Pitfall! (Atari 2600) - Expedition in the Infinite 8-bit Jungle - Saturday Afternoon Gaming
8Welcome to the jungle frustration party friends
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I'm Gaming Jay: Youtube gamer, let's player, fan of retro games, and determined optimist... Normally I'm working my way through the book 1001 VIDEO GAMES YOU MUST PLAY BEFORE YOU DIE in my Let's Play 1001 Games series. This is a great book with a ton of classic retro games but it doesn't have everything and it's even missing some of my favorite video games. Hence, in Saturday Afternoon Gaming, screw it, I'm just going to play whatever I want!
In this series I will be playing some of the best retro games that don't appear in the 1001 VIDEO GAMES YOU MUST PLAY BEFORE YOU DIE book. So pull up a chair, slap on your headphones, and join me as babble aimlessly through some of my most favourite classic games! And hey, if you have ideas or suggestions feel free to leave them in the comments below. I'm always looking for more games to try! Today's game is...
Pitfall!
from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pitfall!
Pitfall! is a video game designed by David Crane for the Atari 2600 and released by Activision in 1982. The player controls Pitfall Harry and is tasked with collecting all the treasures in a jungle within 20 minutes while avoiding obstacles and hazards.
Pitfall! received very positive reviews upon release, and is one of the best-selling games made for the Atari 2600, with over 4 million copies sold.[2][3] It was the top video game on the Billboard charts for more than a year, and inspired numerous sequels and ports across a variety of gaming consoles. It is widely viewed as helping define the side-scrolling platformer genre.
The player controls the character (Pitfall Harry) through a maze-like jungle in an attempt to recover 32 treasures in a 20-minute time period.[4] Along the way, players must maneuver through numerous hazards, including pits, quicksand, rolling logs, fire, rattlesnakes, scorpions, and crocodiles. Harry may jump over or otherwise avoid these obstacles by climbing, running, or swinging on vines. Treasure includes bags of money, gold and silver bars, and diamond rings, which range in value from 2000 to 5000 points in 1000 point increments. There are eight of each treasure type, with 32 in total. A perfect score of 114,000 is achieved by claiming all 32 treasures without losing any points. Points are deducted by either falling in a hole (100 points) or touching logs; point loss depends on how long contact is made with the log. Under the jungle there is a tunnel which Harry can access through ladders found at various points. Traveling though the tunnel moves forward three screens at a time, which is necessary in order to collect all the treasures within the time limit.[5] However, the tunnels are filled with dead-ends blocked by brick walls, forcing the player to return to the surface at one of the ladders, and try to find a way around again, thus wasting time. The tunnels also contain scorpions. The player loses a life if Harry comes in contact with any obstacle (except logs) or falls into a tar pit, quicksand, waterhole, or mouth of a crocodile. The game ends when either all 32 treasures have been collected, all three lives have been lost, or the time has run out.
The game's technical achievements included non-flickering, multicolored, animated sprites on a system with notoriously primitive graphics hardware. Innovative techniques were used to keep the code space within the 4k limit, including a polynomial counter to create 256 screens within 50 bytes of code. The swinging vines are created by repeatedly displaying the Atari's one-pixel "ball" sprite at different offsets.