DOS ain't dead

SDL for DOS and Diablo for DOS (Developers)

posted by Zyzzle, 05.02.2026, 12:19

I finally got it working very well on the same machine mentioned above (bare DOS 7.1 with only an XMS driver and Ramdrive loaded). I had forgotten to load a DOS mouse driver, so the game had crashed upon starting a new character. So, I loaded CTMOUSE before loading DEVX.EXE and the game worked perfectly.

To make the game brighter during play, press "G" to increase Gamma. When this is at maximum setting, the game is finally viewable and indeed completely playable.

It was very smooth and fluid. The framerate according to the game's fps counter remained steady at 60.3 fps throughout. Of course, the sound doesn't work. Saves and restores work and so do screenshots (F12) which capture in .png format. The automap, zoom, and all other keys work. The game saves and restores also work. The saved files are compressed .MPQ files as well. I wonder if there's an .MPQ reader / decompressor or decrypter. I'm not sure if the format has been completely reverse-engineered.

I found a way to "EXIT" the game properly without a crash. I had to use a different DOS extender. CWSDPMI caused always crash, but with the d3x DOS extender stubbed into the DEVX.EXE file, the game exited normally, but upon exiting to DOS the prompt was very dark.

There is a DOS RESET.EXE utility that when executed with the /R switch restores the normal brightness to the video card and refreshes the DOS prompt. So, the SDL layer in DEVX.EXE is definitely doing something wrong with either the gamma or the palette. Perhaps it sets default gamma to 1.0 when the normal value should be 2.2 for DOS.

In all, it's quite an amazing experience to be able to play Diablo in pure DOS 30 years after its release. I'll have to play through again, as I remember it was a very long game back in the day.

Complete thread:

• SDL for DOS and Diablo for DOS - Laaca, 05.09.2025, 05:34 (Developers)
  • SDL for DOS and Diablo for DOS - Zyzzle, 01.02.2026, 09:38
    • SDL for DOS and Diablo for DOS - Laaca, 01.02.2026, 16:50
      • SDL for DOS and Diablo for DOS - Zyzzle, 02.02.2026, 14:27
        • SDL for DOS and Diablo for DOS - Laaca, 02.02.2026, 23:29
          • SDL for DOS and Diablo for DOS - Zyzzle, 03.02.2026, 00:21
  • SDL for DOS and Diablo for DOS - tkchia, 01.02.2026, 11:28
    • SDL for DOS and Diablo for DOS - Laaca, 01.02.2026, 16:56
      • SDL for DOS and Diablo for DOS - tkchia, 01.02.2026, 20:55
      • SDL for DOS and Diablo for DOS - Zyzzle, 04.02.2026, 05:07
        • SDL for DOS and Diablo for DOS - Zyzzle, 05.02.2026, 12:19
  • SDL for DOS and Diablo for DOS - Rugxulo, 01.02.2026, 21:34