Vanshilar -- Space Rogue
 

This is one of the earliest games that I played that I really explored a lot of nooks and crannies about. It came out in 1989 and was by Origin Systems' Paul Neurath. You are basically a space pilot who (eventually) prevent an impending war between us and bugs. How you go about making a living (trading, pirating, bounty hunting) is up to you, there's no pre-selected roles that you have to choose. The game is part real-time first-person space combat, and part overhead adventure/RPG where you walk around and talk to people, although the plot advances purely via the latter part (so that's the part that you're more involved with later on in the game).

The game is pretty open in the sense that it doesn't force you to proceed at any certain pace, so you're free to explore and build up your character and stuff. There's only 9 star systems total so it's not a "thousands of star systems to explore" type game, rather later on it's more about figuring how to advance the plot, like an RPG.

I have the original files for Space Rogue (although the one that's floating around that has copy protection disabled is probably more desirable, I have that too). I also have maps (i.e. compiled from screenshots), and lots of weird tips/cheats like to how play as a Wasp (far better accel etc. than the SunRacer you get), and have it pretty much memorized (still, I hope, it's been many years) so I can write a walkthrough of the game.

Would people be interested in a walkthrough of the game?

of course, we are interested. I will send you a PM with FTP-Info where you can uploads your Stuff on FTP.

I've uploaded the game, a review, screenshots, and the base and star maps.

I'm working on a walkthrough but that'll take a while. In the meantime, if you have any questions, feel free to ask.

By the way, the version that I uploaded has copy protection removed, but if needed, I can also post the answers. Also, I made a slight change to one of the maps, so the maps file I uploaded include that change.

Thank for your contribution! :thumbs:

What's meant here? Did you modify the content of the game? If you did so, for what reason?

One of the maps had a special item that you couldn't get because it was behind an obstacle. The item was already present, just behind something. I basically just removed that obstacle (these maps are static maps so there's no way to remove obstacles through in-game play). I think there was a bug that the game creator (Paul Neurath) probably didn't count on impeding getting that item, since you don't even know that the item exists when the obstacle is there, so it wasn't a "figure out how to get this item" thing.

I basically just changed the maps data file (a one-byte change) so that the obstacle doesn't impede your path. The maps image files (pictures of each map) that I uploaded include this change.

You can get the item by other means (by doing an unrelated quest), but I figured the item should also be acquirable this way, since quite a few items can be gotten by multiple ways, while there was only one other way to get this item.

Maybe it's narrow-minded, but normally games should be as close to the original as possible. Is this item valuable or powerful? Then it maybe should not be retrieved in other ways than through the quest. If it is not, you might be right and the change is just OK.

Actually, I am not sure about how strict Abandonia's rules on modifications on hosted games are, as we do also host cracked versions. It's an interesting question after all.

Yeah, that's why I made a note of it. The item isn't a super-powerful one (far as I know, those can only be gotten in one way), since it doesn't give you a ship ability, but it is an item that you'll possibly/probably need for the main plot depending on how you do it (then again, you can beat the game without getting the item at all, if you know what you're doing). In fact the item isn't mentioned at all in the walkthrough that I've seen on Space Rogue. But yeah, since a lot of the "second-tier" items can be gotten by several ways, I figured I'd put it in as well, since there's only one other way to get the item.

OH YES!!!
I LOVE THIS GAME!:clap:

Thank you for uploading the stuff in the box!

I only have the disc and just uploaded that.
The box and stuff, with the "cool" space rogue on the front, got thrown out when I flew the nest years ago.

You are a fecking star my friend!

I've uploaded a walkthrough for Space Rogue. It covers ships, trading, the plots, and even how to win at the game-within-a-game, "HIVE!". I also have some tips and tricks such as how to play as other ships, removing walls and obstacles (i.e. in the way that you remove walls in DOOM), and how to get the items in the game, as well as many other things.

I've also updated the base maps. I've marked out where items are, which doors need the key card or need to be picked, and the initial start positions of all the characters.

Thirdly, I've uploaded a save file, OETA.SAV. This was the file I used to play as any ship many years ago, but I find I can't reproduce the cheat now in Windows XP nor Dosbox, so I've included it for people who might want to use this method instead of save file editing.

I'm now working on a save file and game file editing walkthrough, such as how to change how many credits you have or what items you have, how to edit the maps, and so forth. However, it may take a while; I have most of the MAPS file mapped out, but don't know much about how to decode the text used when you're on a base (they're in the STRINGS file). Also, there's possibly a plot (or more) that's missing, since I couldn't figure out how to toggle a couple of the RPG plot toggles, so if you know of any plots that I didn't mention, please let me know.

Oh by the way, I didn't upload the stuff in the box, the maps are based on what's actually in the game, not what came in the box. I've lost those many many years back. However, they're readily available on replacementdocs.com.

Something that I just noticed, because I'm planning on putting my walkthrough on GameFaqs as well. I didn't particularly format the walkthrough, in particular I didn't word wrap the text to any particular number of characters, so they'll all really long sentences. Do I need to reformat the file?