Kurt Hectic, retracting his parachute.
Kurt Hectic is one of the major characters of the series, and is the only character who is playable in both MDK and MDK 2. He is the reluctant janitor aboard the Jim Dandy, forced to save the world.
Personality[]
Kurt falling from orbit.
Kurt is very easily irritated, and longs for nothing more than an ordinary life. He enjoys the company of his employer, Doctor Fluke Hawkins, and is friends with Max (but whether him and Harvey speak is unknown). However, this also leads to his bizarre life, as the doctor has exiled himself from Earth and taken his janitor in tow. No cleaning robots or other personnel are ever seen on the ship, so it's assumed that Kurt does all the work on the Jim Dandy in cleaning up. While the mess Hawkins creates is considerable, he finds the pay satisfactory. Harvey is assumed to help him, but it's never shown how.
An unambitious janitor.
Despite Kurt being nothing more than a janitor, he seems to be quite fit and agile, having easily adapted to the Coil Suit. He displays no reluctance or fear when aboard a Mine crawler, however, regardless of the power and size of the enemies he encounters. He stated on multiple occasions that he did not want to be sent down to Earth, and it's implied this is due to his apathy or reluctance to be a hero for no reason beyond selfishness. The ending of MDK 2 shows that he is somewhat xenophobic, giving a basis to his isolationism.
Kurt fighting aliens.
Kurt is very vengeful or objective-oriented, and is capable of charging through hordes of opponents to find leaders and targets, even taking on large WMD's from aliens just to destroy them. He took it personally when Schwang Schwing injured Max, and attacked Zizzy Ballooba for toying with them throughout the series.
Relations[]
Doctor Hawkins[]
Helmet concept art.
Kurt and the doctor appear to get along very well, although the doctor enjoys Kurt's company more than the other way. He does not appear to have any qualms with the doctor and willingly follows whatever he says, albeit while grumbling. He also does not seem to mind cleaning up the doctors messes day after day, and never visually chastises the doctor for leaving Earth, so chances are he is very content with his employer's decisions. He does remark to Schwang Schwing at one point that the Doc is indeed his friend.
Max[]
Max and Kurt did not exchange much dialogue, but they consider each other friends. The two are even shown jokingly messing around with their items, where Max goofs around with Kurt's sniper scope while Kurt tries Max's cigar and coughs.
Schwang Schwing[]
Out of all of the playable characters in MDK 2, Kurt interacts with Schwang the most, seeing him as incredibly annoying, but never seems to truly take Schwang seriously. The feeling is apparently mutual, as Schwang does not appear to consider Kurt at all, and considers the entire situation with Kurt as strictly business.
Other aliens[]
Kurt's attitudes towards the alien menace can be best summed up as lethargic. He sees them as a problem, but does not really want to deal with them. He does not appear to enjoy fighting them at all, and even argues with Schwang and Zizzy. He would personally rather leave them to being fought by someone else and return to his job. As a result, the majority of his irritation with the aliens is the fact that he has to deal with them to begin with.
Abilities[]
MDK[]
In the original MDK, Kurt is equipped with the Coil suit, the Chain Gun/Sniper Scope with varying bullet types, and the parachute integrated to the suit. He can fly off ventilation units when standing directly above them with his parachute open. He can also selectively sprint (which, unlike modern shooter games, does not have any negative side-effects).
MDK 2[]
Kurt is easily the fastest and most maneuverable of the group, capable of sidestepping and moving about quicker than the other two, and being able to strategize his movements much more so with the Chain Gun. He comes with two infinite weapons in his arsenal, allowing the player to choose their attack method much easier. He also has double the HP of the doctor, while half of Max (100 Hit points for Kurt). Like Max, Kurt can pull himself up ledges if he fails to land feet first but hits the sweet spot on the side of the ledge before falling. His animation shows him quickly lumber up, trying to get his legs on the platform and then standing upright.
Thanks to the Coil Suit, Kurt can completely negate falling damage by activating the parachute function on it before hitting the ground, making long falls not only survivable and impossible to die from, but also several levels place items and other goodies out of place of the player unless glided to using the parachute.
Kurt comes with two inventories. The first inventory is used outside of the Sniper Scope, and can be used by highlighting a weapon by scrolling through the inventory, and pressing use. Most of the weapons are either temporary upgrades (Super Chain Gun and Cloak) or grenade like items (Grenade, Dummy Decoy, etc).
Kurt's second inventory consists solely of the Sniper Scope. By highlighting the desired ammunition and pressing fire, Kurt will use that specific projectile to attack a target. As a result, everything but the basic Sniper Bullet has limited munitions and should be saved for stronger enemies, puzzles requiring special bullets (like the Sniper Mortar), or bosses. Only one item for the Sniper Scope is not a bullet, the Sniper Shield.
Kurt's stages often require a mixture of enemy fighting, parachute platforming, and Sniper Lock Ball puzzles. Nearly every other room Kurt enters will contain a puzzles solved by use of the Sniper Scope. Some stages also have parachute platform puzzles that often are either in congruence with sniper puzzles, or simply require the player to maneuver between multiple platforms safely. Kurt does occasionally run into rooms with multiple enemies, however the enemies are often spread apart and allow Kurt to take them out via Sniper Scope. Kurt also runs into a large number of Sentry Turrets which can only be dispatched by the Sniper Scope (although some turrets do exist that can be killed with just the Chain Gun).