Up until now, my experience with Daggerfall has been extremely pleasant. The character generator is wondefully multiplex; I literally spent about two hours fretting over my high elf's optimum skill set and attribute levels. The starter dungeon was fun, if a tad difficult.... The only problem occured when I actually set foot outside the dungeon- my frame rate plummeted drastically, rendering it unplayable. I've tried the cntrl+f8 fix, but that does nothing (f8 is hotkeyed to lower the volume on my computer)! Please help.

Thanks in advance.

What are your current system specs/DOSBox version. Also, have you tried altering the 'detail' level' that appears when you press esc.

Are your cycles set to Auto or Max? If not you may need to increase cycles using the Ctrl+F12 (confirm?) command.

My system specs are fine.
DosBox version 0.73.
Yes I have tried the detail level.

The f8 and f12 are unresponsive.... :/

Post them. Running Daggerfall in DOSbox uses considerably higher PC power than the "recommended system specs" from 10 years ago.

I'm running Vista... My computer is brand new.

I think the reason that f8+cntrl isn't working is that the f keys on my computer don't act as functions. They raise/ lower the volume ect. You know how to change that? I'm horrible with computers.

Please, post your speccs. They'll help us rule out any incompatiblities.

Google a front end called 'D-Fend Reloaded'. install and run it, choose options and tell it where your DOSBox is installed. Now click on Profiles and choose 'Add with Wizard' go through the questions of where Daggerfall is set up, etc. CPU should be set to Max Cycles, Screen to DDraw and Memory to 32mb. That should set you to go.

Intel Core Duo CPU T6600 @ 2.20GHz
4 GB RAM
64-bit
450 GB memory
ATI RADEON HD 4570

Edit: I just found out that my game runs very smoothly in windowed mode (IMO preferable to fullscreen), but I can't move my mouse :/ How do I get it to respond?

Try pressing CTRL + F10.

Woo! Thanks. Running liquid smooth now

Cheers