ROSS'S GAME DUNGEON: CONQUEST EARTH

I'm happy to hear Ross is planning to buckle down and go after the movie project. I've been thinking about what that thing's gonna be like for years.

 
I get the feeling this game was only ever tested on the computers the developers happened to have in the studio, and that they were all the exact same hardware and software config. Making a game use the CPU clock as a timer was recognized as a bad practice at least as much as a decade earlier, when they started having to equip PCs with turbo buttons. Doing that in a way that makes it unclear what the "correct" clock speed even is, coupled with dodgy optimization that makes the game start to run slow unless you have a faster machine than the recommended one... that's just unforgivable. That should get you sent back to flipping burgers.

I did some quick digging on the studio behind it, Data Design Interactive. Turns out they're the same ones behind those awful cookie-cutter Wii and PS2 games from the late 2000s that are basically all reskins of each other—The Ninjabread Man, Trixie in Toyland, and such. That explains a lot.

 
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7:50 Eat Static - Inner Peace

10:50 Eat Static - Gulf Breeze

Both from the album 'Abduction' (Ross might like the eponymous track, since it's got a Rama-esque ambient sound but with some beats).

(Thought it'd be wiser to say that here, since I'd expect copyright bots to scour the comments one day if they don't already; don't want to be the narc!)

 
Ross, as much as I enjoy watching you suffer, I really wish the next Game Dungeon to be about a game you like. It's been quite a while since the last episode when you actually enjoyed what you played.

 
ScumCoder said:
Ross, as much as I enjoy watching you suffer, I really wish the next Game Dungeon to be about a game you like. It's been quite a while since the last episode when you actually enjoyed what you played.
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Not really? He said the Division was mindless, but still fun. Maybe we'll never get a period as positive as the stretch between The Secret World and Rama (and TSW and Darkspore both had the death sentence undercurrent anyway), but it's not like Ross doesn't like games on the show nowadays.

 
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Hey Ross, don't know if you read comments, but try 86box instead of PCEm! It is actual fork of PCEm, but more active and up to date nowadays.

Also, sometimes mouse jank connected to dpi on modern mices. If you have ps/2 ports on your modern pc, you may just get old ps/2 mouse for 1$ for such purposes

 
Great episode

I recommend reading Arthur C. Clarke's 2010: Odyssey 2 if you wanna get an ending that really gives the Jovians their just desserts

 
Ross you did mention the german box art .. PLEASE if you own that version can you post what they changed with the human race ?

The german DE Version needed to replace the humans (like command and conquer etc..) in this case they changed

them into some skinless dark monsters on species selection and it burned itself into my brain but i keep loosing memories of how exactly they looked, i got nightmares as a kid and i would really love to see how they actually changed the human soldier on the left!

 
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I looked up this game, and I was shocked to see it came out in 1997. Every problem Ross had with this game, Command & Conquer had already "solved" back in '95. Heck, Dune II already solved a lot of the UI issues. This game seems like the only good thing it has going for it is the art and graphics, which are legit neat.

The XCOM-style strategic aspect sounded interesting at first, but the UI weirdness seemed to sabotage it (plus, is it really necessary to research a thing in every city? Or to have to research basic things like infantry or power plants in the first place?).

Speaking of C&C, the CGI cutscenes reminded me a tiny bit of Eric Gooch's CGI work for the Westwood-era games, but upon reflection, they are more like the typical 3D you'd see in 90's FMVs.

 
RocketDude said:
I looked up this game, and I was shocked to see it came out in 1997. Every problem Ross had with this game, Command & Conquer had already "solved" back in '95. Heck, Dune II already solved a lot of the UI issues. This game seems like the only good thing it has going for it is the art and graphics, which are legit neat.

The XCOM-style strategic aspect sounded interesting at first, but the UI weirdness seemed to sabotage it (plus, is it really necessary to research a thing in every city? Or to have to research basic things like infantry or power plants in the first place?).

Speaking of C&C, the CGI cutscenes reminded me a tiny bit of Eric Gooch's CGI work for the Westwood-era games, but upon reflection, they are more like the typical 3D you'd see in 90's FMVs.
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Took the words straight out of my mind, I was also going to point this out.

It feels like they wanted to copy what was popular at the time (in this case, both X-COM and C&C), but failed to realize what made what they were copying good to begin with.

And speaking of C&C again... The idea of creating a RTS game with a non-linear campaing where you do research and build bases outside of combat is a neat idea, and Kane's Wrath ended up doing this better than this game years later with it's Global Conquest mode.

Steve the Pocket said:
(...)

I did some quick digging on the studio behind it, Data Design Interactive. Turns out they're the same ones behind those awful cookie-cutter Wii and PS2 games from the late 2000s that are basically all reskins of each other—The Ninjabread Man, Trixie in Toyland, and such. That explains a lot.
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I would say that "explains a lot" is a big understatement considering who we are talking about.

 
I enjoyed the the technical aspects of the episodes. But, as it goes with the baldies episode, anyone who hasn't experienced the classic Cathedral of Kadesh or Bridge of Sighs will always be considered an RTS dilettante in my books.

 
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