Action Soccer Windows 98 SE installation

[Turaltay]

Hello everyone,

i am trying to install Action Soccer (1995) on my Windows 98 SE guest system in PCem. The installation is not starting, because the game says: "You need more 5KB free to run".
The game manual says that this game needs 560KB free conventional memory to run. This is what i get if i enter MEM in the DOS prompt:

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Speichertyp         Gesamt =   Belegt +    Frei
----------------  --------   --------   --------
Konventionell         640K       100K       540K
Oberer                  0K         0K         0K
Reserviert              0K         0K         0K
XMS-Speicher       65,472K          ?   129,824K
----------------  --------   --------   --------
Speicher gesamt    66,112K          ?   130,364K

Ges. unter 1 MB      640K       100K       540K

EMS-Speicher gesamt                   64M (67,108,864 bytes)
Freier EMS-Speicher                   16M (16,777,216 bytes)  

Seems like i don't have enough free conventional memory. How can i fix that?
Here are my config.sys and autoexec.bat.

config.sys

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device=C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\Display.sys con=(ega,,1)
Country=0,49,850,C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\country.sys
DEVICEHIGH=C:\DOS\OAKCDROM.SYS /D:MSC001

autoexec.bat

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mode con codepage prepare=((850) C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\ega.cpi)
mode con codepage select=850
keyb gr,,C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\keyboard.sys
rem - By WIndows Setup - MSCDEX.EXE /D:MSCD001 /L:D
C:\MOUSE\CTMOUSE.EXE /R2
SET MIDI=SYNTH:1 MAP:E
SET SOUND=C:\PROGRA~2\CREATIVE\CTSND
SET BLASTER=A220 I7 D1 H5 P330 T6

[SarahWalker]

Try :

config.sys

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DEVICEHIGH=C:\DOS\OAKCDROM.SYS /D:MSC001

autoexec.bat

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rem - By WIndows Setup - MSCDEX.EXE /D:MSCD001 /L:D
C:\MOUSE\CTMOUSE.EXE /R2
SET MIDI=SYNTH:1 MAP:E
SET SOUND=C:\PROGRA~2\CREATIVE\CTSND
SET BLASTER=A220 I7 D1 H5 P330 T6

[Turaltay]

Try :

config.sys

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DEVICEHIGH=C:\DOS\OAKCDROM.SYS /D:MSC001

autoexec.bat

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rem - By WIndows Setup - MSCDEX.EXE /D:MSCD001 /L:D
C:\MOUSE\CTMOUSE.EXE /R2
SET MIDI=SYNTH:1 MAP:E
SET SOUND=C:\PROGRA~2\CREATIVE\CTSND
SET BLASTER=A220 I7 D1 H5 P330 T6

Thank you for your post. Do you mean i need to delete everything in my config.sys and autoexec.bat file except this lines? Aren't these lines important?

[UPerschke]

Add to top of config.sys:

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DEVICE=C:\DOS\HIMEM.SYS
DOS=HIGH,UMB

And as Sarah suggested change DEVICE= to DEVICEHIGH= (for all other config.sys DEVICE= entries).
LH or LOADHIGH is the autoexec.bat equivalent to replace LOAD.
There are tons of memory optimization guides out there. A number of them suggest to use memmaker, which is arguable.
Imho for beginners it's good to get some initial guidance, but then manually tweaking what it suggests is usually a better option, after reading more into this topic.

[Turaltay]

Add to top of config.sys:

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DEVICE=C:\DOS\HIMEM.SYS
DOS=HIGH,UMB

And as Sarah suggested change DEVICE= to DEVICEHIGH= (for all other config.sys DEVICE= entries).
LH or LOADHIGH is the autoexec.bat equivalent to replace LOAD.
There are tons of memory optimization guides out there. A number of them suggest to use memmaker, which is arguable.
Imho for beginners it's good to get some initial guidance, but then manually tweaking what it suggests is usually a better option, after reading more into this topic.

I have one question. I looked into my DOS folder in C and it is completely empty. Are things like HIMEM.SYS not included in Windows 98 SE or are they located in a different folder?

[UPerschke]

Oopsie, my bad. HIMEM.SYS is in C:\WINDOWS.

