View topic - Early TES: Daggerfall demo - Windows, Apple, Application, Abandonware and Game Beta Downloads/Repository

MrFlibble · Last edited by MrFlibble on Fri Feb 08, 2013 12:06 pm, edited 2 times in total.

Recently I've found a demo of The Elder Scrolls Chapter II: Daggerfall that is different from both the standard 16 Mb demo and the exclusive Betony demo that was included on magazine cover CDs. After a bit of Googling I found it was mentioned in the old unofficial Daggerfall FAQ v0.992:

Quote:

The first demo is currently 10.3MB zipped (46MB unzipped), which includes a swap file on your hard drive. It has also been available on different Game Magazines (those funky CD-ROMS demo things). The first demo is no longer available since it contains lots of bugs and is greatly inferior to the second demo (below).

The demo will run with the Matrox Millenium video card only with 1.9 BIOS which is available from The Matrox WWW Site.

It includes Demo versions of the character generator, the item maker, the potion maker, the spell maker, a tour of sites of interest, and a playable dungeon. Your character will be a pregenerated male 16th level spellsword. There will be no save in the demo. The Demo's 3D rotatable automapping function combines areas covered by your various dungeon explorations, until you log out of the Demo proper. The Demo also contains water, no magic items, and some 'eye candy'. Due to space restrictions, there is no monster AI in the DEMO.

The dungeon is from the pit of jagadha. The dungeon consists of 4 8x8x8 3D blocks. Each block loosely has 8 "levels": there are many partial levels, intersecting ramps between the levels, stairs, balconies, overhangs and rooms with different height ceilings.

This demo is not a beta per se, but it's clearly based on a pre-release build of the game, and there are quite a few noticeable differences. After exiting the game, a message appears that goes "TES: Daggerfall v0.1 completed", although I'm not sure if this could be considered the real version number of the build.

You can get the demo here:
http://demu.org/resource-details/1071

[Edit] Since the Demu.org file archive has been moved to archive.org, here's the updated download link:
http://archive.org/details/TheElderScrollsDaggerfall_1020

There's also a split version, available from giffer.org: DAGDEMO1.ZIP, DAGDEMO2.ZIP, DAGDEMO3.ZIP, DAGDEMO4.ZIP, DAGDEMO5.ZIP, DAGDEMO6.ZIP

Awooo

These are all the demo's I have:

Daggerfall Demo 0.1 - 1995/11/09 (The one posted here)
Daggerfall Betony Demo 1.0.179 - 1996/10/18
Daggerfall Demo 1.0.181 - 1996/11/19 (Standard Dungeon Demo)

I still need to find the Betony and 0.1 demos unmodified with their original timestamps from the original CD's. There was also another 0.1 demo I am looking for that is slightly different and has a female character, this demo was released on the European Version of the April 1996 PC-GAMER. An early 0.1 demo was released first with a fifth level character but it was replaced very quickly with the build posted here, probably because it was too difficult. This one is very difficult to find since it was only posted on the old GAMBETA forum in Compuserve which is gone now. Also note that there was a build between the Betony and Standard Demos, which suggests another demo exists somewhere.

MrFlibble

Awooo wrote:

There was also another 0.1 demo I am looking for that is slightly different and has a female character, this demo was released on the European Version of the April 1996 PC-GAMER. An early 0.1 demo was released first with a fifth level character but it was replaced very quickly with the build posted here, probably because it was too difficult. This one is very difficult to find since it was only posted on the old GAMBETA forum in Compuserve which is gone now. Also note that there was a build between the Betony and Standard Demos, which suggests another demo exists somewhere.

Interesting! I didn't know other demo versions of the game were released as well. It's a pity many demo/pre-release versions of games from that era that were made public remain obscure for the reason of having been published on CDs no one bothered to upload in the digital form later, or were distributed through BBSs, FTPs and websites that are no longer functional. Files not having been archived by web.archive.org due to robots.txt is also frustrating.

