Scorched Earth (video Game) - Versions

Versions

There are several versions known to exist, the earliest being 1.0b (where "b" is presumed to mean "Beta"). Public versions include 1.0, 1.1, 1.2 and lastly, 1.5, which was released in 1995.

Although, graphically, 1.0B looks similar to the later versions, in-game, its menus were completely different. It was also not as feature-rich and contained some different AI class names, such as "Rifleman" and "Twanger" (which may have been changed, as they were also AI class names in the slightly earlier artillery game, Tank Wars).

Starting with 1.0 in 1991, the game became Shareware and was graphically the same Scorched Earth that is widely known of today.

In Version 1.1, more weapons were added, such as Napalm, Smoke Tracers, and Liquid Dirt as well as Joystick support and two new death animations among other things. Also in 1.1, a modem icon was added with the intention of including some form of net play in a following version, however, this feature was never implemented.

Nearly a year later, in 1992, version 1.2 was released which added, among other minor things, a new death animation and Synchronous firing mode. Versions 1.21 and 1.22 were released as very minor updates, both of which listed themselves as version 1.2 in-game and in all documentation except for the "readme" file. In early 1993, version 1.23 was released, and it identified itself as such in-game.

The last version (1.50) was not released until 1995. In 1.5, the registration feature was removed and instead, only a shareware version was released freely while the registered version could only be obtained through a mail order. Purchasing the registered version allowed the player to use the triple-turreted tank as well as removing the shareware reminders. New to this version were lasers and SuperMags as well as a couple of new skies and the introduction of scanned mountain ranges.