Reply to Re: Crazy Old Tim Plays all the DMODs of 2003
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--The Evil Hero DMOD contest--
Announced on March 12, 2003, the Evil Hero contest was the second DMOD contest held by the Dink Network, and the third DMOD contest overall. Unlike the previous contest, this one was to have some sort of actual prize.
Entrants were required to make a DMOD where the protagonist was in some way evil. Notably, unlike the previous contest, there was no requirement that this evil hero not be Dink. The requirement that the hero's graphics be taken from the original game was also removed.
The original deadline for the contest had to be extended in order for there to be at least three entries, but the extension more than did the trick. A then-record five entries were released on June 18th.
155: Computer Virus Author: Blue Release Date: June 18, 2003
"System shutdown in 2 minutes."
This hack came in last in the contest. In fact, all four judges ranked it as the worst DMOD in the contest. This must have been discouraging to Blue, who never made another DMOD. The mod's rating on the site is brought up from 4.8 to 5.1 by the author's own review.
Poor, poor "Computer Virus." It won no awards; it wouldn't have even if they'd given out "not dead last by unanimous vote" trophies. There, there, little DMOD. *I'VE* got an award for you.
...or at least, that's what I wrote here (giving it the Award of Badness) before I decided to go back and check the DMOD one more time. At first glance, it seems that this DMOD is completely impossible to win. Despite the great attack and defense stats you start with, you just don't have enough health to survive the fast pillbugs that fill most screens, let alone the Seth-clone boss at the end. But I went back and found that there is a secret path that leads to an area where you can find three gold hearts and buy elixirs, making victory not just possible, but quite easy. With a little luck, you might even win without using any of the elixirs. Knowing this, I'd have to say that this DMOD isn't quite bad enough to deserve the DFMAOB. Sorry, DMOD. I know you wanted an award really badly. Try to suck a little harder next time.
The idea of a DMOD about some kind of computer problem remains fairly compelling, but nothing of interest is done with it here. You're told "two minutes" early on, but there's no time limit involved. Some effort is made to depict a messed-up world, but it mainly involves sprites that cycle madly through all of the frames in their sequences. They do this far too quickly, and it hurts the eyes.
The dialogue certainly isn't very interesting, especially the attempts at humor, which are some of the flattest I've come across in a DMOD. You can find a Dink clone, for example, who has an arrow stuck up his butt, rendering him unable to fart! Hilaaaarious. At least three of the scripts talk about farting. I can certainly appreciate a good fart joke, but "stop farting and start fighting" isn't much of a joke.
More motherboards should incorporate this kind of security measure. ...Mmm, lasagna.
Another point against this DMOD is that it doesn't fit the theme of the Evil Hero contest very well. For most of the DMOD's very short running time, it seems to be about Dink trying (somewhat reluctantly) to save the world from destruction by the virus. It's only upon examining a sign right before the boss that our "hero" declares that he is actually Dink's evil twin, and after defeating the "virus overlord," he plans to become an evil overlord himself. It's a point that's very sloppily thrown in. Upon beating the game, we learn that this character's name is "Joseph Smalwood" (a misspelling, I assume). There's also a threat of a sequel, but it doesn't display due to a bit of nonsense code.
Here, look at it:
Not sure where Blue got the idea that this would work. The code or the threat.
At least the boss arena is colorful. This guy says "YOUR SUCH AN A**HOLE" the first time you hit him, which I was immature enough to snort at.
Considering the theme of the contest, I'd have made the player be some kind of agent of the virus. Destroy the game world by messing up its logic. Now, that's a fun idea.
156: Beginning of Evil Author: Joeri van Eekelen (Magicman) Release Date: June 18, 2003
"No! More of those priests"
This DMOD came in fourth place in the contest. Hi, Magicman!
"Beginning of Evil" does some interesting things, but it ultimately is not very playable. I couldn't get anywhere near finishing it, and all the discussion I can find indicates that most people's experiences with the mod were similar to mine.
