Donkey Kong Recreated Using 6,400 Post-it Notes

NickFitz writes "Students at UCSC have recreated the first level of Donkey Kong using 6,400 Post-it notes stuck to the windows of the E2 building. It took a team of about 10 people five hours to complete the work, which will remain in place until May 1. There's a time-lapse video of the construction process."

Comments

If MIT students did it

[Anonymous Coward]

It would be playable.

Re:If MIT students did it

[gardyloo]

I doubt they'd go so far as to give the Post-It facsimile an attribute that the original didn't have...

Re:If MIT students did it

[Falladir]

+1, snarky.

Re:If MIT students did it

[sweepkick]

lol!

Re:If MIT students did it

[zoogies]

If Caltech students did it, DK would come alive and eat MIT.

Re:If MIT students did it

[Zantetsuken]

yes, complete with motorized window washer carriage with a rail or track at the top of the building to allow side to side movement

Re:If MIT students did it

[Garrett Fox]

And MIT would finish him off once and for all with your cannon. 8)

Re:If MIT students did it

[Anonymous Coward]

There, I clicked on each. This is a profitable venture for you. Please spam every story with these wonderful links.

Re:If MIT students did it

[Oddster]

They would be ripping off Brown students. You know, the largest playable Tetris game in the western hemisphere. Oh yeah, and it ran on Linux. :-P

----
Brown is the color of poo. - Chris
Yes, yes it is. - Brian

Re:If MIT students did it

[SL Baur]

Hey! That's the Fleming House cannon. I helped drag it back to Caltech, long, long ago.
Sigh.

Re:If MIT students did it

[wiredlogic]

I doubt they'd go so far as to give the Post-It facsimile an attribute that the original didn't have...

I disagree. The Atari 2600 version pretty much sucked because Mario was hard to control (and it looked like crap) but the ColecoVision and arcade versions were easy to play and lots of fun.

I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[MankyD]

While this game's early '80s arcade popularity predates most of today's engineering students...

I suddenly feel so old :(

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[eclectro]

I suddenly feel so old :(

Actually it was like a slap in the face. Donkey Kong is timeless. Today's generation has it way too easy. They don't appreciate what they have. In my day, we had to pay a quarter for each time we played Donkey Kong.

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[Jeff DeMaagd]

What's worse is that when we played DK, we just accepted the idea that DK threw fire. I don't remember anyone that questioned it.

I think what really happen was that he was supposed to throw feces but the focus group refused to play the game.

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, you did not need a quarter to play Donkey Kong (or any Nintendo game using the same cabinet). I had to get my DK fix and paper route money was not cutting it. Remember, back in this time frame, Atari was just about all anyone had for video games and cabinet games were a craze. Anyway, when I was was 12, money was tight but you could get around that. The front Plexiglas panel on the Donkey Kong cabinet could be manipulated so that you could lift it up get your hand in through the bottom of it. With your arm down inside the unit, you could play around for a little bit and find the metal clicker that a quarter would trigger when dropped in. You could simply keep clicking this and get credits up to the 99 max. Every time a credit was given (like from a quarter or you simulating a quarter), the game made a loud "blowwap" noise. To prevent being obvious, you could add one credit, hit the 1 player button to start a new game, then click that metal arm over and over again without that obvious noise. This trick worked better in the pizza shops and smaller venues then the full sized game rooms because the smaller places often did not pay attention or had no one around because the games were often in some side room or in the back somewhere. Full game rooms typically had too many people and employees around. I knew about the generals of how this worked because I had a few full sized video games in my basement, like Clowns, some tank game and a third that I don't remember, all back and white and all played to death. Yes it was wrong but I had to play DK somehow.

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[Anonymous Coward]

Fire? I always thought they were barrels!

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[renegadesx]

So did I, feces makes more sense though.

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[Anonymous Coward]

Like this? http://www.monkeypoopfight.com/smpf2.html

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[ari_j]

Just so we're all clear on this: You couldn't afford to drop a quarter on DK but you could afford to keep three full-size cabinet arcade games in your basement.

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[Heembo]

Like this? http://www.monkeypoopfight.com/smpf2.html I love monkey poop fight, especially since you can't lose or die! :)

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[Jeff DeMaagd]

Barrels too, but I thought I saw a fireball in some of the pictures.

