Collecting older games

[Netami]

I must have played Eye of the Beholder when I was younger because that screen cap looks terribly familiar, with the way the party is set up on the right. It also reminds me of playing Catacomb and Cooridor 7, for some reason.

Being a pre-teen in the 90's was pretty sweet, still, even if I didn't have the internet to download old games. I'd get stuff like Betrayel of Krondor from my uncle, which then led to a deep love of Raymond E Feist books. I got to play Zork off a 5.25" disk, and am probably one of the last kids to grow up knowing just WTF the B: drive was (compared to my little cousins, who don't know anything but flash drives and cable modems).

One of my favorite "finds" was actually Interplay's 10th anniversary box, like... 7-8+ years ago. I originally picked it up because, at the time (what with no internet P2P apps and older games being threatened to not work with the new OS releases), it was the only place to really find Ultima Underworld and I simply adored playing it when I was even younger than that. I also got to play Bard's Tale and, what I can only imagine was the influence for Fallout, some old game I believe was named Wasteland. There were some other greats in that package.

Now is a great time for older games, though. I mean, we've got webpages like Home of the Underdogs (where I downloaded Princess Maker and had tons of fun with the RPG element), net apps and torrents for bundles of thousands of old games, and programs like DOSBox which emulates the environment perfectly. Can you say Quest for Glory? Speaking of emulators, I can't even begin to relate how many hours I spent in HS just playing old (S)NES games and stuff with my friends.

Yep. What a time to be alive.

[Rowne]

Princess Maker, oh now there's a game I had a fun time hacking.  Huzzah for trainers and ... no, I won't detail my efforts.

I'd actually forgotten about Betrayal of Krondor and that makes me a little sad because that's almost like forgetting about the Pandora Directive.  It was one of those games way back when that wasn't an adventure game but actually had a really good story and brilliant characters.

I loved getting the dorky looking middle-aged main character to knock on the doors of irritated peasants, that and merrily playing awful music in Inns.

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Oh and one other thing; I found that Interplay box too over here in the UK!  It was a grand find because I recall reading the dev interview and how they were bitching about having to fit Battlechess onto a disk, great stuff.  It's also how I rediscovered Battlechess and the amusingly camp Star Trek: The 25th Anniversary point'n clicker.

[Netami]

Princess Maker, oh now there's a game I had a fun time hacking.  Huzzah for trainers and ... no, I won't detail my efforts.

Oh, I did that. But it was basically just me abusing the poor girl and making her take the Breast Maximize pill over and over.

Betrayel of Krondor was a beautiful thing. I still find myself going to this website, just out of nostalgia for the old item descriptions and impressive riddles. I was sort've pissed that they toted Betrayel in Antara (or whatever) as a sequel, when it was set in a completely different franchise.

I think Daggerfall is one of my favorite, if not THE favorite (contending with BAK), PC games of all time. Back then, Bethesda didn't need to release a "werewolf expansion" because it was all in the original game. You want an in depth experience? Walk from freakin' Daggerfall to Wayrest and break into the castle's dungeon. Or get the Wabbajack. Buy a boat. Marvel in the glory that is 3D naked women in Dibella's churches; a far cry from the neutured BS going on  in modern games, where the gods dont even really have faces. Oblivion is like a small finger on the body that was Daggerfall, in it's huge scope. Oh wow, you've got great graphics. Well I've got hours of gameplay AND replay value.

[Rowne]

Indeed but I believe I made her weight -15 or something like that, too.

Mistress, you've been pumped up with helium!

Help meee~!

My mind is a horrible, incorrigible place.  Incorrigible is my word of the day, since I'd forgotten about it.  I blame Lurky for reminding me of it.

Oh and to make a quick nod towards Daggerfall, I agree.  There was just so much to do.  Climbing the city walls at night or something.  That and ...

HaltHalt!

No.

HaltHalt!

Go away.

HaltHalt!

Peess awff.  Stupid shop, isn't there a back door?

