News Archive - 2006

2006-12-24

Rampart (PC) is a fun game, nothing great but a game worth playing a bunch of times at least, as usual in one that comes from an arcade.

2006-12-08

Today comes Sweet Home (NES), an horror themed NES RPG, and far better than the generic ones that and next consoles had.

2006-12-03

He-Man and the Masters of the Universe (not the most imaginative title) concludes the Ladybird books. All of them will be up for download starting tomorrow.

I'd like to use this opportunity to remind you once again that the comic updates are heavily depending on you. If the reaction status stays at zero, I won't be able to carry on much further. Your loss. So please see the comics front page for details.

2006-11-14

Crusader: No Remorse (PC) is a very good modern action game. As you can see, I'm pretty much adding 'easy' games at the moment, i.e. games which are easily written about, because they follow well-known patterns. This is a concession to other things demanding my priority right now, but in any case, it can't hurt to have those games on here, too.

2006-11-06

RPG and strategy in the court of King Arthur, and one of the most original designs for a game I have seen can be found in Spirit of Excalibur (PC).

2006-10-26

Oh man... how little I manage to do at the moment. My plan had been to put the rest of the series up this week, but now, I've only managed a single one: Skeletor's Ice Attack.

2006-10-15

Although there has been zero reaction (apart from lots of people silently downloading) to my announcement from September 30th, I still haven't forgotten it. If nobody else joins in, I'll go as far as I can defined by what I wrote then, so there's still a few issues to go. Today: The Iron Master.

2006-10-03

As per the last newspost, I've added Wings of Doom today. Reminder: That series is available for download this week.

2006-09-30

Surprise! Going back to a section I haven't touched for many years (literally), I added a comic scan today: A Trap for He-Man.

In case you're wondering whether this is a one-time-exception, please read what I put onto the comics front page - it's important!

Along with this, I've made a few technical changes. First of all, these new scans should be of better quality than the old ones. Yes, I've learned a little about image processing over the years.

Also, you'll have two alternatives to get the comic: For download (in PDF format, subject to the well-known download rotation, so that'll be available next Monday) and as simple jpeg images as before. Just that the latter can be viewed online as well (and always, no matter what the download rotation says), along with running short commentary of each page. These comments will always be in the language of the comic, because to 'use' them seriously, you have to be able to understand the comic itself anyway. So in this case, it's English only.

Enjoy this scan and please check out the lists I've put on the comics section's index page!

2006-09-26

I have been occupied, but here comes a new one, Troddlers (PC). It looks too much like lemmings, but it isn't a clone, it's a fun and original (as much as it can) game.

2006-09-15

Solar Jetman (NES) added today. It's like lunar lander, but withouth landing. Instead you must carry things around and get rid of enemies.

2006-09-09

Updated emulators:
ZSNES version 1.42 (Windows, DOS, Linux)
SNES 9x version 1.5 (Mac, Linux)
Yape version 0.67 (Windows)

2006-09-05

After I had lost the screenshots for it, many I had done as I player because I liked it, I forgot about the review I had done, but now I found it, and after making some new screenshots here come Ultima VII, part 2: Serpent Isle (PC).

2006-08-17

The second game I talked about on July 9th didn't make it. I simply got bored of playing it too quickly. Which is a pity, I haven't seen it available on the Internet for many years. Can't help it, though. Instead, I reviewed Fury (Plus/4).

2006-08-15

The strangest things happen sometimes. Last night, I found an old review by NetDanzr which he had written when we opened the (now defunct) subsection called 'Hall of Fame'. It never made it to the site for reasons I can't recall. Anyway, here it is: Donkey Kong (NES).

2006-08-10

The system-specific subsections should now be fully functional again. Thanks for all the reports!

2006-08-08

I'm currently committing some internal script changes concerning system IDs. If you experience any unexpected, strange behaviour, please let me know.

2006-07-24

Right. It's been quite a while since we last had a new category on the site. In fact, I think it was in the days of the 'Hall of Fame' which was incorporated into the regular category structure 2.5 years ago. Wandrell ends this period with the first game for an extremely popular home console: Downtown Nekketsu Monogatari (NES). Of course, we also added a fitting emulator, which is FCE Ultra.