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[Anonymous Coward]

that is way too much work. a simple 6 inch guitar string will do, even in a busy arcade place.

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[JavaRob]

I remember barrels first (which would roll along the platforms), followed by fireballs a bit later.

Were there flaming barrels as well? It's pretty vague in my memory by now...

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[Loconut1389]

I'm not sure that I'd reach into the dark recesses of a wooden box with probably unshielded parts and possibly a high voltage flyback transformer for a CRT ;o)

I played donkey kong on my Tandy 1000 for ages, but I suppose thats cheating since it probably wasn't available on personal computer for a few years after the arcade release. (unsure of the timeline).

We used to have a nickel arcade, I spent quite a bit of time and my 1,000 tickets earned me a free pizza or something silly that obviously doesn't cost near what it cost to get 1,000 tickets ;)

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, but how long will it take me to find a six-inch guitar?

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[spineboy]

Just ask the 12 inch guitar player - he'll know where to find it. But he's probably looking for a 1 inch guitar string to play ulta tiny mario brothers.

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[asninn]

The three full-size cabinet arcade games were probably the reason he didn't even have so much as a quarter left in his pocket...

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[Andrew Kismet]

He threw two types of barrel. The blue barrels were filled with oil, and would turn into little fire characters when they hit the fire barrel at the start of the course. The fire would then chase Mario/Jumpman up.

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[BasilBrush]

You had me believing you for a moment. But actually DK never throws fire, he throws barrels, some of which hit the oil fire at the bottom of the first screen and turn into fireballs.

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[Sepper]

I suddenly feel so old :(

I know the feeling. I work at a College, and most of the new students don't remember the Berlin Wall. Some were not even born when it fell.

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[master_p]

Another method was to make a hole in the coin, then use a thin fishing line to insert the coin, then get it back out as soon as the credit is registered.

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[The Ultimate Fartkno]

I know him! He's over there next to the 12 inch pianist. Oh, wait... that's MY 12 inch pianist!

ba-dum-PSSSSH! /try the veal

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[theshowmecanuck]

Just ask the 12 inch guitar player

If you ask him, that would be Gene Simmons... or did you mean?... never mind.

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[soft_guy]

Another method was to make a hole in the coin, then use a thin fishing line to insert the coin, then get it back out as soon as the credit is registered. Does this realy work outside of cartoons?

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[Hyperspite]

It should. I once lost a dime to a skee-ball machine so the attendant came up with a fake dime on a stick. It worked.

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[djdavetrouble]

what happened to stringing a quarter ? that worked on all the early games. we used to string defender at the 7-11 while one of us distracted the cashier....

Re:I've Never Felt This Way Before.

[TKOTolman]

I worked at an arcade in high school the hole in the quarter trick will not work with the newer 1985+ boxes or any arcade box with updated parts. The coin must go by 3 switchbacks before it hits the trigger if you had a string it would just get stuck. Slugs will not work in most coin triggers anymore as well as they now have magnets to jam them in the system. Now since I worked at an arcade this was no problem for me and my friends we would pop open the games and play all we wanted by going into the games OS "looks like a BIOS screen" and setting the game to free play.

Loving it

[EvilGoodGuy]

I'd love to take part in something like that. Reminds me of freshman year, we'd have fun by making things out of our crappy food.
My favorites were the Lettuce Luigi, and the Mario Question Block that I made out of a stale bagel, the different colors on different sides made for a fun effect!

Bravo!

[Kid Zero]

Nice to see students remembering the past. :)

Re:Bravo!

[DanTheManMS]

Nice to see students remembering the past. :)

Or "reviving" as the case may be, as the game came out in 1981, a few years before many of these students were probably born.

Still an awesome effort though.

Monkeys aren't donkeys

[aurb]

Stop messing with my head!

Re:Monkeys aren't donkeys

[EveLibertine]

And gorillas aren't monkeys.

Re:Monkeys aren't donkeys

[LearnToSpell]

Does that mean donkeys are gorillas?

Re:Monkeys aren't donkeys

[LaurieDash]

Correct me if i'm wrong, but I think it was a typo and he was supposed to be called Monkey Kong originally. Something like that anyway.

Re:Monkeys aren't donkeys

[biovoid]

Nope.

