Evil Taco
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Evil TacoParticipant10 print “Yeaaaaaah”
20 goto 10
Evil TacoParticipantOof yeah, I’m pretty sure I’ve never beaten a CPU chess player. There was a chess on the games floppy, which my dad brought from work alongside the 286 that he brought home for summer holidays a couple of times. I also remember fondly playing one of those electronic chess games at a library (in Kajaani, Finland, in the late 80s or early 90s!)
Incidentally, I’m playing Shotgun King: The Final Checkmate obsessively right now … not a DOS game, but you _could_ make it in DOS I’m pretty sure!
Evil TacoParticipantI wrote very simple text adventures with line numbers and everything, and “gosub” was a revelation. My friends advanced well beyond me, some even writing really solid platformers with FreeBasic if memory serves. It would be fun to go back and make something a little bit more advanced now.
Evil TacoParticipantI don’t have much to say but I genuinely mean this – nice writeup, buttercup! You know your pool stuff and this kind of stuff makes following along to the DGC month so enjoyable.
Evil TacoParticipantAre there any pool, snooker, billiards games on GOG.com ? I couldn’t find any with those search words …
Evil TacoParticipantI’m sure this revolutionizes speedrun routing for Sam and Max Hit the Road. \o/
Evil TacoParticipantQBasic theme month?
Evil TacoParticipantYup, these would be cool to play!
Evil TacoParticipantHere’s a screenshot
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Evil TacoParticipantHardcore Gaming 101’s Top 47,585 Games podcast had some entertaining and informative thoughts about the theme of U.S. roadtrip with roadside attractions. Who is it for, and how much of a place and time it is. Really recommended: https://www.hardcoregaming101.net/podcasts/top-47858-games-of-all-time-episode-82-sam-and-max-hit-the-road-super-street-fighter-ii-turbo/
Evil TacoParticipantHat off to you Eulisker for this nice list!
I really like the look of Jim Kobbe’s Pool Game in 3D!
Evil TacoParticipant(I still can’t get over that I _swear_ we had a version that had km/h instead of mph)
Evil TacoParticipantOHHH! This is beyond awesome! Modding GPC? This so cool – this is a game I played as a kid. I have to share this with my sister 😀
Evil TacoParticipantI could see this as a “show and tell” episode!
Evil TacoParticipantYeah, this is a great suggestion for a theme month, it would be a great way to justify featuring them (contrast finding such a good/interesting edutainment game to “fill” a whole month …)
I too recall playing Apogee’s Word Rescue as a kid. I do believe it expanded my English vocabulary at the time.
I guess Mario is Missing is also an educational game? It came with our computer and I played it for far too long. It’s a bummer it was just pre-installed on the hard drive and not supplied as a floppy disk, I lost it at some point. But it was pretty boring. At the time I didn’t think anything how weird it was to have Mario and Luigi et al in a DOS game.
Can’t think of other DOS edutainment examples off the top of my head that I played back in the day. I’ll report back if I recall more, this is quite fun!
Evil TacoParticipantThat’s a fantastic idea for this episode series (Skiing, Golf, Pool, …) !!
Evil TacoParticipantThat’s what I thought!
Evil TacoParticipantOh wow. This is neat. The game sounded quite fascinating in the episode, and it’s quite remarkable it has just now received an earnest upgrade. I mean … how many years is that? I don’t want to count. (Wishlisted!)
Evil TacoParticipantI’ll say all the games I listed are quite short! Also I happily dipped into hints for a couple of things in Full Throttle so I finished it in a single evening.
Evil TacoParticipantdr_st good point, I did _not_ realize how the magnets worked before I found that there was more to that room than initially seemed. That would have helped a lot.
The stuff I tried was way more moon-logicy than the actual solution. Should have taken notes and made my own TRULY bizarro Sam & Max fan game …
Evil TacoParticipantOhh, nice!
Evil TacoParticipantTijn, I was referring to Eulisker’s real life situation!
Eulisker, I indeed don’t think it’s a spoiler to say I didn’t realize the screen with the magnets would scroll.
Evil TacoParticipantWell if you combine the crank and the paradimensional jellybean jar, you have a device that can create time for you. But you have to realize that the corridor next to the photocopier room actually _continues_ to the left even though it doesn’t necessarily look like the screen would scroll. But that’s where you’ll need to use the resulting item so you can access the fire escape, get away from you boss and TADA you have time.
Evil TacoParticipant
Evil TacoParticipantAGS is a COOL idea!
Evil TacoParticipantLove it. Love to logo too!
Evil TacoParticipantThe box art is super amazing. Having now played and enjoyed the game, I can’t help but think it must be cool to have the box and everything at hand! This and the LRG reprint you showcased in the other thread. Just nice!
Evil TacoParticipantThe “aftertaste” of this game is really good, it’s kind of funny I was a little bit mixed or sweet-and-sour on it towards the beginning of this thread, and now I’m thinking very highly of it and also pumped to play more adventure games. Some of it is also from reading and listening to history of the game, about Steve Purcell and his story before and after, hearing more opinions about the game and its setting…
For example people from the U.S. talking about what all these roadside attractions mean and how they are also a thing of time and place and the humour regarding them was something that no longer applies. I think that’s pretty cool, it may mean the humour doesn’t hit as well or easily now or outside of the U.S., but the game’s setting is definitely not generic!
Basically I’m getting all this extra context for the game and it’s very much enhancing the whole experience of playing this game.
Evil TacoParticipantYeah, now I wonder what would be the best way I have at hand to play or at least install the game from the original DVD disc! Simply starting at it on the shelf isn’t working so far. (Kinda don’t want to buy it as digital, would definitely be the easiest option nowadays, but _I already have it_ …)
I’ve heard a bit mixed opinions on the Telltale games and am very curious to check them out for myself!
Evil TacoParticipantI started wondering how I want to play. I probably don’t want to make it _too_ complicated so I don’t end up not playing at all. So maybe the GOG.com version with a modern joypad. But I do have a Thrustmaster USB stick with a few buttons and a tiny throttle lever, which could be quite fun to play with.. (I played the demo with a Gravis Analog joystick back in the day..)
Evil TacoParticipantAaaaand beaten!
I’m thinking it’s indeed not so much that the puzzles aren’t well-telegraphed, but there’s a few Backwards Puzzles. It’s one of Ron Gilbert’s “Why Adventure Games Suck” anti-patterns: https://grumpygamer.com/why_adventure_games_suck/
I solved at least one long puzzle chain without knowing why I was doing it, and at the end I had no idea what to do with the end result. Then after getting a hint (thanks!), I found out I missed half of a room because it was not obvious there was an edge to walk to, I found the _beginning_ of the puzzle.
If I had done things in a different order, the whole adventure probably would have flowed a lot better. I pretty much had a great time from that point onwards.
Evil TacoParticipantOk, now I’ve laughed out real loud! [x]
Evil TacoParticipant“I think the biggest issue with this game visually is that it’s not always obvious you can go someplace.”
THAT WAS IT
good grief
Evil TacoParticipantApril’s game Sam & Max is maybe also a good comparison point! Sam & Max came out in 1993 and Toonstruck would’ve come out much closer to it than it did if the production had been smoother. But Sam & Max genuinely is coming from the underground/indie comics direction (through Purcells) and when you look at it from the way you framed for Toonstruck, it’s a big difference.
