[Evil Taco]

in reply to: How does OMF stack up to other beat em ups? #6827

Fighting 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 Taco]

in reply to: Which bots have the best destruction moves? #6775

The 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 Taco]

in reply to: Magazine Reviews #6773

Looks 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 Taco]

in reply to: Finnish freeware dosgames #6772

I 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 Taco]

in reply to: dat music #6685

The 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 Taco]

in reply to: Magazine Reviews #6683

Glowing, 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 Taco]

in reply to: Planning to partake #6302

Thanks 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 Taco]

in reply to: Circiut’s Edge (1990) #6259

This 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 Taco]

in reply to: The Settlers #6258

Settlers 1 also had that split-screen multiplayer and I played that with a friend, it was pretty special!

[Evil Taco]

in reply to: Star Control II #6257

Star Control II is definitely a must for the club at some point!

[Evil Taco]

in reply to: Zeliard (1990) #6256

I 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 Taco]

in reply to: Who uses real hardware? #5428

What 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 Taco]

in reply to: Betrayal at Krondor #5427

Played 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 Taco]

in reply to: Multiplayer (OpenTTD) #5388

Too 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 Taco]

in reply to: OpenTTD #5220

I would say yes.

[Evil Taco]

in reply to: How to play Mechwarrior 2 + information resources on the game #5076

Awesome 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 Taco]

in reply to: Yes!!! #5075

At 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 Taco]

in reply to: OpenTTD #5074

I’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 Taco]

in reply to: Shareware games that aren’t “cursed” #5073

It’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 Taco]

in reply to: Who wants to join the podcast? #5059

May 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 Taco]

in reply to: Modern DOS Games #4670

This would make an interesting month + podcast!

[Evil Taco]

in reply to: Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Father #3572

I haven’t played it yet, but I am interested and this could be a good incentive to get around to playing it!

[Evil Taco]

in reply to: First impressions #3571

I 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 Taco]

in reply to: Related Games #3564

How do you throw knives while crouching in Jill actually? I couldn’t manage it.

[Evil Taco]

in reply to: First impressions #3560

Forgot 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 Taco]

in reply to: Fallout (1997) #3552

Maybe I would finally get around to playing this one!

[Evil Taco]

in reply to: Pinball Fantasies #3551

The gold standard of pinball video games as far as I’m concerned! I’ve played this one sooo much.

[Evil Taco]

in reply to: Pinball Dreams #3550

I 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 Taco]

in reply to: DosBox Warnings in Reviews #3549

This 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 Taco]

in reply to: Suggested Control Schemes #3548

This 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 Taco]

in reply to: First impressions #3547

I 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 Taco]

in reply to: Games Inspired by X-COM #2840

Terror 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 Taco]

in reply to: The Sequels #2827

Laser 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 Taco]

in reply to: Jeffery Briggs – Designers Notes #2809

Agreed! I feel like going back and checking this game out now.

[Evil Taco]

in reply to: My experiance with X-COM, or how far have you gotten? #2800

That’s true, that ships with OpenXcom.

[Evil Taco]

in reply to: The KDRNICIAN experience #2772

I 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 Taco]

in reply to: The KDRNICIAN experience #2770

There’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 Taco]

in reply to: Things in X-COM that don't make much sense #2769

Maybe 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 Taco]

in reply to: Tips & Tricks #2753

Ohhh, 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 Taco]

in reply to: My experiance with X-COM, or how far have you gotten? #2750

I 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 nowhere

The 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 Taco]

in reply to: OpenXCom Mods #2749

Thanks 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 Taco]

in reply to: The KDRNICIAN experience #2735

One 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 Taco]

in reply to: Thoughts on OpenXcom #2727

I’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 Taco]

in reply to: X-TRA materials #2725

Hex 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 Taco]

in reply to: Programming & File Size #2720

Thanks for the recommendation for GhostControlInc, I’ve added that to my wishlist now. 🙂

[Evil Taco]

in reply to: Lazer Squad – the basis #2719

Tempted to hook up the C64 now… also played Laser Squad Deluxe on the PC back in the day.

[Evil Taco]

in reply to: My X-COM Experiences #2710

Those 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 Taco]

in reply to: A roguelike or roguelikes – specially Crawl #2651

Well, 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 Taco]

in reply to: Old PCs #2650

Looking lovely!

[Evil Taco]

in reply to: Lizard – A New DOS game #2645

This is pretty cool!

[Evil Taco]

in reply to: MechWarrior 2 #2644

I’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 Taco]

in reply to: Tie Fighter #2643

I 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 Taco]

in reply to: Secret Weapons of the Luftwaffe (1991) #2642

I 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 Taco]

in reply to: Subwar 2050 by Particle Systems #2641

This would be interesting!

[Evil Taco]

in reply to: Rules of Engagement #2640

Rules of Engagement 2 + Breach 3 combo has always sounded incredibly fascinating to me. I remember Breach 3 reviewing quite poorly on its own.

[Evil Taco]

in reply to: Abuse #2639

This 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 Taco]

in reply to: M.A.X. (Mechanized Assault and Exploration) #2638

This 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 Taco]

in reply to: A roguelike or roguelikes – specially Crawl #2637

Fun 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 Taco]

in reply to: Loom (1990) #2636

Loom 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 Taco]

in reply to: Scoreboard! #2618

I 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. 🙂

Attachments:

1. 

   gpc-monza-20190707.jpg
   

[Evil Taco]

in reply to: Thoughts on OpenXcom #2616

You 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! 🙂