I have been a Jumpman fan since the day I saw it, it was around at a certain pirate who worked out of Silica Shop in Kent, his name was Reg and we had trades, I remember him saying "you won't want this, its sh*t", just shows how some pirate's were first and foremost about the cash and not players. As soon as I heard the music and saw the game I KNEW this was going to be a game I played to death and to this day it still is even after completing it a couple of times I still load it up and off I go. As time and my pains have moved on I find it a challenge again and of course the old memory of the orders to complete levels bits in is just shaky enough to keep me replaying to get them right. But what makes it so appealing to some people, its certainly no pretty and its not sonically a masterpiece but it plays like a dream, I'd not change a thing about it, it works and its a solid fun game. A while back I found the prerelease version, Jumpman One as its known and its just as fun with some level changes that didn't make the final. Jumpman Jnr was a nice mini follow up but there's too little of it, it needed to be revamped and it was via the PC and some fans but as much as they tried it wasn't as good. And then Randy Glover, the original author started a remake but he abandoned it after some work which was so sad as it was looking spot on. Another remake which Randy gave his blessing to also was worked on and it was good but again it just faded away. In recent times on AtariAge a construction set has been worked on and is capable of making stand alone Atari levels and the coder is adding lots of tweaks to it to enhance the construction kit but its part of a disk utility on the PC that he is also working on and real life means progress is slow. There have been a few single levels posted as files to play on the Atari with a promise of a level collection at some point which can't come fast enough. For me Jumpman just didn't work as well on other computers, the C64 version was just off, I can't explain it but it didn't feel right and I'm a C64 fan so its not fan boy talk, it was just off. They did have a variant on the C64 called Wizzard which is very like it but uses spells and such, its good fun and more complex than jumpman but again its just not cutting the mustard but I guess its not really trying to, its a game on its own merits and deserves a try if you like Jumpman. Paul, Jumpman super fan (possibly the only one )...I'll probably return to this to add links
_______ Great write-up, @Paul! I wish I understood why I never took to Jumpman, because it does have wide appeal among 8-bit'rs, especially on the Atari. If I were to hazard a guess, it's because 1) I found Bounty Bob/Miner 2049er first, and Jumpman seemed inferior to the control of Bounty Bob in particular, and, as you mentioned, the graphics aren't eye-candy necessarily; 2) I found Lode Runner first, and Jumpman seemed to want to be a cross between the likes of BB/49er and Lode Runner. That being said, what Jumpman offered was the option to generate new levels-- and the construction set development you also mentioned is a fantastic way to breathe new life into the venerable game. Neither BB nor 49er offers this. A reboot, or update of Jumpman would certainly be welcome as a way to win new converts, including myself, and I'd love to see it developed! For example: Miner 2049er Again! --Tim
