Identify an 80s/early 90s PC (DOS) arcade game (possibly demon.exe or similar)

Question

Unfortunately, this is going to be very vague but it bugged me for years.

From my childhood I remember playing aт arcade game on 286-family PC running DOS a-la Space Invaders (yet I believe that you were actually travelling up and not just hovering at the bottom of the screen) but you were travelling on grass (green background) and were maybe some sort of insect-like thing (not an aircraft/plane) shooting at other things... At the end of the level there was a big boss which I can only recall as something sitting in a basket of sorts. Sadly, I cannot recall at all what the regular enemies looked like. The second level (to which I hardly ever made it) I think was on dark blue surface, not green any more.

Another thing I remember that the normal weapon was most likely shooting dots while you could get a power up which somewhat resembled rockets (almost like flying swords to be honest).

Lastly, I for some reason remember it as "Demon" or similar but searching for a game like that did not yield satisfactory results.

Asked by Dmitry Selitskiy

Answer

Sounds like "Knightmare." It has sword-like weapons, the grass background, the travelling upwards, and the bug-like characters. MobyGames info: link.

Here are a couple screenshots:

Answered by Adam Flenar

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Mid-90s Shmup Identification

Question

I'm looking for a shoot-em-up from way back in the mid-90s that I had an awful lot of fun with.

I specifically remember having to reboot my Windows 95 PC to run DOS so that I could play this game, if that helps.

I don't remember anything particularly unusual about it - futuristic ships flying around a 2D landscape shooting enemies and dodging projectiles. I think it had different ship options and different weapons, but I can't really remember the specifics.

One specific thing I do remember is some sort of code you could type in at the main menu to play a Scorched Earth clone, which was actually a ton of fun.

Answer

Tyrian is what comes to mind.

p.s., The code is DESTRUCT. ;)

Here's a video playing destruct

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What's this memory-like Marble game called?

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I played it ages ago. It's probably DOS-based, yet worked under Windows3.11 or Win95.

You had to control a black marble with the mouse and had to hit boxes. Hitting a box showed a symbol and you had to hit another box with the same symbol for them to stay open, like Memory. Making all the boxes stay open finished a level.

Levels were quite different, sometimes you had to collect keys, bump some boxes around, some levels featured lasers and mirrors, other added a second but white marble. Some surface-layers could break once you rolled over them, some other inverted the mouse-input.

After a few levels you got a special level where you controlled multiple mini-marbles at once and had to put each of them into a dimple.

Any help highely appreciated :-)

Answer

The game you are thinking of is Oxyd.

The original is most likely no longer playable, but we're in luck! There's an open source project to recreate the game:

http://www.nongnu.org/enigma/

Thanks for reminding me of this gem. I'll be playing this tonight :-).

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What is the name of an old PC game where you moved sphere (bubbles) to eat others?

Question

This DOS game is around 15 to 10 years old and here is how I remember it:

• You had a conic mouse cursor
• You selected a sphere to move from one hole to the next one
• You could somewhat eat/capture other spheres
• The spheres were placed on a line of holes / place-holder and moved from left to right and from top to bottom
• The game area was constituted of a number of horizontal lines holding the spheres
• I'm not sure but it could be a two-player game where the other player started at the bottom right and has to go up to the top left.

Any idea of what this game might be ?

Answer

I am 99.9% convinced that you are talking about Funball, by Impulse games.

I tracked it down over at Moby Games, and here's the description:

Funball is a checkers-like game for two players. The goal is for a player to get a ball onto the opponent's base, while stopping the opponent from doing the same. Each player controls one color of balls--either red or green.

Like checkers, the game board is an eight-by-eight grid. Unlike checkers's squares, though, Funball's bases don't just passively accept balls. Bases can change a ball's size, teleport it, spring it further along, cause it to slide past rather than land, or have numerous other effects--there are thirteen different types of bases. The arrangement of the different kinds of bases isn't always the same, either. When starting a new game, the player can choose from five different preset boards, or use the board editor to create a custom board.

