Video Game / SPISPOPD

SPISPOPD (or Smashing Pumpkins into Small Piles of Putrid Debris) is an Action-Adventure Puzzle Game series developed and published by indie developer Hamumu Games.

The first game of the series, SPISPOPD, was made in 1993 in response to a joke centered around Doom's one-word title. SPISPOPD followed the story of Bouapha the Gourdslayer as he travelled around Pumpkinia to retrieve stolen candles and smash the pumpkins responsible for stealing them.

A direct sequel to SPISPOPD, SPISPOPD II: Dr. Lunatic, was released seven years later in May 2000, and was the first game in the series played from a Three-Quarters View, 2½D perspective. Bouapha reprises his role as the player character, but this time, he has to deal with the game's eponymous character: a Mad Scientist who plans to take over the world by creating a Zombie Apocalypse. Bouapha must Walk the Earth and defeat Dr. Lunatic's poker buddies to obtain the four Keys of Lunacy that will allow him to open the front door of Dr. Lunatic's stronghold. Two expansion packs were released for Dr. Lunatic, the Expando-Pak and Fun Pack, which primarily added more levels and monsters to the original game. Dr. Lunatic and its expansion packs were re-released in October 2011 as a single game, featuring slightly optimised code that improved the game's compatibility with the most modern operating systems.

On September 18, 2003, a complete overhaul of Dr. Lunatic, titled Dr. Lunatic Supreme With Cheese, was released. Supreme radically altered the user interface of Dr. Lunatic, with its primary claims to fame being the over-1000 levels a standard install of it has, a ton of Unlockable Content and an extremely easy to use World Editor that allows players to create their own levels (once they have unlocked it). Just like Dr. Lunatic, Supreme received an Updated Re-release in May 2012.

The SPISPOPD series has played an important role in Hamumu Software culture. Dr. Lunatic's art style and game mechanics, in particular, influenced the look and feel of every Hamumu Software game released until 2008's Costume Party and, to a large extent, defined Hamumu Software as the company that it was until the game's programming code was retired in that same year.

Since March 2018, all three games have been distributed for free on itch.io.

See also the Adventures of Bouapha games.

Has nothing to do with The Smashing Pumpkins.

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SPISPOPD smashes the following tropes into small piles of putrid debris:

