I know it says on the sticky thread you need DOSBox, but is it possible that Redguard could actually run on Win95/98 without DOSBox? I ask because I've heard one person manage it, and I want to be sure they aren't pulling my leg (I think they are). They told me they got it working, got in a fight, and died trying to figure out the combat mechanics.

But has anyone even tried to run Redguard without DOSBox?

Redguard was/is a win 9x compatable program, however it uses 3dfx(glide) for hardware mode(instead of directx or opengl). Running Redguard in software mode should work on a win 9x computer, but hardware mode will look better. I'm no expert on Redguard though as I've never played it, just going on what I remember reading about it.

I originally played it on my Win98 machine. (that was pre-SE2) That is I believe what it was released for.

The sad truth is that ever since I moved to WinXP, I've been dying to play it and can't.. I only found the instructions on the UESP wiki a couple weeks ago, and have been falling deep into Daggerfall, or I'd be trying like hell to get it going under DOSBox now.

Redguard is pretty much supposed to run on Windows 9x.

DOSBox or help by other pieces of software is really only needed in newer Windows OSes.