Good times.

This is primarily why I'm looking forward to Hellgate: London so much, it has the randomization element that I so dearly loved in Daggerfall.

[Tapewolf]

I can't find the original 'Inspector Calls' party, although I think I do have them somewhere. 

In this frankly bizarre screenshot, I appear to have merged the 'Goole' idea with a party based on the UK Conservative Party.  This was about 8 years ago so I have no idea what I was doing.



I think that Goole and Goole are probably NPCs drafted into the party and reshaped with the hex editor.

**EDIT**
I do think the idea of giving them all the same name was a good one - it made the little comments and stuff in the status area rather funny.
Goole is now level 5! - "yeah, but which one?"

[Netami]

I was sort of upset with Princess Maker, I mean... They only got so big. I tried giving her food just to make it seem more realistic that her boobs would grow, but noooo... Yeesh, what a bad parent.

Every new Elder Scrolls game that comes out has me loading it up just to see if I can A) Climb the walls and B) Make the guards say "Halt! Halt! Halt!" Kinda sad that neither has happened, Oblivion going so far as to take out spells that allow flight, simply due to how small it would make the game seem. Hell, they don't even have teleportation circles in their mages guilds, and the Academy is supposedly where the guild was founded! Sigh... Maybe in 5-6 years when the new Xbox comes out and they need an Elder Scrolls game to go with it, there'll be something more attuned to our tastes.

Is that screencap from Eye of the Beholder two, or one? Because I swear I've played a game like that before, only the graphics weren't so crisp and you had six buttons in the lower right. I wasn't any good at the game, but it still looks very familiar.

[Tapewolf]

Is that screencap from Eye of the Beholder two, or one? Because I swear I've played a game like that before, only the graphics weren't so crisp and you had six buttons in the lower right. I wasn't any good at the game, but it still looks very familiar.

They're both EOB2.  I think they used the same basic engine, though.

[Rowne]

Tape: ... that's almost as bad as having an RPG character named Margaret Thatcher and just as funny!

Great stuff.

Netami: 'Tis true.  I was a terrible parent though because I got all the worst outcomes.  I even managed to get her to marry my character (her Dad!) ... but I actually worked hard for that one.  That poor, psychologically unbalanced, dominatrix-equipped girl.

Oh and I know what you mean about Oblivion.  I wanted to like it.  The mods are brilliant.  Fight Ogres with spoons, sail ships along the tiny riverbeds but in the end, I kept comparing it with Daggerfall and even Morrowind and when I started playing the game instead of just playing with the mods, it became glaringly obvious how very crap it is compared to those games.  That makes me sad.

I'm looking forward to NWN 2 because maybe with that, I can enjoy both the game and the mods.

[Netami]

Hmm, I just googled up a page about both games, and neither are close to what I played. I must have tried out some sort of prequel, because even the first Eye of the Beholder had better graphics (and a four player limit). The game I played had six characters in that sort of onscreen display, though no monsters would ever appear on screen. It'd give you text descriptions of what was in front of you.

I thought the little princess eventually marrying her dad was sort've cute. Assuming, you know, that you set your age as 15 when you find her. Something about a fifteen year old saving the kingdom making perfect sense thanks to Japanese video game standards is kind've funny to me. I always thought the worst ending was the upper-class hooker one. Even the one where she becomes Bitch Queen of the Universe is better than that one. There was also something horribly depressing about her just being the wife of a no-name court magician, after spending all those years training and walking around the world and getting in duels... How mundane.

I hope NWN2 is at least as fun as NWN1, because this time I will be ready to hop on the bandwagon and hopefully get some fun out of it. I came to NWN way after it released, hoping for a Baldur's Gate setting, and was sort of let down.

[Tapewolf]

Netami, I was going to suggest "Bard's Tale", but although it does the assembled-perspective thing, it doesn't show the players onscreen like EOB does.

