DOS Games Discussion

What were the best classic games from before 1990 that ran from floppies (no HD installs allowed).

Star Command is definately one of them, though I think there are cracks to allow it to run on your HDD.

Dogbreath wrote:Star Command is definately one of them, though I think there are cracks to allow it to run on your HDD.

Grabbed it from mobygames and will check it out later on my tandy.
I finally founf an external drive (5.25") fir my 1000 HX and want to start playing some oldschool titles.

Be prewarned, you have to change the disk EVERY time you exit/enter the starbase. If you have 2 floppy disk slots SC does allow you to run them simultaneously to avoid constant switching.

*clears throat*

here's my brief list. (all made by Sierra)

1) Space Quest III -->1-3 floppies (can't remember off hand)
2) LSL 1 --> unsure
3) PQ1 --> unsure
4) Kings Quest V --> a whopping 10 (that's right, TEN) floppies!

-Richard-

I have 3 drives on the HX, 2 built in 720k 3.5" and the external 5.25 360k drive. I wanted the external for the original games I have on that media (2 LSL and 3 ultima's), the games I get from the net will be dumped on 3.5" drives so I will probably get away without swapping too many floppies (most pre 1990 games should fit on just 1 or 2 disks). Any of the games that use VGA wont be running on that machine anyway (have a 386 dx/40 for that).

I have to say that ultima looks really nice on a high quality CGA monitor with crisp graphics and vibrant colors (Tandy graphics not the lame 4 color CGA crap)

Alley, Star Wars, Sopwith, Space Commanders

I agree that a dedicated PC with low-D drives is a good idea. My old 180-360-720k floppies aren't reading too well on 1.2-1.44mb drives. I learned loooonnnnggg ago NEVER to write to low-D media on a high-D drive. (Better to copy the data to hard drive and hide the originals in a vault if you value them.)

I spent a year playing an early ver of Star Trek on a huge Z80 machine with dual 8" floppies (gawd, what a racket they made). That's the edition where you had to enter the X-Y move co-ords to move and fire on the tac screen, and the warp speed and direction on the strat map. I recall the frustration of getting lost off map and trying to guess my way back with no refs on a blank screen before ship's energy ran out. Something "modern" PC's don't have anymore. How I wish I had that beast now!!

johpower wrote:I agree that a dedicated PC with low-D drives is a good idea. My old 180-360-720k floppies aren't reading too well on 1.2-1.44mb drives. I learned loooonnnnggg ago NEVER to write to low-D media on a high-D drive. (Better to copy the data to hard drive and hide the originals in a vault if you value them.)

I spent a year playing an early ver of Star Trek on a huge Z80 machine with dual 8" floppies (gawd, what a racket they made). That's the edition where you had to enter the X-Y move co-ords to move and fire on the tac screen, and the warp speed and direction on the strat map. I recall the frustration of getting lost off map and trying to guess my way back with no refs on a blank screen before ship's energy ran out. Something "modern" PC's don't have anymore. How I wish I had that beast now!!

Try eBay

The old games rock on vintage hardware

Dangerous dave was great
and the commander keen series

I was around in the 80's, and most of the good games were on Sega and Nintendo, and if you didn't have one of those you had an Atari!!

Most of the games you kiddies are actually mentioning came out in the 90's.

**Yoshi** wrote:I was around in the 80's, and most of the good games were on Sega and Nintendo, and if you didn't have one of those you had an Atari!!

Most of the games you kiddies are actually mentioning came out in the 90's.

I was born in 1968 so I was around in the 80's also. Some of the best games of the 80's were also on the C64 and Amiga. The PC didnt get popular for games until 1990 and later (but there were a few gems in the 80's).

Computers were rare before 1990, and to find a decent game before 1990 was and is like finding a needle in a haystack. The ones people know from the 80's are games such as Space Invaders, NetHack etc etc...but they are now way past their used-by-date, and to my opinion aren't worth downloading or even purchasing unless you have an ancient x86 - 386 computer on hand that is still in an excellent working condition which to my knowledge, if it fucks up or dies, then you will have a hard time finding someone who fixes those old pieces of scrap metal as they are not servicable anymores because most technicians won't touch them with a forty foot pole.

I know one of you is gonna say you can get an emulator?

I have no problems with emulators, they are handy to a point but I believe all things should fade with time...ie let the old rest in peace and be replaced by something more entertaining.

1989:

Ultima III: Exodus
Ultima Trilogy
Ultima V: Warriors of Destiny
Space Quest III: The Pirates of Pestulon
Police Quest 2: The Vengeance
Pool of Radiance
Defender of the Crown


all classic games that are still fun to play

Sopwith was the ultimate game
the first computer I had, was extremly old, pre-386 times, with no HDD, a 3 1/2, and a 5 1/4 drive, it booted dos off floppies and sopwith was my favourite game

I've played more recent versions of the game but it's just not the same

was commander keen before 1990? i was born in 1987, so i don't really know. i remember though that that was one of my favourite games. along with jazz jackrabbit, hocus pocus. oh, and hugo! can't forget that classic!

barok wrote:was commander keen before 1990

No.

commander keen is from 1990

I didn't have a computer before 1990, but now my fave game that was originally released before 1990 was Space Invaders.

Rogue