sciv(6)

NAME
sciv - FreeSCI's main executable; this loads, links and runs SCI bytecode, such as Sierra's famous adventures games.

DESCRIPTION
FreeSCI is a portable interpreter for SCI games, such as the Space Quest series (starting with SQ3) or Leisure Suit Larry (2 and sequels); see below for a complete listing.

sciv is the main executable which loads, links and runs SCI bytecode. You'll need to run sciv in order to play SCI games.

SYNOPSIS
sciv [ --gamedir dir, -ddir ] [ --run, -r ] [ --sci-version version, -Vversion ] [ --version, -v ] [ --debug, -D ] [ --help, -h ] [ --graphics gfx, -ggfx ] [ --scale-x xfact, -x xfact ] [ --scale-y yfact, -y yfact ] [ --color-depth bytespp, -c bytespp ] [ --disable-mouse, -m ] game

OPTIONS

--gamedir dir, -ddir
    With this option, games resources will be read from the directory dir. Default is the current directory, unless a directory has been specified in the config file (see below).

--run, -r
    Do not start the debugger; only run the game (the default action).

--sci-version version, -Vversion
    This option sets the SCI version for sciv to emulate. Acceptable version numbers are of the form x.yyy.zzz, where x is the major number, yyy is the minor number and zzz the patch level. Note that currectly only SCI0 (major/minor=0/000) games are supported. Normally, the version will be autodetected from the game resource files.

--version, -v
    Display version number and exit.

--debug, -D
    Start up in debug mode.

--help, -h
    Display a short help text and exit.

--graphics gfx, -ggfx
    With this option, you can specify which graphics driver is to be used. In this release, only ggi is supported.

--scale-x xfact, -xxfact
    --scale-y yfact, -yyfact These options allow to explicitly specify the horizontal and vertical scaling factors. The resulting size of the game window will be 320*xfact x 200*yfact, plus any window decorations.

--color-depth bytespp, -cbytespp
    This sets the number of bytes to use per pixel. Some visuals/graphics drivers support several color depths, so that auto-detection may not yield the desired effects.

--disable-mouse, -m
    Many SCI games handle the mouse pointer differently if no mouse is present in the system. This option instructs the interpreter to tell the games that no mouse is present whenever they ask for one; the actual effect depends on the individual game.

game
    An identifier describing the game to start. This identifier (GAME_ID) must be declared in the configuration file.

CONFIG FILE

FreeSCI will create a directory called .freesci in your home directory (unless this directory already exists). If you run an SCI game, this game will create another directory inside the .freesci directory, to store its save games in.

Also, if a file called config exists in this directory, it will be read and parsed by the interpreter after the game has been loaded. At this time, the configuration file may contain:

-   Comments preceeded by a hash '#' sign

-   version = x.yyy.zzz: emulate SCI version x.yyy.zzz. The version number is sometimes printed on game discs, or can be found out by grepping your main executable for "0.000." (for SCI0 games). It is also displayed if the built-in debugger is activated in the Sierra SCI engine.

-   pic0_dither_mode = dither | flat | dither256: (only one of those three modes). dither: Draw in 16 colors, same as Sierra SCI. flat: Interpolate colors (256 colors). Improves some graphics. dither256: Dither in 256 colors. A compromise between dither and flat.

-   pic0_dither_pattern = scaled | 1: scaled: Perform picture dithering to blocks with a width of the horizontal and a height of the vertical scaling factor 1: Dither single pixels (same as scaled if the game is being run unscaled)

-   pic0_brush_mode = scaled | ellipses | random-ellipses | more-random: Affects how semi-random brushes (used mostly for dirt and foilage) are drawn in SCI0 background pictures: scaled: Scale every semi-random pixel to a rectangular block ellipses: Scale every semi-random pixel to a filled ellipse random-ellipses: As ellipses, but slightly shift ellipse offset and size more-random: Add more random pixels to the whole area

-   pic0_line_mode = correct | fine: Specify how lines are drawn when background pictures are rendered in SCI0: correct: Draw lines appropriately scaled fine: Don't scale lines (thin lines, may cause problems)

-   dirty_strategy = 1 | clusters: The "dirty strategy" is the strategy used to collect modifications to the screen content. Modifying this may affect performance on slow or networked systems. 1: Collect everything in one dirty region clusters: Cluster non-overlapping modified regions into a set of regions

-   pic0_scaled = yes | no: Whether SCI0 background pics should be scaled (may look better) or not (faster, looks more like the original games)

-   pic_buffer_size = #: Number of background pics to store in an LRU buffer. Increasing this value will increase the amount of memory used, but may considerably speed up changing back to rooms you visited not too long ago.

-   mouse = yes | no: Specifies whether the interpreter should report to the game that it has a mouse.

-   [GAME_ID]: Commands following this line will only have an effect for the game with the specified game ID. (The game ID is printed during sciv startup, and is also used to create the save game directory).

-   resource_dir: Read the game's resource data from the specified location. Must not be used in the generic part of the config file.

SUPPORTED GAMES

The following games have been tested with FreeSCI and are known to give some level of interactivity. In theory, FreeSCI should be able to let you complete all of these.

-   Hero's Quest / Quest for Glory 1

-   Space Quest 3

-   King's Quest 4

-   Leisure Suit Larry 2

-   Leisure Suit Larry 3

-   Police Quest 2

-   Codename: Iceman

-   The Colonel's Bequest (*)

-   Conquest of Camelot

-   The Fun Seeker's Guide (from the SQ Collector's Series)

-   Hoyle's Book of Games (volume 1) (**)

-   Hoyle's Book of Games (volume 2) (**)

(*) There are still several graphical glitches in the Colonel's Bequest, but the game itself should work.

(**) Due to differences between the way Sierra SCI and FreeSCI handle graphical widgets, these games may cause an accumulation of widgets in the widget subsystem, resulting in a slowdown and some increased memory usage.

SEE ALSO
sciconsole(6), scidisasm(6), sciunpack(6),

BUGS

FreeSCI is incomplete. Space Quest 3 was reported to have been completed with an earlier version of the interpreter, but no success reports regarding other games have been filed yet. This release has the following limitations (plus some bugs):

-   Only SCI0 games are supported

-   Sound is not supported yet

-   The SCI debug functions aren't fully supported (and probably never will be, since FreeSCI uses its own debug functions).

AUTHORS

FreeSCI is copyright (c) 1999,2000,2001 by Christoph Reichenbach <creichen@rbg.informatik.tu-darmstadt.de>, Carl Muckenhoupt <carl@wurb.com>, Dmitry Jemerov <yole@exch.nnz.spb.su>, Magnus Reftel <d96reftl@dtek.chalmers.se>, Petr Vyhnak <pvyhnak@attglobal.net>, Sergey Lapin <slapin@karelia.ru>, Lars Skovlund <lskovlun@image.dk>, Rickard Lind <rpl@dd.chalmers.se> and Rink Springer <rink@springer.cx>.

This man page was written by Bas Zoetekouw <bas@debian.org> and Christoph Reichenbach.