• 2½D: Dr. Lunatic and Supreme. The monsters, characters and projectiles are 3D models rendered as sprites, the floor textures and walls are made of 2D sprites, the game is played from a fixed overhead view, and Bouapha can only be controlled in the compass directions (although he can be bounced into the air in Supreme if he steps on tiles with the correct parameters).
• Action Bomb: The Boomkin in the Fun Pack expansion for Dr. Lunatic is Made of Explodium. When it sees the player, it will relentlessly charge them and attempt a Taking You with Me collision. If it is defeated by getting hit from weapons fire, it will still explode and damage the player if they are too close to it. And has 1 life, meaning a stray AK-8087 shot is enough to make it blow up, even on Lunatic difficulty.
• Ain't Too Proud to Beg: The eponymous Dr. Lunatic, one of the very few characters to have voice acting, runs away and exclaims "Please don't kill me!" as his health drops. Considering what happens when you do kill him, though...
• The All-Seeing A.I.: Averted only in Supreme on Stealth levels; monsters cannot see enemies standing on tiles with a light setting below a specific value.
• Attack Reflector: The Reflector Shield secondary weapon in Supreme. It reflects all enemy projectiles and negates splash damage from explosions.
• Bland-Name Product: AK-8087, Richie Lich and Zomboni, among other less notable examples.
• Broken Bridge: Most worlds in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme have levels that are blocked off until the player completes a certain number of the levels that are accessible from the start, and in the case of the Crazy Asylum of Madness, four Keys of Lunacy (acquired by completing four other worlds) are needed in order to access most of the levels in it.
• Car Fu: Using a You-Go to run over various monsters Grand Theft Auto-style in Supreme.
• Cognizant Limbs: One of the most common traits among boss monsters. Variations include Combat Tentacles, giant claws and turrets.
• Continuity Nod: Pumpkins and the "Hammer Up!" sound effect in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme, as well as collectible candles in the latter, are all homages to the original game.
• Cosmetic Award: Gallery Goals in Supreme. The full version has 100 of them.
• Death Cry Echo: The player character, as well as many of the normal Mooks give off a unique sound when they are defeated. On the other hand, most miniboss and boss monsters just explode a lot.
• Death Ray: The Death Beam in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme, which is used by Dozer the Dozerian, Matilda, Loonybot 5000 and Richie Lich. It does enough damage in one shot to deplete the player's life twice.
• Denser and Wackier / Lighter and Softer: The first game in the series was the bloodiest and goriest. Later games softened things up to make the series more kid-friendly (such as the removal of blood and an Art Evolution to Garfield-inspired graphics), with Supreme being the least bloody, least gory, densest and wackiest game in the entire series.
• Do Not Run with a Gun: SPISPOPD averts this. In Dr. Lunatic, Bouapha cannot move and fire at the same time (he stops moving whenever he throws a hammer or fires his secondary weapon) and in Supreme, this is the default setting, which can be disabled when firing the character's primary weapon once you unlock the Move'n'Shoot ability.
• Double Unlock: After you unlock the Cheat Menu by purchasing it, the game reveals that you purchased an empty cheat list, and that you also need to buy the individual cheats to unlock them.
• Easy-Mode Mockery / Hard Mode Perks: In Supreme, your final score in a level is reduced or increased by 25% if you complete a level on Normal or Lunatic difficulty respectively.
• Enemy Scan: Supreme adds the Monster Scanner as a special weapon which, upon hitting another monster the very first time, throws up a Stat-O-Vision of the monster's description, then generates a barrage of homing shots if the monster is hostile to the player. The Monster Scanner also works on friendly monsters, but it does not damage them in any way.
• Escort Mission: In Supreme, any level with Buddy Bunnies is usually one of these. One kind of Buddy Bunny follows a predetermined path, while the other will follow Bouapha around.
• Every Car Is a Pinto: Autozoids and Traffic. Both have a quite deadly explosion sequence when they are defeated.
• Everything Fades: Anything that is defeated disappears into nothing. Unless if it was telefragged.
• Exactly What It Says on the Tin: Smashing pumpkins into small piles of putrid debris is one of the things you will do most of the time in SPISPOPD.
• Flash of Pain: Every monster and the player in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme turns red briefly when they take damage.
• Flunky Boss: Probably the most common trait among all boss monsters. Most can summon mooks to help them.
• Game-Breaking Bug: One version of the first game was missing a teleporter in one of the final stages. Because of that, the only path onward led to the only teleporter on a given level, which traps the game in an infinite loop to find the destination.
• Game Within a Game:
  • The SpisMall in Supreme has a handful of arcade game machines that the player can spend coins to play with. These arcade games aren't just a fun distraction; they can also earn you some extra money if you're at all decent at them. Due to their simple, but addictive nature, and the fact that they can make you some money, you very well may end up Sidetracked by the Gold Saucer.
