The Great Giana Sisters
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Description
The Great Giana Sisters is a 2D side-scrolling arcade game like Nintendo's Super Mario Bros.After a long and deep sleep, Giana finds herself in a mysterious and evil dreamworld where everything is strange and different.
In 32 levels, Giana has to fight against bad monsters, huge spiders and lots of other creatures to find a magic diamond that makes it possible to return to her own world.
Screenshots
Promo Images
There are no promo images for this game
Part of the Following Groups
- Games involved in legal disputes
- Genre: Hop and Bop Platformer
- Giana Sisters series
- Protagonist: Female
User Reviews
| The game Nintendo doesn't want you to play. | Amiga | Katakis | カタキス (40955) |
| Great sound, but not much after that | Commodore 64 | Scott G (794) |
Critic Reviews
| Lemon64 | Commodore 64 | Dec 01, 2001 | 9 out of 10 | 90 |
| ASM (Aktueller Software Markt) | Commodore 64 | Jan, 1988 | 10.2 out of 12 | 85 |
| Pixel-Heroes.de | Amiga | Oct, 2003 | 8 out of 10 | 80 |
| Pixel-Heroes.de | Commodore 64 | Oct, 2003 | 8 out of 10 | 80 |
| Commodore User | Commodore 64 | Jun, 1988 | 8 out of 10 | 80 |
| Power Play | Commodore 64 | Feb, 1988 | 8 out of 10 | 80 |
| Happy Computer | Commodore 64 | Feb, 1988 | 79 out of 100 | 79 |
| ST Action | Atari ST | Sep, 1988 | 77 out of 100 | 77 |
| The Games Machine (UK) | Atari ST | Oct, 1988 | 75 out of 100 | 75 |
| Top Secret | Commodore 64 | Jul, 1992 | 3 out of 5 | 60 |
Forums
| Topic | # Posts | Last Post |
|---|---|---|
| There wasn't an arcade version? | 4 | Isaac Viana Tapias (2) Jan 09, 2015 |
| Amstrad port: Super rare, or never released? | 6 | formercontrib (159029) Sep 22, 2011 |
Trivia
Development
The game was commissioned by the CEO of Electronic Arts, Marc Ulrich who requested a game similar to Super Mario Bros. There was a gap in the market as there were no games of that type available on home computers at the time. The development team based their new game on extensive play of the NES Mario title. It took around 6 or 7 months to write the game.Never released ports
Although the three versions featured here did (briefly) hit the shelves, no Spectrum version did. While one was definitely planned, some within the company claim that nothing was ever done towards it. If this is the case, Crash! magazine have some explaining to do, as not only did they review it, they gave it 90%.A CPC conversion was also planned and the situation is very similar. At least one magazine reviewed it (Amstrad 100 pour cent), this port is however circulating in unfinished form, apparently leaked.
Problems with Nintendo
The game is almost an exact copy of Nintendo's Super Mario Brothers, with some additions. The play mechanics are almost exactly the same, and graphics are superficially similar. While it is sometimes alleged that Nintendo sued Rainbow Arts and this led to the game being pulled out of the market, developer Armin Gessert stated in an interview (published in a "Classic Gaming" special by German magazine PC Action) that he did not know about any such legal action. It was sufficient that Nintendo got in contact with Rainbow Arts, and let them know their view on the matter before possibly taking more drastic measures. After being taken off the shelves, Giana Sisters was one of the most popular pirated games, though. Many years later, Nintendo took a different, much more relaxed position concerning the Giana Sisters DS game according to Gessert.UK National Computer Games Championship 1988
¶ The Commodore 64 version was used as competition game in the qualifiers for the computer gaming contest in the UK in 1988. The game was played for high-score.¶Awards
- Commodore Force
- December 1993 (Issue 13) – #56 “Readers' Top 100”
Related Web Sites
- AtariMania (Atari ST) (for Atari ST: database; downloadable releases; artwork; additional material)
- CPC-Power (in French) (for Amstrad CPC (unfinished version): downloadable releases; artwork; additional material)
- Game Base 64 (for C64: Downloadable links, Database, Music, Emulation, Frontends, Reviews and Articles)
- Hall of Light (for Amiga: database; manuals; artwork; screenshots; additional material)
- Lemon 64 (for C64: games, reviews and music)
- Lemon Amiga (for Amiga: game reviews; music; manuals; additional material)
- MSX Generation (for MSX: catalogue; cover art; additional material)
- OpenGGS (open source recreation of the game)
- The Manfred Trenz fanpage (Game informations about Manfred Trenz games.)
- Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (encyclopaedic entry for combined platforms)