Warcraft II on Windows XP, A step-by-step guide
Warcraft II - Tides of Darkness. I used to love this old DOS game way back when. But now I want to run it on Windows XP. Yes, it is possible. Here’s how.
DOS Emulation
First you need the very excellent DOSBOX which is a DOS emulator. You can download it from http://www.dosbox.com/.
Once DOSBOX is installed, we need somewhere to put our DOS games. I created a folder called C:\DOSGAMES for this purpose.
Now it is time to run DOSBOX. Once it is going, type the following two commands:
mount c C:\DOSGAMES\ mount d D:\ -t cdrom
NOTE: If your CD-ROM drive is not D:\, modify this accordingly.
Then you can insert your Warcraft II CD. The game can be installed like so:
D: SETUP
Just select all the default options except for the soundcard and music device which you should set to Soundblaster 16.
Making an icon
At this point you can run the game by typing WAR2. But I don’t want to stop there. Let’s now make a pretty icon so you can launch the game with a mouse-click.
Open the folder C:\Program Files\DOSBox-0.72 and find the file dosbox.conf. Copy it to your C:\DOSGAMES\WAR2 folder.
Edit the copy of dosbox.conf and add the following line to the bottom under the [autoexec] section:
mount d D:\ -t cdrom
I’ve found it is also a good idea to reduce the speed of CPU emulation otherwise the map can scroll too fast. Modify the cycles entry in dosbox.conf like so:
cycles=20000
Now save the changes you made to dosbox.conf.
Copy the DOSBOX icon on your desktop. Rename the copy to “Warcraft II”. Now right-click on the icon and select Properties.
Enter the following text (all on one line) into the Target box:
"C:\Program Files\DOSBox-0.72\dosbox.exe" "C:\DOSGAMES\WAR2\WAR2.EXE" -conf "C:\DOSGAMES\WAR2\dosbox.conf" -exit -fullscreen
Then finally click on the Change Icon button.
Click Browse and navigate to the folder C:\DOSGAMES\WAR2. Double-click the file WAR2ICON.DLL.
Choose the WarCraft icon and then click OK. Click OK on the shortcut properties window also.
Now we are done. Click the WarCraft icon and enjoy!
I have a few questions
I already have Warcraft II installed and it’s working–but also not working. The pages load and there is no visible issues (I’m running on Windows 2000) except it’s lagging (find that quite odd) and that my mouse cannot pass a certain point on the righthand side of the screen, about 2/3rds from the left. It’s as though my cursor is at the side of the screen and there is nothing beyond it for it go on. Okay, made no sense whatsoever to me. So I went to try this out and it’s not working which i think might likely be because I have Warcraft II installed already. Would it work if I just uninstalled and reinstalled and where would I find this elusive uninstall option, it’s like AOL you just can’t get rid of it.
You can uninstall Warcraft by just deleting its folder. Things were a lot simpler in the old DOS days.
Sorry I’ve no idea why your mouse stops moving, you might try asking the question on the DOSBOX forum at http://vogons.zetafleet.com/index.php?c=7
Manda,
I believe that if you edit the War2.ini and change the vidmouse setting to 1 that should fix your mouse … at least that is the fix I’ve seen mentioned elsewhere.
Adam,
Do you know how to get the networking to work so that 2 PCs running DosBox with WarCraft II can play a multiplayer game?
Sorry Scott, I’ve not tried to network it. If I do, I’ll post here how it went. I notice that DOSBOX has support for IPX networking so it should work in theory.
THANK YOU!!!! Your tip was the only one that helped, and I spent all day looking how to fix Warcraft II Vista bug
Problem: Every time I try to mount the file DOSGAMES, dosbox tells me said file doesn’t exist, even though I created a file by that name in the dosbox file folder. I’m sure there is something I am doing wrong. Help? Also, I went ahead and tried the subsequent directions (mount d D: -t cdrom, D:, SETUP), and the dosbox screen briefly showed a blurry graphic of an orc and a human before filling with thick blue commands, the last one being “Crash address (unrelocated) = 1:00003793″. Did that happen solely because I didn’t initially mount a new file to store games, or is there another problem?
DOSGAMES should be a folder, not a file.
