Once when I was a little kid I went to the local rollerskating rink. I have been there many times, but on one trip they had Zoo Keeper. I only saw this game twice after that. Once it was at an arcade called Arnie's Place which dissapeared. The other time it was in Funspot in New Hampshire. This is a classic video game and has been overlooked by many many people. There isn't much to say about it though. The idea of the game is you are a zoo keeper. You have to keep all the animals in the zoo. The main levels require you do do so. The screen consists of a timer and the playing field. The level is over if you are alive when the timer runs out. At this point all the animals in the zoo are counted for points. You play by moving the zookeeper clockwise or counter clockwise around a rectangle. If his feet are touched down and he is walking he will do the mason thing and lay bricks to increases the thickness of the zoo walls. If he is jumping over an animal he gets points for the jump, but lays no bricks. There is a cage in the middle of the screen where the animals come from. If the animals are within the brick wall you get points for them. If not they can kill you if you don't jump and you will get no points. Animals inside however will eat the bricks away in an attempt to escape. On the timer there are little pictures. When the timer gets to a picture that item will appear and you can get it for points. Once a level a net will appear. If you get the net it works like a DK hammer. It sends any animals you bag back to the cage.

All you have to do to beat this game is jump the animals which isn't hard because the guy jumps like superman. You have to learn to jump around corners in later levels. And you have to anticipate where the animals are going to try to escape so you can concentrate the bricks in that area. In levels that start out with no bricks you have to be able to set up a complete wall quickly or you will be jumping a long time. That's basically the main part of the game. It's very addicting especially when new animals come and you start seeing lions that will bust throught the thickest walls, but give tons of points if they stay inside.

After you beat some of the normal levels you are taken to the super level. What's the best animal in the zoo? The monkey. How come there aren't any in the game? Because it's the boss of the game. In the super level there are tons of moving platforms and items on some of them. You must climb to the top and rescue the girl from the evil monkey. This isn't a bonus level. If you die here it's game over. It's not hard but the monkey throws crazy amounts of coconuts. If you touch a coconut you start again from the bottom.

Every few super levels you run into an extra life stage. In the extra live stage you have to run right up and then left to get to the extra man. However there are two cages of animals. To keep from dying you have to jump over all the animals that come at you. Also if you die here it's game over. If you don't get the extra life, you lose all your lives. That is often what happens because I was never able to beat this part. I saw someone do it once, but they lost two lives in the process for a net of one lost life. That's the only thing that makes this game have a 4 not a 5 is that in bonus levels you can lose all your lives.

Zoo Keeper was one of the greatest quarter munchers of all time. It takes second place behind DK, Mario, Pac-Man, Centipede, Galaga, etc. But it's still great enough that it deserves notice. Not enough people know about it, and very few have the skills to keep the animals in the zoo. The zookepere is a beer drinking Irishman! The most common items on the timer besides nets are four leaf clovers and beer mugs! Guiness baby!

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