VGA Wheel

You know what a game looks like when someone programs it who understood the theory of graphics perfectly and had no idea about fun in practice? VGA Wheel is one of those unassuming items in the archives of the nineties — a slick program that tries to take Wheel of Fortune and force it through the rigid DOS.

It's a classic quiz where you guess words letter by letter. The computer selects a phrase, title, person, or something similar, and you gradually uncover the letters. Every correct letter brings you points; a wrong guess means losing a turn. You know what should work? Loud applause, dramatic music, suspense. Instead, you get silence and a sparse menu look.

The graphics are typically DOS — simple, hard squares, black background, typeface that looks like it came from an old typewriter. It's readable, sometimes downright clunky, without grace. The game works, offers you a few dozen challenges, has various categories. Controls are straightforward — pick a letter, wait to see if it's right. Nothing complicated, but nothing new either. By the nineties, games already had loud shows; here it's just you and a black screen.

Today it's mainly an artifact — proof that not everything that could fit on a diskette was worth playing. VGA Wheel isn't bad, just boring. Playable if you're missing any quiz game and don't have the internet. The conversion to the browser worked out — at least you don't have to worry about bootable diskettes — but the original felt more like a craft exercise than entertainment.

Try it if you have five minutes and curiosity about how DOS quizzes looked without the polish. It'll remind you that not all games from the nineties were rare relics — some were just... there.