  • Also within the SpisMall is the unlockable quiz show Who Doesn't Want to Be a Moron? It plays much like SPISPOPD Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? without lifelines or dramatic lighting.
• Gotta Catch Them All: The four SPISPOPD keychains in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme. Finding them is a requirement to obtain 100% Completion for all worlds.
• Gravity Barrier: "Crazy Asylum of Madness" in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme has this.
• Guide Dang It!: In Supreme, there are some gallery goals that are very obtuse. One requires you physically find it in the SpisMall, but you could wander around the mall for hours and not find it. Where is it? There's a You-Go on the opposite end of the parking lot that you start in. Get in the You-Go, then drive down the road south of the mall, driving past tons of obstacles. You can't just walk because there's barriers that only the You-Go can destroy Another goal requires you complete a text adventure that you're unlikely to find without simply stumbling across it or reading about it.
• Harder Than Hard: Supreme, when cranked up to Lunatic difficulty, causes all monsters to move faster and do more damage, while at the same time reducing the damage you do.
• Harmless Freezing: Being frozen in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme does no damage and only stops the affected monster from moving for a few seconds.
• Hub Level: The entire series' level structure. The original release of SPISPOPD featured a "hub world" where the player could choose which series of levels to play, and both Dr. Lunatic and Supreme start the player off on a "hub level" in any world, where they can enter other levels through doors/houses/openings/hollow trees/etc. Taking this to a T is that starting the player off on a hub level when they first enter a world was a requirement for any player-made world to be hosted on Hamumu's website.
• Idiosyncratic Difficulty Levels: Supreme's easy difficulty level is Normal, whereas its actual normal difficulty level is called "Hard". Its hard difficulty is called "Lunatic".
• Improvised Weapon: The Mines and Jetpack in Supreme can double up as a rear-facing stationary bomb layer and Toaster respectively. You can probably see where this is going.
• Intentionally Awkward Title: Smashing Pumpkins into Small Piles of Putrid Debris; although the name was not conceived by Hamumu, but rather taken from an old joke about how the next big id Software game should have an unwieldy title just to weed out casual gamers who won't care enough to memorize its name. Dr. Lunatic Supreme With Cheese also counts.
• Killer Rabbit: Doom Bunny in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme. Whatever you do, do not hit one with a weapon.
• Kill It with Fire: Prominent examples include the Toaster, as well as Magmazoids and Scary Scarab.
• Lethal Lava Land: The cavern tile set included with Dr. Lunatic and Supreme includes lava tiles as part of the setting. Consequently, most cavern-themed worlds/levels are guaranteed to be this.
• Level Editor: The World Editor in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme; the one in the latter is Unlockable Content.
• Level Goal: Collecting all the candles on a level in SPISPOPD and touching a specific tile; collecting all the brains on a level and touching a specific tile in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme.
• Limit Break: The Rage attacks in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme, which require filling up the Rage gauge to an amount higher than the player's current health in order to be activated. This is best done by defeating many monsters within a very short period of time and when the player's health is low.
• Macross Missile Massacre: The Death Turret in Supreme. Anything that gets within half a screen's range to just one of these is unlikely to survive the barrage of missiles it unloads relentlessly. The Missile Pack's Rage attack is a barrage of missiles in all directions, and the player can do this with a Missile Pack just by holding down the secondary fire button.
• Made of Iron: The Roly Poly in Dr. Lunatic with its 2000 life. Defeating one takes ages unless your primary weapon is heavily upgraded or if you have a lot of weapons sitting around to use on it.
• Mad Scientist: Dr. Lunatic, the eponymous character of Dr. Lunatic and Supreme.
• Making a Splash: Sneaky Shark and Wet Willy.
• Mercy Invincibility: Averted, but it handles this aversion well as of Dr. Lunatic: most enemies can only deal contact damage through attack animations, which limits how much damage you can take from an enemy travelling as fast as you. However, fire, a projectile which has no collision and can damage you every frame, can still invoke Death of a Thousand Cuts due to this.
• Mirror Match: Evil Clone is this to Bouapha in Supreme, albeit with a different-coloured shirt.
• Monster Compendium: In the SpisMall in Supreme, there is a computer in the Zoobity Zoo area called the Supreme Monster Database, which displays every monster entry the player has seen using a Monster Scanner. The Database also includes additional entries on all monsters that the player can never hit using the Monster Scanner (such as Mine Carts, Rafts, Yerfdog, and the You-Go).
