The Dink Network

This is a DMOD unlike any I've played, it has a lot of talking. And I mean "hug tracts of... talking". Way too much for me, I found it got in the way of the story and getting bored. I've tried to continue this DMOD couple of times, but end up quitting due to the large amount of story dialogue to "spacebar" through, and then I seemed to get stuck in a loop in DinkHD trying to go to the mountains without the Blunderbus magic. So I restarted in freedink and finished the game with the help of the walkthru.

There are a lot of new graphics here, many of them very, very large which jars with me and kind of takes me out of the story. I did like the big star fish you are warned not to touch, so the first thing I did was touch it and die. Hahahaha! I also liked some of the magical elements. But the re-sizing of the ice boncas didn't work for me.

Having to look at large versions all the time slowed down the game play for me, maybe there was a way to fast forward through this, but other than pressing spacebar all the time...

I eventually completed the game, I did die multiple times, reaching the "bad ending" again and again, to the point that it got boring reading all the stuff about reaching the bad ending.

Map - 8 out of 10: Not bad, sometimes a bit sparse, sometimes very crowded, and sometimes so different I wasn't sure what I could interact with, so I was trying to talk and punch most things. The extremely large objects were too weird for me, considering other things like trees were proportional to Dink, and although Dink does shrink a bit as per the story.. it just felt weird at times. There were a number of times I got snagged on hardness especially in the ice/frozen lands which was annoying.

Graphics - 9 out of 10: lots of new stuff here and some of it very nice, some borrowed from other dmods. I liked the glowing lantern effect, and the new rocks and trees looked intriguing. The purple magical fairy thingy was nice. There was some weirdness on some of the many cut scene screens it was all black without the status bars and on others there was a thin line as if the map screen was hidden behind a giant black sprite which the engine didn't quite hide, not sure. It seemed to be a DinkHD thing, as I didn't encounter it in freedink. Also using size increases on sprites (I'm thinking the big pigs here) makes them too blurry in DinkHD, but it handles the shadows better. Those looked weird to me in freedink.

Story - 8 out of 10: There is a good story here, a quest with twists and turns, but the amount of exposition was way too much for me. That opening scene with the invaders just went on and on, as did my conversations with the Fairy Queen. I felt there was way too much information given that I had to retain all at once, and sometimes you got stuff again when you didn't need it.

Sound and Music - 8 out of 10: new stuff here which is always nice, although I seemed to run out of music when talking with the Fairy Queen which did seem strange, being a royal, somewhat solemn occasion. The music at times seem to work against creating any sense of urgency though, making this feel like an unimportant little quest rather than something I needed to give my full attention to, and so lessened the a sense of drama or urgency.

Gameplay/scripting - 9.5 out of 10: the level of scripting here is very good. I encountered one weird repetition loop, about the sword getting me to ask about the Blunderbuss magic from the Fairy Queen again and again, which was because I didn't have it yet. The continual pop-up dialogue about other DMODs the author has made, with the relevant backstory I'm missing, got a little annoying. Occasionally the little girl's dialogue would pop up even though she was no longer accompanying Dink, mainly when fighting, but I also got it when warned not to go back to a certain part of the map. The frozen lands had some nice ideas in it: health deteriorating over time, finding ways to keep warm, avoiding the frozen water with ice holes, and it took me a while to figure out you didn't have to walk on the ice to get around them. I did experience something like a bug here, trying to use fireball magic and switching out to the wand or blunderbus, everything got a bit frozen and the magic stopped recharging. That's when I reloaded and walked on the edges of the frozen water to get around it all.

Humour is present, not always to my taste, but still it's there, sometimes from the talking sword, sometimes from Dink. One time I died saying the girl died too, even though my magic slot had the Saved Solum pic on it, that made me smile.

The end boss scene battle was weird, and I had trouble seeing the last of the enemies I had to beat as they were hidden behind the glowing light sprite that filled the screen.

Some interesting magic, the blunderbus thing was cool and weird at the same time, brought back memories of the original shotgun in Doom for me.

Overall this is worth a look and a play if you don't mind lots of dialogue, occasional map/hardness glitches and a story which slowly unfolds. A lot of thought, effort and time must have gone into the making of this which I appreciated.

I have still yet to play so many DMODs released on The Dink Network. I was mostly active up until around 2007 and played most of the DMODs released by then, but this is one of the first modern DMODs I played and I love it.

I think it's a bit different from most DMODs. The first part of the story is focused on exploration and feels like an adventure game. It reminds me of games like King's Quest - there are certain items you must find and things you must do, and making the wrong step can lead to your untimely death! Not finding the right things you need can either make your life harder later on, or completely prevent you from finishing the DMOD.

When the combat starts it can vary from challenging to easy depending if you unlocked a mighty spell along the way. There is also a segment where you have to wade through a blizzard, and the nasty weather can chip away at your health. That and the bad visibility may make combat more difficult, but you can also recover health by warming yourself with fire...

I won't go into details about the story, but I think it is well written. Perhaps it's a bit too verbose at times, there are plenty of cutscenes and dialogue - I suppose it depends if this is your kind of thing or not. Some of the cutscenes have some really cool graphics, stuff I wouldn't have expected to see in a DMOD!

The map is more beautiful than what I'm used to from olden times! I especially like all the cool trees used here. The oversized clams and other debris seem weird and janky at first, but I find they add to the island's sense of mystery..

I never really know what to say about music in general. The thing that stood out to me the most, is a certain song during a certain sequence near the very end, which I shall not spoil You'll know it when you see it. I also really liked the use of various sound effects throughout the DMOD. I like that and I wish more DMODs did it, it adds to the atmosphere! But hey, maybe they have done that already and I just need to play them all to find out?

Speaking of atmosphere and sound, there's this part where you're in a dark cave with a lantern, and you find a pick which you can use to get some mineral. Most DMODs would just have you press space to interact with the thing, get the other thing, and call it a day (I really have a way with words, I know). But here you have to equip the pick, interact with the minerals, then Dink stands there for a bit picking at the thing while a mining sound plays. Only after Dink is done mining do you get the item. I appreciate the little details like these, and they really stuck with me!

Overall, I think it's a very crafted DMOD. It's quite different from what I was used to playing and it left a really good impression on me!