Impossible Mission

Impossible Mission

Published in 1984, this is a title that slipped under my radar at the time.  All I knew going into it was that it was some kind of platformer where you play a spy infiltrating the underground base of an evil genius.

NOT Mission Impossible!

That brief description really doesn't do this game justice though.  Yes, it's a platformer, but it's also a Rogue-like, and an adventure game, and a puzzle game.  I'll try to explain.  As I mentioned, you are a spy infiltrating the underground base of an evil genius.  You start in an elevator and, at each stop, you move left or right to enter a room.  Each room contains several elements.  First are the robots.  They guard the rooms in the underground base and behave according to several scripts.  Some stand in place, some move back and forth repeatedly and some follow your movement.  Additionally, any of the above can come equipped with death-rays.  These shoot out a short distance in front of the robots.  The robots are guarding, loosely, the several pieces of furniture scattered around on various platforms around the room.  You must search this furniture to find puzzle pieces that combine to create the master password or codes to disable the robots or move some of the lifts in the room.

Death ray

Each room appears to be generated somewhat randomly and can contains any of several layouts along with random placement of furniture and robots with random scripts.  Occasionally, this can create layouts that are all but impossible without the robot disable codes.  This makes the game something of a rogue-like, where the rooms are procedurally generated and each game is unique.  Your only weapons are those codes and the ability to jump.  Beyond that, you have no offensive capability.

Searching the furniture, not peeing on it.

Once you've collected the puzzle pieces (all 36 of them) you can begin combining them into the master password.  You have to figure out which pieces combine to make a punchcard,  4 to a card, 1 letter per card, making a 9-letter word.  The pieces can be horizontally and/or vertically flipped as well as colored any of 4 colors.  This makes the puzzle almost as difficult as the rest of the game, if not more so.  Once you've solved the puzzle you can enter the evil genius' room to complete the game.

Stay a while... stay FOREVER!!

Technically, you have 6 hours to complete the game.  The clock counts down in real time.  However, each time you die, either to robots or falling, you lose 10 minutes.  Each time you use a hint in the puzzle mode, you lose 2 minutes.  I would guess that you could complete the exploration part of the game, if you made no mistakes, in about 20-30 minutes.  Allowing another 10-20 minutes for the puzzle (again, I'm being generous here), you could complete the game in about an hour.  The other 5 hours allow for about 30 lives lost.  Of course, you probably won't complete the game with no errors, so this number is, realistically, a lot less.

Out of time... fail.

My first few playthroughs (okay more than a few) ended with me simply dying too much.  Never even explored the whole base.  Eventually, I was able to collect all the puzzle pieces but I ran out of time at least twice.  Finally, I was able to gather the pieces, put the puzzle together and finish the game with time to spare.  I felt, justifiably, proud.  This game is hard.

Did it!!

Overall, this game was surprisingly, quite good.  Yes, the graphics are a bit dated and the voice synthesis, while novel at the time, is pretty cheesy now.  But, the controls, once you get used to them, are very responsive, the randomness of the rooms gives it quite a lot of replay value, and the variety of gameplay (platforming, puzzle solving, etc), though sometimes ridiculously hard, keeps things fresh.  I don't think that I'll be coming back to play it again anytime soon, but I'd rather play this than Lode Runner and I'm really glad I played it.  It's definitely one of the better early platforms and, if it's already on your list, give it a try.  Don't feel bad if you can't solve the end puzzle though...

Lode Runner

Glorious, 1983 graphics

Released in 1983, Lode Runner was another game I never really got very far into when I first played it.  It was probably too hard at the time.  I remember getting the main idea but being unable to get past the first few levels.  I played through it this time on a C64 emulator and I was getting nostalgic before even leaving the boot screen.

Load"*",8,1

You play as a stick dude trying to avoid the guards (other stick dudes) while collecting the gold on each level.  Once you've collected them all you can escape the level.  The guards are fairly easy to outsmart, but you can easily become trapped.  They can also pick up any gold bars that they happen across, so sometimes you have to kill them to release it (or make them fall).  There are a lot of different versions out there but mine was the cassette version for the C64.

Are they supposed to be stick dudes?

Most of the levels require multiple attempts to find the pattern to beat them.  The guards are fairly predictable and you can manipulate them into going where you want to some extent.  Some of the harder puzzles really require you to think ahead, especially when you have to dig down.  You can dig to the sides of you, but not straight down, so you have to figure out where to start in order to get where you want to be.  Eventually, I managed to pass the 19 levels in my version of the game and was satisfied.  It probably took 3-4 days of playing to get that far.

Get that gold!

