From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Mon Dec 1 22:22:13 2025 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (Mouse) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2025 17:22:13 -0500 (EST) Subject: [geeks] Somewhat OT: old game? Message-ID: <202512012222.RAA15886@Stone.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Decades ago - in the early '90s, I think, but I'm far from sure - I played a game I'm trying to find more info about. My memory is probably fuzzy, but I think it wasa a 4x(-ish) game, set in space. It ran either under DOS or under Windows (now-old Windows, of course, likely 3.1 or 3.11). The most memorable thing about it that is concrete enough for me to describe in text is that one of the planets was named "14 Coli" (which, incidentially, is something I didn't get until years later). Is that enough, perchance, for any memories to bubble up for anyone? /~\ The ASCII Mouse \ / Ribbon Campaign X Against HTML mouse at rodents-montreal.org / \ Email! 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From ross at sunhelp.lonsteins.com Mon Dec 1 23:48:44 2025 From: ross at sunhelp.lonsteins.com (Ross Lonstein) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2025 18:48:44 -0500 Subject: [geeks] Somewhat OT: old game? In-Reply-To: <202512012222.RAA15886@Stone.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> References: <202512012222.RAA15886@Stone.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: On Mon, Dec 01, 2025 at 05:22:13PM -0500, Mouse via geeks wrote: >Decades ago - in the early '90s, I think, but I'm far from sure - I >played a game I'm trying to find more info about. > >My memory is probably fuzzy, but I think it wasa a 4x(-ish) game, set >in space. It ran either under DOS or under Windows (now-old Windows, >of course, likely 3.1 or 3.11). The most memorable thing about it that >is concrete enough for me to describe in text is that one of the >planets was named "14 Coli" (which, incidentially, is something I >didn't get until years later). > >Is that enough, perchance, for any memories to bubble up for anyone? I don't remember the planet names (and don't get the joke if there is one there) but there were VGA Planets and Master of Orion about that time. - Ross From mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG Tue Dec 2 00:27:51 2025 From: mouse at Rodents-Montreal.ORG (Mouse) Date: Mon, 1 Dec 2025 19:27:51 -0500 (EST) Subject: [geeks] Somewhat OT: old game? In-Reply-To: References: <202512012222.RAA15886@Stone.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> Message-ID: <202512020027.TAA24663@Stone.Rodents-Montreal.ORG> >> [...] one of the planets was named "14 Coli" (which, incidentially, >> is something I didn't get until years later). > I don't remember the planet names (and don't get the joke if there is > one there) "E coli" with the E converted from hex to decimal. > but there were VGA Planets and Master of Orion about that time. Hm, looking at Wikipedia.... VGA Planets, according to Wikipedia, is not it. That was multiplayer (and was much slower; the one I played could complete a few games in an afternoon). In the one I played, the computer played all other races, factions, empires, whatever they were called. Master of Orion is closer, but the screenshot in the wikipedia page looks both too elaborate (in the main-screen graphics) and too simple (in the text) to match what memories I have. If those are representative of games of that era, what I'm looking for probably was later, maybe late '90s? Context indicates it definitely was before the turn of the millennium (I didn't have access to that place after about then). Mouse