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  • Y’all ready for some nonsense?

  • Check this out.

  • This is Commander Keen’s Trek 96, developed by I have no clue, published by I don't

  • know, and released for an unknown operating system.

  • Depending on where you look on the box, CYBERDIGITAL released this in 1997.

  • Or maybe it was CYBEREX (Cyber.Ex) because that’s on there too, encapsulated

  • in a weird globe logo.

  • FOR PC,” it states in a yellow starburst, not giving any indication as to whether that

  • means DOS, or Windows, or even what kind of media is inside.

  • And no, there's no system requirements on the box or anywhere on the packaging.

  • Turns out is IS for Windows, it just doesn't tell you.

  • This is one of the single strangest boxed titles in my collection, second only to Jazz

  • Jackrabbit’s Poker Broker, which is credited to the same mysterious company, Cyberdigital.

  • Obviously, each of these releases were intending to capitalize on the popularity of shareware

  • classics Commander Keen and Jazz Jackrabbit by id Software and Epic Megagames respectively.

  • But the thing is, other than the packaging, there’s absolutely nothing tying these to

  • their respectiveinspirationswhatsoever.

  • If you like Captain Kirk, you will love Commander Keen.”

  • Uh-huh, if you say so.

  • Be quick like a Jackrabbit with your cuts and as smooth as Jazz with you bets.”

  • Wow, that's a stretch but hey: gold star for effort.

  • These games are just a clear case of copyright infringement across multiple companies and

  • I have no idea how these were even sold in the first place.

  • Heck, were they even sold in stores at all?

  • I bought both of these sealed on Ebay sealed years ago, and neither one of them had a price sticker,

  • a UPC barcode, or any indication of being sold at retail.

  • For all I know these were handed out by a guy named Fred behind a

  • backroad truck stop in Albuquerque.

  • Opening each box doesn’t reveal much more, with Commander Keen’s Trek 96 only giving

  • you a cardboard sleeve and a plastic bag surrounding a cheaply-labeled CD with the same art as

  • the cheaply-printed box.

  • Jazz Jackrabbit’s Poker Broker on the other hand, hahaha. This CD...

  • Jazz Jack Rabit.

  • This is perfect.

  • The misspelling of their own blatant ripoff title pairs beautifully against that trademark-less

  • Windows logo.

  • And again, more confusion as to who actually made this.

  • There’s the Cyber.Ex logo again, but no mention of Cyberdigital this time.

  • Instead it says Digital Design Development, California, USA.

  • Can’t say I’ve been able to find anything concrete on any of these company names, mostly

  • it’s just a bunch of confused people asking the same questions I am online.

  • But anyway let's try these out! And my first order of business with obscure games like this is

  • to make an archive of the disc, but even that wasn’t normal in this case.

  • My blu-ray burner absolutely refused to recognize either disc, instead making repetitive and

  • slightly concerning noises...

  • *slightly concerning noises, grinding sounds*

  • But I was able to use an old Compaq CD-ROM on my Windows 98 capture PC to successfully

  • make a disc image, although it finished suspiciously rapidly.

  • Sure enough, once I looked at the files in Explorer, it turns out that each CD only holds

  • a maximum of 1.3 megabytes.

  • Seriously.

  • You could fit each game on its own 3.5” high-density floppy disk and still have room

  • to spare.

  • And youve gotta love those truncated 8.3 file names, that’s a real sign of quality

  • right there.

  • So yeah, I had to try Jazz Jackrabbit’s Poker Broker first, and well.

  • It’s pretty darn simplistic, and there’s absolutely no mention of Jazz Jackrabbit anywhere.

  • Or even Jazz Jack Rabit, for that matter.

  • Nope, this is simply the shareware version of Poker Broker 3.0, developed in 1995.

  • Fun fact: one of the developers -- and I'll probably butcher this -- Thu Nguyen

  • is apparently quite the popular name among poker players.

  • Maybe it's just a popular name in general, but

  • there are an intriguing number of people by that name on ranked poker player websites,

  • so I guess it’s only appropriate one wouldve made a PC game about poker back in the day.