Of course, I think Sam and Max too is dated, but not really from the perspective of its release year!
Still thinking a bit more from Toonstruck’s Animaniacs comparison, classic WB cartoons were having a renaissance in the early 90s. Tiny Toons had ended by 1996, Animaniacs was still going, Space Jam was also out in 1996. (I remember playing a SNES Tiny Toons game at friends’..) I don’t think Toonstruck was completely out of sync, but it was a little bit behind the curve perhaps.
Evil TacoParticipantI think this is a good point of view. For one, the development took longer than they planned I believe, which wouldn’t really change what they took inspiration from, but the newer wave of cartoons would have been further away. Animaniacs is a good comparison point in the way it too was looking back to the classics.
Evil TacoParticipantWelcome sanildefanso! It’s already fun to talk with you on the forums, nice to have you around!
That’s a good thought, to keep discussion going on older episodes too on the forums! I’ve gone back and added my thoughts to Jazz Jackrabbit for example. I definitely want to catch up with a few point-and-click adventures, such as Fate of Atlantis and Discowrld!
Evil TacoParticipantHahh, yeah, it’s a shock to go back to multiple save games mentality, usually after a lesson like a soft lock …
Evil TacoParticipantYeah changing the difficulty level mid-game feels really forward-looking. It would be interesting to know a bit more about the history of that feature in practice! It was obviously invented before our current era of accessibility options (which I’m fully in favour of) but I wonder if it’s kind of been there all along, and has come and gone a bit according to zeitgeist.
Adding the objective to the save file name is a great workaround idea, I’m going to take that into use myself (in other games)!
Evil TacoParticipantIf I’ve missed a place I could visit, that could explain so much!! Well, good to have ideas and go combing through all the places I’ve gotten to so far!
Evil TacoParticipantIt really doesn’t feel fully well-telegraphed to me on my first playthrough. Or maybe I’m too sleepy when playing late in the evening and I miss some hints that are only handed out once in the dialog …
But again I really want to emphasize I’m enjoying my time with the game. Our 10-year old has started joining in on my play sessions and has had some great suggestions (I’m also let known that Max is cute).
I started mapping out the locations, rooms, objects and people on paper and found out something I didn’t try. I have no idea why it worked, maybe there was a hint but I forgot it. I have no idea what to do with the new item I received, again, maybe somebody mentioned the item before but I have just forgot it (and no character seemed interested in it now, so I don’t know..)
But at least pretty much every “now why did THAT work?!” moment is accompanied with a fun animation and art, which underlines the wackiness. No expense was spared and it feels entertaining and rewarding.
There _are_ also well-telegraphed moments where I’m able to connect the dots and one thing leads smoothly to another, but those are far fewer than in some of the adventure games that I played recently, including Beneath a Steel Sky and Toonstruck. But somehow being stuck and nothing making too much sense fits well with this game and its world.
Evil TacoParticipantLiterally every time I start the game I have no idea what to do, then I find out something new, then I progress frustratingly little, and then I end the session without any idea what to do.
Sounds bad – it kind of isn’t. It’s beginning to form this very curious, fascinating rhythm. Like I said previously – it really feels like this is how it was designed to play.
Evil TacoParticipantSecond page.
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Evil TacoParticipantHere’s the review from Pelit!
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Evil TacoParticipantLearning the keyboard shortcuts made it a lot more palatable.
These past few days it’s really getting to the groove of figuring out a small step or a couple forwards each evening. Probably very much how it was designed.
Evil TacoParticipantWould be interested in listening to these kinds of episodes!
Evil TacoParticipantA low ranking LucasArts game is still quite a good game on average!
Dry and sarcastic is fair.
Evil TacoParticipantI bought the GOG version, which technically is not the DOS version but a ScummVM package that doesn’t include the executable.
Since I now own _a_ copy of the game I feel justified downloading the DOS version from archive.org, just so I can run it through the DOSBox Staging’s VGA CRT filter which has become _that_ extra sprinkle of fairy dust that makes the experience feel _that_ crucial extra bit nostalgic to me.
I have the good old family 486sx but no CD-ROM drive, plus I’m starting to become a bit scared of turning that thing on (it has some issues with the image already, a bit sad the thing is practically rotting on me).
Evil TacoParticipantJust fired up the GOG version and playing the game the first time in my life. I hate it when DOS games from 1993 predict 2026 so accurately, with incel robots taking over and what not. I also hate it that it’s a fantasy – where’s the freelance police in real life to sort it out?!?!
I didn’t play this as a kid. I was playing a few Lucasarts and Sierra games with an English dictionary at hand (being a non-speaker). I would’ve worn the book out with this game, and either given up in frustration or have my brains swell out of proportion with my still-developing skull trying to fit all that vocabulary in, let alone understand it.
Let’s see at the end which game won out in number and wittiness of references when it comes to middle-aging game developer and animator guys mid 90s, Toonstruck or Hit the Road … (I mean to say, the credits sequence was pretty darn neat!)
Evil TacoParticipantI’m highly unlikely to fire up the game myself, but I’m _extremely_ interested in hearing the episode! I remember reading about the Terminator FPS’ – starting from the 1990 DOS game – along side DOOMs, Dukes and Quakes of the day, and it was always a fascinating “parallel evolution” that I have an impression haven’t _quite_ been as appreciated as they deserved. But you who will actually play this (or have already played them) can be the judges of that, and I’m looking forward to the podcast episode!
Evil TacoParticipantNice catch!
Evil TacoParticipantI have a DVD copy of the first season waiting, at least. Maybe I’ll get inspired and play them after this game, I got a huge inspiration to play adventure games in November-December after Toonstruck!
Evil TacoParticipantIt looks very nice!
Evil TacoParticipantHello! Some great posts already. The Toshiba sounds very cool!
Evil TacoParticipantNice write up! I resorted to some hints as I wanted to get the game finished in a short amount of calendar time but it’s also really fun to solve it all yourself; I _almost_ did that with Grim Fandango playing with my fiancee and it took seven years and still a couple of hints I had to look up!
I got stuck on exactly those two pixel hunting spots you mentioned. I got naturally caught by the goonies exactly once and I could’ve sworn it was mandatory and 100% scripted.
Nothing wrong with paper and pen, that’s what I used for the telephone puzzle and I enjoyed it. Taking pictures with the mobile phone is absolutely not cheating either, memory tests these games need not be!
Evil TacoParticipantThe slider puzzle I could have just done without. Even the Simon Says I was fine with.
Evil TacoParticipantYeah, I indeed did play it, and not only that, I played it pretty much over the weekend, enjoyed it a lot, and then played a couple of more adventure games on top of it!
:-D
Evil TacoParticipantI saw this on Home of the Underdogs and might have fired it up once, but didn’t play it. Having played lots of Elite Plus and loads and loads of Star Control 2, I think this game sounds really really cool…
I don’t really recall hearing anything about this game back in the day!
Evil TacoParticipantAww yeah, I played this a decent chunk somewhere back in time. It’s a cool shareware title for sure.
I also played a lot of Squarez Deluxe from the same author, which is a cool block puzzle game (think Tetris or Bejeweled to some extent), especially in versus mode against a friend.
