|
If you owned a PC in the 80s and 90s, chances are very high you were familiar with this bad boy and/or any of his thousands of relatives: At their peak, CDs and floppies like these were given out like candy. You couldn't pick up a remotely PC-related magazine without having a collection of random software and game shareware dropped into your lap. The quality on these compilations varied greatly, since they were often put together by more or less professional companies; you'd get anything from the likes of Doom all the way down to baby's first "PC optimizer" full of ads. As a kid, I played the heck out of all the shareware CDs we got to get my fill of games. I could probably play the shareware episodes of Jazz Jackrabbit blindfolded at some point. Today, I'm still fascinated with shareware and all the forgotten nonsense that got slapped onto these disks. Thanks to the wonderful (and donation-worthy!) efforts of Archive.org, you can find a big, handy collection of shareware CD ISOs online. I imagine this is kosher to post, since this stuff was always meant to be copied and shared, but I'll take it down if I asked to. Post any thoughts/memories/findings about shareware here and make me feel a bit less alone in this 
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2019 02:03
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 8, 2024 14:58 |
|
|
I'm probably the same as you are with Jazz Jackrabbit, but with Jill of the Jungle. I played the first bit of that SO MUCH. That, Commander Keen, and the platformer Duke Nukem games hardly anyone remembers existed.
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2019 02:38
|
|
|
I used to buy PC Gamer and PC Zone back in the day, each month you'd get a CD-ROM chock full of demos and shareware with the odd freeware program thrown in for good measure. I think my favourite demo to play was Microsoft Flight Simulator '98.
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2019 02:38
|
|
|
Was it true that the Quake shareware CD had the full game, along with all previous ID Software titles?
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2019 03:52
|
|
|
I said come in! posted:Was it true that the Quake shareware CD had the full game, along with all previous ID Software titles? Mine does, along with the full soundtrack by Nine Inch Nails.
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2019 04:09
|
|
|
I said come in! posted:Was it true that the Quake shareware CD had the full game, along with all previous ID Software titles?
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2019 04:21
|
|
|
I said come in! posted:Was it true that the Quake shareware CD had the full game, along with all previous ID Software titles? There definitely was at least one version, I seem to remember it being Windows based. You needed a CD key generator or crack I believe. All the full versions were on the disc so you could call in and order them and play right away. edit: My Gravis Gamepad came with Commander Keen 4. But the joystick port we had only worked with 2 of the buttons, which sucked.
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2019 04:21
|
|
|
When I was a kid our main PC was a Packard Bell Windows 3.1 machine into the year 2000 which means I could only dream about playing games that required Windows 95/98. I lived off the Gravis Game Pad demo CD and any PC Gamer demo discs I could get my hands on. Jazz Jackrabbit, Hocus Pocus, Raptor: Call of the Shadows, Epic Pinball, One Must Fall: 2097 etc. Huge nostalgia for that era of stuff.
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2019 11:09
|
|
|
I loaned so many PC magazines from the library, just to scour their demo CDs for games of any sort. Sometimes games had snuck themselves into the software folder, so it was worth checking out every nook and cranny. It was nice imagining how the full games would be like. 
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2019 12:05
|
|
|
Here's some full versions of old shareware games that have since been freely released online by the rights holders. You'll want DOSbox for these, unless otherwise specified. Alien Carnage Bio-Menace Boppin' (Windows port!) Dark Ages Death Rally (Windows port!) Major Stryker Xenophage: Alien Bloodsport Tyrian (Ported to pretty much everything under the sun) Tyrian 2000 God of Thunder SkyRoads Jetpack Kiloblaster One Must Fall 2097 Overkill Stargunner Xargon There, that's far from definitive but it ought to keep you busy for an afternoon...
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2019 12:48
|
|
|
I played the Shareware campaign of One Must Fall over and over, was really fun. That game was probably one of the closest attempts to a good PC fighting game at the time. Helps that the music owned: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdVnKYcYi3g Also worth noting is that One Must Fall actually developed a legitimate modding community that created a bunch of awesome custom tournaments over the years. Here is a good place to start.
|
|
#
?
Oct 22, 2019 14:16
|
|
|
I got hugely into shareware in like uh I dunno, when was the heyday of Software Labs catalogs? 1992-1993? I must have ordered 50 disks in the span of a few months with my allowance before I figured out that these games were, in fact, not full games, and I was so confused by the very concept of paying for shareware (appropriately so). So then my shame of not understanding what shareware was led to the shame of turning my back on shareware forever and missing out on what was apparently the standard teenager-in-late-1990s experience of random crappy shareware games and web-based Flash games.
|
|
#
?
Oct 26, 2019 01:50
|
|
|
If it weren't for my 1001 DOS Games CDs, I would have never discovered stuff like Dangerous Dave, Jetpack, or Castle of the Winds
|
|
#
?
Oct 26, 2019 02:19
|
|
|
Castle of the Winds seems like the #1 thing I definitely would have been head-over-heels in love with if I had known it existed before like 2015. Popcorn, though, man, Popcorn was good
|
|
#
?
Oct 26, 2019 03:52
|
|
|
Dr. Quarex posted:Castle of the Winds seems like the #1 thing I definitely would have been head-over-heels in love with if I had known it existed before like 2015. Speaking as someone who played it years before finding out "roguelike" was a genre of games, yeah I thought it was pretty incredible back then, and it still holds up well enough for me. I play it on occasion. Another game I enjoyed playing off a shareware CD back in those days: Sorcerer's Cave. It's actually a computer version of a board game, plays kinda like a roguelike but doesn't have traditional RPG combat. It's interesting. I like it, but I don't know if it's for everyone.
|
|
#
?
Oct 26, 2019 04:08
|
|
|
Mordor: The Depths of Dejenol was another pretty good shareware roguelike (sorta).
|
|
#
?
Oct 26, 2019 04:24
|
|
|
American McGay posted:When I was a kid our main PC was a Packard Bell Windows 3.1 machine into the year 2000 which means I could only dream about playing games that required Windows 95/98. I lived off the Gravis Game Pad demo CD and any PC Gamer demo discs I could get my hands on. Did you get a bunch of random games and a desktop replacer with your Packard Bell too? I got it with one that had Win 95.
|
|
#
?
Oct 29, 2019 19:17
|
|
|
AngryRobotsInc posted:Mordor: The Depths of Dejenol was another pretty good shareware roguelike (sorta). You can still get it now, from the dev or gamersgate I think, but you'll need a VM or something to run it. The 3D sequel just wasn't the same, and put some harsh restrictions on class switching so you needed to plan rather than just levelling your whatever you wanted. Dungeon was a bit more interesting, crappy sound clips like "we wish to join" were the same.
|
|
#
?
Nov 3, 2019 17:48
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 8, 2024 14:58 |
|
|
rujasu posted:Speaking as someone who played it years before finding out "roguelike" was a genre of games, yeah I thought it was pretty incredible back then, and it still holds up well enough for me. I play it on occasion.
|
|
#
?
Nov 5, 2019 05:32
|
|
