DStroy

1995, afternoon, network cable stretched across the hallway to a friend's place. No Steam lobby, no matchmaking — just IPX protocol, shouting through the wall, and the urge to blow someone sky-high. DStroy was exactly the game that made this possible.

DStroy is a Czech freeware Bomberman clone by Fully Bugged Software. Nothing more, nothing less. A maze of blocks, player or AI-controlled enemies, bombs with timers, and explosions spreading in four cardinal directions. The goal is simple: survive and eliminate everything that moves. The genre was crowded back then, but DStroy had one major advantage — it was free, ran on almost anything, and could be played over the network with multiple players.

The mechanics are pure Bomberman: place a bomb, count down the seconds in your head, back away to safety, and hope you haven't trapped yourself. One detail I remember to this day — placing a bomb blocks your passage. Back into a corner too quickly and suddenly you have nowhere to go. It's not a bug, it's intentional design that creates some delightfully petty moments in multiplayer. The controls are straightforward: cursor keys plus spacebar, nothing that needs a manual.

DStroy doesn't hide what it is — a modest shareware-era project inspired by the Japanese original, with local network multiplayer added. The graphics are functional, the sound minimal. For something likely made by people who were either in college or just out at the time, the result is solid code. Today it looks like student work, but in 1995 for zero money it was a full evening of entertainment. It's aged exactly as you'd expect — visually shabby, playably surprisingly competent.

Today DStroy appeals mainly to those wanting to see what local multiplayer looked like before Steam — or simply Bomberman fans who've played through every installment and are hunting for a curiosity from homegrown production. It'll run in a browser via DOSBox emulators without a hitch. Takes no more than ten minutes to get the hang of, and then it's just a matter of whether you've got someone nearby you'd like to legitimately slip a bomb under.