[Turaltay]

I can install the game if i use this configuration for my config.sys and the suggested autoexec.bat:

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DEVICE=C:\WINDOWS\HIMEM.SYS
DOS=HIGH,UMB
DEVICEHIGH=C:\DOS\OAKCDROM.SYS /D:MSC001

This changes my conventional memory to 564K, which is enough for the installation. However, this leads to another problem. After installing the game i can start and use the game menu. But as soon as I start a match, the game hangs up with an overflow error. Seems like this killed my virtual machine, because it just starts with a short "beep" and shows a black screen. I just scrolled through the complete game manual and found this section. It is in german but i think the only important thing here is the code:

/* CONFIG.SYS */

FOLGEND EIN TYPISCHES BEISPIEL EINER CONFIG.SYS-DATEI FÜR ACTION SOCCER

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DEVICE=C:\DOS\HIMEM.SYS: unbedingt notwendig um Zugriff aauf den Speicher zu bekommen

DEVICE=C:\DOS\EMM386.EXE 3200: unbedingt notwendig um 3200KB EMS-Speicher zu bekommen

DOS=HIGH,UMB : unbedingt notwendig um MS-DOS im oberen Speicher zu laden

DEVICEHIGH=C:\MTM\MTMCDAI.SYS /D:MTMIDE01:
Unbedingt notwendig, da es sich hier um den CD-ROM-Driver handelt
Diese Zeile ist unbedingt notwendig und hängt von Ihrem CD-ROM-Laufwerk ab, das Sie besitzen.
Sie finden die genaue Zeile, die Sie kopieren müssen, in der Datei "config.sys" Ihrer Festplatte, indem Sie folgendes eingeben: " Edit config.sys".

DEVICEHIGH=C:\PROSONIC\PROS.SYS P220 I5 D1 E : wahlweise, dies ist der Soundkarten-Driver
Diese Zeile kann wahlweise eigegeben werden, sie hängt von der Soundkarte ab über die Sie verfügen. 
Sie finden die genaue Zeile, die Sie kopieren müssen, in der Datei "config.sys" Ihrer Festplatte, indem Sie folgendes eingeben: " Edit config.sys".

/* AUTOEXEC.BAT */


FOLGEND EIN TYPISCHES BEISPIEL EINER AUTOEXEC.BAT-DATEI FÜR ACTION SOCCER.

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Geben Sie folgendes ein:

ECHO ACTION SOCCER
PROMPT $p$g
PATH C:\;C:\DOS:
die vorigen Zeilen können wahlweise eingegeben werden


Zur Einstellung Ihrer Soundkarte : Wahlweise
SET BLASTER=A220 D1 I5 H1 T4

Zum Start Ihres CD-ROM-Drivers: unbedingt notwendig
LH C:\DOS\MSCDEX.EXE /D:MTMIDE01 /M:10

Anmerkung: Um ein wenig Speicherplatz zu sparen, kann man den Parameter /M:10 herabsetzen. 
Man kann z.B. /M:4 einstellen

Um die deutsche Tastatur einzustellen : wahlweise
LH C:\DOS\KEYB GR, C:\DOS\KEYBOARD.SYS 

I can add the line DEVICE=C:\DOS\EMM386.EXE 3200 to my config.sys or i think it would be C:\WINDOWS\EMM386.EXE 3200 in my case. This changes my free conventional memory again to 540K. Do you think that the game freezes because of this or could it be another problem?

[UPerschke]

Do you think that the game freezes because of this or could it be another problem?

Hard to tell. Have you tried it in Dosbox?

[Turaltay]

Do you think that the game freezes because of this or could it be another problem?

Hard to tell. Have you tried it in Dosbox?

I managed to install and run the game now. I found out that i needed to make a BIN/CUE-File from my Disc. That was the problem why the game crashed. This is what my final config.sys and autoexec.bat looks like:

config.sys

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DEVICE=C:\WINDOWS\HIMEM.SYS
DEVICE=C:\WINDOWS\EMM386.EXE I=B000-B7FF AUTO M3 A=64 H=128 D=256 X=B800-C7FF
DOS=HIGH,UMB
DEVICEHIGH=C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\Display.sys con=(ega,,1)
Country=0,49,850,C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\country.sys
DEVICEHIGH=C:\DOS\OAKCDROM.SYS /D:MSC001

autoexec.bat

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mode con codepage prepare=((850) C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\ega.cpi)
mode con codepage select=850
LH keyb gr,,C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\keyboard.sys
rem - By WIndows Setup - MSCDEX.EXE /D:MSCD001 /L:D
LH C:\MOUSE\CTMOUSE.EXE /R2
SET MIDI=SYNTH:1 MAP:E
SET SOUND=C:\PROGRA~2\CREATIVE\CTSND
SET BLASTER=A220 I7 D1 H5 P330 T6

[RealNC]

For DOS 7 (which comes with Windows 95), the DOS line should look like this:

DOS=HIGH,UMB,AUTO

This might give you a bit more free conventional memory.