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THE MERCENARY SITE

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This site is dedicated to Mercenary, Damocles and Mercenary 3 games, by Paul Woakes, (c) Novagen.
They were released on Atari ST and Amiga computers (and elder 8-bits for Mercenary).

Thanks to everyone that contributed to this site, check the credits section. Their names are associated to each of their contributions :-)

15th Nov. 2020 quick update:
- a replacement for the BBS is ready on Reddit, many thanks to Simone Gremmo for setting it up and running it!
- Szymon Ender also made a Mercenary group on Telegram, feel free to join in!
- Also added a link in the Mercenary 3 guide to Mercenary 3 playing guide / FAQ by Michael Hughes.
- And while at it, added links to articles compilations from spectrumcomputing.co.uk, about Mercenary 1 Escape From Targ and The Second City. Quite interesting to see the various articles dates (hence games releases or re-releases).

Long awaited update

latest update: 20th October 2020
Finally! It's been a while. Paul Woakes' passing left me without much energy to go back at the site, even though many of you contacted me. So I'd like to apologize for being so late, and thank you for all that you sent, and your patience.

First, the sad news: as promised long ago now, I finally added a page with reactions to Paul Woakes' passing, recieved from a few visitors of the site. With a small never-seen comforting surprise (thanks to Andrew Griffiths and Tom Davies), do take a look!

You will also notice the BBS has vanished. Why? Well, disc.yourwebapps.com simply closed. They warned the users with ONE email, which I never recieved (spambox?), so I missed the time limit to backup data. It's all gone, yourwebapps' policy regarding privacy meant: deletion when closing, no backup on their side (which is fair). A bit depressing, I didn't have the time / nerve to start any other one yet (TBH, traffic was low with social medias taking over). So if anyone's seriously willing to open and manage a new forum... Please let me know.

Now, the good news: see below for the many other updates! It took 8 months to read back, contact people, work and have something like 600 added or modified files, with many thanks to all contributors. Hoping I didn't forget anyone! Most updated items are tagged with , so that you notice them easily.

Damocles for PC: story... And VIDEOS!

Yes, you did read correctly! Updated the Damocles for PC page, with:
  • new magazine photos, thanks to Simone Gremmo and https://www.retroedicola.com website
  • the story of Damocles for PC, why was is canceled, and never released?
  • and incredible new screenshots and VIDEOS of the game!
    Also check Andy Krouwel's site with the Damocles for PC music! (scroll down)
  • Mercenary Reloaded

    Added a new page about Andreas Eversberg's Mercenary Reloaded, a new PC port of Damocles and Mercenary III, with a stunning OpenGL rendition of the two games.
    Really worth a try!

    Games pictures and stories

    Updated the Mercenary pictures page, Damocles pictures page and Mercenary III pictures page with a short development story, as well as some game jokes explanations... And two pictures of Triton and Juno's surface, after hacking the game!

    Novagen, story and interviews

    Added a story of Novagen Software Ltd, focused on the company and Mercenary's origins, told by Bruce Jordan himself in 2004.

    On the main Novagen page, added a timeline of software releases, and updated several interviews: Mo Warden's, with lost bits from May 1999 found back in emails, and more recent inputs by Mo; Simon Berry's with more details, Novagen code pictures and an unreleased music bonus for Backlash fans; Michael Rooke's, with recent comments following Paul Woakes' passing.
    Added Gary Walton's story, telling us about Paul Woakes and Novagen; an interview of Paul Hughes, who shares some interesting information regarding Novagen history; John Milford's story explaining why he was in Damocles credits; a Nick Bacchus "interview" built from emails; a very short Martin Stallard's story, with the little we know; Dave Dewson's message (previously linked from now defunct BBS); Harrod's anonymous VIP possible story; Jack Moorby's story; Russ Lanier's story (why he was thanked in Damocles).

    Also added new names: Jason Paul Bowker (Mercenary tester), Lee Clarke (Backlash illustrator), Donovan Prince (Hellbent programmer), Gary Sabin (Sabin's Cube in Mercenary?), Carolyn Jones and Connor Byrne (actors in Damocles for PC).
    Finally added Jason Martin and Mark Bedford's roles (play testers), and moved Tony Takoushi out of the Novagen team itself.