Not to mention Jetpack of course! Maybe all these games from Adept Software would make a neat theme month.
Evil TacoParticipantBeing a huge Star Control 2 fan and also playing a lot of these shareware episodes, I was always curious about Solar Winds but only saw it very very briefly and didn’t play it myself. Would be cool to play in the club!
Evil TacoParticipantVeil of Darkness and the Gabriel Knight games would make for great October games.
Evil TacoParticipantThis is on GOG by now. I played this around 2001 (from Home of the Underdogs I’m sure) but didn’t finish it; I must have been pretty close to the finish line though! I’ve become more and more intrigued of giving it another go …
Evil TacoParticipantI saw this on GOG and got quite curious as it’s a game I believe I’ve never heard of before …
Evil TacoParticipantI sure have sunk an hour or a dozen into C-DOGS, the original DOS release first and then later the open source version as well. I recall playing the splitscreen versus and perhaps the co-op as well.
Evil TacoParticipantThis game is simply a must. I suggest it would be covered in 2027 in the 10th anniversary year of DGC itself!
Evil TacoParticipantWow! I must have headed fairly straight to Krondor back when I played the game originally. I think I’ll want to do the same this time around too.
Evil TacoParticipantI sure did fire the game up, and I was impressed with the amount and quality of text on the offer. Sure, it’s the same clues and side quests as in comparable games, but the way the prose is character driven and introduces you to the setting (and/or references it) I find impressive!
I felt the urge to reach for the notebook and the pencil pretty much right away and now having visited the first town on the way to Krondor (cool town music!) I’m afraid the game might be getting its hooks into me..
I’m continuing to wonder how carefully I was reading all the text 30 years ago! Some of the scenes I certainly remember, such as the intro and the first few encounters on the road, but I didn’t remember the characters and conversations in the first town, although I certainly remember the “menu town” screen itself.
Evil TacoParticipantTraxtor’s a bit easy, beat it on my first proper go. My hand does hurt a little bit 😀
Evil TacoParticipantTraxtor’s pretty cool, gave that a whirl! The graphic style works really well. CGA at its best!
Evil TacoParticipantI’m just like DGC – I also haven’t played a Gold Box game and it feels like it would be high time to get around to it!
I hear there are great quality of life mods to the game!
Evil TacoParticipantI own this game in one or two formats; I’ve played the sequel maybe halfway through and it was pretty cool. Would be very interested to play this with the club!
Evil TacoParticipantI thought I had never heard of this game, but I must have read a review in 1995 because the magazine I was subscribing to had one. It was not very positive at all, which might explain why I’ve forgot about it.
It sounds like a frustrating game, but being a part of the Alien franchise does make it interesting. It also looks interesting visually; combining pre-rendered 3D with high resolution comic book style graphics in 1995 is a good example of what game developers were trying to do to make the games look visually impressive.
Evil TacoParticipantI do believe the shareware version was circulating but I never took a look – I kind of feel I missed out. Would be interesting to play this in the club at some point.
Evil TacoParticipantI’m sad I threw my Gravis Gamepad away when the d-pad started going wonky, it would’ve probably been quite repairable. Didn’t know they were also released for Mac!
Evil TacoParticipantSerf City here as well; apparently it’s the U.S. title of the first game. I guess we sailed over the Atlantic for that particular loot. Yarrr!
Evil TacoParticipantListening to This Week in Retro, in relation to the Zork source code being officially open source -sanctioned my Microsoft, it was mentioned there’s an improved fan version of Planetfall around.
I wonder if it’s this or if there’s more: https://github.com/Kweepa/Planetfall-Modern
The Interactive Fiction Wiki mentions it removes hunger and some “unfair deaths”: https://www.ifwiki.org/Planetfall
Which sounds all right to me, I think the hunger mechanic just triggers a replay of the game when you run out, which is not the most exciting thing. I’m kind of fine with the idea of replaying from the start, as long as you know (and remember!) what to do you can be a lot more efficient, but I can understand why this would be too tedious for many players.
I was kind of hoping for an automap which I think this version doesn’t provide, but I guess that’s quite a big ask. (I haven’t finished the game still!)
Evil TacoParticipantThat’s neat that Nethack still supports DOS! This alone makes it a worthy selection.
I certainly spent many an hour playing several versions of Nethack – I believe I first played Hack, not Nethack! I must have played Nethack 3.1.3 a bit and it was a big deal when 3.2.0 came out in 1996. I think I must have played a substantial amount of the 3.4 series, but the “reboot” of 3.6 series I’ve only fired up a couple of times. It would be fun to play this one for the club.
Evil TacoParticipantThis sounded like a curious game in the reviews I read at the time, which weren’t terribly complimentary. But it still sounded interesting!
Evil TacoParticipant2027 would give me a nice amount of time to learn some necessary skills! ^_^
Evil TacoParticipantFinnish stronghold of a games magazine Pelit also appreciated the game up to 90 points. The review notes how having English skills is mandatory not to only solve some puzzles, but to generally enjoy the dialogue.
I’m really impressed how the reviewer even translated many of the locales and puns (such as the Carecrow!) to Finnish!
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Evil TacoParticipantThanks for the replies! I think I’ll check out the first two entries casually earlier in the year, if I get hooked I might try to play Under the Killing Moon as well before September.
I’ve been on quite an adventure game kick thanks to Toonstruck this last week!
Evil TacoParticipantHaha, nice, that’s a decently pleasant use of the infamous CGA palette!
Evil TacoParticipantThere’s at least one recent DOS homebrew pool/billiards game: https://www.doshaven.eu/game/pooliard/
(Maybe the author would be an interesting guest on the episode?)
Evil TacoParticipantAre there any zany or funky pool/billiards games for DOS? I think that would be an angle that would make me curious about trying out a pool game!
Evil TacoParticipantI have this in the shelf, I found a big box budget release for cheaps in a charity store, it’s obviously patiently waiting for a month in DGC!
I also remember it looking very impressive in the magazines, and getting very good scores too.
Evil TacoParticipantYeah that’s fantastic to eye through. The heads-ups about bugs alone is appreciated!
Evil TacoParticipantYeah! It’s “cartoon logic” which is kind of brilliant, it’s zany but fits the theme right on.
Evil TacoParticipantI don’t have personal experience, but I definitely remember Abuse and Linux discussed together back in the day!
Another interesting technical bit I remember being talked about was Lisp being used as a script language in the game.
Evil TacoParticipantIt looks like the GOG release is a Nightdive Studios work, which is promising!
Evil TacoParticipantI played Civ 1 back in the day, one of the DOS games I first saw over somebody’s shoulder, which alone would make it a certified classic.
I played Civ 2 and Civ 3 as well, and then I did a longturn multiplayer game of Freeciv (plus some single-player as well). I’m kind of civved out.. but firing up the original game does have its appeal.
Evil TacoParticipantNice! I thought Abuse ran very well on our 486SX back in the day. Maybe the 15 FPS cap was a part of that!
Evil TacoParticipantYeah this was a really fascinating game to read about back in the day; never played it or even saw it, but I have bought in on GOG since.
Evil TacoParticipantI’ve played AstroFire through and through, but TerraFire didn’t run very well on my 486SX. Would be cool to take a look!
