The Arcade · 1990 shareware
Commander Keen
A boy, a helmet, a pogo stick — episode one, marooned on Mars.
- Side scroller
- Mars canyons
- Ship parts
- Pogo stick
The ship is in pieces. The Vorticons took the rest.
In this game
A 30-day pass to The Arcade — a cabinet of playable titles. You buy access to the collection, not the games themselves.
About this cabinet In the cabinet
1990, id Software and Apogee: eight-year-old Billy Blaze puts on his brother's football helmet, names himself Commander Keen, and flies the Beans with Bacon Megarocket to Mars. Vorticons steal four parts of the ship. Episode one — Marooned on Mars — is the shareware episode they meant you to copy. The other two you ordered.
Tom Hall's childhood is in the details: the Packers helmet, the red high-tops, the pogo stick, and corpses that stay down. Find the four ship parts across the Martian cities. Pogo is how you reach anything worth reaching. The raygun is optional until it is not.
How to play
| ← → | Run. Hold for speed. |
|---|---|
| ↑ / ↓ | Look up or duck / look down. |
| Ctrl | Jump. Hold longer for a higher hop. Also enter a door when standing in front of one. |
| Alt | Start or stop the pogo stick (once you have it). |
| Ctrl + Alt | Fire the raygun (both buttons at once — Vorticon-engine two-button fire). |
| F3 | Redefine keys if Ctrl/Alt fight your browser. |