The Evil Squirrel

Lore & Background

While debuting as a family-friendly series, starting with Conker's Pocket Tales, it has shifted focus to mature audiences with the development and release of Conker's Bad Fur Day; during development, the game was modified to incorporate graphic violence, strong language, offensive humor, and other mature content. These changes resulted in the title receiving a Mature rating from the ESRB, accompanied by a content advisory displayed on the packaging and the title screen when immediately powered on to caution unsuspecting viewers who might otherwise mistake it for a platformer intended for a younger audience. A graphically improved remake of Conker's Bad Fur Day, along with new multiplayer modes, was released as Conker: Live & Reloaded on June 21, 2005 in North America for the original Xbox. Conker's Bad Fur Day was released on Rare Replay and Live & Reloaded has been made backward compatible with the Xbox One and the Xbox Series X.

In Their Own Story

The barrel was supposed to be in the cellar. It was not in the cellar. It was in the river, rolling downhill toward the town, and Conker was still on the dock, holding a half-eaten biscuit and muttering about his shift ending in twenty minutes. The water was cold. The barrel was heavy. The barrel was also, he now realised, the wrong barrel. He watched it crash through a fence, knock over a stack of crates, and come to rest against the leg of a very confused badger. Conker took a long sip of his drink, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and said, "Right. That's it. I'm going on holiday."

He was, of course, not going on holiday. He was going to wade into the river, climb a three-storey factory, and probably start a fight with something that had twice his mass. But at that moment, in that narrow slice of time, the barrel was still rolling, the badger was still staring, and Conker was still pretending he had a choice.

Reader's Guide

Games: Conker's Pocket Tales (1999) - Game Boy Color; Conker's Bad Fur Day (2001) - Nintendo 64; Conker: Live & Reloaded (2005) - Xbox, PC; Young Conker (2016) - Microsoft HoloLens. Related games: Diddy Kong Racing (1997) - Nintendo 64; Project Spark (Conker's Big Reunion) (2014) - Xbox One; Rare Replay (2015) - Xbox One.

Did You Know?

• Conker was introduced at the Electronic Entertainment Expo in 1997.
• Conker's Bad Fur Day was originally titled Twelve Tales: Conker 64 and before that Conker's Quest.
• Conker's Bad Fur Day received a Mature rating from the ESRB with a content advisory on the packaging and title screen.
• Conker: Live & Reloaded was released on June 21, 2005 in North America for the original Xbox.
• Young Conker was released for the Microsoft HoloLens in 2016 and its trailer received more than 30,000 dislikes against just over 1,000 likes.