Also, if you are putting it in the DOSBOX folder or anywhere else in Program Files, put quotes around the path so that DOSBOX will not be confused by the space in the path. Here is an example:
mount c “C:\Program Files\DOSBox-0.72\DOSGAMES\”
I have this weird problem in fullscreen like a piece of what it is shown on the top of screen shows down on the screen
when trying to make an ‘icon,’I can’t seem to figure out how to “Edit the copy of dosbox.conf and add the following line to the bottom under the [autoexec] section,” as you have suggested. I’ve got the game running under DOSbox and all just fine. How do I “edit…dosbox.conf?” And where do I find the “[autoexec] section?” -Thanx.
dosbox.conf is just a text file. Edit it with your favourite text editor - if you don’t have a favourite text editor, you can use Notepad.
So open Notepad and drag the dosbox.conf file onto the Notepad window.
Scroll down to the very bottom and you will see a line which reads [autoexec]. Place the new instructions underneath that line.
Fantastic! Thanks Adam. Glad I found your assistance here!
Just wanted to say right off the bat, I also had the problem with the cursor not moving to one side of the screen with Windows 2000… so it wasn’t just a fluke thing. Anyhow. I just recently found my WCII cd after many years of neglect and it seemed to load and work fine with XP on my IBM T40, until I exited the program. At that point my screen was highly distorted but I could make out the start menu enough to see that it opened and my computer wasn’t locked up. But I had to turn the computer off and back on to use it. Is it ok to play the game and just shut down and restart afterward, or is there a deeper problem here that I’m failing to see.
Once again, you’d be better off referring that problem to the DOSBOX forums here:
http://vogons.zetafleet.com/index.php?c=7
I’m no expert but it sounds to me like it could be something to do with your graphics card or driver being a little bit incompatible with DOSBOX.
I seem to have a problem loading WAR2. After it prompts me to to type in “WAR2″, I get the following:
DOS/4GW Professional error (2504): can’t create swap file “”
DOS/4GW Professional fatal error (1011): VMM initialization error [1]
Any idea what this could be?
Some things I can think of:
1. Whatever drive you have mounted as drive C is read-only
2. Whatever drive you have mounted as drive C is full
That’s about it for me guessing. You might also try asking your question on the DOSBOX forum here:
http://vogons.zetafleet.com/index.php?c=7
I’ve tried both IPX and direct (null modem) connect and neither works. After pressing connect I get “IPX network not detected” error, and after trying direct connect both computers just sit and wait. If anyone gets this to work please post it here!
Yes, I did make sure IPX protocol was installed under XP.
For Vista users make sure when you are creating the icon that when you select the dosbox.conf file after you have edited it that you click on “Create Shortcut” not “Copy”. If you click on Copy you will not get the target box needed to type in the additional info. You must use Create Shortcut in order to get the target box.
Thanks for the tip Ken, I haven’t yet made the jump to Vista. Glad to hear you got Warcraft running on it.
Hi Adam. Thanks so much for the above. All worked well and installed perfectly, but now when I run the game from the created icon it loads the main menu, but when I select Single Player it fails to read the cd. Any ideas on what’s going on?
Jish
In theory this should work for all DOS based games correct? Use the same commands and when making the icon change the WAR2 stuff to whatever game you are making an icon for? I hope so cause I am about to go nuts on old school DOS games. Commander Keen FTW!!!!!!!
Josh, I did have this happen once. The game would ask me to insert the CD even though it was already in the drive. No amount of reinserting the disc, restarting the program or rebooting the PC would make it go.
There must be something in the emulation which is not 100% right and that probably tripped some anti-piracy feature in the game.
I eventually reinstalled the game and it was good after that.
If you are going to reinstall the game, make a copy of all the files ending in .SAV - these are your saved games. You can copy them back after you reinstall so you don’t have to start the game over from the start.
Ken - yes, this technique will work for many old DOS games. Click the following link and you will find a list of hundreds of popular games and whether or not they will run under DOSBox.
http://www.dosbox.com/comp_list.php?letter=a
By the way, I managed to get Warcraft II to run under DOSBox on Linux using more or less the same technique. So you don’t even need a copy of Windows!
So, it keeps asking me for the cd even though it is in the drive! (my cd drive is drive F, so i use ‘mount d F:\ -t cdrom’. What am I doing wrong??? I have uninstalled/ reinstalled, installed it in windows, installed it through dos box etc. Any other ideas?
