Greetings Fellow DMer's

Megatherion · Post by **Megatherion** » Thu Feb 22, 2007 8:48 pm

Hi Everyone,
I been to this site few times last few years and watched it grow+grow with more people so i figure i register. Neat to see alot of people returning to seek it out for that adrenaline rush and fear factor this game provided them, something todays games seem never really to be able to provide correctly. The fact you had to worry about your torches being lit, your adventurer's bellys being full, and making sure they had theyre adequate sleep 'zZZ' lol, was the perfect recipe for immersion. I purchased my copy new in 87 for my amiga 500 and like the rest of you spent countless hours + late nights roaming threw the lower levels and eventually flux caging chaos lol. Burnt out my ill fated amiga 500 floppy drive in process but it was worth it lol. I downloaded a version few years back for pc but it lacked sound so i lost interest quickly. I happened to revisit the forums here and was very happy to see the RTC version with all sounds etc. I noticed all the custom dungeons that are currently available and cant wait to try them.. Any recommendations? Before i do that im going to replay the classic and try and conquer chaos once more.. dam those worms still scare the hell out of me in the dark lol.

Suule · Post by **Suule** » Thu Feb 22, 2007 8:58 pm

My recommendation? Don't play RTC if you're a DM purist. Especially when you played DM2 too.

Try Conflux! It's great...

Trantor · Post by **Trantor** » Thu Feb 22, 2007 9:24 pm

Hi Megatherion, welcome to the forums!

Yes, you are right that DM is a very special game with a unique atmosphere. Don't listen to Suule, if you haven't played DM in a long while, you will hardly find any differences between RTC and the original DM or CSBWin.

I think the best custom dungeons are Towers of Chaos, Surgical Strike and Conflux III. Of those, only Surgical Strike is for RTC, and make sure you are using the old version 0.37, otherwise, some neat things will go wrong. Be advised that Conflux III is VERY hard, though, it makes Chaos Strikes Back look like a walk in the park. So for now, I'd suggest Surgical Strike or Towers of Chaos. Have fun here!

beowuuf · Post by **beowuuf** » Fri Feb 23, 2007 1:58 am

Umm, make up your own mind with RTC, I as with all clones of that type it has new features and is programmed without having access to the sourcecode

Yeah, comflux is cool (CSBwin), tower of chaos (CSWwin), imprsioned again (CSBwin or PC DM versions). Surgical Strike (RTC) and Angel's Egg (RTC)

Poison and Lost Scorlls are also good, fast PC DM games

Welcome to the forums!

Megatherion · Post by **Megatherion** » Fri Feb 23, 2007 7:51 am

Great thanks guys, i will give them a try.

George Gilbert · Post by **George Gilbert** » Fri Feb 23, 2007 11:24 am

Suule wrote:My recommendation? Don't play RTC if you're a DM purist. Especially when you played DM2 too.

Hmmmm

As Trantor says, unless you've played DM very recently (or preferably have RTC and DM running side by side) I don't think you'd notice many differences between the two games!

Conflux (for CSBWin) however is extremely good (although equally, extremely hard) and I wouldn't hesitate to recommend it.

Surgical Strike and Dark Portal (for RTC) are very elegantly put together and superb games in their own right. Linflas' Forest of Doom Demo (again for RTC) is graphically stunning; worth a look to see just what is possible...

My recommendation - try them all!

DSE · Post by **DSE** » Fri Feb 23, 2007 1:44 pm

I dont know what this means - "Don't play RTC if you're a DM purist"

Does a "clone" (yes by definition I know) have to exact ? Can it not be in the same vein, if you ask me RTC is really very good indeed and should not be subject to such comments ... just my opinion though. Why is RTC so far off the mark ... just interested because it plays very well and seems very close to the original (to me).

What do people think of DM Java, which catagory does this fall into, actually can someone put all the clones in a list and tell me if they are considered faithful reproductions and if they arent explain why ?

Also, if you want to play the original, why not just get an emulator for your favourite version and play it that way (I use the Amiga emulator WinUAE which works great) ? Surely, this is what the purists should be using ... not a remake or port of the original but the original itself.

Or is there history here that I dont know about ...