Shigeru Miyamoto, the game's inventor and the one person who unquestionably knows the origins of the name he chose, has repeatedly affirmed that he used the word "donkey" to convey a sense of stubbornness and the name "Kong" to invoke the image of a gorilla.

Re:Monkeys aren't donkeys

[Anonymous Coward]

Original English translation.... "Ass Monkey"

If Stanford students did it...

[__aaclcg7560]

... the IPO would be done. :P

It's pretty friggin cool...

[posterlogo]

I saw it last week -- some great 8-bit action going on over at the engineering building. Ironically, it's the 8-bit stuff that's even remotely feasible to do with post-its, but its so old I wonder how many of those students actually played that game when it first came out...

Re:how long ago was this?

[__aaclcg7560]

So paper cuts don't count as bleeding edge?

First level?

[oneiros27]

... recreated the first level of Donkey Kong ...

How can you tell the first one apart from any of the other levels of Donkey Kong? That sure looks like the sixth level to me.

Re:First level?

[Sigma 7]

How can you tell the first one apart from any of the other levels of Donkey Kong?

The "first" level means that it uses the first possible layout - it doesn't mean that it's the sixth one you encounter in the game (although incidently, the first board does appear as the sixth in the rotation.)

The boards are as follows (although I think the order is a bit different):
- Ladders - a series of bent floors.
- Conveyors - some floors push you left and right
- Elevators - has to elevators on the left hand side.
- Roof - where you remove rivots to cause Donkey Kong to fall.

However, it almost looks like the colecovision version (with scruntched levels) as long as you don't look at the first floor.

Re:First level?

[Anonymous Coward]

> However, it almost looks like the colecovision version

Sir, I respectfully bow to your leetness.

Re:First level?

[Anonymous Coward]

You never got past the first level did you?

This makes me happy

[Conspiracy_Of_Doves]

Hooray for geeks with way too much time on their hands.

Re:This makes me happy

[Achromatic1978]

And no desire to do their bit not to needlessly waste resources for something that'll be amusing for a good fifteen minutes.

Re:This makes me happy

[Conspiracy_Of_Doves]

And how are you so certain that they didn't do this during spring break?

Re:This makes me happy

[Worthless_Comments]

Because obviously every minute of every day for 4+ years you are going to do nothing but attend class and do work for those courses. Besides, it's not like these kids did it at night or anything. Oh, wait... Stop trying to act like some self-rightous ass - it's not very becoming.

Re:This makes me happy

[Chief Wongoller]

Hooray for geeks with way too much time on their hands. .... Obviously way too much time. 6400 notes, 10 people, 5 hours equates to only one note posted every 28 seconds, or around two a minute. Anybody want to offerr these guys a job??

Re:This makes me happy

[Anonymous Coward]

No kidding. Countless kids would probably kill to afford to attend university and these guys waste it making fucking post-it-note art. And you're wasting valuable electricity and computer-time complaining about it.

Re:This makes me happy

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

"Hooray for geeks with way too much time on their hands."

Said the guy posting on Slashdot.

Re:This makes me happy

[steveo777]

The article didn't say if they were using all 5 hours to just stick the post-it's up there, but I'm sure it required some set up on site. I imagine the easiest would be a painter's laser level and a few other gadgets, but it isn't just walk up and start.

Did they do this before?

[MMaestro]

Not with Donkey Kong but with Super Mario Bros (1)? I thought it got taken down cause they didn't get permission beforehand. Hopefully they have permission this time.

Re:Did they do this before?

[mikesd81]

You mean this?

Re:Did they do this before?

[gsn]

They did I think in '03 or '04. I had a friend from high school who was part of that endeavor. Those were individual characters not a full scene though, but still pretty impressive. I read this time its supposed to stay up till May 1 so I guess they got permission. They weren't the first either though. Not sure if I'd call it art but definitely fun to come across if you aren't expecting it. It will be interesting to see how the subject matter changes as we get older.

Re:Did they do this before?

[Amigori]

Here is the thread from last time they did it, Super Mario Bros. style.

Re:Did they do this before?

[coaxial]

Actually, only the killjoys in the econ department on the 4th floor destroyed the mural. The CS, EE, CompE, and School of Engineering offices departments on the 2nd, 3rd and 5th floors didn't have with it. They later got "revenge" by putting the game over scene on 4th floor after removing the notes from the other floors.

