ALEX ZE PIRATE:
Blue Ball Bear said:
This is a pirate video game based upon my comic "Legends" featuring Alex Ze Pirate. You choose which level you want to play, then work your way through to defeat the boss. Along the way collecting gold to buy powerups. It's still a work-in-progress, but it's makin' fine strides towards completion. I hope you all like it so far.
Sexy Times Hitler said:
Some great artists have their unfinished masterpieces. David Foster Wallace has
The Pale King, Jeff Buckley has
My Sweetheart the Drunk and Orson Welles has
The Other Side of the Wind. If that's the case, then it says a lot about Dobson that his unfinished masterpiece is
Alex ze Pirate. The comic or the game? It doesn't matter, he still gave up anyways.
The very first thing you see when the game loads. There isn't even a main menu.
There are two stages you can pick from. Clicking on Coconut Isle pops you into this, complete with a slurred voice going "Eye ahm Alex zeee Piehrat". I don't know why the voice actress sounds drunk, nor do I really want to know.
This looks deceptively decent, doesn't it?
I'll give some mild praise to the sprite-work, in that while it may feel like a prototype for a
Shantae ripoff, it at least kinda looks like a game. The detail is a step down from (sigh)
Kaboom!, though. I can't say the same about everything else. While
Janus had music that was few and far between,
AzP has nothing but stock sound effects and a funky boombox beat if you hold down the attack button.
Of course, it wouldn't be an Andrew Dobson anything without the pervasive feeling of frustration, and
AzP is no different. One similarity between
Janus and
AZP is the lack of post-hit invincibility, but enemies also don't stop when they're being attacked, meaning that when you're attacking the (ugh, male) enemies, you're bound to get hit back.
If you read this game as Alex attacking an island full of exceptional pirates, it suddenly becomes a lot more entertaining.
Items such as temporary invincibility, enemies and 1-ups are programmed just out of jumping range, making me wonder why Dobson put them there if only to be a miserable dick years after the fact. And see those barrels in that picture above? I destroyed one barrel near a platform, only to wind up stuck and unable to progress. It almost feels like he's punishing players for wanting to be curious. There were two virtually identical parts to this level, and after I finished, it yanked me back to the level select.
Then we get to Level 2, "Haunted Isle":
This is insufficiently 2spooky4me.
In what looks more like an abortive attempt at an ice level repackaged as a haunted cave, you go right, passing through a level virtually identical to the last two. As you reach the end...
It yanks you back to the level select.
The end.
Now I'm left wondering what would ever happen to Dobson if he changed his career from being a shitball cartoonist to being a shitball game developer.
Anyways, thank you Kiwis for being a part of this ride with me over the past few days as we explored a lesser known facet of the living failure that is Andrew Dobson.
P.S. As for how I managed to lose three lives in the fucking
AzP game, well, would you give enough of a shit to play this thing as well as possible?
REPLY TIME:
This is just sad. Dobbo genuinely showed passion in making these games, and now he’s simply reduced into a grouchy old man.
Granted it's horribly misplaced passion, but passion nonetheless.
can edit the games graphics and make em penises and hitler and wilford brimley?
Do whatever makes you happy.
