Talk:Invasion of the Vorticons

Hey Litude, are you sure Keen Dreams was released before Goodbye Galaxy? Nobody I know had heard of it until well after Goodbye Galaxy came out, which is why it was referred to at the time as the 'Lost episode'. -- Malvineous 23:06, 24 March 2010 (GMT)

It's made very clear here: (http://www.3drealms.com/keenhistory/index.html) that Keen Dreams began development before Galaxy, however, Bill Amon's old Keen FAQ (http://db.gamefaqs.com/computer/doswin/file/commander_keen.txt), specifically section 2, implies that it wasn't released until much later. I'm not sure what his reference was though. So...it's a bit of a crapshoot. Flaose 16:14, 25 March 2010 (GMT)

So, the mystery deepens. Keen Dreams 1.00 (an initial commercial version with a radically different title-screen) is date-stamped as July 1991. Keen 4 v1.0 is date-stamped as December 1, 1991, and was publicly released December 15, 1991 (if my memory holds up), the first shareware version of Keen Dreams, v1.01, is date-stamped as late July and August 1992. So my theory is that Softdisk published all of the "Lost ID Software Collection" commercially in 1991, and after a year of poor sales decided to release one game (Keen Dreams) as a shareware exemplar of the other games you would get. Thus, I believe that Keen Dreams WAS released before Goodbye Galaxy, but it wasn't well known until a year after.

Though I can't prove it, natch. - Flaose 21:02, 26 March 2010 (GMT)

Keen Dreams was a pracise-run for Galaxy. However, as to which was eventually released first, I can't say... -- DHeadshot 17:47, 27 March 2010 (GMT)

John Romero lists Keen Dreams as 1992, but Galaxy as 1991. However, is he just repeating the Moby Games listings? After all, it was quite a long time ago - he may have used Moby Games to refrsh his memory -- DHeadshot 17:56, 27 March 2010 (GMT)

And Tom Hall's website lists it as 1990. I don't think their memories are a reliable source, haha. - Flaose 16:36, 29 March 2010 (GMT)

I used the 3D Realms website as my source of information and the file modify dates. As the files were completed in July 1991 (as the modify dates suggest), I highly doubt they would've over half a year to publish the game. Regarding Bill Amon's Keen FAQ and the fact that it states September 1992 as the release, it seems to coincide quite well with the release of the shareware version (file modify dates are late August 1992). --Litude 19:02, 29 March 2010 (GMT)

Well Dreams was definitely developed before Galaxy, that's obvious from the style and gameplay, but it was always my understanding that it was given to Softdisk to finalise some obligations id Software had. Flaose's theory that Softdisk then tried to sell it for a while (before Galaxy) then giving up and releasing an updated version as shareware (after Galaxy) makes the most sense with my recollection. It would certainly explain why none of my shareware loving contemporaries of the era knew about it until after Galaxy. So I guess you could argue that there may have been two release dates - the original release before Galaxy then the shareware re-release after. -- Malvineous 12:46, 30 March 2010 (GMT)

I certainly remember reading that there was a large jump between two of the versions relatively early on - perhaps the first of these wasn't shareware. -- DHeadshot 16:03, 31 March 2010 (GMT)