Jumping over barrels in the 1981 arcade game Donkey Kong is one of the fundamental skills you need to master to progress through the levels. Here are some strategies and tips to help you consistently jump over barrels and avoid getting hit:

1. Timing Your Jumps: Pay close attention to the barrels' patterns and timing. You'll want to jump just before the barrel reaches you. If you jump too early or too late, you might collide with it.

2. Position Yourself Properly: Stand a bit away from the ladder, not directly underneath it. This gives you space to react and time your jump, especially because barrels can sometimes roll down the ladders.

3. Anticipate Barrel Movement: Barrels come in two main types: blue, which fall straight down the ladders, and red, which have the possibility of rolling down the ladders or continuing straight. Monitor their patterns to anticipate their movement.

4. Watch the Barrels' Speed: Barrels can speed up or slow down randomly, so always be on your toes and ready to adjust the timing of your jump accordingly.

5. Use the Hammers Wisely: If you're struggling to jump over barrels, use the hammers scattered on each level to smash them. Be aware that while you hold a hammer, you can't climb ladders which might limit your movement options.

6. Practice: Like most arcade games, Donkey Kong requires practice. The more you play, the better you'll get at judging when to jump.

7. Stay Calm: Don't rush through the level. Play methodically and stay calm, focusing on the barrels' patterns and your jumps.

8. Look Ahead: Always plan your next move in advance. Keeping an eye on what's coming will prevent you from being cornered or surprised by barrels.

9. Don't Corner Yourself: Try to stay in the center of the platforms rather than the edges. This gives you room to maneuver and prevents you from getting trapped.

10. Analyze Failures: If you get hit by a barrel, try to understand what went wrong. Learning from your mistakes is key to improving your gameplay.

By incorporating these tips into your gameplay, you should find yourself effectively jumping over barrels and scaling the levels of Donkey Kong. As with all games of this vintage, the key is persistence and pattern recognition. As you play more, you'll begin to feel the rhythm and flow of the game, which is invaluable for mastering it.

The original 1981 Donkey Kong arcade game features four distinct levels, each with its own set of challenges and layout. Not all versions of the game contain all four levels due to hardware limitations of some home system ports, but the full arcade version includes the following:

1. **Level 1: 25m (‘Barrels’ or ‘Girders’)**
- **Name**: 25m, often referred to as the "Barrels" or "Girders" level.
- **Characteristics**: This is the iconic first level where Mario, initially known as Jumpman, must navigate a series of platforms and ladders. Donkey Kong rolls barrels down the girders that Mario must either jump over or smash with a hammer power-up. Fireballs also appear as enemies on this stage. The goal is to reach the top platform where Donkey Kong is holding Pauline.

2. **Level 2: 50m (‘Factory’ or ‘Conveyor Belt’)**
- **Name**: 50m, also known as the "Factory" or "Conveyor Belt" level.
- **Characteristics**: This level introduces conveyor belts with cement pies (or 'pies') that move in opposite directions. Mario has to avoid these or jump over them while also dodging fireballs. His objective is to remove all rivets from the platform where Donkey Kong stands by walking over them, causing the section of the level to collapse and forcing Donkey Kong to move up.

3. **Level 3: 75m (‘Elevators’)**
- **Name**: 75m, commonly referred to as the "Elevators" level.
- **Characteristics**: In this unique stage, Mario must climb moving elevators while avoiding bouncing springs that Donkey Kong throws down. Timing is crucial here as Mario needs to leap onto and off of elevators at the right moments to progress. The goal is to reach the top platform to advance to the next stage.

4. **Level 4: 100m (‘Rivets’)**
- **Name**: 100m, often called the "Rivets" or "Girders" level as well.
- **Characteristics**: This is the final level in the cycle before the game loops back to the first stage with increased difficulty. Mario’s task is to move over all the yellow rivets, causing sections of the structure to fall and ultimately making Donkey Kong fall down. The level features fireballs as well as a new enemy, the rivet-removing creatures known as "Fires" that emerge from oil drums.

