VIC-20 Cartridge Software Reviews

a.k.a. Cartzilla!

First release: July 1997

Copyright notice: © 1997 Ward Shrake. All rights reserved. However, the author and copyright holder grants his permission to any individual(s) for any non-profit use of this document. I just ask that any such people will be fair and honest in giving me my due credit for any and all work that I have done, just as I have gone to great pains to credit those before me. Thanks!

Proofread and converted to hypertext by Marko Mäkelä

Author's notes

This document was made to spread useful information to current users of the Commodore VIC-20 home computer system. It contains small text reviews of most of the ROM-cartridge software that was ever made for the Vic20 computing system. (There are 180 cartridges reviewed here!)

The purpose of this document is partly amusement and partly to help the system's modern users to identify software that has a good chance of appealing to them, so they can check it out more for themselves.

Note that this text covers only cartridge-based software. There were many, many more programs once released in tape format. However, the author chose not to review tape-based software, for various reasons.

I wrote this because I saw a need for it. If you're bothering to read this document, you probably see a need for it as well. I've long been involved in gaming, on many systems. I have Atari 2600, 5200, and 7800 systems, as well as the current Jaguar, the ColecoVision, Commodore's 64 computer, the Vectrex, the Sega Genesis, the Nintendo NES & SNES, and even a few of the real, stand-up, full-sized arcade machines. The list goes on, but you get the idea: I don't only like the Vic20.

I've seen, over and over among all the "classic gaming" groups, some form of the "its a title on a list somewhere, and even though I have no clue what it is or what it does, I have to own one" mentality. If you're rich and have ample space for all these toys, why not. But most of us don't fall into that category, hence the need for solid info. I gave up on the idea of having "everything" a long time ago; some games simply aren't worth having, from a "will I ever play it" standpoint. That goes for the Vic20, and every other gaming system ever made. But there are many games that you'd love, too, if only you knew about them.

Besides, the whole "looking through a catalog of stuff I can have" experience is one all of us like, to one degree or another. And with a catalog this size, you'll stay busy for quite some time, I'd say! Why bother looking at was once available but is no longer sold, you ask? There's simple nostalgia. Or carts to buy amongst other gamers.

But more newsworthy is that most of the Vic20's software library is now freely available to anyone with an Internet account. This is thanks to the hard work of a dedicated crew of Digital Archaeologists. (Paul LeBrasse and Ward Shrake did most of the finding and archiving, with occasional help from other retrogamers on the Internet.) We made sure the Vic20 library didn't become extinct. Then I documented it. (Fifty or a hundred years from now, I hope someone is grateful!) And so far, the copyright owners have thanked us for what we've done, too. Much thanks goes to the people who wrote the Vic20 emulators, as well.

Most of the information in this text file will probably remain "as is" for quite some time. This is because most carts we actually had in our hands, and we don't expect our opinions to change without outside input. However, a handful of carts we did not have at all; the rare few carts that are presently "vaporware". These may change, as we get more info.

Anyway, info about this text is included later on. But to appease those of you with large impatience streaks (most of you?), I put the "fun" stuff (reviews) next, and the explanatory stuff way in the back. The list below is alphabetical by software title, in case you're wondering.

I do hope you will find and keep an appreciation of where our gaming hobby has already been, and where it seems to be going. It's quite a rush, these days, what with all the different emulators and such; for this and all the other gaming systems. We gamers never had it better. Enjoy the ongoing history of the audio-visual amusement experience!

Ward F. Shrake

Contents

VIC-20 Cartridge Software Reviews

Game name A World at War Company Handic Benelux B.V. Author unknown (198_) Game Type Board-style war game simulation. (Hex-based maps, turns, etc.) Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Keyboard. Disable bank 1 if present. Comments Not given a thorough review, due to its complex nature. You will definitely need the original instructions to use any war game.

Game name A.E. Company Broderbund Author Steven Ohmert (198_) Game Type Original shooter, flavored with "Galaxian" & "Missile Command". Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 3 & 5). Joystick. Graphics Excellent. Technically impressive; uses bit-mapping on a computer that was not designed to do this. The smooth, gliding movement of the ships impresses, as does their recession-into-depth. Uses four background scenes; another classy touch. However, from a purely aesthetic point of view maybe the "hi-res" characters just seem small and hard to see by today's standards? For its day... wow! Sound Good. Nice attempt at an interesting background tune; notes try to rise and fall smoothly. Sound effects are average or better. Considering the limits of Vic20 sound, this is also impressive. Gameplay Good, but takes some getting used to. See comments below. Overall Mixed. Technically speaking, this was leading edge stuff for its day both in graphical ability and gameplay mechanic. But is it a fun game to play? You decide. Some may love it, others may not. Ad Text "A runaway best-seller for the Apple II and the Atari 400/800, is a winner for Vic-20. Giant robot stingrays designed to fight pollution have run amok and are attacking in waves from the sky. A.E.tm ('Stingray' in Japanese) is a graphic masterpiece, with screen after screen of spectacular 3-D effects. The arcade-style action is masterful too, as you launch your remotely-triggered missiles and detonate them precisely to coincide with the swooping, diving, constantly changing flight patterns of the deadly A.E.'s!" (From inside cover, Compute's Gazette, July 1983) Trivia Original (non-Vic20) version designed by Makoto Horai & Jun Wada according to the screen credits. (Was Apple or Atari the first?) Comments The game uses the joystick in a novel way. Left and right do just that, but "fire" is non-standard. Missiles that you fire do not "go off" until you release the fire button. In other words, press and hold fire until the missiles are at the altitude you desire, then release the button, which detonates those missiles. Meaning if you rapidly press and release fire (as in modern games) the missiles simply explode a fraction of an inch over your ship! This takes some getting used to, but it results in an explosion which can destroy more than one ship at a time, too. The overall effect reminds me of the game mechanic used in "Missile Command".

Game name Adventure Land Adventure Company Commodore [Vic-1914] Author See Trivia. (1981) Game Type "Scott Adams Adventure Games" series. (#1 of 5.) Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 2 and 3). Keyboard controlled. The game starts when you type "SYS 32592" and hit the RETURN key. (If you are using a software emulator to run any game in this series, try setting your memory expansion to 24k of RAM. These four programs start at $4000, if your emulator asks you that.) Graphics Not applicable. These were text games. You type, it types back. Sound See the trivia notes below, but not applicable for the most part. Gameplay Some will like it, some won't. A good change of pace, regardless. Overall It depends if you like text games or not. The whole Scott Adams series was famous in its time and still has a following online. Ad Text "You wander through an enchanted world trying to recover the 13 lost treasures. You'll encounter wild animals, magical beings, and many other perils and puzzles. Can you rescue the blue ox from the quicksand or find your way out of the maze? For beginning Adventurers and veterans alike." (Seen in "Commodore Power Play" Spring 1983 issue, page 105.) Ad Text Box ads for the entire series read: "Welcome to the mind-boggling adventures of Scott Adams! These true 'computer classics' are among the most entertaining games in personal computing! Each adventure is a completely different mind-fantasy, drawn from the creative imagination of pioneer adventure game-writer Scott Adams. There are 5 Scott Adams Adventure games on cartridge for your VIC-20... we know you'll enjoy them all! Just look at the adventures we have for you!" (Then it describes each as above.) Trivia While the folks at "Scott Adams / Adventure International" should get their fair due for writing the stories and such (on the Vic and other computers), Andy Finkel was responsible for doing the actual programming on the Vic20 versions of the Scott Adams games. Neil Harris was quoted in an online interview, saying that Mr. Finkel had to trim 1/3 the memory out (24k to 16k) of the Vic20 versions to fit them on a cartridge at all. Quite a feat, really. Trivia The games in this series "talked" if you had an add-on piece of hardware called the "Type N Talk". (Otherwise, with a standard Vic20, the text just shows up on the screen as you might expect.) The author hasn't personally heard the quality of this speech but has seen reviews of the Votrax hardware itself, which were good. (And I have to wonder... would emulating this device be possible or practical on today's IBM computers? That would be neat, yes? Even just recording the speech as .WAV files would be cool, IMO.) Trivia All the games in this series seem to have one advertisement for another game in the series within its available texts. At least two games list a phone number to call, if your local computer store doesn't carry the Adventure series. That's kinda cute, huh? Trivia The Scott Adams games were part of a larger collection. While the Vic20 only had five of the games, others did exist for other game machines of the time. The Vic order is as follows: Adventure Land Pirate's Cove Mission Impossible Voodoo Castle The Count For more info about the remaining games, go visit the Internet's online newsgroups that cater to the "text adventure" crowd. Trivia Just in case you've wondered, this Scott Adams is no relation to the Scott Adams that writes the popular "Dilbert" cartoon strip. Comments Merely to conserve some space here, this review is sort of my standard set of observations for the other four Scott Adams games.

Game name Aggressor Company HES (Human Engineered Software) [C305] Author Jeff Minter (1982) Game Type Clone of the arcade coin-op "Defender" by Williams. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Good. Could use the radar screen from the arcade game, but what is there looks good. Not a bad attempt at vector graphic lines! Sound Average. Sound effects are good, but get repetitive quickly. Gameplay Good or better. Fast paced in most places, reasonable balance. Your ship takes awhile to turn around, and without radar, well... Overall Good. Not a bad clone of Defender, given the Vic's limitations. Trivia Actually, I don't believe I've seen any truly good port of Mr. Jarvis' ballistic arcade game on any home machine, until Jeff Minter's "Defender 2000" showed up for my Atari Jaguar system. I guess this was his first official warm-up for the project? Go take a look at the official Atari release of Defender, too. You will see that it has an internal message that says it really was done by HES instead of Atari. Hmmm. Jeff's warm-up number two? Trivia Mr. Minter certainly has a sense of humor. Inside his code is the message "WELL ZAPHOD'S JUST THIS GUY, Y'KNOW". Once you've read Douglas Adam's 5-part "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" trilogy you'll understand that better. And thank Mr. Minter for making you go read an excellent book series when you're all done, OK?

Game name Alien Company Commodore [Vic-1906] Author unknown (1981) Game Type Original game involving mazes and digging. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Average. Nothing fancy. Most likely based on character graphics. Sound Average. Some simple sound effects, somewhat like the gobbling sounds in Pac-Man, but that's about all. No theme music noted. Gameplay Good. Could probably be addicting to some. The idea of digging holes for the other creatures to fall into, and the heart-beating sound effects might build up some decent gaming tension. Overall Average to good. Not really flawed, but not wildly spectacular. Younger children may love the game. For them, it may be ideal. Trivia This game involves elements from games like Pac-Man (the maze and four characters chasing you) and Apple Panic (the digging). You decide if this makes for a good game or not, but it's interesting.

