"Good Old Games"

[Ben Sones]

I am very glad for it. With Steam starting to carry the older Interplay titles, I have been worried about GOG.

Yeah. Steam definitely has a lot more exposure. In GOG's favor, though, they sell the same titles for less money, and with no DRM, and often with extras like soundtracks and the like. Assuming that a person knows about both services, I can't imagine why they'd go with Steam over GOG. But that assumes that they know about both services, of course.

[Tom Ohle]

We're doing well -- sales and user numbers are constantly rising at a fairly steady rate. It's definitely a bit... upsetting?... to see sites covering Steam's addition of Fallout et al without actually mentioning GOG's offering. And in a lot of cases, those are sites that I've tried to get coverage with in the past for games that Steam doesn't have. Ah well. Being the perpetual underdog isn't so bad.
probably worth noting that I do like Steam and still don't think we're competitors. But they're trying! :)

[ZekeDMS]

Should, Vesper, unless something changed a major part of GOG was that all games are Vista/XP compatible.

I do, admittedly, still keep hoping for Neverhood or G-Police now. But if BG&E is there being in my all time favorite tie, I maintain hope!

[Fugitive]

Does Beyond Good & Evil work in Vista? I seem to recall issues with that scenario in the past.

The Steam version worked fine for me on Vista (64-bit even), but I did have to go into the config program and disable the HW Vertex acceleration to avoid some serious graphics glitches. I'm not sure if the GoG version already takes care of that for you or not.

[Tom Ohle]

Our game page says it works with Vista 32 and 64.

[peacedog]

We're doing well -- sales and user numbers are constantly rising at a fairly steady rate. It's definitely a bit... upsetting?... to see sites covering Steam's addition of Fallout et al without actually mentioning GOG's offering. And in a lot of cases, those are sites that I've tried to get coverage with in the past for games that Steam doesn't have. Ah well. Being the perpetual underdog isn't so bad.
probably worth noting that I do like Steam and still don't think we're competitors. But they're trying! :)

You guys have already offered Starflight up an interesting Wizardry 5-7 selection of games Wizards Crown, like Settlers II, The Fallouts, and now many entries from the beloved Might & Magic universe. I'm certainly Dark Sun interested to see what Fantasy General else you guys Crusader get a hold of Syndicate. It's Planescape Torment unfortunate that there are many Master of Orion gems out Master of Magic there where the status of the Magic & Mayhem IP is either uncertain, Darklands contested, or in the hands of the uncaring.

[rowe33]

So what's the difference between the music in HOMM2 and HOMM2 w/ expansion? Is it simply that: different?

From what I recall, yes, just different scores for the towns. I prefer the original ones but it's been a long time. The music was excellent for the themes...

[Rock8man]

From what I recall, yes, just different scores for the towns. I prefer the original ones but it's been a long time. The music was excellent for the themes...

I remember liking the expansion's town music better, but I still wish I could hear the originals again, because they were very good too.

I bought the game last night and started an Evil campaign. I didn't get very far into it yet though, because Trials HD was calling me.

The best part about starting a game like this years later is that I have almost no recollection of the game's campaign, and this time around I can afford to be more aggressive.

I remember when I first played the game, I was always super-careful and collected my forces really slowly, leveling up a single hero with a huge stack of forces, being really careful and conservative with my forces.

It was only after I finished the campaigns that I went online and discovered a more fun way of playing the game: being really aggressive and trying to finish each map as fast as possible. After all, that is what the high score table within the game judges you by. And, the faster you attack, the less forces your enemy has, since enemy forces on the map also grow week after week. This time I'll actually try to see how fast I can finish each map.

[Equisilus]

I went ahead and picked up PoP:SoT at GoG today (I already owned B:G&E). Since so many games have been delayed, I might as well try out something else that I never played before, and it was cheaper than the $9.99 at Steam. Think I'll stick in that widescreen hack, too, to see what it's like at 1920x1200.

I'm not sure how I'll like the gameplay, but for that price, I'm sure I'll get my money's worth and more.

[Rock8man]

It's a great game Equisilus. I don't know how they handled the controls on the PC version, but if you happen to not like them, be sure to give the 360 controller a try before you give up on the game.

[rowe33]

I remember liking the expansion's town music better, but I still wish I could hear the originals again, because they were very good too.

I bought the game last night and started an Evil campaign. I didn't get very far into it yet though, because Trials HD was calling me.

The best part about starting a game like this years later is that I have almost no recollection of the game's campaign, and this time around I can afford to be more aggressive.

