showing 2 games
| name arrow_downward | publisher(developer) | year | description | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| K.C. Munchkin! | Philips;Magnavox (NAP) | 1981 | One of the system's biggest successes: K.C. Munchkin! (For some reason, all Odyssey 2 game titles must end with an exclamation point!) A new take on Pac Man, K.C. ran through mazes, but mazes that moved. He chased after dots to eat, but he actually had to chase them. With only 12 dots ("Munchies") per maze, they moved around the map, often putting K.C. in the path of the bad guys, the Munchters.***AC9435 K.C. Munchkin published by North American Philips in the USA and Canada (English Version) in 1981 K.C. Broyefer! published by Magnavox in Canada (French version) in 1981 Come-Come II published by Philips in Brazil in 1983 Glouton et voraces published by Radiola in France Gufferen released in Denmark Happelaar released in Netherlands Munchkin released in United Kingdom Super-Mampfer released in Germany Munchkin published by Philips in Europe Munchkin published by Siera in Europe The protagonist is the Munchkin The antagonists are the Munchers The objectives are the munchies There are 3 Munchers, each distinctly colored. Each maze has 12 munchies to eat. The munchies start in 4 groups but slowly proceed to roam the maze. As each is eaten, the remaining munchies go faster until the last munchie moves at the same speed as the Munchkin. Eating blinking/flashing munchies cause the Munchers to become venerable for a short time. The Munchers' home square rotates, so that the 'door' cycles through all for directions. This can slow down a Muncher's attempt to regenerate. The player can enter the Munchers' home square too; both can exit in a direction other then the direction they entered. In some mazes, the Munchers' home square is a gateway to otherwise inaccessible areas of the maze. There are 4 pre-built mazes in the normal mode. Additionally, the normal mode includes invisible variations of the mazes that blink off as soon at gameplay begins. In random mode, each maze is randomly generated. Players can create their own mazes in the game. Alas, there was no way of saving these designs using the game. However, they can be preserved with save-states used in emulators. [spoiler=Hint:Last Munchie;Hint:Last Munchie]The Munchkin cannot get it by chasing it, it is too fast. You must calculate where it it going and intercept it there. Alternatively, grab the last 2 munchies simultaneously or in rapid succession while the very last one eaten is headed toward the Munchkin.[/spoiler][spoiler=Hint:Trap the Munchers while powered up;Hint:Trap the Munchers while powered up]A Muncher will not leave the home square as long as the Munchkin is powered up. So steer the munchkin into the home square and repeatedly chomp the Munchers until the power-up fades.[/spoiler] This game was specifically designed to be as legally close to [game=Pac-Man]Pac-Man[/game] as could be gotten away with, defendable in court, and better than Pac-Man. While the maze is smaller, there are significantly less pills to chop, and only three ghosts instead of 4, the maze is animated and more of the screen is accessible, the pills move, and the ghosts are actually different animated characters rather than static clones. And NO FLICKER! Atari (and Sears) were fond of listing the number of game variations on their packages, cartridges, and catalogs (number of players, various features on or off, vehicle types, difficulty levels). In response, Phillips/Magnavox proudly displayed "Unlimited Variations". They could claim this because of the randomly generated and player designed maze modes. Magnavox was sued by Atari who had obtained the rights for the home version of Pac-Man. Atari initially won. One of the details repeatedly brought up in court was the Munchkin's chomping action being too much like Pac-Man's. However, the decision was reversed in the appellate court; although no further copies of the game were produced. The entire fiasco set a precedent for copyright in gaming, and Atari would follow it with a number of lawsuits against various other companies. But the overall effect was the legitimizing of clones. Magnavox would follow-up with a Munchkin sequel that was less Pac-Man like but starred antagonists that were other characters belonging to Atari. A prototype version of this game exist without the Munchkin and Munchers. Instead it has Pac-Man and Ghosts! There are also hacks of this game. The PacMan hack makes the characters and mazes much more like Pac-Man, but since the Odyssey² cannot produce yellow, it was never finished. The Beast Munchkin hack inserts the Transformers: Beast Wars characters. 