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Dad Hacks "Donkey Kong" - Now Pauline Rescues Mario

Posted by Unknown on from the then-nintendo-imprisons-you-for-life dept.

H_Fisher writes "What do you do when your daughter wants the girl to be the hero of your old video game? If you're Mike Mika, you hack the game ROM to reverse the roles. He even changed the 'M' at the top of the screen to a 'P.'"

2 of 262 comments (clear)

  1. Sounds like a great father by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I hope he also fixed the final level bug.

  2. Should Have Gone All The Way by guttentag · · Score: 5, Interesting

    He should have switched the big monkey at the top with the poor little oil drum at the bottom while he was at it, to reflect the full scope of societal changes that have occurred since the release of Donkey Kong.

    In this new version, the girl fights to stop Big Oil at the top from throwing barrels at the cute little monkey at the bottom, while the guy just stands there watching the game. When she gets to the top, she's not rescuing Mario, she's stopping Big Oil from harming cute animals. Mario just happens to come out of his comatose state when she enters the room and feels compelled to feign excitement for her quest.

    In college I had a roommate who felt very strongly that depressed people should not give in to pressure to take Prozac. So I "hacked" (I think I used ResEdit or something... nothing fancy) a Pong clone to replace the ball with a green/yellow Prozac capsule. That way he could "fight the good fight" by trying to deflect the Prozac in response to my repeated attempts to stuff it down his side of the screen. This made him a much more animated opponent in Pong, and I told him this only proved that Prozac does improve people's behavior. Which upped the ante as the game continued, in much the same way that Tetris starts throwing bricks at you with more attitude the further you get into the game.