Trying to ID an old dos game

[Gingerbread Demon]

This was a dos based game but it had really nice graphics, not pixelated as such you could tell they were people and the environments were really well drawn for the time. It came on 8 disks.

It was set in the future and you are a guy trying to save the world and some of the locations are city streets a brothel, a spaceport and a palace. The world was semi industrial looking too.

Also this was one of the first games with actual speech for the characters in that they talked even though there was subtitles but I could never get the sound part to work properly, only the music played and sound effects but the speech was something that never worked on my then win 98 machine.

 

[Timby]

Shot in the dark, but Omikron: The Nomad Soul?

Edit: Or Thief: The Dark Project?

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

Shot in the dark, but Omikron: The Nomad Soul?

Edit: Or Thief: The Dark Project?

No, I thought it might actually be Syndicate or Syndicate Wars but I just found those in my GOG library and totally different.

 

[UssGlenn]

One of the later Space Quest Games?

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

One of the later Space Quest Games?

No those didn't have many adult sections I do remember this game getting an MA rating here in Australia where I bought it. I should have kept the bloody thing

 

[Malicia]

No, I thought it might actually be Syndicate or Syndicate Wars but I just found those in my GOG library and totally different.

I was thinking Syndicate as well. That was an amazing game and one of the few games I completed on the Amiga. Mission Completed

Can you remember anything about the developer or publisher or rough year of release to narrow down a search of MA rating titles from around that time?

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

I was thinking Syndicate as well. That was an amazing game and one of the few games I completed on the Amiga. Mission Completed

Can you remember anything about the developer or publisher or rough year of release to narrow down a search of MA rating titles from around that time?

I think late 90s because I was running it on a win98 machine with "a massive" 500mb drive

 

[Owain Taggart]

I never played the Syndicate games. I thought they looked like strategy games, which I never was much into, so I never looked into them.

 

[StewMc]

Beneath a Steel Sky?

 

[BK613]

I guessing it's not something obvious, like Duke Nuke'em 3D? What genre was it, do you remember?

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

I guessing it's not something obvious, like Duke Nuke'em 3D? What genre was it, do you remember?

Adventure and it seemed to have a bit of everything, but I remember buying it because the selling point was "digitized voices" but it did have semi decent graphics too for the time and was 2d and isometric for some sections

 

[Reverend]

Adventure and it seemed to have a bit of everything, but I remember buying it because the selling point was "digitized voices" but it did have semi decent graphics too for the time and was 2d and isometric for some sections

Your best bet is to try and search Mobygames, as it's about the most inclusive and easily searchable game database around. Based on what you said, I've narrowed it down to these possibilities (I'm assuming you meant eight 3.5" disks, not CDs, since the latter would almost certainly mean it's an FMV game.) Might not be listed here, but it should give you a start. Try altering the parameters based on what you recall, and see where that gets you.

Never heard of it, but 'Innocent Until Caught' seems like it might be a promising candidate.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

OMFG. That's the one. Innocent until caught.

Loved that game to bits. Could never get the fricking voices to work but the in game music worked fine.

 

[Reverend]

OMFG. That's the one. Innocent until caught.

Loved that game to bits. Could never get the fricking voices to work but the 8n game music worked fine.

Looks like it had a sequel too. Neither seem to be on GOG, so they're probably abandonware at this point.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

Looks like it had a sequel too. Neither seem to be on GOG, so they're probably abandonware at this point.

Now tempted to go hunt this down now that I know the title.

Legally where does abandonware sit?

 

[Haggis and tatties]

^^^I doubt you will have to worry bout the Dos police.....but more about getting it to run on a moden system as on the my abondonware site people have left comments about the game having siies with dosbox.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

^^^I doubt you will have to worry bout the Dos police.....but more about getting it to run on a moden system as on the my abondonware site people have left comments about the game having siies with dosbox.

I noticed but still might grab it.

 

[Reverend]

Now tempted to go hunt this down now that I know the title.

Legally where does abandonware sit?

Not sure to be honest. Psygnosis got bought out by Sony, then turned into Studio Liverpool before being closed down as a shell of it's former self. But for a while there in the late-90's it was still a semi-independent developer for non-Sony platforms and still made their own products, so who knows where the rights to it's earlier titles lay.

Often with these things, no one entity really owns them anymore, hence; abandonware. Indeed, them not being on GoG is a good indicator that either nobody owns it, or nobody knows if they own it or not, as GoG can sometimes spend years tracking down and negotiating rightsholders to get an official digital release to happen. It's not unusual for there to be several different rightsholders depending on which company got bought out by whom, and how much ownership the original programmers retained (dev teams were relatively tiny back then.)

Websites that archive such software (and the associated emulators) seem to exist in a semi-legal loophole based around the idea that "if nobody even knows they own it, they won't know to file a cease & desist." In practical terms; such rogue archivists are probably the only thing keeping the memory of older obscure games alive, and are going to be mostly responsible for any kind of official remaster & re-release.