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Nice looking DOS games

stranno

Member
The Godfather: The Action Game (1991, US Gold). Detailed backgrounds and cool pixel art. Probably the worst hit SFX ever heard in a videogame.

S8QJ6nO.gif


Whale's Voyage 2 (1995, Neo Software). A German exclusive first person RPG with texture-mapped environments. Yeah, Elders Scrolls: Arena came out one year before with pretty much the same and far more FOV. But it looks fine.

MTqofeW.gif


Batman: The Caped Crusader (1988, Ocean Software). Graphics werent anything especial but the comic panels effect was really cool, perfectioned by Comix Zone in 2D and XIII/Ultimate Spider-Man in 3D. And it features the Adam West's Batman OST! Note: This is the Amiga 500 version tho, i couldnt find any decent DOS footage.

94P6r1q.gif
 
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Silvawuff

Member
Too lazy to dig up some screen shots atm, but howzabout Commander Keen? Also Alien Siege (aka Halloween Harry) was pretty legit imo.
 

Ivan

Member
Fantastic thread, everyone.

I loved the games that showed an overhead view of a complex city/world, games like SimCity, Rollercoaster Tycoon and Populus.



Beautiful screenshot!

Another one I love:
64530-warcraft-ii-tides-of-darkness-dos-screenshot-a-harbour-with.gif


Which would eventually lead to Starcraft.
Don't do this to me :(. I hate the direction they took after Warcraft 2 so much... This looked and sounded absolutely beautiful, I fell in love in seconds.
 

stranno

Member
Amok (Lemon, 1996). Rendering distance was poor but graphics design was amazing.

eyTo0Cu.gif


Cyclones (Raven Software, 1994). The lesser known brother of the Doom-Hexen-Heretic trinity. It was launched one month before Heretic and one year before Hexen, and it was one of the few alternatives to Doom by the time. Not the prettiest girl in the room, since Doom already revolutionized the raycasters with non-orthogonal levels in 1993, but it has good graphics and the hit distortion effect is cool.

DmCy8Vm.gif


Powermonger (Bullfrog, 1990). The military Populous. Cool 3D battlefield with creative frame design, i love how they limited the 3D graphics with a War Room instead of the classic crappy frame of old 8-bit computers (CPC, Spectrum, etc). Effects are also top-notch.

cZAZkNI.gif
 

stranno

Member
The Zarch/Virus engine, developed by David Braben (co-author of Elite). It was used in this game and I belive in a few more, like Zeewolf 1/2 for Amiga and Conqueror. Maybe even more games.

Zarch/Virus (David Braben, 1987). Amiga footage tho, as always I havent found a decent DOS footage.

g6KdP65.gif


Conqueror (Rainbow Arts, 1988). No shadows but cool dust effect and building destruction.

6cbeeFb.gif


Zeewolf (Binary Asylum, 1994). Amiga exclusive, far more complex than the previous games but ... well, it was 1994.

9PH3s1O.gif
 
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stranno

Member
DragonStrike (Westwood Associates, 1990). A weird mix of Panzer Dragoon and Williams' Joust, it should be called: How to Joust Your Dragon.

cbY1xtN.gif


Operation Harrier (Creative Materials, 1990). Good rotation effects using polygons instead a Mode 7 like Zyrinx's Red Zone for Genesis.

ZzL2MHS.gif


Cybercon III (US Gold, 1991). Graphics werent impressive but it could be one of the first games ever with death camera replay?

T4KI26L.gif


Midwinter (Maelstrom Games, 1989). One more of those weird open-world experiments with clever 3D-2D design.

Dvt2jte.gif


Midwinter II: Flames of Freedom (Maelstrom Games, 1991). In the first game you only drive two "vehicles", here you have better graphics, environments and tons of vehicles. It could have been one of the best sandboxes ever but unfortunately the engine itself is too choppy, no matter the processor.

IS5yjpI.gif


Predator 2 (Arc Developments, 1991). Not pretty but it coud have been one of the first "over the shoulder" third person shooter games on PC. Of course it wasnt an original idea, its just inspired by Sega's Dynamite Duke and previous japanese games. Why are you shooting those random thugs instead of Predator? No idea.

m2lnEPN.gif


Rotox (Creative Materials, 1990). Yeah, another Creative Materials game using rotary polygons, i guess based on the Operation Harrier work.

7zZ6yLE.gif
 
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H

hariseldon

Unconfirmed Member
Powermonger (Bullfrog, 1990). The military Populous. Cool 3D battlefield with creative frame design, i love how they limited the 3D graphics with a War Room instead of the classic crappy frame of old 8-bit computers (CPC, Spectrum, etc). Effects are also top-notch.

cZAZkNI.gif

Powermonger was wonderful. I absolutely adored that game. Here's the magnificent intro (Amiga version):

 
The Godfather: The Action Game (1991, US Gold). Detailed backgrounds and cool pixel art. Probably the worst hit SFX ever heard in a videogame.

S8QJ6nO.gif

Holy shit!

That car sprite is ripped STRAIGHT OUT of STREET ROD 1 (1989).

Will investigate further!
 
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-Minsc-

Member
Has to be stuff like Mech Warrior 2 and Star Wars Tie Fighter. Flat shaded polygons with cool use of colors and gradients and things. Games going for more realistic textured 3D kinda fall flat in comparison (including the same games' later textured editions).


