It took a bit of doing, because everything dated to 2001. The underlying class library (a pre-Sun-acquisition version of the OpenOffice Framework) consists of hundreds of files, and I didn't wanna deal with the nightmare scenario of having to modify a ton of stuff to work under the latest compiler, so I reinstalled Visual Studio 6.0.
At that point I realized that I had a job ahead of me. My old build pipeline was a byzantine scheme of batch and makefiles that could build up to 624 different targets (50 games + 2 shared DLL's * (16 & 32 bit) * 6 languages). It worked and was as elegant as it could be for the job it was doing, but it liked seeing things just-so. And I soon realized that trying to replicate that structure under Vista 64 was a no-go.
Then the lightbulb went off. Since I got Virtual PC, why not replicate my old circa-1999 build environment exactly? A couple hours later, I had Windows 98 running VC++ 6.0.
Only problem I see is that my games used .HLP files, and those were deprecated in Windows XP and are officially abandoned in Vista. So I figure I'm going to have to convert to CHM or PDF something similar, lest I force my users to go to the Microsoft site to download a crusty old help-viewer that doesn't look like it's seen an update since the games were new.
Best I can tell, the pack will have the following games. This is the Cosmi pack minus the Bulldozers. I have a top-shelf bulldozer remake, so there's little point including it here.
Adjacent See
Arcade Poker
Backgammon
Black Box Chess
CardMatch
Checker Connector
Cheesy Pursuit
Core Meltdown
Cryptograms
Deductive Logic
Engulf
Head-on Collision
Hex
Hexapawn
Invaders From Neptune!
Kizbot
Laser Clash
Make4 3D
MazeRace
Moku
Neutron Trails
Nim
Pangki
Pegopolis
Poker Machine
Push-Pull
Quinto
Reversi
Sechseck
Siege
StackBlitz
Suzy Sushi
Think Tank
Tic Tac Toe 3D
Ultimine
Um El Bagara
Vanishing Cross
Wari
Winding Standoff
Zap Pod!
Furthermore I might include these. These were games that I later rewrote in Flash for the site. The Flash versions are better, but somebody might be jonesing for the originals.
Brain Bones
ChessCards
Olive Wars!
Poker Patience
Robottack (now Zombie Kitten Attack)
Shi Sen
Voracity
Plus the games Bryan wrote for Arcade Magic and 40 Games but didn't end up in the Cosmi packs (provided we can find the source code)
Evolve
Lassoo
Hockey
Tennis
So the pack will contain between 40 and 51 games, depending on what source code we can find and how I wanna market this mess.
On a related note, what should I call the pack? In the past, the games have gone by the following names.
24 Games for Windows
Arcade Magic
40 Games for Windows
40 Games for Windows and Mac
Top 50 Blazing Windows Games
Sybex Games (Germany)
(a half-dozen foreign names)
21 Solid Gold Games
201 Solid Gold Games (of which only 50 were mine)
I'm leaning towards something like "The Code Zone Retro Pack" or something like that. Ideas?