After completing these four levels, the game returns to the first stage (25m), but with increased difficulty such as faster-moving enemies and barrels. The game continues to loop and become progressively harder with each cycle. All of these elements combined create a challenging and engaging experience for the player, which is one reason why Donkey Kong has remained popular for decades and is considered a classic in the video game world.

The "White Bear" episode from the second series of the British television series Black Mirror is renowned for its complex narrative and thought-provoking themes. Created by Charlie Brooker, Black Mirror is an anthology series that examines modern society, particularly with regard to the unanticipated consequences of new technologies.

In "White Bear," we are presented with a woman named Victoria who wakes up with amnesia. She discovers that the world appears to be dominated by people who are intent on filming her distress with their phones, while a set of masked individuals hunts her down. As the story unfolds, the audience learns that this scenario is a form of punishment: Victoria is a convicted criminal, guilty of filming her fiancé torturing and killing a young girl, and her penalty is to relive a twisted form of the events every day, with her memory wiped at the end of each iteration so she can experience the terror and confusion anew the next day. The "White Bear Justice Park" is a facility where this punishment occurs daily, with the name referencing the logo seen during the episode—a stylized drawing of a white bear, which also alludes to the teddy bear owned by the murdered child.

The symbolism and main message of "White Bear" can be interpreted in several ways:

1. **The Media and Voyeurism:** The episode comments on the public's obsession with recording events rather than intervening, highlighting the desensitization and detachment produced by constant exposure to violence and suffering through media. The spectators within the episode represent a society more interested in consuming tragedies and horrors as entertainment than in taking action to prevent or stop them.

2. **Justice and Punishment:** "White Bear" questions the ethics of punishment—specifically, whether a punishment like Victoria's, which is based on public shaming and perpetual mental torture, is just. It draws attention to the potentially barbaric nature of society's desire for retribution and the spectacle associated with it.

3. **Memory and Identity:** By wiping Victoria's memory, the episode raises questions about the nature of guilt and responsibility if the perpetrator cannot remember her crimes. It challenges the viewer to consider what makes someone deserving of punishment and whether the aim is rehabilitation, retribution, or merely entertainment for others.

4. **The Spectacle of Justice:** The fact that Victoria's punishment is also a form of public entertainment suggests a critique of the way modern societies might turn justice into a spectacle—much like the public executions of the past—replacing genuine moral justice with a performance designed to satisfy the public's thirst for vengeance.

5. **Empathy and Morality:** The episode invites viewers to feel empathy for Victoria as they see her fear and confusion, only to have that empathy complicated by the revelation of her heinous crime. It plays with the viewer's moral judgments, making them question where their sympathies should lie and whether empathy should be extended to someone who herself failed to show it.

Ultimately, "White Bear" serves as a mirror for contemporary issues around crime and punishment, the role of technology in societal voyeurism, and the complexities of emotional responses to criminal justice. By leaving us unsettled and questioning, the episode achieves its goal of sparking discussion and reflection on these themes.

"San Junipero," the fourth episode from the third season of the anthology series "Black Mirror," explores the concept of an afterlife through a unique blend of technology and human experience. Here's how the episode delves into this theme:

**Setting as Metaphor:**
The titular setting, San Junipero, is presented as a simulated reality. This digital world offers a nostalgic recreation of different time periods, primarily the 1980s, where the deceased can live on and the elderly can visit weekly while their younger selves are depicted. This virtual paradise itself acts as a metaphor for heaven or an afterlife realm, a place where souls go after death to experience perpetual youth and pleasure, free from the suffering, decay, and finitude associated with the physical world.

**Technology and Consciousness:**
The episode introduces a technology that allows the consciousness of individuals to be uploaded to San Junipero upon their death. This challenges traditional notions of the afterlife by implying that it can be technologically manufactured rather than supernaturally bestowed. It raises questions about the nature of existence, identity, and what constitutes the 'self' when divorced from the body.

**Moral and Philosophical Questions:**
Various moral and philosophical issues are addressed through the storyline, such as the ethics of 'choosing' an afterlife, the significance of mortality for making life meaningful, and the implications of a man-made eternity. It prompts viewers to consider whether an eternal digital life is desirable or if it's the limitations and finality of life that give it value.

