3DO ZONE Forums

I was contacted by a very enthusiastic Killing Time fan whose epic internet voyage rewarded him with a method for playing the game on Window 7. I don't have the game anymore and have had tough luck finding it without having to install a shady downloader first, so I thought I'd post it here and see if you fellers could give it a whirl and tell me how it works for you. Granted this could be something that was already mentioned on the forums before long ago (a search revealed nothing of the sort) but I'd still like the community's opinion on its effectiveness before I post it on the site.

Readme text:

I noticed that every other so called patch to run killing time on a modern windows pc is just a rip where you delete the videos in order to avoid the crashed that they cause when they try to run in 320x240 resolution etc. here is a real patch that doesnt require you to rip anything out. I found this patch by pure luck, i cant take credit for it because im not the author nor do i have any idea who made this but i got it from old-games.com and i was very skeptical at first but when i first tried it I was able to play the entire game beginning to end without a single issue. originally this was a full game download but i copied only the necessary patch files and put it all together in a small package to share with any other kt fans who may want to experience this game on a modern windows 7+ pc. just copy these patch files to your original game folder and overwrite the ones inside then use the batch file killing time exe 2nd to run the game. there are only 5 files needed plus the new launcher file that fixes corrupt graphics due to 256-color mode on modern windows.
here are the details..

1 overwrite the main KILLTIME.exe with this patched one
2 overwrite the fmv movie in the \MOVIES folder
3 launch game with (killing time exe 2nd.bat) batch file to fix 256 color problems

the fmv movies are not necessary but if you don't use these then the game will just use the default 320x240 movies and they will play inside of a super small box with black borders. these were resized to 640x480 proportions and fill up much more of the screen. this is as good as it gets..

Really? No takers? I figured at least awbacon would have something to say about it.

I want KT for 3DO. Don't have it for PC

mikemacdee wrote:Really? No takers? I figured at least awbacon would have something to say about it.

I'd be a taker, but I sold my PC version a long time ago. Probably not cheap to get it back.. not that I've checked recently or anything though.

I'll try it at some point.

Haha sorry guys, noticed I was referenced in this but haven't been round in a while. After a miserable Chicago winter it's final warm, so I try to keep my ass off the internet and outside haha

Mac user here, so can't test. Shockingly KT for Mac still runs on the latest revision for OS X except for the ghost apparition movies. They crash the game.

I'll dl this and give it a whirl next time I own a windows machine

Interesting they solved the movie issue with changing the resolution.

I'll have to try upressing the movies on Mac, run them through compressor or something and see if that makes a difference

awbacon wrote:Shockingly KT for Mac still runs on the latest revision for OS X except for the ghost apparition movies. They crash the game.

That's hard to believe -- Mac OS hasn't supported Classic apps since Tiger/10.4, and PPC code isn't supported since Snow Leopard/10.6. Are you using some kind of emulator?

I've had mixed results running Classic apps under 10.4. Most will boot, but many won't play properly. I've had horrible results with Mac emulators on Mac -- I've never even gotten SheepShaver to boot.

Hmm, I have never actually played the PC Version of Killing Time. Perhaps I should track it down and try it. I know I have seen it and checked out the differences between it and the 3DO game, so might be worth playing anyway. Having a patcher like this is useful except that I am running crappy Vista so probably still won't help me.

There is a Mac patch that allows it to run. I just opened it to verify. X 10.9 runs KT perfectly minus ghost fmv

Mike Lutynski gave it a whirl and this is what he had to say:

I tried the hacked/patched Killing Time under Win7 and it works! Yay! Plus with those up-scaled, 320x8x8 -> 640x480x8 intro videos it definitely doesn't crash any more.

The only caveat is that every few seconds, the game screen flickers (as if it's losing the front buffer?) which is too irritating for my retro gaming preferences. As a programmer, it's an unprofessional detail which could be rectified in 5 minutes, so it's doubly hard for me to play it.

Anybody else have the same issue? Think it's still worth putting up on the site despite this?

I used to have copy of it but lost it. It's very very different from the 3DO version.

I gave this patch a try despite running Windows XP myself. It got rid of the problem I'd been having that if I let any of the ghost clips play to the end, the game would hang with a black screen. So thumbs up from me!