Oh no! Yet another "What's that game?" thread!

UbuRoiAA

Alright, I have a PC game in mind yet I do not know much about; I never owned it, I played it maybe 5 times and I have no idea what the name is, so I will need a screenshot to identify it. It might be a bit hard for you guys to find out, but let's try anyway. So...

I played this at a friend house back when I had no computer, so we are talking... maybe 1994-1996. The game was kind of like chess. It was turn-based. You would choose characters, "monsters", and place them on a board. I believe you had some sort of "King", and you had to kill the other player's king to win. Each "monsters" (I say monsters because the only two characters I can remember is a fire elemental and some sort of bat-vampire) had specific abilities. If you attacked an enemy, the game switched to some kind of 2d combat mode.

That's pretty much all I can remember about it. Does it ring a bell to anyone?

Nocren

Sounds similar to Arachon. (I think that's how it's spelled).
Old Amiga and Nintendo game where it was similar to chess, but with monsters that you could control when you fought for a square.
I only remember this game because the computer on the Nintendo version ALWAYS had more health than you. Even when starting a new game (no difficulty selection).

Mugenmidget

Hmmm, that sounds almost like Battle Chess in some respects (the Rook in some of the games was kinda fire elemental-ish I think):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qKcZwPb7C3k

But it also sounds a lot like Heroes of Might and Magic. Whether it's 2 or 3 I wouldn't be able to say, but both had fire elementals and vampires (maybe even the first one did).

Here's footage of all three:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-aHcDzx0CRU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YdthMLeiRE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gj4NDiNiiag&feature=related

Lemme know anything else you can!

EDIT: Never knew about Archon, that game looks sweet!

Orogogus

Nocren wrote: »

Sounds similar to Arachon. (I think that's how it's spelled).
Old Amiga and Nintendo game where it was similar to chess, but with monsters that you could control when you fought for a square.
I only remember this game because the computer on the Nintendo version ALWAYS had more health than you. Even when starting a new game (no difficulty selection).

This game is Archon (it was on the PC, C64, Atari, etc., too), but the OP is probably talking about Dark Legions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Legions
http://www.mobygames.com/game/dark-legions

There are a few similar games, including Archon II and Archon Ultra, but the Archon games didn't let you place the units onto the board. Almost certainly Dark Legions.

Cyber Empires was a pretty cool game in a similar vein, but with mechs.

Elvenshae

Orogogus wrote: »

Nocren wrote: »

Sounds similar to Arachon. (I think that's how it's spelled).
Old Amiga and Nintendo game where it was similar to chess, but with monsters that you could control when you fought for a square.
I only remember this game because the computer on the Nintendo version ALWAYS had more health than you. Even when starting a new game (no difficulty selection).

This game is Archon (it was on the PC, C64, Atari, etc., too), but the OP is probably talking about Dark Legions.

That's what I was going to post.

UbuRoiAA

13 minutes. 13 fucking minutes for something I had in my mind for YEARS!

Thank you Orogogus! That's exactly the game I was searching for.

Now, was the game really any good? How do I play this thing?

lu tze

It was imbalanced as fuck from what I remember, to a frustrating degree.

If you really want to play it, it should run in Dosbox well enough.

Edit: That's Archon... Never played Dark Legions. Dosbox is your go to for old games though.

Orogogus

I've seen people on this board express fond memories of the game. For my part I was a huge fan of Archon, but was disappointed by Dark Legions. I recall my biggest problem being clunky animations. The sprites didn't move very fluidly and basic attacks took a long time, giving the action a stilted, clumsy feel.

The gameplay mechanics were pretty simple. Buy units, upgrades and traps, place on board. Choose one unit to be your "king" -- you lose if he dies. Every turn you move one unit (or more? Don't remember), and if two units are in the same square they fight. You can play against the computer if you don't have another player handy. As I said, I wasn't a huge fan due to the combat. Better options in a similar vein in my opinion are Cyber Empires and Star Control II. The SC2 guys also made a PSX game called Unholy War, which I think was also a 1-on-1 versus sort of game with a strategy component; I don't know if it was any good.

Mugenmidget

Does anyone have an idea of what the game described in this other thread might be?

http://www.sega-16.com/forum/showthread.php?t=13144

When I was a kid in the early to mid 90s in the UK, some of the old PCs in the school I was at had a pirate game on that I used to love playing.

