I had NO IDEA how hard this game was gonna be going into this. REALLY glad the saving and loading was so dynamic because I don't think I'd've been able to get even halfway through the first episode otherwise! :P
Most platformers back then had 'one hit death'. It was a design choice not a flaw and quick saves gave player control over checkpoint placement. Commander Keen games also established basic mechanics for Wolfenstein 3D and DOOM. Find colored key, open door, flip switches, kill some monsters, exit. Keen also started ID strategy to make two games with one technology. Episodes 1-3 used groundbreaking techniques and with 4-5 ID put more effort in gameplay. Later games got same approach: Wolf3D and SoT, DOOM 1 and 2, and both Quakes. Later games were pushing hardware limits and ID software didn't look back to support older hardware. "Goodbye, Galaxy!" series was the opposite. At the time of it's release VGA support was a must. 256 color mode would require new drawing module, but they could simply use custom palette in 16-color EGA mode. Many games did it. For example Lemmings is a 16-color VGA game, same as Another World. Both games also support EGA cards and you can see what a difference custom palette does. Anyway if we consider that ID was focusing solely on 3D graphics it's a good thing that they've manage to make later Keen games as playable as they are.
My boy Billy Blaze deserved MUCH better than what they did to him. These are so damn good! Aliens Ate My Babysitter (or the 3 level demo version, at least) was one of my first games. I know nobody asked for it, but since it's been confirmed that Billy is the grandson of BJ Blazcowicz, and Doomguy is also related somehow, my headcanon is that Keen is the founder and original CEO of the Union Aerospace Corporation. Think about it - he built an interstellar spacecraft as a child, that would be outrageously profitable. And it's not at all unlikely that later executives would pervert its mission. It's happened plenty of times in our world. Finally, as for ADG Mod videos, how about something Doom-related? You've only got eleventy quintillion to choose from. :P
That's kinda part of the problem... half of my requests for ADG Mod videos are Doom related and almost the entirety of the other half are all mature-rated games. I don't want ADG Mod to be JUST mature-rated content. :/
@@Pixelmusement I see your problem. How about the hidden level editor in Jill of the Jungle and Xargon? The latter of which is disabled, but easily re-enabled with some simple hex editing.
The save/load mechanic meant that even as a kid the platforming/enemy difficulty never bothered me. The maze-like levels of Keen 4, on the other hand.... The ice level took me forever back in the day!!!
It is the best game I ever played as a kid! I still own and play it today! Thank you for showing this gem! However, I have to disagree with you about the difficulties. The game has 3 levels of difficulty. If the game is too difficult on "normal", you can get to know the game on "easy" first and improve after the first playthrough. If something doesnt make sense it means, that there is something well hidden you have to find, like for example in the secret that leads to death. If we compare other games from that time period with Keen 4, the save and load option is actually a great thing. Players can always choose how to play this game and they can always develop better skills. (Like the Impossible-Pogo-Jump). Anyway, great video! :)
Yeah. My point about the difficulty is ultimately that you cannot survive this game blind without constantly using the saving and loading mechanics or taking advantage of 1UP farming. Once you know what you're in for you're WAY better off. It's the whole "all or none" approach, perpetuated by one-hit kills. :P
This game has been tested and is working on the latest version of pcem on these emulated machines: * AMI 386DX clone, 386DX/33, ET4000, SB Pro v2, MS-DOS 6.22 * ASUS P/I-P55T2P4, Pentium 200, 64MB, ViRGE DX, SB Pro v2, FreeDOS 1.2
Did you ever played Commander Keen mods based on the Goodbye Galaxy games? There are some really high quality mods out there that are, in my opinion, really impressive in terms of complexity and push the Keen engine to its limits. Here are some of those mods that are worth checking out: The Keys of Krodacia, known as Keen 7 Dead in the Desert, known as Keen 8 Battle of the Brain, know as Keen 9 These three mods are part of the unofficial 'The Universe is Toast' trilogy, which is the unofficial sequel to Goodbye, Galaxy. To me, these mods play like they're official games, but of course, they're not. Atroxian Realm. Good lord, the quality and size of this mod is impressive. This one is known as the first Source-Code mod. Whatever that means, guess it has custom code? The Alphamatic. Sort of a reimagining of Keen 5 and the sequel to Atroxian Realm. That last level, that last level... :o The Terror from Outer Space. Probably my favorite mod. Mirror Menace aka Dimensional Chaos. Known as Keen 10, and the unofficial sequel to The Universe is Toast trilogy. Good one, a little bit glitchy at the end (out of memory crashing) but my second favorite mod nonetheless. Episode 58 - The Ruin of Roib. Aged Keen. Episode 59 - Underworld Ultimate. Also aged Keen. Those two are... weird mods to say the least and I actually didn't finish both of them yet. So there you have a bunch of Keen mods that I find worth checking out. Note that most of these mods are meant for experienced Keen players that like a good challenge as these mods are outright difficult (maybe even feel a tad bit impossible at times), but they can all be finished and completed. For more information about these mods and other in development mods, go to the KeenWiki Galaxy Mods page at shikadi.net: www.shikadi.net/keenwiki/Galaxy_Mods#Full_Mods
(before video) I only ever had the shareware version, when I borrowed it from a 'frenemy'...(not going there) So technically, this was both an ADG Review and an ADG Pro episode. Nice. As far as mods go, while not a mod for a DOS game, THUG Pro (a massive community mod for THUG 2-PC only) is as good of a mod as any for any game I've ever played. It is one I recommend to any gamer, even with the release of THPS 1+2 Remastered on the way. Hmmm...were there any Tony Hawk games released on DOS?
I played plenty of DOS games as a kid and knew difference between CGA, EGA and VGA, but I never realized Keen games we're using just 16 EGA colors until much later in life. The bright colors fit so perfectly with its cartoony look, and use of dithering is so subtle, that it just never occurred to me!
Commander Keen Episodes 1 to 5 are now available on GOG as a single package, I bought them yesterday, I don't know how long they've been on GOG for, sadly GOG don't have Aliens Ate My Babysitter.
