%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% % COCONUT MONKEY GAMES FAQ % % Version 2.0 % % by Fritz Fraundorf % % erggibbon@aol.com % %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% The most recent version of this FAQ is available at Cosmo Canyon: http://come.to/cosmocanyon -----------------------------------+++++------------------------------- %%%%TABLE OF CONTENTS%%%% I. Revision History II. Who is Coconut Monkey? III. Where To Find CM's Games IV. The Games Death From Above Monkey Madness Mayhem Race the Monkey Monkey Command Monkeyroids Monkey Pinball V. Coconut Monkey Sites VI. Credits / Disclaimer ******************************************************* I. REVISION HISTORY ******************************************************* Version 2.0 (8/26/98): - Added coverage of Monkey Pinball Version 1.5 (8/22/98): - A secret level has been discovered in Monkeyroids! Thanks to Remex for discovering this. Version 1.0 (8/12/98): - Added coverage of Monkey Madness Mayhem and Race The Monkey. Version 0.5 (8/11/98): - Added coverage of Monkey Command - Coconut Monkey Sites section added. Version 0.2 (8/10/98): - Hyper-early version. Only has two games covered. Coconut Monkey Sites section not completed. ******************************************************* II. WHO IS COCONUT MONKEY? ******************************************************* Coconut Monkey is the mascot of PC Gamer magazine. He is a brown monkey without any arms or legs (picture one of those Russian dolls that fit inside each other, but as a monkey). He would like to shake your hand, but he has no arms. Besides being just a mascot, Coconut Monkey is also a prolific designer of freeware Klik n Play games, which this FAQ covers. However, his current games pale in comparison to his upcoming masterpiece, Gravy Trader. ******************************************************* III. WHERE TO FIND CM'S GAMES ******************************************************* Coconut Monkey's games can be obtained from two places: 1) From PC Gamer's website, http://www.pcgamer.com (go to Fun Stuff and then Coconut Monkey's Homepage). It's free, so why not? 2) The September 1998 (vol. 5, no. 9) issue of PC Gamer has all of Coconut Monkey's games on the CD EXCEPT for Monkey Pinball. ******************************************************* IV. THE GAMES ******************************************************* %%%DEATH FROM ABOVE%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% Original release: ??? Rating: * Coconut Monkey's first, and also, worst game. It doesn't really have a point to it. Basically, you move a lion back and forth to eat (?) falling elephants, giraffes, and jesters. There's no way to win or anything, and Coconut Monkey isn't even in it. On the other hand, it's so bad it's almost good. --CONTROLS-- - The left and right arrow keys move your lion left and right. That's it. --TIPS-- - After the initial flood of creatures (eat as many as you can), the game will end up as a simple pattern. A giraffe will fall on the right side of the screen; if you eat it, an elephant will fall in the left-center; eat that, and another giraffe appears. If you miss one, the animals will stop falling and you "lose". This just goes on forever, there's no way to win. See how pointless this game is? %%%MONKEY MADNESS MAYHEM%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% Original release: October 1996 (vol. 3 no. 10) Rating: * Coconut Monkey's second game, MMM has primates (a step up from DFA) but not Coconut Monkey himself. It's also his only two-player game. It's also not very good, but at least it has a goal to it. In Monkey Madness Mayhem, two players play as gorillas (which, it should be noted, are not monkeys) fighting in some Western movie for no apparent reason. The idea is to knock out the other player by taking away all his life points -- both players lose one life point whenever you collide. You start with 3 life points, but you can get more by picking up the bananas that appear when you bump into the cowboys. The problem is that only one or two bananas appear per game, which kind of ruins the gameplay. --CONTROLS-- - Player 1: Use the arrow keys to move up, down, left, and right. Player 1 always moves at a constant speed. - Player 2: Use O and P to move left and right (respectively), and Q and A to move up and down. Player 2 starts off moving slowly, but accelerates. - For some reason, you can walk right through the buildings. --TIPS-- - Player 1's gorilla has better controls (with the arrow keys), but Player 2's wins in the case of a tie. Be Player 1. - If you play as Player 1, begin by hitting the guy in a pink shirt right next to you. This will cause a guy in a grey coat to appear in the background. Hit him and one of the two bananas will appear. Grab it. Now, if Player 2 has hit the guy near him, another grey-coated guy will appear in the background (if Player 2 hasn't, hit him yourself). Hit him and get the second banana, and no more will appear. You're now up 4 to 2, and you can't lose. - If you're Player 2, you will win if you tie (both run out of life points at the same time), so try to kill Player 1 before he can kick up any bananas. %%%RACE THE MONKEY%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% Original release: November 1996 (vol. 3 no. 11) Rating: ** Coconut Monkey's first game that's an actual game... well, sorta. It's a racing game in which you (a car) race Coconut Monkey in a one-lap racing duel. Yes, this is the first game where Coconut Monkey himself makes an appearance. It's also the first with music, which is pretty good. RTM, however, is marred by the fact that it's impossible