Game name Alien Blitz Company UMI (United Microware Industries, Inc.) [1619] Author Peter Fokkos and Thomas A. Giguere (1981) Game Type "Space Invaders" clone. (Probably unauthorized.) Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick or keyboard play. Graphics Endearingly crude. In other words, much like the original. Sound Keeps your nerves on edge, like the original. Great laser blasts! Gameplay "Just one more..." Overall Fans of the original Space Invaders will not be disappointed! Ad Text "Your mind must be clear, your nerves steel, and your eyes sharp to prevent the intruders from demolishing the three missile bases under your command. To survive the bomb-dropping enemy, you must think as you dodge, duck, hide, and blast your way to victory... or oblivion! Only the fittest can survive the onslaught of ten skill levels and escape with missile bases intact." (UMI catalog) Trivia Internally, this is just a 4k game. Not at all bad, considering! UMI was one of the only companies that had any games ready for release in 1981. It is sort of comical that both Commodore and UMI released a Space Invaders clone as one of the first games. (Man, were people anxious to capitalize on SI's popularity!) The only other company to release in 1981 was Sierra Online, BTW. Trivia The original arcade game has 55 invaders; 5 rows of 11 each. This version only has 40 invaders. Maybe only an "expert" would notice? The Gameboy cartridge, in Gameboy mode, also has 40 invaders, but the Gameboy cart has sounds that are closer to the original game. The SuperGameboy version, however, comes as close to true arcade perfection as I've ever seen; it appears to download code to the SNES and hand over control to it, for some mind-blowing nostalgia! But aside from that one cart this may be the best clone I've seen. Commodore's Avenger comes close, but this has a closer feel, IMO. Trivia With only minor changes, this game would fool most people if you were to put it into an original-looking arcade cabinet. Since this version and the original are both monochromatic, you could even stick a colored overlay across the screen as later SI models did! But don't forget that the original arcade game had no joysticks; it was just a set of buttons; left, right and fire... remember? (Not that I'm seriously suggesting this... just a sick thought!) Comments Space to start game; it may pause for a moment first. Keyboard controls: fire = SPACE, left = LEFT SHIFT, right = RIGHT SHIFT.

Game name Alien Sidestep Company OEM Author Kerry Erendson (1983) Game Type Variant of "Space Invaders". Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Good. The movement and/or scrolling effects are well done. Sound Plain. Just the average shooting sounds you'd expect. Gameplay A bit flawed. Fun at first, but after the novelty wears off... The concept was kinda cute, but the experience isn't very deep. Overall An interesting change, but not likely to become widely popular. Trivia This is a 4k game internally, although it requires 8k to run. This would seem to explain the lack of depth in the gameplay. Comments There seems to be only one good way to play the game. You have to move left while shooting quickly, to make a slanting barrage of bullets. This seems to be the only way to actually hit the oncoming aliens. Otherwise, as the name states, they sidestep. Once four aliens have landed past your defenses, it's game over.

Game name Alphabet Zoo Company Spinnaker Author Sheldon White (1982) Game Type Educational. Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 3 & 5). Joystick. Comments Not given a very thorough review due to its non-game nature. To really use this cart, you'll need the original instructions.

Game name Amok! Company UMI (United Microware Industries, Inc.) [1611] Author Roger L. Merritt (1981) Game Type Clone of the arcade coin-op "Berzerk" by Stern. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick or keyboard. Disable bank 1 if present. Graphics Good. The original "Berzerk" was not a graphic wonder to begin with. This is arguably better than the arcade game it is based on. Sound Poor. The original arcade Berzerk game had some speech, which made up for its poor graphics. This just bleeps when you shoot. (No more "Intruder Alert" or "Coin detected in pocket"... sigh!) Gameplay Good, but a bit frustrating once you've seen "Super Amok". Slow-paced? Only one of your bullets is allowed onscreen at a time. (However, if Super Amok seems too hard, maybe this is just right?) Overall Good. Could be lots of fun, even if "Super Amok" is better. Trivia As much as it sounds like I'm complaining about this game, it does show how far the industry had progressed in a short time. Berzerk was not out long in the arcades when this home version had arrived. It was only 1982 when Stern put out "Frenzy", the sequel to their earlier "Berzerk" game. Impressive to consider. It wasn't that many years before, when almost all the games in any arcade where black-and-white with huge blocky graphics; remember Midways first game "Gun Fight"? This is Hi-Res compared! Trivia I figured out the patterns in most of the software companies part numbering schemes. Most are easy enough. But what was UMI thinking? Aside from the first two digits indicating whether a particular game was made on cassette or cartridge, can anyone else see any kind of pattern emerging? Did they use a dart board to choose their other digits? Did they just make up numbers at random, to make it look like they had more games? Wish I knew. Trivia Hey now! Don't be stepping all over my memories! (Hee, hee!) I'm impolitely referring to a new 1996 Sega Saturn game called Amok. I know zip about that game; just thought the name was interesting in this context. Has gaming lost that much creativity? That even names are now being recycled, along with gameplay concepts, etc? Again, I'm not dogging the modern game, just wondering what's up. Comments See also Super Amok. It's much more polished than this game is. The basic difference is that this game used 4k of EPROM and its sequel used 8k. Twice the memory space makes a big difference!

Game name Ape Escape Company Spectravideo Author Mike Riedel and Greg Carbonaro (1982) Game Type Variants of two arcade coin-ops; "Space Invaders" and "Rip Off". Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Good. Lots of little helicopters and such onscreen, all moving fairly smoothly as they steal portions of the "Spectra Tower". Sound Good to very good. The sound effects are generally good, but the little guy that vacuums up your dead players is way too cool! Gameplay Very good. Everything moves and/or responds quickly. Overall Very good. Perhaps simple in some ways (graphics?) but well done. Trivia The company name was taken directly off the title screen. They seemed to have been a bit inconsistent about their own name. Comments See also "Cosmic Jailbreak". It looks nearly identical. This game might have been sold to Commodore, along with what later was to become "Star Post", which may have been intended to be a clone of the arcade game "Tempest" when it was first programmed. May. That is a whole other story, however, that's still being investigated.

Game name Apple Panic Company Creative Software (Licensed from Broderbund) Author unknown (1982) Game Type Conversion of the arcade coin-op "Space Panic". Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 3 & 5). Joystick. Graphics Plain looking backgrounds, with very detailed (hi-res) characters. Sound Average. Gameplay Control is too fussy. You have to be pixel-perfect on ladders or it won't allow you to move on them. And so on. Game runs slowly too. Or rather, your character seems to move through molasses. Overall Flawed, but I can sure see where Broderbund got Lode Runner from! They just rebalanced this game and had a classic on their hands. The improved version sold well into the 1990's. This game is more of a history lesson, however, than competition for Loderunner. Review "Space Panic was the first of the climbing coin-ops, but it wasn't a hit until it reached the home market as Apple Panic!" (Seen in EG Trivia, page 111, Apr 83 Electronic Games) Review "Apple Panic... is the computer version of Universal's 'ground-breaking' coin-op, Space Panic. As it happens, the aliens who pursue -- and are, in turn, hunted by -- the game's shovel-wielding hero, bear a singular resemblance to -- you guessed it -- apples! It was therefore a relatively simple matter to redraw the aliens as ripe, red pieces of computer fruit. Other than this minor change in graphics, the computer software version is faithful to its source of inspiration. The action is quick and exciting and this title, which has been around for over a year, continues to do a good business. Like its role model, Apple Panic has become a genuine cult favorite among computer gamers. The ladders, the aliens, the holes -- all the familiar elements are here." (Seen in Jan 83 Electronic Games, on page 52.) Review Another article in Electronic Games, entitled "Closet Classics", (June 1983, pg 84) said this and more... "The object of the game was to catch the aliens by baiting them into pits you'd dug, and then covering them before they escaped. This was accomplished with the 'digging' button. As you got to the higher levels you had to dig two holes, perfectly placed, one above the other, to keep the alien in. The average playing time for Space Panic was 30 seconds. You felt like you'd been hit going up the ladder by a brick falling through the arcade. Or maybe you'd dug a hole too deep to escape from. Whatever it was, Space Panic played too hard and had to be buried. Someone must have seen it though, and liked it, because the game was released as a computer game by Broderbund under the name Apple Panic. This software version is deliciously true to the original. So perhaps there is life after the arcade!" Review A fairly lengthy article on the climbing games genre included a few paragraphs on Space Panic. One quote: "Not only did Space Panic prophesy the advent of climbing games, but of 'digging' games as well!" (See Electronic Games, Jan 83, page 55.) Trivia As you can probably tell, the reason I spent so much time and space on covering this title, is that it is the ancestor to many other games. Games like Loderunner and Donkey Kong apparently were direct descendants of "Space Panic" and/or "Apple Panic". If you can get over the lack of finesse, maybe you'll like this one.

Game name Arachnoid Company UMI (United Microware Industries, Inc.) [16__] Author Allen Pulsifer (1982) Game Type Clone of the Atari's arcade coin-op "Centipede". Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 3 & 5). Joystick. Graphics Nicely animated, but simply colored. Smooth motion overall. Sound Average. Some sounds may have been reused in UMI's Video Vermin. Gameplay Good, but I still like the ultra-fast game Video Vermin better. Overall Centipede fans should definitely give it a try. This one may be more polished and balanced, but the pace puts me off a bit. Trivia An internal copyright indicates that Mr. Pulsifer first wrote his code in 1980 although this wasn't put out by UMI till later. So I guess that means Video Vermin was derived from this code?

Game name Arrow Company Skyles Electric Works Author unknown (198_) Game Type Utility program. An accelerator package for your datasette. Required Unknown, as no one we know actually has one. Comments Not given a very thorough review due to its non-game nature. To use this cart, you'll need the original instructions. May require the original cart, too, if it includes special hardware inside? This must have been popular, judging by repetition of ads run.

