I've been thinking about id's Commander Keen games a lot lately. As you probably know, if you've followed me for any length of time, my Dirk Dashing series of platformer games was heavily inspired by the Commander Keen games from the early 1990s. I have fond memories of those games, and other side-scrolling games published by Apogee.

Back in 1992, I downloaded the episode 4 demo from a bulletin board that I frequented. I loved the game so much, I ordered the entire Goodbye Galaxy series. We didn't have an Internet in those days, so I sent a check by snail mail to Apogee and waited for my package to show up in the mail. I still have the original 3-1/2" floppy disks for Episodes 4-5 that came in that package, along with the official hints and tricks sheet and a bonus disk containing free demos of Secret Agent 1 and Crystal Caves 1.

The hint sheet is printed on red colored paper with black ink. Here's side A of the hint sheet (you can click on it to see a larger version that you can read):



It's over 20 years old now, and I think it's held up pretty well over the years! I'm betting there aren't too many people left who have one of these!

On the back side is a full page ad for Keen 6, "Aliens Ate My Babysitter", which I promptly sent another check. I've still got that floppy disk too, as well as the official hints and tricks sheet for that game. It's printed in black ink on 2 sheets of green colored paper, stapled together. If anyone is interested, maybe I'll scan that one and share it in a future blog post...