PCKF Archive

Back to Main Page

All Updates

2024-01-09
Sorry for the long absence, the PCKF Archive has finally been updated again! Many more neat pictures by guynietoren are available in the fanart gallery, his section is nearly complete now.

The sites of Xtraverse, namely DOS Classics and Spatang, finally disappeared in 2023 after years of inactivity. Should you try to access their domains now, you will get to see something completely unrelated. There are still a lot of links on pages of the PCKF Archive that will have to be changed. But the "old" folder of DOS Classics, which includes various ancient Keen sites and some PCKF threads, has found a new home. The same goes for the Commander Keen Newsletter. Note that the March and May 2003 issues are no longer mixed up, and the December 2002 one is complete. Thanks to Malvineous for giving me access to the whole subdomain archive.shikadi.net.

A new section is available, Public Keen UBB. After having conversed in a subforum of the Jazz Mega Message Board for a while, Keeners finally had a then modern forum of their own. While short-lived, it introduced some features that were brought over to ezboard, such as ranks like "Grunt" and "Vortininja", and a section named "Other Keen Stuff". Almost no trace of the Keen UBB remained, but Cho'gall sent me his archives. And there will be more Jazz Mega Message Board topics, too. Thanks, Cho'gall! For the start, you can read Thea's welcome post from February 2000 and the thread "Norp or Spot?" started by Ilsoap in March 2000. Naturally, Tom Hall knew the truth about the name of Keen's pet Yorp.

2023-04-02
"I come bearing gifts" declared the new member Manboy in September 2001. Said gifts were three Keen 1 levels, a cool 3D picture of a Garg and a now-lost animation of the Martian.
In Galaxieretter's fanart section, I added a funny picture he posted on the occasion of his 22nd birthday (read the topic and you'll understand). The image, sent by Levellass, appears to be the last artwork featuring Blegd and Smeeg. Additionally, you can now view the large versions of some uncoloured character drawings, namely Keen, Mort & I C-2, Spot, and Xky Rauh. Received them from Levellass, too.
The PCKF Archive was voted the Best Website by members of the PCKF not long ago. I'm very happy about that, thank you! I'll write more once the trophies are ready. Their maker, Lava89, is probably too busy to finish them at the moment.

2023-03-10
In February 2005, Rorie asked about the status of the PCKF's possible move. There had been intentions to leave the ezboard network before, but only in late 2007 the community finally moved to an independent forum based on phpBB.
I added some cool sprites to the fanart archive that were made for a 2009 Spriting Contest curated by Maruyama. Participants made Goodbye, Galaxy!-style sprites of characters from other games, though there was no decision about a winner. There are now sections for Bonevelous, Maruyama, Tulip, and VikingBoyBilly, which only contain the aforementioned sprites for the time being.

2023-03-01
UnFleexable a.k.a. Sillygostly asked the Keeners what they would name Keen 7-9 in The Universe is Toast trilogy in February 2004. In addition to titles, members also posted their thoughts on possible events in said games.
You can now see the results for the Keen Awards 2002 categories Best Mod and Keenest Person. The only one that still lacks results is Best Animation. Speaking of Keen Awards, you can still cast your votes in the various categories of the Keen Awards 2022.
Yet another section has been added to the fanart archive. Check out rollytheborb's neat picture of Keen and Violet, the latter being an original Vorticon character.

2023-02-12
In December 2004, Commander Spleen asked the community "What PC Games Do You Play Nowadays?", to get ideas about games to get his hands on.
Mitsukara made cool micro versions of Keen 1-9 title screens. Thanks again to Levellass for those pics. And Mort posted the 93rd comic strip episode earlier this month.

2023-02-06
A member named pyroforte requested a Commander Keen sprite sheet from Keen 4-6 in December 2001. It was Yorpy who provided such a sprite sheet, after taking lots of screenshots.
The artist bagshotrow allowed me to add his Keen art to this site. Among his works is the awesome comic Return to the Shadowlands, which remains unfinished, unfortunately. bagshotrow is the creator of Marta, who went on to appear as the heroine of multiple mods by VikingBoyBilly and Paramultart. You can also view bagshotrow himself as Keen, yet another image sent by Levellass.

2023-02-01
For Xky Rauh's birthday in March 2005, Levellord created The Ripped Mod, where Raumfahrer Rauh ventures through modified Keen 1 levels containing many graphics "ripped" from other mods. Only some days later, she posted Xky's "real" present, Generic Mod III.
I added a nice drawing by bp, then one of the PCKF's youngest members, called "Guess Who's Back?", another file I received from Levellass. Also, Mort released episode 92 of his comic strip last month.

2023-01-25
In December 2002, Slasher posted three neat pictures of the Bean-with-Bacon Megarocket in 3D. TooMuchSpareTime was so impressed that he posted the first "Drool" Emotikeen, which I added to his fanart, alongside some other old works that were still missing, including a funny little Flash animation (itself hidden in a teaser movie).
A new face in the fanart archive – check out Soul Monster's great piece featuring Keen and his nemesis.

2023-01-17
After reading about a game made in probably two hours by Tom Hall, TooMuchSpareTime got the idea for the "Two Hour Tom" challenge in December 2002. Participants had to create a game within two hours. TCL999 was the first one who posted his work – Dopefish Races, a little betting game with Dopefish instead of horses. TmsT himself also relased a now-lost game based on one of his webcomics.
Reworking Mega Man graphics into Keen (or Mort) ones? Apocalypse Gohan did so. More nice images sent by Levellass.

2023-01-08
RoboBlue asked "What Keen enemy would you like to play as most?" in July 2003, and several Keeners posted their thoughts.
All three winners of the 2003 Character Creation Contest are known now, thanks to the following three threads: Best Animated Character, Best Character Mod, Best Still Character. Also, the two accepted entries by eK are there, which I added to his fanart section as well, alongside the images I received from him in 2020. And RoboBlue's Isis-style avatar was actually made by eK rather than RoboBlue himself, so that image got moved.
Additional threads with restored replies are: My greatest creation is completed!, Keen Newsletter Issue 1 is here!, re: how did the keen communtiy begin?, Keen Dreams... literally!, Crystal Caves tile modification tool.

2022-12-31
In October 2004, Levellord posted some cool, non-Keen drawings in the thread "LL's portrait!" Note that they might be a little disturbing.
More topics received additional replies: Emotikeens 2002, 2003 KEEN CALENDAR IS HERE!, Billy Blaze's Dream Machine, 315!!!, Dopefish, Shikadi, Mimrocks, oh my!, How did you get into Keen., The face of things to come, A Quick Question About/Relating-To Vorticons., Hmmm, slightly different dopefish.com intro :O, Yet another random Keen remix.
The formerly missing replies of "Emotikeens 2002" show that QU3TZ4LC04TL (then Killspy) also posted an Emotikeen, the Yorp with Keen's helmet, so I added that one and his other Emotikeen to the fanart section. And two more comic strip episodes by Mort, too.

2022-12-25
Looks like the ezboard contents of the Wayback Machine finally got unblocked! So I was able to access the once missing replies of multiple topics and added them to the respective pages, namely: First completely NEW keen 4 level!!!!!!!!, Norp the Yorp 3: Brain Damage Released!, Another Mod, Group Picture! ^_^, What was the biggest problem with CK2K?, New graphics! *drool*, Monster Bash FILEID.diz.
I added some works in TooMuchSpareTime's fanart section that I had left out before, including Emotikeens. Also, two neat pictures I received from Levellass: TmsT with Sugar Stoopies (2006 photomanip) and the Pumpkeen (2008 reality).
A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

2022-10-10
Ilsoap posted a mysterious teaser in February 2002, and the community speculated about its meaning. A month later, on March 14, the first episode of the animated series Shadowlands came out. Ilsoap is probably the person who introduced the tradition of releasing Keen stuff on 3-14, commonly called Keen Day, in reference to Keen's IQ. I added the teaser to Ilsoap's section in the fanart archive, too.

2022-09-11
In addition to the recent strips 87 to 89, you can also view three long-forgotten experimental strips by comic creator Mort now. When I browsed Levellass's archive, I was surprised to find three strips I never saw before. While he deleted them from DeviantArt long ago, the likewise surprised Mort allowed me to repost them. Well, see for yourself. They are called "Mortimer – Himself", "Time to Go" (both 2010) and "Bloog Madness" (2012).
Also, I added another one of Andrew Durdin's cool banners. It turned out that I had saved the file back when his Keen page was still online.

2022-06-19
Commander Spleen asked for a program to create Keenish sounds for his secret project in January 2004. "Operation: Coffee Break" was eventually released as Watch314 MkII, a fangame.
From Levellass's collection comes a neat sprite sheet created by Slasher. Furthermore, a section for Jacob Pease has been added with two cool pictures of Keen in very different styles. The earlier one was sent by Levellass, too.

2022-06-05
In January 2003, Hirogen2 released an SGA console font for Linux. Only two days later, Zorath posted his DOS SGA font in the same thread.
You can now view the coloured version of Sciz CT's cool picture "Lazy Day". Another file Levellass sent me. Also, I added the four most recent episodes of Mort's wonderful comic strip.

2022-05-29
All of the four threads added today include fanfiction from mid-2001. Three of them can also be found on the fanfiction page of CC314, namely A Delirious End to the Beginning by Neil McRae and KeenEmpire's stories The Essence of Thought (without epilogue) and End of Curses (first part). I guess it doesn't hurt to have the pages where the works first appeared, too.
But there is also a story posted by KeenEmpire in July 2001 that didn't find its way to CC314 for some reason, The Last Fall: Events leading up to the War of the Universes. It's about Vorticons with the mission to resettle an abandoned planet, and the search for the reason why the earlier empire collapsed millennia ago. A well-known villain interferes, and it's up to our heroes to help. I hope this is okay for KeenEmpire, I don't know how to reach them.
Two more images from Levellass's collection, this time by aintnofuntime (allstories): an unfinished 3D Mort and a cute TUIT drawing. Also, the latest amazing set of Keen Awards trophies by Lava89 has been added.

2022-05-23
Xtraverse asked for help with patches in December 2002. Back then, changing enemy behaviour was seen as something just barely possible. In late 2004, it was Xtraverse who made major discoveries related to sprite patches (Keen: Modding).
Multiple of DSL's awesome renders of Keen and Spot made for his 3D movie are available again, as well as two Dopefish-themed image manipulations. The pictures were among the many files I received from Levellass.
Furthermore, I added two neat pieces posted by TooMuchSpareTime this year, namely Maverick's birthday comic and Keen Day 2022.
Speaking of TmsT, I also launched a site covering his old non-Keen works today, the TmsT Vintage Archive. While scanning the Wayback Machine for his Keen stuff, I saw a lot of other nice things, and one day I decided that there should be an archive for those, too. Includes non-family-friendly content, just so you know.