This time there's a sign on the back of the 4th floor (the bottom floor in the video and pics is actually the 2nd floor) barrel indicating that this artwork was actually comissioned by Jim Whitehead and it should not be tampered with.

The installation runs until the end of the month.

Quick question

[johncadengo]

What does UCSC think of this? How long will it stay up?

I'd like to do something like this on my UC campus... See you on the front page of slashdot in a week!

Re:Quick question

[Anonymous Coward]

What does UCSC think of this? How long will it stay up?

According to this post, it was taken down a year ago.

Re:Quick question

[NickFitz]

That's a different work. As this one was done last week, it would have been difficult to take it down a year ago...

6400 of them?

[holywarrior21c]

seriously any slashdotter could do that with only 640 postits!

--

Re:6400 of them?

[justthinkit]

And Bill Gates could do it in 655,360 or less.

Re:6400 of them?

[holywarrior21c]

No buddy, u r close but there will be error message at 1000th color. It is called 'colorfulOverflowingBallmer=01101'

--

Nice!

[vertigoCiel]

Good thing they didn't have any, you know, work to do.

Re:Nice!

[xenotrout]

It's pretty much the beginning of the spring quarter (most UCs have Fall, Winter, Spring and optional Summer quarters rather than Fall and Spring semesters with a shorter Summer "semester") so they don't yet have the really hard work to do. This might have even been put up during spring break. Maybe it was done by Freshmen...could have even been some Winter quarter grads...

Wasted time!

[ProfessionalCookie]

If they're going to make it so big the least those billy goats could do is use 2xSaI. *sigh*

Must've used quality post-it notes...

[LighterShadeOfBlack]

If they used the ones I have at work they'd still be trying to get the first one to stick for more than 3 seconds right about now.

Quit messing with our minds!

[suv4x4]

Quit messing with our minds!

May I be the first to say...

[Lazbien]

NNNNNeeeeerrrrrrrrddddddsssssssssssss!!!!!!

Wow.

[mcmonkey]

And I spent my afternoon doing bong hits and playing Wii.

Kinda puts things in perspective.

After all, marijuana is a renewable resource. How much old growth forest did we lose for those post-its?

Re:Wow.

[Ambidisastrous]

This being UCSC, they probably used both in equal amounts. It's like Night of the Living Dead over there.

Re:Wow.

[Anonymous Coward]

Bong hits? Stop trying to recapture an overrated era and get your head out of your ass.

Re:Wow.

[The_Wilschon]

AFAIK, the paper industry actually plants new forest for the purpose of cutting it down 20 years later, rather than cutting any more old forest. So, because of the paper industry, we actually have more forest than we would otherwise. I know hating paper waste is "eco-aware", but really, it is more like "eco-sheeple"... FYI, recycling produces a lot of very nasty pollutants, too. Not that those necessarily outweigh the benefits of not just filling up landfills, but you've got to be aware of these things or you'll end up harming your cause rather than helping it.

Re:Wow.

[Anonymous Coward]

That's up to the UCSC guys. None is an option.

http://www.3m.com/us/office/postit/faq.html

Re:Wow.

[The Anarchist Avenge]

Do you actually have any idea what an old-growth forest looks like and how an an old-growth forest ecosystem works? Because if you did, you'd know that old growth forests have ecosystems that are far more diverse than monocultures. Also, monocultures require far more energy to keep healthy(gasoline + foresters time + spraying) than mixed vegitation(none).

Re:Wow.

[LearnToSpell]

Uhh, no. What they do is cut old-growth, and then plant fast-growing trees instead. Close though.

Re:Wow.

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, lets all listen to what is obviously a forest industry shill

Re:Wow.

[Anonymous Coward]

This post is brought to you by the letters W, T, and F. Really, are you paid by Weyerhauser to post that shit or what? Come up to BC and take a look at the old growth that is being cut down just beyond what you can see from major roads. You can see it from just about any hiking trail that follows a ridge line. An don't try to pin that completely on the lumber industry; the paper industry takes every tree that is too small to be used economically for lumber.

Re:Wow.

[Anonymous Coward]

Perspective? What perspective?

