Beneath a Steel Sky

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Steel Sky
Beneath a Steel Sky	1994
Beyond a Steel Sky	2020

Key points

Officially available as freeware.

Can easily be run on modern systems with ScummVM.

General information

Game Nostalgia - Detailed game information, developer interviews and game-related media

Soundtrack Enhancement Page

GOG.com Community Discussions

GOG.com Support Page

Steam Community Discussions

Availability[edit]

Source	DRM	Notes	Keys	OS
Retail		Available on floppy disk (manual-based copy protection) or CD (no DRM). The CD-ROM version has full voice acting and a substantial introduction sequence.
GOG.com		Pre-packaged with ScummVM.
Steam		Pre-packaged with ScummVM.

All of the prepackaged versions use the CD release.

The data files are available for free from the ScummVM website.

Essential improvements[edit]

Running the game through ScummVM[edit]

Just use the prepackaged versions if you want the CD release.

Playing the game with ScummVM^{[citation needed]}

Download the floppy or CD data files off ScummVM's download page
Extract it into an empty folder
Open ScummVM and select Add Game
Select the folder you just added the data files to.

To display the original floppy disk version's intro instead of the CD version's comic book intro, go to the launcher, select Edit Game..., and under the Engine tab select Floppy intro, then OK.

James Woodcock's remastered soundtrack[edit]

Original game soundtrack in MIDI format, rearranged and re-recorded using modern studio equipment

Requires ScummVM.

Game data[edit]

Configuration file(s) location[edit]

System	Location
DOS	<path-to-game>\config.dat
Windows	<path-to-game>\beneath.ini^{[Note 1]}
macOS (OS X)
Linux
Steam Play (Linux)	<Steam-folder>/steamapps/compatdata/1368340/pfx/^{[Note 2]}

It's unknown whether this game follows the XDG Base Directory Specification on Linux. Please fill in this information.

Save game data location[edit]

System	Location
DOS	<path-to-game>\
Windows	<path-to-game>\SKY-VM.***^{[Note 1]}
macOS (OS X)	$HOME/Documents/ScummVM Savegames/Beneath a Steel Sky
Linux
Steam Play (Linux)	<Steam-folder>/steamapps/compatdata/1368340/pfx/^{[Note 2]}

DOS savegames are labelled SKY.???, where ??? represents a number between 000 and 999. Savegame descriptions are stored in SKY.SAV.

Save game cloud syncing[edit]

System	Native	Notes
GOG Galaxy		Requires `Internal Update (25 April 2018)` or later.
Steam Cloud

ScummVM 2.1+ supports cloud saves on third-party cloud storage services. See the ScummVM user manual for details.

Video[edit]

In-game menu (F5)

ScummVM settings.

Graphics feature	State	Notes
Widescreen resolution
Multi-monitor
Ultra-widescreen
4K Ultra HD
Field of view (FOV)
Windowed		Toggle with `Alt`+`↵ Enter` (when using ScummVM or DOSBox).
Borderless fullscreen windowed
Anisotropic filtering (AF)
Anti-aliasing (AA)
Vertical sync (Vsync)		For DOSBox use an unofficial build (see the glossary page for other workarounds).
60 FPS and 120+ FPS

Input[edit]

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		Menu can be open with `F5`
Mouse Y-axis inversion
Controller
Controller support		For DOSBox use the DOSBox Mapper (see the glossary page for other workarounds).

Audio[edit]

ScummVM audio sliders. Access in-game by pressing Ctrl+F5 and clicking options.

Audio feature	State	Notes
Separate volume controls		Speech and FX have only an on/off toggle. Music can be adjusted with a slider. Use ScummVM for Speech and SFX sliders.
Surround sound		Uses MIDI driver.
Subtitles		Menu can be accessed through `F5`.
Closed captions
Mute on focus lost

This game supports the Roland MT-32 for music, and takes advantage of the additional sound effects provided by the CM-32L/LAPC-I.^{[Note 3]}

While this game has very few native settings, it can run on ScummVM which adds some additional settings.

Localizations

Language	UI	Audio	Sub	Notes
English				Speech in CD version only.
French
German
Italian
Polish				Fan translation, download.
Russian				Fan translation by «Бюро переводов Old-Games.Ru», ScummVM-build and localization files
Spanish

Other information[edit]

API[edit]

Technical specs	Supported	Notes
DOS video modes	VGA	320x200

Executable	32-bit	64-bit	Notes
macOS (OS X)

System requirements[edit]

DOS
	Minimum
Operating system (OS)	3.30
Processor (CPU)	386
System memory (RAM)	2 MB
Hard disk drive (HDD)	10 MB (floppy) 93 MB (CD)
Video card (GPU)	VGA

macOS (OS X)
	Minimum
Operating system (OS)	10.6.8 or later
Processor (CPU)	Intel Core Duo 2 GHz+
System memory (RAM)	1 GB
Hard disk drive (HDD)	78 MB
Video card (GPU)	64 MB of VRAM

Notes

↑ ^1.0 ^1.1 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).
↑ ^2.0 ^2.1 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>/1368340/ in addition to or instead of this directory. The app ID (1368340) may differ in some cases. Treat backslashes as forward slashes. See the glossary page for details.
↑ ScummVM adds proper General MIDI support.

References

[gamedir-5] 1.0 ^1.1 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).

[Proton_path_note-6] 2.0 ^2.1 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>/1368340/ in addition to or instead of this directory. The app ID (1368340) may differ in some cases. Treat backslashes as forward slashes. See the glossary page for details.

[.22MIDI.22-7] ScummVM adds proper General MIDI support.

[1] Free games: Beneath a Steel Sky and Lure of the Temptress - GOG.com

[2] GOG launches Mac support, 50 games available now

[3] "The "what did just update?" thread" post #709

[4] "The "what did just update?" thread" post #6577

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

[Note 1]

[Note 2]

[Note 3]

Developers

	Revolution Software
Publishers
	Virgin Interactive
Engines
Original	Virtual Theatre
Re-release	ScummVM
Release dates
DOS	March 1994
Windows (ScummVM)	December 18, 2008^[1]
macOS (OS X) (ScummVM)	October 18, 2012^[2]
Windows (DOSBox)	April 7, 2013^[3]
Linux (ScummVM)	March 20, 2015^[4]
Taxonomy
Monetization	Freeware
Modes	Singleplayer
Controls	Point and select
Genres	Adventure
Themes	Cyberpunk, Oceania
Series	Steel Sky