Proto:Magic Carpet 2: The Netherworlds

This page details one or more prototype versions of Magic Carpet 2: The Netherworlds.

There are two early demos of Magic Carpet 2 that show the game in different stages of development.

BASF Demo

A mid-development demo from July 1995, named as it is due to this oddly being released as a tie-in with magnetic media (amongst other things) company BASF. It actually came as a bonus with packs of BASF floppy disks. This connection is not obvious on playing the demo, unless the unused file DATA/BASFLOGO.DAT is interrogated, which reveals a combined Bullfrog/BASF splash screen that would presumably have been meant to be shown before the demo starts, but goes oddly unseen. Possibly this may have been enabled on actual copies that came with the BASF disks, but all versions found on the internet and that came with games magazines seem to not show it. Similarly, there is an unused title screen TITLE3.DAT, and what is clearly a graphic from a menu system (TITBASF.DAT) that is also not accessible.

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The demo is very interesting as it contains many differences to the final game, and not only contains levels that aren't seen in the final game campaign, but are actually different versions of ones that are present but cut in the final.

Misc differences

• The executable is called CARPET2.EXE at this point, in line with the original, rather than NETHERW.EXE as it would be going forward
• The demo begins on the same menu screen as the final. However, the various menu options have a silver rather than brown highlight when hovered over, and the main statue design is slightly different. There are also no pop-up messages explaining what each option actually does yet. Only Exit, New Game and Rename Player can be chosen. The bones on the small altar are not present yet, instead the space is taken up some animated smoke.

Demo	Final

• A different mouse cursor graphic is used in the menus.
• Spiders behave totally differently. They are extremely fast and aggressive, rushing towards the player in an erratic fashion making them very hard to hit and kill.
• Low level enemies seem to do negligible damage to the player. This was likely a deliberate choice due to it being a demo.
• The spell interface looks very different to the final game's. It's a much cruder design, and outside of the night level palette the designs look strange and unfinished.

• The demo executable is seemingly derived from one of the earlier release builds of the original Magic Carpet. Aside from still containing the strings for the original game's levels and wizards, it also responds to the original RATTY cheat mode, which was replaced in Magic Carpet Plus.
• Experience scrolls don't seem to exist yet - they aren't in any of the levels and their graphic is missing from the game's files.
• Music consists of a new version of one of the tunes from the original Magic Carpet, complete with its "danger" variant. However, it doesn't loop and simply stops playing once the end of the song is reached.
• Many sound effects are missing. The intro video is also silent as the sound file that contains its samples is missing. It also cuts off after about 30 seconds.
• The specific objective is always written at the top of the screen, unlike the final where it's only shown in a pop-up box.

• The red arrow guiding the player in the general direction of the next objective does not exist yet.
• Level exits don't seem to exist yet. Instead the player receives a prompt to press the space bar upon completion of the last objective, much like in the original Magic Carpet.
• Completing an objective results in a green text prompt: "Zamzamar completed an objective".
• It's not possible to do a barrel roll yet.

Spell Differences

• There are only two levels for each spell (save magic mine) unlike the final that has three for all.
• Level 1 lightning seems much more potent than in the final game, on par with how it performed in the original game.
• Level 2 fireball is not the rapid fireball spell as in the final. Instead, it's just another slow single shot spell, but seemingly doing slightly more damage.
• Peculiarly, the second metamorph spell here turns the player into an archer, something not possible in the final.
• Skeleton Army from the first game is still in the demo, it even uses the first game's icon still. This spell was removed from the final.
• The different defensive upgrades for the castle don't exist yet. Instead the level two castle spell is called "Double stone" and seems to merely increase the hit points of the castle.
• There are four magic mine spells in the demo rather than only three as in the final.
• The magic mines use a different graphic compared to the final game, consisting of a kind of ghostly genie face:

Build Comment

The demo features the usual build comment in the executable:

Product name    Magic Carpet
Version number  Rough
Version date    Jul 10 1995 07:41:38
Programmer      Bullfrog, Alan Wright
Supplied to     PUBLIC

What is more interesting, is that running the demo actually outputs some of the above to the DOS Prompt on start:

Magic Carpet 2 (Netherworlds)
Rough. @ Jul 10 1995 07:41:38

This suggests the -showversion command included with the final game was specifically intended to show the above to testers, but the output was disabled for the final build. -showversion is not a valid argument in the demo.

Unused Graphics

The TMAPSXX.DAT/TAB files contain an even larger number of unused MC1 leftovers than the final game. For example, all the enemy wizards use the old designs from the first game. Most interestingly, the below rotation frames for a comically crude placeholder version of the worm enemy can be found within:

This creature only seems to have the correct palette for use in day levels. If one of the cut levels with it in are played, it can be seen that its tail graphics are corrupt.