2022-04-17
In August 2001, Forge proposed an interesting idea, a page called the "Keen Wall", where information on the members of the Keen community would be gathered.
A section for Ronnie has been added to the fanart gallery, with more than 40 neat images (and animations) related to the development of Keen 2.5D. I also received some files from Ronnie I didn't have before.
Also, you can view three more photos of Xky Rauh in his cool Keen costume from Halloween 2009. Levellass sent me the pictures. They are a small part of a big collection of Keen art Levellass had gathered over the years, and she gave me the whole bunch. Thanks a lot! Expect more long-lost gems in the weeks to come.

2022-03-05
In the thread "Thou Shalt Not Kill" created by TooMuchSpareTime in April 2003, Keeners discussed whether it's possible to finish an episode without killing (=permanently disabling) any creature.
The gallery of RocketJess now includes some more uncoloured cute drawings, as well modified sprites.
PCKF members can still vote for their favourites in the Keen Awards 2021 polls. Winners will be announced on Keen Day.

2022-02-20
forest123 asked the PCKF members to post Keen jokes in February 2003.
I added the few remaining suggestions for a PCKF logo in 2007 to the fanart gallery's "Other" page, which also means that there are sections for Apocalypse Gohan and ckguy now.

2022-02-13
In July 2002, TCL999 released a demo of his fangame Vorticon VI Episode 2: Attack on Earth. After saving the Vorticons from the Bloogs in the previous adventure and rushing home, he reads an E-mail from Mortimer, claiming that the Bloogs will attack Earth. So the hero travels to Fribbulus Xax to investigate. Unlike its predecessor, Attack on Earth was never finished.
Lava89 has created a great new set of trophies, this time for the Keen Awards 2020. Addtionally, I added the two more strips by Mort.
By the way, the PCKF Archive turned ten years old on 29 January 2022. Okay, during many of those years, very little or nothing happened, but an anniversary is an anniversary. ;-)

2021-12-28
It's been a while since the last update. The recent months have been rather busy ones, I will hopefully be able to update the site more often again the next year.
Anyways, there are several additions to the fanart section. On the "Other" page, you can now find all surviving entries of RoboBlue's 2003 Character Creation Contest in one gallery. Also, I gathered the available creations related to the Giks and Bips "challenge" started by Niborius in 2007, which also means that the sections of Levellass and Roobar received additions, while ShikadiQueen, GoldenRishi and Tabun are new to the fanart archive. In the case of the latter, I also added his Dopefish pieces. And, last but not least, Mort's latest comic strip (#80) has been added.
Have a Happy New Year!

2021-10-17
scalloped llama released a cool Winamp skin in August 2002. One day, such things will also be available in the "More Keen Stuff" section.
Kevin Bolk allowed me to add a great work of Keen art by him. Some more pieces have been added to TooMuchSpareTime's gallery, namely a 2002 Christmas picture (Strife meets Peanuts) and the comics seen in parts 2 and 3 of "Where is DNF?" (external).

2021-09-28
In April 2005, Galaxieretter, then a quite new member, posted information on his Keen comic alongside some pictures. He posted more information on its progress over time, but in the end, it was never finished
Nonetheless, Galaxieretter was a productive creator of Keen art, and dozens of neat pieces can be found in the gallery now. It includes most episodes of his funny Blegd and Smeeg webcomic, which I received from Levellass and Levellord. However, I never received a response from Galaxieretter, I hope he doesn't mind. The sections of Levellord and SynDuo also contain one related image each.

2021-09-11
In May 2000, Slasher (then named Matrix) released the second episode of his Spork trilogy, with more robots to blast and new features such as spacewalking and 3D cutscenes. (For some reason, only one player replied.)
NetRaptor allowed me to add her two neat pieces of Keen art. guynietoren's gallery now includes his cool styrofoam cup sculptures. And there's a little correction, it was Genius314 who posted the first edit of Spleen's "Keen on Korath" avatar, not Spleen himself. Also, excuse me for accidentally uploading a WIP gallery of an artist the last time. It will eventually return in complete form.

2021-09-01
The latest version of the fansite Commander Keen Nexus was launched in March 2002. The site's team was lead by VF4588, who had also run the first CK Nexus and the preceding CK Rocket before. Despite the new site's neat appearance, it became inactive shortly after the (re)launch.
I added some nice pics by DaVince with his permission. Also, two more images can be found in TooMuchSpareTime's gallery now, namely "Happy Keen Day 2009" and a little portrait of Princess Lindsey (with others).

2021-08-25
In June 2003, Yowza posted "That's no door!", related to door tiles in Keen 4. She made the discovery while working on levels – alas, those were never finished. Earlier, in August 2002, scalloped llama posted a set of modified sprites of Keen that show him rollerblading.
Said sprites and additional graphics can also be found in scalloped llama's fanart section now. I also added the missing Flash animations by TooMuchSpareTime, as well as two new comic strips by Mort.

2021-08-01
Scizor CT posted a link to a nice Keen remix in February 2005, more specifically "Keen Commander Nostalgy '96" by cyb0rgjeff.
The "Other" page of the fanart section now includes some works from the community's early years whose creators are unknown. I also wrote a sentence about future plans for the page. Additionally, a Dopefish model by twiZteD has been added, which was made for a Half-Life mod.

2021-07-25
In July 2002, KeenRush reported that he had found a camera bug in Keen 6.
Mort's art gallery now includes all the strips posted in 2015 and 2016. Not only that, he recently created a great new comic, which I added, too.

2021-07-18
In September 2003, CK Guy asked about the CK 1-3 TileInfo format, and Andrew Durdin explained.
Dozens of neat pictures have been added to Commander Spleen's fanart gallery with his permission.

2021-07-04
flamebroiledchicken created the poll "What is the hardest Keen game?" in February 2001.
GMixer's art section now includes a second image, a cool Keen face made out of leather. Also, Mort's strips 44 to 56 have been added.

2021-06-27
In June 2003, NephariteofIlian posted a link to an image titled "Commander Keen all grown up", an interesting interpretation of Keen as an adult, made by a fan nicknamed Qimm.
Added more art by guynietoren, but his section is still not complete. The aforementioned picture by Qimm and an avatar of SpikeNexus I had overseen can be found in the gallery now, too.

2021-06-20
Raichu86 started a discussion on Lemmings in June 2001.
Comic strips 29 to 43 have been added to Mort's gallery, while guynietoren's one now includes the images related to his Keen 4 XL project. Also, I added two nice sprites to lemur821's section.

2021-06-12
In December 2004, Q90 announced his plans for a modding suite, which was initially called iMod and later renamed kMod. Even though multiple Keeners expressed their interest and at least one (grafix) joined the team, the ambitious project eventually died.
I also received the permission from guynietoren, check out his awesome art. Lots of pieces are still missing, but it's a start. Comic strips 0 to 28 by Mort have been added, too.

2021-06-06
Get boxed Aliens Ate My Babysitter! for $29.95! Well, too late, you had the chance in May 2002, as reported by Geoff. The CC314 founder sometimes posted in the ezboard PCKF. Nowadays, the prices might be a little different. ;-)
The creator of the amazing Commander Keen: The Comic Strip, Mort, allowed me to add all his Keen art. Currently, you can find every "extra" piece of art I'm aware of in his section. Sooner or later, the main strips will also become available on this site. Also, the galleries of aintnofuntime and SynDuo have been updated, they both posted edits of a header image by Mort.

2021-05-30
In September 2002, Alecswrld impatiently asked "When is Shadowlands [episode 2] coming?". Ilsoap added some preview images to the Shadowlands site and eventually published the trailer on 14 October. Less than three months after the episode's release, UnFleexable created a topic to talk about Shadowlands 3 in June 2003. Keeners speculated about the content of the episode that was never finished in the end, while Ilsoap dropped some vague hints.
Various neat art by Memsys has been added to the gallery. The Fribbulus Xax video flythrough I mentioned a year ago can be found in the section of Xtraverse now.

2021-05-22
UnFleexable wrote about his Keen dreams in June 2003, and some other members also posted information on their (not necessarily Keen-related) dreams. Only the first page remains, there were many more replies.
Lava89 allowed me to add his art to the gallery, check out lots of cool 3D pictures (and a few 2D ones). I also added a sprite by Mr12000.

2021-05-10
In April 2001, Frenkel joined the PCKF and informed about his altered Keen 4 level he had released more than a month before. Together with his brother Sander, Frenkel ran the site S&F Prod. until 2009 (which has also been archived on shikadi.net). Among other things, the site featured tools to extract and modify data from classic games. One of them is a Crystal Caves tile modification tool published in February 2004.
More great art for the gallery, this time by The Big Palooka. Her pictures, based around unofficial TUIT, were posted by Ceilick in 2012. Thanks to him as well, as he told me her (nick)name so that I was able to ask her for permission.

2021-05-05
AzathothSpawn created the poll "Which Is the Most Dangerous Enemy?" in May 2001. There weren't many replies, but quite a few votes and a winner.
The gallery includes dozens of cool pictures by StupidBunny now, who also gave his permission for the inclusion of his art.

2021-04-18
In March 2003, KeenRush asked about the meaning of the title "Secret of the Oracle". Later, the differences between the registered and shareware version of Keen Dreams were discussed instead. The former version is actually the original commercial release which predates the first shareware edition by about a year.
Take a look at neat pixel art and other cool stuff by aintnofuntime (formerly allstories). He sent me multiple pieces.

2021-04-03
therealdopefish was once contacted by ID and asked by them if they could use his Keen game for the next official one. Not the only surprising announcement on the 1st of April, 2003...
Check out four amazing pictures by Shaylyn Hamm a.k.a. ChemicalAlia, two of which I received from her. The artist was briefly active in the PCKF in September 2007. Also, I added two pieces of ASCII art to Forge's section. They had appeared on Keen Information, the predecessor of the CK Newsletter. The fanart overview page now includes short descriptions for the little icons found below many titles of works.

2021-03-27
Finally, the fanart section has gone live, with more than 500 pieces and counting! I posted an announcement in the PCKF. Thanks to everyone who gave their support. SynDuo made multiple pieces of his awesome Keen art available again. Keeniver sent me a cute Yorp drawing. From Xky Rauh I received a neat photo of himself as Keen. And TooMuchSpareTime allowed me to include all his Keen content, which is a lot. More people sent works or gave the permission to include their art, great stuff will be added in the weeks to come.

