Alien Carnage

[AutoAdmin]

Feel free to rate and discuss this game.

[ThreeHeadedMonkey]

Cool little platformer that's completely different and original. It's freeware nowadays (thank you Apogee, and Joe Siegler in particular), so grab your copy and check it out!

[DOSGuy]

Hey, how about a little credit for Classic DOS Games, too! I originally approached John Passfield about the idea of liberating Alien Carnage/Halloween Harry, and he basically said that he would love to, but he was trying to get the game ported to handheld systems first. I didn't want to publish his private emails, so I asked him to go on the record and do an interview for the site, which you can find here.

Although he didn't release the game as freeware at that time, it was highly encouraging that he was quite willing to do so in the future. Ultimately, Joe Siegler asked him again after a year and a half had passed with no news of a handheld port, and by that time he was ready. Joe Siegler absolutely should be thanked for his commitment to release every discontinued Apogee game as freeware. I'm proud that Classic DOS Games sowed the seeds of this release back in 2005. It just goes to show that if you get an encouraging response, keep nudging once and a while and you may eventually get what you want.

[ThreeHeadedMonkey]

I wasn't aware of that. I'd be interested to see how a console version of AC would turn out.

[MrFlibble]

I've just noticed that something that did not catch my attention before: in Halloween Harry (at least, in the shareware version) the missions are timed, with a countdown timer displayed at the status bar. However, in Alien Carnage (both shareware and full versions) the time limit was apparently removed altogether, and the timer on the status bar is replaced with the counter of how many captive civilians remain on the level.

Another difference is that while in Halloween Harry you need to pay 5 credits to buy flamethrower/jetpack fuel from ammo dispensers, in Alien Carnage you can refuel for free.

I thought that Alien Carnage v1.0 is identical to Halloween Harry v1.2 in everything except the swapped episodes and different title screens.

Oh, and one more thing is that the music in the first level of the office block episode from Alien Carnage is completely different from the music in the same level in Halloween Harry. No idea though if the music was just swapped or the tune in Alien Carnage is entirely new, because I haven't played all the levels. It's not like they swapped episodes 1 and 3 and kept the respective music as it was, since the sewers episode in Alien Carnage starts with a different music theme as well.

[Frenkel]

That's some nice information for the Apogee Software Game Information Vault.

[MrFlibble]

I wonder if they removed the time limit and jetpack fuel cost because of player feedback or just to make the game more accessible. It's certainly quite easy to miss some of the captives and lose a mission because the time ran out, or because you no longer have any fuel to navigate around the level. However, with the time limit Halloween Harry plays more like Alien 3 on Sega Genesis, which I believe was one of the inspirations for the game (well, there are a few direct shout outs to the Alien franchise there anyway).

[Malvineous]

When the time runs out the game doesn't end though. It's a bit like par time - you get a bonus if there's time left on the clock, if there's no time left, no bonus. And if you run out of fuel you can still use the jetpack, it just becomes more annoying (it cuts out after one second or so and you need to press the up arrow again to get another second of use out of it.)

So not really sure why they changed those aspects of the game!

[Lunick]

I'm sure you could probably ask Steve here http://spacecaptsteve.tumblr.com/ dunno if he would remember though

[MrFlibble]

When the time runs out the game doesn't end though. It's a bit like par time - you get a bonus if there's time left on the clock, if there's no time left, no bonus.

Hmm, I remember vaguely playing the shareware version of Halloween Harry - not sure if it was v1.0 or v1.2 though - and I think that when the time ran out (I missed a captive on level 1 and had to backtrack) I failed the mission. At least, this is how I remember it, I may very well be wrong on this. (E.g. maybe I got to the elevator, found out that I had a captive yet to rescue, and, realising that I wouldn't succeed before the time ran out, quit the mission.)

As for jetpack fuel, I don't think I ever ran out of it but I certainly was worried about the possibility

[Malvineous]

Just went to install the shareware version and something tells me they copied the install scripts from another game...