This game was my childhood. I remember thinking I was so clever figuring out the inchworm secret, and laughed my butt off at the stupid pun in the help text.
Coming from a country not using random body parts as measurement units, I never understood the pun until now... And back when I was a kid I didn't find the game particularly difficult. Of course I used saving a lot and probably wouldn't have been able to do it without, but playing through the game in one afternoon was one of our favorite things to do after school :)
I know someone who figured it out by accident ... he just wanted all the worms around him. After that we were always able to play that nutso secret level. :)
It's interesting to me that you found it so difficult. I thought it was pretty hard as a kid, but not tough as nails or anything. I do agree that a three hit system would work well without losing any real challenge.
Oh, god this is pure nostalgia. My first PC was a crappy 25mhz 486 and had this among the shareware preloaded on it. I never managed to finish it because I was never good at platformers.
What a coincidence, I just went back to episode 4 last week - it’s incredible the variety that was put into the shareware episode! I was actually a bit disappointed with episode 5 years later because the levels are all much more similar. Also I felt like an absolute genius when I discovered the big secret in episode 4, even though I was just messing about and did it by accident :)
The shareware was included on the driver disk for my gravis joystick. I was so stoked when I found out not only I got a joystick for my 5th birthday but it also included a game a good game at that.
As seen in this videos description, the source port of Commander Keen named Commander Genius is named as one of the ways to enjoy these games on modern PCs. Commander Genius has a lot off added features compared to the original versions of these games, and is still in heavy development, so new features and new bug fixes are added to this day. There's also the option to use custom- and improved graphics in these games using CGenius, and it just so happens that I recently did a MS-DOS VGA 256 color recoloring of most of the graphics for Keen 4, 5 & 6, with the graphics being stores as png files and can be downloaded from one of the more recent forum threads in the forums of CGenius (links to the forum on the Commander Genius homepage). CGenius also has support for 4 player same-screen multiplayer, so now you can enjoy Keen 1-6 with a couple of friends.
weird, i literally just started playing this yesterday (after finishing Secret Agent for the first time in 30 years) and then i find this video uploaded, meant to be.
After having grown up playing the shareware release of the original Commander Keen, playing Goodbye, Galaxy just felt.. off. The pseudo-3D from the perspective that the walls and platforms were drawn on, the softer sound effects, the extra mechanics.. I actually feel the same way when comparing Super Mario Bros. 3 on the NES - which I had grown up playing - with Super Mario World for the SNES. The latter feels kind of weird. Great video as always, Gemini!
It all depends on tastes and preferences when it comes down to it. I myself prefer the original Keen trilogy over the later Keen games, or even in regards to Mario, I prefer the NES SMB3 to any of the SNES Mario games, but then for something like Metroid, I much prefer Super Metroid over the original Metroid on the NES or even Metroid II on the Game Boy. This is part of the reason why I try not to comment too heavily on graphics or music in these videos, since everyone has different tastes when it comes to that sort of thing. :B
Speaking of recycled music, the song used in Miragia (and a handful of other stages in Keen 4) has its own funny story. It was a song called "Eat Your Vegetables" originally composed for Keen Dreams before Softdisk decided to axe all the music in that game at the last minute to save disk space because they were too cheap to spring for high density floppies. There is a home video shot by Dan Linton (Software Creations) touring the Id Software office after hours in 1993 just before the release of Doom. Bobby Prince had just been brought in to do the sound for Doom and they let him set up in the conference room, presumably since they had nowhere else to put him. In the video, Prince explains the writing process for the song and demonstrates the original MIDI version on his wavetable synth and it's definitely worth watching for his commentary alone.
The glitchy frames gets really complicated on newer hardware like my win 98 machine. When I used an LCD the framerate was fine, but then when I switched over to a CRT it got messed up. You'd think it be the other way round. I just noticed this is episode 268 and I was wondering: when you reach episode 286 :P you should do something themed on the intel 286
There weren't a lot of good platformers on PC like on the SNES and Genesis. But most of the top platformers for MS-DOS came from id and Apogee. Can't go wrong with music from Bobby Prince either. I also like to include this game when testing video card compatibility. Like to look for the cyan border, smooth scrolling on the title, and VGA output that capture cards and flat panels can handle with proper colors. (Last one's not a huge issue with CRTs though.) Keen's just worth having in any collection.
This is neat, but I never considered this game as hard. I would say, despite a certain level, Commander Keen 4 is the easiest Keen game after Keen 1. :)
Agree. There are maybe 2 or 3 levels that made (and still make) me furious but with saving and loading they're not that impossible. I didn't even notice all those things Kris mentioned as being "annoying" (like the moving platforms where you fall down when you're not dead center, the secrets-within-secrets where your only option is to die, the "impossible pogo jump", and the fact that you cannot see very far left or right) when I was a kid. But I agree with it being almost unplayable on DosBox...
My youth! I played the crap out of the shareware Keen4 (in CGA initially, then VGA when we bought a VGA monitor) to the point where my first legal game my father bought me for my birthday was Keen6. Can't say I ever thought the games were hard, but I was crazy good at platformers as a kid. Maybe I should try it again as an adult (once I find a way to make it work with my hardware or DOSBox)...
Excellent video! It is a tough game but there is a charm to it that is irresistible . I hope you'll visit Aliens Ate My Babysitter at some point in the future. Provided you can find a legitimate copy. It's too bad that one seems to have some legal issues preventing a modern release.
Fun Fact: If you play CK4 on Easy, you can use an Impossible Pogo Jump to skip past most of the Isle of Tar, arguably the hardest (albeit one of the optional ones) level in the game.
*The Save Games* ...Wasn't this functionality standard for most games at the time? I remember being able to save pretty much anywhere outside of a cut scene and sometimes even within cut scenes if they were just pre-scripted events done within the engine.
