Windows 98 SE PC and digital distribution platforms

Sikorsky

Heya!

I'm building vintage Windows 98 PC. Do you know if old games from GoG/Steam will work with '98? They don't listed '98 support, but games like original BG, Blood, Doom, Tomb Rider, Quake are before XP so I'm bit confused. Will it be possible or should I look for my old CD's and ebay for CD/DVD versions of the games.

Son_of_Imoen

I don't think there's a way to tell beforehand. You'll just have to try and find out, or be told about the experience of others on a game-for-game basis.

The thing is, GOG, in making the games work on modern platforms, might or might not in doing so break compatibility with pre-XP Windows OS's. But when XP support is listed and Windows '98 isn't, they're in no way obligated to tell or even try to figure out if compatibility with an older OS is broken.

For an ultimate vintage experience as well as for being sure of compatibility, you're better off playing from the original CD's.

jjstraka34

Some games will undoubtedly run BETTER on the OS they were originally made for. But if you spend any time on the GOG or Steam fourms, you know that often times hiccups and problems can boil down to an individual computer, much less an operating system. The thing with GOG is that a vast number of their games are simply pre-configured DOS-Box command prompts and a tool to modify the settings without opening the config file. When it comes to GOG, your main issue is how well your Windows 98 PC runs DOSBox. I have to agree that this is a situation where box copies are your best bet.

AstroBryGuy

Why would a Windows 98 PC need DOSBox? It's built on a version of MS-DOS and can launch a virtual DOS machine to run DOS programs.

jjstraka34

AstroBryGuy said:

Why would a Windows 98 PC need DOSBox? It's built on a version of MS-DOS and can launch a virtual DOS machine to run DOS programs.

I should rephrase....GOG games come set-up to immediately run on DOSBox through a shortcut after install. I am sure there is no reason the actual data that is in the folder can't be used to run on a native DOS system. The only question would be if the GOG installer for each game runs on Windows 98. I suppose there is no reason it wouldn't, but then again, the whole point of GOG existing is that most people no longer have these old operating systems.

Son_of_Imoen

Oh, and as for Steam, check this list for games that run DRM-free: http://steam.wikia.com/wiki/List_of_DRM-free_games

With these games you can install them on an computer with Steam, then copy the game files (using a usb-drive for instance) to a computer without Steam installed and they will play just fine (though sometimes they may need dependencies such as DirectX to run, which Steam would install automatically but you will have to install by yourself now).

I would strongly discourage trying to use Steam or any other form of downloading directly onto your vintage machine as it would need your vintage PC to be connected to the internet, which is a very bad idea as anything pre Vista hasn't had updates for a long time now and is likely to be very vulnerable to exploits, viruses, trojans and the like.