Master of Orion II - Anyone got it to work correctly?

hbk0012 said:

I have the actual game disc for Master of Orion 2 but when I click install, nothing happens. I waited for over an half an hour. Can anyone help me?

"Install.exe" is the DOS installer. Run "Setup.exe" for Windows.

SaltySquid said:

Here's how I got it to work FINALLY on Windows Ultimate x64!! And it didn't require any scripts.

First - Install the game
Second - Change the compatibility to Windows XP (SP2) - 256 color - 640 x 480 resolution - Admin mode
Third - Copy the entire CD into a folder on your HD. I put mine in a folder named "CD" inside my Orion 2 install folder
Forth - Open the folder on the CD called DIRECTX and find the file called DPLAY.DLL and copy it to your install directory.
Last - Edit the file called orioncd.ini inside your install directory. There should be a path in the file that looks like this "H:\" only it will point to whatever letter your CD Rom drive is set as. Change the path to the folder you copied the CD to, in my case it is "D:\Master of Orion 2\CD\". Close and save.

Tada! The game runs without the CD and all color/compatibility issues are solved. I really hope this helps someone else because I've been wanting to play this game for the past week and the color issue was driving me crazy.

This is just what I needed. Though I think you need to install the 1.31 patch on top of this.

Has anyone tried running it in XP Mode for Win 7 x64? It seems like that might address some of the other compatibility issues, though probably not the dplay.dll version issue.

I found a website where you can buy and download old games, like masters of orion 1&2. They have been set up to work with windows 7 and I only paid 6.99 for both games. It's www.GOG.com and I love it! lol :)

I've followed the above posts, copying and renaming the dplayx.dll to dplay.dll and the Batch file ready to go. Works nicely enough. Noticed some problems though. First load up worked fine for a few minutes, then graphical errors appeared. Dissapearing borders, missing backgrounds, systems, buttons. Quit, reloaded, seemed fine. Loaded up save file, went for a few, then crashed. Reloaded, then when tried to load up save file from Continue or loading from saves, Moo2 Crashes.

Any others having these problems?

I just tried what you said and it still says the dplay.dll is missing. I added it myself so I don't know what is wrong.

dumbfire said:

Hello,
Excellent guide for getting this working in Windows 7! Thanks! I have automated your process in a .bat file. Just create a text file using notepad and save that file with the following information below (this is using the default install path for Moo2). Be sure to save your file as "moo2.bat"

TASKKILL /F /IM "explorer.exe"
cd C:\"Program Files"\Microprose\Orion2
start /w C:\"Program Files"\Microprose\Orion2\Orion95.exe
start C:\Windows\explorer.exe

Just double click the bat file and it will kill the explorer.exe, start moo2 and then restart explorer when you quit moo2. I hope someone finds this useful!

Without access to an OS like XP...... is there another way to get this game as well as a few other older games I've dug out of the closet installed??

Hi Tahl,

On Windows 7 32-bit, DOSBox runs the DOS version of MOO2 with good sound and accurate graphics.

People have run it on 64-bit W7 too.

DOSBox also runs MOO2 on Linux, and I've just read of people running MOO2 on Blackberry too.

If you'd like more assistance, I can offer some more pointers on request.

Regards,
zoetropo

I thought I'd share the way I fixed it for me.

I found a post on another forum regarding Diablo2 and Win7 and I modified it for MOO2 (Orion95) and it worked.

For 64bit:
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\DirectDraw\Compatibility\Orion95]
"ID"=dword:333982cb
"Name"="Orion95.exe"
"Flags"=hex:00,08,00,00

For 32bit, it should be (I don't have 32bit so...ymmv):
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\DirectDraw\Compatibility\Orion95]
"ID"=dword:333982cb
"Name"="Orion95.exe"
"Flags"=hex:00,08,00,00

I installed the game from the original disk, labeled Master of Orion II, Battle of Antares. The disk contains both Dos and Windows 95 Versions. I assumed the windows version would be easier to install onto my current Windows system, but no ‘compatibility’ setting adjustment (accessed by right clicking on the executable) would ever work. I did, however, get the DOS version to work.

MOO2 CD Contents
Directories: DIRECTX, FUNSTUFF & TEN
Files on the root: Too many to list BUT it includes the following very important files.
• ORION95.EXE – Installs Windows Version (Error message = Program cannot start because display.dll is missing).
• INSTALL.EXE – Dos Install
• ORION2.EXE – Dos Launch.

STEP 1.
Create the following directory on your computer’s hard drive.
• C:\oldgames

STEP 2.
Copy the entire CD into the ‘oldgames, directory. Note that the directory name is only 8 characters long – which happens to be the dos filename limit.

