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SumDrunkGuy

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My little brother brought his Sega Saturn to show me Enemy Zero. Problem was he was drunk and high and didn't know what he was doing. I had to watch him walk around in circles for two hours. The game didn't seem very good anyways. I'm not sure what it was supposed to be.
 

KeighnMcDeath

RPG Codex Boomer
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Nov 23, 2016
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I guess it is a pity the only Sega Neptune we are going to get is
eR5vukQ.jpg
 

Nikanuur

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Ngranek
There was this neat fantasy/sci-fi card game featuring sky-ships like 10-15 years ago on Pocket PC (Windows Mobile)., Back then the "trading" card game wasn't really trading. It was just a single-player. Anyone has a gues how to find out its name? Looking it up at google, retrogaming, etc. didn't help me much.
 

pOcHa

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Make the Codex Great Again! Grab the Codex by the pussy Insert Title Here RPG Wokedex Strap Yourselves In Codex Year of the Donut Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
replayed bioforge last weekend - was as fun as i remembered it back in the 90's... such a shame they canceled the sequel:



with system shock 1 remake coming later this year, will try the enhanced edition now - a codexian bonus from the manual:

upload_2022-5-31_23-57-49.png
 

Morpheus Kitami

Liturgist
Joined
May 14, 2020
Messages
2,476
While I liked the game itself, what I always found the best part of Bioforge is the story. They knew their limitations and built an interesting and mysterious backstory amid the chaos that is going on as the game starts. More writers could stand to take a lesson out of Bioforge's playbook.
 

Regvard

Arcane
Joined
Apr 17, 2012
Messages
1,070
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Gormenghast
Technomage: The Manlet Simulator

I played the demo of this from some magazine demo disc in 2000. I don't recall whether it was good but it was RPGish.

Technomage is a video game released by German game developer Sunflowers. Technomage was only ever released in PAL territories.[1] It appeared on November 24, 2000 for Windows and on June 29, 2001 for the PlayStation. It was the last own production of the company, in 2002 the internal development department was dissolved.

467166-technomage-return-of-eternity-windows-front-cover.jpg


The player character, Melvin, must save the world of Gothos from destruction. The people of Gothos are split into two types, the magic using Dreamers, and the technological Steamers. Melvin is half Dreamer, half Steamer. Melvin starts in his hometown of Dreamertown, when it is attacked by monsters. He is blamed, and taken to trial to be exiled. His uncle then teaches him the "basics", pending Melvin's exile. This section serves as the tutorial stage. After this Melvin leaves Dreamertown and heads to Steamertown, on his adventure to find his father.
After passing Steamertown, Melvin enters a huge underground labyrinth called "The Hive", where his father vanished during an expedition. The Hive is a vast network built by the former rulers of Gothos. It contains grave complexes, libraries and laboratories; Melvin finds the first crystal of eternity there. When he leaves the Hive, he steps into the Great Forest, the realm of the fairies. They suffer from goblin uproars which are stopped by Melvin who then joins a pair of Shach traders on their journey to the canyon. Here, Melvin encounters Dagomar for the first time, the last survivor of the former rulers of Gothos. He acts as Melvin's mentor and guide. Also, Melvin befriends Talis, a girl who lives in exile because she also is half Dreamer, half Steamer.
After clearing the canyon's mines, they travel to the tower, the former rulers' fortress of knowledge, which is now haunted by an undead dragon. As Melvin kills the dragon, another dragon is freed who takes Melvin to the volcano, which is where the Shach traders live. In the deeper levels of the volcano's caves, Melvin discovers more artifacts and buildings from the former rulers, as well as a map which leads him, Talis and the dragon to the ancient ruins of the former capital of Gothos. Here, Dagomar drops his disguise and Melvin has to find out that Dagomar is Ramogad, the traitor who led to the downfall of the former rulers. After a big fight against Ramogad, Melvin uses the crystals of eternity found in the different regions of Gothos to reactivate both a stasis trap to stop Ramogad and a barrier device which uses a magic liquid to shield Gothos from the demon realms below. Talis then helps Melvin to escape the collapsing ruins and they fly across the ocean towards the sun.
 

