The Dink Network

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Those who wonder who the heck is ZOOM Platform, they are GOG's competitor that has been around since 2016 and aims to make games DRM-Free and make sure as hell that the games they offer actually work (Which GOG abandoned that mission until now with their Preservation Program in 2025). Unlike them however, they release the games not only into their own store but on Steam as well if its exclusive and even offer their service to other publishers/devs to fix the game and provide improvements which can be seen in Flatout 1,2,Ultimate or even in......Postal 3.

The store offers a recent version right now and fully supports zoom-platform.sh installer for Linux users, making it very simple to install and run without relying on frontends such as Bottles or Lutris.

so basically, they'd do everything seth is too lazy to do when maintaining dink on steam. excellent, this is perfect.

Incidentally, the specs on Gog and Zoom store pages differ:

Gog: Windows 7/8/10, 1.8 GHz Processor, 512MB RAM (1 GB recommended); Release date January 1, 1997
Zoom: Windows 7/10/11, 1 GHz Processor (1.4 GHz recommended), 256MB RAM (512 recommended); Release date Jan 15, 1998

which one used ai to generate those

The Zoom page seems to pull most of its data (and screenshots) from Mobygames. The system requirements are probably the default ones Steam tends to tack onto older titles.

Can you even run Windows 7 with 256 MB of RAM?

Also, the ESRB rating tag is a bit suspicious since Dink Smallwood is not indexed within ESRB's site and the game definitely not belonging to the E category...

Edit: looking at some other games there, does Zoom just put E to every game not rated by ESRB??

I'm guessing that it managed to dodge the ESRB back in the day due to being a direct mail order from RTSoft. However, the Iridon Interactive release in Europe received a suitable for ages 3-10 from ELSPA somehow.

Mi amore, mi amore
Espresso macchiato, macchiato, macchiato
Por favore, por favore
Espresso macchiato corneo
Mi amore, mi amore
Espresso macchiato, macchiato, macchiato
Por favore, por favore
Espresso macchiato
Espresso macchiato
Ah-ah
Ah-ah
Ah-ah
Ciao bella, I'm Tomaso
Addicted to tobacco
Mi like mi coffee very importante
No time to talk e scusi
My days are very busy
And I just own this little ristorante
Life may give you lemons
When dancing with the demons
No stresso, no stresso
No need to be depresso
Mi amore, mi amore
Espresso macchiato, macchiato, macchiato
Por favore, por favore
Espresso macchiato corneo
Mi amore, mi amore
Espresso macchiato, macchiato, macchiato
Por favore, por favore
Espresso macchiato
Espresso macchiato
Mi like to fly privati
With 24 carati
Also mi casa very grandioso
Mi money numeroso
I work around the clocko
That's why I'm sweating like a mafioso
Life is like spaghetti
It's hard until you make it
No stresso, no stresso
It's gonna be espresso
Mi amore, mi amore
Espresso macchiato, macchiato, macchiato
Por favore, por favore
Espresso macchiato
Espresso macchiato
La-la-la-la
La-la-la-la
La-la-la la-la-la la-la la-la la-la-la-la
La-la-la la-la
La-la-la-la
Espresso macchiato
Espresso macchiato

Looks like it's possible to run Vista with 256MB so I imagine 7's not too far off.

Welp, Dink Smallwood HD has been delisted from the store by publisher's request

Less than week earlier, Zoom had featured Dink on a Twitter post showcasing their free games...

They asked me in 2024 if I wanted to let them put it on their platform, I told them they were more than welcome to distribute the unmodified installer only.

They ignored that and did it anyway - a sloppy repackage with zero redeeming values.

* It was removed from my installer and put into a JFG installer
* The installer adds confusion by telling you it is installing Dink Smallwood V1.1 (see image. In contrast, our installer gives the actual version number of V2.08 and the date it was built)
* The installer removes the RTsoft logo and link to RTsoft's website
* The installer removes the original useful help and credits completely, replacing it with a new license from JFG (which ironically has an area putting restrictions on "copying")
* The JFG installer does not create links in the Dink Smallwood HD Start folder to to RTsoft, Dink Network, or reporting a bug
* The JFG installer doesn't create the Software\RTSOFT\DINK key which is the path, something the original Dink installer checks so it properly installs over existing installs, as well as third party utils can check to know where Dink HD is installed (ie, DMOD utilities)
* The JFG installer forces you to install to C:\ZOOM PLATFORM, a path that includes spaces which could screw up some DMOD utilities. It also puts things into a sub folder called "Dink Smallwood HD" whereas the original uses "DinkSmallwoodHD".
* If the authentic RTsoft Dink Smallwood HD installer is used, the user ends up with two identical looking "Dink Smallwood HD" options in the same Start folder
* Their uninstaller doesn't give an option to also delete installed dmods. You're just stuck with them eternally I guess

Long story short, JFG did exactly the things I feared, without permission and to my knowledge unlawfully.

