The Colonel's Bequest

[ArcadeAction]

Hello all,

 

I am one person of the two people who are working on a The Colonel's Bequest-dedicated website (www.colonelsbequest.net , right now only with an Under Construction image, but we are working on some nice content. It's one of those games that I was really obsessed with.

 

This game was released on the Atari ST, but I can't find much information about this release. I was wondering if there are any people here who have played this game on their Atari ST and would like to answer the following questions:

 

- Was the graphics based on the PC MS-DOS version? (So only 16-colors?). Is anyone able and willing to provide me with a few screenshots? Even MobyGames didn't have them.

 

- I read on this forum that the game supported the MIDI-port of the ST. Which soundmodules were supported (probably the MT-32, but were there any others?)

 

- Where there any specific system requirements or other hardware that the game supported on ST?

 

- Was it a direct port of the MS-DOS version? Anyone played the games on both MS-DOS and the Atari ST and noticed any differences, bugs, eastereggs, etc.?

 

- How many disks were included? Was an harddisk required? Did the box contain any Atari-specific items?

 

Many thanks!

 

Best regards,

Vincent

[Christos]

Hello,

http://www.atarilegend.com/games/games_det...hp?game_id=3329

The Atari ST has similar graphics to an EGA (better palette though) so I guess you could say it's the same.

[atarian1]

Hello all,

 

I am one person of the two people who are working on a The Colonel's Bequest-dedicated website (www.colonelsbequest.net , right now only with an Under Construction image, but we are working on some nice content. It's one of those games that I was really obsessed with.

 

This game was released on the Atari ST, but I can't find much information about this release. I was wondering if there are any people here who have played this game on their Atari ST and would like to answer the following questions:

 

- Was the graphics based on the PC MS-DOS version? (So only 16-colors?). Is anyone able and willing to provide me with a few screenshots? Even MobyGames didn't have them.

 

- I read on this forum that the game supported the MIDI-port of the ST. Which soundmodules were supported (probably the MT-32, but were there any others?)

 

- Where there any specific system requirements or other hardware that the game supported on ST?

 

- Was it a direct port of the MS-DOS version? Anyone played the games on both MS-DOS and the Atari ST and noticed any differences, bugs, eastereggs, etc.?

 

- How many disks were included? Was an harddisk required? Did the box contain any Atari-specific items?

 

Many thanks!

 

Best regards,

Vincent

 

I have and played it. It was a great game. A little off beat by its use of "Acts" like a play instead of a straight forward adventure. To answer your questions:

 

1. It certainly looks like an exact port of the PC version. I believe all the SCI (Sierra Creative Interpreter) game files were interchangeable between computers. That's why once a game was finished in SCI, other versions were released shortly after the PC version. While great, it also means that if more colors or higher resolution were available, it would not be used due to the PC version's limitation. Basically, the screenshots would look the same as the PC version.

 

2. Yes, the MIDI support was awesome! That was the best part of Sierra games. Especially in this game, it helped create the eerie mood of the Louisiana bayou plantations where it was set. You hear the crickets, creeky footsteps, grandfather clocks going off, etc. Sierra really took this to great depths more than other developers.

 

Only the Roland MT32 was fully supported. A generic driver was available, but no sound effects like the ones I mentioned above are heard - just music.

 

3. The minimum requirements were a 1 MB ST. That's it. A hard disk is strongly recommended. I remember finally getting a hard drive and it sped loading/saving up SO fast! No more disk swapping too.

 

4. Like I said above, I'm pretty sure it was a direct port of the PC version.

 

5. It came on 4 double-sided disks. Completely hard disk installable with no on-disk copy protection (you need a fingerprint code in the box contents to bypass the copy protection question when the game first loads up). The only Atari-specific item was an Atari ST Reference Card containing machine-specific instructions such as how to save/load a game, how to install a game, key commands, etc.

 

I'd like to see your site when you're done!

[Joey Kay]

That game totally rocked. I had it for my Tandy 1000 and lost HOURS to it. I always appreciated how Sierra took advantage of the extra powers of the Tandy series of computers (the powers that they hijacked from the PCjr, IIRC)

 

Looking forward to the website!