Nikanuur

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Don't know what's going on, I see the picture uploaded fine... Also, you can right click the icon, copy the http behind it and paste it into another tab... but anyway, I've uploaded the image to ImgBB. That one should prove a more reliable source. Here you go:

9059-5-technomage-return-of-eternity.jpg
 
Last edited:

Morpheus Kitami

Liturgist
Joined
May 14, 2020
Messages
2,476
I don't remember if it was this game or another poor quality Fallout clone of that era, but from what I've heard, its really slow and tedious.
The Img BB page too, or are you all just messing with me :D ?
No, its just showing a link to the place you got it from. If you can reupload the image somewhere else or see if a different website has an image.
 

Nikanuur

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Like... wtf is going on :D Does jpeg have some meta information? Anyway, this new upload is a pure screenshot edited and saved at Img BB. Thank you for the patience.

bbb.jpg
 

Nikanuur

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Never heard of it.

There's this horrible bug that doesn't allow you to follow up with the quest's objectives. Something like enter/exit a building, if I recall it correctly. It happens during the second or third mission or some such. It's a game-breaking bug. Now, there are these two releases of the game. One of them is patchable, the other one is not. Both are, reputedly, incomplete to some extent. Feel free to look for the right patch and the right version of the right version of the game, and you might even finish it. Other than that, the game's atmosphere is pretty solid, and the game itself is akin to Gorky 17.
 

Lucumo

Educated
Joined
May 9, 2021
Messages
651
I've never played Minecraft but when I saw the game, it really reminded me of the Clonk series. Just instead of 2D and a lot of material (sand, gold, clay etc) being circles, it's 3D and it's blocks. There is sandbox, AI controlled monsters and objects can easily be added by players to the game. Same with maps, of course. The series is a German one and started in 1994, though, I myself only played Clonk Planet (1999) and Clonk Endeavour (2004) with at least one friend, mostly on the same keyboard but also at times via LAN IIRC (don't think we ever tried via the internet).
To build things, you generally need material, so you go out and gather it...chopping trees, taking explosives to the iron vein etc. Of course, the trees need to be made into wood first, so you need a sawmill. Some buildings need energy (like a pump), so you need a windmill and connect both buildings. Different weather exists as well: rain, lightning, snow and volcanic eruptions can take place. In the case of snow, lakes and seas freeze over, making you able to traverse those while previously, even while your clonks are able to swim, they can easily be nibled on by sharks and die. And not to mention, one can't jump off the water but it's possible with ice. Material like clay and metal make you able to build makeshift bridges or weird platforms which you can use to get somewhere. What's interesting is that the game was also in a way realistic that more clonks were stronger than a single clonk. Can't get the stupid tree over the bump or the mine cart is stuck? Ask your friend, or alternatively, use all your own clonks at the same time (possible but it's easier for something to go wrong). The base game has different scenarios with different goals, like collecting money, mine all of X, killing all monsters, defeating another player etc. Apart from the standard scenario, there was the medieval one which was pretty big. It made you be able to build proper castles, get appropriate weapons etc etc. Player-made stuff was really, really good too. Like there was a Stargate pack with functioning Stargates and AI controlled opponents IIRC. The Stippel pack was extremely great too. Stippel are some organic mass (kinda like Zerg) where their "base" grows over time. At first, they only produce small Stippels which slide over the ground and show teeth and jump at you if you get too close (with a great sound). The next step of evolution are...spider things which are faster and hit really, really hard with their legs. The last step are flying insects which makes it really difficult to get away from, however, it fails great shooting them with a machine gun. Honestly, the player packs were great and, in my opinion, the Clonk series were the best games you could play together on the same PC. It's a shame it eventually fizzled out. I think part has something to due with them being ahead of their time. My friend bought the game online back in 2000 which was probably iffy and I don't think too many people had the means to do so (no clue if the games got physical releases, I never saw any at least). So them being shareware made it more difficult. I also don't think pack compatibility was really a thing between different games. So if you spent a lot of time doing something for Clonk Planet, it was incompatible with Clonk Endeavour and I'm pretty sure that bugged a lot of people.

