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309: Dong Author: Rabidwolf9 Release Date: February 24, 2010
"Better Luck Next Time..."
For all of Rabidwolf9's contributions to the Dink Network - scripts, graphics, tutorials - this is his only released D-Mod. I heard him say on his Twitch channel that he likes D-Mods that do something out of the ordinary, so it's not surprising that his D-Mod is a Pong game.
Dink + Pong = Dong. That's all the title means. That's ALL the title means. So I'm not going to make any "EXPAND DONG" jokes. Nope.
Dong is a game of Pong based on the Atari classic. It can be played against a second player or a computer opponent. You can select what score you want to play to - anywhere from 1 to 99. There are four arenas to choose from - three Dink-themed and one based on the classic Pong look. There also seems to be a fifth arena on the map, but I'm not sure if there's any way to play on it. The Dink-themed maps involve knocking around a duck, pig or little girl, all of which bleed with each hit. It's pretty amusing.
The Duck arena.
The Classic Pong arena.
It works quite well. The ball (or whatever) moves differently based on the part of the paddle that hits it and which direction the paddle is moving at the time. It might not move quite the same way you'd be used to from actually playing Pong, but it's close enough. Player two moves using the Shift and Ctrl keys; neither player uses the default brain 1 movement, so the experience is the same for both players.
The computer opponent has an adjustable difficulty setting that controls how often it makes mistakes. The mistakes involve going in the wrong direction while trying to follow the ball, so they're pretty much a free goal for you. You can set the computer opponent to not make mistakes at all for a stiff, but by no means impossible, challenge.
The configuration screen.
It's cool to see Pong implemented in Dink. It takes me back to the very first "arcade game" D-Mod, "Dinkanoid," which also dealt with a paddle and a bouncing balls. The Dink engine doesn't have a "reflecting bounce" behavior built into it, so scripts for these D-Mods have to do some math to determine the angle of movement. It's clever work, and it still feels above my head. Pong has a simple appeal, and a lot of programmers have worked a version of it into their games. It was a minigame in the Commander Keen series and an easter egg accessible via cheat code in Genesis titles NBA Live 98 and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. In a youtube video about old console gaming memories, I saw one guy claim that he and his friends used to play Pong in Mortal Kombat more than they actually played Mortal Kombat. Maybe you could have a few matches of "Dong" (hee hee) with a friend.
310: FallDink Author: Iplaydink Release Date: March 4, 2010
Hey, it's another arcadey-type game converted to the Dink engine. Iplaydink used modified versions of his "Platform Dink" gravity and platform scripts to make an actual game, albeit one without the ability to jump. "FallDink" is based on FallDown, a game where platforms constantly rise and you have to try to fall off them and avoid reaching the top. The platform mechanic seems improved from its "Platform Dink" state. Still present from that earlier D-Mod is the ability to influence the speed of your fall, but it's treated as a feature here. Other versions of this game I've played had no such ability, but I liked having the ability to slow my fall here.
A hero... will fall.
Some games are cloned so often that their origins become cloudy and hard to find. "Snake" type games have their roots in arcades - I first encountered that type of game in a Windows 95 game called Rattler Race, but most know them from the "Snake" on early "feature" cellular phones. Games where you play as a fish and eat smaller fish to grow larger are another case. My first was Something Fishy, a shockwave game made by CleverMedia in 1997, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't the first to exist. One-button games where you press the button to rise and try to avoid obstacles from the top and bottom have recently been made famous by Flappy Bird - I think these can be traced to an early Java game called SF Cave, but who really knows? Similarly, I have no idea where "FallDown" comes from. Iplaydink cites his inspiration as an "awsome iphone app." I played FallDown on a graphing calculator long before there was such a thing as an iPhone, but that obviously can't be the original version. Where do these games come from? Someone must have invented them, but you'll never find out who it was. These simple concepts are the primal video games, existing as an idea, free of authorship. No one has to compare their work on derivative versions to "the original," because as far as they can tell, none exists.
