Dangerous Dave!!!

[Zack]

John, until I first set my eyes on the original Doom, my favorite game of all time had to have been Dangerous Dave, on the Apple IIe. You have to bring Dave back in some form sooner or later!

I remember watching my brother finally make it to level 10 (Sadly, I never beat the game by myself), and we both noticed the huge letters "ID" at the beginning of the level. id Software wasn't founded until '91, so was this supposed to be a hint of things to come? What made you put it in there?

--Zack

[The Romero]

quote:Originally posted by Zack:
John, until I first set my eyes on the original Doom, my favorite game of all time had to have been Dangerous Dave, on the Apple IIe. You have to bring Dave back in some form sooner or later!

I remember watching my brother finally make it to level 10 (Sadly, I never beat the game by myself), and we both noticed the huge letters "ID" at the beginning of the level. id Software wasn't founded until '91, so was this supposed to be a hint of things to come? What made you put it in there?

--Zack

WOW, now this is a rarity: someone who actually played Dangerous Dave on the Apple //!!  How did you get ahold of that copy?

I don't recall putting an "id" near the start of Map10, but man, I am *CURIOUS* about it now!  I'm gonna bust out DDave in AppleWin and see it for myself!

[The Romero]

BTW, your post inspired me to run thru the Apple // version of Dangerous Dave and map out the levels so they're each in one big, long BMP.

I got up to level 6, but man is it HARD!!!!

Oh....I *will* map the whole game up to level 10!!!

I should post a BMP of the levels.... heh.  

[Zack]

That sounds really cool.. It's been a LONG time since I've seen anything past level 7 or 8    I am looking forward to seeing the maps...although I think GIF or PNG format would be better...

Where can I find the image for Dangerous Dave and a good Apple // emulator compatible with WinXP?? (Perhaps this "AppleWin" you speak of?)

And to answer your question: We had Dangerous Dave on the Apple II when I must have been around 6 or 7 years old, although I'm not sure. I asked my dad and he says he got it with a bunch of other games that came each month on a floppy --a subscription to SoftDisk games.

I am positive that 'ID' is in there because my Dad remembers it too, and especially because when we played Doom shareware for the first time, years later, and saw 'id Software' in the credits, my brother pieced the two together and figured id Software worked on the original DDave as well...heheh.

[The Romero]

Well, Zack, your dad was actually receiving the monthly disk subscription to UpTime, the main competitor of Softdisk's.  There was no mention of id Software in the game either because it would still be about 3 years after Dangerous Dave was released before that would happen.

*UPDATE* : I finished grabbing all of LEVEL 6 from Dangerous Dave.....I have 1-6 now.  More to come...

 

[Zack]

Yes, I did become aware of that after I learned of the original release date for Dangerous Dave. I am sure I saw "ID" in level 10 though...it was just a coincidence that that is what linked DDave and Doom together to me and my family.  

I thought perhaps that the name 'id Software' might have been lingering between you guys before you finally created your own company.

[KJ]

This is pretty interesting, too.  Off dopefish.com:

 

quote:
It was pointed out to me recently that the Dopefish can predict the future.  How?   Well, the original Dopefish sketch referenced above was drawn back in 1990.  Dopefish theologists point out that when the Dopefish was called into being by Tom, it made Tom have a foreshadowing of a future id release, Quake.  You want proof?  Look at this cutout from the picture.  See the Quake logo there?    Makes you think, doesn't it?  Especially when Tom was no longer with id Software when they began work on Quake.

[Zack]

That's way off topic. But according to the 'book of id,' Quake was originally a D&D character of John Carmack's...

[AdamW]

kj: heh, look at the word on the left of the picture. it's 'trident'. the drawing is clearly a sketch of a trident...

[KJ]

Yeah, that's what I thought.  But this post did remind me of that; what if they had all the ideas for future projects (i.e. the Quake logo, the name Id) long before they actually made anything with them?  I mean, I've got a lot of ideas like that...

[Zack]

quote:Yeah, that's what I thought. But this post did remind me of that; what if they had all the ideas for future projects (i.e. the Quake logo, the name Id) long before they actually made anything with them? I mean, I've got a lot of ideas like that...

Although that's obviously not the Quake logo there, id Software DID have Quake planned from the very start--even while the first keen trilogy was in the works, and before id Software was officially formed!

I have here an exerpt I typed up (and am typing up a second time due to an evil CD drive...I won't bother explaining) from the previews section in each episode of the first Commander Keen series (ep 1-3):

 

quote:
COMING SOON FROM ID SOFTWARE

As our follow-up to the Commander Keen trilogy, Id Software is working on "The Fight for Justice": a completely new approach to fantasy gaming.  You start not as a weakling with no food--you start as Quake, the strongest, most dangerous person on the continent. You start off with a Hammer of Thunderbolts, a Ring of Regeneration, and a trans-dimensional artifact. Here the fun begins. You fight for Justice, a secret organization devoted to vanquishing evil from the land! This is role-playing excitement.

And you don't chunk around the screen. "The Fight for Justice" contains fully animated scrolling backgrounds. All the people you meet have their own lives, personalities, and objectives. A 256-color VGA version will be available (smooth scrolling 256-color screens--fancy that)!

And the depth of play will be intense. No more "whack whack here's some gold." There will be interesting puzzles and decisions won't be "yes/no" but complex correlations of people and events.

"The Fight for Justice" will be the finest PC game yet.

Oh my...thank the good man upstairs (Ctulhu of course) that they didn't go with that title!    
I'm glad Quake didn't end up being an RPG either (and on that topic, I'm glad id Software didn't decide to go with developing the massively multiplayer game "Trinity" two years ago).

Did dopefish.com ever mention this preview from Keen? It's a shame that they resorted to crappy evidence of early ideas for Quake like that trident on Tom Hall's sketch.

[AdamW]

zack: i've already quoted that in another thread...do try and read stuff that's gone before  

[Zack]

quote:Well, Zack, your dad was actually receiving the monthly disk subscription to UpTime, the main competitor of Softdisk's.

Romero, my dad says he never heard of UpTime, and he's pretty sure he was getting disks from Softdisk...did UpTime distribute Dangerous Dave too?

By the way, how're those screenshots coming?

[Brick_Sledge]

I still haven't been able to find the Apple II version of Dangerous Dave.

[The Romero]

quote:Originally posted by Brick_Sledge:
I still haven't been able to find the Apple II version of Dangerous Dave.

Oh, it will be posted in time.