The game is straightforward, but challenging.  The graphics and sounds are very simple and there's no soundtrack to speak of.  The guts of the gameplay comes from the levels and how to solve each.  As such, it's got a lot of replay value, especially when you consider all the user-made levels.  It was one of the first games to include a level editor and there are, literally, hundreds of levels out there.  There are also a couple sequels if you're really interested.

Lots and lots of levels

My overall impressions of the game are fairly average.  The graphics are simple, but functional.  The sounds and music are very basic.  The core mechanics are solid, however, so it's still a playable, fun game.  The enemy AI is simple, but effective.  They don't just follow set patterns but follow you and home in on your location.  It makes things more difficult, but learning to manipulate them is one of the keys to beating the levels.  And speaking of levels, with the level editor and the dozens of official and unofficial level packs for this game, you could probably continue playing it for months.  If that's your thing, go for it... personally, I found the game entertaining for a while, but it got stale fairly quickly.  I got to level 19, which was the max for this version, and was already ready to call it a day.  Fun game, but nothing spectacular.

Bye, Lode Runner!

Elevator Action

Title screen makes it look like a Western.

Introduced in 1983 by Taito, the next game in my playthroughs is Elevator Action.  As with many of the games I've been playing, I have a long history with this one.  When I was a kid, my allowance was 50¢ a week and, when I'd receive my 2 quarters, I would head to the corner market to spend them on a couple of arcade games near the front.  I got pretty good at this particular game and it even got me in trouble once when I was out too long.  As I headed to the market, my Dad told me to come right back when I was done.  Over an hour later, he showed up looking for me because I hadn't returned and was still in the middle of my second game.  Thanks a lot, Taito!

Rappelling to the roof.

The basic idea of the game is that you are a spy infiltrating an enemy building.  Inside are enemy agents and an increasingly complex system of elevators.  You make your way from top to bottom, avoiding or eliminating spies, collecting secret documents from the red doorways, eventually reaching the garage level where you jump into your car and escape.  It's sort of a side-scroller on it's end (a vertical-scroller?).  Once you complete the level, the color palette shifts and you do it again with faster, more agile enemy spies.

The different stages of each level.

The first section is a simple elevator down the center.  The second makes to exit the elevator to use escalators on the sides of the screen.  The third is a section with no lights but the final section is where the real elevator action begins.  There are 5 separate elevators to use with some tied together vertically.  The enemies can also use the elevators and will shoot at you whenever they see you.  You can dispose of them by shooting them, jump-kicking them in the head, shooting a light out above them (which them falls on them) or, more rarely, squashing them under an elevator.  If you miss one of the red doorways on the way down, you'll perform an jumping animation with "!!" marks then teleport to the door you missed.  You must then travel back down the tower to the bottom.

The escape!

On my first play I did fairly well, getting to level 3 and around 38,000 points.  I decided that beating level 4 and getting at least 50,000 would be a good stopping point.  While doing this, however, I discovered that level 5 had the same colors as level 1 so I wondered if that was the point where it repeated.  After a few (a lot) more tries, I managed to get to level 6 (same as level 2) and, finally, level 7.  Yep, it was the same as level 3.  Good enough for me!  Game complete!

Levels 2, 3, 4 and 5.

There's no real end, I assume, so you could just play it until you're tired of it, but the action is enjoyable and the music is catchy.  There's a satisfying thud when you jump-kick the baddies and the escape at the bottom of each level is fun.  I also enjoyed the extra challenge of trying to kill enemy spies with the light drops and squashing them with the elevators.

My unfortunate demise.

Overall, I still enjoyed the game after all this time.  I was able to get fairly good at it again after a short time and I could definitely see myself coming back occasionally to play it.  It's easy to pick up and play for short periods of time (unless you play for an hour and your Dad gets upset).  The repetition is the biggest problem with the game since it's the same building, level after level.  It feels different since the enemies get smarter and faster, but you don't see anything new once the colors cycle.  Still not sure about a number score for these playthroughs, but let's go for a 7.  Play it... it's good.

Jungle Hunt

Released in 1982, I played the hell out of this game and it remains one of my all-time favorites.  It was often one of the loudest games in any given arcade and I still have fond memories of both the music and the sound effects.