Yes, I think so too. Back then most games had these "save states" as Kris calls them. I was also wondering why he mentioned it as a big deal. But of course, if you compare it to todays' games, where you have only certain "save spots" or can only save at the beginning of a level/map, everything was better back then :)
On consoles, nope. On computers... sort of. Certain genres typically saved exact states and certain genres didn't, and platformers was definitely one of the genres that DIDN'T, so seeing such a feature in a platformer in 1991 is definitely unusual and why I called attention to it. :B
@@Pixelmusement Fair enough. When I said. games of the time' I meant PC games. Also, it just occurred to me that I didn't play a load of platformers at this time, and I think the ones that I did play might have been based on this engine.
I already did with a different game which had it; kinda forget which game it was. I did record some footage of it though just in case I needed some. :B
As a kid I didn’t honor this game like one could have. I rather looked at Jill and its VGA graphics. However In hindsight Keen is much more impressive from a technical point of view. The scrolling is possible through some clever use of the EGA card. Would be nice to dissect the graphics engine at some point!
I'm not sure if having dosbox determines if it is a dox executable, but I'll note that if you run dosbox and run the keen4e.exe, it starts up. (referring to Steam Version)
It does not. The EXE file itself determines what OS it's designed to function with. DOS executables need to be run in a DOS environment, either a real DOS system, a Windows system with DOS support, or inside a DOS emulation, thus if the EXEs run in DOSBox, they're the original DOS executables! Some DOS games on Steam have been reworked into Windows executables meaning they can't be run inside DOSBox or on real DOS hardware. :P
One problem I had is that sometimes, when I had a save-game with a key gem and I reloaded, the game would make an awful noise and the gem would be gone from Keen's inventory. That made the level impossible to complete, and I'd be forced to start over. (I learned to save just before grabbing a gem or just after using it.) I never had this problem on original hardware that I can remember, so maybe it's a Dosbox thing.
@@Pixelmusement Lucky you! Not sure what caused it. I did hear the nasty noise upon reloading in someone else's Let's Play, though they were lucky enough to never have keys when it happened. Who knows.
I don't recall any noise, though my computer at the time probably didn't have a sound card. But the key glitch always existed for me. It was fixed in episode 6, which was my first entry in the series, so I was annoyed to discover it in episode 4. But although it was annoying, it made it less savescummy.
I dunno if you're a Linux user or not Kris but if you do try to use Dosbox-staging this soft fork of Dosbox is kinda overhauling a lot of stuff under the hood and it could very well solve whatever issue you're having with this game. At least it's worth giving it a try.
God, these games are a HUGE part of my childhood. I'm still replaying them to this day - without DOSBox. There is a modern source port available, called "Commander Genius". clonekeenplus.sourceforge.net/
Commander Keen is just like Super Mario on PCs, where you also dont have a health bar. I loved the "first" game (Goodbye Galaxy) as it was the most appealing one to me. I never liked the later episodes that much, as they also included some minor game mechanic changes (big switches ie) and this alienesque overall look. I have to play Commander Keen now...
@@Pixelmusement I know what you mean. I played the level "Crystalus" for a while and finally managed to step through the big door when this f*cking blue bird came across and killed me instantly. Ragequit of the day
What about Keen Drems? BTW you have to try Keen 4 and 5 composite mod patch and keen episode 58 and 59 fan made modes with better graphics then the original games :) also krazy fun Net keen! A multilayer game with the same engine, and yes it is DOS game, but I did not figured out how the network works under real DOS and hardware tho it is working on DOSBOX and it is fantastic depth match up to 4 players via LAN :)
I was waiting for this review for ages, even begged for it, but now when it is out, I had to rethink that instant like I gave it. I mean all what this review is is complaining about how this game is hard. No, this game is not hard, the first trilogy was WAAAY harder. The modern mods are WAAAAY harder. This game is OK hard, if it was easier, nobody would play it just because it is too easy. I have speedrun of one level from CK9 on my channel ( ua-cam.com/video/PQYb9J8nIyY/v-deo.html ). This game is crippling hard, yet still very much playable and enjoyable. I mean, last week you reviewed GODS, one of the most hard games from DOS era and you didn't complain about the difficulty as much as you did here...
Remember, this is my first time playing the game. As I mention at the end, this is definitely a game you can adapt to as most of the difficulty stems from not knowing what's coming and not being able to react fast enough to not die and then not being able to continue because you run out of lives. It all culminates together to make the game impossible to complete blind without using the saving/loading mechanics, but once you know what you're doing, you're WAY better off. As I said multiple times, saving and loading mitigates the difficulty, thus why I'm not mad at the game. I do recognize though that the way this script turned out I kinda lumped all the negative stuff right near the start. I've been trying to pace myself better when I have both good and bad things to say but this time around it wouldn't have been coherent to do that. :P
...just looked for it and I DID find it... except, the only way to get out of that secret instantly ends the level, marking it as cleared, meaning you can't go back in and farm them. :B
Even easy mode is hard? I agree with that finding proper emulation is hard, I didn't know the exact technical reasons, but I went through a few emulators trying to find a good one for mac. So, if anyone's reading this...if you still have access to a 32-bit OS X, Boxer is the best dos app by far. Unfortunately, Catalina ended 32-bit support and now the best that I've found is Dosbox Staging or Dosbox 0.74-3, both of which are independent builds of Dosbox 0.74.
The only difference between the skill levels is the quantity of enemies, which yes, does make a considerable difference in the difficulty. I was playing on "Normal". :B
This game was such a big part of my childhood, never beat it until the 2000s, and I've played a bunch of the mods as well. I also hated those blue bouncing fire breathing balls, the spider alien things were also a pain.
I've beaten the game on easy and medium, but I never managed to get past the Well of Wishes on "hard" - I think I was too scared of getting eaten :P I think my least favorite enemies were the ones that couldn't be permanently stunned, like the Arachnut (what you called the "spider aliens") or the Berkeloid (made of fire and threw fireballs, and couldn't be hurt at all). I thought the walking rocks were cute :)
Eh, I just use the speed boost from the jump button to outswim the Dopefish. Anyway, despite the one hit kills, the games aren't that difficult as long as you play on Easy. I can beat every level of Episode 4 without a lot of trouble, and I only need to use save scumming with the secret level. "Goodbye Galaxy" is still significantly easier than "Invasion of the Vorticans," largely due to significantly better movement and jumping physics, blasters being handed out much more regularly, and the ability to ledge grab.
