OpenCol 0.8.1

OpenCol 0.8.1: the music plays every note again. Many tunes had lost notes, and some (Bird Song, Cornwall, Nightingale) were mostly silence after their first bars.

OpenCol is Sid Meier's Colonization for DOS (version 3.0, February 1995), decompiled and rebuilt as a modern program that plays exactly like the original unless you turn on a rule option. You need your own copy of the DOS game (as sold by GOG and Steam): OpenCol contains nothing of the game.

Play #

1. Download the zip for your system below and unpack it where you can write (not in Program Files).
2. Start the program:
   • Windows 10 or later: opencol.exe (windows-x64; windows-x86 is the 32-bit one).
   • macOS 11 or later, Apple silicon and Intel: opencol.
3. The first time, OpenCol asks for the folder of your copy of the game: the one with VICEROY.EXE (in the GOG version, the COLONIZE folder), or any folder above it. It remembers it.

Coming from 0.8.0: unpack 0.8.1 over your 0.8.0 folder. Your saved games, maps and settings stay as they are.

macOS asks first, because OpenCol is not signed by Apple: right-click opencol and choose Open, or run xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine . in the folder.

Fixed #

• The music lost notes, on Windows and macOS alike. The game's own sound driver plays the music on an emulated AdLib chip. When the driver ended a note and struck the next one in the same instant, the emulated chip missed the change, and the note was not heard again. On a real card a short wait between the two lets the chip see it. Now the emulated chip sees every change, and the tunes play in full.
• The sound driver's timer works as the original's does: it is no longer called a few times at the start when the driver has said it does not need it.

Thanks to the player who reported it.

Limits of this release #

• Sound Blaster and AdLib sound only: the Roland MT-32 and General MIDI drivers are not supported.
• The colony screen, Europe and the reports keep the original's 320 x 200: their pictures were drawn at that size.
• The rule options have no menu yet: they are set in OPENCOL.INI.
• No Linux download: build it from source. Choosing the folder there needs xdg-desktop-portal or zenity; without them, start OpenCol in the game's folder or with --game FOLDER.

Every difference from the DOS game, by part of the game and by release, is in CHANGELOG.md. Open an issue for the fixes and features you want.