The Aching

You're in some sort of cave. A red light eminates from the northern wall, while a green light pours in from the cave's exit. This is Azra, a strange far away world where many dangers loom. You are an acolyte of the Scarlet Lady's Red Court, and have no memory of how you ended up in this cave. But while the game's world and characters are mysterious, the presentation is instantly recognisable as that of a 1980s Sierra adventure game. However, this DOS game isn't 35 years old... it's brand new!

In July we took a look at The Aching, a parser-based graphic adventure game released in 2023 by Hadrosaurus Software. Don't be fooled by its release date however, this is an authentic DOS game that has no trouble running on a Tandy 1000. Definitely something we're interested in!

In this episode hosts Martijn (Tijn) and Florian (rnlf) are joined by two guests to discuss this game. First of all there's Shawn (DJ_HiP), returning from the Stunts episode, and who is completely new to the world of adventure games. Secondly we have Mike (Zerfall), who is a true veteran of the genre growing up on classic Sierra games, and has YouTube and Twitch channels where he looks at old games.

We also got a voice message by TheLobdegg, creator of The Aching, about other modern DOS games.

Enjoy!

[ download mp3 ] (116 mins, 132 MB)

We once again got lots of help from DGC member console with editing this episode. Many thanks to him and all who make this show possible!

Interview: Hadrosaurus Software

Making commercial games for DOS nowadays is not a good business model, right? Hadrosaurus Software is hard at work proving this claim to be totally wrong. Their games Acronia and The Aching (which we played in July) are getting a lot of attention from the DOS gaming community, and rightfully so, we think.

Company founder Clarissa and The Aching creator Tamsin were so kind to take the time to talk to us about DOS game development from a technical, business and personal perspective and shared some interesting and funny anecdotes.

Enjoy!

[ download mp3 ] (101 mins, 116 MB)

We got help from DGC member console, who helped us out with editing this episode. Many thanks to him and all who make this show possible!

We’re accepting donations now

Over the years we've been asked many times how people could contribute some money to the club. We always said that wasn't necessary and it still isn't, really. But we would like to move the server to a more reliable hoster with more bandwidth.

For that we need about €500 per year. The money will go towards the podcast episode and website hosting, as well as our Mastodon instance (for which you can also request an invite, even without donating anything ;))

Anyway, if you want to help us out, you can do that on our Ko-fi.

Thanks everybody who pushed us to finally do this and to everybody donating!

Stunts

The late 80s and early 90s were filled with "true 3D" polygon-based first-person driving games. There was Hard Drivin' in the arcade by Atari, Geoff Crammond released Stunt Car Racer, Spectrum Holobyte published Stunt Driver, to name a few. But the one game that proved to capture the hearts of many and remains being played competitively to this very day is 1990's Stunts (aka 4D Sports Driving), developed by Distinctive Software ("DSi"), famous for making such games as Test Drive as well as Grand Prix Circuit, which we covered in episode 2 of this podcast.

We dove deep into the world of Stunts to see what sets it apart from the competition and why it still has an active following to this very day. That's why we're excited that hosts Martijn ("Tijn") and Florian ("rnlf") are not only joined by DGC club members Rob ("Spoonboy") and newcomer Shawn ("DJ_HiP"), but also by two members of the Stunts forum over at stunts.hu. Lucas ("Cas") is the organiser of the Race For Kicks competition and has developed several tools and utilities for the game. Mark ("KyLiE") keeps a detailed list of custom cars on his website, has worked on custom cars of his own and helps out with hosting several Stunts projects. They're both keen racers and have been active in the Stunts community for years.

Enjoy!

[ download mp3 ] (184 mins, 211 MB)

We got help from DGC member console, who edited the majority of this episode. Many thanks to him and all who make this show possible!

Speedball 2: Brutal Deluxe

The original Speedball from 1988 was already a highly acclaimed futuristic sports game, lauded for its action-packed arcade-style gameplay and superb audiovisual presentation. But when the Bitmap Brothers released the sequel in 1990 for Amiga and Atari ST they truly outdid themselves. Both horizontal and vertical scrolling at a blistering pace was an achievement rarely seen on home computers at the time, let alone combined with an excellent AI. It's still remembered as one of the Amiga's greatest games.

But less well-known perhaps is the 1991 PC port, also by Bitmap Brothers. How does the DOS version hold up to its famous Amiga counterpart? That's what we're here for to find out!

Joining hosts Martijn ("Tijn") and Florian ("rnlf") to talk about this game is DGC veteran Hannes ("MrCreosote") and DGC newcomer Jeremy ("ZorroBandito"), who both played tons of the Amiga version back in the day and know all the ins and outs of what makes this game great.

A big shout out to DGC member Niklas ("killershrew") who was previously on the Dark Forces episode and had planned to be on the Speedball episode as well. He's a big football games fan and we would have loved to have him on, but sadly he has suffered a sudden medical condition and is recovering from that for the foreseeable future. We all wish him the best and are thinking of him. We hope to see him back on for a future episode as soon as he his able. Take care, Niklas!

[ download mp3 ] (163 mins, 186 MB)

We got help from DGC member console editing this episode (again!). Many thanks to him and all who make this show possible!