Daggerfall, otherwise known as Elder Scrolls II, is a massive, non-linear RPG. It is different from its successors, Skyrim, Oblivion, and Morrowind, in that it is focused on a massive random universe rather than graphics. No two games in Daggerfall will be alike although the gameplay element is the same.
[edit: Rather than fix the problems with getting Daggerfall to work on your machine, Ancestral Ghost has compiled a version that works immediately after download and installation. It's the total Daggerfall package. "DaggerfallSetup is a ready to play Daggerfall install compatible with modern Windows Systems. The game already includes patch 2.13 and the official CompUSA Special Edition questpack, and will work with an already configured DosBox. You can install all unofficial fixes at this time via options, as well as new quests and translations." You can find it here.]
This game is difficult to get to work on modern machines, but there are some tricks. If you are new to playing old Dos games on XP or Vista, then read through the following.
1. Download Daggerfall.
2. Go to your C drive and create a folder called Dosgames.
3. Go and download DosBox .73. The top link on that page is for Windows. You can also download DosBox for many other operating systems.
4. In the start menu, use the DosBox Config selection. This will open a text file. Under [dosbox] there is a line marked memsize=16. Change 16 to 32. (Tip - An easy way to find memsize is to do a search [ctrl-f] for "memsize"). If you have an LCD monitor, you may wish to scroll up to [render] and change aspect=false to aspect=true. If desired, change fullscreen=false to fullscreen=true under [sdl]. Close and save.
5. Extract the Daggerfall zip file to c:\dosgames. This will create two directories, dagger and dfcd. If you do not have a good extraction program, I recommend 7Zip. It's quick and easy to use.
6. Run dosbox. Type the following, hitting enter after each:
mount c c:\dosgames -freesize 1000
mount d c:\dosgames\dfcd -t cdrom -label Daggerfall
D:
INSTALL
The Daggerfall install program will run. Leave it windowed, do not enlarge it.
7. Select "Install the Game to your Hard Drive". Change the install size to Huge. Agree to wherever it wants to install it (The Installation states that it will install on c:\dagger but really it is going to install at c:\dosgames\dagger because of the way we mounted the directories into DosBox), that's where we want it anyway. Click, "Go ahead and install the game".
8. After installation is over, it will run the sound set-up program. Use the keyboard keys to highlight auto detect, then press enter. Go with whatever it finds. Got to select midi. For this we want Sound Blaster 16, and Port 388, which should be the default. Click Ok on the screens until you exit installation. This will return us to the Dos-Box screen. Isn't it great that we no longer have to configure sound every time we get a new game?
9. Type dag213. This will run the update. Answer yes to both questions.
10. At this point we can type Dagger and run the game.
11. Every time you load dos box to run the game in the future you will need to type..
mount c c:\dosgames -freesize 1024
mount d c:\dosgames\dfcd -t cdrom -label Daggerfall
c:
cd dagger
dagger
****
The following is optional.
If you do not have other dos games and do not plan on using DosBox for any other game except Daggerfall, you can do the followng to make DosBox a permanent Daggerfall machine.
Go back to DosBox's Config file again. Scroll to the bottom. You will see this line: [autoexec]. Anything entered below this will run automatically every time DosBox is launched.
To run the game automatically when DosBox is launched, copy the below to your file, below [autoexec]:
mount c c:\dosgames -freesize 1024
mount d c:\dosgames\dfcd -t cdrom -label Daggerfall
c:
cd dagger
dagger
Then save the file and closed.
****
This step is not necessary unless you are getting "daggerfall has encountered an internal error at 0". Skip until you try the game. Open Notepad. Go to c:\dosgames\dagger, change file type to "all files", and open z.cfg. Make sure that the cd path is correct. It should read pathcd d:\dagger\arena2\.
[edit: Rather than fix the problems with getting Daggerfall to work on your machine, Ancestral Ghost has compiled a version that works immediately after download and installation. It's the total Daggerfall package. "DaggerfallSetup is a ready to play Daggerfall install compatible with modern Windows Systems. The game already includes patch 2.13 and the official CompUSA Special Edition questpack, and will work with an already configured DosBox. You can install all unofficial fixes at this time via options, as well as new quests and translations." You can find it here.]
