GOG announcement: Master of Orion it is!

[Jesusthewererabbit]

http://www.gog.com/en/frontpage/

Gotta be Master of Orion. Hopefully I and II.



I should probably prepare myself to lose days out of my life again.

Edit: I was right! MoO1 and 2 for $5.99! Also, Outcast, which if I remember correctly was a slightly bizarre looking voxel based third person shooter.

 

[KaOTiK]

I've been playing MoO2 a bit here and there lately, picked up a copy on Amazon for real cheap, but if I had known GoG was getting it I'd waited.

Great game though, good old times.

 

[Jesusthewererabbit]

I have my MoO disc that I picked up in a combo with Xcom at Kmart in about '96. I DosBoxed it a while back, and still had a lot of fun with it. My MoO2 discs, however, were destroyed in one of several moves over the years. Hell, I even played and enjoyed MoO3!

 

[Zenoth]

I remember playing the second one more than the original, and I liked it, I've also tried MoO3 and I also remember that it sucked (bad A.I, declaring war without provocation, irrelevant diplomatic actions, many races that in the end aren't that much different from each others and are highly unbalanced, etc., I'm sure I'm forgetting a few things I didn't liked). I'm pretty sure that if it does end up being the Master of Orion games that it will be the trilogy, but I sure won't touch MoO3 with a kilometer-long stick, I would gladly buy the second one though, and maybe the first too, I shall see.

 

[Arglebargle]

There are some mods that make MoO3 almost playable. Still, the game is a testament to the fact that game companies don't always know what's good for them...or anyone else. I find it a guilty pleasure.

 

[Via]

I found MoO3 in a bargain bin for 99 cents.

I still consider it a great buy for that price. It's more of an dry "running a galactic empire" sim than a game with lots of features that entertain on the same level that doing your taxes does, and the ship design portion is a nebulous mess, but I actually enjoyed it when I was in the mood for it.

The longest possible game setting (I think it was huge galaxy) probably has the potential to be the longest single player game of all time. I bet you could play the same game for 10 years if you wanted to.

I played one game on and off for about 5-6 months and I feel like I barely scratched the surface.

 

[Schadenfroh]

MOO2 was awesome, probably at least in my top 20, never played MOO1, was it better?

 

[Jesusthewererabbit]

MoO2 is better. The original is kinda clunky, but still a lot of fun.

 

[GoodRevrnd]

If they had gone in and rewrote MOO2's netcode I would spooge myself. That thing was limited to IPX and had constant sync and drop issues.

 

[paperfist]

Is there a site like this for even older stuff from the Commodore 64? I have a sudden urge to play Heart of Africa again but a quick search brings up tons of those so called abandon ware sites.

 

[Zenoth]

Is there a site like this for even older stuff from the Commodore 64? I have a sudden urge to play Heart of Africa again but a quick search brings up tons of those so called abandon ware sites.

That's precisely because such games would fall into the abandonware category, but the games on GoG.com aren't exactly forgotten nor abandoned yet despite the age of most of them, in other words the games on GoG are still subject to copyright protections/ownerships, licenses and everything else that would point at the fact that they're still "active". I sent GoG a request once so that they could add Powerslave (Exhumed), but they replied that the game was abandonware (they literally referred to it as such) and that they couldn't possibly known for sure if the copyright ownership was transfered or renewed, or something along those lines.

There's a good explanation of abandonware on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abandonware

In any case I do know that such websites like Abandonia.com still offer "abandoned games" for download, maybe Heart of Africa is somewhere in there.

 

[KaOTiK]

Is there a site like this for even older stuff from the Commodore 64? I have a sudden urge to play Heart of Africa again but a quick search brings up tons of those so called abandon ware sites.

Nope, stuff like that as the poster above me said, is pretty much abandon ware. It is a pretty gray area for legality and is a per title basis.

While I don't support downloading games you don't own, this is one of those rare instances where I'd say fuck it due to the age of it and since the IP is effectively dead. Try google with something like "download Heart of Africa commodore 64" I bet there are some ROM sites out there that would have it.

