Anonymous edits have been disabled on the wiki. If you want to contribute please login or create an account.

Afterlife

From PCGamingWiki, the wiki about fixing PC games

This page is for the 1996 LucasArts game. For the 2019 Signal Space Lab game, see Afterlife (2019).

Afterlife
Afterlife cover
Developers
LucasArts
Release dates
DOS June 27, 1996
Windows June 27, 1996
Mac OS (Classic) 1996
Windows (DOSBox) April 9, 2015[1]
macOS (OS X) (DOSBox) April 9, 2015[1]
Linux (DOSBox) April 9, 2015[1]
Taxonomy
Monetization One-time game purchase
Modes Singleplayer
Pacing Real-time
Perspectives Bird's-eye view, Isometric
Controls Point and select
Genres Strategy, Business
Art styles Cartoon
Themes Comedy
Afterlife on HowLongToBeat
Afterlife on MobyGames
Afterlife on Wikipedia

Key points

The Windows version (patched to 1.1 by GOG.com) can support modern resolutions (such as 1920x1080) with INI tweaks.
The Windows version has issues on modern systems. The DOS version (on the same CD or sold separately) works perfectly in DOSBox.
Retail version requires the CD to uninstall the game.

General information

GOG.com Community Discussions
GOG.com Support Page
Steam Community Discussions

Availability

Source DRM Notes Keys OS
Retail
Disc check (requires the CD/DVD in the drive to play)
Disc check (see Run without the CD).
DOS
Windows
GOG.com
DRM-free
DOS version pre-packaged with DOSBox.[2]
Windows
macOS (OS X)
Linux
Steam
Icon overlay.png
DOS version pre-packaged with DOSBox.
Windows
macOS (OS X)

Essential improvements

Patches

Afterlife 8-bit Sound Update fixes compatibility with 8-bit sound cards

Run without the CD

Copy CD contents to hard drive[citation needed]
  1. Do a full install of the game.
  2. Copy the CD contents to a new folder.
  3. Edit the configuration file (afterdos.ini for DOS version, alife.ini for Windows version).
  4. Change the CD Path line to point to the CD folder.
  5. Save your changes and close the file. The game will now run without the CD.

Game data

Configuration file(s) location

System Location
DOS <path-to-game>\ALIFE\AFTERDOS.INI
Windows <path-to-game>\ALIFE.INI[Note 1]
<path-to-game>\ALIFE\AFTERDOS.INI[Note 1]
Mac OS (Classic)
macOS (OS X) <path-to-game>/ALIFE/AFTERDOS.INI<path-to-game> (mounted in DOSBox)[Note 2]
Linux <path-to-game>/ALIFE/AFTERDOS.INI<path-to-game> (mounted in DOSBox)[Note 2]
Steam Play (Linux) <Steam-folder>/steamapps/compatdata/557240/pfx/[Note 3]
This game does not follow the XDG Base Directory Specification on Linux.

Save game data location

System Location
DOS <path-to-game>\SAVE
Windows <path-to-game>\SAVE[Note 1]
Mac OS (Classic)
macOS (OS X) <path-to-game>/SAVE
<path-to-game> (mounted in DOSBox)[Note 2]
Linux <path-to-game>/SAVE
<path-to-game> (mounted in DOSBox)[Note 2]
Steam Play (Linux) <Steam-folder>/steamapps/compatdata/557240/pfx/[Note 3]
Save data location can be changed in configuration file.

Save game cloud syncing

System Native Notes
GOG Galaxy
Steam Cloud

Video

INI Settings for Afterlife, found in ALIFE.INI.
INI Settings for Afterlife, found in ALIFE.INI.