Although sprite based 3D games like the mentioned Wind Commander are pretty damn cool looking too.


That MW2 video is such a great history lesson.

"The almost unheard of 1024x768." None of this 8k business. It may have been the early 2000's before I was able to use 1024x768.

The note of there have been different versions of games for each 3d card is interesting. Transitioning from 2D to 3D was quite the age.



Oh so very classic and 90's.
 

Airola

Member
Batman: The Caped Crusader (1988, Ocean Software). Graphics werent anything especial but the comic panels effect was really cool, perfectioned by Comix Zone in 2D and XIII/Ultimate Spider-Man in 3D. And it features the Adam West's Batman OST! Note: This is the Amiga 500 version tho, i couldnt find any decent DOS footage.

94P6r1q.gif

Batman The Caped Crusader is still the best Batman game of all time. The C64 version is superior though. Better gameplay, better music.
 

stranno

Member
Batman The Caped Crusader is still the best Batman game of all time. The C64 version is superior though. Better gameplay, better music.
There are too many great Batman games: Ocean's Batman, Sunsoft's Batman, Batman Begins, Arkham trilogy, Probe's Batman Forever, The Adventures of Batman & Robin, Sega's Batman Returns.. Even Tiger's Batman & Robin for Gamecom is probably the second or third "best" game of the system.
 
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stranno

Member
Robocop 3 (Digital Image Design, 1992). Another of those ambitious free-roaming 3D games. It has impressive shading in the shooter levels and another of those primitive "over the shoulder" third person views (completely unplayable tho).

mF3b6kG.gif

shooting stages

Xf9OD19.gif

behind the ass and over the shoulder third person view
 
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stranno

Member
DOS Metaltech series:

Metaltech: Earthsiege (Dynamix, 1994).

MVzS9Bj.gif


Metaltech: Battledrome (Dynamix, 1994). This was the multi-player battle-arena spinoff of the first game. Not pretty but it performed fine in a crappy connection from those days.

SHIU3uD.gif


Earthsiege 2 (Dynamix, 1996). The sequel, far superior to the first game in terms of graphics and gameplay, but still overly complex control scheme.

Tdr2BEl.gif


SandWarriors (Astros, 1997). DOS game in 1997? Holy s*, thats dedication. This is like a Wing Commander in Denis Villeneuve's Dune movie.

M92GplL.gif
 

-Minsc-

Member
Was thinking of Earthseige after posting yesterday. Played that quite a bit back in the day. Never did play ES2. These games would be great GOG candidates.
 

stranno

Member
Iljimae-jeon - Manpa Sikjeok-pyeon (Danbi Systems, 1994). One of those not-really-bad korean games. It is supposed to be an Space Harrier clone but it was obviously "inspired" by Konami's Devastators or G.I. Joe arcade games.

Scaling and ground effect are ok but it is quite hard even on easy difficulty (shots have a gigantic hit-box so you cant move through them), and it doesnt support the DOSBox joystick. If you want to try it, you will need the eXoDOS version with fixed executable for korean characters.

jruXUfV.gif
 
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stranno

Member
Armageddon: Hondon Sog-euro (Mirinae Software, 1996). Another decent looking korean DOS. The starfield looks great but it is a bit confusing sometimes.

z6gYUcu.gif


Advanced Destroyer Simulator (Futura, 1990). The first naval simulator with real-time 3D graphics. Cool water effects and nice ship models.

53fNEDe.gif
 
The first few Mortal Kombat games had pretty faithful DOS ports because the original arcade games were coded in assembly language which made the conversion a breeze.
Wouldn't it be the other way around, that converting a C coded game would have been much more easy?
The Midway arcade board used a https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TMS34010, and porting this to X86 architecture seems not trivial.

Sorry for nerding up here, please go on with this thread... ;)
 

Smirfu

Member
I miss Star Control II. Arguably my first "open world" game. It even taught me how to read X,Y coordinate systems for its copy protection.
How dare you not mention the Pkunk!

rVqOxz7.jpg

I miss Star Control II. Arguably my first "open world" game. It even taught me how to read X,Y coordinate systems for its copy protection.
 
I miss Star Control II. Arguably my first "open world" game. It even taught me how to read X,Y coordinate systems for its copy protection.


I miss Star Control II. Arguably my first "open world" game. It even taught me how to read X,Y coordinate systems for its copy protection.

Have you played the free remake?

 
Star Control 2 really is an amazing gem. Puzzling my way through it with a buddy when I was like 12 are some of my best gaming memories. The writing and story in that game are still one of the best I've encountered in 35+ years of video games.

I bought Star Control Origins when it released. The release was embroiled in a fair bit of controversy, but the game itself I found to be pretty decent.
 

lock2k

Banned
DOS games are awesome. Lots of experimentalism going on and there wasn't a single kind of look or art direction for games. Devs could go wild. Awesome memories.
 

chr0max

Neo Member
The Zarch/Virus engine, developed by David Braben (co-author of Elite). It was used in this game and I belive in a few more, like Zeewolf 1/2 for Amiga and Conqueror. Maybe even more games.

Zarch/Virus (David Braben, 1987). Amiga footage tho, as always I havent found a decent DOS footage.


Zeewolf (Binary Asylum, 1994). Amiga exclusive, far more complex than the previous games but ... well, it was 1994.

9PH3s1O.gif
If you like this, look here:
 
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