RACER (1994), Dos Mode-X game, with source. \ VOGONS
RACER is a vintage shareware MSDOS car racing game from the 1990s. It uses VGA MODE-X graphics mode to achieve hardware assisted smooth scrolling. I implemented a simple form of sprites for the cars in this game, and it shows some of the hardware tricks and hacks programmers from this era used.
Note that not all VGA cards from the era support MODE-X, however for more modern machines, emulators like DOSBOX seem to work ok. (but set the DOSBOX speed to max)
You will find C the source code supplied in the zip archive, to compile you will need Turbo C 2.0 or 3.0. It was released by Borland as a free download. (Try the links at the end of the Turbo-C wikipedia page)
RACER is a re-write of a VIC-20 program of mine, which was published in Commodore Computing International in Nov 1982. (www.commodore.bombjack.org/commodore/ma ... al/cci.htm)
Welcome to RACER - an excellent car-racing game with smooth scrolling graphics. Steer your car along the road, using the 4 and 6 keys on the keypad, or the cursor left/right keys. Hit the CTRL key to Accelerate - when released, you drop back again. Try to avoid on coming CARS, MINES (white), and OIL slicks, but try to collect yellow GOLD BARS for points. When you hit an on-coming car, mine, or run off the road, the game is over - when you hit OIL, you skid. Try to collect green BONUS ARROWS, for points, and a fast 'GOLD-RUN', but avoid red POISON PILLS, which narrow the road and give you a fast 'MINE-RUN'! During the GOLD-RUN, you do not have to face other cars, or mines. You can select a different speed by hitting the F1 key on the title screen. Hit SPACE to pause during play, or ESC to exit. Due to the demands of hardware scrolling, this game works best on a fast PC - a 486 or better is recommended. If you have a slowish computer, you can hit TAB during play to disable the score-display- this will speed things up a bit. This game will run under CGA/EGA, for really slow computers, although the graphics are not as good or smooth in these modes. If you run it under Windows, the animation may be jerky, because of Windows multi-tasking. For best results, run under DOS.
