Atari 2600 Friday’s #35 – Jungle Hunt

Can you survive the jungle?

The Story: Sir Dudley Dashly’s wife Penelope has been kidnapped! Venture into the Jungle to Save Tea Time!

From the Manual: “Let me introduce myself: Sir Dudley Dashly is the name, and big-game hunting is my game. It was, anyway, until yesterday afternoon at 4:00 (teatime, you know) when my wife, Lady Penelope Dashly (Lady P. for short) was kidnapped from camp. It simply ruined my whole tea service! Seems that a couple of savages saw Lady P. and decided to cook her up for their own tea!

Soon after Penelope was captured, the jungle drums started beating. My porters translated the message – they tell me it’s some sort of jungle memo:

TO: THE CANNIBAL COMMUNITY
FROM: THE CANNIBAL RESTAURANT SOCIETY
RE: TEATIME

WE HAVE A SPECIAL ON TODAY’S MENU! OUR SOUP DU JOUR IS ENGLISHWOMAN BROTH, MADE FRESH TODAY AND SERVED PROMPTLY AT 4:00. DON’T MISS THIS SPECIAL TEATIME TREAT, BROUGHT OVERSEAS FROM THE WILDS OF ENGLAND!

DIRECTIONS TO TODAYS MEAL ARE AS FOLLOWS: TAKE ELEVEN VINES THROUGH THE DEADLY FOREST, TURN RIGHT INTO THE REPTILE RIVER, GO PAST FOURTEEN CROCODILES AND EMERGE ON THE EDGE OF THE BOULDER FIELD. RUN THROUGH THE BOULDER FIELD UNTIL YOU REACH THE CANNIBAL CAMP. JUMP PAST THE TWO GUARDS, TURN LEFT, AND … YOU’RE THERE! BON APPETIT!”

From the Box: “Swing into action with one of the most popular arcade hits ever – Jungle Hunt! Realistic graphics place you deep in the jungle as you swing from vine to vine, fight off man-eating crocodiles, dodge bouncing boulders, and save your sweetie from the masked cannibals!”

The Gameplay: So, Dudley had to venture into the Jungle to save Penelope. This means you have to venture through 4 obstacles: The Forest of Vines, The Crocodile River, a Boulder Landslide, and 2 Cannibals with spears. You are given 5 lives with a new one every 10,000 points. When you start, you are given 500 seconds to reach Penelope, a counter on screen ticks down the time. In the Vine Forest, you have to swing across vines like George of the Jungle, don’t worry there are no trees to hit. In the river you have to either swim away from the crocodiles or fend them off with a knife, you can’t hurt them when their mouth is open. In a canyon or somewhere you have to dodge 2 sizes of boulders by jumping over them, running under them or ducking beneath them. In the cannibal’s camp, you have to avoid the spears and make it safely to Penelope. Once you save Penelope you go back to the beginning for an even harder trip. You keep playing until you run out of lives or time. You get bonus points for each rescue of Penelope.

The Controls: Up/Down/Left/Right movement.  Red button stabs crocodiles, jump over boulders/cannibals.

Post Review: Pretty easy game for the most part. it could be more of a who can rack up the most points challenge between friends. Only things of note not covered by the manual are that in the river, you can’t see it, but there is a surface about halfway up the screen, anywhere else you are diving and lose oxygen, just go to the surface to replenish. Also, it takes a little practice to jump the large boulders and cannibals since Dudley just barely clears them. Otherwise, go have fun in the jungle.

The High Score: 15360, The Penelope bonus points were about 10,000 of this actually, so looping the game for those bonus points as fast as possible could easily rack up the score.

Atari 2600 Friday’s #34 – Dark Cavern

It’s like Pac-man with guns and no yellow dots to collect!

The Story: You basically have a nameless protagonist trapped in a cave with deadly blobs, spiders, and robots.

From the Manual: “The object of the game is to avoid the blobs, spiders, and robots… and destroy as many of them as you can!!! Your man is trapped in the cavern, there’s nowhere to hide. Escape the creatures’ bites and keep away from robot fire. Shoot to destroy… rack up points! It’s a bitter fight to
the end!”

From the Box: “Start with 5 men. One is trapped in the cavern at a time. Keep away from the blobs, spiders, and robots!

Start with 20 bullets. Get more as you play. Shoot robots one after another…get more points!

Lose your man when he runs into a robot or gets hit by robot fire!”

The Gameplay: The game begins with you at the center trap door. as soon as you move up, the door locks and he is trapped in the cavern. Your character moves a bit like Pac-man, push a direction on the joystick and you move until you hit a wall. To shoot, Push Joystick in direction and press the Red button to shoot the gun. You can only fire one bullet at a time, you cannot shoot again until the current bullet is offscreen. You start with five men; you lose one each time you die and gain one for each yellow robot you kill to a maximum of five. Spiders will paralyze you for a few seconds leaving you defenseless. The blobs steal bullets, the longer you touch one the more you lose. There are one headed robot’s than can only shoot forward, and two-headed robots than can shoot in both directions.