**Characterization and Personal Journeys:**
The protagonists, Yorkie and Kelly, embody different stances on the afterlife. Yorkie, paralyzed and on life support, views San Junipero as a second chance at life, whereas Kelly, who is terminally ill and has lost her husband and daughter, initially sees it as a rejection of her reality and past relationships. Their personal journeys through acceptance, love, and loss serve as narrative vehicles to explore the emotional impact and individual choices related to the concept of an afterlife.

**Cultural and Social Reflection:**
"San Junipero" also touches on how cultural and social attitudes shape our understanding of the afterlife. The episode's diversity in casting and the central same-sex romance subtly address how different times and societies have viewed relationships, mortality, and the afterlife, reflecting on the changing mores across the decades.

Ultimately, "San Junipero" uses its speculative fiction framework to interrogate contemporary ideas about the afterlife. Rather than providing definitive answers, it offers a nuanced, emotional, and speculative look at how humanity continues to grapple with these eternal questions through the lens of future technology—a poignant reminder that our search for meaning and continuity remains constant, even as the possibilities of our existence evolve. The episode stands out as a compelling piece of storytelling that provokes thoughtful reflection on life, love, and what may come after.

The "Nosedive" episode of "Black Mirror" is a dystopian take on a society that has taken social media to the extreme. While the episode is a work of fiction, it uses technology that extrapolates from current trends in social networking, smartphones, and augmented reality.

In the show, the characters use a ubiquitous technology, typically accessed through their mobile devices and specially-designed contact lenses, which allows them to instantly rate each interaction they have with one another on a scale from one to five stars. These ratings are accumulated to form an overall social score that affects every aspect of their lives, from their socioeconomic status to their eligibility for certain services or privileges.

The technology portrayed combines aspects of:

1. Social Media Platforms: These platforms monitor and record interactions, much like today's social media does with likes, comments, and shares. However, in "Nosedive," this concept is taken to the absolute personal level.

2. Augmented Reality (AR): The contact lenses that characters wear show the ratings above people's heads, similar to visual overlays in augmented reality technologies. Today, devices like Google Glass or various AR apps on smartphones provide primitive versions of this capability, overlaying digital information onto the real world.

3. Gamification: It applies game-design elements and game principles into non-game contexts. In this episode, the rating system turns social interactions into a competitive game where higher scores unlock higher social status and benefits.

4. Big Data Analytics and AI: The technology likely involves complex algorithms and artificial intelligence to process the vast amounts of rating data and to dynamically update each individual’s score based on every interaction.

The impact on society depicted in the show is severe. The incessant quest for a higher rating drives people to inauthentic behaviors, and the societal structure rewards those with high ratings with access to exclusive residential areas, premium services, and societal approval. Conversely, lower-rated individuals face discrimination and exclusion from many aspects of society. This system creates a culture of superficiality, where people are pressured to be overly pleasant and are constantly anxious about how every interaction might affect their ratings.

The episode is a sobering commentary on the potential pitfalls of letting our digital personae and the judgments of others dictate real-world success and personal worth. While the technology in "Nosedive" is not explicitly based on any one existing system, the episode serves as an allegorical warning about the potential trajectory of social media's influence on our lives.

"Black Mirror," created by Charlie Brooker, is an anthology series, meaning that each episode stands on its own as a separate story with a different set of characters, settings, and plots. The series does not follow a traditional chronological order or a continuous narrative across its episodes.

However, there are thematic connections between the episodes, as they all explore the dark side of technology and its impact on society. The speculative fiction nature of the series allows each episode to delve into various aspects of the human experience in techno-dystopian settings or scenarios where technology's unintended consequences come to the forefront.

While the stories are self-contained, fans of the series have noted various Easter eggs, references, and recurring motifs that suggest a broader "Black Mirror" universe, or at least a shared continuity. These might include background news tickers, brand names, or technology that appear across different episodes. These connections, however, tend to be more about creating a cohesive feel to the series and rewarding attentive viewers rather than establishing an explicit timeline or narrative interlinking the episodes.