This is done because the game, when started, requires the original CD in the CD drive. It will always ‘look’ for it and return an error message if the CD was not found. By copying all the files onto the hard drive and installing the game from there, the game will look THERE for verification and find it. This also sidesteps trying to make your modern CD drive and drivers, Dos compatible.

STEP 3.
Download and install DosBox (DOSBox, an x86 emulator with DOS). Click downloads at the top menu, then Download now. I downloaded Version 0.74. It installs by default in C:\Program Files (x86)\DosBox-0.74

STEP 4.
Go to C:\Program Files (x86)\DosBox-0.74 and double click on DOSBox.exe to install the program. Note also that the DOSBox manual is located here as well. If you want to ‘fine tune’ the setup, begin here. Two windows open, one on top of the other. Pull one down to reveal the second. They are the DOSBOX Status Window and the DOSBox Window.
• DOSBox Status Window – Shows the result of opening the DOS emulator and running the default configuration file. WRITE DOWN the entire path for the file created. You will need this later. It is the batch file that you must edit later. My file path was: C:\Users\Dan\AppData\Local\DOSBOox\dosbox-0.74.conf
• DOSBox Window (Will nickname this the Z Box) – Shows the Z prompt. This window is your active DOS emulator. Ultimately, we will get MOO2 up and running inside of it. For the heck of it, type DIR and enter. This is a listing of DOS commands now available to the DOS emulator.
STEP 5.
• Click inside of the Z Box and at the Z:\> prompt, type Mount C C:\oldgames and press enter. The response will be: Drive C is mounted as local directory c:\oldgames\
• Type C: and press enter. The result will be the Z prompt has changed to a C prompt. At the C prompt type INSTALL and enter. You are now INSTALLING the dos MOO2 program and are using dos to do so! You should now see the MOO2 dos installation program!
• At the very bottom, erase C:\MPS\ORION2 and replace it with C:\oldgames We are sticking EVERYTHING into this one directory. Press enter and the installation will begin.
• The SOUND must now be configured. A new window opened. The Pink Box at the top lists your current sound configuration, which is currently NONE for both types of sound. The Blue Box beneath, provides options for configuring sounds. The top item is highlighted which is our beginning point. Double click on Select and Configure MIDI Music Driver. What worked for me (your system may be different) is to highlight Creative Labs Sound Blaster Pro (new version) and hit the SELECT button. In the new window, double click on the top line Attempt to Configure Sound Driver Automatically. Great! Device detected successfully! Select OK and we repeat these steps for the next sound driver.
• Select and Configure Digital Audio Driver
• Creative Labs SoundBlaster 16 or AWE 32
• Select
• Attempt to Configure Sound Drive Automatically
• Device Detected Successfully!
• OK
• Done

Step 6.
As prompted, type ORION2 to run the game! Click on QUIT GAME to close it.

Step 7.
• Now, let’s CONFIGURE the startup batch file to start this game without all this typing! First, the DOSBox Icon was supposed to be placed on your desktop. It wasn’t. Open your start menu, locate the icon and drag it to your desktop and Create Shortcut Here . This will be your MOO2 Startup Icon from now on. Don’t try to change the name. Bad things happen.
• In Step 4, DOSBox created a startup batch file. It is in a dos ascii file format. Ascii is a very ‘clean’ format. It has no paragraph formatting whatsoever. It requires a special ascii editor to work with and save this type of file. To open a special ascii editor, hit START and type CMD (enter). A window opens. At the command prompt type NOTEPAD (enter).
• In windows NOTEPAD, hit FILE, OPEN and now go open the batch file created in Step 4. In my system, the file was located at: C:\Users\Dan\AppData\Local\DOSBOox\dosbox-0.74.conf But wait! Once you have followed the path and have opened the last directory (DOSBox), the file will not be there. The directory is empty! No it isn’t. Go to the bottom right and click on the TEXT DOCUMENTS box. Select ALL FILES. Now, the file you want appears! Single click that file. At the bottom left, the filename of DOSBOX-0.74.CONF appears. Click inside that box and put quotation marks around the filename. It should look like “dosbox-0.74.conf” It is very important to open it in this manner so that is will SAVE as an ascii file and not as a text file.
• A very long ascii configuration file will open. Scroll to the very bottom and alter it as follows (highlighted bold is what to add):

[autoexec]
# Lines in this section will be run at startup.
# You can put your MOUNT lines here.

mount C C:\oldgames
C:
cd \oldgames
cls
orion2
exit

Then, SAVE the file. Do not SAVE AS or it will default to a text file. Now, MOO2 will open each time you double click the DOSBox Icon on your desktop! And it will close easily as well! Yay!

Searching the web yielded several alterations to the configuration file that claimed to expand the dosbox size. But problems were noted. If you want to experiment with changing those settings then have at it. Have fun. And I hope that you are successful and post the correction as well! I did my part! This was always my favorite game. I even won one on the impossible setting! I bet you can too!