Overall most helpful review

Posted on: October 30, 2012

predcon

Games: 451 Reviews: 6

More death animations than Space Quest!

To think this all started from a tech demo featuring SMB3-type smooth scrolling (see 'Dangerous Dave in Copyright Infrigement; see also 'Shadow Knights'). Preceding iD's Commander Keen series was this scattergun-toting redneck, Dangerous Dave, in a variety of improbable, yet cliche, situations. The rules are simple: Shoot everything that moves, collect goodies, and don't get killed. Of course, the folks at Softdisk (under the Gamer's Edge label, a mail-order service predating GameFly) made sure that dying was a pleasurable experience, and threw in a little 'close-up' window that would pop up with an animation of Dave being killed by whatever struck him. The sounds are in glorious, digitized PC Speaker, the colours are in a vibrant EGA, and the levels are classic 'Get to the Exit point' layouts. New players may find the levels a mite repetitive, and would have fun for the first hour or so (there aren't any save points to speak of, so you'll have to play the whole thing through in one session), but older players who still enjoy the original Super Mario Bros. will definitely want to invest in this trilogy. For the former, I would suggest that you try out the first episode of Commander Keen: Invasion of the Vorticons. If you enjoy it, and think you would have fun playing this sort of thing for hours on end, then you'll have fun with Dangerous Dave.

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Posted on: February 5, 2013

Jeffpiatt

Verified owner

Games: 103 Reviews: 7

Lost ID Classic

this trilogy of games is continued from John Romero's platformer series for the Apple ][ computer. The series here is built using the Commander Keen 3.5 engine made with the same code as keen dreams. The first game was made by ID after they split from softdisk under contract. it basically combines the keen game play with the gore id would later be famous for. you play Dave an redneck with an shotgun and you gun down zombies and other demonic creatures. the first game has regenerating ammo when you stop in an safe place you reload your gun. the softdisk episodes you have to pick up shells. if you like id's other games you will find this game interesting.

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Posted on: July 27, 2022

MaxxSkywalker

Verified owner

Games: 235 Reviews: 1

Worth it for Haunted Mansion Alone

This pack features four games emulated in DOSBOX. Dangerous Dave (in the Pirate's Hideout): This game is not objectively good. It feels like an amateur Flash game that predates amateur Flash games, with unfair level design and trial and error gameplay. There are no continues, and you can't get anymore than three lives at a time, so if you game over, you have to start at the very beginning of the game. Yet, there's a simple charm to be had in its simplistic design. An early prototype of things to come, you can definitely see John Romero's design philosophy that carries heavily into games like Wolfenstein 3D. Dangerous Dave in the Haunted Mansion: is the reason to pick up this collection. The game holds up really well close to thirty some-odd years later. The level design is top notch, and the reload mechanic is effective at building tension. While you can't save, if you game over in the latter portion of the game, you have the option of continuing at a previous level to try again, so all is not lost if you lose all your lives. If you get to the last level before the final boss, you can even get an endless cycle going if you keep failing, effectively resulting in infinite retries. The final boss is challenging, yet fair. Dangerous Dave's Risky Rescue: At this point, Romero is no longer at the helm, and you can definitely feel it. Not quite as refined as Haunted Mansion with messy level design and goofy sound effects. The saving mechanic, while very much appreciated, makes the lives system absolutely useless. But that's okay, because challenge shouldn't be based on how many lives you have left. The game overall is good, but not as great as its predecessor. Dangerous Dave goes Nutz: is a game. Takes the previously established elements and crams them into a repetitive and annoying romp through an insane asylum with tons of overused repeating assets. Thankfully the game is far shorter than its predecessors. I guess the developers got tired of developing this game too.

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Posted on: February 11, 2019

Foxysen

Verified owner

Games: 356 Reviews: 39

Haunted Mansion rocks! The rest is trash

DD1 is a port of Double DD game from Apple II. Dangerous Dave was important for Apple II as it was the first proper platformer game for a system, they say, with John Romero figuring a fancy workaround to make collision detection work. But on PC it's a really basic platformer. Clumpsy. With only 10 levels but difficulty through the roof. You have to do a lot of one-tricking. Die in one hit and you can't even have more than 3 of lives at the same time. Trollish design, even got fake platforms. Yea, old 2D DOS platformers games sucked compared to consoles and this one ain't exception. Even if I had it in childhood. Now, DD2 is the real classic. Unique and really good. Dave now has a shotgun and infinite shells in his pocket, out to get ghouls. Think of it as a mix of Doom and Shinobi. From Doom it got gore, yess, shotgun action, ghouls to kill. just rocking. And from Shinobi it got pacing and tension, with one-hit death. Sometimes you are shooting baddies from safe spots diagonally while platforming. Dealing with enemies that can handle verticallity. And then you sometimes travel on the same planes, waiting for monster to pop out from the edge, such as slow zombie or fast werewolf that jumps above you but can screw you up due to level design, with you being all tense. And then taking small break as you reload your shotty by standing still. Also, small death scenes and best usage of PC Speaker I heard so far. Still, it's not perfect and dieing on tricky last parts of some levels sucks. Now, DD3 and 4 were made by different devs instead. Switch to Soundblaster! DD3 ended up amateur, seems like it's their first work. Sure, ammo is limited now but you won't care as you will get like 200 ammo, 50 lives and even get to keep keys even if you die. Tiling of the levels is bad. Combat lost most of vertical threat. Setting is silly. Trash. DD4 is simply lazy! Same bland setting for all bland levels. Bland everything. Infinite ammo, spam projectiles. Just. ROBLOX UGH NOISE!

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Posted on: April 29, 2013

Schnuff

Verified owner

Games: Reviews: 31

Old but not good

Memories of some games are better if you don't try to play the game again after many years. Dangerous Dave is one of those. A platformer with an handicap. You must memorize the way. Not only can enemies you don't see on the screen see you ... and shoot you (but you can try to jump over the knives?) but there are traps that you can only find if you step on them. Highly frustrating because with every hit you loose one of your lives AND must start from the beginning again.

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