Game name Artillery Duel Company Xonox Author See Trivia. (1983) Game Type Semi-educational two-player game, seen on many other platforms. Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 3 & 5). Joystick. Graphics Average to good. They do attempt to draw some bit-mapped scenery. They even throw in some moving clouds, across the hilly terrain. Sound Not bad. Decent explosion effects. Nice "your turn" sounds. Some sounds are better than others, but most are competent or better. Gameplay Fun, assuming you like this sort of thing. Boring, if you don't. But the slowed-down pace may be a nice change from time to time. Overall See gameplay. This is a cute, almost "deluxe" version of the game that almost every other platform eventually had. Xonox lacked in imagination in picking this, perhaps, but did make a nice version. Trivia Hidden inside the internals of the game is a message that says "programmed by jerry brinson dedicated to shana, jacob, audrey and frankie". (It's at $7c61, for you hacker types.) Trivia It is interesting that this is one of Xonox's better videogames, and is also their only 16k version for the Vic20 computer. I bet they coded this from scratch and simply ported the others? For this game, I may take back some of my usual nasty Xonox remarks. Trivia Xonox videogames sometimes came in special plastic cases, with two games per cartridge. They felt this helped to make up for the lack of greatness in each individual game. Basically, they had their costs of manufacturing way down, so they could afford to. If you open one of their carts, you'll see some of the best work around; quality boards, epoxied-over onboard chip blobs, etc. But the average gaming consumer of the time disagreed with their idea of quantity-vs-quality. Xonox still has a lousy reputation with classic gamers. I don't blame the programmers; I'm sure they were forced to just do a quick, half-adequate job most of the time. Anyway, the flip side of this particular "Double-ender" was "Chuck Norris Superkicks". Personally, I like the AD game better than CNS.

Game name Astroblitz Company Creative Software Author Tom E. Griner (1982) Game Type Variant of the arcade coin-op "Defender" by Williams. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Excellent. The graphic effects Tom Griner indulged himself in is technically impressive... even to peers like Jeff Minter! (Mr. Minter implied just that, in an online interview with R. Melick.) Full screen use (including borders), scrollies, neat fold-in effect... Sound Good. I like all the effects, except perhaps your own explosion? Gameplay Very good or excellent. Very fast! Balanced well. Nice controls, too. A very smoothly done game, showing off Mr. Griner's ability. Overall Arguably one of the best ever clones of Defender, on any machine. Trivia This is a 4k game internally, which just makes it all the more impressive! (You'll still need 8k of memory to play it, though.) Comments Use UP and FIRE (together) on the joystick to start your game.

Game name Atlantis Company Imagic Author See Trivia. (1983) Game Type A port of the Atari 2600 title. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick or keyboard. Graphics Excellent. Very clean and detailed. Beautiful colors. Smooth, fast movement. The graphics are so well done, in fact, that the Imagic games don't run well on my VIC emulator! (Glad I have real VIC's.) Sound Excellent. The shooting effects sound good, and the background noises smoothly build tension, as the game gets faster and... Gameplay Wonderful. Fast, tense, but well balanced. All this, in just 4k? Overall Impressive; give it a try. Imagic sure made some great videogames! Ad Text "... Next, Bill gave Atlantis a shot. The Gorgon attack vessels filled the skies above the underground city of Atlantis. Bill fought back from his two missile posts. As night fell, and the Gorgon death rays took their toll, Bill launched his star fighter and attacked the enemy head-on in the air. But little Billy was no match for the fierce Gorgon warriors. No match for IMAGIC... Let this be a warning to all you cocky, know-it-all, self- proclaimed video game wizards out there: Laboratory tests have proven that IMAGIC games, when played in large doses, may be hazardous to your self-esteem and cause chronic Hugedigitosis (sore thumb). In other words, our games are created by experts for experts." (Partial ad, seen in Jan 83 Electronic Games.) Trivia Box art says "Game program designed by Bruce Pedersen." Comments Keyboard controls are: F1 to start, X and right SHIFT to fire. The Atari version definitely has one extra gun, in the center of the screen, that this lacks. But it doesn't really detract here.

Game name Attack of the Mutant Camels Company HES (Human Engineered Software) [C318] Author Jeff Minter (1983) Game Type Variant of Atari's arcade coin-op "Centipede", but taken farther. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Very good. It may look plain at first but all that scrolling does not come easy to the little Vic! Tight ML code, you betcha! Mr. Minter either had a good assembler or lots of practice by now. Sound Really nice. Some of the best sound effects on the Vic20, period. Gameplay Fast and furious, with lots to keep track of. Very well balanced. Overall Great! Mr. Minter was destined for videogaming greatness, says I. It was pretty obvious by this point, if one paid any attention. Trivia This game was intended to be the sequel to Gridrunner. Comments I bought my Atari Jaguar (admittedly on close-out) just to play "Tempest 2000" by you-know-who. So am I a bit biased? Sure. But a good game is still a good game, hero worship or no. And I just got in my copy of "Defender 2000"; worth a Jaguar, for those two.

Game name Avenger Company Commodore [Vic-1901] Author unknown (1981?) Game Type Clone of "Space Invaders". Most likely unauthorized. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Good. No complaints. The original game had five rows of eleven invaders each; this game has ten. (Better than most ports had!) Nice coloring, too, although purists like me may object a bit. The rest of the world will think it's a much needed improvement. Sound Good. Nothing to complain about. It's what you would expect. I've only heard one version that comes closer to the original, myself. Gameplay Good. Smoother response than some other ports on other systems. Overall Darn good. I don't think any SI fan will feel any disappointment. It's a simple, fun and addicting game. What more could you want? Ad Text "It's an invasion of space intruders and you're the VIC 'Avenger'. Space action for arcade enthusiasts." (Seen in "Commodore Power Play" magazine, page 102, Spring 1983 issue) Trivia It is interesting to note that Commodore's first ever game cart was a version of Space Invaders. (See how popular SI once was?) It is also interesting to note that this is one of the rare times Commodore made no mention onscreen of this being copyrighted by them. In other words, there is no date or copyright displayed. (Commodore later made a version for the C64 computer as well.)

Game name Baldor's Castle Company Daedalus Digital Author Martin Kennedy (1983) Game Type Dungeon style adventure game. Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 1 & 2). Type SYS 20182 to start. Graphics Good. A bit plain in places, but good enough to do the job. Sound Average to good. Just the usual sound effects, but done OK. Gameplay Depends on whether you (A) can figure it out without the original instructions, and (B) whether you even like dungeon-type games. Overall See gameplay, and decide for yourself. Trivia Largely written in BASIC, with some machine language routines. The location of the game was also unusual for a cartridge, though not unusual for a game written in Basic. The author apparently just copied the image from his 16k RAM expander's memory area to that same memory area on an (EP)ROM cartridge format. Only this game and the Scott Adams games require a SYS number to start and both because they sit in the area normally used by Basic programs. Comments If you're running this program via a Vic20 software emulator, try setting your RAM expansion memory to 16k. This program starts at memory address $2000 if your emulator asks for that information. After it is loaded into memory, type the SYS 20182 code to start.

Game name Bandits Company Sirius Author unknown (1983) Game Type Variant of the arcade coin-op "Rip Off" by Cinematronics. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Excellent. In fact, so well done that the Vic20 emulator for the IBM PC has a hard time handling this. (Apparently raster effects were used, as well as character set swapping.) Nice moving star field effect. Even colored stars; very nice. Smooth ship movement, lots of colors onscreen, lots of objects... very impressive! (Expect it to look awful on an emulated system, however.) Sound Very good. No music, but the sound effects are well done. Sounds a bit like the best stuff from the better Atari 2600 games. Gameplay Very good. Requires some strategy and thinking ahead as you can't outrun the bad guys once they've gotten ahead of you. Nice job of balancing things, I thought. The arcade coin-op "Rip Off" was an addictive game and I think you'll find this one can be as well. Overall Very nice. Games like this let you know just how little effort, time and skill went into some other Vic20 games. This game hardly looks like it was done on a home console at all, in comparison! Trivia The arcade coin-op "Rip Off" was a black & white, vector graphics game. Even their space ships looked like they came out of earlier coin-ops, such as Space Wars. (The triangular "asteroids" ship.) The game tension and balance made this lots of fun to play. This is another pre-joystick era game; left and right were buttons!

Game name Battlezone Company Atarisoft Author unknown (1983) Game Type Authorized translation of the arcade coin-op "Battlezone". Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 3 & 5). Joystick. Graphics Very good. Nicely done vector graphics, fairly quick movements... Sound Good. They did as much as could be done, within the Vic's limits. Gameplay Good or better. They did a pretty good job of capturing the (onscreen) look and feel of the original arcade game, I think. Overall Very good. I'm not a wonderful B'zone player, so true experts may disagree gameplay is perfect. But this is still a very nice port. Trivia Internal messages show a date of "12-31-83" and "(c) 1983 atari". Trivia The original arcade game's cabinet stood eight feet tall. You had to look through a simulated tank periscope to view the screen. The special joysticks, one per tread, made gameplay special, too. The cabinetry alone added something to the gaming experience, but this type of thing later died off. Why? Arcade operators wanted new games to come in a generic box, so they could easily swap out the old guts for a newer game, when the quarters came in slower. Now, they complain that arcade game companies only crank out more and more of the same old generic stuff. No kidding, guys.

Game name Black Hole Company Creative software Author Tom E. Griner (1982) Game Type Original game, flavored by various early arcade vector games. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Really well done. The opening screen alone (on a real Vic20) is just priceless. Mr. Griner is definitely showing off. The vector style graphics are a feat in themselves, considering the limits of the Vic20's screen resolution and so on. Bravo, Mr. Griner! Sound Average. Hey, if he had to go with minimal sounds to get his very impressive graphics, so be it. Not that the sounds are bad. Gameplay Good. Fans of early arcade games will probably appreciate it more than the average modern-era gamer, who may be a bit confused by it, and why this game would have been a big deal in its day. Overall Very good. Technically impressive but perhaps for limited tastes? At the very least, load it up to see the neat graphical tricks. Trivia This is only a 4k game internally although it requires 8k to run.

