Ultimate King's Quest 4 with Amiga sounds and Munt
Posted: Sun Aug 02, 2020 8:33 pm
The Ultimate King's Quest IV
There are several versions of Sierra's first SCI game, "King's Quest IV: The Perils of Rosella". In addition to revisions of the PC version, there were ports for other platforms. These ports often had different features based on what the abilities of the target platform. The Amiga port had digital sound effects for environmental sounds, which was missing from the PC version. NewRisingSun, famous for his timer bug patches for several problematic SCI games and SCI sound driver hacks has created a patch to add these environmental sounds from the Amiga version to the PC version.
The original NRS KQ4 patch only worked with the PC version 1.000.111 and required the extracted files from the Amiga version 1.023. You had to install the Amiga version in an emulator like WinUAE to get the files for his patch to extract the Amiga audio resources. This can be involved if you do not already have an emulator setup. It also used some DOS based tools to modify the files, so his patch had to be run in DOSBox for anyone on x64 Windows.
This installer uses a binary level difference patch that automatically patches the game. It will work with PC versions 1.000.111 and 1.006.004 with no need to extract the audio resources from the Amiga version. This is all done completely from Windows, even x64. This installer also takes advantage of a special build of DOSBox with Munt for Roland sound.
There are several versions of Sierra's first SCI game, "King's Quest IV: The Perils of Rosella". In addition to revisions of the PC version, there were ports for other platforms. These ports often had different features based on what the abilities of the target platform. The Amiga port had digital sound effects for environmental sounds, which was missing from the PC version. NewRisingSun, famous for his timer bug patches for several problematic SCI games and SCI sound driver hacks has created a patch to add these environmental sounds from the Amiga version to the PC version.
The end result is a version that combines all of the best features from the various versions and can be played in DOSBox with the higher detailed graphics, improved sprite movement, Roland MT-32 music with the Amiga sound effects and the AGI "beam me" Easter egg.NewRisingSun wrote:In my view, there is no "perfect" version of KQ4:
[*]PC version 1.000.106 and 1.000.111 are the only ones with the original detailed graphics. For later versions (1.003.006 onwards), Sierra would simplify the background graphics to make the game fit on one 5.25 inch diskette, removing background detail and separate night pictures.
See http://queststudios.com/smf/index.php/topic,2802.0.html
[*]PC version 1.006.004 is the latest PC version and has the main character walking faster diagonally. It also changes the arrangement for the Fisherman's theme (for the better), and replaces "Lolotte's death" music with a completely different (more appropriate) tune.
[*]Amiga Version 1.023 is the only one with environmental sound effects, and a few additional incidental sound effects as well. The music is horrendous on the other hand.
[*]AGI version 2.0 is the only one with the "beam me" Easter egg.
I therefore tried to combine the best from all versions. So far, I have succeeded combining the first three. I am releasing this as a preliminary patch in the event that someone wants to try it.
The original NRS KQ4 patch only worked with the PC version 1.000.111 and required the extracted files from the Amiga version 1.023. You had to install the Amiga version in an emulator like WinUAE to get the files for his patch to extract the Amiga audio resources. This can be involved if you do not already have an emulator setup. It also used some DOS based tools to modify the files, so his patch had to be run in DOSBox for anyone on x64 Windows.
This installer uses a binary level difference patch that automatically patches the game. It will work with PC versions 1.000.111 and 1.006.004 with no need to extract the audio resources from the Amiga version. This is all done completely from Windows, even x64. This installer also takes advantage of a special build of DOSBox with Munt for Roland sound.