When an evil version of Dink is instructed by his mother to do his homework, his response (brutally murdering her with his bare hands) is perhaps a trifle excessive.
Then again, maybe he just didn't like her grammar.
Dink is soon given a series of tasks by somebody claiming to be a fallen angel; they tend to involve murdering more people. The first guy you have to kill doesn't turn into a corpse or anything, he just stops moving, which looks rather odd, but it's not a big problem.
No, the real problem starts when you get your second task - to fetch some holy water from a fountain to the south. When you attempt to do this, the screen will lock, and there is no way to ever get it to unlock without cheating. What makes this even worse is that there's another fountain to the west that you can get water from with no problem. If you do this, you will likely, as I did, assume that this is what you have to do, since the other fountain gets you trapped on a screen. Unfortunately, picking the wrong fountain means you miss out on a bonus of 5 attack and 3 defense, making the rest of the game insanely difficult. I managed to get quite far this way, but it is a tedious, frustrating affair, particularly because you have to fight nine (NINE!) screens in a row full of pillbug-like priests.
It doesn't get better after that. You'll end up in a confusing maze full of even more priests as well as boncas whom you won't be able to damage much if you haven't gotten the stat boost. After dying in the maze, I looked up discussion on the DMOD, found out about the stat boost, and went back and used the "unlock screen" cheat to get it. The fighting is indeed reasonable with the higher stats, but I still never made it out of that maze, which warps you around during screen transitions. After spending far too long looking for a solution, I gave up. Things apparently get even more frustrating after that, with a dungeon full of invisible holes that send you back. Pass, pass, pass. Yikes.
It's too bad this is so repetitive and frustrating, because the concept is entertaining enough. Dink ends up literally on a quest from Hell, cursed to immortality from his evil deeds. There's also a really neat graphical effect for teleporting where Dink appears to turn into a fireball. Unfortunately, I can't see myself playing this one again.
Hell is like Super Mario Bros. in that way.
Announced on March 12, 2003, the Evil Hero contest was the second DMOD contest held by the Dink Network, and the third DMOD contest overall. Unlike the previous contest, this one was to have some sort of actual prize.
Entrants were required to make a DMOD where the protagonist was in some way evil. Notably, unlike the previous contest, there was no requirement that this evil hero not be Dink. The requirement that the hero's graphics be taken from the original game was also removed.
The original deadline for the contest had to be extended in order for there to be at least three entries, but the extension more than did the trick. A then-record five entries were released on June 18th.
155: Computer Virus Author: Blue Release Date: June 18, 2003
"System shutdown in 2 minutes."
This hack came in last in the contest. In fact, all four judges ranked it as the worst DMOD in the contest. This must have been discouraging to Blue, who never made another DMOD. The mod's rating on the site is brought up from 4.8 to 5.1 by the author's own review.
Poor, poor "Computer Virus." It won no awards; it wouldn't have even if they'd given out "not dead last by unanimous vote" trophies. There, there, little DMOD. *I'VE* got an award for you.
...or at least, that's what I wrote here (giving it the Award of Badness) before I decided to go back and check the DMOD one more time. At first glance, it seems that this DMOD is completely impossible to win. Despite the great attack and defense stats you start with, you just don't have enough health to survive the fast pillbugs that fill most screens, let alone the Seth-clone boss at the end. But I went back and found that there is a secret path that leads to an area where you can find three gold hearts and buy elixirs, making victory not just possible, but quite easy. With a little luck, you might even win without using any of the elixirs. Knowing this, I'd have to say that this DMOD isn't quite bad enough to deserve the DFMAOB. Sorry, DMOD. I know you wanted an award really badly. Try to suck a little harder next time.
The idea of a DMOD about some kind of computer problem remains fairly compelling, but nothing of interest is done with it here. You're told "two minutes" early on, but there's no time limit involved. Some effort is made to depict a messed-up world, but it mainly involves sprites that cycle madly through all of the frames in their sequences. They do this far too quickly, and it hurts the eyes.
