Dopefish
From KeenWiki
The Dopefish is an enemy from Keen 4. It is a big, hungry fish that eats Keen if it gets near him. The first appearance of the Dopefish in Commander Keen is in the Well of Wishes, the underwater level in Keen 4. It also appears in Keen GBC.
The official help text says of the Dopefish:
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The second-dumbest creature in the universe, this creature's thought patterns go "swim swim hungry, swim swim hungry." They'll eat anything alive and moving near them, though they prefer heroes. |
This is a reference to Douglas Adams' Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy which describes the dumbest creature in the universe as the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal. Obviously, the 'Dope' part of the name is a reference to its low intelligence, and has nothing do do with drugs.
Probably the most well-known creature in all of the Commander Keen universe, the Dopefish has spawned a cult following and made numerous appearances in many other games. For a full list of guest appearances, visit the Dopefish's homepage [1].
As it is not possible to fire the Neural Stunner in the Well of Wishes, the Dopefish can't be stunned by Keen, and his only option is to escape from it. The in-game helptext in Keen 4 states that the Dopefish won't mess with a Sprite; however it is possible to lure a Dopefish into contact with a Sprite. Unfortunately, nothing happens: the Sprite will fire at Keen, but its shots are harmless to the Dopefish.
See also Schoolfish, and the List of Keen 4 Creatures.
Appearance in Keen GBC
The Dopefish appears in Keen GBC as decoration on some tiles and as a real enemy. The tile art was directly taken over from the Keen 4 sprite. The new enemy version looks a lot like the first one and can be found in Blooglet Lake on Fribbulus Xax. In contrast to Keen 4, this Dopefish is much smaller and more fragile, being easily defeatable when they are out of water. This may indicate that the Dopefish in Keen GBC are younger versions of the Dopefish in Keen 4. They spend their time jumping in and out of the water, hoping to snap up Keen.
External links
- http://www.dopefish.com - The official Dopefish homepage