'K.C.' were the initials of the president of Magnavox in 1981 (K.C. Mencken). Because of this, some fans like to call the Munchkin, "Mencken Munchkin", but this is not official Followed by the sequel [game=#20751]K.C.'s Crazy Chase[/game] [b]Tags[/b]This game is part of a series and includes a level editor. Ironically, its innovative because its the first clone to be legalized in court. This was a victory for gamers who would otherwise never see certain games for the system they had purchased unless it was in clone form. [b]Relations[/b] Obviously, and it has been stated by Ed Everett, this game is Pac-Man for the Odyssey². However, it is different enough to be a unique game despite the Pac-Man influence. So its not quite a true clone. Also, the Arcade version of Pac-Man was the main influence. Atari's version of Pac-Man was actually published a year after this game. This by no means excludes it's influence. Atari's acquiring of the Pac-Man license promted Munchkin's development, all the while the developer knew that his efforts would have to be better that the 2600 game Atari was eventually going to produce. It is a good thing Munchkin was done [i]before[/i] Pac-Man 2600, because this would have significantly lowered the bar for Munchkin. [Zerothis] | labelimagesubject |
| The Quest for the Rings | Philips;Magnavox;NAP (Philips) | 1981 | [48]***AC9429, The Quest for the Rings, Magnovox, North America. 9429AB/AB9429, North American Phillips, Europe, English. PDSF 271 42039, Phillips, Europe, German. 42, Quest for the Rings, Phillips, Europe 42, La Quête Des Anneux, Philips, Europe 42, Speurtocht Naar De Ringen, Phillips, Europe 06 AV 9429, Em Busca dos Aneis Perdidos, South America, Spanish 42, Jagten på Ringene, Philips, Europe 42, Die Suche Nach Den Ringen, Philips, Europe 42, Sormusten Etsintä, ?, Finland Magnovox is a division of Phillips. The Quest for the Rings is an action-adventure game that uses a game board as well has on-screen action. All the statistical elements and logistics, collectible items, time limit, overworld map, locations and such are tracked by the board game element while the 2-player simultaneous action battles take place on the computer screen. It was a cleaver workaround to increase the depth of gameplay when no existing hardware wasn't suitable. A complete set includes: [list] [*]A large game box with cover art and inside cover art [*]A gold labeled game cartridge [*]Large gold colored manual [*]A fold out game board that's 4 times the box size when unfolded [*]A keyboard overlay [*]7 Castles containing The Dungeons [*]6 Castles containing Crystal Caverns [*]6 Castles containing Shifting Halls [*]4 Castles containing The Infernoes [*]3 Dragon Monster Tokens [*]3 Nightmare Monsters Tokens [*]10 Ring Tokens [*]1 Quest Token [*]1 Hourglass chip [*]8 "Possessions" chips [*]A Quest for the Rings themed game catalog advertising the Master Strategy Series.(this last item is not always considered essential to a complete set by collectors) [/list] For a 3 or more player game, once the keyboard overlay is in place, the Ringmaster (Dungeon Master) decides which tokens will be inside the castles and where to locate them on the game board (without the players watching). Up to 2 tokens can be hidden under the the castles. Some castles will have a lesser ring, some have nighmares and lesser ring, some have a dragon and a lesser ring, some are empty. Each castle has a interior environment (The Dungeons, Crystal Caverns, Shifting Halls, or The Infernoes ). The remaining players, the Heroes, will be competing against the Ringmaster (the Villain). The heroes decide how many turns they will need to gather all the rings (50, 75, or 100 are suggested by the manual). The Ringmaster gets 2 "Possessions" chips for every 25 turns, (so 50=4, 100=8). The hourglass is placed on the turn ruler on the edge of the game board according to the number of turns chosen. The game starts when the Heroes place their quest token at a sea port, the hourglass is moved one turn closer to 0. Each time the heroes move their quest token, a turn is subtracted. If they move onto a castle, the ringmaster lifts the castle to show the environment, a lesser ring (if present), a dragon (if