The dialogue certainly isn't very interesting, especially the attempts at humor, which are some of the flattest I've come across in a DMOD. You can find a Dink clone, for example, who has an arrow stuck up his butt, rendering him unable to fart! Hilaaaarious. At least three of the scripts talk about farting. I can certainly appreciate a good fart joke, but "stop farting and start fighting" isn't much of a joke.
More motherboards should incorporate this kind of security measure. ...Mmm, lasagna.
Another point against this DMOD is that it doesn't fit the theme of the Evil Hero contest very well. For most of the DMOD's very short running time, it seems to be about Dink trying (somewhat reluctantly) to save the world from destruction by the virus. It's only upon examining a sign right before the boss that our "hero" declares that he is actually Dink's evil twin, and after defeating the "virus overlord," he plans to become an evil overlord himself. It's a point that's very sloppily thrown in. Upon beating the game, we learn that this character's name is "Joseph Smalwood" (a misspelling, I assume). There's also a threat of a sequel, but it doesn't display due to a bit of nonsense code.
Here, look at it:
say_stop("`3Wait for Computer Virus II:The Dink Comeback.", X:313 Y:268);Not sure where Blue got the idea that this would work. The code or the threat.
At least the boss arena is colorful. This guy says "YOUR SUCH AN A**HOLE" the first time you hit him, which I was immature enough to snort at.
Considering the theme of the contest, I'd have made the player be some kind of agent of the virus. Destroy the game world by messing up its logic. Now, that's a fun idea.
156: Beginning of Evil Author: Joeri van Eekelen (Magicman) Release Date: June 18, 2003
"No! More of those priests"
This DMOD came in fourth place in the contest. Hi, Magicman!
"Beginning of Evil" does some interesting things, but it ultimately is not very playable. I couldn't get anywhere near finishing it, and all the discussion I can find indicates that most people's experiences with the mod were similar to mine.
When an evil version of Dink is instructed by his mother to do his homework, his response (brutally murdering her with his bare hands) is perhaps a trifle excessive.
Then again, maybe he just didn't like her grammar.
Dink is soon given a series of tasks by somebody claiming to be a fallen angel; they tend to involve murdering more people. The first guy you have to kill doesn't turn into a corpse or anything, he just stops moving, which looks rather odd, but it's not a big problem.
No, the real problem starts when you get your second task - to fetch some holy water from a fountain to the south. When you attempt to do this, the screen will lock, and there is no way to ever get it to unlock without cheating. What makes this even worse is that there's another fountain to the west that you can get water from with no problem. If you do this, you will likely, as I did, assume that this is what you have to do, since the other fountain gets you trapped on a screen. Unfortunately, picking the wrong fountain means you miss out on a bonus of 5 attack and 3 defense, making the rest of the game insanely difficult. I managed to get quite far this way, but it is a tedious, frustrating affair, particularly because you have to fight nine (NINE!) screens in a row full of pillbug-like priests.
It doesn't get better after that. You'll end up in a confusing maze full of even more priests as well as boncas whom you won't be able to damage much if you haven't gotten the stat boost. After dying in the maze, I looked up discussion on the DMOD, found out about the stat boost, and went back and used the "unlock screen" cheat to get it. The fighting is indeed reasonable with the higher stats, but I still never made it out of that maze, which warps you around during screen transitions. After spending far too long looking for a solution, I gave up. Things apparently get even more frustrating after that, with a dungeon full of invisible holes that send you back. Pass, pass, pass. Yikes.
It's too bad this is so repetitive and frustrating, because the concept is entertaining enough. Dink ends up literally on a quest from Hell, cursed to immortality from his evil deeds. There's also a really neat graphical effect for teleporting where Dink appears to turn into a fireball. Unfortunately, I can't see myself playing this one again.
Hell is like Super Mario Bros. in that way.