Any help would be much appreciated
Possibly there is a problem reading from your disc or maybe it doesn’t like F: for some reason.
You could try copying the entire contents of the CD to a folder and mounting that folder as the CD. For example, if you copied the contents of the CD to C:\DOSGAMES\WAR2CD, you can mount it with “mount d C:\DOSGAMES\WAR2CD -t cdrom”.
How can I change the game resolution??? I want to play in fullscreen! :)
Thanks!
Oh fuck… its just ALT+ENTER!! lol
:P
Hey Adam,
Thanks for the walkthrough! For some reason, my campaign wasn’t saved. Is this normal? Also, can we save maps that we edit? Thanks.
I can save fine. Did you actually press “Save”? WarCraft II does not auto-save.
If it is still not saving, I’d be thinking that something is read-only. Maybe your C drive is mounted as type CDROM or does not have write permission.
Check for any read-only options in your dosbox.conf file. Also check the Windows XP permissions for your C drive folder.
I’ve not tried the map editor but I’m pretty confident it would be fully functional.
Adam, I really appreciate the help, however I am running into a problem…
I am mounting the drives fine, I switch directories to the CD-ROM drive, type setup and hit enter. Here is where my problem begins. It first appears to be working correctly, it brings up the typical setup screen as if I was installing normally, but then all of a sudden it crashes and computer code starts scrolling over the screen, ending with: “crash address (unrelocated) = 1.00003745.” Any suggestions??? THANKS!
(p.s. I have a screen shot I would like to show you but can’t figure out how to put it on here.)
Hey I hey I start the emulator and click single player it says the disk isnt inserted. I closed everything and restarted my computer and it still doesnt work
sorry great guide if you can figure out how to get it to work. Ive tried to do this 3-4 times different ways with the CD mounting and I still cant get it to work.
Hey
I have the battle.net edition and simply installed the game and played it on my Vista. Problem is that I can’t save my campaigns properly. I can save while playing, and load that saved game, but if I exit program and start the game again, the save-files have disappeard. Any idea why this is?
I know this isn’t relevant to your little walktrough here, but you seem good at this so I hope you don’t ming me asking anyway. I used to watch my dad play this as a kid, am I nostalgic or what? :)
I have the same problem Mitchell talk about, I was able to play the other day, but when I quit the game and tried to create the icon, I followed all the step and everything semmed fine until I clicked to play in single player…it sayed and still says that the CD isn’t inserted…I think the reason could be it doesn’t look in the good driver…but I don’t know how to change it in DOS.
Also…it seemed even if I complety start from the beginning and skip the setup part, I can’t start the game by typing WAR2 :S
I HAVE THE OLD WARCRAFT 2 BUT IT IS ALREADY INSTALLLED IN MY COMPUTER I DON´T HAVE CD . WHAT CAN I DO?
Problem: Been following the guide 100% i think but when i am to start single player it says i need to insert my cd.. any clue where i did a mistake? (the shortcut is working and things are in correct folders etc)
Ty in advance
Totally different problem. Certain tasks performed cause the game to close. If a catapult launch goes to the boundary of the screen. A building that is destroyed at the edge of the screen. Using the any of the “spells” that use items that come from overhead. Each one of these closes the game. Any ideas? I have changed the video card.
Seems that a lot of people including me, have had very spotty problems with the game not recognizing the CD. I’ve managed to solve it by copying the contents of the CD to a folder and then mounting that folder as a CD drive in DosBOX.
For example, copy the contents of the CD to C:\DOSGAMES\WAR2CD and then in dosbox.conf, change “mount d D:\ -t cdrom” to “mount d C:\DOSGAMES\WAR2CD -t cdrom”.
The downside is that you lose the CD music for the game but at least you can play it. It has some fallback MIDI music which is adequate.
And before anyone asks, no you cannot have a copy of my CD. Get your own!
Hey Anders, re #32 I play it with my 6 year old son, he’s addicted to it!
