Everyone has to start out someplace. Even probably the most devoted and famend sport builders started with one easy thought, sharpening and honing it till their first sport duly appeared. Sometimes these could be launched just about unnoticed; on different events, they’d hit the bottom working with a smash hit of epic proportions. For our second entry on this new collection, we current Chris Shrigley, an trade veteran of some 35-odd years, telling us about his first fully-published sport, the magnificent Bounder.

The Game

Title: Bounder

Format: Commodore 64

Year launched: 1986

Publisher: Gremlin Graphics

Genre: Arcade

Plot: Plot? Who wants a plot? Certainly Bounder doesn’t, the primary character on this bouncing ball sport from 1986. Bounder is an anthropomorphic tennis ball, continuously bouncing throughout a number of deadly landscapes. You can safely leap on hexagonal tiles whereas avoiding aliens and different hazards. Fancy testing your luck? The tiles with a query mark bestow a thriller bonus, however beware: it’s not at all times one thing good, and be careful for the yawning chasms!

Reviews: Bounder acquired uniformly glowing opinions again in early 1986. “Bounder is definitely one of those ‘Just one more go’ type of games and a must for any serious Commodore 64 collection,” enthused Your Commodore journal. But the warmest reward was from the usually ultra-critical Zzap! 64 journal. “Bounder is one computer game that would not look out of place in the arcades, as it looks and plays so good,” opined Gary Penn. Fellow reviewer Julian Rignall echoed his colleague’s sentiments. “Once you start playing [Bounder], it’s almost impossible to put the joystick down! It’s one of the most frustrating and maddeningly addictive programs yet.” A last total rating of 97% secured Bounder a coveted Zzap Gold Medal Award.

The Author

Born in Derby in the course of the Seventies, Chris first found computer systems by way of a Commodore PET, tucked away in the back of his class at college. A below-average scholar, this discovery modified his life, fascinating and interesting the younger man like nothing else. After tasting success with Bounder, Chris and his associates produced a number of extra video games for Gremlin earlier than leaving to start out their very own video games firm, Core Design. Chris quickly parted methods with Core, forming one other firm, Eurocom, and creating for consoles, particularly the Nintendo Entertainment System. After shifting throughout the Atlantic to the US, Chris labored for Acme Interactive, quickly Malibu Interactive. More console growth ensued earlier than he took on a task at conversion specialists Mass Media after which Disney. Today he runs his personal studio, Giant Space Monster. Phew.

Antstream Arcade: Hello Chris! So inform us the way you met the remainder of your crew on Bounder, Robert Toone, Andy Green and Terry Lloyd.

Chris: Hello! I met Rob at an ICPUG assembly early in 1982. He was exhibiting off a textual content journey sport written in BASIC. We hit it off, and I went to his home to play together with his laptop and speak about video games and programming. Andy was Rob’s buddy and lived across the nook from him. He confirmed me the sport he was making – it was a very cool model of Q*Bert written in BASIC and machine code. Very spectacular stuff. Terry labored in First Byte Computers, a Derby City centre laptop store I frequented at each alternative. He was a little bit of a programmer again then, and he’d made a bit of flip-screen platform sport on the Speccy. We turned agency associates, and I ended up hanging out at his home a good bit. He’d hook me up with free floppies and video games from the store infrequently too.

AA: Bounder started as a scrolling demo. How did it flip right into a sport?

Chris: Slowly, very slowly! I made a parallax scroller demo and confirmed it to Rob and Andy. When we lastly determined to make an precise sport collectively, I transformed the parallax demo into the prototype with the Bounder ball bouncing round. Really it was simply the scroller demo with a controllable ball sprite added, my ball animation and no collision detection. I additionally labored on an elaborate sprite and character editor, which we used for the challenge.

AA: What did you every do?

Chris: Andy discovered the map system with the blocks and strips, and Rob began designing maps on squared paper, hand encoding them and inputting the info right into a BASIC software he wrote. Things simply progressed from there. Rob did artwork and design, and Andy and I have been all over, programming stuff as we would have liked. Terry joined us early on, did some enemy sprites for us, and rapidly took over all of the artwork duties, together with drawing a correct Bounder ball and degree graphics.

AA: This was a brand new expertise for you all – did you hit any snags?

Chris: We had all the standard issues creating the sport. Mysterious crashes we couldn’t monitor down, spaghetti code, falling-outs, however finally, we had a sport. One of the final issues I programmed was the title web page as a result of we would have liked one earlier than we despatched it off to publishers.

AA: Was there something you couldn’t do in Bounder that you simply needed to?

Chris: I’m certain there was. The sport design developed as we went alongside and ended up precisely the way it was purported to be. I can’t think about Bounder being any totally different. I’m optimistic there was some extent the place we have been simply accomplished with it, no matter what we needed to do or what was or wasn’t in it. I believe we put all the pieces in that we virtually may.

AA: How did Bounder find yourself with Gremlin Graphics?

Chris: Gremlin was high of our listing, they usually snapped it up, together with us. After visiting the Sheffield places of work round November 1985, we have been all provided jobs and began working there in January 1986. We have been going to ship it to Ocean too, however we may solely afford to make one bundle to ship off.

AA: What did your mother and father consider all this?

Chris: No one actually understood what I used to be doing or was curious about it. It wasn’t till a lot later that my mother and father found my profession and have been shocked at what I’d accomplished and achieved. That mentioned, my Mum was supportive from the start (though a bit of bemused by all of it), shopping for me my first C64 and tolerating my antics. When Bounder was revealed in Boots, she was very proud, however nonetheless didn’t get it. She did admire the brand new couch I purchased her with my first pay cheque, although!

AA: What did you study whereas making Bounder?

Chris: I discovered an terrible lot. Obviously, numerous programming stuff and the way to construction an precise sport. Also, how laborious it’s to complete a sport and the way to truly end a sport (trace: simply say it’s completed). And the way to work with (or not) different individuals. That final one was a giant one.

AA: What does Bounder imply to you at this time?

Chris: I’m very keen on Bounder. It is framed by a beautiful and liberating time of my life, and it began a series of occasions that fully modified my life. It gave me the chance to work within the video games trade and have a profession. All the great issues and alternatives I’ve had since have actually come from that.

You can play Bounder and its sequel, Re-Bounder, on Antstream Arcade at no cost. Our due to Chris for his time – keep tuned for one more dev speaking about their first sport quickly.