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[AlumiuN]

Originally Posted by DarkStar88

How glad I am to see WoE up on Abandonia, with a fair review and working download link. Plucked from a discount rack years ago at a store whose name I forget, this obscure game surpassed my expectations on all measures. It is high time it was given a fair shake.

The essence of this game can be distilled to this: WoE has the ability to take you out of your seat and put you in the shoes of the protagonist. Turn off the lights, find a good set of headphones, and clear your schedule for the next eight hours. Block out the world for a time and you will become that lone soldier in the BTS suit. Exhausted. Jumpy. Horrified. Overwhelmed. Confused. And with the terrible knowledge that your mission is far, far from over.

Know your enemies, watch your status, and at all times remember the Golden Rule of Battle --- In order to win you must defeat every enemy you encounter. The enemy only has to defeat the one of you.

Perhaps one of these days I'll write a proper walkthrough for Woe, seeing as there is none.

I'm glad to see you agree with me. Although I'll admit that I spent far longer than 8 hours playing the game... Did your budget version have a box?

EDIT: And did the Alien Artifact in Level 3 have a purpose?

[DarkStar88]

Originally Posted by AlumiuN

I'm glad to see you agree with me. Although I'll admit that I spent far longer than 8 hours playing the game... Did your budget version have a box?

Nope. It was just the CD case stuffed in among many others on a cheap CD rack. Thankfully the included documentation was pretty thorough.

[AlumiuN]

Originally Posted by DarkStar88

Nope. It was just the CD case stuffed in among many others on a cheap CD rack. Thankfully the included documentation was pretty thorough.

Got a scanner? We could do with a manual and some boxshots (as long as it doesn't look like a budget case ).

[DarkStar88]

Originally Posted by AlumiuN

Got a scanner? We could do with a manual and some boxshots (as long as it doesn't look like a budget case ).

Sorry, wasn't clear on that. The documentation is on the CD itself in an executable.

I may include a list of enemies with screenshots of the list that appears at the main menu if you wait long enough if I ever get that walkthrough started. |-p

As to the questions---

Which Alien Artifact are you referring to? There's a green orb-like one in the alien pyramid that instantly heals you when used in the inventory menu. (good for several uses)

The teleporter room is a controlled-access deal that wasn't really supposed to be run by a single person. It's one of WOE's nastier logic puzzles, like an invisible lava bridge that'll show up later on.

Quite simply it's the old "this thingy turns off that one and that one, and this thingy etc, etc." Try completing the thing before you start the place blowing up. Note carefully which switches affect which other switches.

[AlumiuN]

Originally Posted by DarkStar88

Sorry, wasn't clear on that. The documentation is on the CD itself in an executable. I may include a list of enemies with screenshots of the list that appears at the main menu if you wait long enough if I ever get that walkthrough started. |-p

I've got that one myself. I don't know why I haven't added that as an extra yet. :S Can you still take some box shots if possible?

Originally Posted by DarkStar88

As to the questions---

Which Alien Artifact are you referring to? There's a green orb-like one in the alien pyramid that instantly heals you when used in the inventory menu. (good for several uses)

The red one in the level before the transmitter that when you pick it up, sh*t goes on fire and you start getting pelted by an evil totem pole. I must have missed the green one the first time around.

Originally Posted by DarkStar88

The teleporter room is a controlled-access deal that wasn't really supposed to be run by a single person. It's one of WOE's nastier logic puzzles, like an invisible lava bridge that'll show up later on.

Quite simply it's the old "this thingy turns off that one and that one, and this thingy etc, etc." Try completing the thing before you start the place blowing up. Note carefully which switches affect which other switches.

It would be easy if it weren't for those damn doors that let you in to the other four switches. Let's just say that out of the six switches, they have to be pushed so that you can go from one side the other without having to go back out the way you came in.

Hi,

Dave Faller here (yes, that one).

Apologies to AlumiuN, I changed e-mail provider a while back so I probably never received your e-mail.