Game name Buck Rogers: Planet of Zoom Company Sega Enterprises, Inc. Author See Trivia. (1983) Game Type Translation of arcade coin-op of same name. Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 3 & 5). Joystick. Graphics Very good. Graphically impressive from a technical standpoint, as they are using the entire screen (including its borders) as part of the playing field. Or at least it looks like it, at first. You can't actually go over there, but it is part of the scenery. Nice recession-into-depth perspective effect. The title has some nice raster effect routines on the letters, which hackers may enjoy. Sound Very good. A quality job on the sound effects but no music plays. There is plenty of sound to keep you busy as the game progresses. Gameplay Very good. I can't see much difference, gameplay-wise, between this Vic20 version and the C64 version. I've never actually seen the arcade game this is based on, so can't comment on that aspect. But the level progression seems steady enough, and pacing is good. Overall Very good. Impressive in a number of technical ways, but still simple enough to be a good, playable game. Well done! Trivia Yes, that Sega. The folks that made Sonic the Hedgehog and the Sega Genesis, years later. They must have really been trying to do well, way back when. It shows in their finished code, and it also shows in their full-color cartridge labels. Beautiful! A hearty cheer for someone who cared, while everyone else did awful looking text labels on their carts. I'm so sick of seeing labels that only printed the name in text. Blah! I am convinced that one of the reasons the Atari 2600 became so popular was their use of colorful graphics on their carts. (And why collectors still want them.) Most of the less popular systems had plain text labels.

Game name Cannonball Blitz Company Sierra On-line [CBL-401] Author Screen says "by I.C.G. programer Blip" (1982) Game Type Variant of arcade coin-op "Donkey Kong" by Nintendo. Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 1 & 5). Joystick. Graphics Plain looking, but very smoothly animated. They chose resolution over number of colors, essentially. (Compare to Donkey Kong.) Sound Average or better. Nice attempt at background music, good effects. Gameplay You decide. It has that Nintendo-like tourism/exploration feeling to it that I never quite fell in love with. But other gamers feel tourism results in a deeper gaming experience, in some ways. Overall This is a quality game but it is of a game type that I just don't care for much, myself. It was way ahead of the NES era, however, if you want to give it points for something like that. Comments This is actually only a 12k game internally. (8k + another 4k.)

Game name Capture the Flag Company Sirius software Author Paul Edelstein (1983) Game Type Original game. Something like a non-violent version of "Doom". Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick and/or keyboard. Graphics Awesome. Split-screen graphics with multiple windowing effects and first-person motion, all on a computer that does not even have built-in bit mapping capabilities? Wow. Simply marvelous! Sound Good. Reasonably good tries at tunes, with nice sound effects. Gameplay Where else have we recently seen multi-player, multi-room, first person exploration games? Just add some monsters, and you have a Vic20 version of Doom or Duke Nukem or whatever. How cool! Overall Wonderful. The concept is cool, the execution of it is cool, the fact that it came a decade before this type of thing exploded in popularity makes it way before its time, etc, etc. Check it out! Comments May be hard to figure out without the original instructions. The concept itself is simple enough: two players, each trying to find the flag first. This was a non-computer game a long time before this game came out, but being able to play without a second human being (against the computer) was still a novel idea, back then.

Game name Cave-in Company Spectravision Author Greg Carbonaro (1982) Game Type Original game, flavored by Pac-Man and snake/surround games. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Good. A bit plain or average looking, but they work. Sound Good. Nice opening tune, but it gets a bit repetitive. Gameplay Average to good, but a bit unusual. Has a wide range of levels (6) to choose from; from crawling along to over-in-two-seconds. Overall You decide. It seems like one of those love-it-or-hate-it games. Trivia The company name was taken directly off the title screen. The company seems to have been inconsistent about their own name.

Game name Centipede Company Atarisoft Author unknown (1983) Game Type Translation of Atari's coin-op arcade "Centipede". Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 1 & 5). Joystick. Graphics Very good. Looks just like the real thing, except a bit blocky? Sound Very good. Sounds just like the real thing, for the most part. Gameplay Very good. Only arcade fans could tell the difference, perhaps? Overall Very good. A fine translation, as far as I can tell. It works. I prefer fast, tense games. Try Video Vermin, if you do also. Trivia I don't own a trackball but I presume Atari's 2600 one works.

Game name Choplifter Company Creative Software Author Tom E. Griner (1982) Game Type Authorized translation of Choplifter. Required 8k or 16k RAM; two different versions found. Joystick. Graphics Excellent. Smooth movement of objects, objects all recognizable, etc. Some subtleties: parallax scrolling stars in background, the neat title screen rotation effect, the angles changing to match proper perspective as you cross the line going home, rotors that seem to be turning on the helicopter, the flag waving at home... Sound Excellent. Rotors sound like they are turning, pitch changes as engine speed changes, etc. Just nice sound effects all around. Gameplay Choplifter is justly famous for its gameplay. In fact, the game was converted from home systems to being an arcade game. Yes, the process worked backwards this time. What more needs be said? Overall An excellent rendition of a classic. Mr. Griner always manages to squeeze out the last ounce of performance; another fine TEG game. Ad Text "Those are your men they're holding hostage! We don't care how you do it, but you've got to shoot your way in there and bring 'em back alive. You've got three choppers, probably not enough but it's all we can spare. And the enemy camp is pretty heavily fortified. With tanks, jet fighters and truly nasty laser bombs. Okay, maybe it's a suicide mission, but somebody's got to do it. Dozens of innocent lives are at stake. We're counting on you... don't let them down!" (Seen in Electronic Games, Dec 1983) Trivia Ad also mentions this program was "selected as some of the 'most innovative computer programs' 1983 CES Software Showcase Awards".

Game name Chuck Norris Superkicks Company Xonox Author unknown (1983) Game Type Original tourism & action game. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Mixed. Some portions are hi-res, others are very low resolution. Sound Bleeps and such. No impressive effects, and no background music. Gameplay Boring. The idea probably sounded good at the time; a tie-in with a major action star, Pitfall's running character (except overhead) and so on. But the actual gameplay seems like an afterthought. Overall Bad. Looks and plays like the generic port that it is. But from a historical point of view maybe this game is interesting? It's one of the first of the under-imaginative movie tie-in games. I have to wonder if Chuck Norris actually ever saw the finished game? Trivia This game came as half of a "Double-Ender: a two videogame cartridge". Artillery Duel was its better half, in my opinion.

Game name Cloudburst Company UMI (United Microware Industries, Inc.) [1636] Author Peter Fokos (1982) Game Type Original game, flavored perhaps by Activision's "Kaboom!" game. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Good. Fast and smooth movement, even if the characters are simple. Sound Not bad. Catchy little tune, nice effects. The tune doesn't play incessantly, which makes good sense. More like an attract mode. I wish more games would shut up once in a while. Less is more here. Gameplay Fun. Fast-paced. Might take a while to get used to, but I like it. Overall Simple and fun. What more can you ask of any game? Trivia This is a 4k game internally, although it requires 8k to run. Comments Fire button to start. Your character fires in three different directions. Use joystick movement and fire, together, to switch.

Game name Clowns Company Commodore [Vic-1931] Author unknown (1982) Game Type Translation of Bally/Midway coin-op arcade game "Clowns". Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Paddle controllers, NOT a joystick. Graphics Good enough. Simple, but so was the arcade version of this game. Sound Same as with graphics. Nice funeral dirge, when you die! Gameplay Good. More fun than you'd think by looking at it. Give it a try. (If your characters control poorly, your paddles need cleaning.) Overall Good. An older game but a fun one. Gameplay is the key here. Ad Text "Come one, come all... see the amazing jumping clowns... direct from their show-stopping Bally/Midway arcade tour... A true arcade 'classic'! Colorful acrobats with scoring skill." (Seen in the Spring 1983 "Commodore Power Play" magazine, on page 104) Trivia One of the "arcade classic" series of remakes of older arcade games. The arcade version was made in the late 70's, according to the KLOV (Killer List Of Videogames). There are aspects of other arcade games incorporated into it; namely Carnival and Breakout.

Game name Commodore Artist Company Commodore [Vic-1935] Author Richard Blum (Bubblesoft) (1982) Game Type Utility program. Draw pictures on your TV screen. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Optional are joysticks, lightpens and printer. Ad Text "A true lightpen drawing game... you are the artist... you create the picture... multi color!" (Seen in "Commodore Power Play" magazine, page 104, Spring 1983 issue.) Trivia This cart may be rarer than most. It definitely came when the Vic20's commercial lifespan was rapidly dwindling. The cart I have (A) is only 4k internally, (B) has the other 4k half filled with what looks like a C64 utility program, (C) came in a special case the author believes was used only for limited production runs, (D) is fairly hard to find. (Was it ever massed produced? In other words, does anyone have a tan "normal label" version?) Comments Not given a very thorough review due to its non-game nature. To fully use this cart, you might need the original instructions.

Game name Computer War Company Thorn EMI [THC 22006] Author unknown (1983) Game Type War simulation, apparently inspired by the movie "War Games". Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Nicely done. Neat blinking light / "computer thinking" effects, good use of bit-mapped graphics, multiple screens, and so on. Sound Nice effects, overall, but no background music. Gameplay You will need the original instructions to really play this game. Overall Without the instructions, who knows. But it does look promising. Review This was reviewed in the Feb 1984 issue of Compute. See page 134.

Game name Congo Bongo Company Sega [006-04] Author unknown (1983) Game Type Authorized translation of the arcade game "Congo Bongo". Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Reasonable, but not great. Has various small flaws. Definitely not a show-off piece compared to its peers. The Vic20 was getting pretty advanced in age, by now. Did Sega just crank this out? Sound I suppose it's intended to build tension, but it just annoys me. Gameplay I've never seen any version of this game that was actually fun, so is it fair to just call this average? The C64 version looked great but wasn't any more fun to play. I never saw an unemulated arcade original, so I have to wonder if even it was any fun? Overall I consider this game a dog, but maybe others will like it. Trivia See the other Sega games as well. (Star Trek and Buck Rogers.) I already said it there, but I'll say it again... bravo for cart labels with some color and art to them! Phooey on text labels! Unfortunately, I consider this carts label to be its high point.