2021-03-09
A.R., the creator of the first complete Keen fangame, Commander Keen 2000, posted a few times in the ezboard PCKF under the name newimprovedARbeta2. In Feburary 2001, he asked "What was the biggest problem with CK2K?"
See you on Keen Day. (Mort Day update: Looks like that I made a too heady announcement. But the update will be done soon, I promise. Anyways, check out a neat photo of Xky Rauh as Commander Keen taken on Halloween 2009. Thanks to the depicted Keener for sending me the picture.)

2021-03-01
In November 2002, scalloped llama presented a nice Robo Red model made with Gmax.
That's all for today, stay tuned for something big.

2021-02-21
VolteFace posted a rather simple, but nice Keen wallpaper in August 2002. MRC Marky also posted a link to his own neat wallpaper in the same thread, but unfortunately, it's only available in corrupted form at the moment.
The same month, Djaser presented the Monk Yorp, a character he used as his avatar (and later, signature) for quite a while. The image was co-created by someone named Shadowcrawler. Another picture posted a month later is lost. In February 2003, Djaser reported that the Monk Yorp has been updated. Over time, he created more cool pictures featuring the character. While I lack the respective threads, it will be possible to easily access those images again. In the near future (hint hint).

2021-02-16
In December 2002, Br1ck a.k.a. KeenCommander posted a conversion of the Bloogwaters Crossing song from IMF to MIDI, but wasn't too happy with the result. Xky Rauh tried his hand at the file and posted what appears to be his first of multiple neat Keen MIDI files. At least one other MIDI file, Bloogton Manufacturing, was posted in the same, only partially archived thread. The files by other Keeners are unavailable. More recently, Xky published a MIDI adaption of Robot Hive from Keen GBC on the website VGMusic. He also gave the okay for its inclusion in Xky's Keen Music Pack.
The winners of the Keen Awards 2020 have been announced. No trophies for now, which will hopefully change at a later point.

2021-02-08
Korath III announced the creation of the JavaScript game HangKeen in June 2002, which is essentially hangman with Keen-related keywords. He asked members to suggest more words and Too Much Spare Time to create images of Keen being progressively hanged. Less than two weeks later, Korath III reported that HangKeen is done. While the author left the Keen community ages ago and his site disappeared, HangKeen, which won the Keen Award for Best Online Entertainment, remains playable via Wayback Machine. Sadly, none of TmsT's pictures were archived. A smaller version of an image used for HangKeen can be seen here (extracted from the fangame Real Keen Player 3).

2021-02-01
In January 2004, a new member named Spektre1 announced that they and three friends are working on a 3D Keen game. Since the second page is missing, I don't know if Spektre1 did post any concept art. Though the team seemed to be really enthusiastic and multiple members showed their interest, it appears to be another fangame that never got finished. thenewmoonsidianX, who wrote about his wish to do a 3D Keen in the thread, did actually release the first complete 3D fangame, Keen Dreams 3D, in 2006.
Not too long ago, I stumbled upon Fucl Yeah Commander Keen (FYCK), a rather short-lived Tumblr blog which was initiated by KeenRush in 2010. To my surprise, it contained the missing fifth part of TmsT's 2001 TUIT comic. I sent it to NY00123, who has since updated Selected Strife Contents, where you can now find the complete comic (save for the author's notes). More recently, he added another Sluggy comic featuring Keen, too. I also a found a high-res render of Vorta-Cola cans (you can actually read the small text on them) and Keen's helmet by DSL on FYCK. It has been added to "Renders and Concept Art of DSL's 3D Keen Movie" (or view it here).

2021-01-24
UnFleexable, who had joined by early 2003, was one of the ezboard PCKF's most active members. Among his works is a rather bizarre animation named Bloogville, which features a Bloog family, Vivas and other characters. In February 2003, he announced that he is working on an animation and that he is in search for voice actors. UnFleexable also gave out basic information on the plot and a list of characters. In April, episode 1, made with Klik & Play, was released. UnFleexable posted its drafted script, too. Some days later, Bloogville Bloopers came out as well. Note that the animations are 16-bit Windows applications, so they won't run under 64-bit Windows by default. More episodes were planned, but never finished.
By the way, the voting for the Keen Awards 2020 started yesterday.

2021-01-11
In April 2001, VolteFace told about forum games. Ultra Cool BOB suggested a Keen quiz and asked the first question. Several dozen questions (and answers) by other members followed.

2021-01-04
KeenEmpire asked "Is there a single universe?" in July 2001, in reference to events depicted in fan-made Keen media and their possible relevance for others.
In December 2002, Too Much Spare Time happily reported that he obtained a "craputer" and is able to play Keen with Soundblaster. Good ol' Keen-O-Matics.
kohntarkosz found French Erotic Film in July 2004. TMST, the one behind the fanimutation, continued the wackiness with a remake to celebrate FEF's first birthday.

2020-12-28
In April 2002, Br1ck a.k.a. KeenCommander posted "If Keen or Mortimer were real..." – what would you ask them?
A new member named paradox asked "Which fan games have good graphics?" in December 2002. He was working on a Java Keen engine and in search for graphics he could use for it. Slasher posted two Spork III sprite sheets.
In September 2004, Zero Diamond informed the community about a tool called Wolf Data Compiler (WDC), which also supports games other than Wolfenstein 3D, including Keen 4–6. The author, Adam Biser, joined the discussion, too. In 2007, it was Zero Diamond who released the first (albeit abandoned) Galaxy mod with custom Adlib music and sounds.
Have a good New Year.

2020-12-22
New member Genius314 (a.k.a. Kdash) created the topic "Introduce me to the CK community!" in December 2004. Various members posted some information about themselves. Genius314 intended to use it for a section of his later fansite, Planet CK, but its remains in the Wayback Machine imply that such page didn't exist. The next year, Genius314 released The Galaxy of M, the only completed mod in The Clones of Evil series.
Have a Merry Christmas!

2020-12-14
In January 2002, Forge (Joseph) announced that one can sign up for the Keen Newsletter, a project headed by him until mid-2003. He also posted a preview page, which featured nice graphics (you won't see most of them at the archived commanderkeen.net; if the logo is partially obscured, here is the rest.)
Andrew Durdin, one of the article authors, informed about the release of the first issue in March 2002. In total, 28 issues were created over the course of a bit more than three years. Various Keeners made their contributions. The Newsletter saw a rather short-lived revival in 2011.
Happy 30th anniversary of Commander Keen!

2020-12-07
In September 2000, eK wrote that Cho'gall, Flaose and him are getting close to completion on a new Keen site and he asked Keeners to send their fan stuff. The next month, Flaose announced that the site is actually the completely revamped Cerebral Cortex 314, which came with a cool new design. CC314 was the first large-scale Keen fansite. It was founded by Geoff, who eventually passed the site to Thea, who in turn gave it to the aforementioned trio. There have been no major updates since 2005, though Flaose has continued to maintain the site. CC314 was moved to shikadi.net in 2009.

2020-11-29
Another topic about getting Tom Hall the Keen rights was created by Korath III in August 2002. TMST had an interesting idea...
In July 2003, Malvineous announced that he abandoned FileView, a shell extension that allows to open (and partially edit) data files of various classic games within Windows Explorer. Years later, Malv created Camoto, a collection of utilities for modding DOS games that is still under development.

2020-11-22
In April 2003, then Paperface band member Chris posted some information regarding the creation of his Keen 1 mod. Nearly a month later, Bazooka Wowbagger: Savior of Paperface was released. More recently, Chris returned and posted a beta version of a new Bazooka Wowbagger mod this year, which has been co-created by his girlfriend Casey.
Dr. Witherstone posted a kind of Keen quiz in November 2003. He asked about members' interpretation of certain circumstances in the games, such as where Keen does keep his book in episodes 4–6.

2020-11-15
A new member named Trio Of 9999 asked about the status of Shadowlands in October 2004. Levellord created a sprite comic, of which three strips survive, to motivate Ilsoap to make the third episode. There is also a funny animated short co-created by Ilsoap, which is based on the webcomic Dandy and Company (reply 13).

2020-11-08
In May 2000, Eduardo posted "Triple Nuts!" He had added pixelated Keen to a photo, which does well for a "cheap laugh."
KeenRush started a Keen Emoticon Story in February 2003. It don't know whether it was finished, but what I saved contains 30 replies and more than 250 emoticons.
In October 2003, Commander Spleen announced that he is working on a The Games Factory platform engine. He also posted a little demo that presents a number of background management schemes (reply 7, not Keen-related).

2020-11-01
KeenRush asked the Keeners what the scariest Keen level is in March 2002. The next month, ChargingMoose's question was "What order did you play the Keen games?" As a side note, Xky made an early mention of his Keen 1 mod.
In October 2004, Snaily noted that the website Snopes has an article on the correlation between the outcome of certain games of the American football team Washington Redskins (name changed this year) and the results of the United States presidential elections. The Redskins lost against the Green Bay Packers, the page has since been updated.

2020-10-25
In May 2002, Too Much Spare Time announced the opening of The Chasm of Stife, the successor of The Chasm of Chills, hosted by This Strife. Over the course of a year, more Keen comics and other related content were made available at the site. One addition was a teaser animation (featuring unlucky human troopers and creepy Fleex) for an ambitious project called XAX in June 2002. However, not too much was ever known about it, and in 2004 TMST stated that XAX-related material was lost due to a hard-drive tragedy.
In January 2003, TMST revealed that he is collecting contents for a tribute to the Dopefish and asked the community for support. Later, in April, he announced that "4/13 is coming" and a Keen-related Flash animation will be released on that day. It turned out to be Dopefission, the aforementioned tribute.
The Chasm of Strife closed its doors in May 2003. But as explained in the final comic, TMST a.k.a. Sluggy continued to create comics and animations for This Strife and succeeding sites, with various appearances of Keen.
For the Chasm-related threads I added before the sites became part of NY00123's archive, the links have been updated so that they lead to the latter now.

