Play Windows 98 and MS-DOS Games on iPad/iOS/iPhone with DOSBox-Pure and Retroarch for FREE

Retroarch is now on the App Store for Apple TV, iPad and iPhone devices. Here I go through setting up the DOSBox-Pure Retroarch core, Installing MS-DOS games, Installing Windows 98, and a few clips of DOS based and Windows based games including Fallout, Diablo, and Starcraft

This is a preinstalled system 4gb system image and link to the required ISO to boot it

[00:00] Intro, topics, Bluetooth keyboard recommendation
[01:43] What am I recording on?
[02:00] How does DOSBox-Pure handle games as "roms"?
[02:15] Where to store MS-DOS games and Windows-based ISO files?
[02:58] How to add games to DOSBox-Pure in Retroarch?
[03:43] Clip of Tyrian running on an iPad
[03:58] Installing and gameplay of Star Wars X-Wing Collectors CD-ROM edition for MS-DOS on iPad
[04:58] Clip of Fallout 1 for MS-DOS running on iPad and how to use a gamepad as a mouse in DOSBox-Pure
[06:20] Running general programs in DOSBox-Pure, with Cubic Player 1.6 playing a mod file as an example
[06:50] Installing Windows 98 in DOSBox-Pure
[08:43] Additional in-OS setup for Windows 98 and DOSBox-Pure core tweaks
[09:30] Installing Voodoo drivers for Windows 98
[10:43] Space Cadet Pinball demo gameplay clip
[11:10] Installing multiple games to an installed copy of Windows 98, with Fallout 2 as an example
[11:30] Fallout 2 gameplay on Windows 98 running within Retroarch on an iPad demo clip
[11:53] Starcraft for Windows 98 running in Retroarch on an iPad demo clip
[12:18] Diablo for Windows running in Retroarch on an iPad demo clip
[12:43] Ultimate Underworld 2 for MS-DOS demo clip, OPL-3 emulation

Free ISO maker program download link:
#retroarch #fallout #dosbox

[thinmanpaul]

I keep coming back to this tutorial. It’s the best I found for Win 98 with retroarch on ios. Thanks a million!

Does anyone else have trouble with audio on Windows 98? I have a stutter in the audio. Everything else works gret as in the video…

[konstantinorlov]

Thank you for taking time to do this walkthrough. Very helpful!

[wootks]

One more new discovery. You can run Diablo 2 as well. You need to install the 1.05b version with a no cd patch. I can’t get GLide working without graphical corruption, but Direct 2d works fine.

[ba_commander]

Thanks for this video. I want to try and get Master of Orion 2 working on my ipad.

[samnite]

I am trying to troubleshoot getting DOSBOX Pure to run old games on my RG35XXSP. It's cool that you can get Windows 98 to work in this way. I may tinker with it on my handheld but without a keyboard and mouse it may be too much of a hassle.

[digoneslacerda]

When I try to run the .img file, retroarch close down 😢.

[PhoenixNomads]

Thanks for this amazing Video and all the gold nuggets. What about good old Keyboard and Mouse support? I tried WarCraft 1 and the Mouse is not really like it supposed to be. There are some settings that you can change, for mouse go to Core Option/Input/Mouse Input Mode and change this to "Direct controlled mouse (not supported by all games)"

And for the Keyboard go to Settings (Not the Core Options, rather the settings icon on the right side) then go to Input/Hotkeys/Game Focus (Toggle) - This is a Shortcut u can hit in the game to activate the Game Focus Mode (ON) so now the Keyboard is no gamepad anymore. Now it uses all the inputs like a keyboard.

But even with this two changes... the mouse still sits on top of the game mouse. I have to click to drag the mouse to the location. That makes hovering over buttons and objects not usable at all. Better then nothing... But not how you want to play a Keyboard + Mouse Emulated DOS Game. Any idea?

[xhggz]

This was a great video. Unfortunately the archive link for the prebuilt windows 98 is down because of the attack on the site. I hate to ask, If it's not too much trouble, do you have an alternative link for that?

[ScarySwim]

thankyou very much for giving an iphone tutorial for DOS games!learned a lot in this video, retroarch is so confusing to me.can you please make a sega saturn tutorial for iphone fixing the not reading games error?all fixes are for PC but not iphones

[Виноградникуселі]

I installed Windows 98 in Dosbox X.
help me how to transfer games to the emulator and run them there

[ancelinw]

Hello, thank you for your very interesting tutorial. I have unsuccessfully tried to install windows 98 on my iPhone. Once the iso is launched with DOSbox Pure, there’s no available option to install a new OS on the screen.

Could you please help me ?
Thank you very much

[wootks]

EDIT: Read for partial solution. Tl;dr turn off mouse support in the overlay.

In case anybody is wondering, there is no proper mouse grab support for RetroArch on iPadOS. So if you were thinking you could hookup a USB mouse or use the factory magic trackpad it wont really work well. You have to hold the left mouse button to get the cursor to even move. This makes RTS and FPS games fairly unplayable. There is an open bug for it that has been around for at least a year. Don't suspect a fix is coming anytime soon...

[iApex]

Do the GOG versions of these games also work?

[Vavlm]

Awesome guide, thanks! Quick question: any luck with using bluetooth mouse on ios? Or there is no way other than grabing mouse button to move cursor?

[sentience]

Sir, I’m using your ISO prebuilt file & its beautiful

But when I’m trying to play that Tovak(That Dinosaur game)

It’s getting error
It’s says that it is doing an illegal action & will shut down

So what to do?

[ididanoopsie]

i don’t get how to get it fallout 1 tow work, i don’t know what i’m missing

[JustGoodGames.]

This is awesome. Where does pure install the operating system to and what filetype is it saved as? Documentation looks like it installs as a .dosz (maybe WINWHATEVER.pure.dosz?) in the `retroarch/system` directory? I have a clean install, but I can't get pure to recognize it or the install disks. EDIT: Oh is it a `.sav` file?