The Controls: Up/Down/Left/Right movement.  Push Joystick in direction and press the Red button to shoot the gun.

Post Review: This is one of those seriously hard games. The robots are constantly shooting at you. If you sit in the center cell they will circle and try to shoot you through the wall. It was hard to tell, but the enemies might be moving slightly faster than you are. Your best bet is to sit at a corner and try to shoot then move out of the way of their bullets, harder than it sounds. Definitely a game that could take hours of practice and be so satisfying when you get good at it. If you don’t give up first. For a first-timer and only a few quick plays, even getting a kill was not easy.

The High Score: 11000

August 3rd, 2015 Pickups

I wasn’t planning on picking anything up this week, but I ended up doing so anyway when the girlfriend wanted to go out and hunt since she doesn’t get to as much. We quit after our first stop which had some great stuff we couldn’t pass up. Here is what I grabbed:

First up are cartridges only, Kirby’s Adventure for Famicom and Legend of Zelda A Link to the Past for Super Famicom. For the virtual boy, we have Bomberman: Panic Bomber CIB, although the box is a bit crushed. For the Neo Geo Pocket that is Del Sol 2, a slot machine game, I love my Neo Geo Pocket Color and am always happy to get new games for it. Finally, we have a GameCube Mario Party 4.

I also have a slightly early unexpected eBay mail arrival. A Chrono Trigger Sheet Music Book. I do not play any instruments, but my girlfriend does. So, this is slightly for her, but mostly me because I want a Chrono Trigger collection so bad.

Atari 2600 Friday’s #33 – Adventure

It’s … ‘Adventure’ Time!

The Story: A nameless hero in a nameless kingdom. An evil magician has stolen an enchanted chalice. You must find and return it.

From the Manual: “An evil magician has stolen the Enchanted Chalice and has hidden it somewhere in the Kingdom. The object of the game is to rescue the Enchanted Chalice and place it inside the Golden Castle where it belongs.

This is no easy task, as the Evil Magician has created three Dragons to hinder you in your quest for the Golden Chalice. There is Yorgie, the Yellow Dragon, who is just plain mean; there is Grundle, the Green Dragon, who is mean and ferocious; and there is Rhindle, the Red Dragon, who is the most ferocious of all. Rhindle is also the fastest Dragon and is the most difficult to outmaneuver.

There are three castles in the Kingdom; the White Castle, the Black Castle,
and the Golden Castle. Each castle has a Gate over the entrance. The Gate
can be opened with the corresponding colored Key. Inside each Castle are
rooms (or dungeons, depending on which Skill Level you are playing).

The Castles are separated by rooms, pathways, and labyrinths. Common to
all the Skill Levels is the Blue Labyrinth through which you must find your
way to the Black Castle.”

From the Box: Nothing on the box. Quite surprising for an adventure game like this. I’m curious why they chose to leave it blank.

The Gameplay: Look at the screenshot below, you are the square, that is your character. When you start the game, you should see a key and a castle. Open the castle and claim the sword. You pick up items simply by moving over them. It must be of note that you can only carry one item at a time. You must pass through a blue labyrinth to get to a black castle. Behind this is the grey dungeon, the chalice is hidden here guarded by the red dragon. There are 3 dragons, Yorgle (the yellow dragon) Grundle (the green dragon) and Rhindle (the red dragon), one in each castle. Each castle requires a key of the same color to open the gate. There is also a Bat that will fly around, pick up items (and dragons), and swap items. Interestingly enough, the Evil Magician is not eve in the game, you will never see him. You (and any slain dragons) can be reincarnated if you get eaten but all items will stay where they were, just press the reset switch.

Adventure also contains the first-ever Easter Egg in a video game. If you place a certain invisible item in a certain spot you will get the creators, Warren Robinett, name to appear on screen. This was something he did in a time where it was taboo to give individuals credit for their games.

The Controls: Up/Down/Left/Right/Diagonal movement. The red button drops objects.

Post Review: As everyone knows, my game mode switch is broken and what this does is limit me to one game mode which is Mode 1. Mode 1 of adventure only has 2 dragons instead of three, and only has the blue labyrinth and the black castle. The dragons on this mode run away from the sword. Also, the dragons will latch onto you, but you can move away fairly easy before they bite you. Higher game modes have all three dragons and up to three labyrinths and castles.

The High Score: I was able to complete mode one on my first try in about 2 minutes using a map of the game.