You can see some of them in the video itself whenever you witness Keen or something else leaving a sort of "motion blur" of extra sprites behind. Beyond that, the main problem was shearing, but on multiple lines at a time, thus why I wasn't convinced it was vsync related at first, but after seeing those shearing lines NOT present in my video captures I think at least that much could be solved with vsync.
I live in a very large apartment building and have to use some pretty aggressive noise filtering given the amount of noise that occurs regularly so that's probably what you're hearing is the fine details of the s sound getting negated by that. :P
Why would using a built in save system be considered cheating? Many games have quick save features that you're encouraged to use, I don't see the problem if the devs put it there. Saving anywhere can be a hindrance as well as a help, you can box yourself into unwinnable situations, so in a way it adds an extra layer of strategy knowing when to save or not. Eschewing such a feature when provided legitimately is like cutting your nose off to spite your face, though I can understand it when using emulators as it can ruin some games if they weren't designed for that.
ADG videos debut around the start of the first three Saturdays of every month, Eastern Time, while Shovelware Diggers debuts every week around the start of Wednesdays.
Pixelmusement That’s right! Id tried to license the engine out to several other developers, but Bio Menace was the only game to be completed. Of course, they had much more success with the licensing approach with their next couple of engines :)
Apogee and Id Software milked the hell out of the EGA smooth scrolling hack in the early 1990s--well past EGA's prime and during SVGA becoming standard on PCs. I'm sure Keen 4-6 share a lot of DNA with Dangerous Dave 2 and Rescue Rover (to a lesser extent). Maybe some other titles I'm not aware of as well.
Watching your videos for a long time now, I always wonder, why do you have so much trouble with the old Apogee/ID Platformers? Especially this one, it´s a) easier than Invasion of the Vorticons b) easier than almost every platform game on a Nintendo or Sega console (I´d say it´s about as hard as Super Mario World, which is one of the "easiest" SNES games) c) it has an EASY difficulty setting (you play on NORMAL). Of course it´s not an easy game by today´s standards, but what platformer from that time period is? Anyway, all my opinion of course. I just find it funny. Keep up the good content!
I find the original Keen games easier because I can see what's happening. I have an abysmal short-term memory so when I play a platformer I am almost entirely at the whim of reactionary movement as opposed to memorized movement. If you can memorize everything going on in the levels in Goodbye, Galaxy, then yes, you can doubtlessly get through with minimal effort. I can't even come close to that though, not unless I spent MONTHS playing the game. :P
@@Pixelmusement Ok, I totally understand that. Without quick memorization platformers can be way more difficult. I almost only played platformers (mostly Apogee) when I was a kid so I kinda have an instinct about doing it, that´s probably why I don´t find those games that hard.
@Roobar I can beat Ninja Gaiden. So long as I have time to react to things I can play platformers just fine. The more memorization required, the more I fail at it. :P
Congratulations on being first, JakeTheGuy! Your prize is BILLIONS UPON BILLIONS OF PIXELS! You're receiving them right now as we speak! In fact, if you're on a 4K monitor at 60 FPS you're getting a little over 490 MILLION of them a second! 8D
"Brutally hard" - this is joke, right? Commander Keen is a pretty easy platformer. And you can save your game mid-level, which means you can immediately reload, if you mess up. Unless you completely forgot about the save/load feature, there is no reason to consider this game "hard". But then again, you are the weirdo who dislikes Raptor: Call of the Shadows, so we could expect anything from you :D
That was pretty early in my run so I was still getting used to the pogo mechanics as they're slightly different here than in the original Keen games. I got better at the pogo stuff as I got further in. Also, I had JUST saved so I was being slightly more reckless than I normally would be. :B
@@Pixelmusement heheh ^^ sorry if i sounded a little harsh, I think the feeling is different when you raise playin these games, is just like playing some NES games, which was so hard, but we as kids never complained
Ahh, one of the gold standards of DOS platformers. The are few games I've played more than this one. Tough but rewarding with charm for days.
I had NO IDEA how hard this game was gonna be going into this. REALLY glad the saving and loading was so dynamic because I don't think I'd've been able to get even halfway through the first episode otherwise! :P
Yup! I honestly wished (when I was a kid) there was a way you could glitch yourself into playing the title screen.
@@Pixelmusement I've played the first few levels more times than I can recall, but I've never finished this game. It is really hard.
Pretty much the first thing that gets installed on any DOS machine build I do. Gotta make sure that AdLib is working y'know?
@@RetroSwim lol dude your content is marked for kids
You can really tell that I love this game.
P.S. There's a fan modification of CK4 for playing in composite CGA mode.
@@ianhanschen Glad you like it :)
Most platformers back then had 'one hit death'. It was a design choice not a flaw and quick saves gave player control over checkpoint placement. Commander Keen games also established basic mechanics for Wolfenstein 3D and DOOM. Find colored key, open door, flip switches, kill some monsters, exit.
Keen also started ID strategy to make two games with one technology. Episodes 1-3 used groundbreaking techniques and with 4-5 ID put more effort in gameplay. Later games got same approach: Wolf3D and SoT, DOOM 1 and 2, and both Quakes.
Later games were pushing hardware limits and ID software didn't look back to support older hardware. "Goodbye, Galaxy!" series was the opposite. At the time of it's release VGA support was a must. 256 color mode would require new drawing module, but they could simply use custom palette in 16-color EGA mode. Many games did it. For example Lemmings is a 16-color VGA game, same as Another World. Both games also support EGA cards and you can see what a difference custom palette does.
Anyway if we consider that ID was focusing solely on 3D graphics it's a good thing that they've manage to make later Keen games as playable as they are.
My boy Billy Blaze deserved MUCH better than what they did to him. These are so damn good! Aliens Ate My Babysitter (or the 3 level demo version, at least) was one of my first games.
I know nobody asked for it, but since it's been confirmed that Billy is the grandson of BJ Blazcowicz, and Doomguy is also related somehow, my headcanon is that Keen is the founder and original CEO of the Union Aerospace Corporation. Think about it - he built an interstellar spacecraft as a child, that would be outrageously profitable. And it's not at all unlikely that later executives would pervert its mission. It's happened plenty of times in our world.
