running Might & Magic on Android

[MicoSelva]

So, I've tried to run Might & Magic IV on my android phone using free aDosBox app.
It runs surprisingly well, but is unplayable due to control scheme. Either You have half of the screen taken by a virtual keyboard, or no keys available to control Your party.
Mouse emulation leaves a lot to be desired. But if the game can be controlled with mouse alone (+4 keys and/or joystick) it may be somewhat playable, if troublesome. Luckily the game is turn based.

No keyboard:

With keyboard:

External picture:

Maybe someone has had better results (with different apps, or dome nice configuration of aDosBox). If so, I'll welcome any hints.

 

[FeelTheRads]

There's DosBox Turbo which is supposed to be the best DosBox port for Android, but I never tried it. Might have better control emulation?

Edit: Anyway, I was never able to play real games on a touch screen. It just sucks. Keyboard or mouse, it just can't be replaced by a touch screen.

 

[J_C]

Someone should do a direct port to Android, so you could use the original buttons of the game with your fingers. Damn those Android modders who blow their time for stupid shit.

 

[SCO]

should be possible (if problematic for hovering or double click), to do a dosbox mouse mode that clicks when the touchpad is touched anywhere on screen by default.

 

[MicoSelva]

should be possible (if problematic for hovering or double click), to do a dosbox mouse mode that clicks when the touchpad is touched anywhere on screen by default.

This would probably solve 80% of current problems.

 

[SCO]

I'm unsure about this newflanged shit like cell phones; do these varieties have a external button that can be used by the apps somewhere? You could use that as a modifier maybe to set the default back to normal, or just while it's pressed.
keep that pressed when you need to drag something, release it while pressing the interface kind of thing. And you should be able to switch over the default too for other games.

The secret of UI usability is to make the common usecase easy, unfortunately, that requires reconfigurability and divergence if your platform is not fascist (ex: apple, nintendo).

Actually, clicking on screen -> clicking on game might very well be problematic because some games are probably doing their own thing with the mouse driver and using relative movement; it would probably not work on all games.

 

[MicoSelva]

These new phones have 3-4 physical buttons at most (power, volume up, volume down and, sometimes, home), plus two soft buttons (back and menu), so there's not a wide array of possibility for reconfiguration.

aDosBox has reconfigurable on-screen buttons (8-10 in total): 4 for joystick emulation and 4 (possible 6) for "quick-keys" (default enter, space, escape and backspace). If a game can be played using only a joystick and 6 keyboard keys then we're all set. As I've never played M&M IV before, I have no idea if these would be enough.

I've also tried the mouse emulation in this app, but it's a real pain to use and would probably result in self-inflicted bodily harm if one was exposed to it for a longer period of time.

It's completely impossible to play with the on-screen keyboard, so that option is out.

DosBox Turbo looks more promising, but it's a paid app (around $4), so I'll need to research it a bit more before I dish out some cash.

 

[Gozma]

6 buttons + a d-pad + some mouse stuff would work. You need ~6 buttons for the stuff you will use constantly (e.g. shoot, interact, inventory, cast, map, attack) and the mouse for character selection, the starting menu, and the tab menu, and then rarely onscreen keyboard for entry stuff (riddles mostly). You need maybe 10 more buttons to go mouseless unfortunately.

 

[Themadcow]

Even properly ported versions of similar games (see Bards Tale 1-3) on android suffer with control schemes and UI's that simply were not made for this format. Click points too small, constant need to switch between full screen and soft keyboard mode etc etc. Playable, but certainly not close to the intended experience.

 

[Outlander]

I have an Xperia Play, will give it a try and report back.

 

[Gozma]

Even properly ported versions of similar games (see Bards Tale 1-3) on android suffer with control schemes and UI's that simply were not made for this format. Click points too small, constant need to switch between full screen and soft keyboard mode etc etc. Playable, but certainly not close to the intended experience.

M&M is a good stretch simpler than most blobbers, though. The only thing that will get seriously slower without a keyboard is missing the f1-f6 keys for quick character selections stuff (e.g. transferring items in inventory). MM2 for example has pretty effective ports on Sega Genesis and SNES.

 

[Clockwork Knight]

Playing emulated games on a touchscreen is for very patient people only, preferably those with feminine fingers suited to the size of tablets. If misclicking annoys you, don't even bother because you'll be doing that all the time.

