Trapfall

The Good
Cuthbert in the Jungle was the name given to the release on the Dragon and Tandy Co-Co releases, but that disguises that it is simply a Pitfall clone under the Cuthbert branding. The thing is, it is a very, very good clone. Ken Kalish was produced a number of very well received games on the 6809 machines- Phantom Slayer, Danger Ranger and Devil Assault being superbly executed examples of a Doom-like fist person labyrinth game, an early platform game and the arcade classic shoot em up respectively, but this is almost certainly the best of the lot. Microdeal, responsible for the UK release, got in big trouble for this one, and not for the first time with more severe consequences than for their controversial Donkey Kong clone "Donkey King"; whereas with their Donkey King they simply renamed it to "The King" and continued to sell, with Cuthbert in the Jungle they actually stopped selling it. Whether they would have done so had it not been on the C64 as "Trapfall" is up for debate- I suspect that had it been restricted to the 6809 machines they might have been under the radar enough to avoid having to cease selling the game. Another conspiracy theory is that the game was simply too good, better than official release of Pitfall itself on other platforms- running at damn near perfect pace, with the obstacles wonderfully designed and with ideal progression, it showed up the often sluggish official versions. The graphics here are fine- PMODE 3 - four colors with green background is the only option presented or needed, as it looks as good as it could. A B/W PMODE 4 (or artifact on the NTSC Dragon or Coco) would not look any better, as the Jungle setting suits the blue/red/yellow/green colors on offer. Collision detection is key in these games- nobody wants to be eaten by a croc with daylight between them and it, and the game duly delvers on that front too, damn near perfect. Pitched at perfect difficulty too it engages from the start, although I don't know anyone who finished it in twenty mins, even with an infinite lives (well 255) lives POKE.

The Bad
The sound is a little simplistic in terms of the funeral march played upon death is a lot less advanced than some other games that came later, but about par for the course at the time. I don't think Ken Kalish games had especially fine music in general, but then again, most of them were damn good games that did not need it.

The Bottom Line
Pitfall, so good they got sued.