Finally, as for ADG Mod videos, how about something Doom-related? You've only got eleventy quintillion to choose from. :P
That's kinda part of the problem... half of my requests for ADG Mod videos are Doom related and almost the entirety of the other half are all mature-rated games. I don't want ADG Mod to be JUST mature-rated content. :/
@@Pixelmusement I see your problem. How about the hidden level editor in Jill of the Jungle and Xargon? The latter of which is disabled, but easily re-enabled with some simple hex editing.
Didn't know about those... :o
The save/load mechanic meant that even as a kid the platforming/enemy difficulty never bothered me. The maze-like levels of Keen 4, on the other hand.... The ice level took me forever back in the day!!!
It is the best game I ever played as a kid! I still own and play it today! Thank you for showing this gem! However, I have to disagree with you about the difficulties. The game has 3 levels of difficulty. If the game is too difficult on "normal", you can get to know the game on "easy" first and improve after the first playthrough. If something doesnt make sense it means, that there is something well hidden you have to find, like for example in the secret that leads to death. If we compare other games from that time period with Keen 4, the save and load option is actually a great thing. Players can always choose how to play this game and they can always develop better skills. (Like the Impossible-Pogo-Jump).
Anyway, great video! :)
Yeah. My point about the difficulty is ultimately that you cannot survive this game blind without constantly using the saving and loading mechanics or taking advantage of 1UP farming. Once you know what you're in for you're WAY better off. It's the whole "all or none" approach, perpetuated by one-hit kills. :P
Yes, it's not cheating if the developer added save/load feature by default.
Spent so much time on this game when it came out - classic dos platformer
This game has been tested and is working on the latest version of pcem on these emulated machines:
* AMI 386DX clone, 386DX/33, ET4000, SB Pro v2, MS-DOS 6.22
* ASUS P/I-P55T2P4, Pentium 200, 64MB, ViRGE DX, SB Pro v2, FreeDOS 1.2
Did you ever played Commander Keen mods based on the Goodbye Galaxy games? There are some really high quality mods out there that are, in my opinion, really impressive in terms of complexity and push the Keen engine to its limits.
Here are some of those mods that are worth checking out:
The Keys of Krodacia, known as Keen 7
Dead in the Desert, known as Keen 8
Battle of the Brain, know as Keen 9
These three mods are part of the unofficial 'The Universe is Toast' trilogy, which is the unofficial sequel to Goodbye, Galaxy. To me, these mods play like they're official games, but of course, they're not.
Atroxian Realm. Good lord, the quality and size of this mod is impressive. This one is known as the first Source-Code mod. Whatever that means, guess it has custom code?
The Alphamatic. Sort of a reimagining of Keen 5 and the sequel to Atroxian Realm. That last level, that last level... :o
The Terror from Outer Space. Probably my favorite mod.
Mirror Menace aka Dimensional Chaos. Known as Keen 10, and the unofficial sequel to The Universe is Toast trilogy. Good one, a little bit glitchy at the end (out of memory crashing) but my second favorite mod nonetheless.
Episode 58 - The Ruin of Roib. Aged Keen.
Episode 59 - Underworld Ultimate. Also aged Keen.
Those two are... weird mods to say the least and I actually didn't finish both of them yet.
So there you have a bunch of Keen mods that I find worth checking out. Note that most of these mods are meant for experienced Keen players that like a good challenge as these mods are outright difficult (maybe even feel a tad bit impossible at times), but they can all be finished and completed.
For more information about these mods and other in development mods, go to the KeenWiki Galaxy Mods page at shikadi.net: www.shikadi.net/keenwiki/Galaxy_Mods#Full_Mods
(before video) I only ever had the shareware version, when I borrowed it from a 'frenemy'...(not going there)
So technically, this was both an ADG Review and an ADG Pro episode. Nice.
As far as mods go, while not a mod for a DOS game, THUG Pro (a massive community mod for THUG 2-PC only) is as good of a mod as any for any game I've ever played. It is one I recommend to any gamer, even with the release of THPS 1+2 Remastered on the way. Hmmm...were there any Tony Hawk games released on DOS?
I played plenty of DOS games as a kid and knew difference between CGA, EGA and VGA, but I never realized Keen games we're using just 16 EGA colors until much later in life. The bright colors fit so perfectly with its cartoony look, and use of dithering is so subtle, that it just never occurred to me!
Ah, keen4e.exe is something that I will never forget.
Commander Keen was basically SMW for us MS-DOS kids.
Commander Keen Episodes 1 to 5 are now available on GOG as a single package, I bought them yesterday, I don't know how long they've been on GOG for, sadly GOG don't have Aliens Ate My Babysitter.
This game was my childhood. I remember thinking I was so clever figuring out the inchworm secret, and laughed my butt off at the stupid pun in the help text.
I didn't figure it out till UA-cam.
Coming from a country not using random body parts as measurement units, I never understood the pun until now... And back when I was a kid I didn't find the game particularly difficult. Of course I used saving a lot and probably wouldn't have been able to do it without, but playing through the game in one afternoon was one of our favorite things to do after school :)
I know someone who figured it out by accident ... he just wanted all the worms around him. After that we were always able to play that nutso secret level. :)
Dopefish used to scare me back then.
It's interesting to me that you found it so difficult. I thought it was pretty hard as a kid, but not tough as nails or anything. I do agree that a three hit system would work well without losing any real challenge.
Oh, god this is pure nostalgia. My first PC was a crappy 25mhz 486 and had this among the shareware preloaded on it. I never managed to finish it because I was never good at platformers.
What a coincidence, I just went back to episode 4 last week - it’s incredible the variety that was put into the shareware episode! I was actually a bit disappointed with episode 5 years later because the levels are all much more similar. Also I felt like an absolute genius when I discovered the big secret in episode 4, even though I was just messing about and did it by accident :)
The shareware was included on the driver disk for my gravis joystick. I was so stoked when I found out not only I got a joystick for my 5th birthday but it also included a game a good game at that.
