Penguin Pete
Not to be mistaken for PPP Team's Pengo Adventure or Robert Brandon's Penguin War.
Whereas Nebula is the strongest game of the demo bundle and Pipemare is the most iconic, Penguin Pete is the most ambitious. It’s a large game, consisting of several maze levels linked from a complex and dangerous overworld. The protagonist has more moves than the game effectively accounts for, suggesting an even more ambitious design that was slightly cut down.
In effect the game is a scavenger hunt. The player explores several large, interlinked levels, searching for fragments of a wrecked submarine. The main view is of a large ice field; ice islands are connected by a maze of shifting, submerging bridges. Walruses, bears, wolves hassle our penguin; each requires a certain kind of attack to defeat. None is clearly signaled, meaning a bit of fumbling trial and error.
There is the occasional hole in the snow; hop in, and search for a new submarine chunk. Some of the mazes are overhead-view; some are simple platformers; one is an underwater level. Most of them are mazes, which although often clever, can quickly become tedious and can take an age to finish -- successfully or unsuccessfully.
The game is harder than it needs to be, and a little too complex for its premise. One of the great things about Nebula is its simplicity. There’s practically nothing extraneous to it. By contrast, some of Pete’s moves don’t even work all that well. Good on Joan for trying a Mario-style hop attack, but it should have been cut — as should have the jumping moves in overhead-view levels.
Still, hey, there is a ton of neat ideas in here. The level progression is pretty advanced, and the mazes that involve blindly burrowing into the snow are a bit of genius. They’re simple, and that’s why they work so well. The game is also attractive and, as with the other sample games, endearing.
Contents
Story
A nuclear weapons submarine has been ripped apart after being trapped in artic ice flows. Sections of the submarine are strewn on the arctic ocean floor and others are lodged within gigantic icebergs.
The Navy Seals have recruited Penguin Pete for the dangerous job of finding and recovering the eight sections of the submarine from the waters. After Penguin Pete gets the eight submarine sections, he will be able to board the ship and reach the final scenes of the game.
Instructions
Arrow keys or joystick move Penguin Pete, but we recommend the numeric keypad (set NumLock to on). 4, 6, 8, and 2 move left, right, up, and down. 7 jumps left, 9 jumps right. The 'j' key jumps straight up.
The space bar throws the harpoon. The 'm' key throws snowballs and the 'b' key drops bombs, if you have any. The 'n' key jumps up and back down, killing some monsters. Power level of weapons is:
- Harpoon (lowest)
- Killing Jump
- Snowball
- Bomb (highest)
The 'p' picks up objects. The 'd' key drops objects.
Touch a bomb and you acquire it. Food (such as algae, fish, some starfish, some crabs) increase hit points.
Items such as mines and pebbles increase score. Gold increases money. Hearts add a life.
Credits
PENGUIN PETE was created by Joan Stone
You are free to enhance Penguin Pete and you may borrow any of its Gameware for use in your GAME-MAKER games
Resources
- Several of the monsters are shared amongst all of RSD's games.
Availability
Distributed with all versions of Game-Maker.
In addition, full versions of Game-Maker and its gameware were illegally distributed on several shovelware CD-ROMs in the early-mid 1990s, such as Softkey Entertainment Pack (July 1996)
Archive History
Penguin Pete was introduced to the archive with the purchase of Game-Maker 1.02 in September 1992.
Links
Interviews / Articles
Listings
Misc. Links
- Older gameplay video (YouTube)
- Play Penguin Pete online
Downloads
- Penguin Pete (291.5 kB)
- Ice floes Map (336.6 kB)
- Maze 1 Map (302 kB)
- Maze 2 Map (146.7 kB)
- Maze 3 Map (181.4 kB)
- Maze 4 Map (87.3 kB)
- Maze 5 Map (131.2 kB)
- Maze 6 (and ending) Map (137.4 kB)
- Underwater Map (98.4 kB)