I remember when I first played the game, I was always super-careful and collected my forces really slowly, leveling up a single hero with a huge stack of forces, being really careful and conservative with my forces.

It was only after I finished the campaigns that I went online and discovered a more fun way of playing the game: being really aggressive and trying to finish each map as fast as possible. After all, that is what the high score table within the game judges you by. And, the faster you attack, the less forces your enemy has, since enemy forces on the map also grow week after week. This time I'll actually try to see how fast I can finish each map.

I played the same way, carefully building up and moving around with one or two big stacks. Then using a couple more heroes to ferry more units to the frontlines. I definitely need to get this after my vacation...

[bandidoquest]

I've seen some complaints about the PC controls of PoP:Sands of Time, but I found them really good, I think I finished the game at least 5 times, always with keyboard + mouse, and I don't have any complaint. Brilliant game, btw.

[Sharpe]

So I'm rocking HoMM II and it is the old school goodness. One question - any way to change resolution or screensize? It's playing in DOS box and only displaying in a small piece of my large flatscreen monitor. I guess that is the price for old school? Other than the tiny display it is just a great game, classic clean design, super easy to return to, and still excellent gameplay. This is the kind of game GoG was meant for.

[Cubit]

So I'm rocking HoMM II and it is the old school goodness. One question - any way to change resolution or screensize? It's playing in DOS box and only displaying in a small piece of my large flatscreen monitor. I guess that is the price for old school? Other than the tiny display it is just a great game, classic clean design, super easy to return to, and still excellent gameplay. This is the kind of game GoG was meant for.

You should be able to change resolution and such in Dosbox's config files. I would recommend going here for more info on that.

[Papageno]

So HoMM II has to be run under DOSbox? I suppose that's true of anything that came out before '98 or '99, huh? I know that HoMM III ran natively under Win98.

[Fugitive]

So HoMM II has to be run under DOSbox? I suppose that's true of anything that came out before '98 or '99, huh? I know that HoMM III ran natively under Win98.

I managed to get HOMM II from the Compendium edition to run natively under Win7 x64, but it does take a couple of tricks. The files have to be copied from the CD to a hard drive manually since the installer is 16-bit (fortunately they're already laid out the way they'd be installed) and you have to copy wing32.dll to the \windows\syswow64 directory.

I'm not sure if the GoG edition even includes the Windows executable, though.

(HOMM 1 doesn't work, though. Well, it runs, but it appears in something like a 160x120 corner of the screen and is completely unplayable.)

[Khelavaster]

I remember liking the expansion's town music better, but I still wish I could hear the originals again, because they were very good too.

Help yourself!
The music in the original was excellent, but the expansion's was indeed better. I had the wizard castle's theme on tape and would listen to it almost daily. Really great stuff.

[marxeil]

I've seen some complaints about the PC controls of PoP:Sands of Time, but I found them really good, I think I finished the game at least 5 times, always with keyboard + mouse, and I don't have any complaint. Brilliant game, btw.

I tried the demo and found the controls to be OK but the camera was annoying. It was jerking all over the place.

[Equisilus]

Have to say, after a few hours of playing PoP:Sands of Time, my impression has bounced back and forth between "very cool" & "hateithateithateit". Once it took me 50+ tries to get the idea of how to do wall-to-wall jumping then a couple dozen tries to kill off a bunch of sand creatures attacking me later on. If there's one thing I hate it's repetition without advancement and it has everything to do with the controls. But once I get past those blips of evil frustration, the rest of the game is great. Unfortunately, it makes me dread sitting down to play because I know I have to play until I get to the next save point, another one of my biggest pet peeves about any game that uses them.

So, whether I stick with it depends entirely on what I meet up with along the way and whether it frustrates me to the breaking point or not. I blame gaming boredom because of the lack of anything worth buying new this year for me ignoring my gut feeling about games that have the potential to annoy.

Interestingly enough, B:G&E is one of the few games I never finished, again because of the controls, even though I loved the rest of the game, and both were on sale on GoG this weekend.

[lord of the mark]

I'm a cheapass gamer who is intent on playing all the good games I missed. I got Fallout (the original) from GOG, it has worked flawlessly, and now that I am almost done with it I am pretty sure my next game purchase will be HOMM2 from GOG. Count me a satisfied customer.

[Disconnected]

If you like crawlers just a little bit, you owe it to yourself to check out M&M. 1-2 are basically unplayable, but the rest are both very good and very different from other crawlers.

[baelthazar]

Man, I'm literally drooling waiting over the M&M6:LE collection... grrr... why couldn't they release this before the weekend!?