• More Dakka: The AK-8087 in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme. 99 rounds of energy slugs that do 1 damage each, completely expended after holding down the secondary fire button for about five seconds. Have fun.
• Muzzle Flashlight: Weapons fire from the Toaster or Missile Pack in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme will illuminate the tiles around the fired projectiles. Probably something that should not be done on Stealth levels in Supreme.
• My Name Is ???: In Supreme, the World Editor is shown on the main menu as a string of question marks until you unlock it.
• Mythology Gag: Many, to SPISPOPD.
  • The very presence of pumpkins as monsters, usually in secret levels, in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme.
  • Candles are introduced as collectible items in Supreme, which is a nod to collecting candles being the main goal in SPISPOPD.
  • One of the SPISPOPD keychains is a rocket, Bouapha's form of transport to the next level in the first game.
  • 020Pumpkin.ogg, which is played in most levels featuring pumpkins in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme, was originally a MIDI file present in older shareware releases of SPISPOPD, such as the one available on The Internet Archive.
• Never Say "Die":
  • The final world in SPISPOPD, H***. In addition, whenever the player's health reaches 0 in Supreme, the Record Book adds it to the number of "Defeats" for that profile.
  • Subverted when Dr. Lunatic himself pleas for you to spare his life. "Please don't kill me!"
• Nintendo Hard: SPISPOPD and Dr. Lunatic. Supreme averts this somewhat with difficulty levels, although given that players are free to create worlds with Fake Difficulty, this is subjective.
• Nitro Boost: The Particle Accelerator, a Timed Power-Up that makes you move a lot faster than normal.
• No Fair Cheating:
  • Averted with SPISPOPD and Dr. Lunatic, where you can get away with any cheat code you enter.
  • Supreme plays this straight with its Cheat Menu. Apart from spending 500 coins just to unlock it, the menu starts off completely empty; you need to spend additional coins to unlock each individual cheat in the menu. In addition, once you use a cheat in a level, the results screen that appears upon completing it has a few subtle changes calling you out for cheating through a level, as well as awarding you no coins or points for completing it. The trope then gets downplayed because the game still considers the level to be completed and does not stop the player from retrying the entire level without cheating.
• No Plot? No Problem!: Supreme. The story is still there, but defeating the main bosses is now an optional extra.
• One Bullet at a Time: Played with in SPISPOPD, in that the number of hammers the player character can have on the screen is determined by how many Hammer Up! powerups they have collected so far. Averted in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme.
• One-Hit-Point Wonder: Ludicrous Mode in Supreme, which makes any hit, even an Eensy Weensy's Scratch Damage, instantly lethal to you.
• One-Hit Polykill: The Toaster in Dr. Lunatic shoots a small blast of flame that passes through every enemy it damages. When the secondary fire button is held down, it releases a stream of napalm that will burn through every enemy within its short range. Coupling it with an Ammo Crate in Supreme makes it one of the most dangerous short-ranged weapons the player can get in the game.
• Outside-the-Box Tactic: The Dark Vampire in Dr. Lunatic can only be damaged if you coax it onto tiles with a light setting higher than or equal a specific amount or via telefragging. It is otherwise impervious to everything.
• Post-Defeat Explosion Chain: Autozoids and Traffic have extensive explosion sequences when they are defeated.
• Psycho Serum: Defeating Dr. Lunatic in the Crazy Asylum of Madness will play a cutscene that shows how he becomes a One-Winged Angel when you defeat him.
• Purely Aesthetic Gender: Averted in Supreme with Lunachick, Dr. Lunatic, Shtupid Shroom and Happy Stick Man, as each of them have their own unique primary weapon, Death Cry Echo and Victory Quote.
• Puzzle Boss: In Dr. Lunatic and Supreme, the challenge in a good number of levels with boss monsters is figuring out where to collect all the firepower needed to defeat them. More often than not, the actual boss fight itself is relatively easy compared to this.
• Puzzle Game: This is essentially the original aspect of the games, and most of the player-made worlds for Supreme follow it.
• Quad Damage: The Supreme Squeezy Cheese, a Timed Power-Up introduced in Supreme, makes all of your hammers move very fast and each deal as much damage as a missile. The effect doesn't last very long, but it greatly enhances your damage output.
• Say My Name: KONGOR!! and PUMPKIN! in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme. KONGOR!!, in particular, is very verbal about it.
• Scratch Damage: The Eensy Weensy always does 1 damage with its attack.
• Set a Mook to Kill a Mook: The Mind Control Ray in Supreme. It only has one round of ammunition, but for a full minute or until it dies, an enemy that is hit by it will be invulnerable to your attacks and will go to town on other enemies to you it sees.
• Shareware: The original version was shareware, but relies on the honor system.
• Shout-Out: Several, to Doom:
  • The title, which originated in online discussions prior to the release of Doom in which people jokingly discussed what the next big game would be.
  • The first game's final boss, the Spider Pumpkin, is pretty obviously based on Doom's Spider Mastermind.