to win. First of all, Coconut Monkey starts while the light is still red and gets around the first corner before you have to a chance to move. It's possible to catch up to him, but if you make it to the finish line before he does, a giant gorilla will appear, blocking your path but allowing CM to roll right through it and win. There's no way to win. Losing will bring up a screen of CM hopping around a desert island (huh?). --CONTROLS-- - Press the up arrow to accelerate and the down arrow to deacclerate. You should accelerate on the straightaways, and deacclerate for the duration of the turns. - Use the left and right arrows to turn. --TIPS-- - Consider yourself victorious if you can get the gorilla to appear, since there's no way by it ^_^. - CM will take the turns faster than you can, but you can catch up to him on the straightaways. Just be sure not to bump into him! Doing so will knock your car backwards really far and basically put you out of the race. - If you do it right, you should be able to take the first three pairs of turn in one sweeping turn. - Be sure to deaccelerate on the turns! Bumping into the wall will cost you lots of valuable time. - Careful, CM gets a speed boost on the final straightaway. %%%MONKEYROIDS%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% Original release: December 1996 (vol. 3 no. 12) Rating: ***** Easily Coconut Monkey's best game; it's actually worth keeping on your hard drive for more than an hour. It's addictive, and has some actual depth, not to mention great music! Monkeyroids takes place in the far future, when Coconut Monkies have overpopulated time and space. It's up to you to thin them out. You control a rocket, flying up across the screen, and you shoot at flying Coconut Monkies, breaking them up into smaller Coconut Monkies. The smallest CMs, when destroyed, will yield stars that can be used to obtain add-ons for your rockets. After destroying enough CMs, you will win the game (it has nothing to do with the amount of time you play) and be admonished for ridding the galaxy of Coconut Monkies. No more tasty, tangy coconut flesh for our space-faring race... --CONTROLS-- - The arrow keys move your rocket around: left, right, up, and down. - Shift fires your rocket's weapon (normally a sparkling star). - Enter or Spacebar activates the add-on that the highlighter is currently over. --COCONUT MONKEYS-- - LARGE Coconut Monkeys will break into two medium Coconut Monkeys when shot. 10 points. - MEDIUM Coconut Monkeys will break into six (?) small Coconut Monkeys when shot. 40 points. - SHORT Coconut Monkeys will turn into a star when shot. These are the only CMs that will not loop around to the other side of the screen when they fly off the screen -- shoot them when they appear or they're gone. 100 points. Getting hit by a Coconut Monkey destroys the CM and your ship, causing you to lose a life. You have 5 lives; when you lose all them, it's game over time. --ADD-ONS-- SPEEDUP: This just causes your ship to move faster. It actually makes it harder to control, and SINGLE: Allows your ship to fire single star shots. You already have this; the only purpose it has is to revert back to your normal weapon if you picked up a different one... but why would you want to do that? DOUBLE: Allows your ship to fire twin star shots. Better than the Single, but you're better off saving for the almighty Triple Shot. TRIPLE: This is the one to get! Allows your ship to fire three stars in a 3-way burst. Absolutely get this one. All the other add-ons are pointless. SMART: This is a smart bomb that destroys all the CMs on the screen. Given the number of stars it takes to get, it's pretty useless. Don't bother. SHIELD: Activates a shield that protects your rocket from one (or more? I don't remember) hit. This is kinda good, but if you've got this many stars, hold out for the Homers! HOMERS: Allows you to shoot bullets that home in on nearby CMs. This is great, but by the time you get enough stars to activate it, the game's nearly over. Don't save up for this; get Triple instead. However, you *can* get -- and use -- this if you play the secret level (see below). --TIPS-- - First of all, if you're in 640x480 resolution, be sure to maximize the window, then press F8 to hide the menus. - Stay in the center of the screen, otherwise you might get nailed by a Monkey flying in from off-screen. - Similarly, don't shoot at CMs from too close a range, or you'll be hit by the smaller monkeys that fly out. However, if you can get at just the right range, you can wipe out the small monkeys in one blast for lots of points and stars. - Note that you can't make the add-on selector go backwards. In other words, if you're on the add-on you want, but don't activate it right away, you could lose it if you get too many stars. So always activate the add-on you want right away! (unless it's the Smart Bomb) Note that if you're on Homers and you get more stars, you'll cycle around back to Speedup (I think). - One time, I died, and when my next ship appeared, I had two ships instead one of. I could control both of them (they flew in formation), but neither could shoot, and I lost a life if either was hit. I don't know whether this is a glitch or a secret, but my money's on the former. - My top score is 28750, using the secret level, or 14410 without it. --THE SECRET LEVEL-- Yes, it's true, there's a secret level in Monkeyroids. To enter it, you must rapidly press the fire key (shift) after beginning a new game, but before the screen changes. If you did it right, instead of "MONKEYROIDS: Get Ready", you'll see "GOOD LUCK: Level One" (if you don't get in, hit F2 to go back to