2020-10-18
The Chasm of Chills and The Chasm of Strife, the Keen sites ran by Andrew Kepple a.k.a. Too Much Spare Time a.k.a. King Sluggy between 2001 and 2003, are now available at NY00123's site in the section named Selected Strife Contents. I obtained all available files from Wayback Machine, added a few missing ones from other sources, and made edits (mainly link-related) here and there. Thanks to TMST for giving the permission and to NY00123 for adding these neat (albeit not complete) pieces of Keen community history to his site.
The threads added today are all related to the Chasm. In July 2001, TMST announced that he has started making a TUIT webcomic (winner of Keen Award 2002 for Best Graphical Artwork). There were three separate topics, named "Commander Keen Web Comic!" "BIG SHOCKER!" and "THE END (but where's the restaurant?)". The comic depicts the final confrontation between Keen and Mortimer with interesting plot twists and reached its conclusion a month and some days after the orignal announcement. The Chasm did not only contain comics. In October 2001, TMST put Disco Keen online (later with support from Korath III), where one can choose between various dance moves for Keen. Unfortunately, not many of the dances survive, and the MIDI file is also missing. Nonetheless, the available animations based on the original sprites are worth watching.
In April 2002, TMST posted a funny little teaser animation featuring Duke Nukem for the future Chasm at the humour website This Strife.

2020-10-11
Yorpy asked for Keen WAV files and intended to use one of them as the start-up sound for Windows in August 2001. As the sound files posted by other Keeners then are unavailable, I added two links to Keen: Modding at the top where all extracted sounds are provided by Levellass and Malvineous. The latter, now the owner of shikadi.net (thanks again for hosting this archive), joined the PCKF in December 2001, as seen in the thread. Retodon8, one of the more active members in the past, made his debut a little earlier, too.
In August 2002, Korath III announced that he is putting together a thank-you certificate for MRC Marky, the creator of the trophies for the first Keen Awards event. While the finished certificate is gone, sadly, at least the preview image remains available.
Andrew Durdin posted some Keen-related archeological finds from BBS archives in September 2002. The contents were made by Keen players back in the early 1990s. I added links to cd.textfiles.com, where the ancient files can be found.

2020-10-04
In July 2003, NephariteofIlian (later Kangarus Gyrfalcon) asked about the tastes of Commander Keen and Mortimer McMire. What kind of music, games, food and so on would the geniuses like and dislike? Keeners posted their thoughts.
Some Keen 6 demos were posted by Commander Spleen in June 2004, with the title "ID Won't Toast My Universe!!"

2020-09-27
Killspy and other Keeners discussed about getting Tom Hall the rights to Keen in November 2002. The topic creator posted two responses he had received from Tom.
In January 2003, Too Much Spare Time noted that there are 315 members. Flaose revealed members number 314 and 315.
The aforementioned PCKF admin asked whether it's possible to modify Keen's shot height in August 2003. Andrew Durdin found the needed offset and explained how he did. At the end of the month, Andy founded the Keen: Modding forum, where hundreds of patch requests and patches have been posted since. Flaose's only completed mod is Dangerous Dave in Copyright Infringement, also released in August 2003.

2020-09-20
In March 2001, new member Blue Bounder offered to rate homemade levels in detail. The only level that got rated is Andrew Durdin's Keen 2 level.
Another newcomer named king of keens asked for modding help in September 2004. Xky Rauh posted a modding tutorial for Keen 1–3, which also appeared at Beyond the Pogo and was added to the KeenWiki years later, where it was revised by Nisaba in 2017.

2020-09-13
A new member named Andrew Durdin released his Keen editor to the public in December 2000. Initially, the program also known as KeenEdit only supported Keen 1, but just some days later, Andrew posted a vastly improved version with Keen 2 and 3 support. The tool is the second fan-made graphical Keen editor ever released. In March 2001, Andy made known that he is updating his editor and discussed its development with the community (and also created a poll). KeenEdit was renamed KeenWright to avoid confusion with an older text-based editor. In June 2003, Andrew announced that he has discontinued the DOS version and instead works on a Windows one. Neither version of KeenWright was completed, but nonetheless, many modders used Andy's tool and it influenced later editors. ckguy, who created the editor Mindbelt in 2007, asked Andrew to post the source code of KeenWright in September 2003. He did so some days later in the Keen: Modding forum.
Thanks to SpikeNexus for a photo of his Shadowlands model which had appeared in the Keen Award Nomination 2004 thread. It's seen in reply 9 (or click here).

2020-09-06
The thread "OMFG how confident you can get" was started by KeenEmpire in November 2001. He reported that he was at a place where he wouldn't dare to go without god mode, went through it with cheats, only to realise that god mode was actually not on. After some replies, the discussion shifted to the extra lives near the beginning of the Pyramid of the Gnosticene Ancients.
In April 2002, Andrew Durdin announced that he got the finale.ck* format worked out fully. Two months and a few days later, he presented a little utility named Fin2Bmp, which exports and imports the finale screens of Keen 1–3 as well as the preview pictures found in Keen 1.
Xky started a discussion about Cosmo's Cosmic Adventure time trials in March 2004.

2020-08-29
In May 2003, Br1ck a.k.a. KeenCommander announced that his brother Dr. Witherstone (James) found a way to use the Impossible Bullet Trick in Keen 4 and 5, though it's only possible under certain conditions. One of the bugs exploited in the brothers' and Mich's Keen Asylum level pack.
Last year, I added the November 2003 release thread of a challenging level pack by Joriz a.k.a. Eazyjay, which was missing from the KeenWiki until then. It has been given the title "Ice Planet", as suggested by the creator. The work, which was originally intended to be the first mod in a series, was first announced in July 2003, followed by a one-level demo without graphical changes. Eazyjay noted that the story would involve a new alien race, in addition to Yorps and Gargs. However, he eventually abandoned the mod and released the aforementioned level pack with the finished levels instead.
In April 2004, KeenRush remarked that there is a slightly different dopefish.com intro. Be aware that it might be a little risqué, depending on one's viewpoint... ;-)

2020-08-23
In March 2003, Andrew Durdin started a forum game called Keen Trivia. A member asked a Keen-related question, the one who answered got to do the next question, and so forth.
Earlier, in October 2001, Andrew asked "Which Keen game doesn't feature the BWB Megarocket?" Do you know the answer?
Xtraverse and several other Keeners listed their favourite rock guitar solos in August 2004.
Ned a.k.a. Gizmo wrote me that the splash page image of Bloogology 314 was probably also made by him back then.

2020-08-16
Another connection to H2G2, related to the number 314, was pointed out by Too Much Spare Time in August 2002. keensback (later keen online) created the topic "Why 314???" in June 2003, where you'll not only learn more about the famous number, but also about swirlies.
In November 2003, Robo Blue started a topic about discoveries related to a widely known bug in Keen 4 (and 5 and 6), which enables the player to see the level border and beyond.
More than a year ago, I added a topic that contains a link to a page featuring Bloog-related fan art. Recently, the unmaintained site went offline, but I reached the creator of the pictures, Ned Hugar, and received the permission to rehost them. Under the name Gizmo, Ned was a moderator of the Jazz Mega Message Board, the place where the Keen community used to be in late 1999 and early 2000. He was also a contributor of the lost site Bloogology 314. Check out "More Keen Stuff" for his Keen-related pictures created two decades ago, including an image of Keen himself which was not included in the list.

2020-08-09
Yorpy posted a cute 3D Yorp made in PovRay in July 2002. She had joined the PCKF in 2001 and became an admin by early 2005. Also, Yorpy was an editor of the CK Newsletter since its first issue and eventually followed in the footsteps of the founder Forge. Regarding the image, note that I used the JPEG file from Beyond the Pogo, as the original PNG format image appears to be unavailable.
Another 3D Yorp, done in LightWave 3D, was posted by BKewl the next month, which looks nice as well. Unlike the previous Yorp, it was published in the form of a short video.
In August 2002, Flaose announced the opening of a new subforum, the Book Club. Its original concept was that members would read selected books and discuss its content in the Book Club over the course of several weeks. The first book was Lovelock by Orson Scott Card and Kathryn H. Kidd. There were multiple threads created by eK, each one covering three chapters. I added the topics for chapters 1–3 and chapters 7–9. While I also have the page for chapters 10–12, I won't upload it because of zero replies. Guess why the described concept didn't last very long. By early 2004, the Book Club was renamed The Theater and covers a broader range of media since then.

2020-08-01
After a break, four more topics have been added. It looks like that the Keen Mobile project is dead, so Keen GBC remains the most recent official (widely released) Keen game. In April 2000, I Am Keen created a topic about the Game Boy Color Keen. At that time, it was still unconfirmed whether the game would be made. It was not until March 2001 that Keen's first non-DOS adventure was officially announced. VF4588 posted links to screenshots of the game in April 2001 (and the next month, A Black Falcon did so as well). It was released in May of the same year in North America, followed by the European release in June.
Too Much Spare Time created the topic "Space Oddity?" in September 2002, which deals with the Border Village's level design. In December of the same year, he wrote about a case of "Bad Astronomy" regarding the Goodbye, Galaxy! story. Both topics are "for geeks (and Trekkies) only".

2020-07-04
cybernetic dream (a.k.a. Dreams) posted a picture named Lunchpause in Shadowlands in October 2002. It's a nice mix of game graphics and original art. Note that the image is taken from TMST's 2003 calendar, as the original one (which was probably of slightly higher quality) is unavailable.
On Keen Day 2004, Zorath released his CGA edition of Keen 1. There was never an official CGA version of the game. Zorath modified all the graphics to create the skin mod.
Less than two days later, RocketJess created a topic about a well-known bug in Keen 5, titled "Save the galaxy, kill yourself..."

2020-06-28
In April 2001, therealdopefish released his fangame Real Keen Player 2, which introduces the race of the Solitaire people. Like its predecessor, RKP2 comes with an editor and a two-player mode. Its author, previously only called "Dopefish", already worked on his first released Keen game, Keen4ever, in 1998.
The first episode of Ilsoap's Shadowlands series came out on Keen Day 2002. Six months later, he announced the opening of the Shadowlands website.
Too Much Spare Time knew about a Sesame Street connection in February 2003...

2020-06-21
Over time, Keeners thought up various challenges for the original games. One challenge was suggested by Forge in December 2002, where the player has to beat the games while only using the pogo stick. The younger brother of Br1ck a.k.a. KeenCommander, who had been mentioned quite a few times, finally joined the PCKF under the name Dr. Witherstone.
In September 2003, SGA EVAN asked "How much Standard Galactic Alphabet do you know?" Members also talked about using SGA in real life.
While experimenting with the Impossible Bullet Trick, Commander Spleen found wacky Keen 6 stuff and added it to his website in December 2003.

2020-06-13
In December 2001, Forge presented a nice new Keen sprite which was intended to be used for a fangame – one of many that never saw the light of day.
The same member (now using his real name) posted about tutorials about making tiles at a (non-Keen) site named Disguise's Tileset Resource in December 2003. Xky admired how the creators of Keen and other EGA games made use of the limited colour palette and posted his thoughts in the Keen: Modding forum some days later.
The fourth release of CK Guy's challenging level pack titled Keen 5.5, where Keen infiltrates the Omegamatic Mark II, came out in October 2004. The work is still unfinished; its fifth and latest release dates to November 2007.