Evil TacoParticipantThat would be pretty cool! I love UFO but I haven’t played Terror from the Deep myself, I’ve only spectated it a little bit over the shoulder back in the day.
Evil TacoParticipantI’m really curious about the Evercade versions, I bought a Super Pocket this summer and I think doing a spiced-up versions of old games like this is great. (Evercade hired the Rigel engine author to do a commercial project, so the first game also got the touch-up treatment, which is just really really cool in all.)
Evil TacoParticipantAnother game on my long TODO list, would be happy to take the opportunity, finally, if it gets picked!
Evil TacoParticipantAll right, I’ve finished the game! This turned out to be one of those games where I played the whole thing through over the weekend. I clocked 11.5 hours in GOG.
Do you also have the impression this is considered one of the better games of the “Silliwood” era?
It’s a unique game in many senses, and I thought it was largely very well made, even if it didn’t quite manage to be greater than the sum of its parts. I think it hit me at the right time, I got a lot of enjoyment out of it from the beginning to the end.
I could’ve stomached just a _little_ bit of less pixel hunting and/or a tiny bit more signaling towards the solution here and there – and I could’ve done without the sliding tile puzzle – but having played _not that many_ adventure games, it was at a very pleasant difficulty level for me. I’m thankful red.hexapus brought up Universal Hint System, it fit in very well for me playing this game.
Evil TacoParticipantI ended up looking up a couple of more things in Nefarious’ castle. They were of the pixel hunting variety, or otherwise something not telegraphed that well.
I probably would’ve stumbled across the solutions over a few days of wandering around in the game, but I think I’ll take this approach over that, this time around!
Evil TacoParticipantThis thread was a great subtle hint in itself! I’ve looked up two things so far and especially in the first instance, I had the right idea (I might’ve remembered the solution from a screenshot in the magazine, come to think of it) but it was a bit of a pixel hunting situation.
In the other case as well I had the right idea, but the hints are such subtle nudges that I’m not kicking myself over looking it up, unlike with a “traditional” walkthrough. This is great stuff!
Evil TacoParticipantAhhh, I guess the thing was I first launched the game from GOG Galaxy, and then if I launch it as a stand-alone Mac app, it doesn’t see the earlier saves.
Evil TacoParticipantThanks for the heads up! On Mac here as well. I couldn’t see my save at first, but I think just accessing the folder where the save was (because it already existed, and the save was there) apparently was somehow enough.
Software is weird.
Evil TacoParticipantOk, I played the first twenty minutes. I actually feel right at home! No need to play more before “getting it” at all. What a nice feeling.
Evil TacoParticipantMy first impressions:
I launched it by accident, it took over the full screen before I managed to turn it off and
MAN I WAS BACK IN THE NINETIES! 😀 😀 😀 😀
I mean just the Virgin intro. You have to imagine, I was a little bit jumpscared by it – I wasn’t prepared!
I think I’ll try to set this up in DOSBox Staging instead of the GOG install, just for that sweet sweet VGA display filter. See if it makes it feel even more 90s.
edit: ahh, it looks like GOG runs it on top of ScummVM and not DOSBox, so I can’t just run the files in DOSBox Staging like I hoped.
Evil TacoParticipantAwesome!
I bought it for this month from GOG and I’m installing it right now.
I was wondering if I’ll be able to play it all the way through this month, but then realized maybe I’m setting the bar too high up for myself. I mean, surely it’s “enough” even if I end up just playing it a little. It’s still fun, and it was still because of the Club!
Evil TacoParticipantSuper cool!
Evil TacoParticipantKatsumoto, you seem to have the right mindset for this game! Those two levels that I played (so far) – in the end, I did feel satisfied about beating them!
Evil TacoParticipant“Allegro 4.2 works on DOS” 😮
A friend of mine dabbled with Allegro in the 90s. And some of my favourite games ever are done with Allegro, no joke! I did play them on Windows though – and I have compiled some on Linux too.
I wonder if some of those could be ported back to DOS … !
Evil TacoParticipant“An unfinished DOS demake of a game I have never played”
for some reason I really like how that sounds 😀
Evil TacoParticipantI like the sounds of “short”, that makes me more motivated to return to the game and finish it. 😀
From that list I’ve only played Keens and JJ. I’d probably swap HH and JJ on my list so far.
How about Bio Menace?
Evil TacoParticipantI’ve heard some interesting things about this game lately, I think it would be really fascinating to play!
Evil TacoParticipantThis is a Finnish shareware classic – it has an unusual resolution I think, which gives it a bit of an unique look. I never played it that much, but it would be interesting.
Evil TacoParticipantOhhh time trials scoreboard again?!
Evil TacoParticipant
Evil TacoParticipantOh yeah, this sounds worthy.
I think I played my Betrayal at Krondor before I got a soundcard. I have no memory of the music. It’ll be interesting to dive back into this game!
Evil TacoParticipantLow fidelity alien planet golf for 1990 DOS certainly has an atmosphere!
Evil TacoParticipantLooks like there’s several! 😀 https://ifdb.org/search?searchbar=golf
Evil TacoParticipantAhaha, this is awesome.
Planetfall and the first game makes me wonder if there’s an interactive fiction with a robust golf element built into it.
Evil TacoParticipantI took the laptop and a notepad to a cafe and I’m having a good time mapping out the game area after the rather cinematic beginning. It’s nice to map at the same time; I have terrible memory and you also can’t scroll back to see previous text in the DOS version, so it’s kinda fun to have the game extend to paper this way.
Evil TacoParticipantLooking forward to it already!
Evil TacoParticipantThis is a good one, and also quite different from a lot of the club games so far. It’s kind of a late(r) era DOS game, but it’s shareware, but not the Apogee/Epic Megagames kind of shareware – so it’s all sorts of refreshing. I think it’s also meaty enough for a month due to having quite a lot of levels unless I’m mistaken. It’s a good competitive game I believe too.
Also of note, it has (quite recently) been re-released for modern platforms (such as Nintendo Switch!) and is available for cheap on GOG.com.
Evil TacoParticipantAny news on this front?
Evil TacoParticipant
Evil TacoParticipantTorille! PÃ¥ torget!
I’ve only played this one a little bit, ashamed to say; I think it ran a little lackluster on our 486SX. My friends with a little bit beefier machines did play it, I remember.
Evil TacoParticipantBump! I continue to think Rules of Engagement + Breach combination (probably the latest versions) would be mighty fascinating to nerd about. Would make for a very interesting episode as well, I think.
GOG.com has Rules of Engagement 1 & 2, and Breach 1 & 2 available (sadly no Breach 3).
Let me go ahead and propose July 2026, which is when I would likely have time to dive into such a mighty chimera myself 😀
Evil TacoParticipantI’m running the DOS version with DOSBox Staging; the VGA CRT filter of Staging is top notch. Even just the font of a text adventure looks so much more the part with it. Could we get one for the DGC site? 😀
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Evil TacoParticipantI was inspired enough to play through the CD episodes and the first Holiday Hare campaign. But the second toy themed level got me. I think I’m good. 😀
Really curious to see how Jazz 2 works out, with the larger viewport. High praise in the podcast, I believe the sentiment was “better in every way”. Not that I think Jazz is an amazingly brilliant game – but I did get quite hooked. I seem to have received the sequel in a GOG.com giveaway on 2022. It’s Windows only so I’ll see sooner than later how well my Linux gaming notebook can boot it up!