I'll use this update as a reminder: If the NES is your favourite system, do contribute to present it as well as possible. Also, we're just waiting for more systems to cover, so go ahead and help if you feel something needs to be here!

2006-07-19

That was quicker than I expected, but no thanks to me. It was Smitle who reviewed Alien Rampage (PC) today. Never played it myself, but sounds interesting enough.

2006-07-09

Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord (PC) is the last of the games imported from 21st Century Oldies.

So the long series of daily updates ends here. Of course I can only speak for myself, but as it is, I sometimes even had trouble taking the time for these updates over the last few weeks. I've been playing two games which will eventually end up on the site, but even that was so sporadic that it takes a lot more time than usual. One of them will most likely be finished next week, the other one I don't know.

I don't know what Wandrell is up to these days. Maybe he'll pop in with another bunch of updates, maybe not. Maybe he'll tell you himself. In any case, we're back to the normal schedule of "it's done when it's done".

Ironic sidenote: During the time of the daily updates, the overall number of daily visitors has decreased, however, a bigger percentage is coming through the front page. The way the Internet works these days is alien to me.

2006-07-07

With Warlords (PC), this series of updates is slowly coming to an end. There are two more games left.

2006-06-28

Technology isn't everything, but sometimes, it could improve things. Sopwith (PC) is the proof of this.

2006-06-27

One of the first versions for IBM compatibles of Sokoban (PC).

2006-06-26

After the commercial bestsellers of the last updates, here's a well-known freeware gem: Skyroads (PC).

2006-06-24

Another quickie: Civilization (PC). I contemplated adding this to the existing entry of Civilization for Windows, but in the end, there are more than enough differences to justify seperate entries.

2006-06-21

And another manual: Kult (Amiga). When I first thought of putting up documents like manuals, I was thinking of small text files. Actual scans like this one can get quite big in file size, and so the it ranges somewhere between a few bytes and many megabytes. That is why I've added size information to all the document links now.

2006-06-20

Another manual: The Hound of Shadow (Amiga). There are two manuals of that game online now. The new one is the PDF which I've scanned from the original. The other one is in HTML format and it does include everything, but not in the same layout. However, the latter is a lot smaller, so I left it for people with slower Internet connections.

2006-06-19

No new game today. Instead, I scanned my manual of James Pond 2 (Amiga). While I was at it, I also put the box of Dreamweb on the device.

2006-06-18

Added Pizza Connection (PC) today. This German game was released in the USA by Microprose as Pizza Tycoon. Although NetDanzr played the latter version, our policy is to call games by their original names first (hence some French titles in spite of none of us speaking that language).

2006-06-17

Outrun (PC) is the late and not very good port of one of the most popular arcade games.

2006-06-14

A review by myself again: Great Courts (Amiga). If you think it's ironic to add a tennis game while the football world cup is in full swing, I might agree.

2006-06-13

I'm sitting here at university and the connection is going up and down all the time, so I'll just add this now as long as it's possible: Mortal Kombat (PC)

2006-06-11

Ultima Underworld 2: Labyrinth of Worlds (PC) is very similar to the first one, but improves the things in a way that makes it the best of the two. Also, this one haves an impact, important but very easy to not to notice when playing, in the next one, the second part of Ultima VII.

2006-06-05

Don't worry, the source of NetDanzr's reviews hasn't run dry yet, but whenever there is something else to add, it comes first. Like yesterday and also today. I wrote a review about Ökolopoly (PC) - a completely forgotten game. Now, there's at least one single site which has it...

2006-06-04

Today the next in the series, Ultima VII: The Black Gate (PC). When I first played this game being a kid the freedom it gave me left me confused, I was not used to a game that didn't mark clearly your path and couldn't see where all that freedom ended, and compared to those game that supposedly give so much freedom nowadays, such as Morrowind, it stays as one of the best.

2006-06-02

Going back and forth between good and horrible with King's Quest: Quest For The Crown (PC) today. This is not the same as the official 1990 remake we already had on the site before, although differences are hardly noticable.

2006-05-31

With today's addition of Ishar 3 (PC), we've practically doubled the amount of RPGs on the site by now. One correction to the review, though: The Realms of Arkania series wasn't developed by Sir Tech, but by Attic. Sir Tech was just the publisher in the USA, and they didn't do anything but equip the games with a new title screen. Why am I setting this right here as opposed to the review itself? Because I'm not fooling around in other people's texts.

