IP.Board 3.1.1 Dev Update: Search Engine Optimisation EnhancementsSpectrum Analyzer: Castelian, aka Tower Toppler, aka Nebulus

[Phillyman]

As many of you will know, search engine optimisation is a process of ongoing improvement. We made some big steps towards making IP.Board more search-friendly when we released 3.0 and we

From the Atari 2600 to the NES to the Sega Genesis (hey, watch out for that eyeball!), you thought you've experienced everything there is to know about retro (oh, don't fall again, you little cretin!). Don't get too cocky though, Americans (no no no, not when I'm this close to the top...)! There's a whole other chapter of classic gaming you've likely missed (what do you mean I can't continue?!). Pack your bags... 1UP is taking an extended trip to England to discover:

The most surprising thing about the ZX Spectrum is how much spillover there was from it to the Nintendo Entertainment System. Chances are pretty high that the oddball titles in your collection that didn’t come from Japan made their debut on the Spectrum first. Take Cybernoid, for instance. This Acclaim release brought together the heavy firepower of side-scrolling shooters with the exploration of action-adventure games… while bringing even the most skilled joystick jockeys to their knees. Then there was Castelian. This platformer by Triffix Software traded the usual scrolling playfields for a massive structure that spins as the hero attempts to climb it. The special effect was breathtaking; so much so that it kept players too winded to scream themselves hoarse after they slipped off the tower to their death for what seemed like the thirty-seventh time.

These two games have more in common than their origins on the ZX Spectrum and a knack for turning peoples’ faces purple with rage, however. Both Cybernoid and Castelian were created by the same company, Hewson Consultants. No developer better illustrates the vast divide between American and European gaming cultures than Hewson. Although this team of programmers punched out over a dozen award-winning titles in its native Great Britain, the name isn’t likely to fire a single synapse in the brain of the average American gamer. Even self-styled historians like myself would be hard-pressed to name more than a couple of Hewson titles, because the few that did make it to the United States either went straight to expensive home computers or were given low-key launches under assumed names. Instead of a recreation of the high-tech recruiting tool in the movie, Mindscape’s NES adaptation of The Last Starfighter was Hewson’s Uridium, with the film license slapped on the front of the box!

Castelian suffered the most from an identity crisis, with more aliases than a con artist. When it was released for the Atari 7800, the game was given the more descriptive title Tower Toppler. It was marketed to the Japanese as Kyorochan Land, while the Italians were given Subline. Back in Britain, Hewson couldn’t even decide on a name for its creation, simply calling it “Nebulus.” While the title may have been open to interpretation, the underlying gameplay is easy to define. Just imagine an ordinary side-scrolling action game, with the stages glued onto a cardboard tube. As a bug-eyed creature best described as the awful product of a love affair between Yoshi and Miss Piggy, you must climb up the tube- er, tower!- dodging creatures that would like nothing better than to shove you into the ocean below.

Frustration quickly builds when you discover how death-prone the lead character is, and how merciful the designer of the game isn’t. Unlike some other British video game heroes, the pig-faced Pogo was smart enough to take some ammunition along on his adventure. However, his small white eggs kill only a few enemies, stun a couple of others, and won’t work at all on the rest. One of these invulnerable foes is a giant atom that slowly crawls across the screen, often leaving Pogo trapped and destined for Davy Jones’ locker. Riding elevators also puts Pogo in a precarious situation… the elevator won’t stop until it reaches its destination, and if a stray bowling ball happens to smack him in the face on the way up, he’ll tumble to a lower floor. The enemies in Castelian won’t necessarily kill you if you’re close to the top of the tower, but the unforgiving time limit won’t give you much room for error… and Hewson’s stubborn refusal to let the player continue means that your blood pressure will climb a lot faster than poor Pogo after a couple of games.

Thanks to its monochrome graphics and a total lack of relaxing fish-blasting bonus rounds, the Spectrum version of Castelian lags behind its counterparts on the Commodore 64, NES, and Atari 7800. However, they all share many of the same issues, including a slightly sluggish lead character and level design that borders on sadistic. If you choose to climb these towers and the almost mountainous challenge that comes with them, you’ll want to make a beeline for the crisp and colorful Commodore 64 version, known as Tower Toppler and available for a reasonable five hundred points on Nintendo’s WiiWare service. Just for kicks, bring along a swear jar, and see how long it takes to fill it!

Special thanks to Wikipedia for some historical data.

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