"FallDink" is fun, but it could be better. I don't mind the simple graphics - actually, I find them appealing; they go right along with the simplicity of the game. What I wasn't crazy about was the way platforms are handled. They're randomly placed in such a way that you can find yourself without another platform to land on (falling off the bottom is also a loss condition). Other versions of the game I've played have "floors" that go by with randomly placed gaps in them; this approach seems superior to me because it's harder for bad luck to make you suddenly lose. Still, it was a good way to pass several minutes. The game saves your high score, which is a big plus. My high score was 67.
311: Higgledy Piggledy Author: DinkDude95 Release Date: April 3, 2010
"If my sources of information are correct, Stonebrook will be overrun with evil pigs..."
"Higgledy Piggledy" is the first independent D-Mod by Australian basketball fan DinkDude95, who previously contributed to the "One Screen D-Mod Compilation." In it, Dink must clear Stonebrook (the map of which is identical to the original game) of an evil pig infestation. Fighting pigs with fist and fireball is all you do; you can't enter the buildings. Maybe I've been spoiled by "Bug Mania's" town level, but some easter eggs or at least a little variety would have been nice.
There is a bit of crude fun to be had in making pigs explode into showers of blood, but what we've got here is ultimately an ordinary combat segment from a D-Mod made into an entire D-Mod. The only thing separating this from an ordinary pillbug slaughter is the mother pig, who taunts you and constantly squeezes out new pigs at a rate that is honestly kind of horrifying. It does make me get behind what Dink is doing - at the rate she's going, the world would soon be overrun with oinkers. Still, you can just punch her through the fence.
You know, killing pigs is ALSO something a pig farmer does. I'm just saying.
This game seems like it ought to have a timer and a high score list, but it doesn't. Even if it did, it would also need a bit more variety or it'd fall short of other arcade-type D-Mods. It does have three difficulty levels (Unlosable, Regular and IMPOSSIBLE!!), but that doesn't add much value since the first two are extremely easy and the third is so hard that I didn't manage to kill a single pig. The best thing about "Higgledy Piggledy" is that Dink opens his pig-extermination campaign by saying "Let's fry some bacon!", which is the correct one-liner for this situation. Other than that, it isn't very interesting.
"Better Luck Next Time..."
For all of Rabidwolf9's contributions to the Dink Network - scripts, graphics, tutorials - this is his only released D-Mod. I heard him say on his Twitch channel that he likes D-Mods that do something out of the ordinary, so it's not surprising that his D-Mod is a Pong game.
Dink + Pong = Dong. That's all the title means. That's ALL the title means. So I'm not going to make any "EXPAND DONG" jokes. Nope.
Dong is a game of Pong based on the Atari classic. It can be played against a second player or a computer opponent. You can select what score you want to play to - anywhere from 1 to 99. There are four arenas to choose from - three Dink-themed and one based on the classic Pong look. There also seems to be a fifth arena on the map, but I'm not sure if there's any way to play on it. The Dink-themed maps involve knocking around a duck, pig or little girl, all of which bleed with each hit. It's pretty amusing.
The Duck arena.
The Classic Pong arena.
It works quite well. The ball (or whatever) moves differently based on the part of the paddle that hits it and which direction the paddle is moving at the time. It might not move quite the same way you'd be used to from actually playing Pong, but it's close enough. Player two moves using the Shift and Ctrl keys; neither player uses the default brain 1 movement, so the experience is the same for both players.
The computer opponent has an adjustable difficulty setting that controls how often it makes mistakes. The mistakes involve going in the wrong direction while trying to follow the ball, so they're pretty much a free goal for you. You can set the computer opponent to not make mistakes at all for a stiff, but by no means impossible, challenge.
The configuration screen.
It's cool to see Pong implemented in Dink. It takes me back to the very first "arcade game" D-Mod, "Dinkanoid," which also dealt with a paddle and a bouncing balls. The Dink engine doesn't have a "reflecting bounce" behavior built into it, so scripts for these D-Mods have to do some math to determine the angle of movement. It's clever work, and it still feels above my head. Pong has a simple appeal, and a lot of programmers have worked a version of it into their games. It was a minigame in the Commander Keen series and an easter egg accessible via cheat code in Genesis titles NBA Live 98 and Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. In a youtube video about old console gaming memories, I saw one guy claim that he and his friends used to play Pong in Mortal Kombat more than they actually played Mortal Kombat. Maybe you could have a few matches of "Dong" (hee hee) with a friend.