2006-05-30

Hero Quest (PC) taken from the pool today. If you think this game has already been on the site for 5 years, you're right, but this is the port for another system. Without the data disk, though, as I don't have that one.

2006-05-28

Everything's alright again, so I'm doing this a little earlier than usual to balance yesterday's failure out. I added NetDanzr's review of Dune II: The Building of a Dynasty (PC). I can't resist to comment on this a little. First of all, the title sucks. In Europe, it was released as 'Battle for Arrakis', which at least doesn't make me cringe in pain. What's even worse is all these Europeans who act as if they're 'experts' on the game, yet they refer to it as 'Building of a Dynasty' - what more proof that they only just downloaded the game from an American site do we need? Secondly, it's a horrible game. I really liked it when it was new, but when I actually tried playing it again a few times in this millenium, I found myself bored by the repetetiveness, the lack of challenge and frustrated by the huge amount of luck needed in the last levels (when I opened an old saved game). NetDanzr apparantely doesn't agree with this (fine), but he does mention the third important point concerning this game: its responsibility for driving the computer game industry into the ground. The world would be a better place if it had never been released...

2006-05-27

Sorry, no update today. When I turned on the computer to do the usual daily work, it turned out there was something wrong with it. To be exact, the root file system seems to be corrupt in some way. First time I've ever seen this happen to an ext3 system!

As you can see from this post, it's not that I don't have other computers with which I can access the Internet, but the problem is that all the files for the update are on the mentioned filesystem, so I don't have anything to add right now. Sorry for that, I'll get back to the schedule as soon as possible.

2006-05-22

Same deal as yesterday: an additional review and more screenshots for Command HQ (PC). Tomorrow, there'll be a new game entry again.

2006-05-21

In some cases, the selection of games of TGOD and 21CT did overlap, so today, I can't present a new game entry, but rather a merger: NetDanzr's review of Championship Manager '93 (PC) has been added along with a few 'new' screenshots. Can't hurt to have a second opinion.

2006-05-19

I'm updating a little earlier than usual today. Weekend is approaching, so things are a little different. Anyway, another port today: Castlevania (PC).

2006-05-17

As promised, another RPG today: Autoduel (PC). Please keep in mind that with these daily updates, newsposts keep disappearing from the frontpage at a constant rate. To be exact, they disappear after seven days, so if you haven't been here for more than a week, make sure you also check the newsarchive to stay up-to-date with what's been happening.

2006-05-16

Short break from the RPG flood (don't worry, it's not over yet): Atomix (PC). This is a German game, but I don't have a German version, so if anyone could help out, I'd be glad to put it up.

2006-05-14

Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss (PC) is one of the first good fully 3D RPGs. Now you are trapped in a dungeon among the left-overs of an underground community.

Following the order, the next Ultima are from the saga of the Guardian, formed by the best, and the worse, games of the series.

2006-05-10

Afterburner (PC) today. You see the pattern: I'm just going through the list alphabetically and will continue to do so unless there are very good reasons to postpone individual entries.

2006-05-08

For the sake of the newer visitors who aren't that familiar with the history of this site, I'm going to make this a little longer. For many years, we used to have kind of a 'sister site': 21st Century Oldies. The affiliation started with a simple link exchange and it went on with me hosting the site and both of us sharing the same forum. Sadly, at some point, NetDanzr (the webmaster) didn't have the time to maintain it anymore, so it disappeared. That was a pity, because especially the last incarnation featured excellent game reviews which were now lost.

Fast forward to the present. When I recently dug through my old CDs, I found an old server backup dating back to 2003. Guess what I found - the complete database of 21st Century Oldies. What a waste, I thought, and shot off an e-mail to NetDanzr. His answer: He gave his permission for these old contents to be included into this site now.

So starting today, I'll add the game entries of the old site to our database, starting with Abrams Battle Tank (PC). As you'll see soon, I'll add them one by one. This is for two reasons: First, adding more than one game per update seems to reduce the attention each addition gets and second, I have to do some minor work to convert the old screenshots, review format and everything into ours. So, a little patience, please. Everything will arrive here sooner or later.

