Commander Keen 1: Marooned on Mars
Description official description
Billy "Commander Keen" Blaze, an eight-year-old genius, has flown to Mars in his Bean-with-Bacon Megarocket built out of common household objects. But while Keen was exploring Mars, the alien Vorticons stole vital parts from his ship and hid them in the Martian cities. Now Keen must find the stolen parts if he wants to return to Earth.
Commander Keen 1: Marooned on Mars is the first in a series of platform games. Your objective is to find the 4 missing parts to your ship.
The game begins with a top-down map of Mars. This is the level select screen, where you can walk around and choose the next level you want to enter. On each level, you have to find the exit, and possibly grab a missing rocket part which may be on the level. Once you reach the exit, you're back on the map of Mars.
The levels are typically full of enemy creatures. Most numerous are Yorps, which are mostly harmless, if annoying, but other creatures are a genuine danger. If Keen gets shot or touched, or falls into a pit or some hazardous object, he dies, and you're booted out of the level back to the map of Mars and lose one of the lives.
Thankfully, Keen can defeat some of the enemies with his raygun. He can also find a pogo stick which allows him to jump very high. Other items to find include keycards that open locked doors and bonus items which give score (Keen gets an extra life if he collects enough score).
Groups +
Screenshots
Credits (DOS version)
4 People
| Programming | |
| Creative Director | |
| Graphics / Artwork | |
| Level Design | |
| Sound |
Reviews
Critics
Average score: 80% (based on 5 ratings)
Players
Average score: 3.5 out of 5 (based on 80 ratings with 8 reviews)
Who said side-scrolling platform games were not possible on PC's?!
The Good
Cute and colorful graphics. The gameplay was also great for it's time. Smooth scrolling gameplay was never (or at least not that I now of) seen before in platform games on the PC. Some cool innovations such as a pogo stick to jump higher made this game an instant classing. The gameplay was similar to that of Super Mario Bros. at some points, but it was not just another attempt to clone that game. The story was different from the classic "save the princess" formula. You are eight year old genius Billy Blaze and must stop the Vorticans from destroying earth. Billy travels to Mars in this first episode in a trilogy (this game was one of the first that were distributed following the infamous "get part one free as shareware and get the sequels too by buying them" idea that was used in a lot of Apogee games and many publishers have copied). On Mars his ship gets sabotaged by the Vorticans and now you need to collect the stolen parts to repair the ship and help keen continue his adventures. This story was quite original at that age.
The Bad
Some things are a bit dated now such as finding keys to put in the corresponding doors and the gameplay doesn't also quite do the job anymore after 15 years. When this game was released it didn't really have notable flaws, however.
The Bottom Line
Though this game is a bit too dated at certain points it's still a brilliant game that is still free available as shareware and you can still buy it's sequels. If you are looking for a good classic platformer on the PC, you may want to pick this one up.
DOS · by Rensch (203) · 2005
Console-quality graphics and gameplay on a regular PC!
The Good
Commander Keen was so well-programmed that my jaw dropped the first time I saw it. (This has always been a trend with Carmack & Romero games--the same happened when I saw Wolfenstein 3D, then Doom, then Quake.) Commander Keen uses hardware scrolling and virtual screen tricks to provide very smooth scrolling platform gameplay on any 286 or faster with an ega card. That, coupled with the cute, early kid comic-book-style graphics, makes it just as good (if not better) than most console platformers on Nintendo 8-bit platforms.
The PC speaker sound effects are better than average.
The Bad
The gameplay gets pretty repetitive after a while (which is dangerous, since repetition == boredom).
The Bottom Line
A classic game that should be played by anyone who enjoys console platform games. And for extra punch, play it on a real 286 with EGA as a testament to how well it's programmed.
DOS · by Trixter (8952) · 1999
The Good
The first game in the opening trilogy. You got this game free, and then had to buy the next two. Let's just say that this was good enough to make me splash out on parts 2 & 3. It was a natural succesor to Captain Comic, but a much better game.
The graphics were good - very clear and easy on the eyes. The PC speaker sounds were cute and very well done for the time. The story was invloving and the puzzles were tricky without being frustrating.
The Bad
The control system was poor. Your Jump and Pogo buttons were CTRL and ALT. Your fire was CTRL+ALT. This made running, jumping and pogoing a hit a miss affair as you charged down the corridor only to find yourself wasting ammo rather than jumping the tricky ravine.
The Bottom Line
In every way a classic. Obviously it was vastly inferior to the later CK games with the new engine (CK4 onwards), but for a long time it captivated me like few other games have managed.
DOS · by Steve Hall (329) · 2000
Trivia
Development
Tom Hall (via Classic Gaming):
The first game was actually a joke. It was called Dangerous Dave in 'Copyright Infringement.' (John) Carmack had just gotten a little guy to move around over a tile map, and I looked over at the Nintendo in the corner. I said, 'Wouldn't it be funny to make the first level of Super Mario 3...tonight?' Carmack smiled and said, 'Let's do it!' I copied the tiles pixel for pixel and made a map out of them while Carmack feverishly programmed the guy landing on ground tiles and getting coin tiles. At 5:30 in the morning, we dumped that on (John) Romero's desk and went home to crash. Romero played it all the next day, saying 'This could make so much money!' It was pitched to a friend of a friend at Nintendo, and they liked it so much, they wanted a demo. We added Mario graphics and Koopas and stuff, and sent it to them. It apparently got to the head guys at Nintendo, but they didn't want to enter the PC market.
Softdisk didn't want to use the smooth scrolling trick Carmack had discovered (since it didn't also work in CGA!), so we thought, well, if they don't want it, we could do something ourselves.... So we thought, hey, we'll make our own game. We needed a topic. I asked if they cared what topic-sci-fi, fantasy, whatever. I think Carmack mentioned a kid that saves the galaxy or something. I went off and fifteen minutes later, came back with the paragraph that you see in Keen 1. I read it in a Walter Winchell voice (he's a nasal 40s radio/newsreel announcer). Carmack clapped after I was finished, and we were off and running.
We got contacted by Scott Miller of Apogee, and once Keen was published, it was making enough for us to live on, so we quit and formed id.
Mods
There are some level packs and even mods (files changing the graphics in the games) circulating for this game.
References
Throughout the game there are references to Keen's grandfather, whose name is William J. Blazkowicz. Interestingly, William J. Blazkowicz is the main character in Wolfenstein 3D, id's first person shooter made two years later.
Signs
The writings on the signs in the game actually make sense. Much like the runic writing in Ultima, you can translate it letter by letter and discover what they mean. There is a table to help you translate all those messages on 3drealm's website.
Trilogy
Marooned on Mars is the first of three episodes of the series Commander Keen: Invasion of the Vorticons.
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Related Sites +
-
"Marooned on Mars" Flash version!
Play through levels of Commander Keen 1 via your web browser! -
Beyond the Pogo
This is the ultimate Commander Keen fansite. You'll find almost anything Keen-related here. -
Cerebral Cortex 314
Shrine for the Commander Keen series. Includes lots of trivia, fan art, fan created levels, mods and more.
Identifiers +
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Contributors to this Entry
Game added by Tomer Gabel.
Additional contributors: Xa4, Frenkel, Pseudo_Intellectual, formercontrib, Patrick Bregger.
Game added August 14, 1999. Last modified April 24, 2024.