[Rowne]

I felt the same way when she married that Ranger, after that session where I had her wandering around forests for years until she became little Ms Sensitive (or Emo, whichever you prefer).  That was a little dull too.  Oh and I think when I had her father marry her, I went for the oldest age available.  I'm just glad that nobody'd been watching me play at the time.

As for Neverwinter Nights, what made it great was that unlike Oblivion, they tried to make an engine more than they did a game.  They included the best toolkit known to man and the ability for a person to run their own server.  So whilst the default campaign was a bit crap, there are player campaigns that are pure genius and some of the online campaigns lead to events that I'll always fondly remember.

That's what I'm hoping Neverwinter Nights 2 will be like, to be honest.  I don't really care much if the main quest is any good, just as long as it's a great engine.  If it is, we can look forward to items like Elegia Eternum popping up for it and the good times, they will roll.

The only reason I've ended up not liking Oblivion is because I simply don't like the World, it's just boring and the quests are uninspired and unlike Neverwinter Nights, a modder can't easily rip away and replace the World.  There are projects out there but they might never come to pass, if they do though I might just reinstall Oblivion.

Being able to create a fully customized campaign with incredible ease was a master-stroke for Bioware though.

So ... y'know, I have much trepidation over NWN2.  It could be the best game ever ... but usually with sequels, things are more limiting as opposed to more brilliant and if they limit the Aurora Toolkit, it's just not going to be the same experience anymore.

I'm just ... hoping here.

[Netami]

Something about the fact that you have to wait for a few months after NWN comes out to fully enjoy NWN irks me; waiting on someone to create a better scenario than the developers is a huge gamble. Plus, you know, the whole "online play means you have to play with PEOPLE" factor. People aren't typically kind, or even coherent, online.

I know toolkits are great and all, but somewhere along the line we've lost games like Baldur's Gate and Daggerfall amidst the pandering to people who'd whistfully recreate the setting. Honestly I'd rather have had Oblivion have in depth stuff than allow for people to make eight million mods (do I really need to see a dunmer chick nude, with close detail to areolas?), but I guess the former begets the latter.

There's just time involved. Morrowind didn't really get fun for me until way after it came out, when the mods finally broke a lot of ground. Ian from Machall's Moogle mod is a good example of that. I guess I am just impatient and want all the goodies now, and not later when I could potentially miss out.

[Rowne]

Well, in Neverwinter Nights case, it worked.  Firstly, it wasn't months, it was only really a case of a week or two before the first good module came out, simply because the toolkit was so easy to use.  And given the option of a great scenario with a half-baked modding engine or a great engine with a half-baked scenario, I choose the latter.  I'm weird like that but I'd rather have the option for players to make their own particular brands of brilliance because that way you see stuff you're never going to see with commercial games.

If both could be brilliant though, better yet but usually, with deadlines that's an improbability.

Also, Oblivion is a bad example.  Oblivion's modding system is intricate in some ways but half-baked in a great many more.  It isn't intercompatible with other mods and in general, it's a pain in the arse.  This means that whilst neat little tricks like fighting with spoons are possible, getting something more large and complex working isn't going to be none too likely.  If you're basing this off your Oblivion experiences then I can understand but having spent a good while with NWN, I know how good player-created content can be in the right environment.

Speaking of online, Neverwinter Nights got it right there too.  Do some research into how it actually worked.  The thing is, they had something called Neverwinter Connections.  Exactly like a D&D session, a gaming session would be organized in advance, so you'd get the chance to get to know the people involved before you started playing.  It was easy to spot good gaming groups and bad ones, then once good ones were found it was easy to stick with them and since nobody from the outside could interfere with a gaming session (it's multiplayer, not massively multiplayer), it worked incredibly well.  In fact, Neverwinter Nights worked as well as any game of Dungeons and Dragons ever did for this very reason.