Evil TacoParticipant
Evil TacoParticipantPretty much in agreement with pix et al.
Curiously, even though I’d describe the challenges of this game mostly being “annoyance-based” – limited viewport, fast character but you shouldn’t try to be fast, constantly fire to destroy enemies before you see them so you don’t run into them, fall into spikes/enemies -> look up/down constantly to make sure you don’t … after completing the first episode, the game started to grow on me and I persisted through the six original episodes.
This kind of gameplay sort of wastes its own potential, but it does have its own rhythm and the way it rewards patience, memorization and forethought is kind of satisfying. I didn’t find it super challenging (probably because of patience), but it was challenging enough after the first couple of episodes that I wasn’t bored by it. I think the quality of the levels didn’t drop after the SW episode which I always appreciate. There was also an impressive amount of new stuff sprinkled throughout, such as animations, new kinds of gameplay, level design ideas or new enemies.
The animation is really excellent and probably makes the controls feel much more fun than what they otherwise would be. The music is also great and I’m impressed there is so much of it.
It’s the kind of game I wouldn’t necessarily recommend, but I did find enjoyment out of it. Some of it was a bit nostalgic, but the game has its own niche, a kind of gameplay that is more rare these days as it’s judged “bad” even though it’s just different. Jazz doesn’t execute it perfectly, it especially shoots itself in the foot with the small viewport and the “go fast except don’t” aspect. The generous continues, the level design being pretty fast to go through once you know what to expect, lack of too many annoying precision jumps – these all I certainly appreciated. We’ve seen much worse.
I didn’t play this a lot back in the day, even though I had a 486SX for a long time and really shifted through a lot of shareware games! I wonder if it didn’t really run well on that PC. I don’t remember playing through the SW episode! I remember seeing the game on my friends’ 486DX machines instead. I should give it a try on the old sx some time. I played it on DOSBox Staging which has a _really_ nice, subtle VGA CRT filter.
(Curiously, Jazz Jackrabbit feels like a latter day Amiga platformer, Superfrog for example. Maybe I should try Superfrog again. I bounced (hehe) off it real quick after impulse-buying it from a GOG.com sale.)
Evil TacoParticipantI’m quite curious to finally try out Privateer at some point …
Evil TacoParticipantLet’s go already!
Evil TacoParticipantI’d looove to fly a chopper, yaah!
Absolutely one of the games I read about a lot but never even touched.
Evil TacoParticipantI’ve finished my playthrough of the VGA version. At points I started really feeling how the cuts affect the game’s mood and the way it tells its story. I still stand by my assessment that the VGA version is definitely an all right way of playing this game and if you don’t feel like digging up the EGA version and getting it to run, playing the VGA version via GOG or Steam is much better than not playing it at all 😛 But if you don’t mind a bit of tinkering, I would recommend playing the EGA version first. (I do have my nostalgia goggles on for sure.)
butterburp, I’m a bit envious of you having to figure out the puzzles. I recall it being such a joy. Replaying the game, no matter how many years it was since I last played it, there is no way for me to re-experience solving those puzzles!
Evil TacoParticipantI don’t have a scan, but the Finnish Pelit magazine does have their article archive onine: https://www.pelit.fi/artikkelit/jazz-jackrabbit/
They gave it 87 points, heaping quite a bit of praise on it but lamenting that it crashes a lot.
However, I have to note that Pelit used to publish these short reviews for the shareware episode, not the full game. In retrospect, it feels a bit off. They did mark these with a “shareware” badge, but still it’s kind of like reviewing a demo. It’s kind of strange to see these alongside reviews of full games. I wonder if other magazines did that?
Evil TacoParticipantI wasn’t very impressed with OpenJazz when I tried it. The controls don’t feel good (they’re not great to begin with) and there’s a bunch of bugs (though the original also doesn’t feel super duper polished). The bigger viewport also feels like it makes the game too easy.
But it did allow me to play Jazz with sound on my old Linux laptop – for some reason, the DOSBox supplied by GOG.com had a lot of trouble with sound.
Evil TacoParticipantOne of the many game club games I’ve long been meaning to check out. Maybe in November!
Evil TacoParticipantI haven’t played any Infocom text adventure to a meaningful extent, and I’ve always heard good things about Planetfall. I’m gonna grab the Zork Anthology on GOG.com, it says it has Planetfall included; quite inspired by Loom to play a bit more for the game club!
Evil TacoParticipantI’ve now actually played the VGA talkie version a little bit, and it’s definitely a good way to experience the core game itself! The voice adds its own layer to the experience, and it’s not like the VGA graphics ruin the game. To me it’s a less magical visual experience – but it’s still very good.
Evil TacoParticipantI’m now quite curious about how the EGA graphics would look on an RGB screen … anyplace on the ol’ internet that has comparison pictures? Feels like something Nerdly Pleasures might blog about but I didn’t find a post.
Evil TacoParticipantOn the other hand, I do think the game works just fine without the audio drama intro.
Evil TacoParticipantMy budget copy of Loom I bought in 1995 did not include the cassette, so I only listened to it years and years afterwards from YouTube.
I wonder how I’d felt back in the day about listening to it, I’m not sure I had enough English skills and patience at the time! I was fine with reading the game’s text itself at my own pace. It might have been really cool to listen to the cassette first.
Evil TacoParticipantThe EGA version is really gorgeous if you appreciate those particular limitations. The talkie version cuts content to fit the voices on the CD-ROM. Apparently the FM-Towns version would have the more colourful graphics but no voices, so it should have the original content in place, pretty much.
I played the EGA version back in the day (I still have the budget release box) and I didn’t get that much out of a replay recently-ish, but now I’m thinking I could give these different versions a go for the club. I bet ScummVM is able to deal with these different versions nicely …
Evil TacoParticipantI guess there would be plenty of time to make one!
Evil TacoParticipantThe Space Quest Historian also has a reorchestration up in Bandcamp! https://spacequesthistorian.bandcamp.com/album/beneath-a-steel-sky-reorchestrated
Evil TacoParticipantThat’s super cool, Pix!
Evil TacoParticipantI was definitely noting the same!
Evil TacoParticipantThe book excerpt is fascinating. A nice read for sure.
I believe it is a very European perspective that LucasArts was _the_ adventure game company. Now it feels wild that while making Broken Sword no-one at Revolution was really that aware of Gabriel Knight, considering how famous that feels now. These kinds of perspectives are quite important to note down; our sense of (video game) history easily coalesces into a single narrative, and it can easily be dominated by the U.S. perspective.
The business and company politics and the discussion of the technical lead role, very interesting to read as a software developer fascinated by game development. Tony’s vision of being able to have a “prototype lab” on the side and to be “free of deadlines” etc … isn’t that the dream? Sounds a little optimistic, but I can also relate; I always wish I had more time to just experiment and improve things at my work without such constraints – it’s a challenge to secure time to do this, though it is very good to do for everyone, in the end.
Also wow, to move the office in the middle of a crunch to finish a game!