These folks brought a little art, entertainment, and joy into their own lives and the lives of others. Not only did they select a relatively environmentally friendly medium for their art, but these post-it notes may have been from recycled paper, may still be re-used, and can also be recycled.

You want some perspective? Get your head out of your bong (or wherever else it happens to be).

Re:Wow.

[leoboiko]

I was born in a paper industrial area in southern Brazil. The native ecosystem is being invaded by the imported pinus trees, which spread without control in our climate and ruin the soil, overwhelming everything in its way.

Re:Wow.

[The_Wilschon]

That actually wasn't the point. The point is that the paper industry is planting new forest for the purpose of later cutting them down to make paper, instead of cutting more old forest. The secondary point is that not only do we keep the remaining old forest this way, but we also have a larger number of living trees on the earth at any given time than we would otherwise. True, the excess trees are not in a wonderful diverse ecosystem (I love forests), but at least they are trees.

Re:Wow.

[The Anarchist Avenge]

Now if only it were legal in the USA to grow industrial hemp to make paper, we could let all the shitty monoculture plantations grow back into real forest and supply paper with a fraction of the land that it takes now.

hRmmm

[stim]

At the risk of coming of as a troll... Wasn't this on dig like a week ago? And is this really news?

post it

[Turn-X Alphonse]

I wonder how feasable it would be to do this on walls in bedrooms and such. Maybe a simple Mario or mushroom could at least be done.

I just hope they branch out a bit more from Mario, stuff like Zelda and Metroid need love too

Re:post it

[Anonymous Coward]

here's my tip of the day: the correct spelling is "meant."

Re:post it

[Forrest Kyle]

If you're not sure how feasible it would be to put post-it notes on your wall, you might not be an engineering student. =D

Re:post it

[Anonymous Coward]

I was just thinking that when I saw it. I'll try to see if I can get them to do a Zelda one for next year.

~Sol~

If German Chaos Computer Club geeks did it...

[jd]

...it would be playable, but only if you had the side of a hotel to play on...

6,400

[Disharmony2012]

6,400 post-it notes ought to be enough to re-create any level.

Re:6,400

[robo.cowp]

I can't believe the mods missed that one... I appreciated it!

Re:6,400

[WeblionX]

Only if it's 320x240!

Re:6,400

[OECD]

I guess all the mods today are as young as the students putting up the sticky notes...

Re:6,400

[dgbrownnt]

For the youngsters: It's a Bill Gates reference! :-P

lol

Re:6,400

[NeilTheStupidHead]

If not, 640 000 will be enough for everyone!

Watch out for lawyers!

[Hao Wu]

Are they "infringing" on copyrights?

Is this legitimate, licensed use of Post-It notes -- or will 3M send a cease and desist notice?

Oh heck.

[Cliff Jolly]

I just walked right by this building on Friday but didn't have the presence of mind to look up.

Woops. I'll have to check it out tomorrow.

Meh...

[mattmacf]

640 post-its should be enough for anybody

*ducks*

about 10 people?

[Ruvim]

a team of about 10 people

What, was like 9.5 people?

Re:about 10 people?

[evanbd]

Unfortunately, one of the original 10 team members died in a freak accident involving a rolling barrel during construction.

MirrorDot -mirror [of TFArticle..]

[newr00tic]

http://www.mirrordot.com/stories/0d70e490ec1eae07e 01c98ea762c1c1a/index.html

=]

Weak stack

[dubonbacon]

This is what 14,000 post-it notes look like:

Another day at the office?

Reminds me of Freshman Year

[Nyeerrmm]

Reminds me of my freshman year in the dorms. We never did anything this impressive or visible, but we did spend most of one weekend making a movie, and designed a 'shack' for a Habitat for Humanity fundraiser that was two stories with running water (kind of). Now I'm a senior with more practical projects, drinking, and living in an apartment getting in the way... I suppose I did learn video editing along the way though.

Is it bad that I'm not even graduated and already reminiscing?

Re:Reminds me of Freshman Year

[Anonymous Coward]

>> Is it bad that I'm not even graduated and already reminiscing?

Yeah man, time to apply to grad school!