Graphics feature State Notes
Widescreen resolution
See Widescreen resolution.
Multi-monitor
Pixel-based scaling. A low resolution may be required, as many multimonitor resolutions may cause a crash on launch. See Widescreen resolution.
Ultra-widescreen
See Widescreen resolution.
4K Ultra HD
DOS version will crash at resolutions higher than 1024x768.
Field of view (FOV)
Isometric.
Windowed
For DOSBox toggle with Alt+ Enter (see the glossary page for other workarounds).
Borderless fullscreen windowed
Windows 9x version only. See the glossary page for possible solutions when using DOSBox.
Anisotropic filtering (AF)
Uses 2D sprites.
Anti-aliasing (AA)
Vertical sync (Vsync)
For DOSBox use an unofficial build (see the glossary page for other workarounds).
60 FPS
70 FPS cap in DOS version.
120+ FPS

Widescreen resolution

Both the DOSBox and Win9x releases of Afterlife have an INI that can be tweaked beyond the game's basic options.
Set custom resolution (Windows 9x release)
  1. Open the configuration file, <path-to-game>\ALIFE.INI.
  2. Set the resolution field as desired, and save the document.

Notes

DOSBox can be similarly tweaked by using the DOS configuration file.
This tweak can cause minor glitches with the LucasArts intro video.
The Windows 9x release can crash immediately after the intro video with extremely high resolutions.
The DOSBox version crashes on widescreen resolutions and anything higher than 1024x768.

Input

Gameplay options (located under Global > Misc. Options).
Gameplay options (located under Global > Misc. Options).

Keyboard and mouse State Notes
Remapping
For DOSBox use the DOSBox Mapper (see the glossary page for other workarounds).
Mouse acceleration
Mouse sensitivity
For DOSBox set in the DOSBox configuration file.
Mouse input in menus
Mouse Y-axis inversion
Controller
Controller support
In some cases, it is possible to emulate a mouse using a gamepad and external program.

Audio

Audio Settings.
Audio Settings.

Audio feature State Notes
Separate volume controls
Options are located on the toolbar at the top of the screen. It can also be accessed by pressing F9.
Surround sound
Subtitles
Intro cutscene plays without subtitles.
Closed captions
Mute on focus lost

Localizations

Language UI Audio Sub Notes
English
French
Audio available only in retail version.
German
Retail and GOG.com only.
Italian
Brazilian Portuguese
Retail only (BraSoft).
Spanish

Issues fixed

Tutorial in Windows 95 version is broken

Under Windows 7 64-bit, the tutorial window may appear with nothing else available. Any user input will show a dialog box saying the tutorial was completed.
Run the game in Windows 95 compatibility mode

Other information

API

Technical specs Supported Notes
DOS video modes SVGA
ExecutablePPC16-bit 32-bit 64-bit Notes
Windows
Mac OS (Classic)

Middleware

Middleware Notes
Audio iMuse Used to procedurally generate music based on events and what is being viewed on screen. Can create some issues on 8-bit sound cards, see Patches.

System requirements

DOS
Minimum Recommended
Operating system (OS) MS-DOS 6.0
Processor (CPU) Intel 486DX2 66 MHz or better
System memory (RAM) 8 MB
Hard disk drive (HDD) 16 MB
Video card (GPU) 256-color SVGA-compatible
Windows
Minimum
Operating system (OS) 95
Processor (CPU)
System memory (RAM)
Hard disk drive (HDD) 300 MB
macOS (OS X)
Minimum
Operating system (OS) 10.7.0
Processor (CPU) Intel Core 2 Duo 2 GHz or better
System memory (RAM) 1 GB
Hard disk drive (HDD) 300 MB
Video card (GPU) 64 MB of VRAM
Linux
Minimum
Operating system (OS) Ubuntu 14.04 / Linux Mint 17
Processor (CPU) 2.0 GHz or better
System memory (RAM) 1 GB
Hard disk drive (HDD) 300 MB
Video card (GPU) OpenGL-compatible
256 MB of VRAM


Notes

  1. 1.0 1.1 1.2 When running this game without elevated privileges (Run as administrator option), write operations against a location below %PROGRAMFILES%, %PROGRAMDATA%, or %WINDIR% might be redirected to %LOCALAPPDATA%\VirtualStore on Windows Vista and later (more details).
  2. 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 File/folder structure within the installation folder reflects the path(s) listed for DOS game data.
  3. 3.0 3.1 File/folder structure within this directory reflects the path(s) listed for Windows and/or Steam game data (use Wine regedit to access Windows registry paths). Games with Steam Cloud support may store data in ~/.steam/steam/userdata/<user-id>/557240/ in addition to or instead of this directory. The app ID (557240) may differ in some cases. Treat backslashes as forward slashes. See the glossary page for details.

References