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| The thingie in the logo is the archaeopteryx, the extinct missing link between dinosaur and bird. This brand name went extinct pretty quickly too, with the company reverting back to its original name, Universal. |
Universal is one of those obscure game companies that hangs out in the dimly lit corner of the minds of old-school gamers. So let’s throw a little light on the subject! The company’s two most popular games, Ladybug and the first Mr. Do!, were the creations of Kazutoshi Ueda, a journeyman programmer who went on to develop games for the Turbografx-16, Super NES, and Playstation. Universal went through a turn of the century rebranding, becoming Aruze and attempting a hostile takeover of the more popular, but financially ailing SNK. After that blew up in Aruze’s beaky prehistoric face, SNK was resurrected as SNK-Playmore by SNK’s founder Eikichi Kawasaki, and Aruze went back to the name Universal, receding back into the pachinko industry.
Universal’s contributions to the early arcade scene were limited, but hugely influential all the same. Mr. Do! was the Coke to Dig Dug’s Pepsi, and Cosmic Avenger and Space Panic were both brought to the ColecoVision in the arcade port goldrush of the early 1980s. Universal’s games were a little meatier than the average arcade title, with more urgent gameplay and lots of opportunities for bonus points. Many of their games were build on familiar foundations, but they felt like more honest attempts to give players an expert version of the games they’d already mastered. (As opposed to Exciting New Pac-Man Plus.)
Dorodon
Played: Just in MAME, sorry!
If Ladybug asked, “What if Pac-Man had revolving doors?,” Dorodon responded with “What if those revolving doors caused grievous bodily harm?” Dorodon was designed by Falcon, a small player in the arcade industry that gained notoriety with Crazy Kong. (That was the creepily “off” clone of Donkey Kong using Crazy Climber hardware, which I reviewed in a previous installment of this feature.)
Dorodon uses Ladybug hardware, but unlike Crazy Kong, this is an entirely new game. Well, mostly an entirely new game. The similarities to Ladybug are obvious from the moment you start, but Dorodon is a more frantic and chaotic experience. The blob-like hero must swing all the gates on the playfield to turn them white, but ogres pour out of the center of the screen, hoping to catch him. His defenses include a question mark, which turns all attacking ogres into ice cream cones; a swirl, which swings all white gates, clobbering all ogres standing nearby; and fire, which snuffs out any ogre stupid enough to step on it. (And you too, so be careful!)
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| After grabbing a question mark, the ogres turn into ice cream cones. Sure, why not. |
The gameplay isn’t as immediately intuitive as Ladybug’s or Pac-Man’s, and the ogres will quickly overwhelm you if you don’t swat them down as they appear. While that’s possible in the first stage, subsequent stages get a lot harder, with faster ogres and gates that revert back to yellow or red if you swing them while they’re the target color. The play mechanics are kind of a mess, and nothing really “takes.” I’ve never seen a Dorodon machine outside of the occasional episode of Starcade, and when you actually play it, it’s not hard to figure out why.
Ladybug
Played at: The Malt Shop, in Mount Pleasant MI
(probably in the basement, where all the good old coin-ops were)
Ladybug is Universal’s first shot at a Pac-Man clone, and it’s a pretty good eat ‘em up considering its early vintage. It’s a little “sticky” in the way it controls... instead of smoothly gliding thorugh each turn like the man of Pac, your bug crawls along in single pixel increments, making quick ninety degree turns through intersections annoyingly imprecise.
However, the gameplay of Ladybug is deeper than the game that inspired it. Scattered throughout the maze are revolving gates... push through one and it turns. Although you can move through the gates, the enemy bugs can’t, which means that careful shifting of gates can keep you out of their claws and even lead them into fatal skulls. Along with the expected bonus prize in the center of the screen, players can collect color-shifting letters. “EXTRA” in yellow awards an extra life, “SPECIAL” in red offers an extra credit, and the blue multipliers double, triple, and even quintuple the value of everything else, if your timing is just right.
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| Buggin' out, bugga bugga buggin' out. |
Unlike Pac-Man where you can regularly turn the tables on the roving monsters, Ladybug puts you exclusively on defense. The vegetable prize freezes the enemy bugs briefly, but beyond that, quick thinking and gate spinning are your only hope for survival. It’s a more punishing game than Pac-Man, but also more rewarding thanks to the high point potential offered by the letter tiles and multipliers. The EXTRA bonus in particular would become a mainstay in future Universal titles, starting with...
Mr. Do!
Played at: A gas station (Speedway?) on the edge of Coldwater, MI
Like Ladybug, Mr. Do! provides a more challenging alternative to one of Namco’s arcade hits. While Dig Dug is relatively placid, with the hero plodding along through the dirt to the tune of friendly banjos, Mr. Do! is more lively. Unlike the Pookas and Fygars who sleepily bounce along in their burrows, the monsters in Mr. Do! immediately make a mad dash for the player the moment they emerge from the center of the screen. I guess I’d better get moving, like, right now.
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| They want the D. |
Fortunately, Mr. Do! is armed with the power ball, which violently ricochets through the tunnels until it strikes a target or returns to the crafty clown. He can also push apples into vertical shafts, crushing anything at the bottom, but unlike Dig Dug’s more passive monsters, the creatures in Mr. Do! are often too wily to be flattened by giant fruit. Also, they don’t float through the dirt as ghosts... they chew through it as ravenous beasts, opening up the maze and quickly closing the distance between themselves and the player.