MrFlibble

Awooo wrote:

These are all the demo's I have:

Daggerfall Demo 0.1 - 1995/11/09 (The one posted here)
Daggerfall Betony Demo 1.0.179 - 1996/10/18
Daggerfall Demo 1.0.181 - 1996/11/19 (Standard Dungeon Demo)

I still need to find the Betony and 0.1 demos unmodified with their original timestamps from the original CD's.

Litude at RGB Classic Games Forum has been very kind to upload the image of PC Gamer Volume 4 Number 1 (January 1997) CD, which contains the Betony demo. You can get it here. Kudos to Litude for sharing that!

Hallfiry

The Betony demo actually puts
"TES: Daggerfall demo v1.0 - 10/07/96 17:37:17"
on the stdout, which is a bit strange.

Also, where did you find the 179 and 181? My demos only say 1.0...

Awooo

Thank-you MrFlibble and Litude! This is very appreciated! Hallfiry, The 1.0.179 and 1.0.181 are displayed upon exit of the demo and I have yet to check out those French Magazine CD's which may have some more previews or demos on them.

EDIT:

I also forgot to mention, I have found the 0.1 demo with it's original timestamps. It came on 'The Elder Scrolls - Daggerfall Interactive Preview CD-ROM' which I'll be uploading soon.

Hallfiry

The Preview CD is actually on Amazon afaik (But without the box). There was also a demo CD for the limited edition preorders (I wonder what the Daggerfall figurine looked like... it was limited 100 or so).

I made a little pic with some daggerfall covers that I collected through the years:

The dates aren't ultra accurate, but I think they are more or less correct.

hogsy

Wow... The french retail cover is horrible

MrFlibble

Awooo wrote:

I also forgot to mention, I have found the 0.1 demo with it's original timestamps. It came on 'The Elder Scrolls - Daggerfall Interactive Preview CD-ROM' which I'll be uploading soon.

That would be awesome! ^_^ Was that preview CD included with some other product? Distributed with a magazine? Given away at some special public event?

Hallfiry

On January 31st 1996 a guy on usenet wrote:

Quote:

I don't know if this point as been raised in this newsgroup before, but
I havn't seen it... so here is a little bit of info that you might not
know.

I ordered the Daggerfall Collecters edition a couple weeks ago. Some
of you may think this is ludicrous because the game is still 3 months
away (atleast), but so far I have been rewarded nicely. I received
the promised Daggerfall Demo in the mail on Monday, and I was surprised
to note that there are significant differences between the Net demo and
the CD demo. For one thing the zip file is 5 MB larger. Also it seems
that this Demo randomly generates a character for you, and sometimes
it even generates a female character. Also I have seen some new
equipment that was not in the Net demo: a torch, a Bow and arrow. Besides
the new characters and eq the dungeon is a bit different. The new dungeon
has randomly generated areas. The main layout is the same, but some rooms
are different each time. Also there seems to be more mood lighting in
this version (that may just be my imagination). Also it seems like the
different characters move at different speeds (i.e. the women walk
faster). I havn't done any conclusive tests on the speed issue, that is
just my qualitative analysis.

There have also been some new negative features. It seems that this version
crashes more often. I only played it for an hour, but I got dumped
back do the Dos prompt twice. Both times I was getting blungened by
spells from spells. I am going to write Bethesda about this, but I havn't
seen anyone complain of this, so maybe it's just me.

Also on the CD were playable demos of Future Shock and PBA bowling for
windows. I hadn't seen Future Shock yet, and it's nice. I only wish
both of these games supported 640x480 like Duke Nukem 3D (which is also
another excellent demo, nice graphics). Along with the playable demos,
there were also non-playable demos of X-Car and 10th planet, but something
went wrong with the X-Car demo so I couldn't get it to play.