When watching "Black Mirror," the key is to approach each episode as its own unique exploration of technological themes. The creators have given viewers the freedom to interpret any broader connections in their own way, and any chronological or narrative links are more suggestive and open to personal interpretation rather than forming a concrete overarching timeline.

In the original Mortal Kombat game released in 1992, there aren't any playable secret characters available to be unlocked. The concept of secret characters as playable options was introduced in later Mortal Kombat games. However, the first game did include a secret fighter known as Reptile, who served as an unplayable hidden opponent.

You could encounter Reptile by meeting a set of specific conditions in the game:
1. You had to be fighting on The Pit stage, which is recognizable by the bridge above a pit of spikes.
2. Something had to fly in front of the moon on the game screen, which occurs at random. This was usually a silhouette of Santa Claus in his sleigh or a witch on a broom.
3. You had to achieve a Double Flawless Victory, which means you needed to win both rounds without taking any damage yourself.
4. You had to execute a Fatality at the end of the match without using the Block button at all in the final round.

If all these conditions were met, you would be taken to the bottom of The Pit, where you would face Reptile as a hidden boss. He had the combined powers of both Scorpion and Sub-Zero, making him a formidable opponent.

It's important to note that while Reptile was a teaser for future secret characters to come, he was not a playable character in this game. In subsequent Mortal Kombat titles, additional secret characters were often included, and many of them were unlockable or playable after fulfilling certain game conditions. The challenge and allure of discovering these hidden fighters became a hallmark of the Mortal Kombat series, contributing to its lasting popularity and intrigue among fans.

In the original 1992 Mortal Kombat game, each character had a unique Fatality—a finishing move that could be performed at the end of a match to defeat the opponent in a brutal and spectacular way. Here is a list of the fatalities for each character from the arcade version of the game. Make sure to stand at the correct distance, which is typically close unless otherwise specified.

1. **Liu Kang**
- **Dragon Bite:** Rotate the joystick 360 degrees in a full circle starting from forward and ending in forward (you can also try doing a fast sweep from back to up) and press any punch button.

2. **Johnny Cage**
- **Head Uppercut Decapitation:** Standing close, hold Low Punch and press Forward, Forward, Forward, and then release Low Punch.

3. **Sonya Blade**
- **Kiss of Death:** From sweeping distance, press Forward, Forward, Back, Back, and Block.

4. **Raiden**
- **Electrocution:** Standing close, press Forward, Back, Back, Back, and then any punch button.

5. **Scorpion**
- **Toasty! Spear Decapitation:** From a jump distance, hold Block and press Up, Up.

6. **Sub-Zero**
- **Freeze and Shatter:** Standing close, press Forward, Down, Forward, and then press any punch button.

7. **Kano**
- **Heart Rip:** Standing close, press Forward, Down, Forward, and then Low Punch.

Remember that in order to execute a Fatality in Mortal Kombat, you must do so quickly after defeating your opponent in the final round of the match. As soon as "Finish Him/Her!" appears on the screen, you have a short window to perform the Fatality sequence.

It may take a few tries to get the timing and distances right, so don't get discouraged if you don't succeed at first. Practice in single-player modes to perfect your Fatalities before bringing them into competition against friends or in tournaments.

The original Mortal Kombat game, released in 1992, is centered around a martial arts tournament called "Mortal Kombat." This isn't just any tournament; it's a pivotal event with the fate of Earth on the line, embedded in centuries of tradition and mystical underpinnings.

Here's the core storyline along with some background:

**The Tournament's Purpose:**
Mortal Kombat is a ritual combat tournament that takes place between the champions of Earthrealm (our Earth) and Outworld, a dark, oppressive realm ruled by the evil emperor Shao Kahn. It was established by the Elder Gods, who decreed that if Outworld conquered ten consecutive tournaments, Shao Kahn would be allowed to invade and conquer Earthrealm. This "rule of ten" was created to give Earthrealm a fighting chance to defend itself against otherwise inevitable subjugation by Outworld.