If I put out a new version, I highly (x)doubt they would bother to update theirs, similar to the situation with GOG.

The end user is worse off they install the JFG version on Windows instead of our authentic version, so yeah, I asked them to remove it. Sketchy as hell behavior to ask, be told no, and do it anyway.

I do believe there is a reason for using their own installer which is to support zoom-platform.sh script to help Linux users in installing and running the game by utilizing UMU which works alongside with Valve's Proton or other community-made Proton variations such as GloriousEggroll's (Who kickstarted the UMU project). Other than that it sounds more like a preset was used and the installer does not force you to install into the directory you mentioned, you can still change it.

When your post was posted at their discord channel, it was mentioned that they did offer a fix for the listed problems, but ended up with a request for delisting it. As for the updating to the newer version if it gets release, they would actually do it. Right when it was out and people noticed that it is outdated, they immediately updated it to the recent version.

The issue with installer not having a link to RTSoft website seems trivial since the game already does that (along with TDN link in About section in the game) and generally the 1st thing people would do after installing the game is to play it.

Regarding the issues with some DMOD utilities, which ones we are talking about exactly?

WDED is able to use the registry to retrieve the install path of certain engine variants.

Seth, if you are reading this, I'd like to remind you to consider updating DinkHD on GOG

It's stuck on V1.99

Still would prefer a steam release dont see any reason in 2025 not to have one , also why not modern consoles as well ? every other game seems to get a port for modern consoles

Speaking of portables , has anyone run dink on stuff like steam deck ? i was honestly expecting there would be a port for the newer homebrew consoles aka ps4, switch v1 etc

I find DinkHD runs great on Steam Deck without much hassle. I wanted to say I made some guide about running it alongside Martridge in the Martridge thread, but it was actually for YeOldeDink: https://www.dinknetwork.com/forum.cgi?MID=212186#212187https://www.dinknetwork.com/forum.cgi?MID=212186#212187

DinkHD is pretty easy to get running too, although now that I think about it, I don't think Martridge can launch DMODs on the Steam Deck with it...

Here's the basic idea on how to get it running:
1. Switch the Deck to Desktop mode
2. Download the DinkHD.exe
3. Use 7zip to Unarchive it somewhere (or PeaZip should work too I think?) - the DinkHD.exe installer is an NSIS installer, which is just an self installing LZMA archive that 7zip can handle natively!
4. After unarchiving it, open Steam while still in Desktop mode and choose to "Add a Non Steam Game", be sure to use Proton for compatibility and etc.
5. After adding the game in Steam, while still in Desktop mode, you can go to its properties, and in the General settings you can set Launch options, you can add "-game <PATH_TO_DMOD>" to the launch options to launch a specific DMOD
6. Switch the Deck back to Deck/Game(?) mode, and you should be able to just launch DinkHD without issue

EDIT: Hmm, I'll have to look into if I can get Martridge to launch an game exe through Proton while the Deck is in Game mode... I know shortcuts to steam games use an URI that's something like this: "steam://rungameid/1030300" but does that work with Non-steam games?...

EDIT2: I ran some quick tests on Windows and apparently it is technically possible to launch a non-steam application through steam with arguments. Basically, I have to check if the target launch application starts with "steam://" and do some specific stuff before launching a new process...

else if (exePath.StartsWith("steam://")) {
    // have to respect "steam://run/<id>//<args>/" URI format to launch something through steam with arguments....
    // slashes have to be escaped with %2F
    string argumentsEscaped = arguments.Replace("/", "%2F");
    pinfo.FileName = exePath + "//" + argumentsEscaped + "/";
    pinfo.Arguments = "";
    pinfo.UseShellExecute = true;
    pinfo.Verb = "open";
} else {              

I think this should work on the Deck too, but I'll have to check...

I'll start working on the necessary changes to get everything working in Martridge, and add the guides for setting up Dink for the Steam Deck in the Martridge documentation website too!

I have some other minor UI tweaks to do to make sure it looks and works properly on the Steam Deck, but I suppose I should have a new version ready in a couple of weeks!

Cheers @liquid141 for inspiring me hehe

@liquid141

I'd actually more surprised if more homebrew console ports of Dink actually existed. Our beloved game is quite nieche, even in the freeware or free software territories. The pessimist in me says this won't change in the forseeable future. On the other hand, I can't predict the future, so anything can happen.