Anyway, whilst doing work experience in 2002 at a school in Peckham, London I noticed they had the same game. I was a little surprised, but got on with the work.

Now that I have the means to play the old DOS games, the first game I wanted to play was that pirate game; but I don't remember it's name!

All I remember is the graphics were primitive, being about only 4 colours on screen, and the point of the game was you using map coordinates to find treasure pieces (or ships, can't really remember!).

I know this is a tall order, but can one of you guys please help me locate it?

theparttime

for some reason archon resonated with me as a young gamer too. for a long time ago it was a "what was that game" game to me also. probably up until a thread like this popped up years ago.

Bullio

I've got one that I still can't identify. Someone suggested it was published by Atari the last time I asked. Cross posting from another thread.

I've got one that's been bugging me for a long time. My neighbor had an arcade cabinet for this game back in 1990 or 91. In game the screen had a large red orb on one side of the screen and a large blue orb on the other (sort of like Diablo's UI orbs), and the game was a puzzle type game that I think played like Othello. It had a demonic theme to the game and the cabinet artwork as well. Anyone have any idea what game this is?

Orogogus

Bullio wrote: »

I've got one that I still can't identify. Someone suggested it was published by Atari the last time I asked. Cross posting from another thread.

I've got one that's been bugging me for a long time. My neighbor had an arcade cabinet for this game back in 1990 or 91. In game the screen had a large red orb on one side of the screen and a large blue orb on the other (sort of like Diablo's UI orbs), and the game was a puzzle type game that I think played like Othello. It had a demonic theme to the game and the cabinet artwork as well. Anyone have any idea what game this is?

Ataxx?

http://www.arcade-museum.com/game_detail.php?game_id=6960

No idea about that pirate one, unfortunately.

UbuRoiAA

I will use the same topic to post another question. I've been chatting with a girl at work who also has a game in mind yet don't remember. It was on an Atari machine, "the one with only a joystick and a big red button", it was a platformer, and you had to get all the white squares, which she seems to remember being "sugar" for some reason. There was a level where you had to climb "an upside down tree" without touching "green things that might be frogs". She say she couldn't finish the game because "there was a dog at the end of a level that you had to jump over, but he was just too fast".

Anyone can help her? She might need screenshots as well...

Orogogus

Pitfall 2 for the Atari 2600/5200/whatever, no question. White squares are gold, upside down tree is just how the level looked, frogs are frogs, and the dog was a cave rat.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pitfall_2

emnmnme

There was a pinball game with a tornado theme. You insert a quarter and you hear a woman say, "Uh oh. Looks like rain." There was a spinner in the middle of the table and a fan blew air in your direction when you broke the hi score.

Mugenmidget

emnmnme wrote: »

There was a pinball game with a tornado theme. You insert a quarter and you hear a woman say, "Uh oh. Looks like rain." There was a spinner in the middle of the table and a fan blew air in your direction when you broke the hi score.

Is it Whirlwind?

http://www.ipdb.org/machine.cgi?gid=2765

emnmnme

Mugenmidget wrote: »

emnmnme wrote: »

There was a pinball game with a tornado theme. You insert a quarter and you hear a woman say, "Uh oh. Looks like rain." There was a spinner in the middle of the table and a fan blew air in your direction when you broke the hi score.

Is it Whirlwind?

http://www.ipdb.org/machine.cgi?gid=2765

:^:

EDIT: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hb-HoYSb9FY

Bullio

Orogogus wrote: »

Bullio wrote: »

I've got one that I still can't identify. Someone suggested it was published by Atari the last time I asked. Cross posting from another thread.

I've got one that's been bugging me for a long time. My neighbor had an arcade cabinet for this game back in 1990 or 91. In game the screen had a large red orb on one side of the screen and a large blue orb on the other (sort of like Diablo's UI orbs), and the game was a puzzle type game that I think played like Othello. It had a demonic theme to the game and the cabinet artwork as well. Anyone have any idea what game this is?

Ataxx?

http://www.arcade-museum.com/game_detail.php?game_id=6960

No idea about that pirate one, unfortunately.

:^: I believe that is it. Thank you, good sir!

Mugenmidget

hahaha, sweeet, I love Whirlwind! I play it a lot on the Wii since tables are getting harder to run into. And whenever I find it now, the fan is always busted.