I’ve enqueued a bunch of the podcast episodes on my player’s playlist 🙂
Evil TacoParticipantoh no, GOG.com has the same discount as back in August for two days now …
Evil TacoParticipantMmm, itching to get the sequel now after completing the game. Looked up if the physical edition was still available to buy in Finland, but it doesn’t really look like it. Which is good as I shouldn’t spend more money on games before playing a bit more of what I already have … !
Evil TacoParticipantAs far as memories, I feel like BASS was always on the edge of discussion back in the day when it came to adventure games, though Revolution only really seemed to break through with Broken Sword – before then it was all Lucas and Sierra.
It was a big deal when BASS became freeware with ScummVM, but I still never played it myself before the podcast. And now I’m very glad I did, and started wondering what I’d have thought of it if we’d got it in 1994 – we got a PC in Christmas 1993, I can almost place myself in that time and speculate what I might have thought … !
Evil TacoParticipantI think I’m glad I played the floppy version without the voices … !
There was certainly tension at the beginning of the game. It’s really easy to get your first death, and that can set the tone for a while. The music and sound really highlighted the mood as well – I dug the music a lot (played with the good old adlib sound).
It took a while for me to ease into the “adventure game logic” world, where it isn’t dangerous at all to walk into the police station even if you’re a wanted fugitive. It helped a lot when I read a few hints in the other thread, that there are no dead ends (or maybe there could’ve been, towards the end?) and if someone takes items away from you, you don’t need to worry.
I had some friction with the puzzles towards the beginning, but after about a 1/4 or 1/3 through everything started flowing quite naturally – maybe I got to the right rhythm with the game. Talk with everyone, try items with everything if you need to – but most of the time I quite naturally thought what to do next. The hints about Joey’s importance were rather crucial to get going!
I definitely thought that all the different ways of interacting with the world added a lot to the world of the game. Needing to drag Joey along, him having quite often something to do in many screens, needing to talk with people to progress, the LINC terminals, the cyberspaaaaace … there were a lot of things to do, and not just the “usual” point and click stuff. I very much appreciated that.
The tension picked up at the end. It was clear the game was building up towards a climax and it also started feeling a little dangerous again. I got a bit anxious and afraid to go to the next room and really wanted to finish the game (just now!) in one final push, and not take a break!
Even if the atmosphere was a bit uneven, sometimes quite benign for a cyberpunk story, sometimes rather grim (like finding the bodies in the locker..) I still thought overall with some forgiveness I had a great experience. A remarkable game for 1994, great music, great visuals! A world and characters, a Virtual Theater if you may, I was able to sink into and enjoy. Looking forward to playing more Revolution adventures!
Evil TacoParticipantAaaand beaten! It was a very nice experience. I’ve played through just a few LucasArts games, and Quest for Glory from Sierra … it was interesting to play through a similar, but still distinct point and click adventure.
Evil TacoParticipantI would add: there is pixel hunting. Not literal pixels perhaps, but there’s at least one hard to spot item you need.
Evil TacoParticipantIt looks like something happened when ScummVM updated, and BASS gets all glitchy and crashes now on my phone. Luckily transferring the saves over to PC wasn’t a huge deal, and I’ve been able to progress (and enjoy!) the game.
Evil TacoParticipantGreat tips red! The Joey one already helped me out and the others might help me progress in my current stumpedness.
Evil TacoParticipantI’m happy to report ScummVM on Android is working well for me.
I’ve been able to get stuck, then progress, and get stuck again very nicely 😀 The pick-up, play, put down with a low barrier is great with the phone + save slots in the ScummVM itself.
I’m enjoying the game itself quite a bit! Very happynto finally be playing this one.
Evil TacoParticipantOhh nice, I appreciate the reminder. I just started playing BASS and I feel like I’m going to like it, so better wishlist the sequel already.
Evil TacoParticipantNice, this looks interesting.
I just started playing BASS and I’m already loving the original on the AdLib. I can see why one would get inspired to creating a new version of the soundtrack for the game!
Evil TacoParticipantFighting games are a really sophisticated genre, especially nowadays. But I think OMF is still a lot of fun and very playable. I just gave it a go on archive.org and fell right back to the groove. This was amazing back in the day for DOS.
We played a lot of Street Fighter 2 on the SNES (one friend had hit) and I think that was better as a fighting game, more fun as 1-on-1, but OMF’s tournament mode was something that wasn’t at the time in any other game, and the robot characters, level hazards and tracker techno music were other things also unique to this game. It was also something we could play on PCs and we did play it a lot!
Evil TacoParticipantThe destruction moves were indeed a nice surprise! I think a friend of mine discovered them from a magazine and showed them to me. I had no idea at all.
Evil TacoParticipantLooks like I failed twice to add the image. Maybe this link works, even though adding a picture would be so nice …
https://www.dropbox.com/s/917lm4zflh0992l/20221106_225942.jpg?dl=0
Evil TacoParticipantI agree! These are largely multiplayer versus games played on one computer though. Getting into their essence is not possible without a few friends at hand …
Evil TacoParticipantThe soundtrack is indeed excellent. Demoscene goodness!
If you forgive me some shameless self-promotion, I like the soundtrack so much I’ve made my own version of the main theme: https://ocremix.org/remix/OCR04129
Evil TacoParticipantGlowing, if short review in the Finnish Pelit magazine (7th issue of 1994). It’s mainly a walkthrough of game modes and features, highlighting that this is a bloodless fighting game, you select both the robot and the pilot, the tournament mode adds depth, the robot designs are distinct and remind the reviewer of b-movies, and the fact that the game is an impressively high-quality shareware game is mentioned or alluded to several times.
Evil TacoParticipantThanks for the heads up about the iPad version, yozy! That turned out to be a comfortable way to try this game out with my significant other – fun to play together with the tablet! The game is a bit daunting, at least at first, but very unique and intriguing!
Evil TacoParticipantThis is another game I encountered via Home of the Underdogs. I couldn’t get into it back then, but boy if it doesn’t look cool and unique.
Evil TacoParticipantSettlers 1 also had that split-screen multiplayer and I played that with a friend, it was pretty special!
Evil TacoParticipantStar Control II is definitely a must for the club at some point!
Evil TacoParticipantI got this from Home of the Underdogs around 2000 or so and played it on my old DOS machine. It was pretty cool, though I did give up in some later dungeon that had a pretty annoying maze with invisible updrafts and stuff. But it certainly felt like finding some unknown gaming treasure, Japanese style action game on the PC with great music, especially since I never heard about it before!
Evil TacoParticipantWhat a cool thread!
I have my family’s old Compaq Presario 425 but unfortunately it has some flickering issue with its built-in display and I don’t have the skills to start looking into it.
Evil TacoParticipantPlayed this a good chunk when Sierra decided to offer it free on their website, way back in the late 90s I believe. Good stuff.
There is a great interview of scenario designer / writer Neal Hallford on The Retro Hour podcast: https://theretrohour.com/classic-rpg-neal-hallford-ep291/
For example it’s fascinating to hear about the writing process (with author of the fantasy series Raymond E. Feist) and it’s placement in Sierra’s publishing schedule. The floppy version didn’t do that great, but the CD version was just at the right time. But then the team was split up before the CD sales came in. And Sierra started pushing for the sequel with the team already gone. Good stuff, just like the game itself.