And again, with Morrowind, the mods were a pain in the arse to get working correctly.  The tricks worked fine generally but the quest mods didn't bounce well off each other, it wasn't fun setting up and what the mods could actually do quest-wise was limited in comparison with what they could do in Neverwinter Nights (anything).  Again, the tricks were fun when there were a lot of them and that's how I enjoyed Morrowind, at least for a little while but when it comes to talking about modding, a modding community and the fruits thereof, Neverwinter Nights simply stomps the Bethesda efforts out of existance.

Just my opinion, of course.

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I'd like to expand on how the more important (quest and story based) mods of Oblivion and Morrowind aren't all that intercompatible.

The thing is, Morrowind/Oblivion have no way of exporting or dealing with character information.  It also didn't react to quest mods being installed together, either one mod would break the other (or a bunch of others) or it would simply crash at startup.  Since mod-creators were so protective about their work, it was hard for anyone to get permission to meld them together.  This made it hard to actually play the game because one either had to level up a new character every time to play new quest mods or the quest mods had to be designed for level 1 characters, thus limiting them.

Neverwinter Nights got around this in numerous ways.  It could level, empower and even mould characters based on story events, ongoing in-game customization (a la Ultima) and in many other ways.  The best part of it though is that once a person was done with a character, they could export it, at any time, at any level, with any equipment.  So if a mod says that it needs a level six character, that person could then simply load up the level six, pre-equipped character they'd used in the main quest and exported and they'd be good to go.

Stuff like that just wasn't possible in Oblivion and Morrowind.  In Neverwinter Nights, one could merrily hop from module to module, never stopping for pause and never having to worry about setup or details.  It was really very run-and-go.

[Netami]

Well we've all seen the nude mods, the "house in <x> town" mods, the various weapon mods... All for games like Morrowind and Oblivion, but what about these NWN modules? I have yet to see a very expansive one, or one that I would consider worthy of the praise you're giving. Got any examples?

[Rowne]

Just about everything mentioned in Neverwinter Vault's Hall of Fame.  There's some truly impressive stuff, there and it just goes on and on.  There's no end of quality, talented player content.

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A lot of them are highly acclaimed across the internet and very well known.  There are a number of them there that are veritable works of art and utterly unique and beautiful.  I just wish the City of Doors Initiative had made something of themselves, that would've been beautiful.

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I recommend starting off with the Elegia series, specifically; Elegia Eternum.

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Oh and lest I forget, how about the official modules?  Once again, critically acclaimed (search'n see) and I have to say that having pissed away a good amount of time in the Pirates module, it's pure genius.

[Kenji]

Sonic CD. Excellent choice. Time travel, awesome bonus stages, and the introduction of Metal Sonic.
Jurassic Park. Another excellent choice. And choped full of dinos, which is always good. It's fun to do the infinite ammo cheat from Muldoon's office.

Can't say I ever played the Sega CD version of Eternal Blue. Have em both for the PS1, though.
I still have all my sega CD games sitting about in my room. Although I can't find that one zombie game. The one where you can choose to either make an antidote or death bullets when you find those plants.

Anyways, yay classics.

[Rowne]

To take a break from the discussion of CRPGs, I have to say that I agree about Sonic CD being a lot of fun.  It's actually a shame that the MegaCD wasn't more recognized for its efforts.  They even had Monkey Island and Dragon's Lair available for it, as I recall.  That's naught to sniff at.  Though I suppose it was all the FMV stuff like Night Trap that really did it in.

That doesn't diminish the games that were good, though.  I loved the CD version of Ecco too with the story bits it added.  Great stuff.

[Aridas]

Yeah, I think the fact that every 9 out of 10 games for the sega CD were the exact same kind of thing was what brought it down...

[Rowne]

I agree Ari, it was the era.  The PC suffered in the same way though, there were a lot of unimaginative games on the PC back then.  It's only later it broke off into unique stuff like the Pandora Directive and Shivers.  Early on, everyone was just copying everyone else's ideas.  That's always the case though whenever a new and successful genré or form of technology is discovered.  Everyone jumps on the bandwagon.

