Mr. Do!

Mr. Do![lower-alpha 1] is a maze arcade game developed and published by Universal in 1982. The first game in the Mr. Do series, it was one of the first arcade games to be released as a conversion kit (by Taito), and went on to sell 30,000 units in the United States.[1]

Mr. Do!
North American promotional flyer
Developer(s)Universal
Publisher(s)Universal
Designer(s)Kazutoshi Ueda
SeriesMr. Do!
Platform(s)Arcade, Apple II, Atari 2600, Atari 8-bit, ColecoVision, Commodore 64, Game Boy, Game Boy Color, MSX, Super Nintendo Entertainment System, Tomy Tutor
Release
  • JP: September 1982
  • NA: December 1982
Genre(s)Maze
Mode(s)Single-player

Gameplay
Mr. Do collecting cherries while avoiding Creeps.

The object of Mr. Do! is to score as many points as possible by digging tunnels through the ground and collecting cherries. The title character, Mr. Do (a circus clown—except for the original Japanese version of the game, in which he is a snowman), is constantly chased by red monsters called creeps,[2] and the player loses a life if Mr. Do is caught by one. The game ends when the last life is lost.

Cherries are distributed throughout the level in groups of eight. A level is complete either when all cherries are removed, all creeps are destroyed, "EXTRA" is spelled, or a diamond is found.

Mr. Do can defeat creeps by hitting them with his bouncing "power ball" or by dropping large apples on them. While the power ball is bouncing toward a creep, Mr. Do is defenseless. If the ball bounces into an area where there are no creeps to hit (such as behind a fallen apple), Mr. Do cannot use it again until he has retrieved it. When the power ball hits a creep, it then reforms in Mr. Do's hands after a delay that increases with each use.

Mr. Do or the creeps can push an apple off the edge of a vertical tunnel and crush one or more creeps. If an apple falls more than its own height, it breaks and disappears. Mr. Do can also be crushed by a falling apple, causing a loss of life.

Occasionally, the creeps transform briefly into more powerful multicolored monsters that can tunnel through the ground. If one of these digs through a cherry, it leaves fewer cherries for Mr. Do to collect. When it digs under an apple, it often crushes itself, other creeps, and/or Mr. Do.

Each time the score passes a certain threshold during play, a letter from the word "EXTRA" appears on the playfield as an Alphamonster, and the player can defeat or be defeated by this monster in the same way as a creep. Defeating an Alphamonster awards that letter to the player, and collecting all five letters of the word completes the level, plays a cut scene playing the theme to Astro Boy, and awards the player an extra life. Alphamonsters attempt to eat any apples they encounter, which makes them difficult to crush.

The creeps spawn at the center of the screen. After they have all appeared, the generator will turn into a food item; picking this up scores bonus points, freezes all the creeps, and calls out an Alphamonster and three large blue monsters. The latter can eat apples as well. The creeps stay frozen until the player either defeats all three blue monsters, defeats the Alphamonster (in which case any remaining blue monsters are turned into apples), loses a life, or completes the stage.

Rarely, dropping an apple will reveal a diamond which, if collected within about 15 seconds, completes the level and awards a bonus credit to the player.

Development

Mr. Do! was created by Kazutoshi Ueda.[3][4][5][6] It was inspired by the game play in Namco's Dig Dug game, similar to how many of Universal's other games took license from other companies' more successful games; i.e. Lady Bug (also designed by Ueda) being similar to Pac-Man. The major game play element, the "Powerball". came from Mr. Ueda observing a super ball stuck on the roof of a home near the Universal office in Japan.

Ports

Mr. Do! was ported to the Atari 2600, Atari 8-bit family, ColecoVision, Apple II, MSX, Neo Geo, Tomy Tutor, and Commodore 64. A handheld LCD version was released by Tomy in 1983.

In the ColecoVision adaptation, the Alphamonster and sidekicks are unable to eat apples, making them easier to crush, but the blue monsters eat the shrubbery and cherries. Also, if an Alphamonster is over a letter that has already been acquired, the dinosaur monsters just freeze for a few seconds.