I need to go to that Pinball Hall of Fame ASAP.

Satsumomo

Ok since we're in a roll here... I've been trying to remember what was the first videogame I ever played, and all I can think of is that it might have been this golf game on my dad's 8088 PC.

All I remember is that when you started the game up, you were greeted with a title screen, and a gopher (Wearing spectacles iirc) would pop-up from the green's hole.

This same gopher would always pop-up if you managed to make a hole-in-one. Can't say much about colors or not, this computer was monochromatic.

Orogogus

Mean 18

Title screen

Satsumomo

Ahahaha that is so amazing, wait no, you're amazing. Oh the memories!

Thanks!

Jam Warrior

A toughy as I'm not sure this would have ever left England.

I'm remembering a kind of adventure game back on our school's Acorn computers. Kind of computer educational the only 'puzzles' I can remember are something about running around a town trying get information from people and one that involved using Turtle style programming:

FORWARD 100
LEFT 90
FORWARD 100
LEFT 90
FORWARD 100
LEFT 90
FORWARD 100
LEFT 90

in order to (after a bit of a tutorial) draw in the wire supports on a bridge.

I want to say the name involved crystals but this only ever brings up Crystal Castles which is entirely not the right thing.

Fig-D

I know Castle of Dr. Brain has a programming puzzle in it, but I don't think that's it.

Jam Warrior

Haha! The Crystal Rainforest! And they appear to have done a modern remake.

SmokeStacks

lu tze wrote: »

It was imbalanced as fuck from what I remember, to a frustrating degree.

If you really want to play it, it should run in Dosbox well enough.

Edit: That's Archon... Never played Dark Legions. Dosbox is your go to for old games though.

Dark Legions can be unbalanced if you play the system.

A summoner with a ring of life and a healer in the squares to the left, right, and back becomes a monster factory, letting you crank out unit after unit to demolish your enemy.

I used to play this game over dial up with a friend. Not over dial up internet, I mean dial up as in one of the computers would actually make a phone call to the other computer, which would answer the call, and that's how you would connect. It was pretty badass at the time.

lu tze

Scrap my previous comment, I was thinking of a different game (maybe Archon 2).

One unit had what amounted to homing balls of death, and could basically trash all the others easily, so there was no point in building anything else ever.

I will take the opportunity to plug Dosbox again though, get it, love it.

Dosbox.

Synthesis

I'm always happy to see these threads. First, they're fascinating, and second, I've got a few questions of mine own.

Okay, the game I'm thinking of was advertised in PC Gamer back in the mid-1990s. I'm not sure as to the national origin of the game--I want to say it was Japanese, but only because the the advertisement itself was hand drawn, and vaguely in the style of Tetsuya Nomura. But that doesn't necessarily mean it wasn't an American game.

The advertisement itself featured some sort of "knight in shining armor" with a sort of high-tech twist (looked vaguely Mega Man-ish), and a blond (?) princess hanging at his feet in torn up clothing. I assume the game had to do with rescuing the princess.

I'm sure that's pretty much the worst description ever--based off an advertisement I barely remember. Anyone know this?

UbuRoiAA

Orogogus wrote: »

Pitfall 2 for the Atari 2600/5200/whatever, no question. White squares are gold, upside down tree is just how the level looked, frogs are frogs, and the dog was a cave rat.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pitfall_2

No, she say that's not it. To quote her: "My game was older than that, I think, or cheaper. You couldn't see any details on the dude's face. Only the legs were doing a running motion."

Still, good guess. I don't know what platformers came before Pitfall, to be honest.

Orogogus

I'm 100% sure she's misremembering. You can go older, but I highly doubt that she's thinking of anything along the lines of Donkey Kong, Jumpman, Miner 2049er, Bubbles or Mountain King. Keep in mind that the Atari 2600 had a switch to accommodate black and white televisions. The things she remembers correspond exactly to Pitfall 2 on the Atari 2600.

Also, I'm not sure what details she's seeing on Pitfall Harry's face. There are like 4 rectangular pixels of pink skin and 2 for the hair.

Satsumomo

I think she saw the JPG artifacts and thought they were facial features.

Edit:

Here's another one, this time I saw it in the arcades. I remember the graphics being very similar to Toki's, but your main characters were 2 boys, one in a blue jumpsuit, the other one's was pink. They had pretty stupid faces and what I remember the most is that if you were hit once, you'd lose your jumper and you'd be running around naked, with a little pixel being your weiner.

