Getting started

This is a gameplay patch for the MSX cassette of War in Middle Earth (Melbourne House / Dro Soft, 1989). It is not the game: it is what gets changed in it.

No cassette image is distributed here. The patch is what gets shared, and you apply it to your own copy.

The quick way: the IPS

The repository carries a war_parche.ips of 1,718 bytes. It holds only the bytes that change — our own code, the map's 122 repainted tiles and the new text — and it applies to your own tape with any IPS tool, or with the one included here:

python3 tools/ips.py --aplica war.tsx war_parche.ips war_parche.tsx

Your tape has to be the one it was made from. Its fingerprint is sha256 13c63632…b1d81208; if yours differs the patch will still apply, but nobody can vouch for the result.

The long way: build it yourself

You need Python 3 and make. Put your war.tsx in the root and:

make extract     # pulls the block bodies out of your tape into work/
make parche      # applies the table and writes war_parche.tsx
make ips         # and war_parche.ips, the patch on its own
make test        # the 87 checks

make parche does not write blind: each change first checks that the original bytes are the ones it expects, and if a single byte outside the table differs when it finishes, it aborts. That is why it is safe to let it run on your copy.

Playing it

openmsx -machine Philips_VG_8020 -cassetteplayer war_parche.tsx

then, on the MSX, RUN"CAS:". The whole load is about six and a half minutes of emulated time; with the emulator's throttle off, far less.

What you will see differently

• The whole map is repainted: 122 of the 128 8 × 8 drawings. It is the first thing you notice, because it changes the entire screen.
• Enemy units are drawn on the map, wearing the Eye of Sauron so you do not mistake them for your own.
• Each unit's sheet shows the number for its six attributes, not just "very skilled".
• In the Ring-bearer's sheet, to the left of the ring, the months left before he succumbs.
• The text sits on the frames' own khaki instead of on white.
• And the sheet reads Firme, Virtuoso, Valiente and Fuerte where it read Hábil, Valioso, Duro and Bravo, with its last line whole: "Aliado a la Comunidad".

To reach Frodo's sheet: put the cursor on the Fellowship's cell, fire, and use up and down to step through the units until you get to him. The ring number only shows in the bearer's sheet, which is where the game draws the ring.

Before you judge it

Araubi played a full game with the September build, and that is where the big bug turned up — it is written up in Findings. Nobody has played one with the map repainted. What is known to be missing is in Open questions, and playing it and reporting back is the most useful thing you can do.

Where it comes from

From a commented disassembly of the whole tape, which is a separate repository and a separate site. Every address quoted here comes out of that listing, not out of trial and error.