Rare SCI Games

[Threepwang]

You ninja'd me with this, so I'll just make a separate post to make sure you see it: It's also possible that it's just the EGA thing. Are the others VGA?

I don't have the interpreter 1.SQ4.056 in VGA. Only in LOWRES-EGA. I think it's an interpreter specifically for a LOWRES-EGA edition. However, with the interpreter 1.SQ4.057, the game is in VGA in English, Spanish, as well as French. The German edition uses the interpreter 1.SQ4.030.

[lskovlun]

You ninja'd me with this, so I'll just make a separate post to make sure you see it: It's also possible that it's just the EGA thing. Are the others VGA?

I don't have the interpreter 1.SQ4.056 in VGA. Only in LOWRES-EGA. I think it's an interpreter specifically for a LOWRES-EGA edition. However, with the interpreter 1.SQ4.057, the game is in VGA in English, Spanish, as well as French. The German edition uses the interpreter 1.SQ4.030.

Which is exactly what I was trying to say. OK then, it seems safe to assume that the only difference between 1.SQ4.056 and 1.SQ4.057 is the graphics mode. In fact, this should be discernible from the name of the executable (SCIDHUV.EXE for VGA, and I think SCIDUV.EXE for EGA?)

[Threepwang]

You ninja'd me with this, so I'll just make a separate post to make sure you see it: It's also possible that it's just the EGA thing. Are the others VGA?

I don't have the interpreter 1.SQ4.056 in VGA. Only in LOWRES-EGA. I think it's an interpreter specifically for a LOWRES-EGA edition. However, with the interpreter 1.SQ4.057, the game is in VGA in English, Spanish, as well as French. The German edition uses the interpreter 1.SQ4.030.

Which is exactly what I was trying to say. OK then, it seems safe to assume that the only difference between 1.SQ4.056 and 1.SQ4.057 is the graphics mode. In fact, this should be discernible from the name of the executable (SCIDHUV.EXE for VGA, and I think SCIDUV.EXE for EGA?)

The file in question is not present, but the interpreter 1.SQ4.056 is used for the LAWRES-EGA version of LSL1 Bilingual, Spanish/English, and the game includes the file SCIDUV.EXE. I conclude that this is the LAWRES-EGA edition SOLD SEPARATELY and not a box labeled VGA and EGA. Right?

[Collector]

Hmm, that might be a nice thing to add to the version detector then. Does it contain debug symbols (Detectable by looking for NB00 and NB02 signatures) or the SCI debugger (detectable by looking for any number of telltale text strings). It's also possible that it's just the EGA thing. Are the others VGA?

I would love to add it to the tool. I am not quite sure about what to look for with the NB00 and NB02 signatures. A list of the text strings to get me started would help, too.

[lskovlun]

I would love to add it to the tool. I am not quite sure about what to look for with the NB00 and NB02 signatures. A list of the text strings to get me started would help, too.

The NB00 and NB02 markers are literally just those bytes in succession. They indicate the beginning of a Microsoft Codeview symbol table. The first executable I found with one of those was the Hoyle4 executable. I got a collection of EXE files from you at one point, so I know you have it 

[Collector]

Well, that was easy, thanks.

[Collector]

I noticed that I had a Wiki page based on HWM's Sierra On-Line Interpreter Versions List for the SCI games, but did not have one for the AGI games, so I converted the AGI portion of his list to a new Wiki page. https://wiki.sierrahelp.com/index.php/Sierra_AGI_Game_Versions There were a couple of releases that I am sure about. "AGI Tandy Demo (AKA Sierra Demos II)" and "Season Greetings From Tandy" I am tempted to assume that the "AGI Tandy Demo (AKA Sierra Demos II)" is https://wiki.sierrahelp.com/index.php/AGI_Demo_Pack_2 and the "Season Greetings From Tandy" is the 1986 "A Computer Christmas" AGI Christmas card https://wiki.sierrahelp.com/index.php/Computer_Christmas

Does anyone have any better information and if they are not these releases, does anyone have either of the releases that HWM was referring to?

[Threepwang]

Even rarer, Laura Bow 2 in Spanish: (Game version 1.000.000, Interpreter version 2.000.274) It is written in the ScummVM detection table: "This is the floppy version (text-only) distributed on a CD." By jvprat. Was this version possibly distributed in a magazine?

I am answering my own question. The mystery of this floppy disk edition of Laura Bow 2 on CD in Spanish is solved. It took 15 years. Here is the ticket update: https://bugs.scummvm.org/ticket/5630#no1 So it is indeed a late official version (May 10, 1994) in Spanish by Erbe Software.

[Collector]

I was looking at the EXEs from Hoyle 4. The Windows SCIW_V.EXE interpreter readily unpacks with unlzexe, but unlzexe fails to unpack the DOS SIERRA.EXE. Both of them seem to have been packed with PKWARE 1.03, so both my tool and Gumby's fail to extract the interpreter version for this SIERRA.EXE. At first It looked like that it was not packed since it has a lot readable strings as is, but I see no trace of a version number. Any ideas on what is going on? If it is packed, what can unpack it?

[lskovlun]

I was looking at the EXEs from Hoyle 4. The Windows SCIW_V.EXE interpreter readily unpacks with unlzexe

Hm, that's odd. LZEXE doesn't usually work with Windows executables.

It looked like that it was not packed since it has a lot readable strings as is, but I see no trace of a version number. Any ideas on what is going on? If it is packed, what can unpack it?

Microsoft's EXEPACK could be the culprit here. It doesn't actually compress very well, but it does mangle text strings. Do you know about Ben Castricum's old UNP tool? It knows about LZEXE and EXEPACK and a bunch more. A one-stop shop.

[Collector]

Buried in this SCIW_V.EXE is the string:

PKWARE Data Compression Library(
)
Copyright 1990-92 PKWARE Inc.  All Rights Reserved.
Patent No.
,745
Version 1.03

I am not sure what it is doing there if it was not packed with it, but as I mentioned, unlzexe will not handle it.

The reason that I am trying to sort it out is that this is the one from Hoyle 4. The SIERRA.EXE has the NB00 and NB02 strings visible, even before decompressing.

Strings visible before decompressing are references to Win16 system files and scidll and the string  "Windows version of SCI - HOYLE" along with various generic error messages. It also shows the interpreter's flags, but no hint of a version number. I think ScummVM ID it as on of those "x.yyy.zzz" interpreters, but I would like to have my tool determine it instead of relying on a reference.

[lskovlun]

Buried in this SCIW_V.EXE is the string:

PKWARE Data Compression Library(
)
Copyright 1990-92 PKWARE Inc.  All Rights Reserved.
Patent No.
,745
Version 1.03
I am not sure what it is doing there if it was not packed with it, but as I mentioned, unlzexe will not handle it.

Oh, PKWARE DCL is used for the resource volumes and for savegames. It is not an executable packer.