Lost in Time Help

Opening Theme

Lost in Time Update/Patch

Lost in Time's original requirements:

MS-DOS 5.0 or greater
386 or better
2x CD-ROM
2 MB RAM
19 MB Hard drive space
VGA
Sound Card W7DAC Pro Aud Spectum, SoundBlaster, Sound Source, Thunderboard or MT-32/LAPC-1/CM-32L
Mouse

Audio Problems
- Poor quality or no sound

Game Specific Bugs

Lost in Time CD & Windows XP Help

Extras
- Lost in Time Manual (PDF file) [2.05 MB]
- Lost in Time UHS File (ZIP file) [14.4 KB]
- Lost in Time Walkthrough
- Lost in Time Spoilers
- Lost in Time Demo (ZIP file) [2.61 MB]
- SHP Lost in Time Forum
- Find it on eBay
- Google

Audio Problems

Audio problems are common in the later Sierra DOS SCI games. There's no single fix for all these games.

Problem - Poor Quality / No Sound (Win9x and XP):
The game has no sound or the music is of poor quality.

Solution 1 (preferred):
Play the game in DOSBox. It also will work with the MT-32 sound module, if you are fortunate to have one.

Solution 2:
Use VDMSound. The sound will be as good as your audio hardware, and as with DOSBox, it also works with the MT-32 sound module.

Solution 3:
Play the game with FreeSCI, a third party Interpreter for Sierra's early SCI games.

Solution 4 (DOS/Win9x):
Install DOS drivers for your soundcard. Without DOS drivers installed you won't have sound in a DOS window in Windows 9x. If you can't find DOS drivers for your soundcard, there is an alpha (developmental) version of VDMS that you can try.

Game Specific Bugs

There are a couple of bugs that Lost in Time has that are not speed dependent.

Problem - The Game Locks-up During Cut Scenes:
Lost in Time uses the Redbook CD audio track and the timing during the cutscenes in the game is based on this track. XP's emulation of the old DOS driver (MSCDEX) is imperfect, so the game may lock up.

Solution 1 (preferred):
Be sure to play the game with the latest version of DOSBox. You might want to try a CVS version.

Solution 2:
Use VDMSound. If you use SAPUCDEX for the CD-ROM extension in VDMS it will have greater compatibility.

Problem - The Game Locks-up On Start:
The game locks up as soon as it is started, or after the first sound effect is played.

Solution:
This may occur with Soundblaster 16 or other 16 bit sound cards. Lost In Time is designed to work with 8 bit Soundblaster or Pro Audio Spectrum sound cards. To correct this, run the game's INSTALL program, and choose No Sound. This option will still allow sound if you have CD Audio capability. Soundblaster 16 sound cards have CD audio capability, but this option must be physically connected, and in working order. Otherwise, you will not receive speech in the game. Some 16 bit sound cards may not be compatible with this game.

Problem - Cannot Get Past Halyard:

Solution:
To complete this scene, you must attach the "The end of the Halyard" to the corkscrew. If you run the cursor along the length of the halyard, then you will come to a point with a description: "The end of the Halyard". Click the corkscrew on "The end of the Halyard".

If you are still experiencing difficulty with this scene, this usually indicates that some of the game files have become corrupted. Check your character's inventory. If you have a revolver in your inventory, then this is definitely the problem. Delete the game from your hard drive, and reinstall it from the game CD. To make certain that the corruption does not reoccur, you may want to reinstall after booting your system with a boot disk. For more information on creating boot disks, see Sections 7 and 8.

Lost in Time CD & XP

Goblin's Quest 3 CD version, both Gobliiins and Gobliins, Lost in Time, and WEEN: The Prophecy use the same engine which "hates" the Win NT environment. Getting these to run at all used to be an achievement.

The problem with the Coktel Vision CD games is that the audio is on a Redbook CD audio track and the timing at several point in the games is based on this audio track. XP's emulation of the old DOS driver (MSCDEX) is imperfect, so the games can lock up. You can also try to play the game in DOSBox to avoid this problem, but the following solution is more likely to be successful:

Rip the audio track to your hard drive and play the game in ScummVM to avoid all timing issues. This track can also be compressed as an MP3 or OGG, just be sure to name the file "Track1" with the approprate extension.

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