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Reply to Re: Crazy Old Tim Plays all the DMODs of 2001

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February 13th 2014, 07:19 PM
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Cocomonkey
Bard He/Him United States
Please Cindy, say the whole name each time. 
I'd rather be playing Phantasy Star IV right now. I do this for you guys. >_> Hope you enjoy.

094: The Rings of Destiny (Demo) Author: Micheal Tolland Release Date: March 12, 2001

If I were to judge this mod by its intro, I'd be fairly impressed. The introduction cutscene is surprisingly long and features some neat graphic effects. You can't tell from this screenshot (which I admit I picked to show the unfortunate clipping of the text), but the water is scrolling underneath the dragon in a fairly convincing simulation of movement - an effect I'm not sure I've seen in a DMOD, and certainly haven't seen much. There are also some new graphics like this MS Paint black blob that expands and moves to swallow up the foolish wizards who summoned it to this plane. I was entertained.

Once the actual mod starts, however, it's a bit disappointing. I mean, the first segment works well enough, apart from some nasty tiling. There's a rather unresponsive little village that wants you to kill a "monster," which turns out to be a rather tedious fight with a giant bonca (tedious because you can't do more than 1 damage with your punch). After you do this, there's a cutscene with Dink leaving the village. It's set up fairly well, but it fizzles due to poor use of text.

I'm not just nitpicking or being pedantic when I complain about a mod's use of language - it really takes me out of the story. A couple of the characters here say things that might have been somewhat interesting, but because there was no punctuation and hardly any capitalization, I can't even remember the story at all. It's impossible to take seriously.

Anyway, after the cutscene, you come to a section mapped rather oddly with dull ground and rocks all over the place. There's a man in a bar there who has you do a few chores for him, but on one of them, I found myself unable to continue.

First, I should note that I ran into a major bug on my first run through this mod where the game stopped updating my stats. I couldn't take damage, gain experience, gain stats, or anything like that. I ended up restarting. When I got back to the area in question, I found that the next part features many screens full of slimes that took me down to 1 HP in one hit (and obviously killed me with a second). One of these screens would, for some reason, teleport you right into a rock any time you entered it, regardless of your entry point. The only lead I could find was a screen with a guy shouting for help. It seemed unreasonable, but nonetheless, after a few tries I managed to kill all the slimes without getting hit twice - nothing happens. I gave up at this point. I couldn't find any evidence in the scripts of a real ending, but maybe I just missed it.

I'm kind of tempted to say there was potential with this one, but it's so messed up that realizing that potential would take so much effort you might as well start from the intro again.

095: DWTD (Demo) Author: Hyper B Release Date: March 12, 2001

2001: Year of the Demo. I swear.

This demo doesn't feature a new title screen. It has this splash screen, but as it only shows during the loading of the title screen, on today's computers you hardly have time to see it. This does result in an unusual effect if you try restarting.

I wonder what that title stands for. Down with the Dink? Dink Wets Trousers Day? Don't Wake the Dalmatians? Damnation Was Tiresome, Dude? Given the content, I think the last one is completely spot on, and I am declaring it the official title.

This... thing begins with an odd little scene in which Dink is just taking a walk (you're told this twice) when he gets sent to Hell for... some... reason. I dunno. It's sort of explained that Dink was sent by mistake instead of some evil guy, but if you ask me, Dink has done plenty to earn it. The explosion that sends him there is silent, and there's no music. In fact, there isn't even a sound folder included with the DMOD. The effect is kind of eerie.

Hell is a superlatively strange place. It mostly consists of a series of small areas where not a lot happens, and then Dink is sent to the next one by way of silent explosion. To be honest, I kind of liked it. There's something I find appealing about a DMOD that's just a series of single rooms. I've seen it a few times, but none of the mods in question have been especially high quality, including this one... I wonder if anything exists to really show the potential in this concept?

One thing worth noting is that there's only one savebot in this mod, and it's in Dink's backpack. I don't doubt Dink would do this if he could fit one in there.

At first, Hell just seems boring, and Dink is helpless. In one area, you wander around the same four empty screens until the game decides you've done it for long enough; in another, you do the same on just one screen. I... could see this as a kind of dangation. Actually, I love a change of pace, so it did entertain me somewhat. Dink offers up bemused comments in slightly broken English as you encounter several things, like a tough fight against a non-casting dragon, old acquaintances, and nonsensical riddles. At the end, you have to fight a lot of monsters in order to get to level 4 (this was tightly controlled - you must kill every monster their is to get exactly enough experience). Instead of opening the next area, however, this reveals the end of the demo. However, the knight who blocks you off actually invites you to cheat to get past him and fight a dragon! I did, and cheated again to beat the dragon, but aside from the dragon turning into a girl for some reason, there's nothing else.

I might have enjoyed this sort of silliness going on for a while longer. Ah well, it's not a huge loss. After all, Damnation Was Tiresome, Dude. But poor Dink, he really is stuck in Hell forever instead of Random Evil Guy. It goes to show, kids: virtue is for chumps.