Reception

In Japan, Game Machine listed Mr. Do! on their June 15, 1983 issue as being the twenty-first most-successful table arcade unit of the year.[7]

On release, Famicom Tsūshin awarded the Super Famicom version of the game 25 out of 40.[8] The four reviewers of Electronic Gaming Monthly gave it 4.875 out of 10. All but Dan Hsu felt that Mr. Do! has fun gameplay, but they criticized the lack of enhancements to what was by then over a decade old game, and recommended that players only get it if it were released at significantly less than the normal retail price for an SNES cartridge.[9] Their later feature on 16-bit games reported that, contrary to their hopes, the game was priced at over $50.[10]

Legacy

Mr. Do! was followed by three sequels: Mr. Do's Castle in 1983, Mr. Do's Wild Ride, and Do! Run Run both in 1984. An expanded 99-level version of Mr. Do! was released in arcades by Electrocoin in 1989.[11]

Neo Mr. Do!, was developed by Visco and licensed by Universal for SNK's Neo Geo system in 1997.[12] Mr. Do! was adapted to Nintendo's Game Boy and Super Famicom/SNES with some new gameplay features. A rebranded adaptation of the game was released for the Game Boy Color in 1999 as Quest: Fantasy Challenge (Holy Magic Century in Europe). It was developed by Imagineer.

The arcade version was released for the Wii Virtual Console in Japan on April 27, 2010.[13]

Multiple clones of Mr. Do! were released for home systems, including Magic Meanies (ZX Spectrum), Henri (Atari 8-bit),[14] Fruity Frank (Amstrad CPC, MSX), and Mr. Dig (TRS-80 Color Computer).[15]

References
  1. Japanese: ミスタードゥ, Hepburn: Misutā Du
  1. Steve L. Kent (2001), The ultimate history of video games: from Pong to Pokémon and beyond : the story behind the craze that touched our lives and changed the world, Prima, p. 352, ISBN 0-7615-3643-4, In 1982, Universal Sales made arcade history with a game called Mr Do! Instead of selling dedicated Mr Do! machines, Universal sold the game as a kit. The kit came with a customized control panel, a computer board with Mr Do! read-only memory (ROM) chips, stickers that could be placed on the side of stand-up arcade machines for art, and a plastic marquee. It was the first game ever sold as a conversion only. According to former Universal Sales western regional sales manager Joe Morici, the company sold approximately 30000 copies of the game in the United States alone.
  2. "Mr. Do!: The Do Dude Returns". Electronic Gaming Monthly. No. 88. Ziff Davis. November 1996. p. 252.
  3. Mitsuji, Fukio (July 1989). "コーナー - 水谷潤のゲームデザイナー入門 5". Gamest (in Japanese). No. 34. Shinseisha. pp. 70–72. (Translation by Shmuplations. Archived 2019-12-30 at the Wayback Machine).
  4. Masuda, Atsushi (3 January 2018). "『Mr.Do!』の生みの親、上田和敏氏に開発秘話を聞く！～『Mr.Do!』対談編 前編～". AKIBA PC Hotline! (in Japanese). Impress Corporation. Archived from the original on 2019-12-08. Retrieved 2020-08-23. (Translation by Source Gaming. Archived 2020-08-23 at the Wayback Machine).
  5. Masuda, Atsushi (6 February 2018). "『Mr.Do!』の制作がきっかけで開発者の上田和敏氏はユニバーサルを退社!？ ～『Mr.Do!』対談編 中編～". AKIBA PC Hotline! (in Japanese). Impress Corporation. Archived from the original on 2019-12-09. Retrieved 2020-08-23.
  6. Masuda, Atsushi (13 February 2018). "『Mr.Do』から『スターフォース』、『ギャラクシーウォーズ』まで……開発者の上田和敏氏が語る裏話～『Mr.Do!』対談編 後編～". AKIBA PC Hotline! (in Japanese). Impress Corporation. Archived from the original on 2019-05-13. Retrieved 2020-08-23.
  7. "Game Machine's Best Hit Games 25 - テーブル型TVゲーム機 (Table Videos)". Game Machine (in Japanese). No. 214. Amusement Press. 15 June 1983. p. 27.
  8. "NEW GAMES CROSS REVIEW: Mr. Do!". Weekly Famicom Tsūshin. No. 341. 30 June 1995. p. 29.
  9. "Review Crew: Mr. Do!" (PDF). Electronic Gaming Monthly. No. 88. Ziff Davis. November 1996. p. 90.
  10. "16-Bit's Last Stand" (PDF). Electronic Gaming Monthly. No. 89. Ziff Davis. December 1996. p. 188.
  11. Eugene, Lacey (1989). Computer And Video Games (1st ed.). Terry Pratt. p. 127.
  12. "Neo Mr. Do! Review". neo-geo.com. Retrieved 2008-05-09.
  13. Virtual Console releases April 2010
  14. "Henri". Atari Mania.
  15. Boyle, L. Curtis. "Mr. Dig". Tandy Color Computer Games.
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