2008 video game
QWOP ( ) is a 2008 ragdoll-based browser video game created by Bennett
Foddy, formerly the bassist of 🔑 Cut Copy. Players control an athlete named "Qwop" using
only the Q, W, O, and P keys. The game became 🔑 an internet meme in December 2010. The
game helped Foddy's site (Foddy) reach 30 million hits.[1]
Background [ edit ]
Bennett
Foddy, 🔑 QWOP 's creator, at Fondation Brocher in October 2009
QWOP was created in
November 2008 by Bennett Foddy for his site 🔑 Foddy, when Foddy was a deputy director and
senior research fellow of the Programme on the Ethics of the New 🔑 Biosciences, The
Oxford Martin School, part of the University of Oxford.[2][3] He taught himself to make
games while he was 🔑 procrastinating from finishing his dissertation in philosophy.[4]
Foddy had been playing games ever since he got his first computer (a 🔑 ZX Spectrum 48K)
at age 5.[4] Foddy stated:
"One of the things I found with QWOP is that people like to
🔑 set their own goals in a game. Some people would feel like winners if they ran 5
meters, and others 🔑 would feel like winners if they inched all the way along the track
over the course of an hour. If 🔑 I had put a social leaderboard or par system in, those
people would probably have all quit out of frustration, 🔑 leaving only the most
determined or masochistic players behind."[5]
Gameplay [ edit ]
QWOP 's title refers to
the four keyboard keys 🔑 used to move the muscles of the sprinter avatar.
Players play as
an athlete named "Qwop", who is participating in a 🔑 100-meter event at the Olympic
Games. Using only the Q, W, O and P keys, players must control the movement 🔑 of the
athlete's legs to make the character move forward while trying to avoid falling
over.[6] The Q and W 🔑 keys each drive one of the runner's thighs, while the O and P keys
work the runner's calves. The Q 🔑 key drives the runner's right thigh forward and left
thigh backward, and the W key also affects the thighs and 🔑 does the opposite. The O and
P keys work in the same way as the Q and W keys, but 🔑 with the runner's calves. The
actual amount of movement of a joint is affected by the resistance due to forces 🔑 from
gravity and inertia placed upon it.
Breakthrough and popular culture [ edit ]
QWOP
featured at the Museum of Modern Art 🔑 in New York City in July 2011
On July 27, 2011,
QWOP was featured at the Museum of Modern Art in 🔑 New York City and was part of an event
called "Arcade" hosted by the video game art and culture company 🔑 Kill Screen.[7]
The
Guinness World Records awarded Chintamani, Karnataka resident Roshan Ramachandra for
doing the fastest 100m run on the game 🔑 on April 10, 2013, doing it in 51
seconds.[8]
QWOP appeared on the season 9 premiere of the American sitcom The
🔑 Office.[9]
Alternative versions [ edit ]
An iPhone app of the game was released in
2011.[10][11] The App version follows the same 🔑 gameplay as with the original version,
but the controls differ. The player controls QWOP's legs and arms by moving their
🔑 thumbs around in the diamonds on the screen.[12] Kotaku called the iPhone version "4000
Percent More Impossible" than the original 🔑 game[13] and "An Olympic Challenge For
Thumbs".[14]
A 2-player multiplayer version of QWOP named 2QWOP was also released in
February 2012,[15] 🔑 after being featured at an event in Austin named "The Foddy Winter
Olympics" displaying a selection of Bennett Foddy's games.[16][17] 🔑 This version places
the game in vertical splitscreen, automatically assigning one player's thighs and
calves to the Q, W, E, 🔑 and R keys, while the other player uses the U, I, O, and P
keys.[18][19][20][21][22]
See also [ edit ]