Re:Reminds me of Freshman Year

[supersysscvi]

No, it's not bad. Actually, I'm a freshman and I'm reminiscing about grade school...

game vs. art resolution

[xPsi]

I believe the orginal Donkey Kong had a screen resolution of 224 x 256 pixels. I don't think the art quite matches that resolution (with a 3" x 3" post-it covering 4 floors, you would need 16-foot floors to obtain the same effective vertical resolution). To be fair, they condensed the first level a bit on the top (the girl used to be on a raised platform, no?), so they are looking at fewer vertical pixels in the game -- and those do look like pretty tall floors...

[sigh] I'm saddened that I even bothered to think about this...

Re:game vs. art resolution

[aurelian]

Maybe they were recreating one of the handheld 'game and watch' versions. To be honest, that's what I think of when soemone mentions Donkey Kong. My friends and I rarely had spare cash to spend at amusement arcades, but we could get the handheld games for christmas etc.

Re:game vs. art resolution

[Anonymous Coward]

What's even more sad is that you bothered to post this on /.

*ducks*

Oblig

[superstuntguy]

Imagine a Beowulf cluster of these!

Too much time on their hands?

[davidmillions.com]

That's why the national savings rate is negative in this country.

Re:Too much time on their hands?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's why the national savings rate is negative in this country. Exactly. It's from people blowing all their money on sweet sweet Post-its.

Remember ATHF?

[tuxicle]

How long before someone calls the bomb squad on this one?

Hey, how about that: "someone set up us the bomb-squad"

Re:Remember ATHF?

[Kizor]

Before someone calls an only-in-America terrorist threat on an obvious video game recreation? Last year, complete with the bomb squad you requested and a police chief telling the press how he's incredulous at the way instructions for making cardboard boxes are publicly available online.

Aren't you sorry you asked?

(Don't start fuming over this - instead, make some yourself. They're awesome.)

They were going to do Duck Hunt....

[rubberbando]

but someone kept shooting at the window....

Re:They were going to do Duck Hunt....

[6Yankee]

but someone kept shooting at the window....

...Du ckHunt!

Heh, and...

[Anonymous Coward]

...it is scheduled to be removed on or before May 1.

So, tonight then?

Donkey what?

[voodoo cheesecake]

Can anyone tell me where the F&*@ are the donkeys? Anybody else ever question that?

The E2 Building??

[Mark4ST]

The E2 "building" is right here. Dang kids; get off of my lawn.

yay!

[mstahl]

Go banana slugs!

warning: excessive nostalgia

[Loconut1389]

pc games I grew up with (not counting nintendo, atari, etc)

8088/80286
-------------------
the black cauldron
donkey kong
jump joe
lander
space invaders
pac man
asteroids
blackjack
gertrude's secret (when I was really young)
reader rabbit (of course!)
where in the world (or where in time) is carmen sandiego

earlier 486
--------------------
cabal
ghostbusters
a whole set of Cosmi software
test drive
life and death
bass tour
lotus 3
chessmaster 2000

586?
-----
bioforge (that game ruled for its time!)

ahhh soo many more- what a time. So often, I find the games of old more appealing than a lot of todays complicated games. While I appreciate the graphics and the plots of things like Splinter Cell and sniping for fun in Hitman, there was something really great about the simple games and its a lost market- everything has to be in millions of colors and expertly rendered.. I wish they'd come up with some new old style games. Just can't beat em.

Re:warning: excessive nostalgia

[ari_j]

That reminds me - I am from the only state to have Broderbund make a special version of Carmen Sandiego for it: Where in North Dakota is Carmen Sandiego. We played that one in elementary school on the Apples a bit, but where we really had fun with it was in 7th and 8th grade science (Earth Science and Biology), where the teacher was ancient (how many of you had the same football coach as your father did?) and had an Apple II stuck in the corner of the room without the sense of hearing to care that we were playing games.

But the real games I grew up with were Sargon III (on the IBM, a port that Wikipedia doesn't acknowledge exists) and Flight Simulator 4, and then a plethora of games that our computer vendor put on the computer, most of which I don't remember (some of your list was there, though). Those that I played were a helicopter game and then a few GW-BASIC games ... and when my EE uncle taught me how to escape out of those, print the code, and edit it, I got into programming. The lunar lander game was so much easier when it displayed 9 relevant variables in numeric form instead of just 1, and I easily spent more time and thought hunting the Wumpus on printed source listings than in the game.

