TAGAP

TAGAP: The Apocalyptic Game About Penguins (or just 'TAGAP' for short) is a computer action game for Windows XP and Vista, released as freeware via the Internet in July 2007. In the game, the player controls cyber-penguin Pablo on his quest to save the Earth from the conquering plans of his lunatic creator, Dr. Glowenko. TAGAP is the debut game of Penguin Development Team, a duo of Finnish hobbyist developers. The Title, TAGAP, is an acronym with two meanings. The first is The Apocalyptic Game About Penguins, the tile of the game. The second is Tissue Augmenting Green Addictive Pill, a type of [...] that plays a large role in the game as a plot point (see Plot and Pills).

Gameplay

TAGAP is a 2-D platformer and run and gun shoot-em-up. The keyboard is used for movement, interaction and weapon swapping while the aiming are handled with the mouse, giving player 360^o firing freedom. While the same control scheme has been used in games like Walker and Abuse, TAGAP has a bigger emphasis on shooting than "platforming". Version 1.5 of the game includes the ability to play the game on XInput game controllers, such as the Xbox 360 controller.1

Plot

At a distant research facility, mad scientist Dr. Glowenko discovers the genome for creating bio-engineered cybernetic penguins, TAGAP (Tissue Augmenting Green Addictive Pill). Glowenko begins creating an army of cloned penguins, dubbed "Zombie penguins" due to their corruption by TAGAP. Glowenko plans to take over the world with his army, but one of the penguins, codenamed Pablo the penguin, is fed up of being Glowenko's guinea pig and escapes. He quickly finds himself fighting the whole clone army as he tries to discover Glowenko's plan. Pablo's main adversary is Pedro penguin, another cyber-penguin who is engineered to be more intelligent and has been promised a bounty of TAGAP for [...] Pablo. Pedro uses an extensive range of lethal machines and weaponry to stop Pablo, to no avail. After fighting his way throughout the complex, Pablo kills Glowenko and destroys the base with a nuclear self-destruct device. Pablo heads to Antarctica, where Pedro has a secret base recruiting ordinary penguins and turning them into zombie penguins using TAGAP. Pablo frees the penguins and pursues a fleeing Pedro to a secret fortress hidden inside a volcano. Pablo fights throughout the complex and deactivates the pressure pumps that stabilise the volcano. Before the volcano erupts, Pablo stows aboard the space shuttle and is launched in ORBit, where it docks with a massive space station, the base for Pedro's final strike on humanity. After a lengthy fight through the station, Pablo confronts Pedro for the last time and tries to make him see reason. Pedro responds by activating an enormous, heavily armed penguin shaped robot. Pablo destroys the robot and defeats Pedro, knocking him unconscious. Rocked by the robot's explosion, the station begins to destabilise. After a moment’s hesitation, Pablo grabs Pedro and rushes to the hanger, where one small space fighter remains. The two penguins escape the station as it violently explodes. The shuttle crashes in Antarctica, and Pedro asks why Pablo saved him. Pablo replies, "That's what we video game heroes do." The penguins Pablo freed earlier arrive and the group throw a party, all differences forgotten.

Setting

The gameplay of TAGAP is set in several locations around the world. The first half of the game is set in Dr. Glowenko's secret base, located in Southern New Zealand. The setting then moves to Antarctica, where Pedro's base is located. The fight is soon taken to downtown Tokyo, and then to a North-Japanese volcano transformed into a secret fortress. For the final chapter of the game, Pablo launches into space and battles in a massive space station in orbit around the Earth.

Weapons

TAGAP features a wide range of weapons. Some, like the shotgun, flamethrower and minigun are standard weapons in most video game arsenals. Others like the OMG-20k and the Disintegrator are unique to the game. Pablo can carry eight different weapons, all featuring two firing modes. For example, the Plasmagun's secondary function deploys a temporary shield, and the shotgun hurls a powerful grenade. In addition to these mobile weapons, throughout the game the player can also control a few heavily armed combat vehicles. These include a miniature Helicopter, a laser turret and a small space fighter. These vehicles also have secondary fire ability, such as rockets (helicopter) or charged plasma bursts (space fighter).

