Syndicate Wars deploys to GOG

Don your trenchcoat and strap on your cyberleg, as finally both of Bullfrog's classic Syndicate games are on virtual shelves. The original Syndicate returned via GOG after years in the aether last January, shortly before the release of Starbreeze's Syndicate FPS reboot, and its sequel Syndicate Wars joined the party yesterday.

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Don your trenchcoat and strap on your cyberleg, as finally both of Bullfrog's classic Syndicate games are on virtual shelves. The original Syndicate returned via GOG last January after years in the aether, shortly before the release of Starbreeze's Syndicate FPS reboot, and its sequel Syndicate Wars joined the party yesterday.

GOG's selling Syndicate Wars DRM-free for $5.99, which is perfectly reasonable.

Syndicate Wars brings shiny new toys to the top-down tactical series, including Razor Wire you lay across streets, zappy Electron Maces, orbital strikes of superheated tungsten rods, and Nuclear Grenades which can and will destroy buildings gloriously.

With these shiny new tools, you set about the usual business of killing folks for EuroCorp--or the new Church of the New Epoch faction. Once again, you control a squad of four agents when in the field, and upgrade their weapons, equipment and bodies with funds you raise. 's nice.

From The Chatty
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    March 22, 2013 6:45 AM

    Alice O'Connor posted a new article, Syndicate Wars deploys to GOG.

    Don your trenchcoat and strap on your cyberleg, as finally both of Bullfrog's classic Syndicate games are on virtual shelves. The original Syndicate returned via GOG after years in the aether last January, shortly before the release of Starbreeze's Syndicate FPS reboot, and its sequel Syndicate Wars joined the party yesterday.

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      March 22, 2013 7:17 AM

      I don't think I ever played wars is it as good as regular syndicate?

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      March 22, 2013 7:30 AM

      Cool!

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      March 22, 2013 7:33 AM

      Bought! Spent so many hours in this game, shooting just about everything.

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        March 22, 2013 7:53 AM

        Me too, gets hard as nails so proud to have finished it, even if it just involved cheesing it with rail guns!

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      March 22, 2013 8:44 AM

      Syndicate Wars is really touchy in terms of speed control in DOSBox because there isn't a frame rate cap. The CPU speed required to make the 3D part of the game run acceptably is much higher than for menus and other areas (especially if you run the game in its high res mode), I wonder if that was addressed in their release or if they just made everything run too fast like in Under A Killing Moon.

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        March 22, 2013 10:59 AM

        Yeah, I'd like to know how it runs. I was never able to get it running right :(

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      March 22, 2013 9:07 AM

      [deleted]

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      March 22, 2013 9:51 AM

      All over this. Time for another bout of Bullfrog worship!

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      March 22, 2013 10:03 AM

      Guys, have anyone tried this? I'm all over it if it's working properly (like it should), but I'm afraid it's just a quick port with speed issues. Please understand that I haven' tried any of GOG's ports so I wouldn't know how well of a job they do.

      I would love a GeneWars port too!

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        March 22, 2013 10:22 AM

        In general GOG releases are literal repackagings of the original deliverables.

        So, if it was a Win95 game back in the day then it installs the original Win95 executables, with the compatibility settings tweaked (and possibly a graphics wrapper thrown in for good measure) so that it runs on a modern PC.

        If it was a DOS game (and I wager this one is, 1996 and all) then they release the original DOS executables and a copy of DOSBox configured to run it.

        In general they do NOT go get the old source code and do a quick compile.

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          March 22, 2013 11:06 AM

          Wow, they really ship it with DOSBox? I was thinking it was all transparent and acted like the original release except it now actually runs.

          Disappointing, thanks for the info Schnapple!

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            March 22, 2013 11:37 AM

            What's wrong with using DOSBox? You double-click on the Syndicate Wars shortcut on the desktop and then you're in Syndicate Wars. It doesn't get any more transparent than that.

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              March 24, 2013 4:11 AM

              There's nothing wrong with DOSBox, and nowhere did anyone say so either.

              But running Syndicate Wars in DOSBox comes with a whole slew of issues with the framerate and sound. Perhaps they've worked around that, but there ya go - that's the reason I asked if they ship with DOSBox.

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            March 22, 2013 1:00 PM

            Well they rig it up such that you just double-click on an icon or whatever and it runs. It's not like you have to fire off a command line. Sure, you see the DOSBox window for a second but believe me, you would probably want to have them run the original executables in DOSBox instead of trying to port it to Windows 7 from old 16-bit source code or what not.

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              March 22, 2013 1:02 PM

              [deleted]

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              March 24, 2013 4:12 AM

              Well that's fine. I wouldn't want to port 16-bit code, for sure. :)

              Thanks again for the info!

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              March 28, 2013 3:38 AM

              Is there any way to increase the resolution beyond 640x480? Any mods or such? I really want to relive this game, but I want it to look better and with more overview than 640x480...

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      March 22, 2013 12:01 PM

      BETTER THAN SEX!

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