My kids will probably get a Nintendo. I'll claim to be some sort of Zen master and insist that only when they appreciate the Nintendo will they truly be ready for a Wii, or whatever exists by the time I have kids.

Re:warning: excessive nostalgia

[JazzLad]

...a port that Wikipedia doesn't acknowledge exists... That darn Wikipedia. I'm sick of closed databases of information. Why can't someone create an open encyclopedia that anyone can contribute to?

(If you didn't grin, that sound you heard was 'whooosh')

Re:warning: excessive nostalgia

[Loconut1389]

I've often had the same thought for my son- and our 1981 nintendo still works too. I don't want him playing Halo 4 or whatever is around when he turns ~8 (he's two and a half now).

I'll let him play gamecube with us when he's old enough to be able to do it, but for now he likes his plug-in Thomas game

Re:warning: excessive nostalgia

[ari_j]

I try not to edit Wikipedia unless I have specific information. Right now all I remember is that I played Sargon III and that it had both a DOS version and an Apple II version in the same box. I can't even tell you with certainty what year that would have been.

MOD PARENT UP

[Deef]

There is a huge difference between an old-growth forest and the ones that the forest industry plants to replace them. Basically, the forest industry removes almost all of the plants and wildlife that are not the single tree species that they are trying to harvest, not to mention the many species that rely on living in or around dead and rotting trees (which are, of course, unprofitable to keep around since they make logging more difficult). What they forest industry leaves behind when it clearcuts an area is more like a park -- as close to antiseptic as a forest can be, with uniform trees of the same species, relatively evenly spaced, and with nearly all of the underbrush cleared out. The "normal" ecosystem of most of these areas has been effectively destroyed and replaced with a monoculture.

As a result, one disease, predator species or parasite that targets that single species of tree can wreak amazing amount of havoc. I vividly remember the Pine Bark Beetle infestation of lodgepole pines in central Oregon about twenty years ago -- there were dead and dying trees as far as the eye could see, and in many areas, about one tree in ten survived. You can imagine how much of a fire risk all of those dead pines were, in the middle of a high, dry desert that was somewhat known for frequent thunderstorms. Even today, there are still huge areas that were formerly heavily forested where there is now approximately one tree left standing every hundred feet as a result of this massive infestation.

The grandparent post seems to be implying that the forests maintained by the forest industry are in some way an equivalent replacement for the ones that grow naturally. This is very much not the case.

Will they Recycle after?

[eldaria]

Using all those post-it and only for a short time, not for a long time art object. Will they just throw them away after or will they use them again for something else? My guess is the first one, but then hopefully in the paper recycle bin. :-) Looks cool though.

I wonder..

[n1hilist]

Who got first post(it) ? :)

Free post-it ad on slashdot

[jopet]

respect - nice scheme to have a free post-it ad presented to a crowd the size of the /. audience.

The irony of it

[ciaran.mchale]

Years ago, people predicted that computer technology would result in the "paperless office". Now, people are using paper to create the "computerless video game".

Re:The irony of it

[Anonymous Coward]

Makes you wonder the speed of the game, though. 1 frame/5 hours. That's 5.56E-5 fps refresh rate or 0.78 pixel change/second. It'll probaby take 10 years to clear the first level. I'll stick with paperless computerless video games and computerless paperless office, thank you very much.

Re:The irony of it

[ChronosWS]

Computerless paperless office? What exactly do you to, and would anyone notice if you stopped doing it?

Re:The irony of it

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly!

Re:why don't we just burn down the Amazon?

[pandrijeczko]

Congratulations on your BA in "Being a loud mouthed pillock".

Perhaps if you gave your brain the opportunity to engage, you'd realise that maybe there are people out here who just simply ***ENJOY GAMING*** rather than caring about making fashion statements.

My friend, I'm 45 years of age and I was probably playing computer games when you were just a twinkle in your dad's eye. At the moment I'm working my way through "Halo" on the PC, last night I had a semi-drunken evening with a few good buddies playing "Super Monkey Ball" on the Gamecube and having a "Speedball 2" league with them on a PC emulating a Commodore Amiga.

If you're short-sighted enough to only care about modern games, then that's your problem - just leave the rest of us to our fun.