Pills

Genetically modified drugs, known as pills, play a large roll in the game. The most common type of pill is the green TAGAP (Tissue Augmenting Green Addictive Pill) pill. As the name suggests, Pablo is addicted to the pills due to their role in his creation. Due to this, the game's health bar is based on the percentage of TAGAP in Pablo's blood. When the amount reaches 0%, Pablo will lose a life. Eating TAGAP pills increases Pablo's health. There are four types of Pills in total, each with a different effect. Pills are colour-coded to indicate the effect they induce. Red pills, known as "One-ups", contain a super-dosage of TAGAP, amounting to an extra life. Blue pills, dubbed "Speed", are custom-made combat stimulants that makes the world move so fast that Pablo does not realise he is taking damage, rendering the player invulnerable for a short time. Pink pills, "Steroids", allow Pablo to run twice as fast and perform higher jumps. When the TAGAP level in Pablo's blood reaches 100%, any more pills taken will result in an overdose. This is represented through by a green hue covering the screen, hallucinations and slow motion ability, resulting in an unparalleled combat state. In addition to the pills, there are three more powerups. Medkits restore all health and Credit cards increase the player's score. There is also a mysterious item of alien technology that multiplies the amount of rounds fired from all weapons by four.

Production

The game took almost four years to develop, starting in November 2003 as one-man-project, lead by Jouni Lahtinen. Jouni soon joined forces with Petja Heiskanen in early 2004 and the duo went under the alias of the Penguin Development Team. The game cost almost 2500 Euros to make, which was 2500 Euros over the budget, since the game was intended to be freeware. Nearly all the money was spent on software and hardware. TAGAP was originally five levels long instead of the current ten. The remaining five levels were meant to become a post-release expansion pack. However, since five levels felt ultimately too short in game testing, the levels were incorporated into the game.The game is dedicated to Snowdrop, an Albino African Penguin (pictured). It was a resident of Bristol Zoo Gardens from November 2002 until August 2004.

References to other games

TAGAP has many inside jokes scattered throughout the game, most of them being industry insides. For example one Tokyo billboard (pictured) advertises the "forthcoming game" "Pimps at Sea", which is the code-name Bungie Studios has used for the Halo game series while they were in development. TAGAP also features miniature versions of Dopefish, the cult-favourite game characters originally created by Tom Hall. They can be found swimming in the Antarctic waters on one of the levels. Project leader Jouni Lahtinen is a huge fan of the Doom series, and TAGAP pays homage to them several times. For instance, in an early office level, the names on office booths are the names of the marine as seen in the Doom novels, original designs and the Doom film (the character in Doom was never officially named in the game).

Technical

TAGAP is build on top of a heterogeneous standard and external library background. OpenGL standard for the graphics, DirectInput for input devices (e.g. Mouse and Keyboard) and FMODEx as the sound engine. With version 1.4 of the game there is also an especially compiled binary available for pre-XP Windows operation systems. This 'as-it' released binary seems, according to some bug reports in the TAGAP forum, to be currently unstable. The game also features a developer function, allowing players to construct their own weapons, characters, levels and cut-scenes.

Soundtrack

The soundtrack for TAGAP was composed and produced by the co-producer of the game, Petja Heiskanen. It was released on the TAGAP home page for free download alongside the game in July 2007. It consists of thirty three songs, including two bonus tracks, with a running time of 70 minutes. Also available for download are printable album covers, including a CD insert, a CD back cover and LightScribe CD labels. Jouni Lahtinen made this statement on his website regarding TAGAP’s soundtrack.

Poor movie can have decent soundtrack, but movie can't be any good if the soundtrack sucks. It's the unwritten law that applies to all entertainment, including games; If you think of your favourite game, you'll most likely remember it's sound. Being a soundtrack buff I know a thing or two about good scores; All I can do is to thank Mr. Heiskanen for this absolutely perfect soundtrack that ultimately made TAGAP a whole.

Track listing

Sequel

TAGAP 2, a sequel game to TAGAP, was officially announced on November 16th 2007. The game is currently in pre-production. The game starts a few months after the events of TAGAP, with Pablo and Pedro teaming up to take on another army of zombie penguins lead by General Primo, the most advanced cyber-penguin ever. TAGAP 2 will be released as freeware over the Internet for Windows XP and Windows Vista operating systems. TAGAP 2 currently has no release date, but is currently scheduled to be finished in "lesser time than the original".

External links

• TAGAP – Official Website

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