Arena IX (Project Dump)
An incomplete work, now presented decades after its quiet cancellation. It follows directly from Arena VIII story-wise (obviously) and was of much higher ambition and production values compared to the previous games (from a historical perspective based on reviews on DigitalMZX, it wasn't a high bar to clear).
If that sounds unbelievable given Arenas IV-VIII, watch the title screen.
This was intended to mostly be a turn-based RPG, with resource management intended to be the primary challenge. There was even a hidden character you could recruit if you found them enough times.
I (Anerki) assisted here and there with writing and the like. Some characters were strange idealized (by ~14-16 year old standards) self-inserts, including at least one real-life friend of DGM's at the time.
There's a handful of glitches at the intro sequence, unfortunately, and it's shaky throughout. Even so, there's plenty of boards to poke through out of sequence to see how it was going to shape up. The game ends on an unintentional cliffhanger that ultimately was meant to tie some characters between this work and my own unfinished project, Gumballz (at that point called 'Me & My Gumballz').
I've long since lost contact with DGMascaro, so I can't ask him for permission directly. If you're seeing this down the line, DGM, hope things have gone well for you over the years!
If that sounds unbelievable given Arenas IV-VIII, watch the title screen.
This was intended to mostly be a turn-based RPG, with resource management intended to be the primary challenge. There was even a hidden character you could recruit if you found them enough times.
I (Anerki) assisted here and there with writing and the like. Some characters were strange idealized (by ~14-16 year old standards) self-inserts, including at least one real-life friend of DGM's at the time.
There's a handful of glitches at the intro sequence, unfortunately, and it's shaky throughout. Even so, there's plenty of boards to poke through out of sequence to see how it was going to shape up. The game ends on an unintentional cliffhanger that ultimately was meant to tie some characters between this work and my own unfinished project, Gumballz (at that point called 'Me & My Gumballz').
I've long since lost contact with DGMascaro, so I can't ask him for permission directly. If you're seeing this down the line, DGM, hope things have gone well for you over the years!