  • Anyway, Poker Broker 3.0 is just the most bog-standard draw poker game for Windows you

  • can imagine.

  • Place a bet and youre dealt five cards.

  • Choose which cards to hold and which to replace, then you either win or lose that hand depending

  • on the luck of the draw.

  • Sometime youll be given a bonus card out of nowhere, which is just "exhilarating."

  • But there’s no end goal, no high score table, no other players, nothing really more to the

  • game other than a couple options like peeking at cards and choosing where to cut the deck.

  • And just think, this was version 3.0 of Poker Broker, I can hardly fathom how little the

  • first two versions provided.

  • I at least hoped for a hastily-cloned Jazz Jackrabbit as the dealer or something, but

  • nah, this one screen is all you get.

  • Well, you also get this screen, but I think that’s a bug and not a feature.

  • Commander Keen’s Trek 96 isn’t much better to be honest, but let’s dive into it anyway.

  • *shoddy Star Trek theme WAV plays*

  • Before playing I had to increase the resolution since it’s one of those games that haphazardly

  • piles awkward windows onto the screen.

  • And yeah, this one is once again devoid of any mention of its namesake -- instead of

  • Commander Keen we simply get Trek 96, a German game by Oliver Lenzko and Jochen Burkhardt

  • calling themselves J&O Software.

  • Heh, yeah this is not the episode for me to pronounce names correctly.

  • Anyway, it's a top-down space action/strategy game that mimics the popular

  • Star Trek games of the time period.

  • These actually date all the way back to 1971, originally programmed on mainframe computers,

  • and subsequently becoming programming fodder for anyone just learning how to

  • code their own games in BASIC or what have you.

  • One of the more popular variants at the time this one was made was WinTrek from 1992,

  • which used a similar selection of windows and GUI elements to update the classic mainframe game.

  • But Trek 96?

  • ...hehe.

  • Other than the use of a few WAV files ripped from Next Generation, there’s absolutely

  • nothing noteworthy here.

  • *klaxon and phaser WAV files ripped from Star Trek Next Generation play*

  • You use the arrow keys to move around space, activate a few basic starship systems with

  • the mouse, and hold down keys like shift and control to activate phasers using the most

  • cumbersome aiming reticle in gaming history.

  • It sucks.

  • The game over message though, well that is amazing.

  • Congratulations!

  • You have destroyed the Enterprise!”

  • Haha, what?

  • Congratulations?!

  • Is the goal to destroy the Enterprise? I mean, is that sarcastic? I dunno man.

  • Can’t say I cared to figure out either, because it always crashes after anywhere from

  • 2 to 5 minutes, seemingly at random.

  • And that’s Commander Keen’s Trek 96 and Jazz Jackrabbit’s Poker Broker.

  • Neither one of them are worth playing, ever, but at the same time theyre infinitely

  • fascinating to me.

  • How this kind of thing ended up getting any kind of boxed distribution is mind-boggling

  • to me, largely because of when it came out.

  • This was 1997, and the idea that some no-name company from California could pop up and seemingly

  • get away with blatant IP infringement is ludicrous to me.

  • And sure, maybe id and Epic didn’t care since Commander Keen and Jazz Jackrabbit were

  • kind of old news by ‘97, but what about Trek 96?

  • This was a game clearly billing itself as a Star Trek game and using Star Trek assets

  • and trademarks unofficially, and CBS is infamous for coming down hard on any

  • project that even mention Star Trek.

  • Maybe they did send a cease and desist to them, or maybe they didn’t,

  • I can’t find anything saying either way.

  • All I know is that these two games are phenomenally bizarre and I hope that your day now an enjoyably

  • weirder place to be after having seen them in action.

  • And if you enjoyed this video on these things then perhaps you would like to see some of my other videos.

  • There are new ones are every Monday and Friday here on LGR!

  • On similar topics and beyond.

  • And as always, thank you very much for watching.

Y’all ready for some nonsense?

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爵士傑克兔的撲克牌經紀人與基恩司令的跋涉?WTF (Jazz Jackrabbit's Poker Broker & Commander Keen's Trek? WTF)

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    林宜悉 發佈於 2021 年 01 月 14 日
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