    Magazines reviews

    On the Games reviews page :
  • Upgraded scans quality of ST Action (Novagen interview), The Games Machine Damocles preview, Micro News Damocles review and The One Damocles (early!) review
  • Added Damocles previews / reviews (Micro News, Joystick, Atari Magazine, Computer And Video Games), Mercenary 1 review (Atari User), Damocles for PC preview (The Games Machine, thanks to Simone Gremmo and retroedicola.com), and ST Format Damocles cheat (thanks to Jacob de Meza).
  • Boxes and Manuals

    Added box scans for Mercenary 1, from many different versions, with letters from Novagen. Ever seen that huge poster? Also added more Damocles boxes, and details on Mercenary 3 box. Thanks to Jacob de Meza and Stephen Stuttard for their help.

    Games solutions

    Added Jacob's help files for Mercenary 1 and 2nd City. Damocles guide was enhanced with links to wonderful vector graphics maps for Damocles in HTML 5 thanks to Gabor Kiss, as well as Gabor's additional details on the Wishes Solution, and minor guide corrections and updates with thanks to Juri Fossaroli. The Mercenary III guide also now has more details about some bugs (thanks to MDDClone author), and help files for items, from Jacob.

    Damocles demo

    Another surprise from Andreas Eversberg, who modified the magazine demo disk into a playable version! Fly and explore at will!
    Also added a magazine and disk scans. See the Damocles Demo page.

    Gamma System

    Added a new Gamma System page, with information on planets, and anecdotes about their names.

    Targ Survival Kit

    Now available from the Targ Survival Kit page are scans of English, French and German posters, in rather high resolution.

    Youtube, links

    Updated the links page with various videos from Youtube (solutions, playthroughs, from different versions including 8-bits). Also added a link to Gabor Torok's "Merc", an interesting very Mercenary-like new game ;)

    Music

    Added a music of Mercenary 1, from the Novaload loader of US Gold's C64 version. (thanks to Stephen from Australia)
    Also check Simon Berry's interview for a small Backlash surprise.
    Next updates... could include more box scans, maybe a few BBS messages backed up, more magazines reviews and screenshots from 8-bits Mercenary versions, which I didn't have time to work at if I wanted the update done in 2020 ;)


    (updates history)
    There are still loads of info to be worked on for a next update - more to come as soon as I can.

    -------------------- SPECIAL MESSAGE --------------------
    Over the years I have recieved lots of incredibly interesting emails, but haven't always been able to reply. So I lost touch with some people that contacted me, which is always a pity. Right now I'm looking to contact again for an interview:
    - Nick Bacchus - we exchanged lots of very interesting messages
    - Peter Pachla - we chatted in 1999 and your email address (not surprisingly) doesn't work anymore
    Gentlemen if you ever see this message please send me a mail ;)

    Address for the site, with frames and without ads:
    http://mercenarysite.free.fr
    The other mirrors are now down or not updated anymore.



    THE MDDCLONE

    The Mercenary/Damocles/Dion Crisis Clone is the PC/Windows version of these classic games. Mercenary and Damocles (including the missions) and the Dion Crisis are all waiting for you!
    Click here to read about this initiative, and freely download the latest version.


    HINTS AND SOLUTIONS

    Don't waste any time, here they are! If you think some hints are missing or if you discovered more about the games, mail me!
    Mercenary, Damocles and Mercenary III . Also available: the Targ Survival Kit (official hints for Mercenary 1).



    PICTURES, REVIEWS AND HISTORY

    If you never saw the games or would like to see them again, make your choice! About 30 pictures for every game are available, along with details about their creation.
    Mercenary 1 and The Second City, Damocles and data disks, Mercenary 3, and the quick story and pictures of Damocles for PC!
    See also the Atari ST demo of Damocles, the Mercenary 1 boxes scans, Damocles boxes scans and Mercenary 3 boxes scans.

    Pictures and interviews of The NOVAGEN team - the people that made the games, as well as company history.

    Peter Young sent the first reviews long ago, now many reviews are available here.



    USEFUL THINGS

    Amiga users, here are hard drive installers for Mercenary 1, Damocles and Mercenary 3! They also fix some problems for use with A1200. Thanks to John Selck who sent them.

    The D-Bug team patched Damocles and Mercenary III to run on Atari Falcon. The patched games also work for conventional Atari ST, and are hard-drive intallable.

    Also available: the public transport schedule that was supplied in Mercenary 3.

    The emulators section is here to help you to run Mercenary with various emulators. Fell free to contribute if you know emulators that are not described yet!



    CREDITS AND LINKS

    They are now here !
    Thanks to everyone that contributed (and keep contributing) to this site.


    If you feel interested, have any wish or comment about this site, send me an Email!
    symoonmyself@hotmail.com

    This Mercenary site might take a long time to be built, don't be impatient!!! Riss-Key builders are sorry.


    Since 1996.