You're in a Nazi prison, with a dead guard on the floor in front of you. You take his gun. Now you can fight your way out. This is the exciting premise of 1992's Wolfenstein 3D, developed by id Software and published as shareware by Apogee.

Now we all know Wolfenstein 3D was not the first FPS game ever made, or the first FPS id Software made, or even the first Wolfenstein game. But it's definitely one of the most foundational games for the first-person shooter genre, so all the more reason for us to finally check this one out for March, which is when we try to do a big blockbuster FPS game every year.

We have two guests joining Martijn ("Tijn") and Florian ("rnlf") for this episode. First of all long-time DGC veteral Bjorn ("TigerQuoll"), who not only joined the discussion on the forums for this month, but who also made a Wolfenstein 3D level pack for us all to enjoy! See the links below to get these. Also joining is first-time podcast participant Jake, for whom Wolfenstein 3D is one of their favourite games ever.

We also got two voice messages, one by watchful and one by Albrot. Thanks a lot for those! Also many thanks to DGC member console, who helped us again to edit this episode. All your support is much appreciated, we couldn't make this show without it.

Enjoy!

Direct mp3 link here or use your podcast app of choice.

You can also follow them on Mastadon here

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/11368425

Alternative Youtube Link

cross-posted from: https://retrolemmy.com/post/6261478

Happy 40th anniversary to the first game in the King's Quest series, one of the first graphical adventure games, and where Sierra really made their name.

This game also kicked off the Adventure Game Interpreter (AGI) engine, which Sierra used for many games. Wikipedia says: They employed it in 14 of their games between 1984 and 1989, before replacing it with a more sophisticated engine, Sierra's Creative Interpreter. There's no Wikipedia article for the SCI engine, but I know it was used in Phantasmagoria and Shivers, here is the ScummVM wiki page for SCI instead.

Wikipedia Synopsis

King's Quest: Quest for the Crown is an adventure game developed by Sierra On-Line and published originally for the IBM PCjr in 1984 and later for several other systems between 1984 and 1989. The game was originally titled King's Quest; the subtitle was added to the games box art in the 1987 re-release, but did not appear in the game.

It is the first official part of the long King's Quest series (not counting 1980's Wizard and the Princess), in which a young knight, Sir Graham, must save the Kingdom of Daventry to become the king. Designed by Roberta Williams, the game was revolutionary and highly influential in the evolution of the graphic adventure game genre by introducing more detailed graphics and animation.

An official remake titled King's Quest I: Quest for the Crown was released in 1990. An unofficial remake was released by Tierra Entertainment in 2001.

Videos

Space Quest Historian - King's Quest: A Fair and Balanced Retrospective

Power Pak - King's Quest - The First Adventure

Links

IGDB page

MobyGames page

About !retrostatus@retrolemmy.com

This is the first post in this brand new community for big milestone anniversaries of retro games (15 years or older, every multiple of 5 years). See our sidebar for more info and resources for making your own posts here.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.mods4ever.com/post/284

I found this cool old website for The 7th Guest, The 11th Hour, and T7G3: The Collector. The author is "Bones the Caretaker". The section of the website for The Collector says "Copyright site-design and written content by Paul van der Meer 2003".

Wait a minute, I know that name! Paul van der Meer is the director of The 7th Guest VR and Project Lead at Vertigo Games!

I don't know how old this website is, but it doesn't exist anymore. Luckily the Wayback Machine captured most of it (missing a bunch of images).

Unfortunately the Wayback Machine is a little slow, so navigating around the house in this way is a bit of a pain, and the split screen isn't sized properly for modern screens.

So I made this tweaked version that can be easily self-hosted or downloaded, and it runs much faster.

Viewable on http://t7g.mods4ever.com/

If you're lazy, the easiest way to see the whole site is to go to the map page and middle click every link. T7G Map and T11H Map

Source code at https://github.com/Die4Ever/bones-7guesthomepage

If you have any improvements to contribute you can make a pull request.

Wayback Machine: https://web.archive.org/web/20041127023227/http://uk.geocities.com/veluan2002/

I've started replaying this recently, and it still hold up.

Only downside is that it's a bit slow. But with some snacks and drinks this is a great time killer!

Yippee!

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.mods4ever.com/post/172

Here's a list of different places you can chat about this series of games. We're a bit divided, but the fans are out there!

