RUNNING DOORS TODAY

Doors in the Modern Era

Running a BBS today means running doors on modern hardware — and that introduces a challenge the original authors never anticipated. Classic DOS door games, written for 16-bit x86 DOS, need to run on contemporary 64-bit Linux servers. The drop file mechanism and the game logic are unchanged; the execution environment is not.

DOS Emulation

The most common solution is DOS emulation. Two tools are widely used:

DOSBox was designed for running DOS games and handles the CPU-intensive rendering that some doors require. It is easy to configure and behaves predictably with the widest range of DOS software.

DOSEMU (DOS Emulator for Linux) is faster for server use and integrates more cleanly with Linux processes. It can be configured headlessly and is the preferred choice for production BBS servers running many door sessions simultaneously.

The practical workflow on a Linux BBS server:

1. Install DOSBox or DOSEMU
2. Configure a virtual COM port (via tcpser or similar) that bridges the DOS serial port to the TCP socket for the current user session
3. Configure the BBS to write the drop file and launch the emulator with the door executable
4. The door runs inside the emulator, communicates with the user over the virtual COM port, and exits normally when done

InterBBS Features

Several classic door games supported interBBS play — allowing users on different BBSes to compete in the same persistent game. LORD's IGM ecosystem included interBBS packages, and TradeWars 2002 had dedicated interBBS server software.

InterBBS gaming required the SysOps involved to exchange game state data between systems. In the dial-up era, this was often done via FidoNet or direct dial-up links. Modern implementations exchange the data over TCP/IP, making planet-spanning LORD and TradeWars games straightforward to configure.

Synchronet and Mystic both include built-in support for interBBS game synchronisation. If you run one of these platforms, interBBS gaming can often be configured through the standard admin interface rather than requiring custom scripting.

The Living Door Scene

The door game community never entirely disappeared. Games like LORD and TradeWars 2002 are actively maintained for modern systems — native Linux builds exist alongside the classic DOS versions. New door games are still being written, often in C, Pascal, or Go, targeting current operating systems directly.

Running doors on your BBS today is easier than it has been in many years: documentation is better, emulation is reliable, and the community maintains both the classic games and the tooling needed to run them. The door library remains one of the most effective ways to build a daily-returning user base.