Boulderdash C64
| Developer: No One Inc. | Graphics: |
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| Publisher: N/A | Sound: |
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| Year: 1989 | Difficulty: |
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| Genre: Boulder Dash | Lastability: |
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| Number of players: 1 | Rating: |
7/10 | |
Inspired by the arcade game The Pit (1982, lower the volume before clicking!), Boulder Dash pioneered a new genre of video games, consisting of collecting diamonds in mines filled with rocks and monsters. You can dig tunnels, push boulders and drop them on creatures to make them explode, sometimes releasing additional diamonds. The concept is straightforward but devilishly effective, so much so that hundreds of more or less distant clones followed…
We can roughly break Boulder Dash into four generations:
- The classics, which debuted on the Atari 800 and Commodore 64 in 1983, led by the iconic Boulder Dash, followed by Royal Boulderdash and Rockford, among others:
– A single type of diamond.
– Only two different types of enemies (butterflies that follow walls to the right and turn into diamonds, fireflies or tanks, that follow to the left and give nothing).
– A limited number of lives.
– “Intermissions”, sort of bonus levels, very small, where you only get one attempt.
– A green substance, the “amoeba”, which spreads, blocks spaces, and kills enemies on contact. If you manage to contain it with walls and rocks, it transforms into diamonds; otherwise, once it reaches a certain size, it turns into rocks.
– A blue amoeba that does not multiply, rocks and diamonds can pass through it (Boulder Dash 2).
– Walls that extend if you dig in the wrong place (Boulder Dash 2).
– You can catch diamonds mid-air.
- The second generation, which thrived on the Amiga with games like Emerald Mine (1987), Eat Mine, and Bond Mine:
– More vibrant colours and better animations.
– Unlimited lives.
– Ability to save and return to previous levels.
– Two types of diamonds (green emeralds and blue sapphires, which are worth three emeralds but break if a rock falls on them).
– Two new enemies (small green men who chase the player and the infamous “yams”, orange balls that devour sapphires).
– The green amoeba no longer transforms, no more extending walls, diamonds can no longer be caught mid-air.
– Additional elements like bombs, dynamite sticks, wheels, doors, keys, invisible walls.
- The third generation, emerging in the 1990s, marked by Supaplex, then titles like Forgotten Mine on Amiga, DX-Boulderdash and Rocks‘n’Diamonds on PC:
– Return of extending walls!
– New features like guided balloons, rock or enemy generators, bi-coloured doors and keys, areas where only enemies can dig, traps to shove at enemies (and sometimes yourself, thanks to an optional bumper).
- The last generation, appearing in the 2000s with Boulder Dash ME on mobile and Boulder Dash EX on Game Boy Advance, amongst others:
– Tiny levels.
– Ability to rotate the screen 90 degrees.
– Awful, anime-style graphics.
– Cheesy music.
– A glut of new modes, a rubbish story, special items and abilities…
– Let’s stop there, it’s going off the rails!
Why is this game so addictive? I came across an interview with Peter Liepa, its creator, on Arno’s page. He explains that playing Boulder Dash satisfies different psychological impulses such as greed (collecting masses of diamonds), destruction (triggering rock avalanches and killing butterflies) and even the neurosis of cleaning, when you start wanting to dig everywhere to remove all the earth from a cellar! It cracked me up!
Back to the game that interests us. Boulderdash 64, as the name suggests, is the adaptation of the Commodore 64 version for Amiga. It’s naturally prettier than the original, and while the level design remains brilliant, the game engine feels like a watered-down “second generation” version, stripped of intermissions and limited lives.
I’d recommend instead Boulder Dash Collection 2, which bundles the first three Boulder Dash titles in their original glory!
Still with me? Hello? Anyone there?
Update:
Boulder Dash has, of course, received its own “laundry detergent” remake. I’m still unsure whether to laugh or cry. Judge for yourself.
Sniff, sniff.
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