Atari's
Crystal Castles is a game that resides on the cusp of most retro gamers' memories, even if they don't know it. The gem-collecting adventure wasn't prominent enough to take up brainspace with the likes of
Super Mario Bros. or
Defender, but with some work, it can be recalled.
"Crystal Castles," people repeat slowly when they're asked if they've ever played the game. "Wasn't that the
Pac-Man thing with the bear?"
Good start. Crystal Castles involved navigating a maze to collect gems, much like Pac-Man. But Atari added the following: A bear named Bentley, pseudo-3D environments (a remarkable thing to behold in 1983), killer bees, a witch with a taste for bearmeat, and an army of killer foliage that was cloned from the kite-eating tree that tormented Charlie Brown.
Crystal Castles for the arcade was programmed by Franz X. Lanzinger, who is alive and well as the President of Actual Entertainment, Inc. Lanzinger built the levels in Crystal Castles to look like three-dimensional castle towers, many of which had multiple floors, separate gem deposits, and elevator access. These spires weren't just out-of-the-way regions that had to be cleared of gems; a clever player could coax enemies onto the elevators and strand them on an upper level while Bentley cleared out the rest of the castle.
Outsmarting the enemy, along with speed, was the key to winning Crystal Castles. A lot of baddies got in the way of Bentley's gem-collecting habit, and not all of them were easy to dispose of. Crystal balls slid across the playing field and devoured gems to deprive Bentley of points--though they had no objection to taking a bite out of his hide if he got in the way, either. Gem-eating green centipedes towered vertically on most levels, but they could be squashed if Bentley ran into them while they munched. A witch named Berthilda was hell-bent on turning Bentley into bear stew, but Bentley could best her if he wore a magic hat that granted him a few precious seconds of invincibility.
And those were merely the enemies who tended to keep out of Bentley's way. The others--the carnivorous trees, the aggressive skeletons, and the angry swarms of bees that hovered around bonus honey pots--actively chased Bentley and rained on his teddy bear picnic.
Crystal Castles was ported to a number of home systems and computers, including the Atari 2600 in 1984. A straight adaptation was impossible, given the original game's complex isometric environments and the Atari 2600's limitations. A whole new game developed in the spirit of Crystal Castles made a lot more sense, and programmer Peter Niday arranged his priorities straight away: He focused on creating a highly playable game instead of wasting time and energy on a port that would ultimately be a short, unplayable jumble of vaguely recognizable levels.
Needless to say, a few things had to go in order for Crystal Castles to exist on the Atari 2600. For starters, Bentley Bear lost his clothes (except for the magic hat, when he could nab it). He ran around the game fields with the breeze in his fur as he collected gems, which had lost their form and color and instead became generic dashes.
But Crystal Castles for the Atari 2600 kept its isometric viewpoint, which was definitely an impressive accomplishment for the system. Though the playing fields took up far less of the screen, Niday widened the narrow corridors that built the arcade game's levels, and packed them full of gems to collect. Enemies were still plentiful and intelligent. Niday even retained one of the arcade game's definitive features for the 2600: When Bentley collected gems in a "rising" pattern, the bleeps that accompanied his hoarding would similarly rise in pitch. When he descended through a level, so would the gem-collecting boops.
Though Crystal Castles remains a good example of what the Atari 2600 could do in the hands of a capable programmer, it had its problems. One sticky point was the game's controls. The original arcade title controlled with a Trackball, which gave Bentley the speed and freedom to really book it around the game boards and swipe up gems before enemies had a chance to lock onto him. Most Atari 2600 owners had to make do with a joystick, which didn't boast the same reaction time as the trackball.
Jumping was even trickier. Jumping was Bentley's only defense against the kite-eating trees, which would lay still for a couple of seconds if Bentley could clear them. But without any real indication of where Bentley would land, more often than not he planted both his feet onto an enemy and lost a life.
Which leads to the mention of one Atari 2600 omission that was less important, but still missed. In the arcade version of Crystal Castles, Bentley left behind a word balloon exclamation whenever he got iced. He'd say "OH NO" and "GOOD BYE" and "OUCH", until he lost his last life and let go of his bear manners with a hearty "#!?"
Crystal Castles was a pretty difficult game to clear on both the 2600 and in the arcades. Most gamers were too impatient to stick around for the challenge. As day-to-day distractions pile up in our brains and push out older information (don't forget your mom's birthday, though), is sweet Bentley Bear in danger of falling off the lip of our memory and into black obscurity?
Fear not. A Toronto electronic music band called Crystal Castles made a great big noisy fuss across the charts last year, and they stand to do a repeat performance this year. Though the band is actually named after the dwelling place favored by She-Ra, the Princess of Power (with members of Crystal Castles going as far as to admit in a February interview with NOW Magazine that they hate video games), it's enough to keep Bentley Bear alive by association.
"Crystal Castles? Is that the band that named itself after that Pac-Man game with the bear?..."
It's the Circle of Clinging to Life, Simba.
(Screenshots from
AtariProtos and
Hot Generation)
More...
Linear Mode
