If you let a few months transpire, even the stock at the spent shops will turn over dramatically.
The manual sports the "Made with Macromedia" and multi-colored (pre-v4) Quicktime logos. When I run the installer in Wine, I am prompted to install QT v2.13. Old school.
So the disc uses Quicktime. Unfortunately, my Linux computer cannot seem to see any of the data files on the disc. The CD-ROM contains installation executable for the SNL app as well as QT, but no data files are seen even though 'df -k' reports a full CD-ROM. It might be a similar issue as with The Daedalus Encounter. I will need to check if the data files appear in Windows.
The CD-ROM has a 200+ MB file called bundle.000 which apparently belongs to the Behind the Magic portion. The file is a typical fourcc/chunked file format. The master chunk type is BUND which contains a BNHD chunk at the front. After the BNHD chunk comes a BNDT chunk. This is rather interesting as it is some kind of computer script in plaintext. It starts off as:
#include "general\\scripts\\intrnatl.s"
// Globals
public char demo_version = 1;
public char global_path_string[201] = {0};
public char global_file_string[51] = {0};
public char global_path_string2[201] = {0};
public char global_file_string2[51] = {0};
public char global_string1[81] = {0};
public char global_search_string[81] = {0};
public long global_long1 = 0;
public long global_long2 = 0;
public long global_long3 = 0;
public char trivia_table[500];
public int trivia_correct = 0;
public int trivia_found = 0;
public int option_video_back = 0;
public int option_subtitles = 0;
public int option_print_orient = 0;
public int option_print_size = 2;
public int TRIVIA_COUNT = 300;
if (demo_version==1) {
TRIVIA_COUNT=10;
reg_RegistrySetEntry(
"software",
"LucasArts Entertainment Company LLC",
"Behind The Magic",
"VSE" );
} else {
TRIVIA_COUNT=300;
reg_RegistrySetEntry(
"software",
"LucasArts Entertainment Company LLC",
"Behind The Magic",
"v1.0" );
}
// Resources
wor_CursorLoad( "GENERAL\\IMAGES\\", "CURSOR.bm" );
wor_FontFree( TRUE );
wor_FontLoad( "GENERAL\\FONTS\\", "ARIAL14.BM" );
...and it goes on and on with plenty of plaintext data. All of the referenced images and other associated resources must be contained within as well and the main program is likely a script interpreter.
The Yoda Stories portion only has a 4.5 MB fourcc/chunked data file so it, but plenty of .WAV sound effects in a separate directory.
As for Wine compatibility, setup.exe runs nicely and installs Yoda Stories. Unfortunately, that game crashes. As for the Behind The Magic: Vehicles Special Edition application, that works absolutely perfectly. Further, it contains video clips of Star Wars vehicles in action. Given the fourcc/chunked format of the data files, I would expect the clips to be in LucasArts' own SAN format. The application also has a map screen which illustrates many, many behind-the-magic areas to explore. This disc only contains a sampling: Vehicles.
The installation file is 210+ MB and seems to install just fine in Wine. The setup screens make copious references to something called Catware. As I watch the Wise installation program install hundreds upon hundreds of data files with the extention .ptb, I ponder how the game could have benefitted from resource files...still watching the installation...judging from the number of files with the words char (character) and npc (commonly non-player character) in the filename, and the number of and names of different files in the maps directory (witches lair, road of doom?), this has got to be some kind of fantasy role playing game.
Ah, at long last, the installation is installing the \Sounds\Music directory. I see TRACK1.wav, TRACK2.wav, etc. Will there be FMV to go along with it? Doesn't look like it. Though there does seem to be a map creation utility.
Finally, the installation nears completion and the game asks if I want to install shortcuts to the client, the server, and/or the mapmaker. Server? Is this a MMORPG? I really don't know as the game wants a 16-bit color mode in order to run.
The first thing I notice about the file system is the presence of a smk/ directory. Seeing Smacker files pretty much brings the investigation to a close everytime. However, there is also a victory/ subdirectory that contains a 92 KB file named smackply.exe. It is a small, MS-DOS (MZ-format) executable program that looks like a standalone Smacker file player.
In the directory for the Chronomaster format, there is a number of files with the extension .DFA. They range anywhere in size from a few kilobytes up to almost 6 megabytes. Judging by certain markers in the file, it appears to be a simple palettized animation format that supports arbitrary sizes.
More information on the DFA format can be found in "1-Hit Wonder" Formats.
[Link: Chronomaster DFA samples]
Running under Wine does not yield much success, probably because the games (both the main game and the demo game) are DOS games at heart.
Attempting to install the game under Wine leads absolutely nowhere.
Followup: The VMD multimedia system has been reverse engineered. See the multimedia formats page for more information.
The game also has a New Line Video/ subdirectory with a TV commercial for the Nightmare on Elm Street collection released some years ago. The commercial comes in both MPEG and SVQ1/IMA ADPCM QT formats.
Installing under Wine runs smoothly enough. Then it fails when it gets to the DirectX 6.1 setup. Trying to run the game afterwards results in a "Unrecognized Fatal Exception" error.
Digging through the CD-ROMs' data directories, I find a series of files named .cnm which have markers indicating that they could be animation files (based on the clear presence of audio and video parameters in the header).
All of the executables on the disc fail rather silently when run under Wine.
All of the QT files are Cinepak at reasonably high resolution for the time, and 11025 Hz PCM. Watching through the QT movies, I have to say that this is the best-produced interactive movie game I have seen. Some of the story is told through the perspective of the evening news anchorpeople and is interspersed with clever faux commercials. The rest of the video in the game is, well, reasonably well-acted given the genre.
The installation does not last very long under Wine but that's okay since any competent QT-compatible player can handle the data files.
The application runs quite well under Wine, though the multimedia fails to play when selected.
[Link: AVI samples compressed with RT21]
The game itself installs and plays just fine under Wine. At least the intro movie plays fine. After the intro movie, the game did not really do anything.
by Mike Melanson (mike at multimedia.cx).
Multimedia Exploration Journal
Multimedia Research Institute Main Page