2020-06-06
Killspy (a.k.a. QU3TZ4LC04TL) presented two cool images of a 3D Sparky in November 2002. As not all browsers display TIFF format images, I converted them to PNG, but you can still access the original files by clicking on the PNG ones.
Lady Supernova stated "I was really bored" and posted a cute little picture of Keen in July 2003.
In October 2004, a new member named Mr Soap announced that he works on a Commander Keen painting. Sadly, the thread's second page is missing, so I don't know whether the painting was finished (and if any other pics still exist). But the drawing looks nice, even without paint (and without a head).
On the "More Keen Stuff" page, I added baCK by OnkelPeterle, an abandoned port of the Galaxy engine from January 2006. It didn't get very far, but at least you have the chance to control a Poison Slug (sorta). Thanks to Spleen for the file. OnkelPeterle is also the author of the tool Intro Text, which allows to modify the intro animation in Keen 4–6.

2020-05-30
Currently, a new theme (or multiple themes) for the PCKF is in the works. Back in November 2002, Too Much Spare Time posted new graphics for the PCKF, namely topic icons and two more Emotikeens, which were quickly added to the board. The previous icons for unread, hot and closed topics were , and , respectively.
More new graphics followed nearly a year later, in October 2003. eK had created nice new Post Topic and Post Poll buttons, while the Blorb  replaced ezboard's default icon for sticky topics. The discussion, of which only the first page remains, also lead to a new logo (probably by eK, too) and a new colour scheme. A similar colour scheme was used for the phpBB PCKF until 2016.
Snaily released a Random Maze Generator for Keen 1(–3) in May 2003, a cool little tool that creates maze levels. Its author became a moderator of the PCKF by 2003 and had been a member of the Isis team, too.
Xky Rauh's Keen Music Pack has been updated. As a bonus, it also includes two neat Cosmo's Cosmic Adventure MIDI files now which I have received from Xky. In the case of "Devo", I added its topic from January 2004 as well.

2020-05-23
The poll "How would you rate Keen Dreams?" was posted by Snortimer in February 2001 (results available). He has been active in the Keen community since at least 1998 (with some absences) and was one of the ezboard PCKF's earliest moderators.
Cho'gall and Too Much Spare Time posted the notes for Commander Keen ringtones in August 2001. So take your Nokia 3210, 3310 or whatever and enter them. ;-)
Last but not least, a little discussion about Bounders started by Ilsoap in May 2000.

2020-05-17
In 2003, Xtraverse created two very neat 3D versions of world maps from the Keen games. The images of the Shadowlands were posted by him in February 2003. Three months later, Xtraverse presented the cel-shaded Fribbulus Xax. For the two image galleries, he won the Keen Award for Best Graphical Artwork of 2003. In the case of Xax, Xtraverse also made a video flythrough, which was only posted in August 2006.
I added a discussion about the appearance of Vorticons from January 2004, too, which was started by RoboRed, a member who had been active since the InsideTheWeb days.

2020-05-09
Ilsoap created a topic about ideas that flopped in October 2002. He and some other Keeners posted ideas that never got off the ground, such as a The Simpsons parody starring a Bloog family.
In April 2003, Djaser asked "How did you get into Keen?" Quite a few PCKF members shared their story.

2020-05-02
One of the more curious references to Keen is a music album titled Goodbye Galaxy by Israeli electropop artist Spark-O. It was released by the record label ak duck in January 2004. While the album doesn't contain Keen tunes, its cover features the Bean-with-Bacon Megarocket from the Vorticons title screens, and everything is written in SGA, save for the Spark-O logo. Note that I've updated the links in Br1ck's reply to point to ak duck's Bandcamp presence, where you can also find a bigger version of the cover. The first post's link leads to the archived old site instead since the album's Bandcamp page lacks the description with Commander Keen (originally misspelt "Kommander").
Earlier, in March 2003, Ilsoap announced that a Keen 1 mod named Lego Keen is in the works. He posted a little sneak peek in the form of two screenshots. The Keen Award-winning mod came out in December of the same year.

2020-04-26
A member named ThE gRiNcH FwR created a poll about the best classic side-scroller in September 2001. The thread is notable for the "invasion" of Jazz Jackrabbit community members.
In July 2002, thenewmoonsidianX asked "How should The Universe is Toast be made?" In this case, the poll's (pretty clear) results are available. Commander Spleen posted various ideas regarding a new Keen adventure.

2020-04-18
In January 2003, UnFleexable and others Keeners discussed about a mysterious sprite in Keen 4 which can be viewed with the sprite test cheat. It depicts Keen looking at his ComputerWrist. Eventually, Tom Hall was questioned.
Big update to "More Keen Stuff", dozens of images have been added. I asked Scizor CT about the pictures that are missing from his two "Dopefish, Shikadi, Mimrocks, oh my!" threads. He lost the files long ago, but still had the original sheets and scanned them all, including previously unpublished drawings. I also received images from DSL, who worked on a promising 3D movie in the 2000s and won a Keen Award for his artwork then. All the pics were gone, now at least some of them are available again. There are several model sheets for the movie made by Mort as well.
By the way, 20 years have passed since the Keen community officially moved to the ezboard-based PCKF on the 15st of April, 2000.

2020-04-12
Happy Easter! Xtraverse created quite a few cool pieces of Keen-related 3D artwork in the first half of the 2000s. Among them are pictures of a Yorp and Berkeloid(s) from October 2002 and a Blue Bird with poor Inchworm posted in November of the same year.

2020-04-05
Last June, the Keen community was surprised by the announcement of a Commander Keen mobile game, the first new official Keen title since the release of the Game Boy Color game in May 2001. Back in December 2001, the magazine PC Gamer (at least the U.S. edition) wrote that a game using the Quake III engine is in the works. According to the article, in "Return to Commander Keen", the pre-teen genius has to deal with both puberty and an Amazon dictator. Of course, it was just a joke. The non-existant developer "Wicked Googly Software" was later referenced in TMST's Ten Years On.
More serious were the news about Keen Chronicles in March 2002, a compilation of the original Keen games for PC and Pocket PC. Tom Hall confirmed the project's existence, but also stated it is not being worked on any more. Nonetheless, it appeared at at least four shopping sites (not archived). The only thing left is the logo of Keen Chronicles, which can be seen in the KeenWiki.
I found one of DSL's two missing images from "Bush OMG" in the Wayback Machine with a different URL. Check out reply 17 and listen to the words of President Mort W. Bush. ;-)

2020-03-29
Who would have thought that id Software would send a cease and desist order to the makers of The Mystery of Isis II, shortly after the release of a new version of Isis packed with loads of new content? Even Tom Hall joined the PCKF to give advice. It's too bad that only the first page survives, but at least you can see Tom's first post. It all happened on the 1st of April, 2002...
In September 2003, Commander Spleen suggested the creation of a collective Keen mod. Andrew Durdin invited the Keeners to discuss its development in the newly founded Keen: Modding forum. Since then, a lot of work has been put into the Commander Keen Community Mod (CKCM). As of today, it is still unfinished.
Two weeks ago, I had added the thread of Zorath's mod with screenshots. Later, I also received the concept art from Zorath. You can view the pics (and another screenshot) on the "More Keen Stuff" page.

2020-03-21
The topic "If you had it your way..." was created by Root16 in November 2004. Several Keeners wrote what features a game would have if they had free rein.
Too Much Spare Time posted a funny little Flash animation titled "I AM Commander Keen!" in March 2005. He used the photos of someone named Redlof who was costumed as Commander Keen (with a unique helmet).

2020-03-15
In April 2003, Zorath posted screenshots and concept art of his Keen 1 mod. While the concept art is still missing, Zorath sent me the six neat screenshots he had posted back then, which feature a Galaxy-style (and Dreams-style) tilted view. Unfortunately, the development never really went beyond the creation of tiles and a test level. But Zorath did release several skin mods, namely the Keen 1-3 Intergalactic Versions and the CGA edition of Keen 1.
Only some days later, Grelphy also announced that he has a mod in the works, which was given the title Episode Y and acts as a sequel to Xky's Episode X. Over the following weeks, he added additional promising screenshots to the thread's first post. About two months after the announcement, Grelphy posted the full version of the Keen 1 mod, which was his only complete mod until the release of the abandoned, but nearly finished Vox trilogy in 2008.
Also, the winners of the Keen Awards 2019 have been announced. Check out the cool trophies by Lava89.

2020-03-08
A new demo version of The Mystery of Isis II was posted by project leader eK in March 2001. It came with a level editor that was intended to be used for a level design contest, since the team was in search for a new level designer. As that version of the editor appears to be unavailable, the link leads to the Win32 editor from May 2003 instead (retrieved via ckguy's Zap|Zot|Net). As a side note, the thread contains an interesting detail about the abandoned game Keen and the Moon Stone (later retitled Myth of Moon Stone).
Later that year, in October, eK and Snaily posted several tasty screenshots of the promising fangame. Luckily, the images were mirrored by the site CK Nexus back then.
By July 2003, eK announced that the ambitious Isis II project is stopped. The source code was eventually provided by programmer John a.k.a. Twilight Dragon in September 2003 (I had received the file from Spleen a while ago). The aforementioned Win32 version of the editor written by DML1001 was also reposted in the thread by the new Keen community member MultiMania. In 2010, the original project leader Geoff revived Isis II.

2020-03-01
In October 2002, Too Much Spare Time noted that he likes Yorpy's avater, which depicted an adorable Yorp family and was created by eK. The Yorp with skirt and bow was previously used for the splash screen of the level editor Keen MakeOver v2.0. Yorpy also posted the full resolution image in that thread, which was not archived. I asked eK about it and he even had the raw PSD files from way back. Not only that, I also received images of a Vorticon Woman and a Shikadi with its Shockshund, which I never saw before. You can find everything on the "More Keen Stuff" page.
UnFleexable created a topic about newly added Emotikeens and other emoticons in March 2003. As you can see, the opinions on them differed.

2020-02-22
"adurdin, how do you do it?" asked the new member CK Guy in September 2003. He wanted to know how Andrew Durdin gets the offsets for the patches, and the modding pioneer gave a detailed answer. CK Guy (now spelled ckguy) later made a name for himself in the modding community with his levels and tools.
The nominations for the Keen Awards 2004 started in March 2005. Those Keen Awards were the last of their kind. After several unsuccessful attempts to revive the event, the Keen Awards 2019 will hopefully be a success.