Unused Levels

The demo features five exclusive levels. However, interrogating the Levels folder and LEVELS.DAT/TAB files reveals the demo actually comes with nine levels in total, with the last four inaccessible. While the demo responds to the -level argument, it deliberately can't load levels past the fifth, only loading level five if later numbers are used.

The levels folder is also interesting as it contains not only the expected LEVELS.DAT/TAB files used by the demo, but also the constituent loose LEV0000X.DAT level files and their .inf manifest files, in the same format as those accidentally included on the original pressing of the first Magic Carpet. These reveal the names of the various new map elements, as well as early names for some of the enemies, as seen in the final game executable text.

Sixth Level

A cut desert level. One of the more finished cut levels. The player has to run a gauntlet of deadly traps right from the off, including a wyvern attack the instant the level starts, and a swarm of bees. This level is actually included with the final game but cut, as level 161. This is exactly the same file as included with the final game, but it actually doesn't play correctly with the demo exectutable, as it hides the spell items the player starts with here (the intention is the player starts off unequipped and must pull off various daring feats to get the spells), making most of the level redundant.

Seventh Level

Another, less finished version of the third level of the demo. Already has all objectives completed on start. Killing the spiders unleashes more waves of manticores and more spiders.

Eighth Level

Mostly empty level save a few buildings, large herds of wandering zombies, and a few dragons.

Ninth Level

Another level in very early stages, with only some houses and villagers present.

Unseen Text

At position 871104 in the game's executable, text from the level editor can be seen:

Load Level
Generate map
Generate features
Initialise Models
Config menu

The file DATA/ETEXT.DAT contains the game's text strings. At this point it still contains the narration from the original game's intro, and other left overs from Magic Carpet. However, it also has some revealing text showing a lot of spells that both aren't in the demo, but also didn't make it to the final game:

• The extra spells listed here suggest the game would have four subspells for every spell, rather than three in the final, and two in the demo
• While in the demo there is no rapid fireball spell, the text here shows a) it was already in consideration as an extra fireball spell and b) there would be a rapid fireball II spell
• There is an extra possession spell called "castle magnet" - presumably to draw mana into castles automatically without needing a balloon?
• The extra castle defensive upgrades are present here as in the final
• As well the inexplicable archer morph as seen in the demo itself, there is also a cut spell "Sentinel Morph". These are both strange choices as they are essentially cloaking spells for multiplayer - how would the constantly flying player disguise themselves as largely immobile ground enemies?
• There is a cut healing spell called "Aid II"
• There is a cut shield spell called "Mana Shield"
• There are more potent final lightning, amplify, and meteor spells listed
• A second version of the castle teleport spell, unclear what it would do differently
• A "See Metamorph" spell, that presumably would show you other players disguising themselves using the metamorph spell
• Originally the "Army" series of spells would contain Skeleton Army, Bee Army, Manticore Army, and Spider Army. Of these only Bee army made it to the final
• Fool's Mana would have a subspell called "Player Fire", whatever that would do
• Cave-In does not seem to exist as a spell yet

Bullfrog's Christmas CD Demo

This was a demo included on the Bullfrog's Christmas Demo CD sold by Bullfrog over Christmas 1995. While its presentation suggests it would be an earlier demo (a custom simplified title screen and only 1 of 3 levels is actually playable, with the other two being simply non-interactive demo replays), it's actually a very late-development release from October 1995.

By now the game is naturally close to the final appearance and design, the objective text is now gone. Spiders behave as per their final incarnation.

The demo also has an instruction screen visible from the main menu:

Miscellaneous Changes

• The chat window cannot be toggled in the demo, and thus cheats can't be used
• While the demo accepts the -level argument, it doesn't actually do anything, the game always goes to the title screen.
• Even at this late stage, the executable still contains the level and wizard names from the original Magic Carpet.
• It's now possible to do a barrel roll, as shown off by one of the replays.

Levels

The demo includes three exclusive levels, one for each type of environment. Only one is actually playable, a night level. The other two levels playback an input file to show off the game being played to a high standard.

Unused Graphics

The demo includes an earlier graphic for what became the experience scroll. Here it's a variant of the spell pot graphic. This suggests the final spell scroll redesign must have been late in development.

Build Comment

The demo features the usual build comment in the executable:

Product name    Magic Carpet
Version number  CD Demo
Version date    Oct 26 1995 15:41:57
Programmer      Bullfrog, Alan Wright
Supplied to     PUBLIC

As with the previous demo, the above is output to the DOS prompt when run, with some more information:

Magic Carpet 2 (Netherworlds)
Setup Drive C:
CD Demo @ Oct 26 1995 15:41:57

The -Showversion command works properly with the demo. It causes the game to quit back to DOS after showing the above, letting testers see the build information. This functionality became -Showversion2 in the final executable.