Game name Cosmic Cruncher Company Commodore [Vic-1922] Author unknown (1982) Game Type Pac-Man variant. Different graphics but same overall concept. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Fair to average. And I'm being rather generous, I think. Lots of flickering on the 4 characters that chase you, for instance. Big blocky graphics, for another. All in all, it's almost ugly. Sound Not bad, but could be better. The Pac-Man theme can almost be recognized, which is surprising as this was a legalized remake. With some work, the sounds could become fully recognizable... Gameplay Good. It is almost surprising, as the screens look so bad that you almost don't even want to give it a try. Put this game's code for gameplay with say Jelly Monsters character graphics and we would have a really nice port of Pac-Man, I'd say. (There may be more work than that, but it would get you fairly close, fast.) Overall Mixed. Sort of the game that could have been but never was. The authorized version of Pac-Man is no wonder, itself, so maybe... Ad Text "Maneuver your 'Cosmic Cruncher' through the Milky Way and 'Crunch' all the pulsars in the galaxy... eleven challenging levels of play... over 300 color / maze combinations. Exciting arcade action!" (Seen on page 104, Spring 1983 issue of "Commodore Power Play" magazine.) Trivia Commodore wasn't the only game company to try to make money on an unauthorized Pac-Man game. Magnavox also made a Pac-Man variant to hopefully sell more of their Odyssey2 home game systems. Mags then said Magnavox got sued, lost, and had to change their game to one that wasn't such a close copy of the original. (This adds fuel to the argument that Commodore had similar problems. Whether they were actually threatened or were just scared, I don't know.) Trivia See also Pac-Man, Jelly Monsters, Trashman, and probably others. If any of you ever get tempted to cut up Vic20 cartridges to make "multicarts" or what not, Cosmic Cruncher would be a good choice! It's not like they are rare. They are practically an ultra-common. A reason for this may have been Commodore pushing it harder, since they now knew for sure that they wouldn't get in trouble for it?

Game name Cosmic Jailbreak Company Commodore [Vic-1927] Author Commodore UK (1982) Game Type Variants of arcade coin-ops "Space Invaders" and "Rip Off". Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Plain looking, but it works well enough. You can't easily mistake the characters for anything else. Nice sneaking-in-from-the-side effect. It gets to you over time and helps build up game tension. Sound Pretty good. Has those familiar SI background sounds to it. Gameplay Fun. Give it a try before you dismiss it for its simple looks. Overall Silly but fun. A nice combination of two excellent arcade games. Comments Compare this game to Spectravideo's Ape Escape. Who copied who? Did the Spectravideo authors later sell their game to Commodore, who made this version? Did Commodore just liberate it via their UK offices? Or were both games based on a third I don't know about? There is definitely something going on between these two games. If anyone has some solid info on this, let us know about it.

Game name Creepy Corridors Company Sierra On-line, Inc. [CCL-401] Author Don McGlauflin (1983) Game Type Original game, influenced by Wizard of Wor and others. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Only two colors, but the screen resolution is very good. Watch your character and see if he doesn't move like the WoW character. Sound Sparse. Only a few sound effects. Actually, that's kinda nice! Gameplay Fun, if a little slow-paced at first. Avoid monsters while moving through a maze and collecting special objects. Hey, I think I vaguely remember hearing about a game like that; Pac-something or other? Hee, hee. This game also has touches of dungeon style play. Overall They took various ideas and integrated them well. It's a fun game as is, and a model for future integration efforts. Perhaps a good starting point for a modern Vic20 rendition of Wizard of Wor?

Game name Crossfire Company Sierra On-line, Inc. [CFL-401] Author Gordon (1981) Game Type Authorized translation of the Exidy arcade game "TARG". Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Simple, but maybe that is good after a while when things speed up? Sound Average. Nice effects but no music. Gameplay Good enough. Move in four directions and fire at aliens. And of course, avoid them while moving through the maze. Overall I am not personally in love with the game but you can't win them all, right? Maybe others will find the play mechanic appealing. Review "Targ (Exidy): One of the most unique approaches to the maze chase contest presents alien invaders moving over a grid of city streets seen in overview. The game has become a home classic in a slightly altered form as Crossfire from On-line for the Apple II and Atari computers." (Not to mention the Vic20! Text taken from Electronic Games magazine, June 1983, pg 89. The article listed Targ among others they called "some forgotten coin-op gems".) Trivia Title screen says "Jay Sullivan's Crossfire". Not sure why.

Game name Dancing Bear Company Koala Technologies Author See Trivia. (1983) Game Type Not really a game. Maybe call it an "entertainment experience"? Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 1 & 5). Joystick. Graphics Cute. A bit simplistic, perhaps, but very cute! One bear plays the piano while another bear dances on stage. Not quite like the modern phenomenon of Full Motion Video, so don't be scared away. Sound Not bad. Considering the Vic's limits, not bad at all! Trivia Screen credits say "Produced by Audio Light" and list the names of Greg Hospelhorn, Rosemarie Rotunno and Rick Parfitt. Comments Koala later made the Koala Pad device for the C64 machine. This cartridge must have come with some sort of external device; it doesn't seem to respond very well to the normal input devices. Without having one, it wouldn't be fair to do a full review. Nor did we have access to the original instructions. And the screens refers to a cassette, too. Oh well! The cart itself is cute...

Game name Deadly Duck Company Sirius Author unknown (1982) Game Type Original game, perhaps similar to Imagic's Demon Attack. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Plain-looking due to the black background screen, but well done. Sound Simple effects and not many of them, but it suits the game. Gameplay Good. The dropping bricks which temporarily box you in may be either loved or hated, depending on the player. But it is fun. Overall Fun enough. Demon Attack and others were really just upgrades of Space Invaders, with various twists. Each has its pros and cons. Comments Game is really only 4k in length, although it takes 8k to run.

Game name Deadly Skies Company Tronix Author Thomas Kim (1983) Game Type Variant of arcade coin-op game "Carnival". Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Good. Nicely done side-scrolling, clean object definitions, etc. Sound Average to good. Just sound effects, but they are done well. Gameplay Fast to frantic. Avoid flying objects out to get you, while your helicopter drops bombs on ground-based targets. Overall Very good. A nicely done update of the carnival game theme, with fast play action and good gaming suspense. How high can you score? Trivia This is a 4k game internally, although it requires 8k to run.

Game name Defender Company Atarisoft Author unknown (1983) Game Type Authorized translation of the arcade game Defender. Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 3 & 5). Joystick. Graphics Impressive, but not perfect. The movement is pretty jumpy, to get as much onscreen as they can and move it as fast as they have to. Sound Good. Some of the sounds are very nicely done if a little rough. Gameplay Good. I generally rate all home versions of Defender pretty easily however as I don't think many home machines handle Defender well. It is just too fast and demanding a game to copy it perfectly. Only Jeff Minter's Jaguar game "Defender 2000" gets that nod. Overall Try it yourself. Fans may find some imperfections but someone who is not familiar with the original game may not mind them. The arcade original was a love-it-or-hate-it proposition, anyway. Review "The macho game: Defender. Defender is a game of superlatives. It requires the best hand-eye coordination of all the games (with the possible exception of its sequel, Stargate), and it is the most difficult to teach. Many think it is by far the best, most exciting, and most challenging game there is. Others believe it to be undeniably the worst, the most difficult to understand, the most frustrating, and the most pointless game of all. Defender is the ultimate macho game -- women rarely play it -- because it requires loud, frequent blasting of the enemy." (Seen on page 54 of "Score! Beating the top 16 video games" by Ken Uston, 1982.) Review "Defender has very complicated controls, and you will never be more than a novice without mastering them, learning to use them as automatically as you breathe... Mastering Defender requires some perseverance, but most players find the effort worthwhile." (From pages 76-78 of "How to master the video games", 1981, by Tom Hirschfeld. Bantom Books, ISBN 0-553-20164-6.) Trivia The arcade original was a 1980 Williams effort. It is widely felt to be one of the most demanding and difficult videogames ever devised. Nearly two decades after its initial arcade release the original still commands much respect from those who've played it. Eugene Jarvis, the original programmer, deserves a hall-of-fame award for making it, IMHO. Robotron should seal that deal... Trivia Here's one to keep you awake at night, wondering. Inside the code of the game itself is this message: "COPR.HES,1983 V1.1x". Wow! Comments To give you an idea of how hard the original arcade game was, I once watched a 5-year old play against his older brothers. The five year old, on tiptoes, couldn't even see the screen. He was in "Use the force, Luke" mode the whole time. His scores and his brothers scores weren't much apart. After seeing that and seeing how quickly my quarters were disappearing, I decided two things: (A) I loved the game and (B) there was no way I could afford it!

Game name Demon Attack Company Imagic [720050-1A] Author See Trivia. (1983) Game Type Translation of Atari 2600 game "Demon Attack". Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Excellent technically, but may look plain at a glance, due to the empty black background. The game was faithfully ported over from the popular Atari 2600 console, and looks as good or better. Sound Very good. No music, just sound effects. Just like on the 2600. Gameplay Addictive. This was a very popular game, then, and still fun now. Overall Very good. This game was good enough to spawn many imitators. Ad Text "First, Bill played Demon Attack. Wave after wave of deadly demons bombarded Bill with lasers. The tricky demons split into two, even let loose with a few fireballs. But somehow Bill managed to wipe them out and take off into space searching for the demon's home base. Unfortunately for little Billy, he found it... Let this be a warning to all you cocky, know-it-all, self-proclaimed video game wizards out there: Laboratory tests have proven that IMAGIC games, when played in large doses, may be hazardous to your self-esteem and cause chronic Hugedigitosis (sore thumb). In other words, our games are created by experts for experts." (Partial ad, seen in Jan 83 Electronic Games.) Trivia Box art says "Game program designed by Bruce Pedersen." Comments Another Imagic game that has trouble running well on the PC Vic Vic20 emulator. Apparently, this is because it uses raster scan effects, a very sophisticated programming technique. This fact, coupled with the 4k total code length, makes me wonder if this game was made simply by altering the source code to the original Atari 2600 version? Maybe. It seems possible. Can anyone confirm?

Game name Dig Dug Company Atarisoft (Licensed from Namco) Author unknown (1983) Game Type Authorized translation of Atari's arcade coin-op "Dig Dug". Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 1 & 5). Joystick. Graphics Fairly good, all in all. Not perfect but not bad, either. Sound Pretty good. You can tell they tried but the song gets old fast. Gameplay Fair. I'm much more satisfied with the C64 version, myself. Overall Decent as a stand-alone but mixed as a copy of the arcade game. Another game rushed out in the last days of the Vic's lifespan? Trivia Internal messages date the game code at "27 OCT 83". (At $a013.)

Game name Donkey Kong Company Atarisoft (Licensed from Nintendo) Author unknown (1983) Game Type Authorized translation of Nintendo's arcade coin-op. Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 1 & 5). Joystick. Graphics Good. A little crude but recognizable. Well, maybe really crude? It's hard to believe Atari did their best, with 16k to play with? Other people made really good games, with only 4k to work with. Purists will note some missing between rounds graphics, as well. Sound Good. Recognizable sounds all around. No complaints from me. Gameplay Good. Seems to me to be a good enough conversion in this respect. (Gameplay is generally very important to me. I am usually willing to forgive lapses in graphics to get good gameplay.) After all, this game is fun enough on even the sub-mini B&W Gameboy system. Overall Good. Perhaps I'm under-rating the game a bit as it has never been one of my all-time favorite games. But it plays just as good as the arcade original or any other home system, in my opinion. Trivia Mario makes his debut on the Vic20 machine! And soon to come, the Nintendo home system that took over the post-crash gaming world! This point in time is right at that turning point, from hippies running the gaming industry to it being run by corporate types.

