be caused by the use of patches or drivers nor meant for the game, but I see nothing in the game's folder that should not be there, unless you replaced, say, the SB driver. I'm beginning to think that perhaps one of the files is corrupted. Give me a few days and I'll go over the installer's script and see if I can find anything. After I do a new build, delete the game's folder, download the installer again and reinstall it.

[magumba]

was this every solved? I'm seeing this type of thing now on 2 machines. I'm using the QFG collection installer. Attached is the diagnostic text. The wife used the same installer on her laptop, but has been playing QFG4 with no problems. She is using Win 7 home, my laptop has win 7 enterprise, and my desktop has win 7 ultimate.

The game starts, i walk into town (chose the thief every time is that makes a difference), talk to the sheriff for the first point, then i can't really do much else most of the time. It's crashed with the resource error when trying to talk to Otto, I've seen the "You've done something unexpected", now most of the time it just locks up with no error when I try to save it. I've tried installing everything into several different types of directories, different drives, etc with no luck. I haven't tried the other games yet.

[Collector]

It looks like you have nothing missing from your installed directory, nor anything wrong with you config. I have tried multiple times to replicate the crash, but cannot. Did you download the installer from here? Have you tried to add any extra patches? Does QfG1VGA crash on your wife's PC? If not, does it crash if you copy over the QfG1VGA folder from her PC to yours?

[magumba]

Good suggestions. I did download the installer from this site. I didn't add any patches or anything. I did get it to crash on my wife's machine. She created a guy, didn't put any points in him, and just started the game. That didn't seem to crash. I created a guy on her machine with exactly what i was doing on mine. While it didn't give the exact error that I can duplicate on mine, it did give an error and crash. Here is exactly the steps i'm following.

1. Launch QFG1 VGA
2. Click through the beginning statements
3. Escape out of the Sierra logo
4. Create new Hero
5. Double click Thief
6. Name: Magumba
7. Roll over Magic, hit right arrow once to learn the skill.
8. Roll over Parry, hit hit right arrow once to learn the skill.
9. Roll over Luck, hit right until no more points are available (should end up with 30 pts total).
10. Click "Start".
11. Left click through the dialog.
12. Right click twice to cycle to the lips
13. Talk to the sheriff to get your first point
14. hit escape to exit out of his dialog set
15. left click on Otto to speak to him

Sometimes it just locks up, most times I get the "Opp! you did something unexpected" with different error codes. On the wife's PC, i got "You get no response." as expected, but when I hit it a second time, I got a missing resource error. Hope that helps to replicate it. I've tried different names, using points, not using points, putting points in different areas, nothing made a difference.

Actually, i may be onto something. From what I've tested, it seems that hitting ESC to get out of a dialog box instead of using the "Enough Already" breaks it. I opened up the sheriff's dialog, closed it with Enough Already, and I can click on otto all day. After closing the dialog with ESC, i clicked on the sheriff again and it crashed. Noob actually mentioned the ESC key earier in this thread, so maybe that's the issue all together. i will play some late with just using the mouse as the interaction for everything and see how that goes.

[Collector]

I was able to replicate it with the escape button. I have always dismissed dialog boxes with the mouse, so never encountered it. I removed all patch files and it still crashed at the same point, so it is in the base game, not introduced in one of the patches. It seems to be something with the handling of the escape key in the game's main script. The way it seems to refer to phantom VIEW resources makes me suspect that this function was carried over from whatever game was used for the template and was never caught. The beta testers fro the game must have all used the mouse to dismiss dialogs, too, or they would have caught the bug. I'll continue to play with it and see what I can find out with a Debug build of DOSBox. I might be able to make some fill-in VIEW resources to stand in for what it is looking for, but it will probably require someone capable of making SCI patches to create a proper script patch.

Thanks for reporting how to duplicate the error. At least there seems to be the reasonable workaround of using the mouse to dismiss dialogs instead of the escape key for time being.

[Tawmis]

Hey Collector, should you make mention of this on the QFG page (and use the screen shots above) to say, "Hey, if you're getting this error, don't press ESCAPE, use the mouse to dismiss the error" or something - so that it's easily seen on the QFG section of the page?

[joebro]

Funny how some discussions never go away, especially on the internet...was surprised to find a message update in my e-mail.

Just wanted to say what a great job you've done with the site, it's a great resource for Sierra fans. My laptop PC died on me not to long ago and I decided to get a Mac (my brother works for Apple and convinced me). I have to say it's working out pretty good but the awesome Sierra Installers from this site aren't designed for Mac but Alan Bestor has done a pretty awesome job as well with Boxer. Also, I was ecstatic to find that MT-32 ROM support has been implemented (at least with the Mac version of DOSBox); I remember trolling for an actual MT-32 on eBay and got you. It was pretty incredible seeing it in action.

Anyway, I haven't played the QFG 1 VGA version in Boxer so I don't know if this error occurs there as well...more than likely. Interesting, nonetheless. Take care.

J

[Collector]

The problem is in the game's script, so I would be very surprised if it did not occur in Boxer as well.

Just so you know, Boxer does not use an official build of DOSBox, though I believe that he is finally talking to the DOSBox devs. I did have someone that had looked into Mac versions of my NSIS scripts, but he didn't have time to get very far. I would be more than willing to host any Mac versions of my installers if someone was able and willing to script them.