2020-02-15
Manboy, who had joined the PCKF by September 2001, undertook an ambitious project. He worked on a music video featuring dancing Yorps, DJ Robots and a singing lady Garg. In September 2002, he posted an image of a cute 3D Yorp. Its wallpaper-sized version is missing. Another image, the opening shot of the video, was posted by Manboy the same month alongside some details on the video's content. It shows sad Spot pining for places beyond Earth. Again, the high-res version is lost, but it's a really nice pic nonetheless. In October, he revealed five short animations of Yorps and the singing Garg (the latter is the only video with sound).
While the music video was never finished, Manboy did release the opening 18 seconds of it in November 2002. Unfortunately, the AVI file is long gone (I'd add its thread if it reappeared).

2020-02-08
Ilsoap started a discussion about a (fictional) KeenCon in November 2002. He and other members were dreaming about an event attended by fans from around the world, with the Keen creators as guests and many Keen-related activities.
An image titled "oh NO !!!!" was posted by memsys in March 2005. While that picture doesn't survive, a funny manipulation of the Keen 5 title screen by GMixer does. And there's a Levellordian theory on Robo Red, too.

2020-02-01
Two ancient fangame discussions added. In May 2000, Xtraverse (known as Korath or Fiver long ago) released a demo version of Where's My Pogo?, his second known Keen game. While the demo of the platform game lacks a story, in the full version it is Keen's task to stop the Koraths who stole his pogo in order to hypnotise and enslave the human race. Xtraverse was a very productive Keener in the 2000s. He became an admin by 2003 and ran the website Beyond the Pogo (still online, but inactive).
StevenVI released five fangames in 1999 and 2000. One of them is Wurdz: Commander Keen from June 2000. It is a text-based game inspired by Wheel of Fortune, but in this case all the word puzzles the player has to solve are related to the Keen universe.

2020-01-25
In March 2005, Xtraverse posted a crazy theory involving Christopher Columbus and teleporters, which was thought up by (allegedly drunk) TheOmegamatic. Even more detailed is a post by Levellord, which shows her vivid imagination.
Earlier, in August 2003, stickmanofdoom created the topic "stoner trees?" Do the trees in Keen 4 really look stoned?

2020-01-18
Between February and November 2003, Scizor CT posted more than 30 nice pieces of fan art. The first thread was given the name "Dopefish, Shikadi, Mimrocks, oh my!" He drew various creatures from the Keen universe, most image links work. Later, Scizor started the topic "The Return of DSMOM" and posted more pictures, including a redone Keen 4 title screen and a Robo Red jack-o'-lantern. The b/w versions of coloured images are missing in the second thread, but otherwise it's all there, except for the Bobba.

2020-01-12
In November 2003, Keengamer (Rorie) announced that his fangame Pac-Keen is finished. It is a Pac-Man-like game using Keen graphics. In various mazes, the boy genius has to collect the goodies known from his original adventures, but Foobs get in his way, which are not so harmless this time. Fortunately, the foes become vulnerable whenever Keen picks up a Neural Stunner.
The main reason for the inclusion of "can't get sound to work in windows xp" from July 2003 is a link in the Pac-Keen topic.
The nominations for the Keen Awards 2003 took place in January 2004. Keeners nominated people and their works in 13 categories.

2020-01-04
A new year, two more topics. In September 2002, Ginger Van posted a long list of Keen-related memories in the thread "I remember..." Other Keeners also shared their thoughts. Do you recognise at least some of your own memories? I do.
Xtraverse presented a neat 3D image of the gang from Keen 5 in December of the same year. Besides the enemies, the picture also features the game's various items.

2019-12-28
Less than a month before Keen Day 2004, Xky Rauh started a discussion about the Keen works that were under development at the time, such as XkyKeen2 and the third episode of Shadowlands. Levellord posted her second mod Dangerous Keen in the Haunted Mansion on Keen Day (in her time zone). Like Shadow Keen, it is a Keen 1 mod made within a short time. As implied by the title, it mainly uses graphics and levels from Dangerous Dave in the Haunted Mansion. Keen sets out to find the things lost by Dave in the mansion during the original adventure.
"Gah! LL drew something! Kill it!" is a thread created by Levellord in November 2004 where she presented an unusual depiction of Vorticons, inspired by a webcomic named Purple Pussy.
Thanks to aintnofuntime a.k.a. allstories for the "Speed McMire" image which was posted by him in the topic "Bush OMG" (reply 37).

2019-12-21
In December 2002, Killspy posted a Christmas Emotikeen, which became part of the PCKF's set of emoticons. Killspy, more recently known as QU3TZ4LC04TL, also voiced the Bounders in the second episode of Shadowlands.
"Where were you Christmas '92?" asked Commander Spleen in January 2004. The Universe is Toast was to be released around that time. In any way, have a merry Christmas 2019.

2019-12-14
It's Commander Keen's 29th birthday! Back in 2000, on the occasion of Keen's 10th anniversary, Joe Siegler (JSdopefish) of 3D Realms created an in-depth article on the series' history titled "A Look Back at Commander Keen". 19 years later, it's still a very good read.
Manboy posted a very short but sweet video called "Yorp on my desk" in October 2003. It features an animated 3D Yorp integrated into live-action footage. As far as I know, the video was one of Manboy's last contributions in the Keen community.

2019-12-07
Xky Rauh doodled various Keens and creatures in May 2001, which were added to CC314. Interestingly, Xky stated that he would like to create a set of Keen sprites in that style - a year later, he announced that the work on his Keen 1 mod has begun. Episode X a.k.a. XkyKeen1, the second complete mod ever released, was finished after a month and a few days. It won the first Keen Award for Best Mod.
Later, in December 2002, Manboy created a cute new Keen 1 sprite (the "XkySkin") based on Xky's cool doodles. Since then, Manboy's sprite has been used (partially modified) in several mods, such as Levellord's Shadow Keen.

2019-12-01
In July 2003, Too Much Spare Time released French Erotic Film, now a classic of the fanimutation genre. The bizarre work features Commander Keen sprites and the Dutch song "Opblaaskrokodil", among other things. Not only that, TMST presented a great Snow Dopefish. Just like the Snow Slug of 2002, the "Snopefish" won the Keen Award for Best Non-Computerized Art.
grafix posted a picture from TMST's website in February 2005. It's a mock ad for insect repellent which includes a nice sketch of Keen being attacked by Skypests. Poor Keen!

2019-11-23
Robo Blue, a Keen community member since at least 1999, curated a Character Creation Contest in 2003. More than 20 characters were posted in July and August. Afterwards, members voted for their favourites in three different categories. I don't have those threads, so the exact results are unknown. Nevertheless, most of the competition's entries are available.

2019-11-16
RocketJess joined the Keen community by early 2004. She became known for her cool and adorable fan art. In March 2004, she presented three pictures of Billy and Mortimer. A year later, RocketJess posted some new (and old) sketches of classic computer game characters.

2019-11-10
A new member named allstories released the fangame KeenKong in November 2003, which is inspired by Nintendo's arcade classic Donkey Kong. Keen has to avoid the baddies and save Princess Lindsey. Over time, allstories posted various pieces of fan art, such as a cute Keen sprite in April 2005. He is also known for the unfinished mod trilogy Cataclysmic Conquest, but sadly, I don't have the discussion of its only complete episode, The Last Moon. (Feb. 2020 addition: I should have mentioned that he returned in 2019 under the name aintnofuntime.)

2019-11-02
A cool 3D picture of the Omegamatic was posted by Tomer2000 in August 2001.
In the thread "Origin of Gnosticene Ancients" from November 2003, Vitamin Zach wrote that yellow creatures resembling the Gnosticene Ancients appear in Naughty Boy, a little-known arcade game by Jaleco. Gnosticene Ancients? They are actually called Treasure Eaters, as pointed out by TCL999. The correct name comes from a mail sent by Tom Hall to the Keencyclopedia creator. Due to the May 2005 hack, basically everything ever written by TCL999 in the PCKF was deleted, but "Treasure Eater" was reconfirmed by Tom in 2007.

2019-10-27
In August 2004, SkypestB2 created the thread "Fangame or mod ideas - Where from?". SkypestB2 himself told about the inspiration for his game Keen in the Bronze Age. The most in-depth answers were posted by Xky Rauh and Commander Spleen.
Members who were active in the mid-2000s might remember the ambitious project of Matthew Larsen (matlarsen). In 2006, Matthew and his team worked on a Goodbye Galaxy movie, which was never finished. The filmmaker posted various details about the work as well as images and music. Only a single image is left, and the first track was digged up by Malvineous in 2009. I recently asked Malv and it turned out that he downloaded the three other MP3 files at the time, too. Check out the More Keen Stuff section.

2019-10-22
Pimento took suggestions for a future Keen fangame in May 2000. The topic is one of the few surviving discussions from the PCKF's first two months. Also known by other names such as The Soggy Mop, Orb or hinkle0, Pimento was the leader and co-founder of the group VaporTech International, which released multiple Keen fangames.
"What enemy do you wish was real?" asked Shocksund in October 2000. While the results of the poll are missing, there are interesting answers nonetheless. Shocksund (more recently LJH) is remembered for Vorta Retra, the first Keen 3 level pack.

2019-10-13
In May 2003, Djaser announced that his fellow countryman Mark a.k.a. The Candyjunk is working on new levels for Keen 4 and 5 (which were still a rarity then). The level packs were originally intended to be released by December at the latest. However, they were still unreleased in February 2004. Eventually, Djaser made the three complete levels and several unfinished ones available to the community (that part of the discussion is missing). The available work is promising, but The Candyjunk has not posted any more levels as of now. However, Nisaba completed an unfinished Keen 4 level by Mark for her 2017 pack Buried in Oblivion.
The PCKF Archive's sections are on individual pages now. Additionally, each subforum of the ezboard PCKF has its own table. The changes should make the site easier to navigate.

2019-10-05
In August 2002, Korath III started a new group fanfic. It only lasted for less than a month, though the story was promising. Keen has been displaced in time and realises that he is now in the year of 2002. The young hero learns that the universe has seen better days...
A Commander Keen / Sailor Moon crossover fanfic was posted by NephariteofIlian between November 2003 and July 2004. I don't know whether it was ever finished, but the available prologue and four chapters are well-written. Mortimer ends up in the Negaverse after his defeat, while Keen (who wrongly believes that his nemesis is done for) encounters strange monsters and a new character named Sailor Gnosticus.

