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Unused Keen Art meant for an Apogee catalog

Posted: Thu Nov 02, 2017 10:57
by guynietoren
Repost. Found on Reddit this morning.
George Broussard‏ (Founder of 3drealms & Apogee) just found an old painting by Ken Rieger in a closet. Was meant to be used for an Apogee catalog.
Image

Also as someone else posted on there. (username wasn't language appropriate to credit)
Pharoah's Tomb or Paganitzu
Cosmo's Cosmic Adventure
Wolfenstein 3D
Monster Bash
Duke Nukem
Commander Keen

Re: Unused Keen Art meant for an Apogee catalog

Posted: Thu Nov 02, 2017 11:54
by Roobar
Oh wow. Bill Blaze has matured. Neat find.

Re: Unused Keen Art meant for an Apogee catalog

Posted: Thu Nov 02, 2017 13:33
by Plasma Captain
This is neat, but... I'm sorry, Keen just looks kind of off. His shirt looks like it's pinned to his left shoulder, his face looks flat, his legs look like they aren't jointed properly to his hips and the helmet just looks strange in a way I can't currently specify. It's strange because everything else on the page looks great!

Re: Unused Keen Art meant for an Apogee catalog

Posted: Thu Nov 02, 2017 13:56
by KeenRush
This is pretty neat. Cosmo seems to have fur coating instead of lizard skin like I always imagined. I wonder if that's just artistic freedom or if the painter was told that he's got fur? Duke looks a lot "Duke1", somehow. More athletic? As for Keen, I agree that it's a bit off unlike the others, but it's not that bad, doesn't really bother me. Fascinating, this; one of the few non-pixel Keen graphics from that early era. That picture conveys Keen as a dorky kid - the helmet too big, t-shirt tucked into jeans. (Heh. Or is it late 80s / early 90s fashionable style?)

Re: Unused Keen Art meant for an Apogee catalog

Posted: Thu Nov 02, 2017 17:34
by Levellass
It's certainly a mixed bag, methinks varying levels of effort went into each section.

Re: Unused Keen Art meant for an Apogee catalog

Posted: Thu Nov 02, 2017 17:54
by nanomekia
Huh. This is neat.

I always thought Cosmo was furry myself.

Re: Unused Keen Art meant for an Apogee catalog

Posted: Thu Nov 02, 2017 18:57
by Roobar
Oh come on! Now all of a sudden everyone thinks it's a hairy green Yeti? Ridiculous. I've never thought of that. Even the cover art never suggested that.

The only explanation as for why he has fur coating is that all these characters drawn in this pic have matured. And Cosmo in the games is just a small alien. Small aliens of his kind don't have fur yet, but when they are becoming adults, they begin to grow. And that Cosmo right there is an adult Cosmo with a lot of fur. But hey, that's just a theory. A GAME theory. Thanks for watching.

Keen helmet looks unusually big. The face is also strange looking one.

The matured Monster Bash kid looks Dante-ish.

Image

Re: Unused Keen Art meant for an Apogee catalog

Posted: Thu Nov 02, 2017 19:04
by nanomekia
To be fair Roobar, I never saw the cover art (that I can remember). :P I was also maybe eight years old when I played that game.

I should boot up DOSBox and give it another go.

Re: Unused Keen Art meant for an Apogee catalog

Posted: Thu Nov 02, 2017 19:55
by Levellass
Roobar wrote: Thu Nov 02, 2017 18:57 The only explanation as for why he has fur coating is that all these characters drawn in this pic have matured. And Cosmo in the games is just a small alien. Small aliens of his kind don't have fur yet, but when they are becoming adults, they begin to grow. And that Cosmo right there is an adult Cosmo with a lot of fur. But hey, that's just a theory. A GAME theory. Thanks for watching.
Ok Matt-bar, gonna have to put some objections up there. First of all we see Cosmo's parents, one with blue hair one with red (like his son.) The father has a receding hairline, we see in the ending photo at Disneyland that he has forehead wrinkles. This suggests that all members of his race at all ages are relatively hairless, possibly moreso than humans

Re: Unused Keen Art meant for an Apogee catalog

Posted: Thu Nov 02, 2017 20:21
by ScarletFlame
oh nooo...
The art for commander keen doesn't really look too good.

Re: Unused Keen Art meant for an Apogee catalog

Posted: Thu Nov 02, 2017 21:18
by Roobar
Levellass wrote: Thu Nov 02, 2017 19:55
Roobar wrote: Thu Nov 02, 2017 18:57 The only explanation as for why he has fur coating is that all these characters drawn in this pic have matured. And Cosmo in the games is just a small alien. Small aliens of his kind don't have fur yet, but when they are becoming adults, they begin to grow. And that Cosmo right there is an adult Cosmo with a lot of fur. But hey, that's just a theory. A GAME theory. Thanks for watching.
Ok Matt-bar, gonna have to put some objections up there. First of all we see Cosmo's parents, one with blue hair one with red (like his son.) The father has a receding hairline, we see in the ending photo at Disneyland that he has forehead wrinkles. This suggests that all members of his race at all ages are relatively hairless, possibly moreso than humans
Perhaps his parents are using epilators. :crazy

We can speculate more. He could be using some sort of a fur growing chemical in that pic. Or he has hormonal disorder that's causing fur growth. Or these aliens are indeed hair-less, but Cosmo is a mutant who's becoming a Werecosmo when scared, or is becoming King Kong alike (see how's posing just like King Kong). Or that's his Halloween costume/pajama. Or perhaps that fur is his true form, but in the game he's wearing a costume hiding his fur. Or that's not Cosmo at all, but he's hairy cousin. I could go on.

Re: Unused Keen Art meant for an Apogee catalog

Posted: Sat Nov 04, 2017 3:46
by Levellass
To narrow things down we must first discover what the creature below him is, is it in the games?

Re: Unused Keen Art meant for an Apogee catalog

Posted: Thu Nov 09, 2017 14:37
by guynietoren
ScarletFlame wrote: Thu Nov 02, 2017 20:21 oh nooo...
The art for commander keen doesn't really look too good.
Yeah, his head needs to be further back in the helmet unless he shoved a pillow back there. Also the ear holes are in the wrong spot for that size of helmet.

Re: Unused Keen Art meant for an Apogee catalog

Posted: Sat Feb 17, 2018 4:50
by SpeightM09
Those aren't ear-holes though, they'd be where the face guard would be fitted on a football helmet, whatever it's called. Either way this is a nice find! And Cosmo has fur, for some reason this upsets me on a personal level and I don't know why.