I hope some people found this interesting. I assume this Demo CD will be
available in stores, so if you really don't want to buy the collectors
edition (which I can't understand why you wouldn't), you don't have to.

Happy Gaming,
-Anthony

Aleff Correa

Hallfiry wrote:

On January 31st 1996 a guy on usenet wrote:

May I ask you where do you find those old usenet postings?

Hallfiry

Aleff Correa wrote:

Hallfiry wrote:

On January 31st 1996 a guy on usenet wrote:

May I ask you where do you find those old usenet postings?

groups.google.com

mrpijey

Would be great if you guys could upload all these demos and betas (properly named with version and dates please) to BA so I can put them in our archives. Since the demos are pre-release versions (as I understand it) I'll tag them as (beta demo). Unless I am wrong?

Awooo

Okay, Here's the Daggerfall Preview CD.

Link: http://www.mediafire.com/?88or6o8ubx5o8o5

I never knew about the Demo which came with the Collectors Edition, He mentions that it randomly generates both Male and Female characters which isn't found in any of the other available demo's as far as I know, apart from the demo on the European Version of the April 1996 PC-GAMER which starts you off with a Female character to begin with.

EDIT:

Just found some info on the missing 0.1 Demo which was featured on the 'European PC Gamer CD', apparently it was also found on 'PC Power'.

Source: https://groups.google.com/group/comp.sy ... aad8008837

Additionally, The 'Betony' Demo was also available on 'PC Games'.

Source: https://groups.google.com/group/alt.gam ... 0a9a696f86

MrFlibble

Awooo, thanks a lot for sharing that one!

Awooo wrote:

I never knew about the Demo which came with the Collectors Edition, He mentions that it randomly generates both Male and Female characters which isn't found in any of the other available demo's as far as I know, apart from the demo on the European Version of the April 1996 PC-GAMER which starts you off with a Female character to begin with.

So this means there was yet another demo of the game? Nice!

Awooo

No problem! This demo was sold standalone on a CD prior to the release of Daggerfall, it was also the first real public demo of the game. I think the Collectors Edition Demo could be the missing version between the Standard and Betony demos.

We are currently missing:

- Daggerfall Collectors Edition Demo
- Daggerfall Demo found on the European Version of the April 1996 PC-GAMER - This is an updated version of the Interactive Preview CD Demo.

- Daggerfall 'Beta' demo which features a 5th level Spellsword - Was available on the Compuserve GAMBETA forum at some point which is now long-gone and Bethesdas own website. The demo was initially set to be released around August 1995 but it kept getting delayed and was eventually released as a 'Beta Demo', it can be said that this is the rarest of all the Daggerfall Demos out there. It came in two files, dagdemo1.zip (5.38MB) and dagdemo2.zip (4.71MB) respectively. This is also the build which came directly before the Interactive Preview CD.

Source: https://groups.google.com/group/comp.sy ... 1f12b1b582?

dezodor · Last edited by dezodor on Wed Feb 29, 2012 5:43 pm, edited 1 time in total.

i found dagdemo on one of my cd-s, but it has 6 parts, not 2... so this might be an other one, anyway here it is: http://www.mediafire.com/?d4gh9p997o9trgc (9mb from futureshock disc)

and these too, just in case if someone still missing them:

http://www.uesp.net/file.shtml?dagger/files/dagdemo.zip (16mb, allows you to play in a dungeon)
http://www.uesp.net/file.shtml?dagger/f ... betony.zip (58mb, allows you to play in outdoor areas)

Hallfiry

The 6 part demo is the preview cd demo.
the other two are the betony demo and the 181 demo again.

Awooo

Yep, we already have those builds. Some further reading has revealed that the 'Collectors Edition' demo is actually the same thing as the European demo!

Quote:

If you wish to have the other demo released in Europe and to some people
that pre-ordered Daggerfall check out my home page.

Source: https://groups.google.com/group/comp.sy ... cc107cf87d?