2019-09-29
During a discussion about TED5 in March and April 2003, Br1ck (a.k.a. Cosmos, KeenCommander, Gr1nreaper) posted the first fan-made Keen 5 level, almost two years after the first Keen 4 one. Most of the work was done by his younger brother Dr. Witherstone (James). In November of the same year, the brothers and Mich released Keen Asylum, the first complete set of custom Galaxy levels. The Keen 5 level pack is also notable for its use of various TED5/Keen 5 exploit and tricks.
Thanks to Xky for the eleventh song in his Music Pack. In early 2003, he created a MIDI of the song "Please Don't Metal With Me!", which is used in the levels Bloogton Manufacturing and Bloogfoods, Inc.

2019-09-21
Morse code is part of the background music heard in the Keen 6 level Bloog Control Center. A new member named Dark Hood decoded it and posted the result in July 2002, which was a really keen discovery. Composer Bobby Prince had forgotten about the Morse code in Keen 6, but remembered that he did the same thing in Wolfenstein 3D.

Added a section called "More Keen Stuff". I was in search for the Keen Award-winning The Armageddon Machine MIDI and asked Xky about it. He sent not only one, but three MIDIs to me. They can be downloaded together with the seven songs that are still available at DOS Classics. Just listen to them. Also, you can view the complete issue 8 of the CKN and download a skin mod called RKeen4 by Q90.
I know, this page has become quite long, I'll split it in the future.

2019-09-14
Neat pictures of a 3D Dopefish were posted by Manboy in February 2003. He also created a short but sweet video that shows the universe's second-dumbest creature in action.
Too Much Spare Time released Dopefission in April of the same year. The well-received Flash animation is a tribute to the Dopefish. Lots of creative ideas, great music, very funny. Just watch it.

In July 2002, KeenRush asked for usermade Keen 4–6 levels. The only custom Galaxy levels available at the time were ChargingMoose's first level and a little demonstration by Frenkel, though. Then ChargingMoose told about his unfinished set of Keen 4 levels and posted what he had (six complete levels). The levels, made to look and feel like the original, were not available for download for more than a decade and a half. Recently, I found a way to contact ChargingMoose, and now the levels are back. You can read the whole story in the present-day PCKF.

2019-08-31
In January 2003, the creator of the first user-made Keen 4 level, ChargingMoose, published his notes from when he was making said level. You can see that he really put a lot of effort into it. Shortly afterwards, ChargingMoose became absent from the Keen community. Almost a year later, he told about the reason and posted a photo of himself standing at a street name sign reading "Keenland Dr(ive)". TMST posted two pics of computer game-related street names, too. By the way, the Keenland sign's coordinates are: Latitude 34°02'13.7"N, longitude 84°27'06.9"W.

2019-08-25
Did you know that Cerebral Cortex 314 and Keen were mentioned in Time magazine in May 2003? Check out DML1001's thread about an article on The Matrix Reloaded in said magazine.
Another interesting Keen sighting was posted by Andrew Durdin. It's a filk song titled "MIPS to the World" that had appeared in a newsgroup in December 2001. Commander Keen is given a mention in its lyrics.

2019-08-17
In December 2001, Admiral Bob released the first (and second) beta version of CKPatch, one of the tools that paved the way for Keen modding. Thanks to the patch-loading utilities for Keen 1–6 (originally excluding Dreams), it is possible to modify the game without having to edit the game executable file itself. Admiral Bob's third and last beta release of CKPatch was version 0.9.0 in June 2003. The later versions of CKPatch were developed by other Keen enthusiasts. A lot of patches have been published since CKPatch's initial release, and in recent years, Keeners have even released mods that turn Commander Keen into games of other genres.

2019-08-11
Xtraverse released the first complete Keen 3 mod, Norp the Yorp 3: Brain Damage, in February 2003. Norp's third adventure takes place inside Mortimer's body, because the evil (and now giant) genius swallowed Keen's pet Yorp.
In September 2003, Slasher posted a neat 3D picture of Keen's head in the thread "The face of things to come". It was one of his last activities in the Keen community, besides a brief reappearance in 2007.

2019-08-04
Many things have changed in the Keen community since November 2001. But one thing that hasn't changed is the original batch of Emotikeens. In said month and year, the Keen-themed emoticons created by Too Much Spare Time were incorporated into the PCKF and they are still used in the forum of today. Since then, more Emotikeens have been designed by different Keeners. In October 2002, TMST himself presented 12 new Emotikeens.
In January 2002, TMST published an outstanding work titled "Commander Keen: Ten Years On". It's a humorous take on Commander Keen's story. TMST created many pieces of artwork and put a lot of research into it. Check it out, if you haven't already. 3D Realms took notice and even added Ten Years On to their website. It isn't surprising that the mockumentary was the winner of the Keen Award for Best Narrative in 2002.

2019-07-27
The three threads added today are all related to fanart. Check out the cool picture of a Keen-themed Volkswagen Beetle posted by Andrew Durdin in January 2003. In December of the same year, DSL presented four nice drawings of Keen and other well-known characters. Last but not least, a cute Yorp made by Genius314 with a graphics tablet in April 2005.

2019-07-20
Ceilick, known as the creator of the unofficial The Universe is Toast trilogy, released his first mod in October 2002. Crash on Gobo III, a Keen 1 mod, takes place on the titular jungle planet Gobo III. Its sequel, the Keen 2 mod Planet Destruction, came out in January 2003. Keen's task is to stop the brainwashed Yorps from destroying Earth and other planets. Both mods are part of the Invasion of the Yorps trilogy. Ceilick didn't finish the third episode, but it was eventually completed by a group of Keeners in 2009.
A user named Eazyjay (more recently known as Joriz) released a Keen 1 level pack in September 2003, its topic was given the title "Test your keen skillZ". All levels share the same basic design, but new challenges are added with each level. Eazyjay's brother (Captainkeen) was possibly involved in the creation of the pack, but unfortunately, the first page of the topic is missing. The brother also made a separate set of three levels, which is not available anymore. In November of the same year, Eazyjay released another level pack. He worked on a mod, but got "a bit lazy" and made the finished levels available. I can tell you that the ice-themed levels are very hard.

2019-07-13
In March 2002, Andrew Durdin told about fanart of Bloogs and other Keen 6 creatures and objects from the 1990s. The pictures were made by Gizmo and are still available at his inactive website. He was one of the contributors of long-lost Bloogology 314. Said site was created by Thea, who was the second owner of Cerebral Cortex 314, too.
Bloogology 314 was all about the study of Bloogs and other Fribbulus Xax inhabitants, it inspired multiple other "-ology" sites which can be viewed in the archives of DOS Classics. However, Bloogology itself disappeared entirely (save for fragments of its InsideTheWeb board). I never saw it, but judging by various comments, it was definitely one of the more popular Keen fansites around 1999. In August 2002, Thea surprisingly announced plans to bring back Bloogology and give it a complete overhaul. Other Keeners were willing to help. Unfortunately, Thea stopped posting the next week. I didn't save any more recent posts by her, maybe this was Thea's last activity in the Keen community.

2019-07-06
Three Keen 1 mod topics added. In May 2003, Grelphy released Episode Y, where Keen explores Mortimer's ship. It is a sequel to Xky's Episode X. Victor4k created a mod named Keenbot, which features a player sprite (the titular Keenbot) that is only one tile tall and allows for previously unseen level desgins. A beta version was made available in July 2004, but Victor never finished it. The surprising release of kohntarkosz's The Search for the Sentinel took place in August 2004. In the previously unknown mod, Keen has to activate the so-called Sentinel in order to save the inhabitants of Synchronica VII after his unfortunate emergency landing.

2019-06-30
In November 2002, Too Much Spare Time announced that he is compiling a Commander Keen calendar for 2003. A printable calendar featuring fanmade Keen content for every month. Manboy contributed a cool 3D picture titled "Martian Winter Wonderland". Shortly after Christmas, TMST published the neat completed calendar on his website. Half of the images are still accessible via the Wayback Machine.

2019-06-22
The Keener Commander Spleen made his debut in the PCKF in August 2003 and introduced his mod Monky Business: An Essence of Mayhem. He informed the community about its development and posted various classy screenshots and other artwork on his website over the following months. Almost a year after the original announcement, Spleen released the long-awaited beta version of Monky Business, also known as OrbKeen. Keen, wearing a monk robe, explores a mysterious, surreal world and has to retrieve stolen artifacts. The work is still unfinished, but Spleen has released a number of other mods since then.

2019-06-15
In May 2002, Ilsoap posted a cool picture of a fearsome Arachnut. I didn't find it on the Web, but Ilsoap sent it to me. Not only that, I received synopses of the Shadowlands episodes 3–9, too. Thanks a lot! Another nice piece of fan art is RocketJess's adorable Group Picture, posted by her in March 2005. It is one of her last Keen pictures. In the same month, the thread "Bush OMG" was created by DSL. The page features a funny image of a certain Mr Bush (reply 7). Two other humorous pictures also survived (see the last nine replies).

2019-06-08
In April 2001, a new member named ChargingMoose surprised the community with the first completely new Keen 4 level. The only Keen 4–6 level editor available at the time was TED5, which doesn't support the released Keen games by default. Nonetheless, ChargingMoose managed to create a new level with a hex editor and a slightly modified TED5. You can read more about the developments in Andrew Durdin's 2002 article "Changing the World / Editing Keen with TED". A later milestone in Galaxy modding was the release of Andrew's ModKeen 2.0 on Keen Day 2004. Finally, modders were able to extract and edit the graphics from Keen 4–6. It's no wonder that the utility was one of the winners of the Keen Awards 2004, more specifically in the category Best Editor/Other Keen Program. Like in 2002, nice trophies were created, in this case by xtraverse. The 2004 Awards were the last ones, though there have been unsuccessful attempts to revive them.

2019-06-01
Remember TMST's prank call? In April 2003, Grelphy indicated that the numbers of two real live Billy Blazes are found in the American White Pages phone directory. Not spectacular, but then Too Much Spare Time gave one of the Billys a call and published the recording... well, see for yourself. ;-) The prank call is still available online on a different site (link included). It was the winner of the Keen Award for Really Keen Stuff of 2003. Another entry for the Awards was Ilsoap's mod Lego Keen, released in December. In Lego Keen, which was voted Best Mod by the Keeners, players explore a world made of Lego bricks. Who were the other winners? Check out the list of winners of the Keen Awards 2003.

2019-05-26
Added three topics of mods released in 2004. The earliest one is Zelda II, released by the new member CheesyDave in January. It uses the graphics and setting of the NES game, so it looks and feels very different from the original Keen 1. In July, Levellord released Shadow Keen 2, a Keen 2 mod and the sequel to her first mod. Bad Dreams, also by Levellord, came out in September and was a birthday present for Commander Spleen. Most of its graphics are taken from Keen Dreams, but the Keen 1 mod comes with a plot twist.