Not only are there different types of bases, the balls themselves can be different sizes. The relative sizes of the balls determines the outcome of an attack, and can have other effects, depending on the target base. In addition to the balls, the board can contain a spider, which moves around the board each turn, and can lay eggs that balls can absorb to grow larger.

The game can be played against the computer, or against a friend in hotseat mode.

Here is a gameplay screenshot:

And the game's starting screen, with the conic mouse cursor:

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Name of a DOS game back in the 90s, a bouncing yellow ball?

Question

It's a puzzle game with different levels. You control a bouncing yellow rubber ball and bounce and navigate your way through the level. The obstacles include beds of nails that can deflate you if you land on it, or one way door, etc. The ball automatically bounce up and down by itself on the same tile if you left it alone. It's a 2D side viewing game.

Answer

Yeah I found the one I had in mind. It was the Bumpy's Arcade Fantasy:

Checkout the gameplay movie here

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Help me remember Egypt-themed arcade game

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I remember playing it on 286 circa 1996, so must have been 320x200x256.

It was 2D, and was a combination of arcade and puzzle elements. A bit like Duke Nukem 2D, but much slower paced, and the setting was exploration of tombs, pyramids, and the like. The only enemy type I seem to remember was snakes (but there certainly were more).

I think there were mini-games where one has to collect pieces of puzzle and arrange them into a picture--hieroglyph or a greek letter.

There were several campaigns, focused on geographical areas, selectable from a map. I think there were campaigns for Greece, Egypt, Middle East, Far East.

I'm not sure but possibly there were 3 characters with distinct abilities like in Lost Vikings.

Answer

Could it be Super Solvers - Challenge of the Ancient Empires?

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Early-90s DOS action/adventure game with an isometric view that is similar to the view in Puzzle Quest 2

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There is an old DOS computer game in which you play a wizard or a wizard-type character in which you collect keys, if I remember correctly. I think you could also pull levers to open doorways to other rooms. I remember the character being really old and possibly bald (though I'm not completely sure). You moved around a tower and fought enemies (animals and the like) and some of the floor tiles would teleport you to other parts of the tower. The graphics were also very nice and colorful... I have a very vivid image of the game in my mind, except I can't place it. Please help! :-)

Thank you,

Ragnar

Answer

This sounds like Mystic Towers.

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Looking for an old DOS roguelike game

Question

I played this game when I was still in high school (about 15 years ago). It's a roguelike dungeon crawler. The movement mechanism in this game is a bit like Dungeons of Dredmore, where the enemies move with you.

It has a topdown view. The wall on the edges of the game is grey, but any wall inside the confines of the edges is brown. You consume oxygen cells (blue) as you move, energy cells (yellow) when you fight enemies (which are all green with different stats) or when you use an ability or fire a weapon, and health cells (pink IIRC) when you are hit by an enemy or when you pass through fire/energy doors. All energy doors have a number on them which determines how much health is deducted from your total everytime you pass through it.

There is a shop and an exit shaft on every level as well as various teleporters and blue chips that you can consume to find the position of the above mentioned objects.

You also get to pick up various mushrooms that have different abilities that you can use at a later time (such as going through walls).

You are supposed to collect diamonds, gold, silver and bronze as loot in this game, which you use to purchase weapons/devices and improve your abilities.

There are also plants that you can find at various stages of growth. Each plant has a different percentage of growing into one of the three types upon maturing: oxygen, energy and health, which you can then consume. You can use the Bio scanner device (I think?) to view the all the above information.

And the most important part, the dungeon levels are randomly generated, again, like Dungeons of Dredmore.

I simply cannot remember the name of the game. I'd kick myself as soon as somebody mentions it.

Answer

The game is called Reaping the Dungeons, from 1993.

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Who is the guy in this picture?

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In DOS there was my favorite game, but I forgot its title. I have just seen the main hero of this game in this 404 message:

Could you please tell me the name of the game? As I remember, it was about a captain, whose spaceship broken on the planet and you should choose the level walking on the map, open new levels and so on. He also show his Thumbs Up very interesting.