The save game problem sounds like some kind of permissions issue. Check that:
1. The folder where the game is installed is not marked read-only.
2. You have not used the “-t cdrom” option when mounting the folder in dosbox.conf
3. The game folder is not a subfolder of the CDROM folder
Then again, it could be some Vista security weirdness. I never saw a more paranoid OS. I don’t have Vista myself so I can’t speculate any more than that.
re #37: Rick, I’ve heard that changing the core setting in dosbox.conf can help with crashing problems. Try changing it from core=auto to core=normal.
ya man i followed your instructions and it worked beautifully, but one problem. it seems no matter how i do it the cd isn’t being recognized. mounting it regularly didnt work and transfering the cd to a folder didn’t either. i would really like to mount the actual cd being that the music is the reason for playing. and also my cd rom is drive E, not D.
in the .conf file at the bottom i have it as “mount e E:\ -t cdrom”.
when i transfered the cd contents to a folder i did your folder, WAR2CD and i had it at the bottom as “mount e C:\DOSGames\WAR2CD -t cdrom”.
is that not right? what in the world else can i possibly do?
Try mounting the CDROM as drive D. So if you are using the original CD, that would be “mount d E:\ -t cdrom” or if you have copied it to your hard disk, it would be “mount d C:\DOSGames\WAR2CD -t cdrom”.
Hey, I just managed to install Warcraft II on my computer, but I was wondering if there was a way to play it in a smaller window so I can do other things at the same time? Any help would be appreciated x
Emm0r - edit your icon (right-click then choose Properties) and remove the “-fullscreen” item from the Target box. Now Warcraft will run in a window. You can use Alt-Enter to switch between windowed and full screen mode.
Ctrl-F10 is a useful key to remember, it snaps your mouse out of the game window.
i got all this to work but the map is doing something odd. the colors of my units and buildings are flashing red to green to blue to yellow then it repeats the process. any ideas?
Sounds like a palette issue. Are you running in 8 bit colour ?
If not, I have no idea. Try asking your question in the DOSBOX forum at http://vogons.zetafleet.com/index.php?c=7
The way it worked for me: I had an installed game. It works under XP but soetimes it crashes when I move the mouse to top left corner. Also I wish to run it in window. So I decided to use DosBox.
The game runs normaly when started manualy. But it asks for CD when ran with shortcut method described above. Here is how I ran it:
First create shortcut where I put this line:
C:\Programs\System\DOSBox-0.72\dosbox.exe -conf F:\Games\dosbox.conf
Then add lines at end of custom dosbox.conf file in [autoexec] section:
[autoexec]
# Lines in this section will be run at startup.
# mount the disk where the game resides:
mount F F:\
# navigate there:
F:\
# change directory
ChDir F:\Games\Warcra~1
# run game
F:\Games\Warcra~1\WAR2.EXE
Voila!
hello i have warcraft 2 battle net and it works perfectly on windows xp
i downloaded warcraft 2 from a torrent file..i dont have the cd for the game but seem to have all the files needed from the cd..but cant get single player to work still says i need the cd..ive tried the dosbox program cant seem to get around that either…if anyone can tell me how i can play this game without the cd.i could use the help thanx..
Just go to eBay and buy a CD. Copies of the Battle Net edition go very cheap these days.
Yo i did the icon thing as insructed but when i go to play in single player it asks for me to put in the dis but it just so happens that i have the disc in so it’s not working. on a side note when i rather just type in WAR2 to play the game in dosbox how do i do that cuz it tells me command is invalid.
Hey Zacora, scroll up! I answered this one already in comment #38.
Thanks a MILLION, Adam! I really appreciate your help on this.
Ahhhh good ‘ol warcraft II.
This is a good method for playing the old dos games, but honestly i’d have to recommend just playing the battle.net edition.
It’s cheap to buy, has both tides and the expansion, still has support on battle.net, and works on any version of windows released in the past 12 years with no problems.
It also has a faster maximum game speed, which is nice.
If you ever have problems with getting battle.net edition to work on LAN with IPX, just set your settings as follows on all machines that are going to play:
Internal Network Number: 00000000
Frame Type: Ethernet 802.3
Network Number: 00000001
So as far as the errors with reading the disc, I don’t really understand how to fix that. Do I need to start over and replace the WAR2 file with the WAR2CD file in DOSbox? I’m really new to all this, so it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Thanks again.
Follow the procedure as described in my original article but after you have finished, create another folder called WAR2CD and copy all the files off the CD into that new folder.
