Once again, Google has entirely outdone themselves with their newest doodle: In honor of the fiftieth anniversary of one of the most successful sci-fi shows in the history of ever, today's Google doodle is an 8-bit Doctor Who game, which features just about all of the key elements of the series: All 12 incarnations from the Doctor, from William Hartnell to Matt Smith, the Doctor's trusty sonic screwdriver, his mortal enemies the Dalek alien race, Cybermen, and, of course, the TARDIS. Trust me when I say, I just spent about an hour playing this game, and I did not even notice.
For those who have somehow never seen the series even though it's been around since, oh, 1963, it follows a man called the Doctor, who is the last of his alien race, the Time Lords. He travels around through the space-time continuum in that little blue police box called the TARDIS, generally with a hot female companion of some sort (right now that honor belongs to English actress Jenna-Louise Coleman). One of the key features of the Time Lords is their ability to regenerate a certain amount of times at the end of their life, or when killed. Though this effectively keeps them in existence for long time, when they regenerate, they develop a completely new appearance, new personality, new everything — the only thing that remains the same is their memories. This would explain why there are so many incarnations of the Doctor.
In the Google doodle — which, according to Deadline , is the biggest Google doodle ever — the user can portray any incarnation of the Doctor they choose, and must avoid enemies like Daleks and Cybermen to retrieve all the letters that make up the word 'Google.' Each letter serves as a new level, so there are six in total. The doodle (or Whodle) was created by English designer Matthew Cruickshank.
You can check it out below, or head on over to Google.co.uk to play. Doctor Who's 50th anniversary special, which features three incarnations of the Doctor together at once for the first time, is set to air tomorrow on BBC America in the US, and BBC One in the UK.
