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This issue was brought in the following topic:
http://www.gog.com/forum/blood_series/difficulty_setting_changes_when_loading_save_files/page1

In short, when you load a saved game, the damage scaling changes. When playing on the easiest difficulty settings and loading that game, the damage increases -a lot-. Likewise on the hardest difficulty, it decreases.

The glitch goes away when loading a new level from the begining, but thats it. This is a pretty annoying glitch, especially for the less experienced playesr, and in this topic I provide a way to fix this with memory editing.

This is not a direct fix. This is more like a way around it. It does work, but it takes effort from your part to go around it.

In any case, you can fix this, and I'm going to tell you how.

#1: Download DosBox 0.74. Grab the DosBox.exe, and replace the one that came with Blood with the 0.74 one. (only replace the .exe, nothing more)

#2: Download DosShark http://vogons.zetafleet.com/viewtopic.php?t=26158&sid=7282ff1e3a0fa33e1525db211bfb0d3c (only works with DosBox 0.74)

Put DosShark wherever.

#3: Open Blood normally through DosBox

#4: Open DosShark

#5: Click "Attach to DOSBOX"

#6: In Scanner, click 1 Bytes to open the menu, select 4 Bytes.

#7: Click New Scan.

Now, start a new game (do NOT load an old game yet). For the next step, you have to enter a number depending on which difficulty level you have chosen.

Still Kicking: 144
Pink on the Inside: 208
Lightly Broiled: 256
Well Done: 304
Extra Crispy: 368

#8: In the white box in DosShark, type the number that corresponds to the difficulty level, and click "Exact Value".

#9: Start a new game in another difficulty level.

#10: Enter the number corresponding to the new difficulty level, and click "Exact".

#11: There should be 6 (or so) codes on the left. The 3rd one should be the true damage scaling number.

#12: Click that 3rd code, and click "Add to codelist". You can change the first thing (Name). The other thing you want to change is the last box, which is the number you want to freeze the damage scaling at.

If you enter 144, everything will deal damage to you as they do in Still Kicking difficulty, and that even after reloading a game, or even in Extra Crispy. You can use this to play exactly how you want, or to go around the glitch mentioned in this topic.

#13: In DosBox, go to "Codes". Click "Save", and save the file. This is so next time, you can just "Open" the file and essentially skip step #6 to #12.

Select the code under Codes (there should be only one), and click Activate. [X] becomes [O], which means its activated.

You will have to reattach DosShark, load the cheat and activate it every time you open DosBox with Blood again. This takes 5 seconds once you've done all the hard work :)



Yes, I'm aware that this is a rather complex solution and its really just a way to avoid the glitch through cheats, rather than straight up fixing it.

However, it does work. You can use this to use a damage scaling from another difficulty, or to force the damage scaling to stay the same even after loading.

I have not encountered any crashes using this and so far it works as expected.

I hope at least a few people out there find it worth it to use this.
Post edited June 25, 2013 by SFJake
Cool, many thanks for looking into this. It does confirm that it is some flaw within the game itself rather than due to it running through DOSBox, and as such I very much doubt we'll ever get a proper fix. It would be nice if we could patch the blood executable, though, to permanently fix it. Here's hoping that when BloodXL is eventually released that it doesn't suffer from this bug.
Patching the .exe without the source makes it incredibly hard, unfortunately. If only we had the source, even an amateur like me could fix it.

Don't worry about BloodXL. If the project gets far enough (I really hope it does), he will make it open source (apparently he's waiting for the Beta stage of his engine, according to the wiki) and if that talented guy won't fix them, someone else will. :)
Post edited June 25, 2013 by SFJake
This thread should REALLY be pinned to the front page as it is the only thing I have ever found to fix this issue. Huge thanks, even though it's 5 years late :)
There are also ports of Blood. Both have the difficulty fixed for save games.

You can find them on:
https://nukeykt.retrohost.net/
https://m210.duke4.net/

They are very accurate, so you can experience the game without any emulation!
Bumping this due to the recent release for those who wish to play the original DosBox version as it is still the only way to get around the damage scaling bug.