As seen in this videos description, the source port of Commander Keen named Commander Genius is named as one of the ways to enjoy these games on modern PCs. Commander Genius has a lot off added features compared to the original versions of these games, and is still in heavy development, so new features and new bug fixes are added to this day. There's also the option to use custom- and improved graphics in these games using CGenius, and it just so happens that I recently did a MS-DOS VGA 256 color recoloring of most of the graphics for Keen 4, 5 & 6, with the graphics being stores as png files and can be downloaded from one of the more recent forum threads in the forums of CGenius (links to the forum on the Commander Genius homepage). CGenius also has support for 4 player same-screen multiplayer, so now you can enjoy Keen 1-6 with a couple of friends.
weird, i literally just started playing this yesterday (after finishing Secret Agent for the first time in 30 years) and then i find this video uploaded, meant to be.
After having grown up playing the shareware release of the original Commander Keen, playing Goodbye, Galaxy just felt.. off. The pseudo-3D from the perspective that the walls and platforms were drawn on, the softer sound effects, the extra mechanics..
I actually feel the same way when comparing Super Mario Bros. 3 on the NES - which I had grown up playing - with Super Mario World for the SNES. The latter feels kind of weird.
Great video as always, Gemini!
It all depends on tastes and preferences when it comes down to it. I myself prefer the original Keen trilogy over the later Keen games, or even in regards to Mario, I prefer the NES SMB3 to any of the SNES Mario games, but then for something like Metroid, I much prefer Super Metroid over the original Metroid on the NES or even Metroid II on the Game Boy. This is part of the reason why I try not to comment too heavily on graphics or music in these videos, since everyone has different tastes when it comes to that sort of thing. :B
Speaking of recycled music, the song used in Miragia (and a handful of other stages in Keen 4) has its own funny story. It was a song called "Eat Your Vegetables" originally composed for Keen Dreams before Softdisk decided to axe all the music in that game at the last minute to save disk space because they were too cheap to spring for high density floppies.
There is a home video shot by Dan Linton (Software Creations) touring the Id Software office after hours in 1993 just before the release of Doom. Bobby Prince had just been brought in to do the sound for Doom and they let him set up in the conference room, presumably since they had nowhere else to put him. In the video, Prince explains the writing process for the song and demonstrates the original MIDI version on his wavetable synth and it's definitely worth watching for his commentary alone.
The glitchy frames gets really complicated on newer hardware like my win 98 machine. When I used an LCD the framerate was fine, but then when I switched over to a CRT it got messed up. You'd think it be the other way round.
I just noticed this is episode 268 and I was wondering: when you reach episode 286 :P you should do something themed on the intel 286
There weren't a lot of good platformers on PC like on the SNES and Genesis. But most of the top platformers for MS-DOS came from id and Apogee. Can't go wrong with music from Bobby Prince either. I also like to include this game when testing video card compatibility. Like to look for the cyan border, smooth scrolling on the title, and VGA output that capture cards and flat panels can handle with proper colors. (Last one's not a huge issue with CRTs though.) Keen's just worth having in any collection.
This is neat, but I never considered this game as hard. I would say, despite a certain level, Commander Keen 4 is the easiest Keen game after Keen 1. :)
Agree. There are maybe 2 or 3 levels that made (and still make) me furious but with saving and loading they're not that impossible. I didn't even notice all those things Kris mentioned as being "annoying" (like the moving platforms where you fall down when you're not dead center, the secrets-within-secrets where your only option is to die, the "impossible pogo jump", and the fact that you cannot see very far left or right) when I was a kid. But I agree with it being almost unplayable on DosBox...
You only SOMETIMES fall through those purple platforms and only when trying to walk on them. You always land on them initially just fine. :P
Yeah, I haven't played this in ages but I played it a lot in middle school and I don't remember it being that tough.
My youth! I played the crap out of the shareware Keen4 (in CGA initially, then VGA when we bought a VGA monitor) to the point where my first legal game my father bought me for my birthday was Keen6.
Can't say I ever thought the games were hard, but I was crazy good at platformers as a kid. Maybe I should try it again as an adult (once I find a way to make it work with my hardware or DOSBox)...
Funny , I was certain you already did a review of this. Keen is such a staple in DOS gaming history, it was such a no brainer you would review it.
I think he has reviewed the first one
14:20 Did you try the game's EGA support against DOSBox-X's vmemdelay option? Try vmemdelay=500, vmemdelay=800, etc.
Yeah, I tried that. No effect. :P
A true classic! One of my favourite DOS games.
Excellent video! It is a tough game but there is a charm to it that is irresistible . I hope you'll visit Aliens Ate My Babysitter at some point in the future. Provided you can find a legitimate copy. It's too bad that one seems to have some legal issues preventing a modern release.
Fun Fact: If you play CK4 on Easy, you can use an Impossible Pogo Jump to skip past most of the Isle of Tar, arguably the hardest (albeit one of the optional ones) level in the game.
*The Save Games*
...Wasn't this functionality standard for most games at the time? I remember being able to save pretty much anywhere outside of a cut scene and sometimes even within cut scenes if they were just pre-scripted events done within the engine.
Yes, I think so too. Back then most games had these "save states" as Kris calls them. I was also wondering why he mentioned it as a big deal. But of course, if you compare it to todays' games, where you have only certain "save spots" or can only save at the beginning of a level/map, everything was better back then :)
On consoles, nope. On computers... sort of. Certain genres typically saved exact states and certain genres didn't, and platformers was definitely one of the genres that DIDN'T, so seeing such a feature in a platformer in 1991 is definitely unusual and why I called attention to it. :B
@@Pixelmusement Fair enough. When I said. games of the time' I meant PC games. Also, it just occurred to me that I didn't play a load of platformers at this time, and I think the ones that I did play might have been based on this engine.
One of my favorite dos games, gets fairly hard near the end but you can speedrun through it quite quickly
I guess the swastika at 7:38 is the one John Romero mentioned as referencing their upcoming game Wolf3D...?