!stauf_mansion@lemmy.mods4ever.com - This Lemmy community, you're here right now! If you need a Lemmy account then go here and make the account. (Sorry, my server is too weak!) If you already have a Mastodon account (and you're feeling brave/technical) then you can put @stauf_mansion@lemmy.mods4ever.com into the search box there and follow that account.

https://discord.gg/Hss5cJg - Stauf's Mansion Discord. Pretty active with a good number of fans. ALSO HAS Stream Detective so you can find people streaming these games on Twitch! Very fun to watch people fumble through the puzzles for the first time and chat with them, just be careful with backseating. Make sure you assign yourself the roles to get notifications for Stream Detective, ask in there if you need help.

https://www.reddit.com/r/7thguest/ - Reddit community. Not very active, but with a good post or crosspost there could be people from outside the subreddit finding it.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/the13thdoll - Facebook group. Lots of fans for all the games here, very active.

https://mastodon.social/tags/the7thguest - Mastodon hashtag, you can follow hashtags on Mastodon so they automatically show up on your home feed, very handy! Also check the hashtags for#the7thguestvr, #the11thhour, and #the13thdoll and whatever else you want.

https://www.gog.com/forum/the_7th_guest_series - GOG Forum. Mostly tech support questions but there are a lot of fans there.

https://www.gog.com/forum/the_13th_doll_a_fan_game_of_the_7th_guest - again a GOG Forum but for The 13th Doll. Still mostly tech support questions.

https://www.twitch.tv/search?term=the%207th%20guest - Twitch categories so you can watch people playing the games live and chat with them (just be careful with backseating). Open each one and click Follow to add the game to your followed categories list. But honestly you're better off joining the Discord and using the Stream Detective inside there.

https://twitter.com/hashtag/The7thGuest?f=live - Twitter hashtag. Unfortunately you can't follow a hashtag on Twitter, so you gotta just check it manually. Also check hashtags for #the7thguestvr, #the11thhour (although there's some noise in there), #the13thdoll, and any other game you want. (Make sure to switch to the "Latest" tab instead of "Top")

Any other places with fans of the series? Let me know! I'm mostly hanging out here and in Discord, but I'll probably see you if you post to any of the others!

It took William Gee 20 years of mapping to finish this.

Made for eduke32

https://www.moddb.com/mods/wg-mega-pack

You can download the free megawad, and the first too. Or you can support them and buy it for a mp3 or costum midi soundtrack.

It is ~~compatible with the original DooM, but~~ made with gzDooM in mind.

I case you didn't know: John Romero is one of the original developers and Co founder of id Software.

The 7th Guest was notable for being one of the first cd-rom only games for DOS. It was an atmospheric game with some challenging puzzles. And the obligatory cheesy acting as was usual for FMV games.

Recently a VR remake was released, so if you have a VR headset you might want to check it out. They changed up the puzzles so it's not a one on one remake, and that makes it more fresh in my opinion. Though being able to just freely move and look around the Stauf mansion would have been enough for me.

This is a hidden gem. Smooth gameplay with great visuals. Though the gameplay is pretty bland.

eXoDOS is an attempt to catalog, obtain, and make playable every game developed for the DOS and PC Booter platform. We strive to find original media rather than using scene rips or hacks. This collection uses DOSBox to allow these older games to play on modern systems. Games supported by ScummVM give the user a choice between emulators. All required emulators are included and have been setup to run all included titles with no prior knowledge or experience required on the user's part.

This pack includes 7,633 DOS games. The focus is on games that were either released in English or are fairly easy to play without a knowledge of the native language. This is not every DOS game ever made, however it is a very high percentage of all commercial releases. There are thousands of freeware, homebrew, and shareware games that will continue to be added in future packs.

Non English games will be released in Language Packs. Currently several are in development. All language packs require the base English pack to function properly.

There is also an optional Media Pack Add-On, which can be downloaded below. This adds books, catalogs, magazines, and game soundtracks to eXoDOS.

The games have already been configured to run in DOSBox.

New features include:

• Universal Game Options - Full screen vs Windowed, window resolution, and aspect ratio preferences are now stored in a single conf file and applied at launch. When you run the config (either at setup or when running install for a game), it will read these values and report them to you. When making a change now, it simply changes one file, instead of going in and changing over 7,000 files. This is much quicker and makes it easier for users to customize the pack with their own settings in the options.conf file.
• Universal Launcher - All games now have a very short batch file that points to a single launch file. This means any changes to the way games launch only need to be made a single time in a single place. An exception.bat file was added to account for games which have special options. The existence of this file auto diverts from the primary launcher. The big win here is the ability to make changes in a single file that benefit every game.
• DOSBox Index - This goes hand in hand with the universal launcher. Now, at launch, it checks a file called dosbox.txt that resides in the util folder. This file contains every single game, along with which version of dosbox it calls. If you want to use a different version of dosbox, you simply replace the existing dosbox calls with the ones of your choice rather than having to edit thousands of individual launch files.
• Multiplayer Index - Similar to the DOS Index, any game that exists on this list is treated as a multiplayer game, which means the ip.bat will run and generate your WAN and LAN IP's addresses in order to provide them for the host.
• Focused Collections - eXoWAD and eXoZZT take the best user created maps\worlds\conversions and present them automated and ready to play. This is in addition to the pre-existing Unlimited Adventures work that added hundreds of user created worlds to that title.
• All New Updater - The Updater, introduced in v5, has been somewhat problematic due to its reliance on a file host. I've rewritten it to now to check a small text file that resides on my website. This will have a dynamic link in it, which will allow me to upload the updated files anywhere I like rather than having their location hard coded into the update file.
• Printer Support - Games with the ability to print can now do so, straight to PDF.
• Media Add-On Pack - Books, Catalogs, Magazines, and Soundtracks related to MS-DOS games are available as an optional add-on pack.
• 30 Second Game Videos - The first complete (almost there) collection of MS-DOS Video Snaps, made exclusively for eXoDOS.
• Improved eXoDOS Plugin for LaunchBox - Custom installed playlist features and functionality for game extras and language packs.
• REELMagic Games - Support for games designed for the REELMagic MPEG Decoder cards.
• Auto CRT Shaders - DOSBox Staging's amazing feature that allows it to dynamically pick the best CRT shader for your video output and screen resolution. You've got to try it to believe it.
• Over 400 New Games

