Moon Minions

Moon Minions is a currently lost old Scott Cawthon game released in 2004. From the screenshot above some information we know from old Daily Click reviews and articles, we know the game was about a RPG where you can take control of a moonman and his minions on a robot infested planet and must try and destroy a interstellar dark energy called the "Phantom Core", a more detailed plot can be found below. Much more is known about this game and it's gameplay than other Scott games thanks to game info detailing the majority of it on the Daily Click found on the Wayback Machine.

## Plot & Gameplay

"The goal of Moon Minions is to explore a robot infested planet, chasing an interstellar dark energy called the Phantom Core. It takes on many forms using parts from the creatures it finds. Your mission is to chase it from location to location, destroying each new body it builds until it is defeated. Along the way, you can also build creatures using the parts you find. Kill enemies and use their parts to build battle companions. You can be working on three minions at any given time, each of which can help you in battle.

You may also release your minions into the wild, where other players may encounter them as enemies. If your minion kills another player, you receive exp and spoils, while that player just gets delayed in their quest. You can also bump into minions built by other (possibly more advanced) players, so watch out. Use the "run" option is needed.

Don't worry if you die, even from an unfair fight. ALL of your items, exp and info gets saved automatically to the server."

You can also build three minions at anytime with your moonman. Some attacks with your moonman include your quick attack, your special cannon shot move and running and for your minions a gun attack firing whatever item you have held, and a two cannon shot for special and of course run also. You can find "tanks" as well in the game that you can attach to your bots to give them special powerups as well as CPUs that make them appear as a monster, as well as the previously mentioned guns as well as shields that block attacks.

Fight- quick attack
Special- shot from arm cannon, fires your tank weapon if one is equipped.
Run- you have a two out of three chance of escaping each time you click this

Your minion:
Attack- fires whatever gun you have equipped in it's gun slot
Special- fires a blast of whatever weapon is equipped in it's tank slot
Heal- Use this to heal your moonman! Your minions HP cannot be restored during battle, but using this command will heal your main character. How much HP it restores is determined by that minions level.

Finding and applying items:

After battles, there are four kinds of items that you may find. You may find CPU's, tanks, guns, and sheilds. After battle, you may look at your items grid to see what you have found. If you see something that you want to keep, click on it and it will move to your current iventory slot reserved for that type of item. NOTE: you can only store one item at a time of each kind. Items in your "found" box stay there until the game is turned off. They save from battle to battle, but do not save to the server for the next time. Use them up quickly. There are many things to do with them that will save them however. All items in your moon man's inventory are saved, all items in the inventory of all three minions are saved, and all four items in your temp inventory is saved.

After picking which items to put into your temp inventory, click "done". You may now apply these items to either your current minion, or yourself. Note that applying them to your minion or your moonman have very different effects.

CPU's: Apply a cpu to a minion, and that minion takes on the appearance of the the monster. Apply a CPU to your moonman, and you and your current minion will absorb the exp from that CPU. This is a great way to add some quick level-up's to a minion at level 0.

Tanks: Apply a tank to a minion, and that minion will receive unlimited special attacks of that weapon type. Apply an ice tank, and that minion will obtain the ice attack special ability. A tank applied to a minion never wears off, and can only go away if you replace it with something else manually. Apply a tank to your moonman, and your moonman will receive ONE power shot with that attribute, but it will be much more powerful than that of the minions special attack of the same. Also, while that tank is equipped, your moonman will have special auto-properties in battle until your use your special attack.

special attributes:

Fire tank- none
Ice tank- auto-heal in battle
Goo tank- enemy auto-poisoned
Shock tank- auto-heal in battle X2
Dark tank- enemy poisoned in battle X2

NOTE: Remember, you only get these properties in battle when the tank is equipped to your moonman. If you use your moonmans special tank, he will fire his power shot and the attributes will be lost until the next tank is equipped.

If your moonman does not have a tank equipped, you still have unlimited special attacks but they are much weaker.

