efliks / dark-harmony

My first DOS game: revived!

Dark Harmony v0.1

Dark Harmony, previously known under a Polish name Mroczna Harmonia, was my first game written in C. If I recall properly, the development started around 1999, and it was in 2001 when I added the last changes.

Here it is again, 22 years later, cleaned up slightly and made possible to compile.

The code is really bad from today's perspective, but keep in mind that it was written by a teenager. I had to remove the sound code, which was buggy and never worked properly. Maybe I will add it again if I find some time.

In the meantime, enjoy Dark Harmony!

Installation instructions

To compile Dark Harmony, you need Turbo C++ 3.0 and a PC running DOS. You can also use a DOS emulator, for example DOSBox or a VirtualBox VM with DOS.

Once you have Turbo C++ 3.0 installed, replace the following paths in the makefile with your own:

CC=c:\tc\bin\tcc.exe
LINK=c:\tc\bin\tlink.exe

And adjust the -L option in tlink.txt:

-Lc:\tc\lib

Then, build the executable:

c:\harmonia > c:\tc\bin\make.exe -f makefile

Q&A

1. How to play Dark Harmony?

   Once in the intro screen, hit <SPACE> to enter the game. Use keyboard arrows to control the position of the player. Use <CTRL> to fire the weapon at the alien ships. You can hit <SPACE> at any time to pause the game. Return to the game by pressing any of the arrow keys. Use <ESC> to exit the game.

2. What power-ups can be collected?

   The power-up system is super simple. After killing 20 alien ships, a power-up will pop up at a random position. Collect it by flying your ship towards it. A power-up upgrades the weapon and at the same time adds one "life". If you get hit by an alien ship, not only do you lose one "life", but your weapon is downgraded as well.

3. Are there levels in the game?

   Not really. As you keep killing alien ships and collecting power-ups, new types of alien ships continue to show. After some time, no new types are shown, and the game just continues.

4. What is the future of this project?

   If the time permits, I may clean up the code a bit more. I may also add a new sound system, becuse the old one was extremely crude and buggy. It may be interesting to experiment with different compilers and port the game to a different platform. For now, only the minimum work has been done to be able to compile the game.