2019-05-18
"Wake up Billy, it snowed last night!" – this is the title of a topic created by Too Much Spare Time in June 2002. He presented his neat snow King Sluggy, which won the Keen Award for Best Non-Computerized Art (by the way, another picture is available here). And take a look at KeenCommander's nice snow Sparky, too. TMST's first contribution in the PCKF was the "Message from the Dopefish Department" almost a year earlier.

I've also added the thread "Keen 6's Portable elevator! No kidding!!!", created by KeenCommander (a.k.a. Br1ck or Cosmos) in December 2001. It's all about the famous trick in Keen 6 known as the Impossible Bullet. KeenCommander's younger brother Dr Witherstone (James) discovered it, and although he was not the first one to do so, it seems that the bug was not as widely known then, even among experienced Keeners. It became the winner of the Keen Award for Really Keen Stuff. In October 2002, a unique walkthrough for Keen 6 written by Dr Witherstone was posted on Commander Keendom, which makes extensive use of the Impossible Bullet trick.

2019-05-12
Slasher (Corey, a.k.a. Matrix) released the second demo of Spork III in June 2002, nearly two years after the first one. His work won the Keen Award for Best Fan-Game. The game's story was intended to be told in comic book format. Eventually, Slasher abandoned the game and worked on the comic instead. Only two pages were completed, but Slasher's art is definitely worth a look, just like the game.
Regarding Keen Awards, I added two more topics from 2002. In "All Done!", KorathIII posted a nifty table of Keen Award winners based on the Keen 4 high scores level "so that future generations can look back on this momentous occasion". Also, don't miss the Award Acceptance Speeches by Too Much Spare Time (who won four Keen Awards) and other winners.

2019-05-04
In February 2002, TCL999 impressed his fellow-Keeners with his A through Z interpretation of Commander Keen, the Keencylcopedia. Most of its content eventually became part of Beyond the Pogo. The same year, TCL999 received the Keen Award for Best Website. Remember the Keen Awards? Well, after at least one unsuccessful attempt, the June/July 2002 discussion started by Too Much Spare Time lead to the first Keen Awards. Initially, the members had to nominate Keen works (and people) for the different categories in the Official Nominations Thread. After it was done, the Keeners voted for their favourites in 13 separate polls between 22 July and 6 August (I combined them into a single page, results are missing in three cases). Flaose, who handled the process, posted the list of the winners of the Keen Awards 2002. Check out all the cool trophies created by MRC Marky.

2019-04-27
The InsideTheWeb section has been expanded. I've compiled a list of links for (almost) everything I found in the Wayback Machine. It's more than I expected, the oldest messages date back to September 1998. I also included a list of selected messages (a subjective selection, of course). You won't find in-depth discussions with dozens of posts like in the PCKF. Nonetheless, those boards are an important part of early Keen community history.

And there are more topics from the ezboard days, all related to the fangame The Mystery of Isis II: "Things to come", "Another update" and "Been a while eh? Isis II time ..." Team member eK reported on the development of the game in mid-2000. In February 2002, he started the Countdown to Isis, more than 80 replies of this thread survive. The demos of Isis II were among the most promising and popular fangames of the early 2000s, but it was abandoned in 2003. Fortunately, the project was revived in 2010.

2019-04-14
Three topics added, all of them related to the early days of modding. Soon after the original release of ModLatch, Andrew Durdin announced an updated version with Keen 1 support in the topic "Edit Keen 1-3 tiles!" Only a few days later, ModLatch became obsolete as Andrew revolutionised Keen modding with the first release of ModKeen on 1 April 2002, announced in "Edit Keen 1-3 Tiles, Bitmaps, and Sprites!!" On the same day, Keeners discussed the possibilities of the new program in the topic "Commander Keen 1-3 editing".

2019-04-06
Thanks to Snortimer who reuploaded his collection of InsideTheWeb messages and related images he made available in 2011. Now you can also download the ZIP archive from here. One day I will integrate the pages into the PCKF Archive so that they are browsable. InsideTheWeb was a provider of message boards that existed from 1997 to 2001. The various boards created by Keeners on ITW were basically the earliest predecessor of today's PCKF.
Furthermore, I've added the topic "Keen editing". It contains the very first post of one of the PCKF's most active members, KeenRush. He requested a program to change graphics in Keen 1, and some days later Andrew Durdin released ModLatch (which was soon followed by ModKeen).

2019-03-16
In the topic "Keen Progs", member Justin introduced two utilities he made, a high score editor for Keen 1 and a save game editor for Keen 4, source code included. It's from April 2000, one of the oldest discussions I was able to dig up. By the way, I added the ninth JMMB topic named "Isis Demo II rocks...", overlooked it before.

2018-12-02
Added the topic "how did the keen community begin?", where Keeners discussed the early days of the community in the 1990s. "Veterans" like Ilsoap and Cho'gall shared their memories. Ah, history.

2018-05-25
I have added a new section called "JMMB Topics". Before the PCKF on the ezboard website was created, the Keen community was active on a subforum of the Jazz Mega Message Board (JMMB) for some months. It was named "Commander Keen Stuff" and moderated by then CC314 owner Thea. The main reason for the new board, which was in use from November 1999 to March 2000, were the limitations of the previously used InsideTheWeb service. Eight topics of the JMMB's Keen section were archived by the Wayback Machine, and you can find the respective links on this page now. It isn't much, but better than nothing.

2018-05-10
Three years have passed. Well, sadly, the ezboard.com domain and all its subdomains have become inaccessible in the Wayback Machine again, and there are no signs of a change. Therefore, I have removed all archive.org links in the topic table. But as I saved most of the affected pages back then (though by far not all topics archived by that site), it is possible to restore most of the content sooner or later. But still, there's a little addition: The topic "Monster Bash FILEID.diz", which appears to be the only PCKF page of the ezboard era found on archive.is.

2015-05-02
Three mod topics added: Doomship Dilemma by Dr Villain, Zelda II by CheesyDave, and Shadow Keen 2 by Levellord. Also, check out the amazing mod I've released on 1st April. ;-)

2015-03-14
Happy Keen Day! An important event in Keen history took place in April 2001, then a new user named ChargingMoose surprised the community with the first completely new Keen 4 level. Another topic added today is that on Victor4k's innovative, but now long-abandoned mod Keenbot. Two more classics of modding are Ceilick's early works, Crash on Gobo III and Planet Destruction.

2015-02-21
Two more mod topics from 2004 added. First, The Search for the Sentinel released by kohntarkosz, his first and thus far only mod. Second, Bad Dreams by Levellord, which was a birthday present for Commander Spleen. And then there's a cool and adorable Group Picture by RocketJess, too.

2015-01-26
In August 2003, the Keener Commander Spleen made his debut in the PCKF and introduced his mod Monky Business. Almost a year later, he released the critically acclaimed beta version of it (the finished mod will be awesome!). Also, check out "Bush OMG" for a funny picture of a certain Mr. Bush and more...

2015-01-13
Added the first three links to the Wayback Machine. It's all about the release of now classic mods: Norp the Yorp 3 by Xtraverse, Keen Y by Grelphy, and Lego Keen by Ilsoap.

2015-01-11
A late Happy New Year! It has been a while since the last update. As you may have noticed, the old PCKF is available again in the Wayback Machine (a really nifty thing!). That said PCKF pages became unavailable with the site's relaunch some years ago was the main reason for the creation of this little archive.

So, now you ask, does the PCKF Archive still have a point? Yes, it does have, as the pages archived by the WM alone won't provide you an overseeable table with archived topics like the one below. If you want to get to see "all" topics in the WM, you have to switch around between the dates of archiving in the topic lists. Not only that, the PCKF's ezBoard incarnation used different subdomains over the course of the years (the earliest being "pub7", I think), and the WM treats pages with different subdomains as separate ones, of course. Furthermore, there are a lot of threads not in the WM, and thus a bunch of "broken" links that aren't marked as such.

As you can see, the table allows for much easier navigation, at least for the topics that are included. So rather than copying and editing the PCKF threads for this page, I will link pages of the Wayback Machine soon. It's much less time-consuming, the list will grow much faster, and you'll get to see more notable discussions in the community's long history. The only real disadvantage is that WM pages are normally not indexed by search engines, as far as I know. But that's okay for now.

Feel free to browse the PCKF in the Wayback Machine yourself. As said, there are different subdomains for different periods (only those used before the attack in May 2005 are included here):
pub7 (April 2001), pub128 (August 2002), p072 (June 2004)
(they also overlap, though, making it even more complicated)

2014-07-01
Release topic of Norp the Yorp in Diffusion by Xtraverse added, another classic mod.

2014-05-18
Added the topic on the release of Bazooka Wowbagger, a mod by Paperface from the early days of modding. By the way, I've finally released my mod a week ago. Hey, a little self-advertisement doesn't hurt! ;-)

2014-03-23
Again, two more topics! In July 2001, then new member TMST presented the community a fantastic Commander Keen: The Movie poster. There is also a topic from "The Classics" sub-forum now, "Cosmo, anyone?", which is about Cosmo's Cosmic Adventure.

2014-03-17
Ever wondered where the cool little GIF of pogoing Keen is from? Find the answer! Moreover, read what Keeners thought about Keen on PS2 and other consoles back in 2002.

2014-03-14
Long time no update! Sorry for the hiatus. On Keen Day, I've added the topic "Billy Retire?!" about Jill of the Jungle, another platform game classic.

2012-03-03
Two more topics today: Almost a decade ago, Xky released his Keen 1 Mod, have fun reading the reactions back then. I've also added an early Keen Community Story started by Forge (sadly, two pages are missing).

2012-02-29
With Xtraverse's permission, I've incorporated the links to the many topics in DOS Classics' archive, what makes accessing them much easier. But beware that certain discussions can get quite "controversial". ;-) I've got my files back, too, so expect more blasts from the past!

2012-02-11
Currently, I don't have the majority of topics I saved on hand (don't worry, nothing is lost). But still, I want to present you something new until I have them back, so enjoy reading about Kangarus's (unfinished) Commander Keen fanfic and Rorie's 1st piece of fanart.

2012-01-29
The PCKF Archive has opened! Thanks to Malvineous for giving me this webspace. It starts with six topics, and they contain various really entertaining posts, don't miss them. More will be added bit by bit.

Commander Keen © id Software. This website is not affiliated with id Software in any way. The copyright of each post is believed to be owned by its respective author.

page top 🔺