Game name Dot Gobbler Company Machine Language Games Author unknown (198_) Game Type Probably a Pac-Man clone, although this is only a guess. Required Unknown. We haven't seen one and thus don't have it archived yet. Comments One of the rarer carts for the Vic20 library, as our Cartridge List notes. Perhaps not fabulous gameplay, or it would likely be easier to find? Still, it would be interesting to see, someday.

Game name Dragonfire Company Imagic [720052-1A] Author See trivia. (1983) Game Type Translation of the Atari 2600 game "Dragonfire". Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Very good. Uses raster effects like the other Imagic games. Has more than one screen, offering more variety than some others. Sound Average or better. Gameplay Very good. This is the major thing that Imagic excelled at! Overall Very good. A simple but fun game. Excellent, addictive gameplay. Ad Text "Dragons rule! The young prince hopes to defeat them -- but first he must reclaim the king's treasures. The Prince attempts to cross castle bridges. Hatchling dragons try to prevent him. They hurl deadly fireballs at the agile Prince. He leaps, ducks and sprints to avoid them! When the prince gets across the bridge, he finds a splendid storeroom -- and its ferocious guardian! He can take every treasure he touches. He must grab them all before a magical exit appears and he can escape. But the dragons become smarter and faster! Their fiery breath spells doom!" (From the box art.) Trivia Box art says "Program designed by Tim Yu." Who programmed it?

Game name Face Maker Company HES (Licensed from Spinnaker) [C324] Author Jay Stevens (1983) Game Type Educational. For young children. Assemble funny faces on-screen. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Disable bank 1 if present. Comments Not given a very thorough review due to its non-game nature. To really use this cart you may need the original instructions. Then again, maybe not. Fire it up for your toddler and just wing it? (I can't wait to see if my little nephew likes this one or not.)

Game name Fast Eddie Company Sirius Author Kathy Bradley (1982) Game Type Original climbing game. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Almost Atari-2600 like in its looks. Still, the characters are easy enough to make out. Simple-looking, but what the heck? Sound Average. Gameplay Fast and seemingly well-balanced play. Run around, grab all the stuff, jump over your antagonists, etc. Simple, but can be fun. Overall I tend to agree with the review below. I'd take more games like this one over disappointing arcade conversion, etc. Review "This climbing game sends your on-screen alter-ego, Fast Eddie, zipping up and down ladders and darting along five floors in his quest for prizes. The valuable items float overhead, some stationary, others bopping along at a healthy rate of speed. With the 10 prizes per screen appearing two at a time at different locations, Eddie's task is not an easy one... Game designer Mark Turmell, and Kathy Bradley, who converted Fast Eddie for the Vic-20, have produced a fun game. If not exactly state-of-the-art, it does a good job with the computer's capabilities. The graphics are okay, and the play-action adequate. Not a game to write home about, but not the worst way to pass an evening either." (Seen in Electronic Games, Dec 83, pages 80-81. Review by Charlene Komar.) Review Also reviewed by Compute's Gazette; page 102, October 1983 issue. Trivia Don't confuse this game with "Fast Freddie", a rare arcade game that featured a side-scrolling character that hanglides. The two games have similar names, but are otherwise very different.

Game name Final Orbit / Bumper Bash Company Sirius Author unknown (1983) Game Type Two games in one: a space shoot-em-up and a pinball simulation. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Good or better. The space game looks brighter, more colorful than the pinball game, but both are technically impressive. Neither raster effects nor bit-mapping are standard options on the Vic20. Sound Good. Mostly just sound effects, but they work well enough. Gameplay Both games play well and as you might expect for their game types. Overall I really like the pinball simulation. It may not be as realistic as simulations on other (later, more powerful) machines, but it is fun just the same. One of my favorites! The space game is OK but I just don't usually get excited by that type of game. Try it. Trivia This cartridge is odd in a number of ways. It has two 4k games inside one 8k chip for one. But only the pinball game had any copy protection code in it. This may mean that both games were originally intended to be on separate cartridges, but were later combined into one game cartridge. Anyone know more about this? Comments To flip between games use the "C=" key in the lower left corner. The space game controls with a joystick, as you might expect. The F and L keys control the pinball flippers. Press F to load a ball into the ramp, L to adjust, both F and L together to start.

Game name Fourth Encounter Company Thorn EMI [THC 22005] Author unknown (1983) Game Type Original vertical shooting game. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Average or better. Displays some technical finesse in the things that it does, but they are subtle enough to be missed by most of the gaming public. Does a good job of moving multiple objects on the screen at once, even if each of them looks fairly simple. Or odd. The opening wave looks like flying carrots to me. Sound Average. Your "ship dying" sound can get annoying after a while. Gameplay Average. Not bad, but not stunning either. Overall Maybe a little more tweaking in what was there to make it a truly interesting shooting contest? Most of the essential elements are there but they lack that last little oomph to be really great.

Game name Frogger Company Parker Brothers (licensed from Sega) Author unknown (1983) Game Type Authorized translation of the arcade coin-op "Frogger". Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Poor. Very uninspired. Like they didn't know the Vic20 very well or they just didn't care. Most likely, the latter. Sound Good. Effects OK, song good. But it doesn't play during the game! Gameplay Fair. Most of the mechanics are there but something still lacks. Overall Poor to fair. I can't even seriously call this version "good". If you really want a good version of the original Frogger try the one Starpath made for the Atari 2600 (via their Supercharger). Trivia The original arcade game was put out in 1981 by Sega, who had licensed it from Gremlin. According to information seen in the "2600 Connection" newsletter, Frogger was based on a game from Atari called "Space Race". Frogger is definitely better known. The arcade cabinet artwork included tire tracks near the screen. Trivia This game had 8k of available space to use, but may have been rushed out the doors. Whatever the reason, not all that space was used for game code. About 3k of the 8k is empty. Poor choice! Note that early ads from Parker Brothers show they were making and selling C64 and Vic20 games at the same time... I can only assume they put far less effort into the Vic20 market's game, figuring that you had to take whatever garbage they offered you.

Game name Galaxian Company Atarisoft Author See comments. (1984) Game Type Authorized translation of the arcade coin-op. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Blocky and fat but they move reasonably well. The designers were definitely convinced from the start that the Vic20 couldn't handle the original graphics "as is". Before you agree totally, take a look at "Star Battle"... Atari's is colorful, Commodore's hi-res. Neither reach arcade emulation perfection. It's a give-and-take. Sound Good. Most of the sound effects are very well done. Gameplay Not bad at all. They captured the arcade look and feel pretty well, all in all. Galaxian was basically an updated Space Invaders game (diving aliens), but wasn't as fast-paced as later vertical shooters. The one-bullet-at-a-time was that way in the arcade, by the way. Overall Aside from the blocky lo-res graphics, not bad. Give it a try. Trivia Internal binary codes reveals this message; " 1984 designer software bill bogenreif 6". (See it at $AFD8 to $AFFF.) One can only speculate that this meant that Atari bought this version from some outside source, rather than program it themselves? Trivia This is one of only two 8k games by Atari; the rest were all 16k. There doesn't seem to be any date-related pattern to explain it. I imagine they weren't as worried about saving $ on memory chips and just used up whatever memory they felt they a game needed. Trivia I have no idea why they waited this long for this cart to be made in the first place. Galaxian was popular for years before they got around to releasing a version. And when they did, apparently it was written by someone outside the company. Why? I can imagine that the "gaming crash" left Atari internally disorganized. So other reports have indicated. This cart and Jungle Hunt are the only two cartridge titles to have been released with an onscreen date of "1984", even though internal messages sometimes date the games well into December of 1983 or even into January 1984. Not even Commodore released any carts beyond 1983; they shifted to the C64 and so did the rest of the marketplace. This definitely helps to explain why Galaxian is such a hard cart to find!

Game name Garden Wars Company Commodore [Vic-1932] Author unknown (1982) Game Type Original game, involving mazes and shooting. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Very Atari-2600 looking. Almost surreal in some ways. Trippy. Sound Average or better. Gameplay I think you either need to (A) be on heavy pharmaceuticals or (B) have the original instructions to understand this game. But the gist of it is the standard run-around-in-a-maze-and-shoot-things. Things seem to move quickly but your movement controls are picky. Overall You decide. I'm staying neutral on this one!

Game name Ghost Manor Company Xonox Author unknown (1983) Game Type Original game, released on multiple home gaming systems. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Crude. Almost Looks like a direct port from the 2600 machine. Sound Average. Gameplay Awful! One of the most boring games I've ever played. Maybe very small children will find its pacing to their liking. Maybe! Overall Disappointing, even for a Xonox game. The best I can say about it is that maybe we're missing something, without the instructions? With a light gun to shoot the objects this might be OK, but... Trivia Most games by Xonox have a reputation among most classic gamers as being of the lowest possible quality. I most certainly agree! It is interesting to note, however, that internally the cart were made of very high quality parts, suited best for mass production. How's that for misplaced priorities? Making many games, all bad? Trivia Cart label reads: "Plays on Vic20. Use Joystick controllers. Turn off console when inserting cartridge. Read instructions before playing." My cart was a single-ender, by the way, not a double. Which makes no sense, as this isn't stand-alone material. Comments Try pressing F1 then F5 to start the first level. Touch the ghost as many times as you can, then you progress to the next level. If you just stay in the center he'll come to you, but you have to be moving in some direction or it doesn't count. Such fun! Whoopee!

Game name Gold Fever Company Tronix Author Corey Ostman (1983) Game Type Original climbing game. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Another "hi-res" eye test, uh, I mean game. Seems to be built on character graphics. Some cute animation on the characters. Sound Average. Gameplay Not bad. You have to know that ladders are ladders, and that they invisibly extend up and down. You'll see what I mean, when you try it. After learning that, it's just a simple matter of running around collecting all the gold then finding a level's exit door. Overall Not bad on its own merits but pretty good for a 4k game! Could be fun to play just seeing how many levels you can beat. As intended.