Ladybug was a deeper game than Pac-Man, and so it goes with Mr. Do! Every ten thousand points, a humanoid Scrabble tile appears at the top of the screen, going against the flow of enemy traffic. Hitting this “Letterman” earns you letters that eventually spell EXTRA, for an extra life. Lettermen also appear when you eat a fruit target in the center of the screen... along with three gooey monsters that devour falling apples. (So much for that tactic.) Stages can be completed by killing all onscreen creatures or collecting all onscreen cherries, and you get a point bonus if you grab eight cherries in a row. It’s extremely technique-dense for a game released in 1982, is the takeaway here. You might even call Mr. Do! the Dark Souls of Dig Dug, but really... just don’t.
Mr. Do's Castle
Played at: A Wal-Mart in central Illinois
Ms. Pac-Man was a lot like Pac-Man. Galaga was a lot like Galaxian. The sequel to Mr. Do! is... nothing like Mr. Do! This may have come as a shock and an annoyance to fans of the original, but Mr. Do’s Castle is a great game in its own right, when taken on its own terms.
This time the clown is playing exterminator in a castle infested with... unicorns? (Am I reading this right?) These aren’t the fun, cuddly, My Little Pony kind of unicorns, however! Imagine red, vaguely equine gremlins... they’re still kind of cuddly, but deadly to the touch. Like those gremlins from the movie, they have a habit of multiplying and getting more hostile if left unattended, so squish ‘em quick with your trusty unicorn-bashing hammer! A direct hit will do the job in the first two stages, but past that you’ll have to crush them with the blocks that make up the floors. Choose your targets carefully! Any block you drop leaves a gap that could leave you stuck until the unicorns fill it. (They poop blocks. It’s a video game thing; best not think too deeply about it.)
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| I mean, they're kinda like unicorns? But they walk like people, and poop like wombats. (Look it up.) |
Unlike the first Mr. Do!, Mr. Do!’s Castle is a platformer, a bit like Donkey Kong but a whole lot more like Lode Runner and Universal’s earlier Space Panic. As an arcade game from 1981, Space Panic felt rough and unpolished, but Mr. Do!’s Castle illustrates the difference two years of design experience and improved technology can make. It plays cleanly, with the jester scurrying across the playfield, dropping blocks, kicking over ladders, and generally making a nuisance of himself. It looks better than the first game, with a sense of depth to the castle interior. The soundtrack is bouncy and energetic, a perfect fit for the frantic action.
Mr. Do’s Castle exudes confidence in its design. It knows exactly what it wants to be, and does it better than either Lode Runner (too finicky for arcade play, although there have been arcade versions...) or Space Panic (which runs about as smoothly as a UNIVAC mining Bitcoin). It’s definitely not the Mr. Do players wanted, but it’s a detour that’s well worth taking.
Mr. Do's Wild Ride
Played at: A laundromat in Tekonsha MI
This is where the Mr. Do! series hits its first snag. Mr. Do’s Wild Ride borrows even more heavily from Donkey Kong than the previous game, but the amusement park setting ultimately proves its undoing. Like Donkey Kong, it’s a race to the top of the stage, but instead of girders and barrels, Mr. Do! is on the tracks of an active rollercoaster. Mr. Do! will quickly become Mr. Done if he’s clipped by a rollercoaster car or one of the other rides at the theme park, forcing the player to frequently shimmy up ladders to dodge the oncoming traffic.
Where do I even start with this one? First, the premise is idiotic. Bubble-blowing dinosaurs, hungry yellow spheres, and time-travelling space ships I can buy as charmingly odd video game concepts. Running up an amusement park ride while cars are racing on it just seems senselessly suicidal. There’s really no better way to do whatever you’re trying to accomplish here? Can’t you just, you know, buy a ticket? Better to ride the rollercoaster than to get smeared all over the front of it.
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| You don't have a jump button, because jumping on a rollercoaster track would be... too... dangerous? Look, it's just easier to call this game stupid. |
Beyond the stupid concept, Mr. Do!’s Wild Ride is just obnoxious to play. There’s a lot of overly lateral gameplay where the ladders don’t get any you closer to the goal and the only upward movement you’ll get is from the track loops on either end of the screen. Holding down a button triples Do!’s speed, but you’ll still need to spend a lot of time loitering on ladders to keep from getting bounced around the screen by oncoming rollercoasters. Way to take the fun out of the fun park, Universal.
Kids, just say no to playing on rollercoaster tracks! It’s dangerous, and even worse, it leads to games like Mr. Do’s Wild Ride.
Do! Run Run
Played at: An arcade inside an IGA grocery store
Finishing up the series, at least in the 1980s, is Do! Run Run. Out of all the sequels, this is the closest in spirit to the original Mr. Do!. This dot munching maze game is seen from an elevated overhead view. Some platforms are higher than others, so when you throw that power ball, take care that it doesn’t fly over the heads of the clams and snakes chasing after you!
Colorful tubes replace the apples from the first game. Tip one over by either pushing it from above or knocking out the supports below, and the tube rolls downward, crushing any monsters in its path. The Lettermen from Mr. Do! and Castle return, and Mr. Do! can boost the value of dots by drawing a box around them, turning them into lemons and pineapples. Seems like a lot of unnecessary busywork, but it’s there if you want to wring more points out of the game.
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| Hee, hee! Someone's getting squished by this gaudy looking drum! |
Do! Run Run wasn’t built with the same confidence as the original or Castle... some of the new play mechanics in particular feel contrived. Qix called, it wants its territory marking back! Still, Do! Run Run has the feel of an impromptu band reunion on the roof of the Universal office. It’s a little unpolished, but the heart is still there, and you’re just happy to see one more performance from the old gang. Rock on with your bad self, Mr. Do!.
