Heroes of Might and Magic III Dreamcast unreleased community fundraiser

[Arcadia]

As this is a Windows CE game, there exists a strong possibility to patch in some missing parts from the PC version if it gets to that point. I wish the source code was available for this, but next best thing would be modding in stuff from the PC version if possible. As we all know, thbose Windows CE ports are very close to the way the PC counterparts were file and format wise. Half-Life and 4X4 Evo are very modable.

Don't get my hopes up man!

 

[Wombat]

Keep on getting back to this thread to see if the fundraiser is already up, can't wait to see this one out in the wild!

 

[neo]

+1

 

[thedoctor45]

Just fyi, the actual fundraiser link is now posted over here:

Heroes of Might and Magic III Dreamcast unreleased community fundraiser

Hi! The fundraiser is now LIVE! : http://gf.me/u/xrpssv It has been created by Jan with my consent. You can put the link in all forums, blogs and Dreamcast fan sites you want. I've always wondered about that Louise!

www.obscuregamers.com

 

[KGRAMR]

Awesome to see yet another unreleased Dreamcast title being finally preserved! I hope we can all see DC Deer Hunter being released as well someday...

 

[thedoctor45]

Awesome to see yet another unreleased Dreamcast title being finally preserved! I hope we can all see DC Deer Hunter being released as well someday...

If this release manages to get funded, Test Drive Cycles will most likely be next in the list.

 

[FatalistDC]

Hi!

The fundraiser has finished, thank you very much to all people who have contributed and all the people interested in the game.

I have uploaded Heroes III to Mediafire. I have 2 dumps of the game and I have uploaded the 2 GDI dumps so you can compare the checksums if you want. I checked the GD Ripper console after finishing both dumps without any sector related errors in the log. Photo below.

Heroes III first dump:

http://www.mediafire.com/file/ryc0mb87nu86gdm/HeroesIII_1stRip.zip/file

Heroes III second dump:

http://www.mediafire.com/file/d4vfkwcz9iufdmd/HeroesIII_2ndRip.zip/file

Nero or Discjuggler images soon.

When you play the game please note that it is a beta (v0.800) and therefore there are expected or unexpected bugs and crashes.

thedoctor45 has posted in Dreamcast Talk forum a very interesting report of the german developer about why was the game canceled. Please read it:

https://www.dreamcast-talk.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=12659&start=90#p127486

 

[Anthony817]

Awesome thanks so much! Eagerly hoping for and anticipating Test Drive Cycles!

 

[accel99]

Thank you. Surprisingly this doesnt work with demul. Ill wait till someone games a thorough video.

 

[thedoctor45]

From what I was able to test, the files only seem to be working properly with either the GD-EMU or the USB-GD.
DreamShell has some weird issue where the controller just stops responding after you enter the main menu but that could be due to my hardware setup...

I'm working on getting this converted into CDI format but I've been running into some problems so it might take a little longer than expected.

 

[fafadou]

What the n'est things to do with those isos ?
It's possible to mix it ?
Have you notice diffrences between them ?

@thedoctor45 : I'm not familiar with wince games. What the best way to build a cdi please ?

 

[FatalistDC]

Thank you. Surprisingly this doesnt work with demul. Ill wait till someone games a thorough video.

Yes, it does not work with Demul, I tried it too.

 

[FatalistDC]

From what I was able to test, the files only seem to be working properly with either the GD-EMU or the USB-GD.
DreamShell has some weird issue where the controller just stops responding after you enter the main menu but that could be due to my hardware setup...

I'm working on getting this converted into CDI format but I've been running into some problems so it might take a little longer than expected.

What's your hardware setup? If you have the loader v0.7.0b2 the game stops responding like that. The only benefit I saw with that loader in the game is that the sound of the intro is correct.
With the loader of DreamShell 4.0 RC4 game runs ok but the sound of the intro of the game is not ok. Notice that the Load game option hangs the game if you don't have a VMU on the controller.

I've had trouble creating nrg or cdi image as well.

 

[Anthony817]

What the n'est things to do with those isos ?
It's possible to mix it ?
Have you notice diffrences between them ?

@thedoctor45 : I'm not familiar with wince games. What the best way to build a cdi please ?

It is from the same source disc. It was only dumped 2 separate times due to bad sectors. So one version may have good files the other has bad sectors from.

 

[darcagn]

It is from the same source disc. It was only dumped 2 separate times due to bad sectors. So one version may have good files the other has bad sectors from.

They are the exact same files.

 

[darcagn]

Here's a CDI release for those who want to play on original hardware.
45000 style layout, nothing removed or downsampled, original sort order carried over, dummied to just under 80min.

I haven't really tested it much other than loading up a single player game successfully.

MEGA

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mega.nz

 

[fafadou]

With dreamshell you have a loader 0.7.b3 and try the 0.7.b1 it gives excellent result

 

[thedoctor45]

What's your hardware setup? If you have the loader v0.7.0b2 the game stops responding like that. The only benefit I saw with that loader in the game is that the sound of the intro is correct.
With the loader of DreamShell 4.0 RC4 game runs ok but the sound of the intro of the game is not ok. Notice that the Load game option hangs the game if you don't have a VMU on the controller.

I've had trouble creating nrg or cdi image as well.

I was actually not able to get the game to run correctly on any loader version using my NTSC-U Dreamcast. I'm beginning to think that the problem is somehow related to the region code of the game - from my observation, the controller freezing issue happens (mostly) on NTSC-U (and probably also NTSC-J Dreamcasts) my PAL Dreamcast does seem to run it correctly.

Maybe someone with more experience in hacking DC games can find a solution to this.

PS: Setting the async read option from "true" to "16" in ISOLoader setting helps with the audio problems in loader version 0.6.X

 

[fafadou]

The 0.6.x beta is not good for hdd, only for shenmue I, try the 0.6.1_gcc_7.1.
If there is no cdda, the best result will be with 0.7x loaders.
You have to defrag the hdd to use them as you probably know already.

If the game is not region free, I patch the IP.BIN and run gdibuilder. But for me it's not working, the track01.bin is still the same. Probably someone like @FamilyGuy may help.

 

[thedoctor45]

the burned CDI version does boot on an NTSC-U unit but the controller stops responding just like it does when using DreamShell so it is definitely a hardware related problem.