Kangaroo (video game)

Kangaroo
Kangaroo arcade flyer
Developer(s)	Sun Electronics
Publisher(s)	Sun Electronics, Atari
Platform(s)	Arcade (original) Atari 8-bit Atari 2600 Atari 5200
Release date(s)	1982
Genre(s)	Platform
Mode(s)	Up to 2 players, alternating turns
Cabinet	Upright
CPU	Z80 (@ 2.5 MHz)
Sound	Sound CPU: Z80 (@ 2.5 MHz) Sound Chip: AY8910 (@ 1.25 MHz)
Display	Raster, 240 x 256 pixels (Vertical), 24 colors

Kangaroo (Japanese: カンガルー^?) is an arcade platform game that was released in 1982. It was manufactured by Sun Electronics and distributed by Atari. Kangaroo is one of the first arcade games similar in style to Donkey Kong without being a direct knock-off. The player takes the role of a mother kangaroo wearing boxing gloves, who is trying to rescue her son from fruit-throwing monkeys.

Unusually for a platformer, there is no jump button. Instead, the player pushes up—or up and diagonally—to jump.

There are four different levels. Each of them consist of the mother kangaroo on the bottom floor trying to reach the top floor where her joey is being held captive by some monkeys. On each of the levels, there are monkeys who are throwing apples at the mother kangaroo. Sometimes the apples are thrown so that she must jump over them and sometimes they are thrown so that she must duck. If she gets face to face with one of the monkeys, she can punch the monkey with a boxing glove. She can also punch and destroy apples if they're thrown in level with her gloves. Also, there are pieces of fruit that she can jump up and get for points. Additionally, there is at least one bell on each level that she can hit so that more fruits will appear. She must be wary of the big Ape, who will occasionally appear and try to take her gloves away from her. The level must be completed before the time runs out, otherwise the player will lose a life.

Levels 1, 2 and 4 consist of different platforms that the mother kangaroo must jump onto or climb onto via a ladder. On the third level, the cage in which the kid kangaroo is imprisoned is held up by an entire troop of monkeys and there is a horde of apples that the monkey will unleash if five of them climb up there. On this level, the mother kangaroo must punch each monkey in the stack several times until the cage is lowered and when the cage has been lowered enough, the mother kangaroo must climb to the next floor to get to the kid kangaroo before the cage is raised again or before the monkeys have an avalanche of apple cores unleashed.