...I didn't even SEE that until you pointed it out just now... :o
For reference, the Steam version does not appear to have CGA support either. (No keen4c.exe)
I loved keen 4 as a kid, it's the best one on my opinion.
Aww, you didn't comment on the amazing pong minigame (paddle war) in the menu.
I already did with a different game which had it; kinda forget which game it was. I did record some footage of it though just in case I needed some. :B
As a kid I didn’t honor this game like one could have. I rather looked at Jill and its VGA graphics. However In hindsight Keen is much more impressive from a technical point of view. The scrolling is possible through some clever use of the EGA card. Would be nice to dissect the graphics engine at some point!
I didn't get the Terminator 2 reference. What was he referring to?
It's actually an original Terminator reference, specifically with how the title scrolls in as the effect was first seen in Terminator. ;)
@@Pixelmusement Got it! Thank you!
I'm not sure if having dosbox determines if it is a dox executable, but I'll note that if you run dosbox and run the keen4e.exe, it starts up. (referring to Steam Version)
It does not. The EXE file itself determines what OS it's designed to function with. DOS executables need to be run in a DOS environment, either a real DOS system, a Windows system with DOS support, or inside a DOS emulation, thus if the EXEs run in DOSBox, they're the original DOS executables! Some DOS games on Steam have been reworked into Windows executables meaning they can't be run inside DOSBox or on real DOS hardware. :P
One problem I had is that sometimes, when I had a save-game with a key gem and I reloaded, the game would make an awful noise and the gem would be gone from Keen's inventory. That made the level impossible to complete, and I'd be forced to start over. (I learned to save just before grabbing a gem or just after using it.)
I never had this problem on original hardware that I can remember, so maybe it's a Dosbox thing.
I absolutely did not run into this at all during my gameplay... :o
@@Pixelmusement Lucky you! Not sure what caused it. I did hear the nasty noise upon reloading in someone else's Let's Play, though they were lucky enough to never have keys when it happened. Who knows.
I don't recall any noise, though my computer at the time probably didn't have a sound card. But the key glitch always existed for me. It was fixed in episode 6, which was my first entry in the series, so I was annoyed to discover it in episode 4. But although it was annoying, it made it less savescummy.
You had an older version. Get version 1.4 it doesn't have this bug
I dunno if you're a Linux user or not Kris but if you do try to use Dosbox-staging this soft fork of Dosbox is kinda overhauling a lot of stuff under the hood and it could very well solve whatever issue you're having with this game.
At least it's worth giving it a try.
God, these games are a HUGE part of my childhood.
I'm still replaying them to this day - without DOSBox. There is a modern source port available, called "Commander Genius".
clonekeenplus.sourceforge.net/
Commander Keen is just like Super Mario on PCs, where you also dont have a health bar. I loved the "first" game (Goodbye Galaxy) as it was the most appealing one to me. I never liked the later episodes that much, as they also included some minor game mechanic changes (big switches ie) and this alienesque overall look. I have to play Commander Keen now...
Even the original Super Mario Bros. gave you powerups which let you take a hit and survive. Heck, they had invulnerability powerups too! :P
@@Pixelmusement I know what you mean. I played the level "Crystalus" for a while and finally managed to step through the big door when this f*cking blue bird came across and killed me instantly. Ragequit of the day
What about Keen Drems?
BTW you have to try Keen 4 and 5 composite mod patch and keen episode 58 and 59 fan made modes with better graphics then the original games :) also krazy fun Net keen! A multilayer game with the same engine, and yes it is DOS game, but I did not figured out how the network works under real DOS and hardware tho it is working on DOSBOX and it is fantastic depth match up to 4 players via LAN :)
I was waiting for this review for ages, even begged for it, but now when it is out, I had to rethink that instant like I gave it. I mean all what this review is is complaining about how this game is hard. No, this game is not hard, the first trilogy was WAAAY harder. The modern mods are WAAAAY harder. This game is OK hard, if it was easier, nobody would play it just because it is too easy. I have speedrun of one level from CK9 on my channel ( ua-cam.com/video/PQYb9J8nIyY/v-deo.html ). This game is crippling hard, yet still very much playable and enjoyable. I mean, last week you reviewed GODS, one of the most hard games from DOS era and you didn't complain about the difficulty as much as you did here...
Remember, this is my first time playing the game. As I mention at the end, this is definitely a game you can adapt to as most of the difficulty stems from not knowing what's coming and not being able to react fast enough to not die and then not being able to continue because you run out of lives. It all culminates together to make the game impossible to complete blind without using the saving/loading mechanics, but once you know what you're doing, you're WAY better off. As I said multiple times, saving and loading mitigates the difficulty, thus why I'm not mad at the game. I do recognize though that the way this script turned out I kinda lumped all the negative stuff right near the start. I've been trying to pace myself better when I have both good and bad things to say but this time around it wouldn't have been coherent to do that. :P
Omnispeak is a pretty good port for playing Keen 4-6
you get a secret 1UP area with multiple 1UPs in the first level.
...just looked for it and I DID find it... except, the only way to get out of that secret instantly ends the level, marking it as cleared, meaning you can't go back in and farm them. :B
@@Pixelmusement Common for level 1...CK5 does the same thing
Even easy mode is hard? I agree with that finding proper emulation is hard, I didn't know the exact technical reasons, but I went through a few emulators trying to find a good one for mac. So, if anyone's reading this...if you still have access to a 32-bit OS X, Boxer is the best dos app by far. Unfortunately, Catalina ended 32-bit support and now the best that I've found is Dosbox Staging or Dosbox 0.74-3, both of which are independent builds of Dosbox 0.74.
The only difference between the skill levels is the quantity of enemies, which yes, does make a considerable difference in the difficulty. I was playing on "Normal". :B
@@Pixelmusement Also, the gravity is floatier on easy, which makes some of those jumps less difficult, and the ammo gives 8 instead of 5.
Did I just heard the music from Catacombs 3D?
YUP.
Guys: Yay.
Girls : Yay.
@@Pixelmusement I didn't know it was actually Catacombs 3D for the longest time, think it was LGR or another UA-cam video.
