Video game: Commander Keen (series)

Overview
Commander Keen is a seminal PC platformer series that began in 1990, created at id Software with programming by John Carmack and design and story by Tom Hall, alongside John Romero and artist Adrian Carmack. Released for MS-DOS, it brought smooth, console-like side-scrolling to IBM-compatible PCs at a time when that seemed impossible. Its bright EGA visuals, witty tone, and agile movement established a template for PC action games and launched id’s rise, even as the studio would soon pivot to first-person shooters.

Story and Episodes
The hero is eight-year-old prodigy Billy Blaze, who dons a football helmet and becomes Commander Keen, piloting his Bean-with-Bacon Megarocket to thwart galactic threats. The first trilogy, Invasion of the Vorticons (1990), sends Keen from “Marooned on Mars” to defending Earth in “The Earth Explodes” and confronting the Vorticon conspiracy in “Keen Must Die!” The Vorticons, manipulated by a shadowy Grand Intellect, provide a humorous yet surprisingly cohesive sci-fi arc that hints at a human boy-genius rival.

Keen Dreams (1991), often called “Episode 3.5,” unfolds in a dreamland ruled by the tyrant Boobus Tuber, swapping Keen’s usual tools for throwable “flower power” seeds. The second major arc, Goodbye, Galaxy! (1991), comprises “Secret of the Oracle” and “The Armageddon Machine.” Keen rescues the Gnosticene council and dismantles the Shikadi’s planet-destroying Omegamatic, introducing richer worlds, secrets, and the series’ most enduring mascot creature, the Dopefish. Aliens Ate My Babysitter! (1991) caps the classic run with Keen raiding the Bloog homeworld to rescue his sitter, leaning harder into colorful slapstick while preserving the series’ exploratory heart.

Gameplay and Technology
Commander Keen blends tight platforming with light puzzle elements. Levels sprawl horizontally and vertically, connected by a world map. Movement is buoyant and precise, with a signature pogo stick for high, momentum-driven jumps, a raygun or neural stunner with limited ammo, and keycards or colored gems to gate progress. Secrets, optional areas, and hidden levels reward curiosity, while humorous signage and enemy behaviors give each stage personality.

The breakthrough was technical: Carmack’s adaptive tile refresh and clever EGA page-flipping produced fluid, pixel-smooth scrolling on hardware thought incapable of it, a leap first proven in a Mario-like PC demo and then fully realized in Keen. Later episodes added richer tile sets, sloped surfaces, and, with composer Bobby Prince, AdLib music alongside PC speaker effects, elevating atmosphere without sacrificing speed.

Distribution and Development
Published primarily by Apogee under the shareware model, the first episode of a trilogy was freely distributed to drive mail-order sales of the rest, a strategy that expanded Keen’s audience and reshaped PC game marketing. Keen 6 shipped at retail through FormGen, while Keen Dreams appeared via Softdisk, reflecting id’s transitional period and contractual obligations. Tom Hall’s expansive series bible, informally dubbed “The Universe is Toast!,” mapped out future episodes that were set aside when id redirected its energy to Wolfenstein 3D and Doom.

Legacy
Commander Keen proved that PC action games could match console smoothness and charm, opening the door for id’s technical and design ambitions. Its humor, secret-stuffed maps, and tactile pogo-driven traversal influenced a generation of platformers, while characters like the Dopefish became enduring in-jokes across the industry. More than a technical demo, the series fused approachable fiction with mechanical precision, marking a pivotal moment when shareware, creativity, and engineering aligned to redefine what PC games could be.