Difference between revisions of "About"

ScummVM is a project in which there is an attempt to rewrite the original executable file of a given game, based on the game's original source code or by using reverse engineering techniques to see the code that's contained in the game's executable and rewrite it in C++. This means that ScummVM's executable can be used to replace the game's original one, but of course the game's data files (graphics, audio, game scripts etc) are needed to play the game itself. Therefore, ScummVM is NOT an emulator of a specific operating system, as, for example, DOSBox is for DOS. ScummVM is actually a full rewrite of each game's engine, which has many advantages:

* The game can run on many different platforms, thanks to ScummVM's portable platform backend

* Some bugs which existed in the original game's executable (or specific scripts) may be fixed

* It's possible to re-encode the game's audio files into popular formats, such as MP3, OGG or FLAC so that the game itself takes up much less space

* Most game engines allow the player to save much more save games than the original interpreters did

* In some games, ScummVM offers added functionality which did not exist in the original games. For example, it offers full mouse functionality in older Sierra AGI games, which had no mouse support

* It's possible to listen to the game's MT-32 music cards without an actual MT-32, via a sophisticated system which emulates it