Answer

Commander Keen.

In case you're referring to the guy in the 404 picture displayed when clicking your link. If not, post a different link.

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What was this DOS / CGA puzzler/platformer?

Question

This is one for gamers from the PC's CGA era. It's a game I remember playing as a kid on my Dad's WYSE PC (Had a green monochrome CGA display, 5.25" floppy drive and 20MB hard drive!!)

Game description
It's a puzzler/platformer, where you control an alien looking for parts to fix his ship. You can move left, right, jump and after picking up a pistol a few screens after starting you can shoot (until the pistol runs out of ammo).

The game is divided up into screens, you have to reach the left/right of your current screen to move to the next one.

There are enemies in the game that kill you on contact, you are able to kill them by shooting them.

You are able to pick up items in the game. I remember there being drinks you could have, some would kill you, others would swap the controls round for a time.

Also you had a health/air/power (One of those) level, which slowly go lower as you played the game. If it ran out it was game over.

I thought the name of the game was Galactix - but I can't find anything on the internet to support this.

Above is a mock-up of how I remember the starting screen for the game. You start standing in front of a large rocket, the one you have to recover parts for. The right hand column of the screen is used to show inventory and health information.

Any ideas?

Answer

The game is Galactix. It was a free game that came with the September 1988 issue of PcPlus.

For your viewing pleasure: http://youtube.com/watch?v=h1t01JMvHXg

Heres a screenshot:

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Searching for old PC game: Robots fought in a 3D arena, you 'programmed' them by connecting circuits between radar, guns, etc.

Question

I cannot remember the name. I think I know it, but don't want to have the wrong name stick in anyone's head. I cannot find it based on what I thought it was called.

You put 'components' on these robot platforms, and connected them to each other. The components were things like radar, guns, motors, etc. If I remember correctly, the platforms were big and slow, or small and fast. The smaller ones had fewer empty 'spots' to put components. When you built your bot, you put it in an arena. You had no control over it at that point, they just fought it out. I even remember servers where you uploaded your bot and someone would have them battle other users' 'bots' hundreds of times, and tally/ranke

Answer

Could it be Mind Rover?

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Trying to remember the name of a DOS based math game I used to play

Question

Here are some of the features I remember:

• It was a side scrolling game where you walked left and right down a hall
• It was on DOS
• It had enemies that you zapped with a remote control
• When you zapped an enemy - either you or the enemy (can't remember which one) consisted of a walking tv with an antenna - zoomed into the tv of the enemy and showed a math problem such as 5 + ? = 10
• I think you could go into rooms in the hall
• When you jumped you did a flip (ala contra style)
• You were either on a space ship or maybe a hotel (yeah I know, super vague). But there were multiple floors, and as you progressed up, things got more difficult.

Answer

Super Solvers: Outnumbered! This was a great game, along with the others in the series.

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A DOS sidescroller where you played as some kind of captain?

Question

It has been bugging me for ages..it was the one game I lived on as a kid.

• You were some kind of (yellow?) superhero/captain person and you had a ray gun.

• It was 8-bit style graphics, maybe VGA. It was about 1998 when I played it. (Very, very simple)

• It came on a floppy disk and I ran it via DOS.

• Some of the enemies were wasps in this set of dark stairs you could go down.

• I vaguely remember some random beach balls (the generic colourful ones) appeared

• Most of the world was above ground and was at night. There was some kind of wooded area as well..but the rest was underground in a top secret base type place.

• There was no vocals or speech or anything.

The reason I mention the captain part is I swear the game is called Captain Banana or something.

EDIT: The HUD/GUI was non-existent, or there wasn't much of it.

Answer

That sounds a lot like Captain Comic, though it had a fairly large HUD/GUI. The date is also about 10 years off (it's from 1988, not 1998. Though I doubt many DOS, floppy disk based games were coming out in 1998)

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