Blogs Games I Own: Dungeon Keeper, Theme Park, Theme Hospital

http://www.bit-tech.net/blog/2009/09/26/games-i-own-dungeon-keeper-theme-park-th/

 

theme hospital is one of my all time favourite games, and i still pull it out from time to time for a play.

i think when that finally stops playing on windows, it will be a sad sorry day for me

 

I recently tried to get Dungeon keeper 2 working on Windows 7. I failed. Ended up playing it on my XP laptop. Such a classic.

Now I'm searching high and low for my copy of Startopia. Like Theme Hospital on a 3D doughnut shaped space port. I love this one.

 

another game swallowed up by EA and tossed was westwoods NoX.. really liked that game

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nox_(video_game)

 

DK2 is an awesome game - great dark sense of humour running through it!

 

Bullfrog were serioualy amazing.

 

Theme Hospital and Dungeon Keeper 2 are fantastic. Like yourself, I've wasted many of my hours playing those games, but *never* completed either of them. I have a serious urge to go play Theme Hospital and actually complete it once and for all.

I bet there's some cosmic nirvana waiting for me.

 

I'm much the same. I tried to play Black and White but didn't get too far into it. Black and White 2 was better for me because it was simpler and somehow just more enjoyable - not that I am arguing for games to be more 'accessible' as such. More time was spent with creature fighting, say, than looking after whiny villagers.
I thought I liked strategy games because I used to spend a lot of time on Civ II and Red Alert 2. Yet I played Red Alert and found it somewhat boring, and Supreme Commander... well, it seemed to me to be the Diablo of RTS (grindy).
It takes some humour and consistently enjoyable gameplay to keep me going. Or semi-naked leather-clad women. That will work too. (There must be something there as to why the Horny Reaper is so angry... frustration perhaps?) Not that I would be so pathetic as to lust after digital women... And besides, I'm keeping myself for Jade...
P.S. I do not mean Raymond.

 

Dungeon Keeper is one of my top three all time favouite games (along with C&C Red Alert and Doom 2). Completed it LOADS of times. Mostly down to the fact that (unlike DK2) fortified walls were indestructable. My game plan for every map was basically find the choke points in the map straight away, tunnel right to them and build an inpenetrable wall across the gap. Then, with unlimited time on my side (especially if there were gems around, i.e. unlimited money) I could spend hours constructing the perfect dungeon in preparation of a final battle that would usually only last minutes.

It was this element of sandboxing, of giving the player time to design the perfect dungeon is what I loved so much about it. Some maps were quick and manic true, but mostly you could play it at your own pace. DK2 lacked this (shame), so the pace felt far more dictated by the game and not you.

You're right about the atmosphere making the games what they were though. The DK universe was such a coherient one, and the ability to possess your creatures and travel around in the (surprisingly robust) first-person view made it all the more believable. In fact, I might go play it again now. You have conquered this realm!

 

Gutted... just dug out my theme hospital CD, and i cant play it on 64bit Windows XP.

Any idea how to get it running again ?

 

@Simon, have you ever tried Abandon Loader or dos box?

Anyway, DK2 is one of my all time favourites too. Syndicate and syndicate wars... Good old times... PRE FPSs. But much time before C&C there was a fantastic game. Westwood's DUNE 2. The game that started all RTS (at least i think was the first ever).

I still remember when spaceship games were a must. Back then, Joe was in diapers...

 

Aahhh, and I really miss them.

Never finished any of the "theme" games nor DK... I do like strategygames and usually finish them but I never quite got into these (plus I didn't really see the "theme" games as strategy...more like a fun version of simcity

 

Wish I could get the Direct3D version of DK Gold running on newer OS's - i think the last OS that could run it was 2000, or even 98!

FYI your dungeon heart is being attacked.

@Simon: The installer for Theme Hospital is 16-Bit, so won't run in the 64-Bit OS. However, you can copy the files from the disk and enable compatibility. worked for me (though couldn't save for some reason)

DK is a 16-Bit launcher for the game, so no luck there

 

@Omnituens

I'm running DK Gold Direct3D in Windows Vista 64 bit.

Create a Windows XP 32-bit Virtual Machine with Microsoft VirtualPC and run the game in there.

Both DK and Deeper Dungeons work like a charm.

 

That doesn't count

However, how did you get the D3D version to run in XP? Mine just says "not a valid Win32 application" and I have to run it in Software mode.

 

@Omnituens

There's a D3D patch floating around out there that wasn't part of the Gold CD. My work firewall is blocking the download sites so I can't link you, but a google search results in a few places to get it from.

 

Hm, already tried all the ones I could find, but I'll give it a go.