[Papageno]

If you like crawlers just a little bit, you owe it to yourself to check out M&M. 1-2 are basically unplayable, but the rest are both very good and very different from other crawlers.

I'd never heard the term "crawlers." Is that moniker due to how you jump from square to square of the map?

BTW, I have very fond memories of the Mac version of M&M 1, but that one had (a very small amount) of sound--basically little musical cues when you'd encounter monsters. Hard to believe it's been twenty years.

I'm going to buy that M&M RPG compilation just to be able to play World of Xeen again sometime. It was great.

[Disconnected]

I'd never heard the term "crawlers." Is that moniker due to how you jump from square to square of the map?

Dungeon Crawls are a RPG genre. Crawlers don't have to be, but generally are unconcerned with narrative, dialogue, character development, strategy and simulation. Instead they focus on presenting players with elaborate obstacles that have simple, but often deceptive, solutions. This is typically true of all aspects of a crawler, from navigation to combat to dialogue and so on.

The M&M games are some of the purest crawlers in cRPG-dom.

I can't recommend the first two, but the rest hold up well enough for the fun to remain mostly unmolested. If you have fond memories of the first two, I suggest you spare them by not replaying either ever again. I kind of wish I had.

I sat out to replay the entire series early last year, but eventually gave up on the first two. Trust me, the interface will destroy your fun, resurrect it, torture it a bit, heal it, and only then cast disintegrate on it, till naught but singed motes of dust of joys long past remain. Or something like that. Trust me, spare yourself.

[Papageno]

Oh, I'm not really thinking of going back and playing I-III at all (I actually finished I and III back in the day, but never got very far in II for some reason). Especially the lack of automapping in the first game was a pain.

EDIT: a great regret from playing the first game-- I remember that my party was fighting its way through Castle Alamar (where there were some really badass monsters) and managing to survive an encounter that yielded a chest with... an Archer's Bow--an item with absolutely awesome stats and a perfect fit for my archer. I debated with myself whether I should head back to town to save. It was too dangerous to even rest in the castle, but I stupidly decided that I should just risk it and sure enough, my party was attacked and within a couple of rounds half my party was "Eradicated" which was worse than dead (I can't remember if you could even come back from it--well, maybe at a temple for a lot of gold). Of course I quit without saving but in the process lost the Archer's Bow, which I never found again, alas. In the end I cheesed out and equipped most of my party with the alien blaster weapon that was the equivalent of casting disintegrate.

[rezaf]

Oh, I'm not really thinking of going back and playing I-III at all (I actually finished I and III back in the day, but never got very far in II for some reason). Especially the lack of automapping in the first game was a pain.

I wonder why you draw the line at III. Isles of Terra was compared to the first two like Windows to DOS, but the difference between MoM3 and 4/5 was pretty small, kinda like between Win95 and Win98.

In fact, I'm not sure if replaying MoM3 would be actually a better choice than replaying World of Xeen (4 and 5 combined), as it is a huge, extremely time-consuming effort to finish WoX whereas IoT is just barely manageable.
_____
rezaf

[Disconnected]

M&M3 also has an edge over WoX in that the volume of information the player has to keep track of, is a fair bit smaller. That makes it easier to play sporadically over a long period. I played most of it during breaks at work.

[Equisilus]

What precisely drove you away? I picked BG&E up this weekend and I was actually surprised by how easily the game controlled.

There's a particular hovercraft sequence later in the game that totally frustrated me, if I'm remembering it correctly (it's been a while). I hit a wall with it and had enough with the annoyance of trying to control the damn thing. I saved my games, though, in case I ever wanted to give it another try. As I said, I loved everything else about the game, but couldn't be bothered to get beyond that particular mountain of a mole hill.

[Miramon]

By the way I seem to be the only person in the world who liked the higher-numbered M&M games, so if Tom should happen to have the rights, whatever investment of time is required to dosbox-ize and package the games for download will be repaid with at least one download!

[Papageno]

I wonder why you draw the line at III. Isles of Terra was compared to the first two like Windows to DOS, but the difference between MoM3 and 4/5 was pretty small, kinda like between Win95 and Win98.

In fact, I'm not sure if replaying MoM3 would be actually a better choice than replaying World of Xeen (4 and 5 combined), as it is a huge, extremely time-consuming effort to finish WoX whereas IoT is just barely manageable.
_____
rezaf

I guess I remember the graphics being a little nicer in WoX, plus, I thought it had some clever puzzles. On top of that I did actually already finish III back when, and I never finished Xeen (well, I may have finished whichever one you start out on--Darkside?) back in '95 or so. This would have been the Mac version. VI (which I also never finished) was the first one I played on a Windows machine.