DD4: Canadian Boxing Day
Release type: Shareware
Release date: 1998
Levels: 25
Author: Alan Caudel
Website: Dummy Duck
Related games: Dummy Duck, Dummy Duck 2, Dummy Duck 3, Dummy Duck 5
FULL ENTRY COMING SOON!
With the formula set, the fourth Dummy Duck game has some decisions before it. How are we going to play this? Dummy Duck 3 worked well. Really well. Do we do another like that, maybe try to make it incrementally better? Do we do something wildly different, like Simon's Quest or Adventure of Link? Well, as you'd imagine, DD4 chooses door number three. Yes, it's basically the same kind of thing we had last time. But, in Claymation!
[At a stretch, Sonic the Hedgehog 3, plus SMB3]
[Just as the last game was part of an artistic phase, at this point Caudel is playing with stop-motion animation.]
[The era of multimedia - The Neverhood, etc.]
But, yes, also push elements to new extremes: the story, the anthology of disparity.
Doesn't play as well as the last game. Harder again; movement is less smooth; levels are messier.
The game also includes extensive hand-drawn and in-engine cutscenes. Messier and less cohesive aesthetic, even as each portion is more ambitious than the last.
Incorporates concepts from Adventure and Jet!. Also, a scrolling shooter segment involving Red that works surprisingly well.
Lots of health, and now enemies tend to move in predictable patterns, making them more of a passive environmental threat, but enemies take away a ton of health and levels are filled with navigational hazards. Lots of lives, to make up for all of the trial and error that will be required.
The extensive story segments (involving a mix of .FLI animation and automated in-engine segments) serve to contextualize and justify the abrupt changes of location and design style between levels.
Level 1: Standard bucolic scene, punctuated with spikes and topped with a space ship interior.
Level 2: shooter segment from inside ship cockpit
Level 3: Space Harrier / Jet! sprite-scaler sequence
Level 4: Adventure QTE sequence.
Level 5: Another bucolic platformer.
Lots and lots and lots of cutscenes, using a mix of in-engine elements, hand-drawn and photo-collage .FLI animations, and meticulously timed sound clips.
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|---|---|---|
| Dummy Duck 3 | DD4 | Dummy Duck 5 |
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Contents
Story
Dummy Duck 4
Well, Mister Bad is back. And he's knee deep in EVIL! It's up to our favorite feathered hero to save the entire UNIVERSE!!!!!!!!!!!!
Well...
maybe, the entire world!
umm...
Okay, just Middleburg.
So... Well, Mr.Bad uses his spaceship (which is 1 word!) to fly around and blow up stuff.
Okay...Well, you know, that's not very good, so if you don't want stuff to be blown up, then BEAT THE GAME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Instructions
You can either use the joystick, arrow keys, or the numeric keypad to control.
UL U UR
\ | /
L - - R
/ | \
DL D DR
- - - - - - - -
joystick controls:
button B = fire
button A+D = duck
button B+A = pick up
- - - - - - - -
keyboard controls:
space bar = fire
"/" = duck
"p" = pick up
Credits
ALAN CAUDEL drew the pictures and took photos of the clay figures
ADAM TYNER scanned the photos
YURIK NESTOLY did the voice of Dummy Duck
MATT WEARS did Lil' Red's voice
ALAN CAUDEL was Foo-Foo
ADAM HENNON tested the game while I was making it, and gave me the idea for the sea monkey level
ADAM TYNER's Questor series was the inspiration for the overhead level
NATHAN LEWIS told me how cool the game was
ALAN CAUDEL did all the design, sound effects, storyline, and everything else!!!
YOU played the game!
THANK YOU!
Background
Alan Caudel:
- The game's alternate title, "DD4: Canadian Boxing Day" was a parody of the movie "ID4: Independence Day" which was popular at the time.
- This is a random memory that I just had while I was typing. Dummy 4 came out around the same time as the movie Desperado. I hadn't seen the movie, but I remember seeing the commercial that had someone shooting a rocket out of a guitar case. This seemed like such a ridiculous idea that I had to include it in the game. So, the main weapon in Dummy 4 is a guitar case that shoots rockets. I don't think I ever explained it in the game.
- The idea for a claymation game probably came from playing The Neverhood. I built clay models for each of the characters and animated them. Digital cameras really weren't around much back then, so I had to take all the photos for each frame of animation with a regular film camera and wait for the film to be developed. Then Adam Tyner scanned in each photo and imported them into Game-Maker.
- The claymation process was very arduous. I was pretty economical with the photos that I shot. I think I used every photo that I took. I knew what a pain it would be to redo any of it, so I tried hard to get it right the first time. I don't think I had to go back and re-shoot anything.
- If I remember correctly, I used tons and tons of .FLI animations in this game. Almost every level got an animated cut-scene or two. I had just gotten a scanner, and I did several hand-drawn animated sequences. I think out of all the games I made, I probably put the most effort into making this game and it might just be my favorite.
Availability
This game was published to the On Target Programming Web site. Other distribution is unknown.
Archive History
After an earlier wave of rediscoveries, on July 13 2011 Alan Caudel provided another archive of previously missing Game-Maker material, including the following:
Links
- The Game-Maker Story: Infoboxes (Gamasutra)
- Play old 1990′s MS-DOS Dummy Duck games online! (DummyDuck.com)
Downloads
- DD4: Canadian Boxing Day (7.5 MB)