Evil TacoParticipantToo bad, TTD multiplayer is really relaxed fun! Even if the month is over, I really encourage trying again some time. Maybe the club could have a “multiplayer month”, going back to games that where the multiplayer plans didn’t work out? Or a bunch of multiplayer games that couldn’t carry a month on their own?
Evil TacoParticipantSeptember 12, 2021 at 7:37 pm in reply to: How to play Mechwarrior 2 + information resources on the game #5076Awesome resources and links, thanks! My friend had Mercenaries and it was a really impressive game. We even played it a bit over LAN. I borrowed his CD when I finally got a beefier PC in 2001 and played until I had a mission that kept crashing. I regret a little bit to say I never returned the game to him..
Evil TacoParticipantAt school we had an old 486 in the classroom at the end of 90s/start of 2000s. TTD was one game that we had there and one day, I forgot the time passing while staying after school and playing it. As I was leaving I met a parent of one of my friends. She was a bit surprised I was at school that late, but when I explained why I was there she (very warmly) sighed that that was about the only explanation she was willing to believe (I was quite often at their house playing videogames, or vice versa).
Evil TacoParticipantI’ve played quite a bit of OpenTTD. I spent a couple of evenings playing multiplayer. This was practically just playing together in a sandbox, not trying to compete or anything, just building stuff and chatting.
I have also definitely played on my own and with OpenTTD’s better tools for building tracks, signal posts and what not, tried to build rail systems that can handle multiple trains. In the original, I always build one track per train, I could never get it to work otherwise.
Evil TacoParticipantIt’s so much easier to list some examples of ‘cursed’ ones..
One Must Fall 2097 definitely had a lot of good stuff in the full version. 7 more robots to play as (though the Jaguar is the best bot), and was it 75% more of the tournament mode to play. I finished and enjoyed the whole campaign, so it must have been good enough.
In addition to the Apogee’s episode model, I also associate shareware with my native Finnish bedroom coder style shareware games. These were often versus-type games, and you would get more levels, weapons etc when you registered. I was certainly happy to pay a bit of pocket money for these, every now and then. Stuff money in an envelope, send it off and receive a floppy back later. Good times.
Evil TacoParticipantMay I suggest reaching out to Juho Kuorikoski? He’s a Finnish game historian (he wrote that X-COM book I posted a photo of during the UFO month), he’s written a history of adventure games (with lots of interview) and he’s also a Trekkie. He might be interested in joining. Here’s his Youtube channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFGibZYiy3Yp3XxXpIC7vhg/about and Twitter: https://twitter.com/RamboAslak
I believe his first video on his channel was 25th Anniversary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqL8z4fVBKc
Evil TacoParticipantThis would make an interesting month + podcast!
Evil TacoParticipantI haven’t played it yet, but I am interested and this could be a good incentive to get around to playing it!
Evil TacoParticipantI also do feel like these shareware DOS platformers (from U.S.) have a distinct feel of their own, compared to say console platformers from Japan or microcomputer platformers from U.K. It’s worth experiencing!
Evil TacoParticipantHow do you throw knives while crouching in Jill actually? I couldn’t manage it.
Evil TacoParticipantForgot one thing. I very much appreciate how little punishment there is for failing. You just go back to the last checkpoint and there is no lives system. In that way it resemble more modern games. And you can also save anywhere.
Evil TacoParticipantMaybe I would finally get around to playing this one!
Evil TacoParticipantThe gold standard of pinball video games as far as I’m concerned! I’ve played this one sooo much.
Evil TacoParticipantI first played this game when visiting the family of my mother’s friend, they had an Amiga and we played the Steel Wheels table. It was so cool. I might have read about the game from a magazine before that.
I remember having the demo for DOS which had the Ignition table, and playing that quite a bit. Then I got Fantasies which amazed me for playing MODs through the speaker, and later I got Dreams as well, which does the same thing. Very impressive!
The sounds coming crackling through the PC speaker is very nostalgic to me!
Evil TacoParticipantThis is definitely a game I want to put on the 486 for playing. I’ve also been lucky enough to find a Gravis Analog Pro from a flea market for practically nothing. Looking forward to September, hope I have the time!
Evil TacoParticipantThis if from the time where shift, ctrl and alt were the action buttons in action games… The norm for indie games currently is z, x, c … I wonder if this comes from Japanese homebrew games actually, at least that’s where I first personally encountered this scheme, in late-nineties Japanese PC games I got from Home of the Underdogs back in the day.
Anyhow, the shift and alt (and arrows) do feel ok to me, maybe because I’m used to them originally.
Evil TacoParticipantI was aware of this game back in the day but of these kind of games on DOS I guess I mostly stuck to the Keen games. (Which I now find a bit curious, there were a lot of decent shareware platformers, I’d now think I would have enjoyed playing more of those games, but I guess I spent my time playing other games.. anyhow!)
I’m checking back to DOS Game Club after a break and thought Jill would be something quite low effort to get into, and that turned out to be correct. I grabbed it for free from GOG.com and just spent a breezy hour or so playing through the first episode, and a bit into the second. It’s a good feeling when a game “clicks” and you want to keep playing. My daughters enjoyed spectating as well.
The game is really choppy, as discussed here. The level design also feels a bit like it was thrown together and then seeing what would stick. On the surface at least, but actually playing through the levels, you’re actually funneled through the correct path and the levels are less random and mazey than they seem at first. It’s kind of a good balance between feeling larger than it actually is and still not losing your way, at least as far as I played.
I did get used to the choppines of the gameplay quite quickly. The boomerang dagger was quite interesting and fun to use, as is the spinning blade weapon. The transformations are cool too. The add variety.
There’s definitely a kind of random thrown-together feeling with the silly messages and sound effects and what not. I’m not really fond of the music myself, it feels a bit random as compositions, though the mood of the tracks is cool.
If I have the time I’ll try this on the 486, maybe that will evoke even more of the nineties feeling.
Evil TacoParticipantTerror mission civilians are one of the few reasons for being very active in the original.. well, apart from blaster launcher fire and psi attacks.. the later I’ve set to LOS only in OpenXcom, so there goes that reason!
This time around I’m learning there’s not really much reason to enter UFOs, it’s better just to wait outside for the aliens to come out. ..or is it?
Evil TacoParticipantLaser Squad Nemesis was really cool. It was player vs player game over the e-mail/internet. Instead of being your turn – enemy turn, both parties gave their commands and then they were played simultaneously.
Their subscription system allowed playing tutorial against the computer, and a couple of practice matches against actual players. I did that, but at the time I didn’t have the means to pay for playing the game.
Evil TacoParticipantAgreed! I feel like going back and checking this game out now.
Evil TacoParticipantAugust 15, 2019 at 10:55 am in reply to: My experiance with X-COM, or how far have you gotten? #2800That’s true, that ships with OpenXcom.
Evil TacoParticipantI have also enabled that mod. First time trying it out, but it should eliminate one of the annoyances I’ve had with the game in the past.
If it gets too easy, I’m sure there’s a more fun way to make it more challenging.
Evil TacoParticipantThere’s so much stuff I haven’t been aware of despite first playing the game in 1996 or so, and that location reveal thing is such a thing. It’d be nice if the game / UI signaled some of that stuff. It makes sense to have a time limit, balance-wise, but I don’t think the game tells this at any point.
