Thanks for the feedback, that's a fair criticism - the gameplay is not identical, and the pits and crocs are more difficult than on the Atari. (It is possible to jump across all three in one go, however).tokra wrote:After playing the game for some time and comparing to the Atari-version I agree with Mike on this one. On the original you can jump over all 3 crocs in one go. In this version the crocs are VERY difficult to manage, to the point of making it annoying. If there is a way to make this easier, maybe as Mike suggested, this would really help playability.Mike wrote:Speaking of which, I'd like to ask whether it might be feasible to change the jump width a bit. At the moment it looks like it is ~18 pixels, which allows to jump across the smaller pits (albeit barely), but gives a lot of problems when jumping over the crocodiles. Even though one can stand on their heads when their mouth is open, after a jump you come out 'misaligned'. Is that the same behaviour on a 2600? Maybe it would be nice, if the jump width could be set to 16 pixels instead, with an extra pixel of tolerance allowed at both sides of the small pits (after all, you still stand with one foot on the edge).
Also I noticed that the jumps over the small pits need to be timed much more accurately than on the original. I realize they must look wider on the VIC due to the technical constraints, but maybe extra tolerance when jumping over those is possible as well?
When you work on a game, you become very adept at it's nuances through constant testing and don't realise just how difficult the learning curve can be. My daughters (8 and 11) play the game and still struggle on the crocs - less so on the pits.
The scorpion, cobra and fire obstacles should be easier to navigate though?
One of the game-design issues with Pitfall! was that there was no increasing level of difficulty, so by screen 5 you've come across the most difficult screen you'll encounter..
Will tinker a bit and see what I can come up with.
velocissimo! Thank you!