Game name Gorf Company Commodore [Vic-1923] Author See comments. (1982 Commodore & 1981 Midway) Game Type Authorized translation of the arcade coin-op game "Gorf". Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Fair to good. This looks oversimplified at a glance but the real arcade machine was the same way. A fairly good copy all in all. Sound Average for a home machine. The arcade original had built-in speech capability, which just wasn't possible to duplicate on most home machines. (The C64 has it, but only if you bought a special piece of add-on hardware called the "Magic Voice." I typed up all the phrases once, and put them on the Internet.) Gameplay Good. A simple-but-enjoyable multi screen space shoot-em-up. Overall A decent copy of an arcade classic. Fun enough, but no speech. Ad Text "(The smash-hit arcade game!) Midway's incredible coin-operated game is now on cartridge for the VIC! Includes 4 completely different games, multiple levels of difficulty, some of the best cartoon graphics ever devised for video games. Invaders, gorfies, death ships, saucers, aliens... it's terrific!" (Seen in the Spring 1983 issue of "Commodore Power Play" magazine, page 104.) Review An article in the Summer 1983 issue of "Commodore Power/Play" magazine, pages 38-39, lists ways to use programming bugs to get very high scores. The article was written by Jeff Bruette, one of the Commodore programmers that helped to make this very game. Trivia Onscreen messages credit the following people as authors of this version: Bill Hindorff, Andy Finkel, Jeff Bruette, Eric Cotton, Mike Scott, and Jimmy Snyder. (Displayed in that order onscreen.) Trivia It must have been very interesting to have been around the folks at Commodore in their earliest Vic20 years. This is one of the first game clones actually OK'd by the company that owned the rights. (Earlier games had been made, released, then yanked off the market.) Perhaps because it was so unusual for Commodore at the time, ads then would not let you forget that this conversion was perfectly legitimate and approved by the copyright owners. Trivia It's interesting to note that these officially sanctioned carts were some of the first to have been copy-protected, even in ROM. If you copy the ROM's image to RAM (from an unmodified cart) the resulting image will not run in RAM. My question is, whose idea was this; Commodore or Bally/Midway? (Does anyone know for sure?) I can see BM wanting to protect their stuff, as the whole reason they were collaborating was Commodore tried to infringe on them. But if it was Commodore's idea, how hypocritical were they? Am I too harsh? Over half their first 12 carts are questionable! They make their system popular on the merits of other's games and then decide to protect later games from their own customers? Who did they think they'd attract with that type of marketing? Yeesh! Then again, maybe BM saw it this way, and demanded protection? Comments In the first mission, you can wipe out the entire bottom row of bad guys before they start firing back, if you shoot carefully.

Game name Gridrunner Company HES (Human Engineered Software) [C312] Author Jeff Minter (1982) Game Type Variant of the arcade coin-op Centipede. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Simple but effective. The game doesn't seem to lack anything. Sound Good. Mostly laser blasts and the like but it all works well. Gameplay Very good. Fast-paced and addicting. If you've never seen the game its a bit like Centipede on steroids, with extra features. Overall Very good. Jeff Minter made his reputation on games like this. Ad Text "$5 says you can't beat Gridrunner. Gridrunner is the toughest, fastest, arcade quality game ever to challenge a Commodore or Atari computer owner..." (HES ad, Compute's Gazette, Oct 1983 pg 19) Ad Text "Is Gridrunner unbeatable? No one, not even the author, has ever achieved the last Gridrunner. It is an extremely fast-paced arcade quality game designed to test your coolness under fire and challenge your reflexes. As the pilot of Gridrunner, a combat ship, you must annihilate the various enemies traveling along the 'Grid.' High scores are possible only through the mastery of the patterns of the X/Y zappers and the Gridsearch Droids which, when destroyed, mutate into potentially lethal pods. Gridrunner has 32 levels of difficulty (20 levels in the Vic 20 version). To this date, the 13th level has been the highest achieved." (HES ad, July 1983 Compute's Gazette magazine, page 31.) Review "...Gridrunner is about alien Droids in the year 2190 who are stealing electricity from Earth's orbiting power station, the 'Grid.' To stop them, a combat ship patrols the Grid. In the game, the Grid is a large lattice on the screen, and Earth's combat ship moves along the lower portion, firing on segmented Droids, dodging the X/Y zappers, and eliminating mutating yellow pods which some times lodge in the lattice." (Text from an article about Jeff Minter. See page 52, August 1983 Compute's Gazette magazine.) Trivia A 1996 Sony Playstation game was released with the same name. What's up with that? Wonder if they knew and did it on purpose? Comments This is a 4k game internally although it requires 8k to run.

Game name HesMon Company HES (Human Engineered Software) [C302] Author T. M. Peterson (1982) Game Type Utility cartridge, used to read and write machine language code. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Keyboard. Comments Not given a very thorough review due to its non-game nature. To really use this cart, you'll need the original instructions. And a good understanding of 6502 machine language programming. Among those who had such needs, this was once a very popular cartridge.

Game name HesWriter Company HES (Human Engineered Software) [C304] Author unknown (1982) Game Type Utility program. A word processor. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Keyboard. Comments Not given a very thorough review due to its non-game nature. To really use this cart, you'll need the original instructions. It is really doubtful that many will use any memory-limited word processor in this day and age. However, keep in mind that Bill Shakespeare had only a sharpened feather and a bottle of ink... compared to that this is high tech! Any WP beats a typewriter.

Game name Home Babysitter Company Commodore [Vic-1928] Author unknown (1982) Game Type Educational / entertainment for small children. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Big and simple. It fits the theme and does the job well enough. Sound Interesting. The ABC song is kinda cute, I think. The memories... Gameplay Geared to a very low age bracket. For its market, its pretty good. Overall Should work well at its intended purpose of entertaining toddlers. It may even help teach them something in the process. If nothing else, they'll learn the very basic concepts of using a computer. Trivia The title screen calls this program "Home Babysitter II". Why? Was there another one put out on tape, or planned as a cartridge? What happened to #1? Tape? Or am I missing something obvious? Comments The cartridge includes sections on counting, learning your ABCs, and assembling funny faces on the screen. Small children will need some adult help to get started. Once they know the keys to press (remember that pressing RESTORE takes you back to the main menu, for one) they may do just fine on their own.

Game name Household Finance Company Creative Software Author unknown (1983) Game Type "A home application program." Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Keyboard. Comments See Personal Finance by Commodore. Creative licensed this title to them. The two seem to be identical, other than the titles.

Game name IFR (flight simulator) Company Academy Software Author Rom Wanttaja (1983) Game Type Flight simulator. (Instrument flight only.) Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Average. Just a display of gauges on a cockpit; no scenery of any kind. Yes, this is functional and fits the theme -- instruments only -- but the gauges are still not quite graphic masterpieces. Sound Good to very good. I like the engine idling noises and such. Gameplay That depends. I like it, but mostly because of all the cool ways I've found of crashing. It doubt it was intended to be amusing but it is the way I play it! (Useful info... hit "E" to eject!) Overall You have to have a taste for this sort of thing. More realistic flight sims exist today (at least speaking graphically) but this one has its individual charms. Overall, not bad for Vic20 flight. Probably excellent, if you just want to fly by instruments. For its time, this was probably amazing... and for 8k it still is! Review "Has a quality of realism which sets it apart from others, even those I've tested in flight school." (Compute's Gazette.) Review "Great program!" (Info-64.) Review "It is tremendous fun." (Compute's Gazette.) Review "Flight tested by an air traffic controller, two skilled pilots and an elementary school class. Highly recommended by all." (Midnite Gazette.) Review "This is an unbelievably realistic simulation of the difficulties facing a pilot in instrument flying. I'm a 747 pilot and I think that this simulation could do a lot to improve the reactions and instrument scan habits of even very experienced pilots." (747 pilot, Power Play, Feb/Mar 85, pg 31) Trivia The author recently contacted Paul LeBrasse, making some nice remarks on our Vic20 resurrection work. (Thanks!) He also said he writes books for a living now, so check that out. He claims that this cartridge sold 30,000+ copies on the Vic20 alone. This is believable, if you've ever seen how steadily his ad ran in any of the big Commodore mags back when. He later made a version for the C64 computer as well. (Thanks for all the info; appreciated!) Comments You definitely need the original instructions if you hope to fly the plane with any degree of success and actually land it. But you can also have fun discovering key-presses by Zen, as I do.

Game name In the Chips Company Creative Software Author Gene Genoar (1983) Game Type "Concept home education program" Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 3 & 5). Joystick. Comments Not given a very thorough review due to its non-game nature. To really use this cart, you'll need the original instructions.

Game name Jawbreaker II Company Sierra On-line Inc. [JBL-401] Author Doug Whittaker (1982) Game Type Maze & eating game. Original, but flavored by Pac-Man just a bit. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Good. Large and blocky, but it doesn't really seem to detract. Sound Good. Decent theme music and some nice sound effects. Gameplay Good. Probably best played by younger children or those who like games that are somewhat slower paced. But it can be fun. Overall Good. Nothing sensational perhaps, but a fun look at a simple game with some personality. A cute "alternative" game, for those times when you're sick of the same-old-thing syndrome? Review I can't find the article now, but I know I read of at least one reviewer that liked this game a lot, from way back when. (Sorry!) Trivia Released on multiple hardware systems as were most On-line games.

Game name Jelly Monsters Company Commodore [Vic-1905] Author unknown (1981?) Game Type Clone of arcade classic "Pac-Man". Apparently very unauthorized. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick or keyboard play. Graphics Some flicker and occasional glitches, but overall very good. Uses up nearly all of the screen for its maze, unlike Atari's version. Impressive technically, considering the hardware limitations! (Q: is the flicker due to this being a PAL-based/European game?) Sound Sounds closer to the original than Atari's official version does. Gameplay Not bad at all! Beats most other game console versions by a mile. Overall Very good. It's hard to believe this was done on a 3k computer! Atari should have just slapped their name on this one instead. Trivia This is another one of Commodore's earliest-released carts that is heavily rumored to have been a "way too close to the original" clone of an arcade classic, so it was pulled off the market. This is probable as Vic-1922 is another Pac-Man clone, but has been changed quite a bit from the original. Probably due to its legal status, this is one of the harder Commodore cartridges to find. Comments Use the cursor keys to center the screen image at start-up. This is not a bug, per se, but a built-in feature of the Vic20.