Additionally, the European demo is an older build than the '0.1 version' from the 'Preview CD' according to Hal Bouma, a Daggerfall programmer at the time.

Quote:

Well, the only difference between the USA and European version
is that the European version (if its what I think it is) is a build
older than the USA version. We had to do some changes at the last minute
(like change the female to a guy) for the USA version.

Source: https://groups.google.com/group/comp.sy ... d51256175f?

MrFlibble

loxotron wrote:

i found dagdemo on one of my cd-s, but it has 6 parts, not 2... so this might be an other one, anyway here it is: http://www.mediafire.com/?d4gh9p997o9trgc (9mb from futureshock disc)

Apparently, the same six-part demo is available from GIFfer.org:
http://www.giffer.com/public/dos/pdemo/demo0006.htm

[Edit] Not sure how new or useful this info might be, but there are old original screenshot packs from the game available from the archived Daggerfall homepage:
http://web.archive.org/web/19970605100112/http://www.bethsoft.com/html/dagpm1.html

Hallfiry

Power Play 11/95 had an 8 pages preview of Daggerfall:
http://www28.zippyshare.com/v/19120476/file.html

moto85

this game has some incredible music.. i havent seen the trailer nor played the game in years.. but the music in this game still give me goosebumps.. intresting demos! cheers

MrFlibble

Yep, I love the music too

Back to the early demo, I think it's a pity they decided to drop some features that were going to be in, judging by what can be seen in this release. Apparently, clothes were supposed to play a greater role, protecting from environment and probably also influencing how NPCs would react to and interact with the player character. I guess the distinction between plain and formal clothing that remains in the full game could have been intended to serve the purpose of better interacting with various factions (commoners vs. nobility etc.). Another obvious use of clothes would have been changing the apparel if you're hiding from someone (e.g. the guards). Such features would have generally added to the role-playing side of the game.

MrFlibble

Out of sheer curiosity, I decided to check if the Betony demo is going to work with the newer EXE from the downloadable dungeon demo (after all, it's a later build of the game and could be less buggy). I took all the Betony files into the dungeon demo's ARENA2 folder, and edited Z.CFG to point to the necessary starting map. It seems to work fine except for one thing: the sky/horizon texture is not displayed at all in outdoor environments, resulting in glitchy graphics. It doesn't seem to be the result of a missing file, so I wonder if it's plain hardcoded in the EXE or can be remedied with editing Z.CFG (there's some variable there called "renderscape", I wonder if it could be somehow related to the problem at hand).

MrFlibble

Awooo wrote:

I never knew about the Demo which came with the Collectors Edition, He mentions that it randomly generates both Male and Female characters which isn't found in any of the other available demo's as far as I know, apart from the demo on the European Version of the April 1996 PC-GAMER which starts you off with a Female character to begin with.

Actually, it turns out that you can play the v0.1 demo (I've tested it with the Internet download version, but I guess the preview Cd one is just the same) with a female character. Just open Z.CFG and edit the gender variable's value from 0 to 1:

It will generate a female character - always the same face, but random female clothes each time. However, the male body with blue underpants seems to have been set to override gender selection, so the character will still have the same male body. From this point, things get even more interesting, as looking into the IMG files reveals that there is one female body image with added blue underwear, namely BODY10I0.IMG, while all other BODY####.IMG sprites, both female and male, are naked, just like in the full game. The male body sprite that is actually used in the game has a completely different filename, M_BRTCLT.IMG (I guess this stands for "Male Breton clothed (?)

" - the CLT part does not seem to stand for a class name). Replacing this file with the aforementioned female, you get this:

Of course, any other of the body sprites are usable here too. As mentioned above, the game automatically generates random female garment items (including underwear, by the way):

Another curious thing I've noticed (most likely a bug though) is that if you "use" a Khajit suit, it will turn into an Eodoric, and vice versa:

Early TES: Daggerfall demo

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