310: FallDink Author: Iplaydink Release Date: March 4, 2010
Hey, it's another arcadey-type game converted to the Dink engine. Iplaydink used modified versions of his "Platform Dink" gravity and platform scripts to make an actual game, albeit one without the ability to jump. "FallDink" is based on FallDown, a game where platforms constantly rise and you have to try to fall off them and avoid reaching the top. The platform mechanic seems improved from its "Platform Dink" state. Still present from that earlier D-Mod is the ability to influence the speed of your fall, but it's treated as a feature here. Other versions of this game I've played had no such ability, but I liked having the ability to slow my fall here.
A hero... will fall.
Some games are cloned so often that their origins become cloudy and hard to find. "Snake" type games have their roots in arcades - I first encountered that type of game in a Windows 95 game called Rattler Race, but most know them from the "Snake" on early "feature" cellular phones. Games where you play as a fish and eat smaller fish to grow larger are another case. My first was Something Fishy, a shockwave game made by CleverMedia in 1997, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't the first to exist. One-button games where you press the button to rise and try to avoid obstacles from the top and bottom have recently been made famous by Flappy Bird - I think these can be traced to an early Java game called SF Cave, but who really knows? Similarly, I have no idea where "FallDown" comes from. Iplaydink cites his inspiration as an "awsome iphone app." I played FallDown on a graphing calculator long before there was such a thing as an iPhone, but that obviously can't be the original version. Where do these games come from? Someone must have invented them, but you'll never find out who it was. These simple concepts are the primal video games, existing as an idea, free of authorship. No one has to compare their work on derivative versions to "the original," because as far as they can tell, none exists.
"FallDink" is fun, but it could be better. I don't mind the simple graphics - actually, I find them appealing; they go right along with the simplicity of the game. What I wasn't crazy about was the way platforms are handled. They're randomly placed in such a way that you can find yourself without another platform to land on (falling off the bottom is also a loss condition). Other versions of the game I've played have "floors" that go by with randomly placed gaps in them; this approach seems superior to me because it's harder for bad luck to make you suddenly lose. Still, it was a good way to pass several minutes. The game saves your high score, which is a big plus. My high score was 67.
311: Higgledy Piggledy Author: DinkDude95 Release Date: April 3, 2010
"If my sources of information are correct, Stonebrook will be overrun with evil pigs..."
"Higgledy Piggledy" is the first independent D-Mod by Australian basketball fan DinkDude95, who previously contributed to the "One Screen D-Mod Compilation." In it, Dink must clear Stonebrook (the map of which is identical to the original game) of an evil pig infestation. Fighting pigs with fist and fireball is all you do; you can't enter the buildings. Maybe I've been spoiled by "Bug Mania's" town level, but some easter eggs or at least a little variety would have been nice.
There is a bit of crude fun to be had in making pigs explode into showers of blood, but what we've got here is ultimately an ordinary combat segment from a D-Mod made into an entire D-Mod. The only thing separating this from an ordinary pillbug slaughter is the mother pig, who taunts you and constantly squeezes out new pigs at a rate that is honestly kind of horrifying. It does make me get behind what Dink is doing - at the rate she's going, the world would soon be overrun with oinkers. Still, you can just punch her through the fence.
You know, killing pigs is ALSO something a pig farmer does. I'm just saying.
This game seems like it ought to have a timer and a high score list, but it doesn't. Even if it did, it would also need a bit more variety or it'd fall short of other arcade-type D-Mods. It does have three difficulty levels (Unlosable, Regular and IMPOSSIBLE!!), but that doesn't add much value since the first two are extremely easy and the third is so hard that I didn't manage to kill a single pig. The best thing about "Higgledy Piggledy" is that Dink opens his pig-extermination campaign by saying "Let's fry some bacon!", which is the correct one-liner for this situation. Other than that, it isn't very interesting.
