li63sfm@sdcc7.UUCP (stephen lau) (05/19/85)
Atari has come out with a new video arcade game called,
Paperboy. It is copyrighted 1984, but it is the first time I
have seen it anywhere. The object of the game is to deliver
newspapers to your customers without damaging
their houses or running into cars, people, houses, lawnmowers,
potholes etc. You start with a designated number of houses on a
street the have subscribed to your newspaper. The street name
depends on what difficulty level you choose, for example, Easy
street, Middle road, Hard way. Along with these houses that have
subscribed, there are a number of houses that did not subscribe,
they are painted black. You start down the street on your bike,
passing each house. You must throw the newspaper either onto the
porch of a house or into their mailbox. There is a firing button on
the controls that you use to toss the papers. As you pass the houses
that did not subscribe, you can seek revenge by throwing the
newspapers into their windows and lamps and breaking them. A
cumulative bonus occurs for damaging non-subscribing houses.
Obstacles block your path as you make your rounds such as
dogs, cats, cars and kids on Big Wheels. You can stop these menaces
by hitting them with a newspaper. As you increase in levels, they
become trickier and much faster to avoid. Atari, with their usual
sense of humor, has loaded this one with funny quirks. Some of the
obstacles consist of people break dancing in the street or neighbors
fighting or a sadistic kid that chases you down with his radio
controlled toy cars. In one wave, you pass by a sign that shows a
Pac-man with a slash thru it. Once you pass all of the houses, the
music kicks in and you now become a hot-rod biyclist riding thru a
dirt course. This is a challenge wave and you must complete the
course without crashing to recieve a bonus.
The waves consist of days starting on Monday. At the end of your
route, the game tallies up your bonuses for damaging houses and
records the number of subscribing houses you missed. These
houses then become unsubscribers. If you lose all of your house
the game ends. A house will re-subscribe if you have a perfect
day and deliver to all your houses. Also, if you happen to
damage something on a house that has subscribed, you will
lose that house. Your bike will only carry 10 papers at a time
so every 4 houses or so a stack of papers will appear on the
sidewalk that will replenish your supply if you run over it.
The game is set up like Return of the Jedi with its 45 deg
orientation and the graphics resemble Marble Madness. The only
drawback is that objects will tend to flicker when they move.
This is sometimes a dead giveaway if something is about to
cross your path. The sound is good as is the paperboy's voice.
He sounds a lot like Luke Skywalker and says things such as "Like
Bogus!" or "Aren't I awesome?" etc.
Stephen Lau
San Diego Academic Computing Center