I just spoiled myself from the wiki for a really funny-sounding strategy against psionic enemies: give your troops low-powered weapons (such as regular pistols and rifles) and put them in good armour. That way, if they’re taken over, they can’t hurt each other. Psi-aliens themselves are squishy, so they can be killed with bullets.
The interesting bit about this strategy is that the psi-aliens’ “companions” (that show up in terror missions and bases etc) are very well armoured..
Evil TacoParticipantMaybe that depends on difficulty level and version – I’m playing OpenXcom on Veteran and I was just now checking for the best thread to lament how Alien Grenades are the bane of my troops.
Evil TacoParticipantOhhh, that reaction shot thing, that explains alot. After 24 years or so after first playing the game, I just now started using the smoke grenades when playing for the club, and it makes such a difference. And makes so much sense.
Evil TacoParticipantI have beaten the original DOS version a few times, I believe at least twice without cheating. I’m not sure if I ever completed an OpenXcom run. It does become a bit of a slog towards the end. There’s two things I’ve found off-putting:
– Those endless crash missions, they do become boring
– Psychic attacks out of nowhereThe first point – I’ve started thinking that maybe it is not obligatory to clear out every crash site. Once you have enough monthly points anyway (shooting down UFOs counts) and don’t need to discover tech etc, or don’t need elerium, etc etc, mayyybe it’s ok to not do every crash site.
The second point – maybe the psionic training stuff you mention helps to mitigate that, but by that point I’m usually pretty fatigued and find constant mind control attacks unfun.
Still the best game ever made.
Evil TacoParticipantThanks for the list, I feel like installing most of those into my current game!
That idea about civilians running away from things sounds like it would not only make sense, but possibly make the terror missions a bit more dynamic. Like the aliens moving around a bit more also. The civilians tend to die quite fast.
Also nice to see you Canageek! I remember you from CRPG Addict blog comments (I haven’t been super active there but I’m ‘evktalo’ there.)
Evil TacoParticipantOne of the reasons that I think this game is so good is that you can have played this game for quite a bit and still learn new things. Like that the smoke grenades are actually useful. Well.. it should be obvious really, but somehow I suppose I’ve just assumed they’re just there for show. I haven’t read strategy guides – I guess they’d spoil this effect.
Smoke also slowly stuns. I wonder how viable it would actually be to throw a smoke grenade or three into a UFO and just wait. I have had it happen a couple of times that I win a fight when the final alien passes out in smoke, but I’ve never tried that deliberately.
Evil TacoParticipantI’m playing OpenXcom as well. You can really customize how much you want the original changed; you can toggle a lot of UI improvements on and I would still maintain it is very much the same game.
I will freely admit I toggled a ton of gameplay changes on, as there’s a lot of smart stuff that I feel like will make the game even better. I’ll try to try the original on the DOS machine as well this month..
Evil TacoParticipantHex editing! I do have to admit that on my first run through the game, I definitely hex-edited my troops to have superpowers, and also loaded a lot when they got killed.
Nowadays I find that taking the punches and considering when to cut losses and retreat is a much more fun way to play. But it is possible to enjoy this game in many ways..
A friend of mine played Terror From The Deep a lot as well, but I think I passed as I heard it had bigger maps that ended up being a bit exhausting, and also being a bit too difficult. The theme is pretty cool, though. I believe OpenXcom also has support for the sequel, and it sounds like it’ll benefit from a little modding even more than the original, so I plan to check it out eventually via OpenXcom.
Evil TacoParticipantThanks for the recommendation for GhostControlInc, I’ve added that to my wishlist now. 🙂
Evil TacoParticipantTempted to hook up the C64 now… also played Laser Squad Deluxe on the PC back in the day.
Evil TacoParticipantThose kinds of stories are a testament to this game’s strengths.
Maybe we need some sort of spoiler warnings. 😀
My favourite story that I recall is an attempted raid at an alien base. I was getting my ass kicked, and I had to pull back and escape the mission.
However, while escaping I noticed (with a mind probe) that the commander of the base had snuck in the way of escape. I was able to stun the commander while escaping, and carry the body out. This made it possible to interrogate the commander for the location of the Martian base.
I sincerely hope I’m not making the story up.
Evil TacoParticipantWell, in this case, Crawl has been continuously develop (well, Stone Soup is technically a fork I suppose..) Going back to old versions feels a bit painful. But maybe I haven’t realized the right spirit!
Last Stone Soup version with a DOS release is 0.5.1 from mid-2009 here: http://crawl.develz.org/release/0.5/
Evil TacoParticipantThis is pretty cool!
Evil TacoParticipantI’ve played a good bunch of the Mercenaries prequel to this game. It was a pretty fun to play over LAN. Also played the campaign up to a point where I couldn’t progress due to a crash bug. Great stuff regardless.
Evil TacoParticipantI played the demo of Tie Fighter on my machine and got a lot of enjoyment out of that single mission. I played a little bit of X-Wing vs Tie Fighter at a LAN party ages ago. I also found a copy of X-Wing Alliance at a flea market and fired it up to see if it worked in wine.. but I still haven’t given any of the games in the series a proper go. Despite everything about them being utterly fascinating to me! I really need some motivation! 😀
Evil TacoParticipantI remember reading a review from a computer magazine for this in September 1991, and being very fascinated by the review.
A few years later I got the game (though let’s just say it didn’t come with the manual) and played it a bit, don’t think I understood it much at the time!
Evil TacoParticipantThis would be interesting!
Evil TacoParticipantRules of Engagement 2 + Breach 3 combo has always sounded incredibly fascinating to me. I remember Breach 3 reviewing quite poorly on its own.
Evil TacoParticipantThis would be a cool pick for sure! I played the SW version and thought it was really neat (although my machine would slow down a lot trying to run it during the more action-y parts). Not too long ago, I played a more recent build a bit again and felt that it held up pretty well. The keyboard+mouse combo in 2D was very fresh back then and feels ‘modern’ still. I’ve played a bunch of recent-ish indie games that must have had Abuse as their inspiration.
Evil TacoParticipantThis is a pretty cool game! I remember it from back in the day (mostly over the shoulder of a friend). I have it from GOG and it’d be nice to have an excuse to dig into it.
Evil TacoParticipantFun to see a recommendation for Crawl. 🙂 I don’t think there’s a version for DOS that wouldn’t pale in comparison with the more modern continuations though..
Evil TacoParticipantLoom is quite wonderful. It can make for a lighter month, as it is a rather easy and short adventure game. But it is very well done in every aspect.
Evil TacoParticipantI uploaded a Monza record to the scoreboard! Sadly I didn’t have my old copy of the game and don’t have my (and my sister’s and friends’) old times anymore.
They probably weren’t too impressive. 🙂
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Evil TacoParticipantYou can indeed turn off improvements in OpenXcom granularly.
There’s bug fixes, there’s UI improvements, and there’s enhancements that improve/change gameplay aspects.
For my money, if you just use bug fixes and UI improvements, you’re basically playing the same game.
I believe many of the fixes have also been introduced to the DOS original by fanmade patches over the years. So you can get a lot of the bugfixes at least, to play in actual DOS environment too! 🙂
