"Star Miner" is a lot like Asteroids except you collect material dropped by stationary asteroids (and sell it for upgrades, repairs etc.) and fight other ships. It's a simple game from 2003.

I *think* it's hard to find the full version of this game, so I'm sharing a link here. While doing some research recently I came across an old email from 2012 when I contacted Cliff Harris of Positech Games about his old game "Asteroid Miner" (or "Star Miner" as I played it in an eGames shareware disc). I re-contacted him, asking about getting the game on GOG, and ultimately he didn't seem that interested (and admittedly the game isn't high on the wishlist and isn't a particularly complex game so GOG might have rejected it). So I got permission to share the game; the zip file is the demo version with a registration key to make it the *full game*, and I included a dll to stop a crash and selected those standard compatibility fixes on the EXE.

It seems to run okay on my W7 machine but obviously I can't guarantee it for anyone else.

http://www.mediafire.com/file/4bqb8g548v8guj1/asteroidminerNew.zip/file

Gameplay: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1fseBg0E-g

Cool!

You didn't add any screenshot, however.
Is this the game you're referring to?
https://www.mobygames.com/game/windows/asteroid-miner

Anyone tried it on W10?

Oh yeah I forgot to link to a YT video. Edited in.

Small bump and some info I found in the YT link comments (I didn't have any game speed issue but others might):

"For game speed issue: Download ThirteenAG's Ultimate Asi Loader (x86) and put the .dll in the game folder. Rename the .dll to 'ddraw.dll'. Create a text file in the game folder and name it 'wndmode.ini' so the extension is .ini instead of .txt. Copy this in wndmode.ini (After saving the file Windows adds a '?' at the end of 'Border=0', delete it):
[WINDOWMODE]
UseWindowMode=1
UseGDI=0
UseDirect3D=0
UseDirectInput=0
UseDirectDraw=1
UseDDrawColorEmulate=1
UseDDrawFlipBlt=0
UseDDrawColorConvert=1
UseDDrawPrimaryBlt=1
UseDDrawAutoBlt=0
UseDDrawEmulate=1
UseDDrawPrimaryLost=0
UseCursorMsg=0
UseCursorSet=0
UseCursorGet=0
UseSpeedHack=0
SpeedHackMultiple=5
UseBackgroundResize=0
UseForegroundControl=0
UseFGCGetActiveWindow=0
UseFGCGetForegroundWindow=0
UseFGCFixedWindowPosition=0
EnableExtraKey=0
ShowFps=0
UseCursorClip=0
UseBackgroundPriority=0
DDrawBltWait=-1
Border=0 "

Also I guess what I shared isn't really new (I didn't realize) since other YT comments share the same code to turn the demo into the full game.

Also, "Asteroid Miner also supports IPX and TCP/IP multiplayer with a maximum of eight players, which is unlocked in the demo."

Thanks fellow gog user.
Edit: works on win xp but i had one crash by now with the modname ddraw no slowdowns though.

Did you try the Mediafire version in the first link? Sorry I can't help other than that and what's posted in this thread. You could try contacting Positech too but ultimately it just is a very old game made for old machines.

I actually got this to work!! Take a look at this YT vid:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cykBJw_gwOI

1. I downloaded the DSWin8 folder, took the two files in that folder (aqrit.cfg & ddraw.dll) and copied them into where astroidminer.exe is.
2. Downloaded V2_02_90_build.rar and extracted that whole folder into a folder above astroidminer.exe (see picture)
3. Followed the directions in the YT vid with Edit>Add and all of the other stuff.

Hopefully this works for you!

Thanks for the screenshots! I prefer that to youtube vids.

Is it just me, or does the intro screen, the text font, and the layout if the GUI seem familiar to anyone else?
I'm sure I've seen it in another game..
If only I could remember it.

You're welcome.
And you're right, I have a dejavu too, but I don't know about what other game.

Thank you! I wish I could find out who owns War Inc....
When I get back home I'll try Star Miner :D

Necrominer... :-)

heh, well since this has been necro'd (no problem with that if the new information helps people run the game), I'll share some other free/freeware titles I've shared in the past:

The Blupi games have been made free, you can download ISOs at the bottom - http://blupi.org/

and a way older thread of mine contains Nebula Fighter -
https://www.gog.com/forum/stargunner/nebula_fighter_cool_shmup_similar_to_stargunner/page1

and Hamumu Software made all his old games free (Spooky Castle, Supreme With Cheese, etc.): https://hamumu.itch.io/spooky-castle , https://hamumu.itch.io/