Page 26 - OSG Presents Classic Gamer Magazine #4

t’s one of the legends of unlike those other guys who are quest: Waterworld, but roughly
the Atari era – the famous doing it for the money. equivalent in entertainment value.
“Coke Wins!” cartridge for You’re Kevin Costner, trying to
I the 2600, originally de- • Con Air: The Game – you’re John shoot down the brains of multi-
signed as a premium, mail-in-your- Cusack, zipping along the bottom tudes of moviegoers so they’ll be
proofs-of-purchase type item from the of the screen in Colm Meaney’s just unconscious enough to enjoy
Coca-Cola Company. But for those your next colossally-budgeted film
who have actually seen the game, flop. In place of the mothership is
it’s very easy to see that it’s just a a Hollywood studio contract which,
rip-off of Atari’s own Space Invad- if shot ten times, will give you the
ers cartridge, hacked to turn the green light to go ahead and make
rows of advancing invaders into the an even bigger bomb about post-
letters PEPSI. apocalyptic postal workers.
There’s a reason why this car-
tridge never officially made it out I’m sure you get the idea. But if
the door; it wouldn’t have made not, ask me for my idea about a
money for anyone but Pepsi’s attor- really great game based on that
neys. To this very day, Pepsi’s family-friendly slice of celluloid
early-80s legal team can be heard called Eyes Wide Shut.
howling, “Why? Why didn’t they In retrospect, with a little bit of
release Coke Wins? My Maserati reflection on how many first-
could’ve been paid for by now!” (stolen) car. An airplane (formerly person or off-to-one-side-and-slightly-
Flash forward to 1998. I’m browsing Space Invaders’ mothership) is above-first-person shooters we’ve got-
the web and discover a Star Trek web dropping large numbers of dead ten out of various and sundry Holly-
site with a Java version of Space In- bodies out of the sky. You must wood franchises, would it actually be
vaders, which replaces the usual bar- shoot each one down to prevent any worse if we got sixteen gazillion
rage of alien critters with Romulan an old couple in Arizona from hav- clones of Space Invaders?
ships, Borg cubes, and so forth. Other ing a heart attack.
than that, it’s exactly the same game.
Somewhere between Coca-Cola and • Wag The Dog: The Game –
a Star Trek fan with too much time on you’re White House press secre-
his hands lies the truth: Space Invaders tary Joe Lockhart, attempting to
he Coke Wins Project
is a universal game, almost a kind of shoot down row after row of report- T The Coke Wins Project
quasi-meta-game. All you need is a ers asking you to compare this
protagonist, some antagonists, and whole Lewinsky mess with the Think you can be a bit more
voila – you’ve got a whole new game. movie Wag The Dog. Bonus creative than having the words
No fancy cut-scenes which explain points for shooting a floating blue “PEPSI” invade your planet?
your motivation – just blast those little dress (once again, formerly the Alan Watkins has created a tool
varmints outta the sky! I thought about mothership) out of the sky. (Based that allows you to create your very
ways that this formula could be applied on a true story.) own word invaders.
to Space Invaders based on the plots “The Coke Wins Project” was
of hit movies from the past several • Wild Wild West: The Game – previously only available for UNIX
years…and quickly realized that Holly- you’re mega-star Will Smith, trying machines, but lately Alan was in-
wood’s been missing the boat by turn- to shoot down row after row of spired to create a version for Win-
ing every box-office blockbuster into a heads of producer Barry Son- dows as well. He’s also willing to
3-D, Doom-style shooter. There is an nenfeld for giving you a big smelly create a Mac utility provided some-
easier way. dog of a movie instead of just go- one out there can assist him with
ing ahead and making Men In the technical details.
• Twister: The Game – you drive a Black II. (Also based on a true Once you’ve created your own
red truck back and forth along the story.) masterpiece, send a screenshot of
bottom of the screen. Several it to cav@classicgamer.com and
rows of little tornadoes bear down • Independence Day: The Game – we’ll print the best ones. The most
on you, dropping hailstones from hey, wait a minute…this wouldn’t creative will win a free issue of
on high. You try to shoot them need to be different from Space Classic Gamer Magazine.
with reinforced oil drums full of Invaders at all!
Christmas ornaments – erm, http://www4.ncsu.edu/~awwatkin
ahem, scientific instruments – all in • Waterworld: The Game – com-
the name of science, of course, pletely unrelated to Atari’s Sword-

Classic Gamer Magazine Summer 2000 26