Guns: Apply a gun to your minion, and the minion will aquire that weapon as its "attack" function. There are five gun types. And using the attack command is twice as fast as using your special attack, so having a good gun equipped can be a life saver. If you apply a gun to your moonman, then you and your minion will both absorb the exp from that weapon. Once again, this is a good way to add quick levels to a minion at level zero.

Sheilds: Although these icons looks like sheilds, they actually affect your SPEED during battle. The same goes for your minion. Having a high level sheild equipped will cause your action meter to fill faster. You can apply a sheild to your minion or your moonman, both are permanent until you apply a new sheild. NOTE: If you apply a low level sheild to a character with a high level sheild, it will overwrite the high level sheild.

Minions:
You can build three minions at any given time. When in the menu, click the buttons "slot1" slot2" "slot3" to change between your minions and build them to your liking. You can also switch your current minion during battle by clicking the green orbs to the right of your minion. If one of your minions dies during battle, the next minion will take its place until you have no minions left.

After any battle, all three of your minions are restored to full health. You will not be restored to full health after battle however. You minions HP works differently than yours. A minion cannot be healed during battle. Your minions start each battle with a fixed amount of hp depending on their CPU and level. Each attack on you from an enemy deducts an equal amount from your current minion. Once that minion hits zero, they are out of the picture until the battle is over.

Releasing minions:
Once a minion has an item equipped in all four slots, it can be released. When you release a minion, other players may encounter it as an enemy. If you minion kills another player, you will be notified by that minion, and spoils will be sent to you. The spoils can be random, and depend upon how many minions you have under your command. The "authority" counter in the menu screen displays your minion value. Each time you release a minion, you gain authority points. More powerful minions are worth more points when you release them. Having higher points ensures that more players will encounter your minions, and also that more exp and better items will be taken.

How it works:
When you release a minion, a simple stat file is created with that minions basic info such as level, attacks etc. When another players encounters an enemy, they have as much as a 1 in 4 chance (in the last few areas) of encountering a player-made enemy. When this happens, that players computer downloads a random stat file to load into that enemy.

Enemies created by stat files are not exactly as they were when they were under your wing. For example, if you max out your minions speed, they will be faster when encountered as an enemy than they were at your side. Also, if your minion has an ion or ionX2 cannon equipped, this will be translated into a 5 or 6 shot cannon. Minions can heal themselves when encountered as enemies.

Auto-battles:
If there are not many players online at a certain time, the program will compensate by simulating battles between your minion program and another players minion program. In this scenario, the computer will pit a random minion of yours against a random minion of another player (who may be offline at the time). If their minion is defeated in this battle of stats, you will be notified of victory and get exp and items. This feature exists so that if someone plays the game after its popularity has come and gone, they can still have an online experience.

There ARE files stored on your computer relating to your minions, but tampering with those files will not alter your minions or their battles, it will only affect how your computer interprets the data they send you. So for accurate information, leave them alone. (example: changing a number in your file may cause a reporting minion to look like a different minion type, even though the other player still encountered the original).

Getting transmissions:
During the game, you will be contacted by two kinds of characters. Watch the top left corner of your screen. One type of transmission will be a minion reporting a victory. The other type will be headquarters sending you mission information. When you enter a new area, HQ will contact you with specifics on your next task.

ONLINE AND SERVER INFO:

Please be patient with the server. I enjoy making online game, but only have my home computer to act as the 24/7 server. This works fine most of the time, but it also experiences slow connections occasionally or may be dissconnected for a few hours at a time. I apologize for any inconvenience. But this computer is dedicated to acting as the server, and it is a fast machine, so most people will not encounter problems.''

## Trivia

* The game's main antagonist, the "Phantom Core" shares the name with one of Scott's earlier games the previous year, also named Phantom Core.
* The game's combat system has a surprising striking resemblance to the PS1 Game Digimon World 3 from the screenshot and information available.
* According to the game's reviewer one of the monsters comes out of a ball, similiar to that of Pokemon.