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Isometric CGA Dos game [CORBA COMMANDO]

Posted: Mon Jan 20, 2014 9:51 am
by ChrisM
Hi all,

I recall it being called cobra command (but it isn't)
it's a DOS game
CGA (Red, Blue and Yellow with black background I recall)
I recall on the main menu (black screen with two options) you use the cursor keys to move the cursor and the left shift (right shift didn't work) to confirm your selection.
it's isometric
You're a man wearing a blue suit with yellow dots.
Your head randomly looks left and right slightly.
from searching these days, it looks similar to head over heels but isn't that game
There were spikes, blocks you could push, blocks that went up and down (You could stand on them) as well as blocks that just move towards you and can eventually trap you in the corner.
Pretty sure it was a .com file.

So... anyone recall this?

Posted: Mon Jan 20, 2014 10:50 am
by Quadko
I've got one game in mind I can't track down, but looking for it I came across a number of probably-wrong long shots. Figured I'd pass them along rather than throw them away. Lots of ZX Spectrum games match this rough description, so I was looking for ones ported to dos - I remember a puzzle game through isometric rooms, and something about a ghost or haunted mansion, maybe a bubble, but I may be confusing it with nonisometric bubble ghost: http://www.mobygames.com/game/bubble-ghost/screenshots


So, maybe look through the 'cobra' game list on moby?
http://www.mobygames.com/search/quick?q=cobra&x=0&y=0

Possibilities for isometric games

http://www.mobygames.com/game/sweevos-world/screenshots
http://www.mobygames.com/game/treasure-trap/screenshots
http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/cadaver/screenshots
http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/mysti ... creenshots
http://www.mobygames.com/game/chimera/screenshots

Other long shots from my search

http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/great ... creenshots
http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/isome ... creenshots
http://www.mobygames.com/game/windows/m ... creenshots
http://www.mobygames.com/game/knight-lore/screenshots
http://www.mobygames.com/game/batman_/screenshots
http://www.mobygames.com/game/alien-8/screenshots
http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/starquake/screenshots
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Abad%C3%ADa_del_Crimen
http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/space ... creenshots
http://www.mobygames.com/game/magnetik-tank/screenshots
http://www.mobygames.com/game/alien-8/screenshots

Edit: the game I was trying to remember above was Airball: http://www.mobygames.com/game/airball , just for future reference.

Posted: Mon Jan 20, 2014 11:10 am
by ChrisM
Sweevo's World looks quite similar to it actually! though the one I am thinking of is much much simpler. Again, Alien 8 looks similar but once again is way more complex looking than the game I remember.

I remember the walls of each screen being a row of brick posts.
Also there were conveyor belt style blocks that could move you around.

Posted: Mon Feb 24, 2014 3:52 pm
by Vyothric
I think I have this game.

I have this 5.25" disk (which unfortunately I can't read due to a non-working 5.25 floppy drive).

Image

But, I also have a backup of what was on my old 386, which appears to have this game on.

Image

Image

It runs in DOSBox but has to be slowed down a lot.

Posted: Mon Feb 24, 2014 4:03 pm
by Quadko
Wow, that's fantastic. Very nice, thanks for tracking that down! :thumbsup:

Posted: Mon Aug 11, 2014 6:43 am
by ChrisM
That's absolutely amazing! :D:D:D

Thank you so much for finding it Vyothric, that's the one. Quite glad I remember the details (even if I did get the CGA colours wrong!)

It seems quite a few of my early game memories come from the PC Plus Super Disk

Vyothric, I don't suppose there's any chance you can upload it (if you were to see this again?) I'd love to play this game again :)

Regardless, thank you.

Posted: Wed Aug 13, 2014 8:07 am
by Quadko
You haz PM. :)

Posted: Wed Aug 13, 2014 9:54 am
by ChrisM
Thanks Quadko, replied :D

has been a pleasure playing it again! I'd love to find an archive of all the old PC Plus Super Disks!

Posted: Wed Aug 13, 2014 11:30 am
by Vyothric
Don't know if any of these work but I can give them a try.

Image

Posted: Wed Aug 13, 2014 4:54 pm
by Quadko
Very nice. "Snake, Lake, Weasel" That has a nice ring to it - they obviously had fun trying stuff. And I think we (you? :)) tracked down hellfire at another request. I love the enthusiasm and little code snippets they traded around in those days. I wouldn't trade the internet and Sourceforge/codehub/etc., but it doesn't have the same cachet at all. Or maybe it's just I'm a software professional and not an amateur simply doing it for the love of exploration any more.

Posted: Sun Aug 17, 2014 1:02 pm
by Vyothric
Well, the bad news is that I could only get disk #41 to read.

But...I did manage to actually find Issue 35, so I scanned this:

Image

Posted: Sun Aug 17, 2014 1:15 pm
by ChrisM
That's brilliant :D I remember looking through PC Plus as a kid and flicking through until I found a mention of a game or something. (Seemed like games were only 2% of the magazine back then1)

I see from your disks the mention of the game snake, man that was a great version of the snake game. That's the one with mushrooms and different coloured apples right?

ALSO!!! I see the disk bottom middle mentions Read Guard, that's the game I was looking for in this thread - http://www.dosgames.com/forum/about1974 ... highlight= :) Tis a real shame that disk doesn't work. I'd love to find out what I was getting wrong in (what I assumed was) the final level.

Posted: Sun Aug 17, 2014 5:50 pm
by Quadko
Wizard!

Nice scan, thanks for sharing. I love the way atarimania catalogs ads along with game info; it's fun to see here as well.