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I present to you two versions of the soundtrack to Theme Hospital (Bullfrog Productions/Electronic Arts, 1997) composed by Russell Shaw and Adrian Moore. MIDI music was rendered using ¥Weeds¥ soundfont, and the OPL music was captured in SVN DosBox using a SoundBlaster 16 setting.
Download the archive here: http://www.dosnostalgia.com/files/themehospital_ost.zip
Here’s a cool animated Ocean Software logo taken from Last Rites (1997), although I’m fairly certain I’ve seen it in some other games as well.
A non-interactive rolling demo of Interplay’s Star Trek: Judgment Rites (1993) taken from Interplay’s 10th Year Anthology: Classic Collection CD-ROM.
Download the demo here: http://www.dosnostalgia.com/files/ritesdemo.zip
David Wolinsky of Don’t Die joins me to discuss a handful of strange mods for vanilla DOOM. The mods we discuss include such things as 10,000 enemies, Ned Flanders, cyberdemons in pits, exploding barrels that follow the player, and many more. Things are about to get a little weird in Hell.
Download MP3: http://www.dosnostalgia.com/podcast/dosnostalgia_ep19.mp3
Follow David on Twitter: https://twitter.com/davidwolinsky
Visit “Don’t Die”: http://www.nodontdie.com/
Today I join a cast of stereotypes for a game of street basketball. Slam City with Scottie Pippen (Digital Pictures, 1995) is a game full of motion, video, and very questionable acting and humor. What you gonna get? Gonna get respect!
MobyGames page: http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/slam-city-with-scottie-pippen
Brian Rubin of Space Game Junkie joins me to discuss all sorts of DOS games that involve simulation and trading in space. Strap in, and prepare to launch.
Download MP3: http://www.dosnostalgia.com/podcast/dosnostalgia_ep18.mp3
Follow Brian on Twitter: https://twitter.com/spacegamejunkie
Visit Space Game Junkie: https://www.spacegamejunkie.com
Today I take a look at the “Gamos Logical Serial” or a set of four puzzle games developed and published by a Russian company Gamos between 1992 and 1994. These games are From Corner To Corner (Уголки), Color Lines (Цветные Линии), Balda (Балда), and Nine (Девятка). Get ready for some high resolution EGA goodness, and my inability to properly play any of those games.
John Connolly joins me to discuss the various challenges he faced while trying to learn MS-DOS game programming. We also talk about a bunch of techniques that were necessary to deal with limitations of computers of the past.
Download MP3: http://www.dosnostalgia.com/podcast/dosnostalgia_ep17.mp3
Follow John on Twitter: https://twitter.com/JohnConnolly0
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Every time I check out a new AAA release I can’t help, but feel that gaming culture became very different. Now a game feels the need to show me a tutorial on how to open a door about a hundred times, draw a gigantic arrow on screen to point me in the right direction, and if I’m struggling with a puzzle, the protagonist will eventually just blurt out the solution. It’s all fine and good. I’m older now, and don’t have as much time or patience for games. These changes make the overall experience less frustrating and therefore more enjoyable, BUT in most cases they kill the two things games used to heavily rely on – exploration and discovery. Many games of yesteryear have dropped you in its world without many hints on what to do and how to do it. They counted on you being adventurous and persistent. As a result many games were quite hard. Some (UFO/X-Com, I’m looking at you) were almost impossible, yet felt incredibly satisfying when conquered. This got me thinking about times when hard games delivered truly great gaming experiences. Good times. And then I remembered a certain 8-bit mascot…
In my first ever unboxing video I’m cracking open the Collector’s Edition (number 40 of 1000) of Retro City Rampage: 486 (Vblank Entertainment, 2015) to see what goodies are hiding inside. It turned out to be a pretty cool package!
Music by Louis Gorenfeld: soundcloud.com/extentofthejam
For the first time ever I’m flying solo. In this podcast I introduce & play some of my favorite tunes from DOS games. FM, MIDI, tracker, and digital audio music is present. Relax & listen.
Download MP3: http://www.dosnostalgia.com/podcast/dosnostalgia_ep16.mp3
And once again it’s time to look back at DOS games from 20 years ago. Despite the release of Windows 95, MS-DOS gaming was still alive & well.
Many of the 3D games of that era supported high resolution SVGA graphics. Unfortunately I didn’t have the hardware necessary to show them off, so instead I presented these games in glorious VGA.
A little while ago I stumbled upon this non-interactive demo of the first Heroes game. I was surprised that It was nearly 200 megabytes in size, since nobody would be crazy enough to download that much in 1995. Turns out it was made for CES 1995. So here it is. Enjoy.
Download demo here: http://www.dosnostalgia.com/files/heroes1ces.zip
Apparently at one point Sierra was developing a talkie version of Conquests of the Longbow: The Legend of Robin Hood, but the project was cancelled. This short non-interactive demo is all that survived.
Check out these two demos Creative Labs made for their Sound Blaster cards:
A cheesy “The Elements” one for Sound Blaster Pro
And a simple, yet cool one for Sound Blaster 16
I keep forgetting to mention that I’ve been lucky enough to be a guest of a wonderful Square Waves FM podcast not just once, but TWO times! If you missed the sound of my voice, then you’ll be happy to know that both podcasts are rather long.
In Episode 9 I talk at length about various Macromedia Director games (obviously #NotDOS)
And in Episode 30 I discuss various 3D DOS games from the 80s.
I suggest you subscribe to this podcast. A lovely host (Brian, who was a guest on episode #2 of DOS Nostalgia Podcast) and great guests.
Jake, a retro gaming enthusiast from Australia joins yours truly to discuss real time strategy games. The boom of the genre happened during the DOS days, so we had plenty to talk about. Join us as we travel through history from The Ancient Art of War to some of the biggest titles of the 90s.
Download MP3: http://www.dosnostalgia.com/podcast/dosnostalgia_ep15.mp3
Follow Jake on Twitter: https://twitter.com/alonelybluebox
Our friends’ journey comes to an end. Enjoy the last two levels of Gobliins 2: The Prince Buffoon!
The recently freed Prince Buffoon has thrown a tantrum and refused to cooperate. As a result our heroes need to get him off a tree first and then rescue him from his own mushroom-enduced nightmare immediately after, only to see him being carried away by a bird. See me struggle with a few repetitive sequences.
A long overdue video about differences between versions of LucasFilm Games’ classic LOOM. I explain why I’m not really fond of the VGA CD-ROM update of the game. I also briefly touch on the FM Towns version. Long story short: play the EGA one. (P.S. You can still ask me about LOOM)
My original review of LOOM from 2009: https://youtu.be/PpGbFxSjpME