**The Backstory:**
By the time of the original game, Outworld has already won nine consecutive tournaments, courtesy of its champion, the half-human, half-dragon Goro. Earthrealm's very existence hangs by a thread, and the next tournament is the final opportunity for its warriors to defend their realm.

**The Main Characters and Their Motivations:**

- **Liu Kang:** The main protagonist of the game, Liu Kang is a Shaolin monk who enters the tournament to defend Earthrealm and bring honor to his temple. He believes in the purity of the martial arts and fights to protect his home from devastation.

- **Johnny Cage:** A Hollywood action star who, despite his fame, seeks validation that his martial arts skills are legitimate and not just movie magic. He enters the tournament to prove himself to his skeptics.

- **Sonya Blade:** A no-nonsense member of the United States Special Forces, Sonya enters the tournament on a mission to pursue and capture the criminal Kano, who is also a participant in the tournament.

- **Kano:** The leader of the international crime syndicate, the Black Dragon. Kano is a ruthless mercenary who joins Mortal Kombat for personal gain and to escape his pursuit by Sonya Blade.

- **Raiden:** The thunder god and protector of Earthrealm. Raiden personally involves himself in the tournament to ensure that Earth has a fighting chance against the might of Outworld.

- **Sub-Zero:** A warrior from the Lin Kuei ninja clan, Sub-Zero is an assassin who enters the tournament for reasons that are shrouded in mystery. (In later games, it’s revealed that he was hired to assassinate Shang Tsung, the host of the tournament.)

- **Scorpion:** A specter seeking revenge for his own death and the slaughter of his family and tribe. He mistakenly believes Sub-Zero to be the murderer and seeks to kill him during the tournament.

- **Shang Tsung:** The sorcerer and main antagonist who hosts the tournament. He serves Shao Kahn and has been the key to Outworld's success in the previous tournaments through deceit and powerful dark magic.

The original Mortal Kombat game's narrative is limited by the technology of the time, but it laid the groundwork for one of the most intricate and extensively developed lores in video game history, which has expanded through decades of games, movies, comics, and animated series. The motivations of the characters and the stakes of the tournament provided a fertile ground for the series to build upon, growing into the vast and detailed universe it is known for today. The theme of good versus evil, the survival of Earthrealm, and the rich backstories of the characters all contribute to the dramatic tension that has captivated fans for generations.

In the original "Mortal Kombat" (1992) video game, each character has a set of special moves that can be executed using specific joystick and button combinations. Here's a list of the seven playable characters from the game and their special moves:

1. **Johnny Cage**:
- Green Bolt: Back, Back + High Punch
- Shadow Kick: Back, Forward + Low Kick
- Split Punch: (Close to opponent) Block + Low Punch

2. **Kano**:
- Cannonball: Hold Block (3 seconds), then release
- Flying Knife: Down, Forward + High Punch

3. **Raiden**:
- Lightning: Down, Forward, Low Punch
- Teleport: Down, Up
- Torpedo: Back, Back, Forward

4. **Liu Kang**:
- Fireball: Forward, Forward + High Punch
- Flying Kick: Forward, Forward + High Kick

5. **Scorpion**:
- Spear: Back, Back + Low Punch
- Teleport Punch: Down, Back + High Punch

6. **Sub-Zero**:
- Freeze: Down, Forward + Low Punch
- Slide: (Hold Low Kick + Back + Low Punch) then release Low Kick

7. **Sonya Blade**:
- Ring Toss: Back, Back + Low Punch
- Leg Grab: Down + Block + Low Kick
- Square Wave Flight: Back, Forward + High Punch

Remember that the game uses a five-button layout: High Punch, Low Punch, High Kick, Low Kick, and Block. Additionally, some moves require the player to be at a specific distance from their opponent, such as Johnny Cage's Split Punch.

Executing these moves during gameplay allows players to gain a tactical advantage by surprising opponents or countering their attacks, which is a fundamental aspect of the strategy in "Mortal Kombat."

Keep in mind that the effectiveness of special moves can vary based on your timing, the distance from your opponent, and your ability to combine these moves into combos or use them to strategically outplay your opponent in a fight.