STINKOMAN COMPLETE

December 21, 2020 1:51 AM

Fifteen years ago, homestarrunner.com's fictional video game company Videlectrix released Stinkoman, a Flash platformer game starring the "20X6" version of their characters. Eventually the game would end up with nine levels and a promised 10th that was never finished. UNTIL NOW, literally days before browser support for Flash dies forever. The ridiculousness of this timing is not lost on them. You might need to use these instructions to reenable Flash support--very temporarily, of course. (Note that the Flash install page still tries to install bullshit McAfee stuff if you don't uncheck those boxes.) Fortunately you don't need Flash to view the trailer.
posted by JHarris (15 comments total)

By coincidence I have a Windows 7 virtual machine that I was considering deleting since it was only taking up space. Who knew I'd find a use for it in 2020?

For that matter who knew I'd harbor the slightest bit of nostalgia for Flash? I haven't run anything with Flash on my home computers for years, maybe a decade. It's amazing how long it's taken Adobe to end it, especially when considering how quickly they've happily killed off other things I've relied heavily on.
posted by ardgedee at 3:09 AM on December 21, 2020 [4 favorites]

I've worked through the levels up to 5 now, and wow, the game is really cheap in places. Take advice and play the New Mode, it's a bit less annoying, although your blood will still get pretty angried up by the end of it. Playing this reminded me of a lot of the frustrating things about Flash games, like levels that compound little frustrations on each other. Like, control delays with switches you must hit X number of times with an unintuitive blocking move and an enemy that appears for a split second at the edge of the screen to snipe you, and inflict stun frames, at the wrong time (yes I'm talking about Level 4).

Which is, of course, why there's the New Mode, which doubles your health, puts in level midway checkpoints, gives you five lives AND puts you back on the ground if you fall into a pit (sometimes--it's buggy). But even with all that, I'd keep breakables and liquids away from you while playing this.
posted by JHarris at 3:32 AM on December 21, 2020 [1 favorite]

BTW, Chrome seems to work a bit better than Firefox for this on my machine, in Firefox even when the game would play it didn't display any graphics on my screen.
posted by JHarris at 3:33 AM on December 21, 2020

Does this mean Animusic 3 might come out someday? Hopefully there won't be problems with being able to play it.
posted by Nancy Lebovitz at 5:31 AM on December 21, 2020

A much safer and better way to play vs. enabling flash is to download the swf and then play it using Ruffle.

though I haven't actually played through; it's possible there are bugs, though in general Ruffle is extremely good
posted by dmd at 5:42 AM on December 21, 2020 [3 favorites]

I've done it for you if that helps.
posted by dmd at 5:49 AM on December 21, 2020 [5 favorites]

Ruffle seems to missing quite a few (external?) assets... including the actual ground for the 1.1 level which means you just keep falling and dying.
posted by Nonsteroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drug at 7:50 AM on December 21, 2020 [2 favorites]

I absolutely love the concept of this game, but between the counterintuitive controls and the lack of pausing, I have never been able to go much of anywhere in it. But I'm totally delighted by the new animated trailer that runs in front of it.

I WILL FIGHT A BRICK WALL!
posted by Countess Elena at 9:01 AM on December 21, 2020

Do not ducking install flash! It's a goddamn backdoor.
posted by metametamind at 9:50 AM on December 21, 2020

Modern browsers are very cautious about Flash applets even when it's installed. You have to jump through multiple hoops to get them to play, and even Chrome forces you to click on the applet anew on every restart. Of course you could phrase it like, "Do you really want to hand your whole machine over to The Brothers Chaps??!?!" But Flash is going away entirely in a few days anyway.
posted by JHarris at 11:31 AM on December 21, 2020

Do you really want to hand your whole machine over to The Brothers Chaps??!?!

Hmm... Will they turn it into a Lappy 486? Because maybe!
posted by biogeo at 11:35 AM on December 21, 2020 [2 favorites]

OMG SmallBu knocked that intro out of the park. (I've been humming their PSA on handwashing for a while now.)
posted by fifteen schnitzengruben is my limit at 12:51 PM on December 21, 2020

As a curator for BlueMaxima's Flashpoint Flash-preservation project, rest assured they're on it like a bonnet. The next version, following the Flashocalypse, is going to be a banger (Escape Men! Actionscript 2-era Poptropica! We even found most of Prawn to be Wild!).
posted by BiggerJ at 9:47 PM on December 21, 2020 [1 favorite]

Also, Ruffle can't run it yet because it's not ready for various kinds of prime times, including multi-file games (on an unrelated-to-this-game note, it also can't run ActionScript 3 yet.)
posted by BiggerJ at 9:58 PM on December 21, 2020 [1 favorite]

Actually, here's how to get it to run in Flashpoint if you don't trust the browser plugin and don't want to wait for the next version of Flashpoint.

1. Download Flashpoint Infinity 9.0 from the Flashpoint site.
2. Join the Flashpoint Discord (linked from here).
3. On the Flashpoint Discord server, search for 'from: Souls#9280 in: pending-fixes stinkoman' without quotes, and download both .zip files you find this way (StinkoHomestar.zip and Stinkomancutscenes.zip).
4. In your Flashpoint Infinity 9.0 folder, open the Legacy folder, then the htdocs folder.
5. Open the StinkoHomestar.zip file, open its content folder, then drag all the folders you find into the htdocs folder you opened in step 4.
6. Do step 5 again, this time with the Stinkomancutscenes.zip file.
7. Open Flashpoint 9.0, search for Homestar Runner and play it. You'll find a link to Stinkoman 20X6, and you can also access it through the games menu.

If you find any problems, please mention them to Souls, the uploader, in #bug-reports.
posted by BiggerJ at 10:12 PM on December 21, 2020 [2 favorites]