247270.jpg

battle.png

clonkend4.jpg


Meh, so difficult to find good screenshots, especially of the two versions I played. Can't even find a good Stippel one. But yeah, packs could get crazy. Look at Clonk Rage (2007):
240323-clonk-rage-windows-screenshot-the-new-and-revised-hazard-pack.jpg

240321-clonk-rage-windows-screenshot-a-two-player-split-screen-game.jpg
 

:Flash:

Arcane
Joined
Apr 9, 2013
Messages
6,453
It's a shame it eventually fizzled out. I think part has something to due with them being ahead of their time. My friend bought the game online back in 2000 which was probably iffy and I don't think too many people had the means to do so (no clue if the games got physical releases, I never saw any at least). So them being shareware made it more difficult. I also don't think pack compatibility was really a thing between different games. So if you spent a lot of time doing something for Clonk Planet, it was incompatible with Clonk Endeavour and I'm pretty sure that bugged a lot of people.
Clonk was really a unique thing, but I think the problem was that it was mainly a thing by a single developer who started the series as a teenager and never really professionalized and really never reached beyond the German market.
Then he wanted to make a 3D version, and I think life, family, etc. got the better of him. I don't think he ever made much money with it.
You can still see how non-professional the thing was by his youtube channel. He published the gameplay videos for the never released 3D version with very non-descriptive names on his personal channel with less than 200 subscribers:
https://www.youtube.com/@matthesb/videos
 

Lucumo

Educated
Joined
May 9, 2021
Messages
651
It's a shame it eventually fizzled out. I think part has something to due with them being ahead of their time. My friend bought the game online back in 2000 which was probably iffy and I don't think too many people had the means to do so (no clue if the games got physical releases, I never saw any at least). So them being shareware made it more difficult. I also don't think pack compatibility was really a thing between different games. So if you spent a lot of time doing something for Clonk Planet, it was incompatible with Clonk Endeavour and I'm pretty sure that bugged a lot of people.
Clonk was really a unique thing, but I think the problem was that it was mainly a thing by a single developer who started the series as a teenager and never really professionalized and really never reached beyond the German market.
Then he wanted to make a 3D version, and I think life, family, etc. got the better of him. I don't think he ever made much money with it.
You can still see how non-professional the thing was by his youtube channel. He published the gameplay videos for the never released 3D version with very non-descriptive names on his personal channel with less than 200 subscribers:
https://www.youtube.com/@matthesb/videos
Hmm, looking at some interview regarding Clonk X.
Clonk-Online: Was machst du zur Zeit außer fleißig an ClonkX zu werkeln?
wink.gif


Matthes: Abgesehen davon, dass ich mich zur Zeit meist mit Rucksack und Wanderschuhen um den 45sten südlichen Breitengrad herum durch die Wildnis bewege, bin ich neben Clonk weiterhin in ein Visualisierungsprojekt in Zusammenarbeit mit meinem Bruder eingebunden.
Regarding money:
Clonk-Online: Auf wie viel werden die Kosten zu schätzen sein?

Matthes: Irgendwo im Bereich zwischen dem jetzigen Preis und dem Erstveröffentlichungspreis von Clonk Planet.

Info: (ca. zwischen 10 und 25 €.)
I do think he made okay money with it at least. After all, it was pretty popular.

But yeah, fully focussing on the project could have been better. Though, not sure 3D was ever the right direction. Perfecting the 2D approach would have been good but then again, it was the 00s. Having a commercially viable 2D game like this seemed unthinkable.
Less than 200 subscribers but a video with 170k views, funny. The Clonk 4 (1998) and the Clonk Planet (2000) trailers are awesome, by the way. It also reminded me of that sci-fi scenario (base overrun by aliens) in Clonk Planet which was a lot of fun.


 

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