Bouncing around and inconsistent speeds in DosBOX

[kakhome1]

When playing custom Descent levels in DosBOX, I often have to bump up the number of cycles to not have lag. However, this causes my ship to 'bounce' up and down more and it also causes my speed to vary considerably depending on detail level in each particular area (especially turning speed).

Anyone know of a way to fix this, aside from source ports?

[Sirius]

Sadly, there isn't. In the DOS versions of Descent, you just have to make sure your framerate ("frametime" cheat code shows you this in D2 - it's not a "real" cheat code though and doesn't reset your score to zero) doesn't go too high. Somewhere around 200 seems to be the breaking point, but keeping it below the 100-120 range might be safer.

[Krom]

Sadly, there isn't. In the DOS versions of Descent, you just have to make sure your framerate ("frametime" cheat code shows you this in D2 - it's not a "real" cheat code though and doesn't reset your score to zero) doesn't go too high. Somewhere around 200 seems to be the breaking point, but keeping it below the 100-120 range might be safer.

A good number to aim for is the vertical refresh rate of your display (60 Hz for most monitors). Doing it that way typically avoids the worst of the high framerate bugs without making the game choppy.

[Xfing]

Yeah, no idea why you'd want to have any more than 60 FPS for a game this old anyway.

As for custom levels being slower, I've got no idea why it would be so. But I think it's possible to adjust the amount of memory that Dropbox uses, that might be it right there.

[kakhome1]

Anyone know how to cap framerate in DosBOX and increase memory allowed?

[AlexanderBorisov]

Most probably no way to cap the framerate, because framerate is dependent on the game itself, not DOSBOX.
You can only control CPU frequency. For consistent speed you need to use a source port like Rebirth or XL

[Sirius]

Memory is probably configurable through its .ini file. Framerate, yeah, you have to adjust CPU frequency until it looks about right.

The DOS version of D1x allowed framecap, but it doesn't run easily in DOSBox for some reason.

[kakhome1]

How do you configure the memory; as for CPU speed, is that simply seeing the cycles option?

[Descer]

Nr. 3 o' self tech support: "Read the documentation".

[Sirius]

Yes, it's cycles.
For memory, find the dosbox-0.74.conf file (I'm assuming that's still the current version) and look for the "memsize" setting.