Dude hacks DONKEY KONG, lets his daughter play Pauline!

Times have been tough for Pauline: the damsel-in-distress that Mario had to climb up those girders to rescue from Donkey Kong way back in 1981.  Mario and DK of course went on to bigger and better things.  Then there were all those women who came into Mario's life before he settled on Princess Peach.  But whatever happened to Pauline?

Mike Mika, who works at Other Ocean Interactive, was asked by his three-year old daughter if "she could play as the girl and save Mario".  Mika hacked into the ROM of the Nintendo Entertainment System's port of Donkey Kong and after fiddlin' around with the coded innards, he had produced what he calls the "Pauline Edition" of Donkey Kong!  Here's a clip of it in action and you  have to admit, it's a really sweet thing to do for a kid :-)


Jump here for more at Cinema Blend about this awesome hack!

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Doom, Super Mario Bros. 3 deemed "historically significant"

Last week, a committee that had been working on it for some time announced ten of the most culturally significant video games of all time. It's similar to the National Film Registry that's run by the Library of Congress. On the list of games deemed to have historical value: Tetris, Zork, Super Mario Bros. 3, SimCity, the Warcraft series, and... get this... Doom! Yes, Doom is among the first video games to be listed as having made an impact on culture and history. But as a longtime Doom-er, I knew that already. As is often said among Doom-aholics: "Doom will never die... only it's players will".

It's a good list. But if it ever gets expanded upon I think that we should see The Legend of Zelda (the original NES game), Pitfall II and Wing Commander added to it. Heh-heh, Wing Commander: now there is a game franchise that I would love to see return in a big way!

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