Thursday, July 19, 2012

The (almost) original version of Pitman (Catrap) preserved

A while ago we have covered Catrap, a fun puzzle game for the original Game Boy, which you can also get on Nintendo's Virtual Console. If you've read the article, you know that it is actually a remake of a 1985 Japanese home computer game called Pitman.

Well, thanks to the efforts of community member BdR, who ardually typed in the game's source code, everyone can now try out the original MZ-700 Pitman - well, almost the original, as the code is based on the French Sharpentiers version in S-BASIC, which used to be much more commonly used than the Hu-BASIC version Isokawa used to program his game. Of course, you need an MZ-700 emulator to run it, but the download contains a readme that explains all the necessary steps. Be sure to also bookmark BdR's homepage in case of possible future updates.

Those interested in the game's source code can also find scans of both the original code (printed in the Japanese Magazine Oh!MZ 8/1985) and the French adaption in the article. Also check the forums to read and/or take part in the discussion about the game, its history and its code.

UPDATE: BdR has made a new version that fixes some bugs and deleted features in the Sharpentiers version, so it's now even closer to Isokawa's original code. The file hosted here has also been updated.

3 comments:

  1. Does it have rewind, like the GB one?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Nope, you can only restart a level or skip it, at the cost of one try each. (As soon as one level is cleared properly, the number of tries is fully reset).

    ReplyDelete
  3. BdR has made a new version that fixes some bugs and deleted features in the Sharpentiers version, so it's now even closer to Isokawa's original code. The file hosted here has also been updated.

    ReplyDelete