Game name Joust Company Atari Author unknown (198_) Game Type Vaporware. (Translation of the arcade coin-op game "Joust".) Ad Text Shown in an ad in Compute! on page 4, June 1984 issue. This ad shows computers lined up, with boxes of Atari games piled up on top. The effect was a list of sorts; what games had come out for each system. Stargate was no longer listed, but now Joust was shown for the Vic20. No screen shots or other "proof" were shown. I really doubt we'll ever see a production cart, but perhaps a prototype exists somewhere? (On cassette or disk, most likely.) Trivia The original arcade game, by the way, was a 1982 Williams effort. One of its main claims to fame was that it was the first game to allow two players to play at one time, instead of taking turns.

Game name Jungle Hunt Company Atarisoft (Licensed from Taito) Author unknown (1984) Game Type Translation of the arcade coin-op "Jungle Hunt". Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 3 & 5). Joystick. Graphics Fairly good. They got all the individual elements into the game but each of them is a bit blocky; almost abstract looking. The usable screen is cut nearly in half. Is that good or bad? The horizontal dimension is more important to the gameplay than the vertical one is and it creates a cinema-like wide-screen effect! Besides, the arcade original wasn't really a graphic masterpiece. Sound Good. They captured the feeling of the arcade game fairly well. Gameplay Good. Simple perhaps, but fun. Captures the arcade's feel well. Master each screen's required skill, and move on to the next one. Each task is fairly simple to master but keeps you coming back. Overall Good. I liked the arcade original quite a bit. Although this is not a perfect translation it captures the look and feel well. Perhaps a good game to try if other games frustrate you easily?

Game name Jupiter Lander Company Commodore [Vic-1907] Author Hitoshi Suzuki, HAL laboratory (1981) Game Type Clone of the arcade game "Lunar Lander". Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Keyboard controlled. Graphics Fair, but better than I remember the original arcade game being. The original game was one of Atari's first B&W vector graphics units, produced at roughly the time Asteroids came out. Sound Good. Simple, but fits the mood of the original game. Gameplay Hard! Some people may find it frustrating, at least at first. Modern players may feel its too much work and too little reward. However, this is pretty much true to the original arcade game. Overall It definitely represents a piece of gaming's early history. Try it yourself, then decide whether that is good or not. Ad Text "Pilot your 'Jupiter Lander' through the treacherous crevices of a mysterious planet. Variable rocket thrust, anti-gravity, horizontal retros." (Seen in Spring 1983 Power Play magazine, page 102) Review "This is a pretty slick lander game with some interesting variations. The best point is that it provides a close-up of the landing site." (From Electronic Games magazine, Nov 1982, page 49) Trivia Definitely gives one a feel for how far home computers had grown. This is arguably as good as the original arcade version was. Trivia Commodore may have gotten away with copying Atari's 1979 coin-op game "Lunar Lander" when they made this game, primarily because Atari apparently copied theirs from an earlier PDP-11 game of the same name. This game is very deeply rooted in gaming history! Comments See on-screen instructions for keys; 3 function keys are used as upward thrusters, A and D keys are used to move left and right.

Game name K-Razy Antiks Company CBS Software (by K-byte & Kay Enterprises co.) Author unknown (1982) Game Type Original maze game, ported to many platforms. Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 3 & 5). Joystick. Graphics Mixed results. Mostly, its done very well, but with some slight imperfections or things that could have been done better. For instance, the ant animation is good but the anteater's is fair. Sound Average. Gameplay It looks like it has a lot to it but I didn't quite "get it". I didn't have the original documentation so I'll cut it some slack. Overall See gameplay. It has potential, if one understands its rules.

Game name K-Star Patrol Company CBS Software (by K-byte & Kay Enterprises co.) Author unknown (1982) Game Type Original horizontally-scrolling space shooter. Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 3 & 5). Joystick. Graphics Simple, both in coloration and general shape. Sound Average. Just sound effects. Gameplay Too slow paced for me to enjoy much. Maybe a good beginning game? Not much reward for the player as I see it. Just target practice. Overall I didn't play this game much. If it just repeats the same idea over and over, at a snail's pace, I'd say they wasted the 16k. It did include some novel ideas, but none that I think really made much of a difference in the overall gameplay experience.

Game name Kids on Keys Company HES (Licensed from Spinnaker) [C325] Author Frank Tendick (1983) Game Type Educational. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Keyboard. Comments Not given a very thorough review due to its non-game nature. To really use this cart you'll need the original instructions.

Game name Kindercomp Company HES (licensed from Spinnaker) [C322] Author Jonathan Creighton (1983) Game Type Educational. Required 16k RAM (8k in banks 3 & 5). Joystick. Disable bank 1 if present. Comments Not given a very thorough review due to its non-game nature. To really use this cart you'll need the original instructions.

Game name Lazer Zone Company HES (Human Engineered Software) [C3__] Author Jeff Minter (1983) Game Type Original shooting game. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Plain black background looks, well, too plain before you begin to play. You'll be thankful for the lack of distractions, later on! Sound Very nice sound effects and lots of them. Gameplay Geez! Too much to keep track of simultaneously until you develop new skills to. Which means, you play it a lot. This is not to be taken as a complaint, by the way. It will keep you coming back. Overall Thank you, Mr. Minter. Another ballistic blast-fest to enjoy! But as said elsewhere, this game requires more than just a good aim to feel you've mastered it. The unusual play mechanic offers a nice respite from the same-old-same-old videogaming blues. Review "Jeff Minter's latest, Lazer Zone, has a novel play-mechanic. The computerist controls shooters which move along the bottom and right-hand edges of the playfield depending on which direction the player pushes the stick. There's a lot of subtlety along with the shooting in this one." (Seen in Electronic Games, Sep 84, page 64)

Game name Lode Runner Company Broderbund Author Mike Wise and Doug Smith (198_) Game Type Climb and run game, with some puzzle-solving aspects involved. Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 3 & 5). Joystick. Graphics Plainly colored but detailed enough. Great character animation. Sound Average. Gameplay Wonderful in any of its ports. Extremely well balanced and paced. Overall A classic game. In any of its versions, on just about any gaming platform, Lode Runner can offer hours of contented entertainment. Ad Text "...You will maneuver through scene after scene, running, jumping, drilling passages and outfoxing enemy guards in a secret underground hideaway as you pick up chests of gold stolen from the citizens of the Bungeling Empire. There's no end to the thrills, chills and challenge." (Partial text from Broderbund ad in Dec 1983 Compute's Gazette.) Trivia See the entry for Apple Panic for some historical notations.

Game name Lunar Leeper Company Sierra On-line Inc. [LLL-401] Author Dr. Bob of I.C.G (1981) Game Type Original space game, heavily influenced by coin-op Defender. Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 1 and 5). Joystick. Graphics Nicely done. A static screen shot will not show off the wonderful character animation. One of the best efforts on the Vic20. See it! Sound Average or better. Gameplay Fun. Sort of like a simplified Defender. You are still trying to rescue land-based people in a space ship but you have fewer enemies to contend with here. Some may consider that improvement! Overall This is a very well done game. Especially due to its youthful age (1981) this is a very impressive piece. Play it. Show it off.

Game name Machine Language Monitor Company Commodore [Vic-1213] Author unknown (198_) Game Type Utility program. A tool for programmers who want to code in ML. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Keyboard. Comments Not given a very thorough review due to its non-game nature. To really use this cart, you'll need the original instructions. This program may also be called VicMon at times. The keyboard commands used in the program are explained in the "Vic Revealed" book by Nick Hampshire, if you can't find the original docs anywhere. (If I ever get some free time, maybe I'll type them in and upload.)

Game name Mastertype Company Broderbund Author See trivia. (1983) Game Type Educational game. Learn to touch-type by shooting space objects. Required 16k RAM (8k each in banks 3 & 5). Joystick. Graphics Good. Some graphics are more detailed than others but it works. The explosions look unrealistic but are very colorful. Sound Good. Sound effects almost sound blurred sometimes, but are nice and clear on others. Nice deep Game Over effects, nice zaps, etc. Gameplay Fun enough. It has its tension built-in if you don't know how to touch type very well! (Hee hee.) But that's the point, isn't it? Overall Good for either learning to touch-type better or blasting things. Trivia Title screen says the copyright is held by "Lightning software", and credits "Bruce Zweig & Jim Fox with Edward Chu" as authors. Trivia I couldn't resist bragging about this... I own a prototype cart of this game! In a special, hand-openable case, with a dot matrix printer label which states "Mastertype. Sample. Property of Broderbund software not to be sold or given away." It also has a handwritten "38" in the upper right corner. A piece of history? Comments To really use this cart, you may need the original instructions. However, if you're willing to experiment with touch-typing, know that your four left fingers rest on the ASDF keys, the right hand sits on the JKL: keys and your thumbs rest near the space bar. This is the "home position" that is used when touch typing. It will make sense as the game progresses through its exercises.

Game name Maze Company HES (Human Engineered Software) [C3__] Author Tom E. Griner (1983) Game Type Original treasure collection / maze game. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Another techie show piece by Mr. Griner. Neat title effects! Character based, but nice animation on the various characters. Sound Average. Gameplay Good or better. Nice tension from the monsters chasing you. The concept isn't very original but the game is fun to play. Overall Dungeon games were very popular in this time period. This is a nice example of that genre. Competent in all areas, I'd say. Trivia I am slightly biased against this program since my absolute, all-time favorite simple dungeon game is a 1982 piece by Don Worth of Quality Software... "Beneath Apple Manor" for the Apple II. It kicks butt, in my humble opinion! That game is the only reason I still have an Apple II computer, actually. Don, if you still have the source code, please release it on the net. The world deserves to see more of that game, IMHO. Another good one was Epyx's "Sword of Fargoal" game, released on both the Vic20 and the C64.

Game name Medieval Joust Company Thorn EMI [THC 22007] Author unknown (1983) Game Type Original game; a medieval jousting simulation. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Very good, considering Vic20 limits. Hi-res and split-screened. Sound Average. Gameplay Without the original instructions, who knows? Overall It has potential, I suppose, once you figure it out. Might be an interesting novelty item. Where else can you simulate jousting?

Game name Menagerie Company Commodore [Vic-1926] Author D. W. Johnson (1982?) Game Type Variant of arcade coin-op Frogger. Required 8k RAM in bank 5. Joystick. Graphics Plain looking. Big empty backgrounds, big one-color characters. The characters are nicely drawn and detailed however. Sound Below average to pitiful. Could be much better, even on the Vic. Gameplay I like the original Frogger better. So will you, most likely. Overall This is one of Commodore's worst efforts, as far as originality, gameplay and sound is concer