Thankfully, in the case of both the PC and the MegaCD, there were very unique games on offer if one knew where to look.  The FMV era was a bit of a messy and undesirable morass though, to be sure.  It could've been capable of so much more, it deserved it.  It was ballsy of Sega to even try.

Also, in regards to the Neverwinter Nights discussion, I've moved that to another thread since I don't want to hijack this one.

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Actually, speaking of FMV-ish games, has anyone played Scratches?  It's an indie adventure game in the style of Myst but not quite.  I really got into the demo because it had such a well handled and almost soupy atmosphere that could chill to the bone.  I'm so going to buy that one when they release their digital download option.  I read they were going to do that anyway, I hope they follow through.

[Xuzaf D]

Errg... PC gaming. It never makes any sense to me, and it seems there are fans for every obscure title. I'll never understand the appeal of pc games when 99% are paint by the numbers RPG's and Shooters.

[Blazehawk]

Also, in regards to the Neverwinter Nights discussion, I've moved that to another thread since I don't want to hijack this one.

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Actually, speaking of FMV-ish games, has anyone played Scratches?  It's an indie adventure game in the style of Myst but not quite.  I really got into the demo because it had such a well handled and almost soupy atmosphere that could chill to the bone.  I'm so going to buy that one when they release their digital download option.  I read they were going to do that anyway, I hope they follow through.

I think hijacking in the name of NWN isn't a smiteable offense. 

I played a little bit of Scratches, I'll have to steal it from my boyfriend again to play it more. I liked it, very creepy. ^^ Oddly enough it reminded me of the original Alone in the Dark for some reason.

[Rowne]

Seraline: That's true.  Still, I've objected to the arguing that goes on elsewhere that causes thread hijacks and I am a polite sort, I don't like doing that to people so instead of forcing everyone to read an ongoing discussion, it's easier to move it off to another thread.  That way people can optionally choose.  My conscience would pester me otherwise by removing that free choice.

As for Scratches, you're right on the money, I'd say!  The elements are very much the same.  One happens to be stranded in an old house, a creepy old house with no other human contact.  There are things going on which are obviously "not right" and the whole endeavour feels truly creepy, I find that on times it makes my skin crawl with some of the stuff they came up with.

I really had to force myself through it though because usually I don't do so well with creepy.  I'd say that it also reminds me of Silent Hill because it has that same kind of atmosphere.  I can't play it for extended periods because I just get nervous and shaky.  I have to put it down for a few hours, come back and play for a bit, rinse and repeat.

For a horror game though, that's exactly the response they'd want, I'd wager.

Warlike: Such a view will often spark a discussion and for that reason, rather than polluting this thread, I've created a new thread with my reply to your opinion.  You can find it in the same subforum as this thread.

[Aridas]

Reviving this thread to mention another game, Lunar Pool is crazy and fun. >.>

[Arcalane]

Errg... PC gaming. It never makes any sense to me, and it seems there are fans for every obscure title. I'll never understand the appeal of pc games when 99% are paint by the numbers RPG's and Shooters.

And that's the sad thing. The only truly unique games I've seen recently have been Uplink (which was ripped off several times over), Darwinia and DEFCON.

Older games...

Come on, who's played Syndicate? The original one. Come on, hands up, admit it. Four cyborgs taking on entire police divisions and other cyborgs to complete a mission. What's not to like when they have flamethrowers, miniguns and such?

[Aridas]

Which is the original? I have a giant box with Syndicate in it, and I never got around to playing it.

[Arcalane]

Which is the original? I have a giant box with Syndicate in it, and I never got around to playing it.

Well, the series is;
Syndicate
<expansion I can't remember the name of>
Syndicate Wars

Syndicate Wars was in 3D, but lower quality graphics than those of Syndicate (if you catch my drift... Syndicate's pixellated art was awesomesauce) and the series kinda died there. I have no idea where the rights are now.

[Aridas]

Ah, then I do have the original. I should try to get it working...