Dad Hacks "Donkey Kong" - Now Pauline Rescues Mario 262
H_Fisher writes "What do you do when your daughter wants the girl to be the hero of your old video game? If you're Mike Mika, you hack the game ROM to reverse the roles. He even changed the 'M' at the top of the screen to a 'P.'"
Why is this necessary? (Score:0, Informative)
Let's count up all the female player characters that exist in video games that aren't sex objects, exist for a male character to save, or exist as a plot device (that is, female characters you can play that exist as characters in and of themselves, not as part of a plot to empower male characters):
April Ryan
Faith in Mirrors Edge
Chell in Portal (though you almost never see her)
Lightning
Princess Toadstool in Super Mario 2 (though this character is powerless in almost every other Mario game)
um... I'm out. I'd do the same list with male characters, but I'd exceed the maximum comment size.
Re:Gender roles (Score:5, Informative)
If the daughter finds them OK, what's wrong with it? Maybe she likes "girly" things.
Re:Pie factory in the NES version? (Score:5, Informative)
There was a VC release bundled with certain editions of the Wii that had a ROM of the NES version with the pie factory level grafted in.
-uso.
Re:Why is this necessary? (Score:3, Informative)
A little offtopic, I know, but it took me until just now to realize that she was Terry Pratchett's daughter. Apparently she will also get all the rights to Discworld and continue writing it. I certainly hope she is up to the challenge.
Who is this...Mario? (Score:2, Informative)
The three characters are Pauline, Donkey Kong (now Cranky Kong), and Jump Man.
Re:Gender roles (Score:5, Informative)
I see gender roles are still alive and well, with Pauline using pink umbrella's and pink handbags in her quest to defeat Donkey Kong...
Has no one actually played Donkey Kong? Those were from the original game as the icons for bonus points. They were Pauline's items that she tossed for Mario to pick up. If he were going to really flip that aspect, he should change the color/style on the umbrella, and maybe make the purse a lunch pail or something. But that's more sprite editing.