You should now have two folders, C:\DOSGAMES\WAR2 and C:\DOSGAMES\WAR2CD
Then edit the dosbox.conf file and find the line which reads mount d D:\ -t cdrom. Change it to mount d C:\DOSGAMES\WAR2CD -t cdrom
Still getting the insert cd error. Any ideas? I’m trying this on my hp laptop with Vista, by the way.
Sorry, that technique works for me. Maybe just double-check everything.
what will make the game run smoother? that method works but the game runs all choppy. thanks in advance
Try fiddling with the simulation speed. You can do this while playing the game using Ctrl-F11 and Ctrl-F12.
Once you find a good value, edit dosbox.conf and modify the line which reads “cycles=20000″.
Your advice works well for me but the game still needs the Cd to run? any ideas on how i could fix this?
Have you tried the fix mentioned in comments #38 and #56 ?
Can you use Dosbox IPX or nullmodem to connect War2 online with 2 computers in different states?
I’ve no idea. Let me know what happens when you try it.
I’m at the step where I have to rename the target on the icon properties, I type: “C:\Program Files\DOSBox-0.72\dosbox.exe” “C:\DOSGAMES\WAR2\WAR2.EXE” -conf “C:\DOSGAMES\WAR2\dosbox.conf” -exit -fullscreen but it’s telling me the target is not valid. What should I type? Am I doing something wrong?
I have already install the game and it loads properly, withut using the DOSBOX, but the map scrolls too fst, using the mouse or the keyboard, any thoughts how to fix this?
i have read all of the notes but i can not get the network to work it says no ipx network found i have instaled ipx protocal on both comps any ideas and thanx for getting my war2 to ware i can play again
turn the speeds down in options f10
why cant i type \ into dosbox it only lets me use / for some reason
also when i type mount c C:\DOSGAMES\ which is with / rather than \ it comes up with “Directory C:/DOSGAMES/ doesn’t exist”
Hey, thanks for the great walkthrough. I decided to “go back in time” and play the original Warcraft, and was able to get it to work using the same steps.
I did have one question, though. How can we type in the game itself? Say if get bored and want to use a cheat code (gasp), how can we get the box to come up? Hitting “enter” doesn’t work as it normally would.
Never mind. It seems it was a temporary glitch, as it works now.
Well i seem to be mounting the cd rom drive correctly but when i type in e: setup it says there is a data file error. Does this mean my cd is broken? or did i just mount it incorectly ? well any advice would be great
I have warcraft 2 working 100%, but for some reason, when I enter into single player, I only see human campaign and ork campaign, where is the custom menu?
Do I have to beat the game in the levels before I can play it custom?
I tried using DOSBOX, but for some reason my backslash “\” will not work when I am using DOSBOX. Also, will DOSBOX also allow me to play Ultima IV-VII? I do miss the old days of DOS. Not too happy with vista.
I’m running windows 2000, The hd is formatted as NTFS. I was trying to run Warcraft 2 but it can’t seem to detect my soundcard which is a Soundblaster Value from Creative lab. I tried to set is manually, but still having the same problem. Any suggestions?
Working amazing in vista! Had the same cd rom problem, but comment #38 directions fixed it. Everything runs, music is midi, but oh well. Thanks so much Adam!!
This is a priceless tutorial Adam. Thank you so much for your effort!
for those having issues with finding the cd drive go to the war2.ini in the war2 folder and change the cdpath to the where your mounted drive is….
mine was set to cdpath=C:\ so i changed it to cdpath=D:\ in the war2.ini and then it worked
Has anyone got the IPX Multiplayer to work?
Adam… Just wanted to say a huge thanks! Your advice was invaluable for me to enjoy an outstanding game from the past.
Thanks dude! It’s working perfectly! I do the same process with the first Warcraft: Orcs and Humans and the expansion of Warcraft II. The unique difference that i put is the cycles number: 2000 made the game run too slow. I put 8000 and it’s working good. Thanks!!
can i just say this is a brilliant walkthrough. i had to do a bit of trial and error to make sure i followed your examples word for word but now it works perfectly. i know 0 about DOSBox coming in. thanks so much Adam for your effort on the above!
I have played all the way through Tides of Darkness, is there a way to play the expansion set? thanks