Police Quest IV

Police Quest IV: Open Season
First release	1993
Also known as	Police Quest 4 PQ4
Developed by	Sierra
Published by	Sierra
Distributed by	(unknown)
Platforms	MS-DOS, Macintosh
Resolution	320x200 or 640x480, 256 colors
Engine	SCI
Support	Since ScummVM 2.0.0
Available for Purchase	Yes

Police Quest IV: Open Season was the fourth game in the Police Quest series. It was the first game by ex-LAPD police chief Daryl F. Gates, who would act as the principal consultant for the SWAT series. Rather than focusing on Sonny Bonds from fictional Lytton, CA, Police Quest IV follows a Los Angeles police homicide detective named John Carey. He has to investigate a series of murders which seem to be completely random and not connected to each other.

Installation

Required data files

For more information on how ScummVM uses game data files, see the user documentation.

WARNING: Unlike other games, SCI games have significant variation in the naming of required files.

They also can load supplementary files by resource maps, so it is recommended to keep all files in the game data directory from the CD.

Unless otherwise specified, do NOT remove any file from the directory, even if it does not appear on the following list, since this will likely cause weird bugs.

Copy all files to the game directory. Some games need additional work:

Floppy games with RESOURCE.p01, p02, etc. and/or RESOURCE.a01, a02, etc. files

• Concatenate all RESOURCE.p0* files to RESOURCE.000 (e.g. copy /b RESOURCE.p0* RESOURCE.000 on Windows, or cat RESOURCE.p0* > RESOURCE.000 on *nix).
• Concatenate all RESOURCE.a0* files to RESOURCE.AUD (e.g. copy /b RESOURCE.a0* RESOURCE.AUD on Windows, or cat RESOURCE.a0* > RESOURCE.AUD on *nix).

Games with multiple CDs

• Directories that exist on multiple discs (e.g. ROBOT and VMD directories) must be merged together, not replaced.
• Rename the RESOURCE.SFX from each CD to RESSFX.00<cdnumber>, and the RESOURCE.AUD from each CD to RESAUD.00<cdnumber>, to match the corresponding RESSCI.00<cdnumber> file that exists on each CD.
• It should be safe to replace any other files from later CDs that were copied already from earlier CDs.

Police Quest 4 from GOG.com

Rename PQ4.gog to PQ4.ISO, mount the ISO, and copy the files from the ISO in the normal manner.

Simultaneous speech and subtitles

Certain CD versions of Sierra SCI games had both speech and text resources. In ScummVM, it is possible to enjoy a combined mode, where both speech and text are shown at the same time.

Either speech only or text only can be selected from the game's settings dialog. Only ScummVM's audio options can be used to enable text and speech mode.

External links

• Wikipedia article on the Police Quest: Open Season series
• Police Quest: Open Season article on MobyGames
• Screenshots (Police Quest series)