  • The ending sequence of earlier versions of the game (later versions just made a generic "You Win!" screen after each world) had Bouapha returning to Earth only to find that the pumpkins had already invaded, just like Doom's ending.
• Slippy-Slidey Ice World: Icy Mountain in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme, but especially in Supreme, where many levels feature thin or Frictionless Ice.
• Sphere of Destruction: The Mines' Rage attack in Supreme. An expanding ring chain of explosions from the player makes it one of the most powerful Rage attacks in the game.
• Stat-O-Vision: The Monster Scanner in Supreme. It even shows Description Porn when a monster is hit by its projectiles the very first time.
• Status Buff: Acquired through various powerups in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme.
• Super Drowning Skills: Across the entire series, the player character dies instantly if they touch a water tile...
  • Super Not-Drowning Skills: ...but in Supreme, the player character can also survive underwater for about 45 seconds without air and stay underwater indefinitely if they are standing near air bubbles. In addition, if the player runs out of air underwater, they don't die immediately, but their health bar will go down very fast.
• Take That, Audience!: The defeat message shown to players in SPISPOPD was "You suck". The default defeat message in Dr. Lunatic was changed to "Try again!" but players had an option to switch it back to "You suck". Supreme removed the option and stuck to "Try again!", thus averting this trope completely.
• Tele-Frag: Can be done in Supreme by having a non-ghost monster teleport to the same location as another non-ghost monster, instantly killing the latter.
• Three-Quarters View: Dr. Lunatic and Supreme.
• Title Scream: SPISPOPD, when it finishes loading.
  "Ssssssmashing Pumpkins into Sssmall Piiiles of Puuuutrid Debris!"
• Turns Red:
  • Matilda in Dr. Lunatic. Her head must be destroyed three times. On the second round, her head's protective hide falls off, allowing her to fire her Death Beam faster; at the same time, her tail projectiles have a slightly increased effective range. On the final round, her skull and mouth are blasted away, preventing her from firing her Death Beam and giving her less life, but causing her tail projectiles to have an insane range that makes close-up attacks near-suicidal.
  • In Supreme, Dozer the Dozerian's front grille gets blown off when it is down to half of its maximum life, revealing (and allowing it to fire) its Death Ray.
• Unintentionally Unwinnable:
  • There are a few dumb ways to make the hidden text adventure in Supreme unwinnable. Some side areas can only be entered with certain items, but have a one-way exit back to the main area. The items required to enter these areas can be dropped while inside the area. Make of that what you will.
    These unwinnable situations, in particular, are:
    • Leaving the jar in any of the southernmost rooms and exiting to the northern part of the map. If you haven't watered the seed yet, or there were any other yet-to-be-useful items in that area, you'll have to restart.
    • Leaving the pirate boots in The Icy Path and exiting to The Icy Foothills. If any useful items were in that specific room, such as the quarter, you'll have to restart. Not even approaching the room from The Icy Chasm, which is physically higher up, will work without the pirate boots. (Leaving the climbing gear on top of The Icy Mountain Peak can not lead to a situation like this, as the game refuses to let you go down until you've picked up the climbing gear again.)
• Unlockable Content: Supreme contains many additional locations and features that are usually unlocked with coins. Even the World Editor is unlockable content!
• Updated Re-release: Dr. Lunatic in October 2011 and Supreme in May 2012.
• Victory Sphere of Light: Upon collecting all the brains on a level in Dr. Lunatic and Supreme, the player character will yell a Victory Quote and illuminate the area around them.
  Bouapha: "I'M KOOL KAT BAD!"
  Lunachick: "Whoohoo!"
  Dr. Lunatic: "Huhuhuhu! Get 'im boys!"
  Happy Stick Man: "Happy Stick forever!"
  Shtupid Shroom: "YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!!!"
  MechaBouapha: *grunts*
• Violation of Common Sense: Some of the Gallery Goals require the player to do this. Drowning with an Energy Barrier active, for instance, or walking unarmed into a crowded animal enclosure to touch a star at the far end.
• Weapon Specialization:
  • Bouapha and his red hammers, which are efficient for both melee and range combat.
  • Dr. Lunatic: Bolts of electricity which can chain to multiple enemies.
  • Lunachick: Her megaphone, which fires large bursts of red sound energy.
  • MechaBouapha: Same as his non-mechanical counterpart.
  • Shtupid Shroom: Poison mushroom spores, which are the only weapon used by a playable character that can inflict poison.
  • Happy Stick Man: Random projectiles of various types.
• Xenomorph Xerox: The "Xeno Hunter" enemy in Supreme, and related enemies.
• You Have Researched Breathing: The World Editor and Move'n'Shoot ability in Supreme. You need to spend coins to get both.
• Zero-Effort Boss: Dr. Lunatic - the final boss - subverts this. As himself, he has no attack, very little life and runs from you if you get too close to him. However, he is also hard-coded to revive as the Super Duper Zombie the moment you defeat him.