Adamo · Post by **Adamo** » Fri Feb 23, 2007 1:47 pm

Welcome to forums Megatherion!

yep, I agree - try`em all. What really counts is not the engine, but a designer`s idea and work that he put in building his own custom dungeon.

BTW: Suule, I found RTC version of DM2 even better than original one. RTC`s version keeps "old style" play, while in FTL`s original version there were a lot of differences comparing to good old DM/CSB dungeons. Improvements aren`t always for better; there are a lot of new things, wchich I didn`t like in DM2. RTC`s DM2 version keeps original "old style" interface, for example doesn`t have double step in-game move, wchich I didn`t like in FTL`s DM2 version. I would say GG`s DM2 is more "purist" in sense of a gameplay than FTL`s one (!) - so if you want to play DM2 I recommend you RTC engine rather than original version!

As for the custom dungeons, I think ConfluxIII is biggest & most complicated one.

DSA wrote:

Also, if you want to play the original, why not just get an emulator for your favourite version and play it that way (I use the Amiga emulator WinUAE which works great) ?Surely, this is what the purists should be using ... not a remake or port of the original but the original itself.

why? CSBwin is an EXACT translation (with other, optional features wchich you don`t have to use if you don`t like). So - when you want to play ST version of CSB, why to run it at ST emulator if you can have the same thing in windows?

Post by **linflas** » Fri Feb 23, 2007 2:05 pm

DSE wrote:What do people think of DM Java, which catagory does this fall into, actually can someone put all the clones in a list and tell me if they are considered faithful reproductions and if they arent explain why ?

- CSBwin : exact reproduction of ST version.
- RTC : not faithful because
+ monsters can ungroup
+ perspective/way of resizing items is different
+ monsters affected by poison don't run away from oh-ven cloud (which is really NOT cool when you fight dragons !)
+ many other minor stuff i don't remember
- DMjava : ermmm.. ask to someone else

DSE · Post by **DSE** » Fri Feb 23, 2007 2:24 pm

Adamo - I see your point, I however do run emulators in windows in full screen. Also, to reminisce I played the Amiga version which there isnt a direct port of, or is there ? Also (not wanting to start a fight :O)) but I did say "why not just get an emulator for your favourite version and play it that way". Thanks.

Linflas - thanks for your response, the clouds have parted slightly.

beowuuf · Post by **beowuuf** » Fri Feb 23, 2007 3:50 pm

DMJAva - not faithful because
Monster do not group
Monster go up stairs
Low levls of stamina lead to damage
Poison highly cumulative
Levels take longer to gain
Monster can heal over time
Monsters can climb stairs
Probably a few other stuff

Joramun · Post by **Joramun** » Fri Feb 23, 2007 4:50 pm

DM Java has only 4 skills if I'm correct. No subskills for Fgt/Nin/Prs/Wiz and no hidden skill.

The balance is very different, too...

Post by **Lunever** » Fri Feb 23, 2007 7:30 pm

As usual Suule exaggerates a bit imho. I had countless hours of fun playing RTC, even if there are a couple of things I would like to have a bit closer to FTL in general, closer to FTL in the "original DM" dungeon, or less FTL and more daring and experimental in the RTC-DM dungeon.

Adamo · Post by **Adamo** » Sat Feb 24, 2007 5:00 am

DSE wrote:

I did say "why not just get an emulator for your favourite version and play it that way".

ooh I`ve got it. For DM there are no big differences between platform versions, so it doesn`t matter, but Amiga vrsion of CSB has magic map option, wchich makes it favorite for most people.

Linflas wrote:

- RTC : not faithful because
+ perspective/way of resizing items is different

Beo wrote:

DMJAva - not faithful because
(...)
Poison highly cumulative

...there are also changes of the original code in CSBwin.

But SOME changes, if reasonable, are for the better. i am always a purist, but when, for examplde, RTC has better perspective, or poison cumulates in DMjava, that`s just more realistic (=better for the player).

beowuuf · Post by **beowuuf** » Sat Feb 24, 2007 8:56 am

Actually, since DM is a game there are game balances issues - whether it was just the balance of the dungeon or a balance in the engine, DMJava's level advancement and cumulative poison made it quite nasty - I am certainly not doing down the ngine, it just made one area so nasty I didn#t carty on for a while