And as for the "Donkey Kong" thing? Yep, a complete waste of paper but it's a few people having a bit of fun and not just sitting there moaning at what everyone else is doing...

Re:why don't we just burn down the Amazon?

[AdonaiElohim]

Er... I hate to get personal here, but what the heck is wrong with you?

They used a few dozen packets of post-its. A single copy of the Sunday New York Times probably has five times as much paper in it.

And it's art. Your opinion of how much material they used for their art project, compared with your recollections of how much paper you used to get your oh-so-valuable degree, means precisely bubkis. Are you livid with rage that Shakespeare messed up all of that parchment? Carrying a grudge against van Gogh for wasting all of that canvas? Does the thought of those cavemen in France destroying their environment by blackening the roofs of their cave fill you with rage?

Dead Pixel

[Channing]

:-p

Re:Dead Pixel

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, there are dead pixels even in this work of post-its. I found one of the post-its laying on the floor one day.

~Sol~

How about nobody?

[imsabbel]

If they played it when it first came out, they really shouldnt be students anymore.

Re:How about nobody?

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you suggesting that there is(/should be) an age limit to education or college admission?

Very disappointing

[Flying pig]

When I read the headline I thought it meant that they had reproduced the first level programming as a flow chart using Post-it notes. Modern programmers won't remember this, but once upon a time you diagrammed the program logic before coding, rather than coding first and then using tools to produce the diagrams. Post-it note programming isn't a bad idea. You can create all the major code points on post-its, then join them up on a board, then rearrange the sequences for optimisation.

I just made myself feel so old, I need to go and chip a hand axe out of flint and kill myself.

Snopes: Donkey Wrong

[tepples]

Can anyone tell me where the F&*@ are the donkeys?

Dick Wolf, the man behind TV's Law & Order, is neither a penis nor a lupine. Likewise, Donkey Kong is not a donkey. The name "Donkey", which could be a derivative of Duncan, carries a connotation of stubbornness. See also Snopes: Donkey Wrong.

For donkeys, see Kicking Ass: The Democratic Party's Blog and History of the Democratic Party.

Re:why don't we just burn down the Amazon?

[maskedavenger]

oh, I don't play modern games, I'm as old as you actually. I just got an n64, I have Starfox, Dr. Mario, and Super Mario 64. Pretty sweet. But yea, short-sighted people suck.

Animal nomeclature

[Ex Fish]

Billy goats? Billy goats?! Bah! We at UCSC are proud Banana Slugs.

Pokemon

[tepples]

Now, people are using paper to create the "computerless video game". This has been the case since the Pokémon trading card game if not earlier.

DK rap

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.pastebin.ca/441339

dk rap song

ObStyx Lyrics

[Randolpho]

Hooray for geeks with way too much time on their hands.

Styx said it all:

Sitting on this barstool talking like a damn fool
Got the twelve oclock news blues
And Ive given up hope on the afternoon soaps
And a bottle of cold brew
Is it any wonder Im not crazy? is it any wonder Im sane at all
Well Im so tired of losing- I got nothing to do and all day to do it
I go out cruisin but Ive no place to go and all night to get there
Is it any wonder Im not a criminal?
Is it any wonder Im not in jail?
Is it any wonder Ive got
Too much time on my hands, its ticking away with my sanity
Ive got too much time on my hands, its hard to believe such a calamity
Ive got too much time on my hands and its ticking away from me
Too much time on my hands, too much time on my hands
Too much time on my hands
Well, Im a jet fuel genius - I can solve the worlds problems
Without even trying
I have dozens of friends and the fun never ends
That is, as long as Im buying
Is it any wonder Im not the president
(hes not the president)
Is it any wonder Im null and void?
Is it any wonder Ive got
Too much time on my hands, its ticking away at my sanity
Ive got too much time on my hands, its hard to believe such a calamity
Ive got too much time on my hands and its ticking away from me
Too much time on my hands, too much time on my hands
Too much time on my hands

If Iowa State students did it...

[Assassin bug]

It would be Copyrighted.

Old

[Anonymous Coward]

This is either a couple of years old, or these guys have either copied the previous people, or randomly come up with the exact same project all by themselves, I saw this same thing reported a couple of years back.

Next on the agenda:

[cameroneagans]

Animate it!