2006-05-05

Quite a rarity added today, courtesy of Pietoro: El-Fish (PC). It baffled people when it came out, and I guess it still does, seeing that almost nobody is willing to touch it. As if popularity had ever been a good indicator of quality!

2006-04-29

It's my turn again today, and I dug pretty deep through my old magazines. On one of those with a cover disk, I found Energie-Manager (Amiga). The hundredth (spelling?) entry in the strategy genre by the way.

2006-04-11

Hello, hello. Jumping in to support main webmaster Wandrell a little with a small addition: Universe (Amiga). Not a very good game, but an Adventure, so it's at least worth knowing about.

2006-04-09

Savage Empire (PC) was an attempt to save money by reusing an already created game engine, which apparently did not work. It's the first non-linear Ultima, along with Martian Dreams, the two Ultima Underworld and the Ultima Runes, for Nintendo consoles.

I did not to put the "Worlds of Ultima" sub-series label, as the next, Martian Dreams, has "Ultima, Worlds of Adventure". Better to avoid confusion.

2006-04-02

With Ultima VI: The False Prophet (PC) ends the second trilogy of this series. Now a horde of demon-like beings invade Britannia, but at a difference to many games, a genocide is not the correct solution.

2006-03-18

I'm currently testing a new method to prevent other sites linking directly to our downloads. Would be unnecessary if there weren't idiots who think it's funny to use our resources and burn my money while taking the credit themselves out there. Anyway, there are many of those, so it has become a necessity to counter the latest tricks these people are using to continue their evil deeds. Of course, locking down security like that might affect regular visitors as well. So if you keep getting redirected to the page showing a photo of Leech or if images don't show as they should, please let me know.

2006-03-10

Der Clou! (Amiga) is a game I really enjoyed when it first came out, and it hasn't lost its touch since then. When I was adding this game, I noticed the entry of They Stole a Million only had the English version for download. No idea why that was, so I added the German version to that as well.

2006-03-05

Ultima IV: Quest of the Avatar (PC) is where the Ultima series started to be what they are known for, a good game based on a philosophical system. It is also the only one made freeware, to give publicity to Ultima IX, whose only relation with the games is the title.

2006-02-26

We're all getting older, and so is this site - it turns six today! And, following one of the few traditions we have here, the design has been changed for this occasion. Like it was two years earlier and two years before that. I hope you all like it.

As opposed to 2004, this has really just been a change of looks. The system working in the background has proven itself very well, so I kept it completely and just slapped a new frontend onto it. In case you're wondering where the extensive game search capabilities went, move your mouse cursor over the headings above...

To explain the approach I took with this design which is a little different than the one before, I wrote a new editorial explaining many technical issues. It's called The Browser Wars - Part 42. Should be an interesting read for those who have no display problems, too, of course. For those who absolutely can't stand the new design or can't get it to work at all (not possible, actually), there's still the old 'plain version' (a link to which you can find at the bottom of this page).

Preparing these visible changes sucked up all the free time I would have spent with the site this year. You might have noticed all game additions since January have come from Wandrell so far. Huge thanks to him for that once again! He also did some work today and added D/Generation (PC).

As a final note, the only tiny change to the way the site's working is that I've split the applications into subcategories again. They had become quite numerous again. Only two of these subcategories so far, but at least it splits the truely classic programs from those which are 'helper' applications (emulators). So, in case anyone ever wants to pick up adding to that section again, the groundwork has been done.

That's it. On to another year!

2006-02-19

Livingstone supongo (PC) is a game that makes me wonder how I could reach so far when I played it as a child. It is also a game that was very popular in Spain up to the early nineties.

2006-02-12

DragonStrike (PC) is the first game of aerial combat in which you mount a dragon, and the best as far as I have seen.

2006-01-29

One of the best graphical adventures I have seen is Conquests of the Longbow (PC), with multiple solutions, minigames and a good story, even thought the main character is Robin Hood.

2006-01-15

Dreamweb (PC) has been added today. An adventure in which the world salvation is reached through the dreams of a murderer.

2006-01-07

Today here comes UFO: Enemy Unknown (PC). The game will be added later by Mr Creosote, along with and old review of and incomplete submission from 2002.

2006-01-06

All downloads are functional again. Actually, the second server has been online for two days already, but I simply forgot to activate the links on the download pages. And there I was wondering why nobody connected...

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