First post, by RetroDosGamer
I'm old so forgive the lack of info listed here 😀
[DOS] Shooting game with a flexing grid, light blue, ran too fast on newer PCs
Trying to track down a DOS game I played years ago (likely late 80s to early-mid 90s based on the hardware issue below). Details are fuzzy since it's been decades, but here's what I remember:
- **Visual style:** The main play area was a grid/mesh, light blue in color (though that might have been a configurable palette color rather than fixed). The grid was wider near the edges of the screen and narrower toward the middle — almost a funnel or bowed perspective shape, not a flat top-down grid.
- **Movement:** I don't think I was locked to one spot — I recall being able to guide something freely around the screen, not just at a fixed center point. The grid itself also seemed to move or flex (up/down, side to side), so it's possible the grid was reacting to my movement or the perspective was shifting rather than me actually flying "into" it.
- **Gameplay:** It was a shooting game — I believe I was shooting at the grid itself, or possibly shooting through/along it at something in the middle. Can't recall enemies, sound, or music.
- **The hardware clue:** This was one of the few DOS games I could reliably play, because it had no speed control — it was tied to CPU speed. On faster computers it ran way too fast to be playable, which points to an earlier DOS title using cycle-based timing rather than a real-time clock.
- **Distribution:** I'm fairly sure this was shareware or freeware, not a boxed retail game — I got it from a BBS or shareware disk rather than buying it in a store.
Not Tempest/Tempest 2000 — I don't think I was locked to the rim of a tube, and the grid moving/flexing doesn't match that.
