Early Crimsonland history¶

The original koti.mbnet.fi/temper/crimsonland/ site survives as 33 root-page captures representing five distinct revisions. The complete CDX result, raw HTML for each distinct revision, retained artwork, hashes, and local release artifact paths are recorded in analysis/historical/koti-mbnet-crimsonland/.

Site revisions¶

The committed CDX inventory preserves every capture timestamp even when several captures have identical content. Raw page captures and recovered artwork remain under ignored artifact directories. The archive retained four images from the 2003 design. The 2002 logo, background, thumbnails, full screenshots, and both 1.2.2 ZIPs are referenced by the HTML but were not retained by Wayback.

Release inventory¶

✅ Found means a package has been recovered and its contents confirm the version number. ❌ Missing means a release is documented, but its package has not been recovered. The 1.0.x row represents unspecified early releases.

Freeware (2002)¶

Commercial (2003-2010)¶

Recovered packages are deliberately stored under ignored game_bins/, with their retrieval URLs, sizes, and SHA-256 hashes committed in the manifest. Versions 1.9.2 and 1.9.4-1.9.7 were probably never released. No announcement, forum post, scene release or trainer names them, and every installer checked from July to early September 2003 carries the 1.9.3 executable.

Recovery through disc contents¶

On 2026-09-28, filename searches in DiscMaster recovered four previously missing builds: 1.3.1, 1.8.7, 1.9.0, and 1.9.3. DiscMaster indexes files inside disc images and nested archives, allowing packages to be found even when a disc's catalog description does not name the game. Searching crimsonland* also finds CrimsonlandSetup.exe, which the plain crimsonland search did not return.

The sources, original-package and executable hashes, exact version-string offsets, PE timestamps, extraction details, and retained search results are in analysis/historical/discmaster-recovery/manifest.json. The extracted trees are stored in game_bins/crimsonland/{version}/ alongside the previously recovered versions. All verification was static; these packages have not been runtime-tested. Disc file dates and PE timestamps are not treated as exact release dates.

The 1.8.7 recovery confirms the previously uncertain forum mention with an actual distributed executable. The 1.9.0 installer contains a complete game tree despite its release notes saying "UPDATE ONLY". The two 1.9.3 installers have different hashes and differ in other files, but their game executables are byte-identical. The cland.exe on Chip April 2002 was checked and excluded: it is an unrelated puzzle game called C-Land.

The 2003 and 2004 Reflexive installers wrap an Inno Setup installer in a Reflexive Arcade loader, so their outer PE timestamps (2003-04-25 and 2004-04-08) date the loader, not the game. Carving the embedded Inno image (at offset 0x34c04 and 0x30e04) and running innoextract recovers the full game tree. The executable version strings and each package's whatsupdated.txt both identify the builds as 1.9.1 and 1.9.8. The 1.9.1 notes still carry an "UPDATE ONLY package" heading, although the package holds the complete game.

The 1.9.92 installer ships its game image as an encrypted crimsonland.RWG behind the Reflexive wrapper, which reflexive unwraps. Its whatsupdated.txt still stops at 1.9.91, so the 1.9.92 notes survive only in the 1.9.93 file. A third-party WinRAR repack of the same build carries a byte-identical unwrapped executable with rewritten 1.9.92 notes.

The 2014 remaster, GOG's "Classic 2.0.0.4" installer label, the Russian "2.0" crack bundle built on 1.9.8, the CL:ONE fan mod releases, and the 2012 MyPlayCity portal build labelled 1.9.94 are separate version lines and are not listed here.

Recovery through web archives¶

A follow-up search swept Wayback captures of the author, 10tons and Reflexive download hosts, cover-disc listings, download portals, and community, scene and trainer sources. Its sources, the eight candidate installers it retrieved, and their hashes are in analysis/historical/web-release-search/manifest.json. It added 1.2.5, 1.8.8 and 1.8.9 to the inventory but recovered no new package.