cross-posted from: https://kbin.social/m/Emulation/t/547700

Emulator of x86-based machines based on PCem.

Gravis UltraSound fixes by @lemondrops in #3664
Fix GDB stub builds due to undeclared symbol by @Theldus in #3655
Update language module by @kzmidze in #3649
GDB stub small fixes: out-of-bounds and wrong packet reply in 'qfThreadInfo' by @Theldus in #3666
Update actions/checkout to v4 by @jriwanek in #3677
Add new 4.0 dependencies to RPM spec file by @rderooy in #3672
Disable the softfloat checkbox when no FPU is selected by @lemondrops in #3694
Assorted fixes by @lemondrops in #3695
Machine table fixes by @lemondrops in #3702
Init LPT before Network to fix PLIP mode. by @yishayv in #3706
SCSI changes and fixes: by @TC1995 in #3698
fix flags for serial passthrough on unix by @adh in #3691
Video, Storage and MCA changes/fixes. by @TC1995 in #3713
Fix compilation. by @TC1995 in #3714
GHA changes by @jriwanek in #3720
Assorted fixes by @jriwanek in #3719
qt: Add a warning when cpu_override is enabled by @lemondrops in #3724
Assorted Cleanups and fixes by @jriwanek in #3722
Updated Simp. Chinese and Japanese translations by @EmpyreusX in #3725
Remove several unused variables by @jriwanek in #3730
Fix Japanese translation (Win32 and Qt) by @EmpyreusX in #3729
GHA: Enable mac builds, homebrew fixes by @cold-brewed in #3731
Revert a testing change that shouldn't have been there by @lemondrops in #3735
Update the bug report template by @dhrdlicka in #3741
More video fixes: by @TC1995 in #3745
README update: Remove unmaintained managers by @cold-brewed in #3738
Issue template tweaks by @lemondrops in #3752
Future support for higher clocked CPU's + A little more lint by @jriwanek in #3753
Remove the C/C++ standard flags from the toolchain files by @lemondrops in #3754
Compaq Plasma fixes: by @TC1995 in #3756
VGA/XGA memory fix. by @TC1995 in #3761

I never really figured out how to play this game back in the day. It still lingered with me.

It's pretty good. Combining strategy with city building. The city building is pretty deep and satisfying. The stragety is there, but nothing to write home about. Just have the biggest baddest army and you'll win.

https://www.mobygames.com/game/1588/caesar-ii/

Man this game was complicated, no wonder I never really figured out how to play it lol. I did enjoy mixing the monsters though!

This game is not hard, but it is fun. Take your hovercraft racing, shooting everyone you see. Be mindful to refuel and stock up on ammo, and you'll do great.

It's on the short side, and can be finished in an hour or two. But I keep coming back to it.

https://www.mobygames.com/game/2208/hi-octane/

This game was on everybody's naughty list. And that's why everyone wanted to play it. It's not the best racing game, with floaty handling, and moon inspired physics, but it was amazing with it's localized damage model, and the option to win a race not by racing fast, but destroying your opponents or even killing every pedestrian on the map (but who had the time and/or patience for that?)

If you had A Voodoo card this game would look even better, with full 3D acceleration.

https://www.mobygames.com/game/367/carmageddon/

This game is ridiculous in the way only Shiny can produce. It will also make you scream at your keyboard because of the underwater levels. Boy are they hard.

I used to love the cartoon from the 90s based on this game.

https://www.mobygames.com/game/2927/earthworm-jim/

This game takes a simple premise, going to the exit, and makes it hard. Not at first, but the difficulty ramps up pretty hard as you go.

https://www.mobygames.com/game/23765/stone-age/

This is my all-time favorite game. I love this game. I play it on every hardware I can. It's the one game I always come back to. This is top-tier DOS Gaming. Ageless fun in a macho package.

https://www.mobygames.com/game/365/duke-nukem-3d/