This game was such a big part of my childhood, never beat it until the 2000s, and I've played a bunch of the mods as well. I also hated those blue bouncing fire breathing balls, the spider alien things were also a pain.
I've beaten the game on easy and medium, but I never managed to get past the Well of Wishes on "hard" - I think I was too scared of getting eaten :P
I think my least favorite enemies were the ones that couldn't be permanently stunned, like the Arachnut (what you called the "spider aliens") or the Berkeloid (made of fire and threw fireballs, and couldn't be hurt at all). I thought the walking rocks were cute :)
Eh, I just use the speed boost from the jump button to outswim the Dopefish.
Anyway, despite the one hit kills, the games aren't that difficult as long as you play on Easy. I can beat every level of Episode 4 without a lot of trouble, and I only need to use save scumming with the secret level. "Goodbye Galaxy" is still significantly easier than "Invasion of the Vorticans," largely due to significantly better movement and jumping physics, blasters being handed out much more regularly, and the ability to ledge grab.
Can you provide any guidance on how to recreate the graphical glitches you mention?
You can see some of them in the video itself whenever you witness Keen or something else leaving a sort of "motion blur" of extra sprites behind. Beyond that, the main problem was shearing, but on multiple lines at a time, thus why I wasn't convinced it was vsync related at first, but after seeing those shearing lines NOT present in my video captures I think at least that much could be solved with vsync.
Definitely completed this as a 10 year old.
Your "s's" sound a bit metallic. Dunno if it's my speaker or your microphone
I live in a very large apartment building and have to use some pretty aggressive noise filtering given the amount of noise that occurs regularly so that's probably what you're hearing is the fine details of the s sound getting negated by that. :P
are you going to do the standalone ck games?
These very games have been modded tons.
Why would using a built in save system be considered cheating? Many games have quick save features that you're encouraged to use, I don't see the problem if the devs put it there. Saving anywhere can be a hindrance as well as a help, you can box yourself into unwinnable situations, so in a way it adds an extra layer of strategy knowing when to save or not. Eschewing such a feature when provided legitimately is like cutting your nose off to spite your face, though I can understand it when using emulators as it can ruin some games if they weren't designed for that.
Pixelmusement could you give me the schedule again for your channel
ADG videos debut around the start of the first three Saturdays of every month, Eastern Time, while Shovelware Diggers debuts every week around the start of Wednesdays.
Looks similar to Bio Menace right down to the menus.
I think it might be the same engine, just with some tweaks on the Bio Menace side of things... Not 100% certain though. :B
Pixelmusement That’s right! Id tried to license the engine out to several other developers, but Bio Menace was the only game to be completed. Of course, they had much more success with the licensing approach with their next couple of engines :)
Apogee and Id Software milked the hell out of the EGA smooth scrolling hack in the early 1990s--well past EGA's prime and during SVGA becoming standard on PCs. I'm sure Keen 4-6 share a lot of DNA with Dangerous Dave 2 and Rescue Rover (to a lesser extent). Maybe some other titles I'm not aware of as well.
Watching your videos for a long time now, I always wonder, why do you have so much trouble with the old Apogee/ID Platformers? Especially this one, it´s a) easier than Invasion of the Vorticons b) easier than almost every platform game on a Nintendo or Sega console (I´d say it´s about as hard as Super Mario World, which is one of the "easiest" SNES games) c) it has an EASY difficulty setting (you play on NORMAL).
Of course it´s not an easy game by today´s standards, but what platformer from that time period is?
Anyway, all my opinion of course. I just find it funny. Keep up the good content!
I find the original Keen games easier because I can see what's happening. I have an abysmal short-term memory so when I play a platformer I am almost entirely at the whim of reactionary movement as opposed to memorized movement. If you can memorize everything going on in the levels in Goodbye, Galaxy, then yes, you can doubtlessly get through with minimal effort. I can't even come close to that though, not unless I spent MONTHS playing the game. :P
@@Pixelmusement Ok, I totally understand that. Without quick memorization platformers can be way more difficult. I almost only played platformers (mostly Apogee) when I was a kid so I kinda have an instinct about doing it, that´s probably why I don´t find those games that hard.
@@ala21964 he's just bad at platformers XD
@Roobar I can beat Ninja Gaiden. So long as I have time to react to things I can play platformers just fine. The more memorization required, the more I fail at it. :P
@@Pixelmusement But....Ninja Gaiden is about a gazillion times harder than any Apogee game :-O
In what parallel universe is this game hard??
I had a feeling this video was coming out soon.
(Also, first :P)
Congratulations on being first, JakeTheGuy! Your prize is BILLIONS UPON BILLIONS OF PIXELS! You're receiving them right now as we speak! In fact, if you're on a 4K monitor at 60 FPS you're getting a little over 490 MILLION of them a second! 8D
1337 views! Woo hoo!
So I wasn't being a dumb kid back then, I just didn't know what I was getting into.
When I was a kiddy I liked keen dreams the most, dunno why cos it's the worst out of all of them!!
I mean, my sister preferred Skunny Kart to Wacky Wheels... Even when something is objectively bad we may still prefer it over other better things. :B
@@Pixelmusement wacky wheels all the way!! Specially with the awesome shredding intro music
"Brutally hard" - this is joke, right? Commander Keen is a pretty easy platformer. And you can save your game mid-level, which means you can immediately reload, if you mess up. Unless you completely forgot about the save/load feature, there is no reason to consider this game "hard".
But then again, you are the weirdo who dislikes Raptor: Call of the Shadows, so we could expect anything from you :D
Man, this game is not hard at all
Make a Quake mods video ;)
D
you are very bad at playing it.. hahah.. seriously 08:40 ..how you can die so much there
That was pretty early in my run so I was still getting used to the pogo mechanics as they're slightly different here than in the original Keen games. I got better at the pogo stuff as I got further in. Also, I had JUST saved so I was being slightly more reckless than I normally would be. :B
@@Pixelmusement heheh ^^ sorry if i sounded a little harsh, I think the feeling is different when you raise playin these games, is just like playing some NES games, which was so hard, but we as kids never complained
I hated this game.