Mouse Support

Heya,

Today I received an old boxed set of the Doom games, "The Doom Trilogy." Everything seems to set up fine, except for configuring my mouse.

My computer runs Windows XP, so Doom is very outdated, of course --- but the Windows 95 version runs just fine. The problem I am having with my mouse is that the game acts as if it does not detect it, or does not think I want to use the keyboard and the mouse together (which I do). Well, I've run through the Launcher's Configuration screen dozens of times, made certain that mouse support is enabled, and set everything up to my satisfaction; but when I go into the game, only the keyboard functions. The mouse does nothing in the game, except sometimes click on a hidden bar on the top of the screen (for quitting and minimizing and the like).

Confused, I tried installing the DOS version of Ultimate Doom as well. When I configure it to work with the keyboard and mouse, it functions fine...so I would use the DOS version, except that my sound card does not function with it for who-knows-what reason, and it simply ran faster and better in the Windows 95 version.

But, I cannot use my mouse in the Windows 95 version...could someone please tell me what is going on, and how to fix the problem I am having with configuring the mouse? It'd be a pain using only the keyboard when playing Doom.

Someone, please help me out here...

http://www.doomworld.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=18077

Without going really indepth about the problem and offering some crazy trouble shooting solution, here's my suggestion. Get a source port from the site here. It's a good thing to have all that customizability and it also is a good solve for software conflicts/issues like this.

EDIT: Yeah. What Grazza said.

Thanks!

Apologies for not being really familiar with this...but, I was just looking over the ports before seeing your reply, and I'm not too sure which one to use. Some seem (not too sure) to add features such as jumping capability and all that...but I don't want any of that.

My whole thing was to play the original game, without any neat add-ons yet. I just want the mouse to operate.

Could you guys please refer me to a port that doesn't add any special features, and only adds mouse support (or at least allows me to choose whether or not to turn on those features, such as looking up and down, and other things not in the original game)?

-Melissa- said:
My whole thing was to play the original game, without any neat add-ons yet. I just want the mouse to operate.

Could you guys please refer me to a port that doesn't add any special features, and only adds mouse support (or at least allows me to choose whether or not to turn on those features, such as looking up and down, and other things not in the original game)?

Your best choice in this case is PrBoom, especially once you make sure all the settings are set as close as possible to Doom's or Doom95's (since you can run Doom95 you'll be able to recall them.) As noted on the port's page v2.3.0 is a beta, so 2.2.4 is recommended instead for regular use now.

Prboom and Eternity sound like the ones that would best meet your requirements. But most ports make the added features optional, so you might find that, e.g., Zdoom is suitable too - it depends just how compatible with the original game you want it to be.

Thank you very much! I'll try that one out.

yeah i'd recommend eternity but prboom is another good option, although with the latter you'll have to change some options to make it act like regular vanilla doom.

I tried out Prboom and, thankfully, everything works out great! Exactly what I wanted.

I'll try out Eternity too, just in case. But, thanks to you guys, I've got it working now. Yay!

Thanks for responding and answering my question...and so quickly, too! Maybe you should start charging money for this. After I stop asking questions, that is.

Oh, and by the way, which level editor do you guys recommend?

I'd recommend Doom Builder, which has an innovative 3D mode that makes editing fun and easy. It's still being tested, but it doesn't have too many bugs, and you might as well start messing with it already since it's in full development at the moment.

sargebaldy said:
yeah i'd recommend eternity but prboom is another good option, although with the latter you'll have to change some options to make it act like regular vanilla doom.

Actually, Eternity is much like PrBoom except that it has additional (new) map editing and playing configuration features. And you have to change options for both engines to make them really work like Doom and Doom2. You may be confused here about Eternity because by default it just doesn't use the colored status bar, but its compatibility modes aren't set to Doom-like functionality for the most part (you have Boom-like physics and monsters.) One thing that is notably different in Eternity (and apparently not modifiable) is the sound Chaingun zombie men make when they attack, which is unlike Doom's.

Note that to get Prboom behaving as much like the original game as possible, you need to change the settings not only in "Doom Compatibility" (make them all "Yes" - I think that is correct, anyway...) but also in "Enemies", to turn off the enhanced monster AI that was added in MBF (make the first two {'infighting' and 'remember'} "Yes", and the rest of them "No" - again, I'm not 100% certain).

You can make Prboom try to emulate the original game exactly by putting -complevel 1 in the command line. The only drawbacks then are that you can't use savegames, and that whenever you ought to get a GF50/GB50 gametic, you only get GF49/GB49 (i.e. you run slightly slower).

it isn't just the colored status bar, recoil is defaulted on in prboom which is a godawful idea i think. but yeah i suppose you're right. another thing eternity has that i don't like is that god mode stays when you warp.

Yes, that's right; you need to change the settings in "Weapons" as well as "Doom Compatibility" and "Enemies".

The default config really should be as in the original game... I always use -complevel myself, so avoid all that mess.

You guys are great. It works wonderfully - at last, a classic (in other words, ancient) game to play when I should really be working! Yay!

Thanks again. I'll try out that level editor, too!