Reflexive personalised each download with the affiliate's ID, so captures of one build differ in size and hash. Captures were grouped by date and size, and one installer from each group was unpacked. Size changes between 1.9.3 and 1.9.8, and between 1.9.9 and 1.9.92, turned out to be rebuilt wrappers around an unchanged game executable. The 2009 rebuilt wrappers also defeat the current reflexive unwrapper, which leaves the encrypted range undecrypted, so those packages were identified by their other files instead.

Linked forum threads¶

The June 2002 page links to Pelit.fi thread 398570 and MuroBBS thread 118962. Neither thread has been recovered. The evidence and ignored raw artifacts are inventoried in analysis/historical/crimsonland-forum-links/.

The April 2022 MuroBBS bulk crawl does contain a record for the migrated URL /threads/118962/, but the archived response is HTTP 404 and says the thread was not found. The neighboring title-sorted CDX block contains no Crimsonland record, and public Wayback results contain no capture of the original thread ID. This makes the bulk archive evidence of a pre-crawl gap, not a recovered copy of the discussion.

Pelit.fi's public Wayback prefix and exact-URL indexes contain no capture of thread 398570. Its file catalog does independently preserve records for CLAND117.ZIP (1.1.7, 7.2 MB, 2002-05-23) and CLAND130.ZIP (1.3.0, 9.5 MB, 2002-07-24), but neither catalog record has a downloadable payload or checksum. The current Pelit forum search requires authentication, so a migrated private thread remains an open lead.

Credits as preservation leads¶

A static comparison of all twelve recovered executables is recorded in analysis/historical/credits-leads/manifest.json, with reproducible extraction, binary hashes, string offsets and commercial credits setter calls. The combined freeware tester/thanks/greetings list grows from 14 handles in 1.0.2 to 20 in 1.3.0 and 23 in 1.3.1/1.4.0. Commercial credits add Dirk Bunk in the recovered 1.9.0 build and Avraham Petrosyan in 1.9.1; the credited names then remain unchanged through 1.9.93. These are first appearances among recovered builds, not exact introduction dates.

The 1.0.2 and 1.3.0 credits also preserve a nine-person 10tons roster with explicit handle/name mappings. In particular, milzer is Miikka Kulmala, credited for the commercial game's manual and play testing. His public Pikku-ukot mesoo repository preserves a 1999–2001 game whose original source credits 10tons, milzer and crud. This provides a concrete preservation contact lead; the inspected repository contains no recovered Crimsonland package.

A contemporary matricks forum post links to birdie.org/~ascorbiq/paqer.zip and an old batman.jypoly.fi discussion. Neither payload nor discussion was recovered. The matching handle is suggestive, not proof of identity. Wayback requests failed or timed out, so those checks do not establish absence from the archive.

The commercial binaries also retain greetings to Chaos^, Matricks and Muzzy, but all eight overwrite those entries with an empty string before the credits table is complete. Stored strings must not be mistaken for displayed credits. This investigation recovered leads, not an additional game version.

Useful behavioral evidence¶

• The 1.2.1 page describes four prototype levels unlocked by holding left Ctrl and typing LEVELS in the main menu.
• The 1.3.0 package contains seven .lvl files (level_1 through level_4, outdoors, redlight, and tolmec), while the 1.4.0 readme says level mode was disabled for that release.
• The 1.3.0 readme documents 17 weapons with two hidden weapons. The 1.4.0 readme changes that to three hidden weapons and explicitly hints that players can trace the game binary to discover them.
• Both freeware readmes say Vampyrism was disabled in 1.2.4 and later. That is stronger evidence for an otherwise missing 1.2.4 release.
• The original page names Grim 2D API for graphics, FMOD for audio, and DirectX 8.1 as a runtime requirement. It also records the early two-player shared-perk design and encrypted high-score migration.
• The 2002-12-16 announcement describes the commercial design before launch: Quest, Rush, and Survival, more than 40 perks, more than 15 weapons, and Reflexive's in-game trial purchasing system.

Preservation boundary¶

The archive is intentionally honest about gaps. A release mention or dead link is evidence that a version existed, not evidence that its package was recovered. No 1.2.2 binary, screenshot, or missing 2002 image is represented as present.