Dogworld
A Terrible Game Review by Paul Harrington
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Castle Paradox’s random game selector turns up some interesting gems. Today, I was greeted with a game that looked profoundly horrible: Dogworld. It’s an old game, posted back in 2003, but it seems no one actually downloaded it. I have no idea what this game is I don’t really know what to expect. Yet, I feel compelled to write a review, and will do so as I play the game.
Before starting, I open the text file included with the game and get to the character list.
Wolfie: Main hero of the game
Stat type: Power
Powder: Secondary Hero
Stat type: Water/Ice/Wind
Fifer: The Nabors dog
Stat type: Mud
Squirly: POWER TO THE SQUIRL!!
Stat type: Rabid
Pengwin: A Pengwin
Stat type: Water/Ice/Wind
Bessy: A very powerful cow
Stat type: Power
Starting up the game, I’m surprised to see that it uses plotscripting at all, and that there is actually an introduction scene. I expected to be thrown headfirst into an incomprehensible mess. Of course, the first text box has a dog declaring himself dictator and saying “YOU SHALL CRUMPLE!!!”, so I’m sure it’s only a matter of time. Oh, here we go:
That’s more like it. Control is now given to the player, who can then talk to the five NPCs present, none of which do anything. No text boxes, no actions, nothing. I look at my stats screen and find that every stat my character has is set to zero. I find another NPC standing on the roof of a house, but he doesn’t do anything either. I’m starting to suspect I didn’t download a game at all. I walk into a nearby house and find nothing. I walk onto the roof of another house, which ends up being a door, and find nothing in this area either. Both of these houses lead to empty, content-free yards. Two more houses are blocked by more mute NPCs. I finally go into a third, and I find a dog house in its yard. Messed up, because all of the inhabitants of this town are animals. The fact that some of them keep their equals as pets is troubling and sad. However, at least the doghouse has content!
Inside, I find stairs which lead me to the first NPC that can speak. His dialog is not what I expected, because it includes text from characters who aren’t present in the room.
The dog I am talking to then calls me “master” and dies. I try to leave town, and my exit is forbidden by a message that tells me to find “Powder.” I’m fairly certain that this was the dog I just talked to, and that he is now dead. There are no more rooms that I can access, but the text file says that the game ends at an airport, so something is amiss.
I turn on the OHR system debug key that allows the player to override wallmaps. I enter one of the houses blocked by NPCs, and find a brown dog; he dies when I talk to him. I realize at this moment that I am not playing a game involving a heroic quest; I’m controlling a psychopath that kills innocents with the power of words. I’m wondering why I can’t simply kill the game’s antagonist by talking to him, attacking him, or pushing him into a lake. He doesn’t do anything, he just stands in the center of town silent. Perhaps he’s already dead.
The last blocked house has nothing in it, so I use the debug keys to exit the town. I find myself on a world map, and enter a nearby city. I enter the first building and find several floors of identical rooms and desks, tables, and computers that I can walk through. Wolfie is perhaps a ghost, unable to make contact with the living world. After all, I find myself in an empty city in an empty world, unable to speak with the few living beings I encounter. This is a most terrible hell. I try four more buildings, and find them impossible to enter. Powder had told me to visit this place, but I find nothing but isolation and a depressing silence in this city of the dead. I leave quietly and make my way east.
I enter a forest and check my map. Disturbingly, I find far more than a forest; I find detailed images of every room in every building I have encountered so far. This is certainly the place where the world of the living intersects the world of the dead, and perhaps here I can find some sort of answers. I enter a tiny hole in a tree and am taken to a room whose interior measurements far exceed their exterior. Something is terribly wrong with this world. I find nothing in this room but a series of ever descending stairs, leading nowhere. I leave this tree and continue my wandering. I find two orange trees among the hundreds of apple trees, but they seem to do nothing. After following a trail, I come to what can only be the edge of the universe.
There is another hole here. I enter, knowing full well that what awaits may be the worst horrors of the Earth. I never could have anticipated what I'd find.
So it was true, I really had come to the end of the universe, and to my surprise this end contained gateways to other worlds. Ever curious, I decided to explore the so called “Secrate Area.” A door in the southern region leads nowhere but to the blackness of space. I enter what looks like a small town, and am teleported back to where the game begins. This is no good, so I return to the panel I used to get here and go back to exploring the legendary Secrate. I find another panel, and using it takes me back to the empty city I have already explored, but in a most horrific way; I am embedded in the wall of a skyscraper, unable to get down. I quickly exit, and return to the edge of the universe. As it would turn out, the edge of the universe is a terribly boring place filled with trick doors and bad color schemes. I return to the forest at last.
I spend far too long exploring the forest only to find no more doors. I give up, exit, and return to the world map. I can find nowhere else to go. I see an endless ocean, and my map is bare, except for the tiny island I am on. I return to my home town, heartbroken, and still none of the inhabitants respond to me. The quest is hopeless, and evil has prevailed. I surrender.