Anyway, it's great to see discussions about WoE still going on after all this time (14 years!). Before anyone asks, I don't know how to get through the levels, it has been a long time! Reading through this thread I can't believe how much I had actually forgotten.

About the level editor. It required using two monitors to use, the normal VGA one and a monochrome monitor connected to a Hercules graphics card. The VGA displayed the game as normal, the monochrome had all the editing functions on it (yeah, two monitor systems back then, boy we rocked!). The question is, is the editor in the game that was released? I don't know. The only way to find out is to get hold of a Hercules card and plug it in and see what happens. On a technical note, the Hercules video ram mapped to a different address and IO range than VGA which allowed the two to co-exists, but did mean controlling the card directly.

The game wasn't entirely written in assembler, there was a semi-compiled lisp-like scripting system in there - the compiler created byte codes which were interpreted by the game. These scripts controlled all the game logic. Alas, this compiler no longer exists in my archives. This was the last project I did that involved so much assembler - it just takes too long to write anything in assembler.

My favourite puzzle is definately the three digit combination lock - specifically the code to get out. The code to get in is on one of the clipboards that others have mentioned. The only clue to the combination to get out is given by one of the NPCs, along the lines of "you need a code to get out as well as getting in". Now, if you think about it, to get into the room in the first place, the combination lock must be set to the code required to unlock the entrance, so you needed to make a note of the combination when you entered the room before changing the combination. Of course, most people missed this.

As for the valve-turning puzzle - there is a logic behind how they behave, but don't ask me what it is, I don't recall.

Dave Faller

P.S. Flez and Ian are the same person.

[AlumiuN]

Originally Posted by Dave Faller

Hi,

Dave Faller here (yes, that one).

Apologies to AlumiuN, I changed e-mail provider a while back so I probably never received your e-mail.

Anyway, it's great to see discussions about WoE still going on after all this time (14 years!). Before anyone asks, I don't know how to get through the levels, it has been a long time! Reading through this thread I can't believe how much I had actually forgotten.

About the level editor. It required using two monitors to use, the normal VGA one and a monochrome monitor connected to a Hercules graphics card. The VGA displayed the game as normal, the monochrome had all the editing functions on it (yeah, two monitor systems back then, boy we rocked!). The question is, is the editor in the game that was released? I don't know. The only way to find out is to get hold of a Hercules card and plug it in and see what happens. On a technical note, the Hercules video ram mapped to a different address and IO range than VGA which allowed the two to co-exists, but did mean controlling the card directly.

The game wasn't entirely written in assembler, there was a semi-compiled lisp-like scripting system in there - the compiler created byte codes which were interpreted by the game. These scripts controlled all the game logic. Alas, this compiler no longer exists in my archives. This was the last project I did that involved so much assembler - it just takes too long to write anything in assembler.

My favourite puzzle is definately the three digit combination lock - specifically the code to get out. The code to get in is on one of the clipboards that others have mentioned. The only clue to the combination to get out is given by one of the NPCs, along the lines of "you need a code to get out as well as getting in". Now, if you think about it, to get into the room in the first place, the combination lock must be set to the code required to unlock the entrance, so you needed to make a note of the combination when you entered the room before changing the combination. Of course, most people missed this.

As for the valve-turning puzzle - there is a logic behind how they behave, but don't ask me what it is, I don't recall.

Dave Faller

P.S. Flez and Ian are the same person.

Good to hear from you again, Dave. I didn't think you had shunned me. On a side note, does anyone know any emulation software that supports dual-screens and Hercules graphics cards? Anyway, that valve-turning puzzle kept me busy for about 5 hours while I turned them all in succession, seeing as I couldn't find any sensible solution and the only sign that it worked was some of the machinery and the screen at the door. 512 combinations later...

Also, Ian and Flez are the same person?

Finally, one of my friends asked me yesterday if I wanted to help remake WoE in the Source engine. Knowing him, nothing will come out of it any time soon, but I foresee a remake in the future...

EDIT: Actually, can you remember the RSC and LIB file specs? Because if you can, I may be able to wangle an existing Wolfenstein editor to edit WoE.