present), and/or nightmares (if present). The ringmaster then manually enters this information into the game using the Odyssey²'s keyboard. The overlay conveniently provides START, RESET, NO RING, The Dragon, The Nightmares, The Dungeons, Crystal Caverns, The Infernoes, Shifting Halls, and RINGMASTER CONTROL buttons. It also groups them to indicate which sets only allow one selection to be made. The game finally moves on-screen at this point. The first time this sequence is activated, each players of the Heroes must choose to be a Warrior, Wizard, Phantom, or Changeling. This step is skipped for subsequent battles. They then take control of the Heroes as they navigate the interior of the castle towards the exit and hopefully get the ring if one is present. The lesser Orcs and Firewraths are always present in every castle while a Dragon or The Nightmares only appear in some. The Warrior's Sword can repel Spydroth Tyrantulus, stun Doomwinged Bloodthirsts, repel a Dragon, and confuse the dragon in certain circumstances (held in the up position toward the Dragon when bellow the dragons eye level.) The Wizard's Spell will [i]momentarily[/i] repell Spydroth Tyrantulus, stun Doomwinged Bloodthirsts, stun the Dragon, and halt a ball of fire. The Phantom is unarmed but may pass freely into and out of walls thereby frustrating the enemies. The Changeling also is unarmed but may become invisible at will. A team of differing abilities is best for ring questing. If the Heroes die or fail to get a ring, a turn is lost and that ring is given to the Ringmaster to place in another castle (without the Heroes seeing). The Heroes must still exit the castle no matter how many turns it takes. If they flee a Dragon, the Dragon can take the ring to another adjacent castle (at the direction of the Ringmaster) in full view of all the players, and even chase the players. If the Dragon stops chasing the players, it remains in that place. If the players flee to the sea, the Dragon must stop pursuit. At anytime, the Ringmaster can use a possession chip and take control of one of the Heroes. During a possession, should the Ringmaster fail to stop the other player from obtaining a Ring, the Heroes will gain a turn and the Ringmaster will lose his possession chip. Should he manage to kill a player (as opposed to causing his death), the Heroes will lose 5 turns and he will keep his possession chip. The story explains that Ringmaster cannot touch a lesser ring directly or he will be stricken. If the Ringmaster accidentally touches a ring, he will lose his possession token and the Heroes will gain 5 turns, and get the ring (left by the stricken Ringmaster). For each ring the Heroes have, they can make that many additional moves per turn. Any turn modifying penalty or bonus resets the count and the additional moves are not carried over. The Heroes win if they get all 10 rings before running out of turns, the Ringmaster wins if they don't. The story is inspired by Wagner's Ring (Germanic/Norse), Luned's Ring & Ring of Ogier (Arthurian Legend), Otnit's ring (German Mythology), Solomon's Ring (Abrahamic Legend), and of course Tolkien's rings of power. The manual is unusually written in present-tense-implied-second-person-by-proxy (I think) and includes retelling of past events without changing narrative. It is implied in the manual that there is a master ring in the possession of the Ringmaster and that the 10 lesser rings can neutralize it. Also unusual for a videogame, one of the players is the villain, not just an opponent. The player in the villainous roll can be as nasty or as campy as they choose. [b]Tags[/b]: The traditional style game board makes it an augmented reality game, the Ringmaster player is the antagonist. The protagonist Phantom character is never fully explained but all indications are it is of the undead kind (ring wraith). Their are huge fire breathing dragons that will pursue the multiple protagonists all the way to the sea in an attempt to cook and/or eat them. As far as I know this was the first game to offer characters with non-identical abilities for more than one simultaneous player. Additionally, completing the game as a single player with one character is incredibly difficult; the various characters have complimentary abilities. It is designed for two players and to discourage both players choosing the same character. This precedes Dandy and its clone, Gantlet for these innovations. [Zerothis] | labelimagesubject |
