[comp.binaries.ibm.pc.d] Stargoose

nx00699@dsac.dla.mil (Gene McManus) (12/26/90)

I just put up 'Stargoose', and as Bill noted in the distribution, this
is an arcade-quality game. My system is a Zenith Z-248, and I've
noticed an interesting thing: when the game is exited, the clock speed
is about 3 times faster than normal. Norton's SI shows system
performance at about 1/3 normal (6.6 vs 2.0). Is anyone else seeing
this?

Another question; what format is the documentation file?

Thanx...
Gene

cpp@cci632.UUCP (Carl P. Petito) (12/28/90)

In article <2297@dsac.dla.mil>, nx00699@dsac.dla.mil (Gene McManus) writes:
> I just put up 'Stargoose', and as Bill noted in the distribution, this
> is an arcade-quality game. ...
> ... the clock speed
> is about 3 times faster than normal. 
> 
> Another question; what format is the documentation file?
> 
> Thanx...
> Gene

I disassembled enough of my BIOS to figure out how to reinit the clock
timer that gets changed by stargoose.  The following is the code; it works
for my XT class clone - your mileage my vary:

	cli
	mov al, 0x36
	out 0x43, al
	mov al, 0x00
	out 0x40, al
	out 0x40, al
	sti

The code puts timer 0 of the 8253 chip back into a divide by 0xffff; I
assume that stargoose needs a faster interrupt rate and hence the divisor
factor was changed for timer 0.

And yes, I know the code could be made more compact, etc; why bother?

And I also ask - what is the documentation format?


Carl Petito

bruce@bmhalh.UUCP (Bruce M. Himebaugh) (12/28/90)

In article <2297@dsac.dla.mil> nx00699@dsac.dla.mil (Gene McManus) writes:
>I just put up 'Stargoose', and as Bill noted in the distribution, this
>is an arcade-quality game. My system is a Zenith Z-248, and I've
>noticed an interesting thing: when the game is exited, the clock speed
>is about 3 times faster than normal. Norton's SI shows system
>performance at about 1/3 normal (6.6 vs 2.0). Is anyone else seeing
>this?

Yep.  I noticed this when I went to play Frac after playing Stargoose.  It
makes the blocks drop much much quicker.

>Another question; what format is the documentation file?

I would also like to know this.

Thanks,

Bruce
--
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   PATHS: uunet!{ncoast,aablue}!fmsystm!mrsmouse!bmhalh!bruce
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dieter@dischw.toppoint.de (dieter fritzsche) (01/03/91)

nx00699@dsac.dla.mil (Gene McManus) writes:

> I just put up 'Stargoose', and as Bill noted in the distribution, this
> is an arcade-quality game. My system is a Zenith Z-248, and I've
> noticed an interesting thing: when the game is exited, the clock speed
> is about 3 times faster than normal. Norton's SI shows system
> performance at about 1/3 normal (6.6 vs 2.0). Is anyone else seeing
> this?
I am wondering on running time, after ending that game, i lost 2 hours of
the day, but now i know, where i lost them.
But an other crazy feature was, that my serial port got out of order and
I need to reboot, to get my modem to work after playing that game, it seemed
to work very hard in the system of my machine, but thats the price for fancy
games or not ?



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