The main game consists of 4 stages.  In the first, you swing from vine to vine across a jungle like set of screens, 10 vines in all.  You have to judge the timing of the vines correctly or fall to your death on the jungle floor below.  The second stage has you fighting crocodiles in a river armed with only a knife.  The crocodiles open their mouths randomly making avoiding them often a better strategy than fighting them.  In addition, you have to manage your air supply as well as avoid sets of bubbles that rise from the river floor which will incapacitate you, pull you to the surface and make you a sitting duck for crocodiles.  On the third stage you're climbing up a hill while boulders fall toward you, bouncing erratically, forcing you to jump over or duck under them.  On the final stage you face two native bushmen who have captured your girl and have her suspended over a boiling cauldron.  Once you finish all four stages you get the one-screen ending of the girl giving the adventurer a much-deserved kiss.  Then you get to start over with each stage palette-shifted and slightly faster.

The four stages of level 1.

In addition, to the new colors and increased speed, the next couple of levels start adding extra features to make things more difficult.  Starting on level 2 you will face a couple of baboons on stage one who will knock you off the vines and kill you.  On level 3 you will have to dodge multiple rocks on stage 3 falling simultaneously and an additional bushman on stage 4 throwing spears at you from the trees.  Level 4 has all of these things and makes you weaker and unable to jump a high or far.  After this point, the game just gets harder and harder, faster and faster until you die.

Level 2, with baboons.

Level 3, with multiple rocks and new bushman in tree.

For my play-through, I decided that I wanted to try to beat every stage through, at least, level 4.  It took about a week of playing about an hour a day to accomplish this goal.  One of the biggest frustrations is having to start from the beginning after each failed attempt.  I got very good at level 1 and level 2 and slowly progressed through level 3.  Level 4 took forever to complete, especially the falling rock stage; get hit by a couple of rocks and it's back to the beginning. Once I figured out the patterns, however, I was finally able to get through level 4 and started stage 1 of level 5 only to die on about the third vine.  Oh well, mission complete.

Level 4, hard as hell.

The only stage I got to in level 5.

One of the things that I wanted to talk about here is the concept of home version letdown.  Consoles of this era were dramatically underpowered compared to arcade machines.  What this usually meant was that a console version of any given arcade game was quite a bit simpler than it's arcade counterpart.  I had the Atari 2600 version of Jungle Hunt in my home and played it quite a bit, but it's a far cry from the arcade version.  Stage one was ridiculously easy, barely requiring you to time the vine swings at all.  Stage two had crocodiles but no bubbles which, in the arcade version make additional hazards to avoid.  Stage three had rocks rolling on level ground without the erratic bounces that make the arcade version so hard.  Stage four has native bushmen, but you face them one at a time without the spear throwing version on later stages.  There is also little to no music on any stage.  I do prefer the home version ending, however, as it has both characters sort of dancing around instead of the big graphic of the girl kissing the old man.

Still fun, but much simpler.

I still love this game and had a blast playing through the arcade version of the game.  I played the Atari version as well, just for completeness but it hardly compares.  If you can get MAME running on your computer, I would highly recommend giving this game a try.  It's got some great, catchy music and some decent graphics for the age.

Pitfall

Pitfall!  September of 1982 gave us this great, iconic game.  You play as Pitfall Harry as you work your way through the jungle trying to collect 32 treasures in 20 minutes.  You get three lives to make it to the end and lots of perils await: alligators, scorpions, campfires, snakes, rolling logs, quicksand and pits.

Play-through for me consists of simply completing the game.  It doesn't have to be a perfect game with no points lost and no lives lost... just complete it.

And it was freakin' hard.  I've spent the last several days trying to beat it.  To explore the game I played through it going only one direction, left or right, just trying to survive for the full 20:00.  After that it was pretty apparent that you can't complete the game without taking shortcuts through the underground. With 256 screens (8-bit!) there's a lot to explore.  Each underground screen equals 3 above ground screens and you have to take the right underground passages because some of those passages lead to dead-ends and some bypass treasures.  So, I downloaded a map showing the optimal route.  But. even with a map, it takes a good amount of skill to finish this game.  Many times I died before the time limit and once I ran out of time with one life still remaining and two screens to go to the last treasure.  That one hurt.  My final play-through was very tense at the end:  I had no lives left and I missed the last two vine swings, delaying me precious seconds.  I managed to run across the last obstacle and grab the last bar of gold with 2 seconds remaining.  I was ecstatic.

The game doesn't offer much of an ending.  It just freezes and shows the publisher logo alternating with the copyright year.  I'm not really sure how much replay value the game has either.  I suppose you could try to improve your time or your score, but I think I'd take a break for a while first.  This game is hard in that way only old-school videogames can be.

I did have a great time with this game and it is definitely a deserving icon in videogame history.  I think the game holds up pretty well today and is still quite fun.

3 lives, 20 minutes, ready?	Aha!  A diamond!
Digital tarzan yell is music to my ears.	Two seconds to spare!  Whew!