Playing without the CD

[TheBigRedOne]

This is probably a retarded question, but can you play SB without having to have the CD-ROM handy?

If so, how?

[retard mode off]

BRO

[Nikb]

You can make up a single CD which has all the hps games on it. It is a must do - I only have one cd and I don't have to change it. Only time it comes out of the drive is when I play a non HPS/Tiller game. Better than trying to find cracks etc which are a pain with the different versions. Works with the Campaign Series as well.

I'm trying to hunt for the instructions - Ernie from the MBC/CCC posted instructions a while ago.

Basically you copy the individual disk over to the hard drive. Keep the main exe files and delete the balance. Then copy them directly to a single CD. This should replicate the parent disk. So my game disk just has a whole lot of HPS game directorys (exactly as you find on the original parent disk) with exes under.

Pretty simple - though somebody could probably explain it better. I'll keep hunting for that post.

[Nikb]

Found 'em.

You can try this link:

http://members.tripod.com/garyned/Disk_Copy.htm

Or the following are two posts on the ACWGC forum:

1. Create a temp directory if one does not already exist. For example C:\temp

2. Create a folder for each game as follows:
C:\temp\Campaign Corinth
C:\temp\Campaign Shiloh
C:\temp\Campaign Peninsula
C:\temp\Campaign Ghettysburg
C:\temp\Campaign Ozark
C:\temp\Campaign Franklin

3. Copy the files from the original CD to these directories. For example, copy cp_start and cpo from Corinth; copy cp_start and cpf from Franklin; copy cp_start and cpg from Ghettysburg; copy cp_start and cpz from Ozark; copy cp_start and cpp from Peninsula; copy cp_start and cpi from Shiloh.

cp_start is for the campaign game and the others are for individual game scenarios.

4. Once you have the directories and the files copied, copy each folder to your writable CD. When finished you should have a CD with six folders and two files in each folder.

5. If you want to include the editors, then you will need to add those files to the CD.

1. Make a new folder named C:\HPS_disk.

2. Copy each HPS and BG game folder into that folder.

3. Delete ALL sub-folders for each game.

4. Delete ALL files in the main game folder you copied over, EXCEPT any ??????. EXE file. So, for most games you will have a game folder, like Campaign Shiloh that has one to four files in it.

5. Copy all folders to a CDROM. Do not copy the folder C:\HPS_disk. Do not rename any of the game folders.

6. Play away and never have to swap disks.

All my HPS/BG games were installed using the TYPICAL install and I can play the music, have the sound effects work without problems.

Once you have this system setup, ANY new HPS game can be added the same way and ADDED to your CDROM. OR you can simply burn an entire new CDROM.

Should work OK. Boy it makes it easier/quicker to play.

Cheers

Nik

[Ozgur Budak]

Best one is magic cd. Nik already mentioned it. Make sure to select a re-writable one as you can add more titles in the future.

[Alpha Zwo]

I am using a single CD for all my HPS games and it works well with games like Campaign Antietam, PzC Smolensk etc., but will not work with any of my SqB games. What am I doing wrong or what is different in contrast to the other games?

Thanks in advance.

Cheers

Tom

Private Bombadil

[TheBigRedOne]

Bump.

This is a useful thread for folks who have multiple SB games and didn't realize that you can make a master disc to play off of. This thread was 'unapproved' for a long time, but with HPS doing away with the disc requirement, Rich Hamilton has given the nod on his blog to talk about the magic disc.

I've used one for years and is a great way to go until all the games get updated and this becomes obsolete...

Nik's post works well. A simpler way of saying it is that once the game is installed on your computer using the master disc, create a folder on a CD-R or RW with the EXACT same name that appears on the master disc and transfer the exe file of the game into that folder. This should be all you need to run the magic disc. Make sure that if you have multiple drives on your computer that you install them using the same drive so that you can just leave the disc in there. I installed Eagle's Strike using a different drive and have to switch it because I'm too lazy to uninstall/reinstall on the other drive!