the title screen and try again). In the secret level, you fight tiny blue buzzsaws worth 10 points each. These little buggers are fast, and you only get 1 star from each, making the bonus level a lot harder than normal Monkeyroids. Stay at the bottom and shoot as many as you can to get the Triple Shot. After a while, you'll fly off (like you just beat the game) and enter normal Monkeyroids. However, you get to keep all the points and weapons you earned in the secret level! Want to start the game with Homers? Now you can! %%%MONKEY COMMAND%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% Original release: January 1997 (vol. 4 no. 1) Rating: *** This game isn't bad, but it's not the classic that Monkeyroids is. In Monkey Command, you have to defend five cities from falling Coconut Monkies, and if you can do well enough, take on CM himself. The goal in each level is simply to destroy all the falling Coconut Monkeys, and then you will move on to the next. The CMs will blow up the cities at the bottom if they hit;7 lose all five cities or your cannon and you lose the game. --CONTROLS-- Simply click to fire. You need ammo to fire, and each shot uses up one unit of ammo. You have plenty of ammo, though, so this is never really a problem (in fact, I've never run out of ammo ^_^). --LEVELS-- Level 1: This level is pretty much just warm-up. Just blast at the falling Coconut Monkies and try to use as little ammo as possible for extra points (your ammo is refilled between levels). Level 2: Things gets a little trickier here. Occasionally, a plane will fly by and drop out an extra salvo of CMs. Things can get a little hairy at thsee points, but, remember, you don't need to save *all* the cities, just 1. Level 3: The toughest level. The CMs will fall in clusters and split into more as they descend (this reminds me of Monkeyroids). However, a lot of them will be aimed off to the side, away from your cities, so you don't need to shoot them. Just worry about the ones that are heading towards the cities. Red Alert: In this final level, a giant Coconut Monkey flies around, releasing small ones. Just shoot the ones he releases and keep shooting at the big CM. When you do enough damage to him, he'll blow up in some really cool special effects, and you win the game. It's actually quite easy. --TIPS-- - Normally, you get 10 points per CM shot, but you are awarded extra bonus point at the end of every level (except the last) based on how much ammo you have. Therefore, try to use as little ammo as possible. - One trick to conserve ammo is to take out two CMs with one shot. To do this, shoot one CM, and the explosion will destroy any nearby CMs. - You don't have to save all your cities. Even if you lose a few, you can just defend the one you have (which is easy) and you'll stay alive. Of course, you don't get as many points at the end of the level if you have fewer cities. - DON'T LET YOUR CANNON GET DESTROYED! If it is, you lose the ability to shoot, and have to sit there helplessly while all your cities are destroyed. %%%MONKEY PINBALL%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% Original release: July 1997 (vol. 4 no. 7) Rating: ** Coconut Monkey's final Klik-n-Play game does not end his legacy with a bang. It's a pinball game, which is fine, but the fact that the Extra Ball device releases about 30 Coconut Monkeys that can rack up over 7 million points on a single ball. --CONTROLS-- - The space bar launches a new Coconut Monkey ball. - The left and right arrows control the left and right flippers, respectively. --TIPS-- - Just wait around for the Extra Ball thing to appear (it's the gray vortex with four arrows pointing into it), then shoot Coconut Monkey in there. A huge wave of CMs will come out, slowing the game to a crawl. Sit back and watch the points build up. Once they're gone up, repeat ad nauseum. - Don't play this game, play Monkeyroids instead. ******************************************************* V. COCONUT MONKEY SITES ******************************************************* COCONUT MONKEY'S OFFICIAL HOMEPAGE http://www.pcgamer.com/static/funstuff/coconut.shtml ---------------------------------- Besides holding CM's games, Coconut Monkey's Homepage also includes sound files, graphics, and game design philosophy. Unfortunately, it's never updated any more. COCONUT MONKEY FAN CLUB http://members.tripod.com/~yeti00 ---------------------------------- Basically, all this page is a fan club you can join. COCONUT MONKEY FAN CLUB (OTHER PAGE) http://www.geocities.com/area51/vault/9106/cmfc.htm ---------------------------------- This is a different page that the above one, but it's the same fan club. This page has more info on Coconut Monkey himself, and a web ring. Go here, instead of the other one. There's also a monthly newsletter you can get if you sign the guestbook. ******************************************************* VI. CREDITS / DISCLAIMER ******************************************************* This FAQ is copyright 1998 by Fritz Fraundorf. Coconut Monkey's games are copyright Imagine Media; created on Maxis's Klik-n-Play. This FAQ is not associated with or endorsed by Imagine Media, Maxis, or Eurocom. You may freely distribute this FAQ for noncommercial purposes if it is not altered in any way and I am credited. %%%CREDITS%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% - PC Gamer, for creating Coconut Monkey and his games - Maxis and Eurocom, for creating Klik-n-Play, on which CM creates his masterpieces - Remex (remex@zeldafan.com) for discovering the secret level in Monkeyroids! - Karzon (karzon@aol.com) for providing me with a copy of Monkey Pinball.