 

[paperfist]

Thanks guys

I did google it, but the 'problem' is you get locked into a wild goose chase sometimes or end up on some sites that look a little iffy.

I know the legality end of it is gray, but it would be super cool to have a Steam like service for the very old games like I'm looking for

 

[Jesusthewererabbit]

I was right! MoO1 and 2 for $5.99! Also, Outcast, which if I remember correctly was a slightly bizarre looking voxel based third person shooter.

 

[AyashiKaibutsu]

There are some mods that make MoO3 almost playable. Still, the game is a testament to the fact that game companies don't always know what's good for them...or anyone else. I find it a guilty pleasure.

I think it's more a testament to poor software engineering. It seemed to me that they failed on every front of what they were trying to create and just released it realizing they could never make it what they wanted it to be.

 

[lupi]

Hmmm, may have to make my first buy thÉre. I have moo 1 and 3 buy never did get a copy of 2.

 

[Lonyo]

I've been kind of wanting to play Outcast since forever, for no complete reason.
It's one of those I had a demo of and I think I played, and always wanted to get the full thing.

Now I will.

 

[Arglebargle]

I think it's more a testament to poor software engineering. It seemed to me that they failed on every front of what they were trying to create and just released it realizing they could never make it what they wanted it to be.

Only partly: Infogrames/Atari had the most screwed up management, and they weren't willing to do what it took to get the game working right. They did just release it, pretty much unfinished, though thankfully there was actually a patch produced....though you need an unofficial patch as well for it to be really worth it. They were having money problems due to mismanagement, and just barfed it up. Long term, releasing a decent game would have been much better for the company, but......

 

[jdjbuffalo]

I was thinking of picking this up since I'm a big MOO2 fan but haven't played it in ages.

On GOG it says "Windows XP & Windows Vista (32 & 64 bit)" but they don't mention Windows 7 64bit. Based on my previous experiences with Vista is that if it works in Vista then it will work in Windows 7. Has anyone tried it with Windows 7 64bit?

 

[Jesusthewererabbit]

I haven't had any problems with with anything from GoG on Win7 x64 except Interstate 76, and we are lucky that one even runs at all. I wouldn't worry about it at all, and if you are really worried, I'll let you know as soon as I get it bought and downloaded.

 

[Zenoth]

Great additions to the GoG games library, I'll definitely buy Outcast (never played) and the Master of Orion 1 + 2 pack.

 

[WhipperSnapper]

How does MOO2 compare to Sins of a Solar Empire? I've never played any of the MOO games so I have no idea what I missed. <Edit> Based on the screenshots at GoG, it almost looks a little bit like Alpha Centauri (since you can customize units) but in space.

 

[Jesusthewererabbit]

How does MOO2 compare to Sins of a Solar Empire? I've never played any of the MOO games so I have no idea what I missed.

Take Sins, make it turn based, and give it a story. I really think Sins is a better MoO3 than MoO3 was, even though I enjoyed it too.

They are both run with DosBox, so there are no issues yet with running it. I've got it minimized, and listening to this music brings back memories...

 

[A5]

How does MOO2 compare to Sins of a Solar Empire? I've never played any of the MOO games so I have no idea what I missed. <Edit> Based on the screenshots at GoG, it almost looks a little bit like Alpha Centauri (since you can customize units) but in space.

The modern spiritual successor to MoO2 is Galactic Civilizations 2. Of the games you listed, it's most like Alpha Centauri - there are no real-time elements in MoO2 like those in Sins.

 

[shortylickens]

Still have MOO2 on disc, so I dont need this.
Interestingly, it works great under Windows XP. Better than many games made after it.
I think its my all time favorite with Imperium Galactica 2 a close 2nd, and Galactic Civilizations 2 a distant 3rd.
But IG2 doesnt fucking work right any more. I may seriously need to make a Win98 system just for a handful of games, like IG2 and Magic and a couple others.