 

[MicoSelva]

I've checked Dosbox Turbo YT channel and there's a video of DaggerFall running on Asus Transformer tablet (with the docking station/keyboard). This could actually make sense, especially if You can use touchpad to emulate the mouse (although I highly doubt that).

I have a transformer with docking station too. I wasn't really using the keyboard until now, but I might as well give it a try with M&M IV when I return home.

Outlander Let us know about the results.

 

[Luzur]

whats wrong with playing the game on your normal computer?

 

[MicoSelva]

Nothing, but it doesn't fit into my pocket.

 

[Outlander]

Well it sure beats a touchscreen GUI, I set up the d-pad to movement and the mouse cursor to the touchscreen. You can set the mouse cursor to respond to the d-pad but it's not very practical that way.
I'm using DosBox Turbo 2.1.2 and trying to figure out how to map the other keys.

 

[MicoSelva]

I'm not sure how it works in DosBox Turbo, but in aDosBox turning off "relative mouse movement" seemed to help - now I'm basically dragging the cursor all over the screen.

If only the on-screen buttons were not in the way *sigh*.

 

[gromit]

With all the touchscreen bitching, and DOS love, that usually goes on here, I'm surprised I'm the first one to say GET A FUCKING PHONE WITH A QWERTY SLIDE-OUT

 

[MicoSelva]

^ That's probably a good idea.
I've run the game on transfomer tablet with keyboard and it is of course much better, although the lack of F1-F6 keys (and also no Escape key) is kind of annoying. This can be partially circumvented by using the remappable on-screen buttons, but there are only six of them, so one of the function keys will not be mapped (Escape key is more important).

Touchpad is kind of useless, as it has its own cursor, which You can then use to drag the original in-game cursor around. Needless to say, it's not very convenient.

Important: in aDosBox set mouse emulation left click to Tap instead of Normal, or for some reason You won't be able to drag the cursor to the top half of the screen (both phone and tablet).

As for the phone, considering we have the 6 on-screen buttons to use, and one of them is mapped to Esc, can one of M&M experts which of the following buttons are most often used in the game and should be mapped to the remaining 5? :

S - Shoot
C - Cast
R- Rest
B - Bash
D - Dismiss
V - View Quests
M - Automap
I - Information
Q - Quick Reference
Space Bar - interaction

 

[Gozma]

A)ttack
Space Bar - interact
C)ast
S)hoot

and the fifth choice candidates are all kinda equally secondary... V I guess?

Inventory management will drive you insane if you pay too much attention, because it will have to all be done with mouse (normally it's all done with the f1-f6 keys). Don't bother with armor besides the main piece (e.g. plate armor) until you see high quality prefix stuff (like emerald to obsidian).

 

[alx3apps]

The state of dosboxes on android is not great: aDosBox is a straightforward port has broken scaling and is very slow, anDosBox is great but unsupported and DosBoxTurbo is a rip-off version of anDosBox and was made closed-source in recent versions (which is illegal, because original DosBox is GPL'd).

Playing on touchscreen only is not very comfortable even with anDosBox' absolute mouse mode. I tried MM3 on qwerty-keyboard phone and played through the first town. But qwerty phones with horisontal diaplays (to show 320x200 properly) is hard to find theese days - last models are from 2011. I'm looking forward for this qwerty phone that should be the ultimate device for turn-based blobbers and goldbox games.

I'm also toying the idea to make custom (special for chosen games) onscreen controls for anDosBox (it's open source) to play on touchscreen only (e.g. for MM3 - make vertical columns of hotkey buttons on left and right sides of the screen or use transparent buttons) - but it's only an idea for now.

 

[Jvegi]

So how is Magic DosBox? A revolution? Looks cool.

 

[MicoSelva]

I fixed my screenshots in the opening post. Fuck Photobucket.

 

[aweigh]

why dont you buy a bluetooth controller and use that most emulators support those

d pad = movement keys
buttons = mapped to frequently used hotkeys

 

[Max Stats]

why dont you buy a bluetooth controller and use that most emulators support those

d pad = movement keys
buttons = mapped to frequently used hotkeys

Or could you go all out and use a bluetooth keyboard?