The Adventurers' Guild

Well, the bug bit me and now I feel the urge to play through the entire series of Bard's Tale games - well, the three in the trilogy, anyway. I played on a Commodore 64 back in the day, but that machine is now defunct.

So the question is, what version to play? Since I'm emulating no matter what, it's a very open question. I've heard the MS-DOS versions are pretty weak, especially of BT3. The Amiga version of BT3 has the same flaws as the MS-DOS version. I don't think the Apple IIgs got BT3 at all, or it would be a slam-dunk.

My cursory attempts to play the C64 version show that the BT1 disk images are filled with somebody's high level hacked (31 all stats) characters. I guess I can delete them, but Garth's is still full of stuff. It'll take away some of the joy of getting a Mage Staff or Bardsword if I know I could just go buy 'em any old time. The only character disk I found without such a party is corrupted and crashes if I try to heal at a temple.

Anybody know where I can get C64 disk images that are "fresh?" Or should I just give up and play the Apple IIe versions?

I have a patched version of BT3 for MSDOS that is much, much closer to the Apple/C64 versions.

https://github.com/downloads/ChrisAubuc ... thiefp.exe

@rakenan

have you tried "Arnold's" disk version of BT1 for the C64?

The link is posted somewhere here in the forums.

Like here

ZeroZero wrote:@rakenan

have you tried "Arnold's" disk version of BT1 for the C64?

The link is posted somewhere here in the forums.

Like here

That's the one that crashes when I try to heal at a temple. Maybe I got a bad download.

It almost feels like giving up, but I'm playing the Apple IIgs version of BT1 and BT2. I'll have to start a new party for BT3, but that just means I'll get to level my rogue up with the rest of my party, since I can't see dragging a dead weight rogue through the first two games.

I have to think that the IIgs version must be the best. The graphics and sound are excellent for the time, much better than any other version I've seen. Even with the fairly lame KEGS emulator, the experience playing the game is very good. On the IIgs, the game is as good as I remember it being, which is very much not the case when I usually go back and try to play a game I loved "back in the day." Usually much of the appeal is nostalgia, but the IIgs makes nostalgia reality.

@rakenan

What emu for the C64 do you use? I use the CCS V3.7 and the
Arnold disks just work nice. I just verified that temples work.

It may rather be a problem of the emulator that you use.

E D I T
I just tested CCS V3.8 and all still works... Or did you mean healing
from anything other then wounds? Heal dead or special states?

In fact, I made a dumb mistake. I was using the disk images hosted here at the Adventurer's Guild, and tried to get accustomed to the hacked character disk, so I started looking for a replacement. When I found the arnold images, I just grabbed the character disk (well, city disk according to the file name) and stuck it in the folder with the files from here. Starting with the Adventurer's Guild hosted boot disk and using the arnold city disk produces a crash for me on both CCS64 and VICE when I try to heal from simply HP damage at a temple.

Using the full set of arnold disks, it turns out, works fine. The city disk is just not compatible with the crack used on the disks hosted here.

That said, I'm wrestling with the urge to continue with BT1 and BT2 on the IIgs. The graphics and sound are better, I'm almost to the point of fighting the 99 Berserkers x4, and I have found some loot I'd hate to give up. The only downside is that I won't be able to transfer my party to BT3, which was my favorite of the series.