“Dust: A Tale of the Wired West” is a game produced by Cyberflix in 1995. The game ran at 512×384 resolution and there was no changing that. When the gamebar is visible at the bottom, you are left with 512×264 for the viewport. This means that you are staring at 135,168 pixels.
In remastering the game without access to the original textures, this is all we have to go by. So if an image is small, well … it’s going to stay small. There’s no way of getting closer or zooming in and getting more detail.
The unsolved posters are listed first, followed by all the final redesigns of the posters.
If you notice any mistakes or improvements I could make. Please let me know! I had to guess some of the text where it was simply too small and no reference material was available.
Dust has lots of posters plastered across the quaint town of Diamondback. This is my work in progress of posters and images that I managed to redesign through hours of googling and pixel-staring.
Unsolved posters
Prepared Chalk
ELEGANTLY PERFUMED
ENGLISH
PREPARED CHALK
DEAN & NEVANS
PHARMA?C???
This poster was adapted as a joke to reference teammembers “Robb Dean” and “Jay Nevans”.
Googling the combination of those names will not help us find the original medicine patent or advertisement.
I was not able to find anything using Google Image-search or by Googling the strings with quotes and asterisks.
If anyone knows the original image, I’d love to know.
Mysterious Red Bottle
This poster only hangs on the outside walls of the Saloon.
I have not managed to find any reference image using Google Image search, or by describing it.
It might be a whiskey bottle or flask, or maybe a medicine-related bottle.
It’s hard to make out if there are flames engulfing it or maybe they are clouds or fumes.
I can’t make out the lettering at the top or bottom either.
Again, if anyone has idea’s on the original image. I’d love to know!
Jail Notice
I imagine this piece of paper has something to do with the previous Sheriff being hanged from the tree. The texture is just too tiny to make any sense of.
Stagecoach Company Notice
This notice is posted on the outside wall of the stagecoach company building. It probably has something to do with a postal company, but the logo is too small to read anything or Google Image search.
Succesfully redesigned posters
Various
These posters were definitely the most interesting ones to redesign. The Martash and Repent ones, were simple to reproduce because their resolution was high enough.
The others have originals that I had to find through extensive research:
- “The Bishop Is Coming” – https://david-stimpson.blogspot.com/2019/11/harmony-posters.html
- “The Head of Joaquin” – https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Joaquin_Murrieta#/media/File:Joaquin_Murieta_head_poster.jpg
- “Waiter Girls” – https://books.google.nl/books?id=_4eNDgAAQBAJ&pg=PT7
Medicine Posters
The medicine posters might have taken up most of my research time. For some of these it took a lot of time to find the original advertisement the designer used as reference. Others are jokes that also reference development-team members.
- “GONO” – https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gonorrhea#/media/File:Gono_-_Man’s_Friend.png
- “Grove’s Tasteless Chill Tonic” – https://grovearcade.com/timeline/groves-tasteless-chill-tonic/
- “Rowlands’ Macassar Oil” – https://ravelledesoterica.wordpress.com/2014/05/08/macassar-oil/
- “Johnson’s Anodyne Liniment” – https://collections.nlm.nih.gov/catalog/nlm:nlmuid-101701727-img
Wanted Posters
The “Wanted” posters are kind of a different story. They all reference development-team members, so it’s impossible for me to find the original photo’s. Also the developers might be fine with their pixelated faces in the game, but maybe not so much with high-res versions floating across the net.
Have a look at the game’s credits to try and figure out which developers the posters were made after.
One I did not see coming; Lead-developer Bill Appleton played The Kid in this game.
I decided to pick and choose from old mugshots from the 1900s that fit the description on the posters.
- “The Kid” – Image from “Dust: A Tale of the Wired West”
- “Heck Tankersley” – https://monovisions.com/vintage-mugshots-of-prisoners-1900s/
- “Agate-Eye Anie” – https://co-curate.ncl.ac.uk/resources/view/43306/
- “Dirty Don” – https://www.reddit.com/r/OldSchoolCool/comments/ifnphl/mugshot_from_1900s_hungary/
- “Mad Todd” – https://monovisions.com/vintage-mugshots-of-prisoners-1900s/
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