Okay, so for whatever reason the game cannot be bought anymore because apparently Ambrosia Software, its publisher, had its website offline effective immediately. What this means is that the only way you’ll ever have a chance to play the game is through its “free version” which is available on a few sites that host said game’s version. So if you want to get the full version of the game, you’re out of luck. And so am I.
To be honest, when looking at Unity Technologies’ early history around the internet I looked at a game by the name of “GooBall”. Then I invested my time into finding out who this “GooBall” game is, going as far as using Wayback Machine to get some more info on the game. I was even considering buying the game on this Ambrosia Software website back when it was still online, and I’ve just downloaded the free version of the game(referred to as “TRIAL VERSION” by the website itself in which the game was located) that was available on the website just for the heck of it even if I didn’t have a Mac OS X computer to go with it. And then stuff like the above happens and now I’m feeling pretty lost…
“Nearly all of the company’s ten employees were laid off in 2013, but Welch denied rumors of the company shutting down. […] In 2017, customers reported on Ambrosia’s Facebook page that attempts to contact the company were unsuccessful and they were unable to make new purchases. As of July 2019, the web site is offline.” (source)
Yeah I’m aware of that info. Aside from having to live with the fact that that the game - alongside many other Ambrosia Software games - will never get a proper re-release for whatever insane reasn, this tells me absolutely nothing.
I just wanted to vent out about my frustrations regarding the way this game has been released for years, nothing more nothing less.
It would have been taken down eventually due to the requirement that all apps be 64-bit.
You mean the insane reason of “it was never popular”? I just finished looking through the list of games they published and aside from GooBall none of them look even the slightest bit familiar.
Some of those games are genuine masterpieces, though: Escape Velocity was childhood-defining for me, and their many takes on the PC arcade were all extremely high quality.
I can understand why they failed when mobile became the big thing, but it’s always struck me as morbid and not a little strange how their ghost of a website and hearsay of a business hovered for so long after their alleged dissolution. They were once so proud and outspoken; it produces quite the mystique.
Ambrosia was a mainstay on Mac back in the mid 90’s. I sunk hours and hours into Maelstrom, which was their breakout hit at the time, but they had others. Sad to see them go.
I loved Gooball, used to play it for hours as a kid. The best part is how you can cheese all of the levels by just activating sticky mode. Maybe that game is why I’m using Unity today? Who knows.