You could wield several weapons, like clubs and bats. I think it was a pretty horrible game, not sure.

Mugenmidget

Satsumomo wrote: »

I think she saw the JPG artifacts and thought they were facial features.

Edit:

Here's another one, this time I saw it in the arcades. I remember the graphics being very similar to Toki's, but your main characters were 2 boys, one in a blue jumpsuit, the other one's was pink. They had pretty stupid faces and what I remember the most is that if you were hit once, you'd lose your jumper and you'd be running around naked, with a little pixel being your weiner.

You could wield several weapons, like clubs and bats. I think it was a pretty horrible game, not sure.

hahaha I remember that one, it was actually kinda fun but definitely awful in the graphics department.

It's either "Hard Head" or "Hard Head 2" you're thinking of, here's a screenshot from the second one:


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_Head

Also if anyone else can help with locating the name of the "unknown game" in this thread, I'd appreciate it: http://www.sega-16.com/forum/showthread.php?t=13144

Satsumomo

Woo! That's exactly the game I was thinking of!

It's kinda sad that I love videogames so much but I can't exactly pin-point the first one I ever played, but that's definitely one of the first.

kirg

UbuRoiAA wrote: »

Orogogus wrote: »

Pitfall 2 for the Atari 2600/5200/whatever, no question. White squares are gold, upside down tree is just how the level looked, frogs are frogs, and the dog was a cave rat.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pitfall_2

No, she say that's not it. To quote her: "My game was older than that, I think, or cheaper. You couldn't see any details on the dude's face. Only the legs were doing a running motion."

Still, good guess. I don't know what platformers came before Pitfall, to be honest.

Bolded part sounds like Jumpman and Jumpman Junior, although that doesn't mesh with what you described earlier.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EG7TUaDdJvQ

ObiFett

Man I loved Jumpan as a kid. It was like an early N.

Orogogus

The legs were doing a running motion in Pitfall, too, although you could see the arms moving, too. But point by point:

It was on an Atari machine, "the one with only a joystick and a big red button"

This is the 2600 joystick. 5200 had the side buttons + keypad and the 7800 had the side buttons. The 8-bit computers had 2600-style joysticks, I guess, but they also had keyboards and everything.

it was a platformer

Narrows it down right away to... Pitfall! 1 & 2, maybe Miner 2049er, Keystone Kops, the Swordquest games, Xenophobe, Burgertime. Joust?

and you had to get all the white squares, which she seems to remember being "sugar" for some reason.

Gold bars, although you didn't actually have to collect any of them.

There was a level where you had to climb "an upside down tree" without touching "green things that might be frogs".

The screenshot shows the tree-looking ladder guarded by a poison frog.

She say she couldn't finish the game because "there was a dog at the end of a level that you had to jump over, but he was just too fast".

Near the beginning/end of the game, there's a cave rat (can't find a screenshot), and if you approach it rushes you and pushes you back into the water. You can try jumping over it, but it doesn't work. You have to go through the entire game and get it from behind (making sure not to jump over the damn thing).

hamdingers

This one is so old ... not sure it can be solved.

I used to play 2 games on my C-64 with the tape drive. One was Beach Head. (Ah.... Beach Head.)

The other was like a really old pre-cursor to Master of Orion. There was a galaxy map, where all the planets were represented by letters (A, B, C etc). You conquered planets with fleets - when the fleets fought it would switch to a side-by-side view of the two lines of ships battling.

I want to say it was called "Galaxy".... I remember liking it.

Mugenmidget

hamdingers wrote: »

This one is so old ... not sure it can be solved.

I used to play 2 games on my C-64 with the tape drive. One was Beach Head. (Ah.... Beach Head.)

The other was like a really old pre-cursor to Master of Orion. There was a galaxy map, where all the planets were represented by letters (A, B, C etc). You conquered planets with fleets - when the fleets fought it would switch to a side-by-side view of the two lines of ships battling.

I want to say it was called "Galaxy".... I remember liking it.

You might have answered it on your own, because there's a game called Galaxy that seems to fit that description:

http://www.mobygames.com/game/c64/galaxy/screenshots

No screenshots of a side view battle, though, and I'm not familiar with C64 stuff so I can't be sure either.