Mine

------------- MECHWARRIOR 2 COLLECTION ---------------

MECHWARRIOR 2: 31ST CENTURY COMBAT

MECHWARRIOR 2 EXPANSION PACK: GHOST BEAR'S LEGACY

MECHWARRIOR 2: MERCENARIES


NOTE: IF YOUR COMPUTER IS A P3 OR HIGHER, OR IF YOU ARE RUNNING WINDOWS XP, IT IS HIGHLY RECOMMENDED YOU PLAY MECHWARRIOR 2 FOR DOS!

OTHER NOTE: YOU MUST HAVE THE CD IN THE FIRST CD DRIVE AVAILABLE TO PLAY MECHWARRIOR 2!

Mechwarrior 2 has a lot of quirks leftover from the days of the early PC.  I will do my best to address these issues in this document.

First, if you attempt to install the game within Windows XP, it will fail immediately, claiming that NT is not supported.  This is easily fixed by exploring into the CD and editing the Properties for the file "START.EXE" to run in compatibility mode as Windows 95.  That will at least let you install the game.  However, the Windows 95 version refuses to run with XP at all.  Once again, IF YOU ARE RUNNING WINDOWS XP, YOU MUST INSTALL AND RUN THE DOS VERSION.

Second, if you actually have Windows 95 or 98, you should have a computer that is a P3 500MHz or slower if you want to actually play the Windows version of the game.  Otherwise, you will be unable to use a significant number of weapons as their collision models appear slightly inside the weapon firing them on very fast computers.  In other words, your missiles will explode inside the missile racks if your computer is too fast.  I do not actually know what the cutoff speed is for this issue, but I do know that once I upgraded to an Athlon XP processor, MW2 hated me.

Third, at least two of the games fail to look at anything besides the first CD drive letter it comes across.  This means that you'll have to burn the disks if your virtual drive isn't already your first CD drive letter, insert the burned CD into the first CD drive, and then run the game.

Suffice it to say, it takes some major work to get this thing to run properly on modern computers.  I'll outline the methods I took to get the original Mechwarrior 2 to run - with any luck, the same methods will work for the expansions.

I have included all the files necessary to run the game from a DOS window in Windows XP, with the exception of VDMSound which allows sound to function properly.  It can be downloaded from SourceForge at the following URL:

http://sourceforge.net/projects/vdmsound/

At the time of this writing, the actual homepage for VDMSound is dead.  Hopefully this will change.

The manual for Mechwarrior 2 is included on the CD.  Simply look in the "MANUAL" directory - it's a PDF file.

In order to install Ghost Bear's Legacy, you must have the CD image for Mechwarrior 2 on hand as it checks for the presence of the original game.  You don't have to have the original game's CD burned to install, but you may need Ghost Bear's Legacy burned to play it.


INSTRUCTIONS FOR INSTALLING AND PLAYING MECHWARRIOR 2

1. (OPTIONAL) Download and install VDMSound if you want audio.

2. (OPTIONAL) If you want CD music to play properly, copy the contents of the SAPICDEX directory into your Windows\System32\ directory.  Edit your AUTOEXEC.VDMS file in the VDMSound directory, replacing the reference to "mscdexnt.exe" with "sapicdex.exe".  Bear in mind, the copy of Mechwarrior 2 I have has no CD music to make room for "FREE AOL! TRY TODAY!" - you may want to leave out this step if you're only playing the original game.  The other two games have the music though.

3. If your emulated CD drive does not appear as the first CD drive, burn the image to a blank CD and place it in your first CD drive.

4. Explore the CD and right-click MINST.EXE, then select "Run with VDMS".  (Or, if you don't want sound, just double-click it.)

5. When Windows XP complains about the program wanting direct access to the hard drive, click the Ignore button.

6. Go through the dialogue, allowing the program to autodetect your audio.  Feel free to change the installation directory when the opportunity presents itself.

7. Once the install completes, navigate to the new directory created by the install.

8. Copy the NOLFB.COM file included in the download into the directory that contains MECH2.EXE.

9. Create a text file in the game directory.  Call it START.BAT and edit it using Notepad or any other straight text editor.  Put the following text in it:

NOLFB.COM
MECH2.EXE

Save and exit.

10. Right-click on START.BAT and select "Run with VDMS".  (Or if you are not using VDMSound, just double-click it.)

11. Gaze in awe at the state-of-the-art prerendered introduction movie.

12. Once you have mouse control, press ESC, click on "COMBAT VARIABLES", and change the resolution to 640x480.  I find the game has issues at the lowest resolution, and my card freaks out when I try to run it at 1024x768.

Now you should be able to play through the game without any issues.  Don't ask me how to change the mouse movement speed; I have no clue, and I always played the game with just the keyboard anyways.

With some appropriate modifications of the above directions, you should be able to get the rest of the games working just fine.  Good luck, and happy hunting!

-Michael Martin
sparrohawc@hotmail.com

P.S.  If you want to play NetMech online, there are directions on how to get it up and running in XP on other sites and the game is downloadable for free.  Just run a search.

P.P.S.  I have included the Battle Pack patch (bpmw105.exe) and the 1.1 patch for Mechwarrior 2 (mech2v11.exe) if you want to give them a try.  I didn't bother, myself, but I'm also something of a completionist.