Public Commander Keen Forum

I've played the XkyKeens a bit again, lately. It goes in phases, some weeks in a year when I play through one of the mods daily. I still can't get my head around the quality. It's no secret that I'm not the best level builder out there; I just can't get that flow and feel. I don't know why. Will we ever get something like them again? It's probably my biggest ambition to make a mod that is even close to the genius and atmosphere and sheer playability of any XkyKeen. It might never happen.

Does anyone else regularly play them? What other K1-3 mods do you people play? Every once in a while I play Clouds Unseen, Save Spot!, and Mr. Black's Keen 3 levels (not a mod, but so damn fine). Probably some others too but can't remember.

there are indeed some Vorticons mods I'm coming back to from time to time. as I' thinking about it, it seems that it's quite a number of them. and by the way, believe it or not, some of which are creations of yours. in fact, their are on top of my list. I love the rethinking of possibilities very much. and the aesthetics are overwhelmingly nice. so here is my list:

• Extinction (by KeenRush)
• Fall Up (by KeenRush)
• Clouds Unseen (by StupidBunny)
• Retrosis (by Commander Spleen)
• Mondochrome (by Commander Spleen)
• Episode Dash (by Xkylyr Rauh)
• Episode Null (by Xkylyr Rauh)

KR you are one of the best level builders in Keen! I've though so ever since Yorphius and it became irrevocable fact once Smile came out (albeit being ridiculously difficult).

However you are correct in saying that XkyKeens are amazing. KeenX was mindblowing in its day, and the only negative I can say is that some other Keeners have caught up to its standard in the intervening 14 years or so.

Nobody has made anything quite as good as either Null or Dash. Will anyone ever do so?

I think I've red about XkyKeens once.

I still pronounce it zi-kee-keen and ain't none-a-you gonna stop me

lemm wrote:I still pronounce it zi-kee-keen and ain't none-a-you gonna stop me

Them's fite'n words, donchanoe. You wanna take this outside, ehh?

I haven't completed many mods, but the XkyKeens are among the ones I have. Still never got into Dash enough to replay it, despite its incredible high quality in terms of style, design and concept. Keen X retains a memorable place as the first mod I played and gets replayed every couple of years (though I'm not sure I've played it all the way through for a long time).

KeenRussian mods are often hard and unforgiving, but they're generally well structured, including the level design. I got some way through A New Dope, and was occasionally chipping away at a Fall Up saved game on my Pentium but accidentally the whole drive and swapped it for another box a long while ago. Probably still have the running copy somewhere but I'll just start it again I guess. Smile is off the agenda until I set up that save-state version of DOSBox and have a solid few weeks to not think about anything but gaming, if that ever happens.

Bananasauros and ValKeen are half-completed on my Pandora, but it's been put aside for a fair while.

Completed Lego Keen and found it replayable although the atmosphere gets a bit drab after a while so I didn't complete it last time around. I quite enjoyed Search for the Sentinel. Played a bit of Clouds Unseen to write a review (or whatever tulip would have me call it) and it's also on the Pentium waiting for another round.

I agree that the XkyKeen mods are quite fantastic. I remember some of my memories with them (especially the first two). While it would be neat if someone made a mod that's at least equal to their quality, I don't think it should really matter too much. While I do try to put some effort into my own mods, I can say that what matters to me the most is having a mod that some friends and I could play and enjoy, and having fun with making mods.

For mods that I play frequently, Keen 9 easily comes to my mind. Not only is it one of my favorite mods, it is probably also one of my favorite games in general. Besides Keen 9, I sometimes play some of my previous mods. While I can't say the old ones were at least decent, I play them just for the memories. I sometimes also get some laughs from some of the writing on my old mods, just because of how bad I find them to be.