Play the Demo level?

[McGloomy]

Is there a way to play the demo level (that is shown when you don't start a game but just leave the title screen running)?
If there isn't a way to do it in-game, did someone take the time and rebuild it with a level editor?

[mk1995]

As far as I know, there is a way to play the demo level as-is, but it's eluded me.

However, I did remake the demo level into a playable state while at the same time adding some stuff to it.

DEMO.rar

Run DEMO.EXE instead of PRINCE.EXE.

(74.13 KiB) Downloaded 465 times

Enjoy.

[McGloomy]

Wow, great work! It was nice to see the few level screens that are shown in the demo as part of an actual playable level.
Unfortunately the game crashed everytime I died ("integer divide by 0" or something like that), but I just restarted it and played through the level anyway.

Maybe someone else knows the way to play the level in-game?

Anyway: Vielen Dank und beste Grüße von einem Landsmann!

[mk1995]

I kinda did the latter of the two, but the demo level in and of itself is unplayable due to the layout it has (look at it in RoomShaker and you'll see what I mean). Thus I added some more rooms and altered already existing ones to make the level playable.

[McGloomy]

Could someone please upload a modified version of LEVELS.DAT or PRINCE.EXE? I'd love to explore the demo level, even if it isn't really playable. Unfortunately I don't know much about all this level editing stuff.

[Norbert]

Could someone please upload a modified version of LEVELS.DAT or PRINCE.EXE? I'd love to explore the demo level, even if it isn't really playable.

Since the file that mk1995 provided appears to no longer be available, here is a new link.
(Note: run DEMO.EXE instead of PRINCE.EXE. Also, I made some very small changes so it's actually possible to finish the level.)

Unfortunately I don't know much about all this level editing stuff.

If you want to edit levels, you could download apoplexy and then copy the files from the DEMO.zip into its prince/ directory.
The same is possible with some other editors, like RoomShaker.

[RusFan]

I'd love to explore the demo level, even if it isn't really playable.

If you want just to see what rooms it contains you can see my demo level map which I've made year ago. Complete maps for other levels you can take from here.

[Norbert]

You know what I've always wondered about ImageShack (and why I've never used it myself): if I click on an image there (or on the magnifying glass), I ony get an ad pop-up and the page itself goes to the main page of ImageShack.
Does anyone else have this behaviour in their browser? Maybe it's because I'm using GNU/Linux, or the wrong browsers or something. Or maybe all the big versions of these images get deleted after a couple of months/years...

[RusFan]

You know what I've always wondered about ImageShack (and why I've never used it myself)

Yea, for last time it became very strange and buggy. It does not save number of views and ratings for example and I can't to open pictures in native resolutions. But just for storaging pictures it still suits me well. For your problem I have nothing to say.

[Andrew]

You know what I've always wondered about ImageShack (and why I've never used it myself): if I click on an image there (or on the magnifying glass), I ony get an ad pop-up and the page itself goes to the main page of ImageShack.
Does anyone else have this behaviour in their browser? Maybe it's because I'm using GNU/Linux, or the wrong browsers or something. Or maybe all the big versions of these images get deleted after a couple of months/years...

I used to get the same behavior with Firefox (Windows), but then realized that turning off the ad-blocker and script-blocker add-ons fixed it. Seems they somehow detect these and refuse to zoom into images. I stay away from ImageShack now.

[David]

turning off the ad-blocker and script-blocker add-ons fixed it. Seems they somehow detect these and refuse to zoom into images.

ImageShack uses JavaScript to zoom in, and your script-blocker probably disabled JavaScript on the site.

[Norbert]

I just noticed that CusPop has a "Demo level status" drop-down with "Not playable" and "Playable".
I've tested this, but it does not work.
While the prince does not move automatically, the demo ends as soon as the player presses a key.

[David]

I just noticed that CusPop has a "Demo level status" drop-down with "Not playable" and "Playable".
I've tested this, but it does not work.
While the prince does not move automatically, the demo ends as soon as the player presses a key.

You're right.

What CusPop does:

Code: Select all

in control_kid():
seg006:0CF5 83 3E 9E 0F 00           cmp  current_level, 0
seg006:0CFA 75 34                    jnz  loc_79E0 ; <-- change to JMP

Search: 83 3E 9E 0F 00 75 34
Change: 75 to EB

What's missing:

Code: Select all

in process_key():
seg000:04E0 83 3E B8 42 00           cmp  start_level, 0
seg000:04E5 75 51                    jnz  loc_538 ; <-- change to JMP

Search: 83 3E B8 42 00 75 51
Change: 75 to EB

By the way, the hack in CusPop was made by me, back in 2007(!) according to my files.
I don't know how could I overlook that it's unusable.


Additionally, I found two modifications of PoP which make the demo level playable, in different ways.

In DEMO.rar (from 2008), level 2 was edited to look like the demo level, with some extra rooms.
Additionally, levels 5 and 10 contain two of the extra levels from the European Mega Drive version of PoP.
(They are levels 6 and 7 from here. Level 5 is missing the guards and the potions.)
It might be the same file as in the second post above, but I can't download it, it says "The selected attachment does not exist anymore.". I didn't know this can happen.

In DEMO.zip (from 2012), level 1 was edited to look like the demo level, with only slight changes.

[Norbert]

What's missing: [...]

I'll fix the next release of apoplexy accordingly.
And I'll add a link to your post in the "CusPop TODO list" forum thread.

[Norbert]

What's missing:
[...]
Search: 83 3E B8 42 00 75 51
Change: 75 to EB

I can find these bytes in p0 and u0, but not in p3, u3, p4, u4.
Any chance the JMP can also be applied to 1.3 and 1.4?