![\"img_2698\"](\"http:\/\/192.168.3.4\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/10\/IMG_2698.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nI searched through my stack of floppy disks and found the original install disks.\u00a0 To my delight they still worked and I copied the contents of the disks to my Linux folder.<\/p>\n
A refresher on DosBox is needed.\u00a0 DosBox mounts a folder on the Linux computer, in my case the folder is named “Pi_C”.\u00a0 DOS has a 8.3 filename limitation, so that’s why the folder name is short.\u00a0 This folder it located in the home directory of the user running DosBox.\u00a0 To mount a drive letter in DosBox to the folder, issue this command.<\/p>\n
mount c Pi_C<\/pre>\nBefore I continue on about the Tornado game, DosBox has key commands you should keep in mind.\u00a0 The special keys can be referenced at http:\/\/www.dosbox.com\/wiki\/Special_Keys.\u00a0 I had found that the game captures the mouse and keyboard inside DosBox and this can force you to hard reset if you don’t know the keys to press to escape.\u00a0 If all else, know that CTRL+F9 will kill (close) DosBox.\u00a0 Back to Tornado.<\/p>\n
Now the working drive can be changed and DOS commands can be run as usual.\u00a0 I changed to the folder that contained the Tornado installation and ran the “Install.exe” command.\u00a0 It started the install by doing a system compatibility check.\u00a0 It was humorous to see that the Raspberry Pi had no trouble handling it.\u00a0 Unlike my experience, the install did not prompt me to install the next disk, since they were all copied into the folder.<\/p>\n
Once the install was done, I changed to the game directory.\u00a0 Here I ran the “Tornado.bat” command saw the game start up.\u00a0 One thing I had forgotten was that the game quizzed you when it was run.\u00a0 It asks a question and references the page number of the manual.\u00a0 Good thing I kept the manual around.<\/p>\n
The game operates just as I remembered.\u00a0 One thing with DosBox is you can increase you process power by pressing CTRL+F12 to add CPU cycles to the emulator.\u00a0 It is fascinating that the game uses a less that 40MB of data, compared to games today.\u00a0 Granted the visual effects are very limited, but the game has overall detail that makes up for this limit.<\/p>\n
There are some die hard fans of this game.\u00a0 While looking into some background about the manufacturer, I came across a forum.\u00a0 The company that developed and marketed Tornado is no longer in existence, however there are owners of the holdings that remain from the work.\u00a0 The forum had discussions about the possible release of the source code from the game, will have to wait and see if anything comes from that.<\/p>\n
Forum discussion – http:\/\/www.moodurian.com\/tornado\/forum\/index.php?PHPSESSID=5de61013a02dc2c382d466e2dc8a4fa5&topic=9.msg32#msg32<\/a><\/p>\n
Another interesting discovery was the game is online and available to the public to play.\u00a0 The Internet Archive has a DosBox version here, https:\/\/archive.org\/details\/TORNADO_1020<\/a>.\u00a0 This DosBox runs inside the web browser.\u00a0 The Internet Archive has cataloged over 2000 of the retro games, Tornado being one of them.\u00a0 Cool find!<\/p>\n
If all this reading has made you hungry, here’s a tip Chef Ramsey gave to the crews that operate the Tornado.\u00a0 Cheers!<\/p>\n