How well would VirtualBox and ReactOS run old Windows games? At least that is a free idea for someone to mess with. Yeah, ReactOS tries to imitate Windows NT rather than the DOS-based Windows 9x series, but it may work well enough anyway.

I think typically they came with a DOS version, or at least a bunch of them did. At that point Windows was mostly just a front end for DOS. I'm sure there were some APIs and such, but even up until about Win2k, DOS was always in the background to various extents.
ReactOS is related to Wine, I'm unclear as to the extent, but there are some developers in common to the two, and IIRC they do use some of Wine's work for implementing portions of the OS.

Personally, on the rare occasion that I've run them, I haven't had much trouble with stability.

For those specifically interested in DOS games, one can also run FreeDOS as well. For that extra measure of nostalgia. Unfortunatelly, I think that they solved the scrapping for kilobytes of RAM bit of the experience.

There is always this, it's not complete and probably abandoned by now, but here's openwindows.
http://www.jankie.net/soedesh/20.htm

Technically WinE can do this, and it should be entirely legal to do so if you have the relevant Operating Systems. That's not to say it's particularly easy, and as those libraries aren't open they cannot supply or preconfigure them for you.

Microsoft has focused more on this recently, and there's a download that allows you to go back down the DirectX curve here supposedly setting up the full set of libraries in a way that plays nice. Not that it helps any with the "This wasn't designed for 64-bit Windows" errors that can crop up. If what they're talking about with Windows 8 is true that may not be a issue in the future.

Codeweavers has been focusing a lot on that lately, mainly because if it doesn't work, few games will. Since nearly all the code they develop ends up in Wine, I'd expect it to get better over time. Right now DirectX 6,7,8 and 9 work to various degrees with Crossover, but DirectX 10 is still known to be broken.

I pay for crossover just as my way of contributing to the work.

There are already decent Windows emulators... I played Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire on one.

They will only get better. The problem is the license issues with Windows, it being a Microsoft product.

If it is an authentic emulator that kind of legal issues shouldn´t exist.

Which one(s) have you tried/used?

Windows 3.1 works perfectly in DOSBox - I've been using it for years. The biggest difficulty, is finding the right drivers but the DOSBox forum has plenty of topics to help you out. Myself, I managed to get the authentic Soundblaster 16 drivers working with DOSBox which is a blast!

I completely forget the name of it to be honest. It was one of the top suggested ones when I googled. If I come across it I will post again.

Will not happen since Windows is too complex compared to DOS. Btw. a Windows XP "emulator" has been under development for like 10 years and still in alpha stage. ReactOS

ReactOS isn't an emulator however, but a stand-alone operating system aiming to be binary-compatible with the Windows NT line. Still, put it inside a VM (VirtualBox, for example) and you get the best bet for a free solution to running older Windows games under a modern OS. Another solution would be a Windows version of Wine, but that's unlikely to happen anytime soon.

I thought it was a Win95 emulator & that is been in development for 15 years. ;-)

Anyhow, here's what I managed to do last night. I got Oracle VM VirtualBox, and installed an archived copy of Dos 7.1 followed by an archived copy Windows 3.1 to make a VM so I can play Rogue's Quest again. I haven't installed RQ yet, but I've got Windows 3.1 running, so I'll let everyone know how it works out when I try to install it.

For now, its time to feed my triplets.

Your virtual machines are normally in "<your user folder>\VirtualBox VMs", the HDD is the vdi file in each VM's folder (if you don't see filename extensions, look for the largest file, it's most probably that one).

Not that it'll do you much good in installing stuff, a better bet is to put your stuff in an ISO file (CDBurnerXP can help, if you don't have any other application to make them) and then feed that ISO to the VM, DOS/Win3.1 will see it as a physical CD. Of course, you'll need CD drivers installed first.

If you have the game on real diskettes or a CD, VirtualBox can use that one directly and pass it through to the OS inside.

Thanks Miaghstir, but after all the trouble I went through of setting up a Win 3.1 VM & making an .iso out of Rogue's Quest...when I go to run the setup file in the VM, it tells me RQ was intended for a different version of Windows (without telling me which one).

Ain't that a kick in the head?

[edit] Well I'll be dipped in shit...just googled & found that RQ was released in 1997, so chances are it was written for Win95.

*head desk*

[2nd edit] Nope, wait a minute...found more info stating it was meant for Win 3.1 & later. Now I'm really confused!