"Frak

Frak (expletive)

Frak is a fictional version of "fuck," "shit" or "damn" first used in the original Battlestar Galactica series. It continues to be used throughout different versions of the franchise as an expletive....

" is also a made-up expletive used in the TV series Battlestar Galactica

Battlestar Galactica

Battlestar Galactica is an American science fiction franchise created by Glen A. Larson. The franchise began with the Battlestar Galactica TV series in 1978, and was followed by a brief sequel TV series in 1980, a line of book adaptations, original novels, comic books, a board game, and video games...

and other popular media.

Frak! is a 1980s computer game originally programmed by Orlando (aka Nick Pelling

Nick Pelling

Nick Pelling is a British-born computer programmer, best known for a series of 1980s computer games for the BBC Micro written under the nom-de-plume Orlando M. Pilchard. He was educated at Brentwood School, and has both a BSc in Maths and Philosophy and an MBA with Distinction...

) for the BBC Micro

BBC Micro

The BBC Microcomputer System, or BBC Micro, was a series of microcomputers and associated peripherals designed and built by Acorn Computers for the BBC Computer Literacy Project, operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation...

 and Acorn Electron

Acorn Electron

The Acorn Electron is a budget version of the BBC Micro educational/home computer made by Acorn Computers Ltd. It has 32 kilobytes of RAM, and its ROM includes BBC BASIC along with its operating system....

 and published by his own 'Aardvark' software label in 1984. The game was ported to the Commodore 64

Commodore 64

The Commodore 64 is an 8-bit home computer introduced by Commodore International in January 1982.Volume production started in the spring of 1982, with machines being released on to the market in August at a price of US$595...

 the following year by 'The B Team' (Jason Perkins, Anthony Clarke and Mark Rodgers). The BBC and Electron versions were included on the Superior Software

Superior Software

Superior Software is a video game publisher. It was established in 1982 by Richard Hanson and John Dyson, two graduates of the University of Leeds, England...

 compilation Play It Again Sam 4 in 1987 and re-issued in budget form by 'Alternative Software' in 1989.

Frak! is a side scrolling platform game

Platform game

A platform game is a video game characterized by requiring the player to jump to and from suspended platforms or over obstacles . It must be possible to control these jumps and to fall from platforms or miss jumps...

 in which the player controls a caveman

Caveman

A caveman or troglodyte is a stock character based upon widespread concepts of the way in which early prehistoric humans may have looked and behaved...

 named Trogg. In each level, Trogg's object is to find three key

Key (lock)

A key is an instrument that is used to operate a lock. A typical key consists of two parts: the blade, which slides into the keyway of the lock and distinguishes between different keys, and the bow, which is left protruding so that torque can be applied by the user. The blade is usually intended to...

s located on the level. The platforms and ladder

Ladder

A ladder is a vertical or inclined set of rungs or steps. There are two types: rigid ladders that can be leaned against a vertical surface such as a wall, and rope ladders that are hung from the top. The vertical members of a rigid ladder are called stringers or stiles . Rigid ladders are usually...

s (replaced by logs, ropes and chains on later levels) constituting the level are laid out in a very tricky form. When Trogg steps off a platform, he does not fall straight down, but instead slides diagonally downwards. Added to the fact that long falls will kill Trogg, this calls for very skillful jumping among the platforms. Trogg exclaims "Frak!

Frak (expletive)

Frak is a fictional version of "fuck," "shit" or "damn" first used in the original Battlestar Galactica series. It continues to be used throughout different versions of the franchise as an expletive....

" (presumably an expletive) each time he dies. When the user manages to complete the three levels, they are returned to the first level with the screen display upside down. The game then repeats the same three stage sequence, following which it rotates 90 degrees and repeats again. Subsequent loops consist of video being displayed in black and white and rotated, and also the display being flashed on and off in three second intervals.
When the original BBC Micro version was converted for the Acorn Electron, the screen mode was changed from four colours to two because of the Electron's inferior video speed. The extra RAM freed up by the smaller frame buffer made it possible to include extra levels (bringing the total to nine against the BBC's three) and a screen designer which was not in the BBC original. The C64 version has six levels. Each level is much larger than the visible screen, and has a distinct graphical style and catchy background music (different for each level).

Enemies in Frak! come in three forms: the large, hairy Scrubbly, pig-like Poglet and large nosed Hooter (each static, as 'statues'), balloon

Balloon

A balloon is an inflatable flexible bag filled with a gas, such as helium, hydrogen, nitrous oxide, oxygen, or air. Modern balloons can be made from materials such as rubber, latex, polychloroprene, or a nylon fabric, while some early balloons were made of dried animal bladders, such as the pig...

s and dagger

Dagger

A dagger is a fighting knife with a sharp point designed or capable of being used as a thrusting or stabbing weapon. The design dates to human prehistory, and daggers have been used throughout human experience to the modern day in close combat confrontations...

s. The statues obviously stay still, whereas the balloons fly straight upwards and the daggers fly diagonally downwards. Contact with any enemy will kill Trogg. To combat the enemies, Trogg is armed with a yo-yo

Yo-yo

The yo-yo in its simplest form is an object consisting of an axle connected to two disks, and a length of twine looped around the axle, similar to a slender spool...

 that he can launch straight horizontally. The yo-yo will kill any enemy it comes into contact with.
Each level also has a time-limit, which can be topped up by the occasionally found light bulbs. However, if the time runs out, the level does not end - instead, the game continues in the dark.

Frak! encodes high scores as nonsensical secret messages, such as Hairy gonks kiss green Buddhas slowly. These could presumably be sent to the game's publisher as proof of reaching a high score.

In the 1990s, an attempt was made to port Frak! to the Amiga

Amiga

The Amiga is a family of personal computers that was sold by Commodore in the 1980s and 1990s. The first model was launched in 1985 as a high-end home computer and became popular for its graphical, audio and multi-tasking abilities...

, with updated graphics (including "frak!tals

Fractal

A fractal has been defined as "a rough or fragmented geometric shape that can be split into parts, each of which is a reduced-size copy of the whole," a property called self-similarity...

" in the background), but the port was never finished.

There was a notorious hacked modification known variously as Frak69, Frak Up or Frak Upgrade. Trogg's sprite now featured a crudely drawn penis, which did not replace the yo-yo weapon as stated in various anecdotes surrounding this version. The game was retitled, "Fuck!" and the same expletive now appeared in speech bubbles

Speech balloon

Speech balloons are a graphic convention used most commonly in comic books, comic strips and cartoons to allow words to be understood as representing the speech or thoughts of a given character in the comic...

 during gameplay. The title page was altered, changing the name of the characters in the game. Trogg becomes The Rapist and the monsters were replaced by "Wife", "Baby" and "Whore". The title page also bore the following legend:

Alteration ideas by A.Person...

Perversion beyond belief by *Orlando*

(C) Verysick Software 1985.

As part of the copy protection, illegal copies would cause Trumpet Hornpipe, the Captain Pugwash

Captain Pugwash

Captain Pugwash is a fictional pirate in a series of British children's comic strips and books created by John Ryan. The character's adventures were adapted into a TV series, using cardboard cut-outs filmed in live-action , also called Captain Pugwash, first shown on the BBC in 1957, a later colour...

theme tune, to play endlessly rather than loading the game properly (Pugwash being a pirate).