Captain Goodnight and the Islands of Fear

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Captain Goodnight and the Islands of Fear
Captain Goodnight and the Islands of Fear.jpg
Developer(s) Broderbund
Publisher(s) Broderbund
Platform(s) Apple II
Release 1985
Genre(s) Action

Captain Goodnight and the Islands of Fear is a 1985 action video game by Broderbund. It was released on the Apple II, in English and French. [1] The player must traverse air, sea and land in jets, jeeps, tanks, trams, boats, submarines, and on foot to advance toward enemy territory, the goal being deactivating the Doomsday Device on Doom Island. Along the way, enemy forces attempt to stop the captain. [2] [3]

Contents

Plot

F.O.G. HQ has been given an ultimatum: either give 200 billion dollars to the Federation of Evil, or the free world will be destroyed. It is up to Captain Roscoe “Buzz” Goodnight to destroy the doomsday device before it can be activated. [2] [3] The hero, Captain Goodnight, is a cross between "Biggles, James Bond and Hannay". [4]

Gameplay

After a short briefing, Captain Goodnight is dropped off at an airfield where he begins his journey to find and destroy Doctor Maybe's Doomsday machine. The player has 24 in-game hours to accomplish this, represented by a timer that counts down from 100 "hours" at a rate of one minute every realtime second. Along the way, Goodnight encounters various enemy vehicles and robots. Being hit by any of these will knock Goodnight down, but he simply dusts himself off and jumps back into the fray, meaning the player has effectively unlimited lives. However, each time this happens, one hour is deducted from the timer. If the timer reaches zero before Goodnight can destroy the Doomsday machine, Maybe activates it, destroying the world and ending the game in failure.

Development

The game was designed to be "loaded with humor". [5]

Roland Gustafsson provided the protection schemes for this game. [6]

Reception

Video game reviewer Reggie C. deemed it "One of my favorite games from the Apple era", adding that it has "less than an hours worth of action" and is "crazy hard". [5] InThe80s said the game "showed the foregrounds to Austin Powers", [7] while Unwinnable Weekly deemed it "pulpy but incredibly difficult". [8] Vintage Game Consoles said the game "impressed with its rich cinematic, multistage gameplay". [9] Home of the Underdogs said it was "One of the most underrated Apple II games ever made", describing it as "funny", "addictive", "frustrating", "clever", and "realistic". [10] The Australian Apple Review wrote that the game "is very nearly the ultimate that can be achieved with current technology on computer". [11] Finnish Retro Game Comparison Blog deemed it a "brilliantly parodic tribute to James Bond". [12] PC Magazine deemed it one of the Apple II's best exclusive games. [13]

The game was listed at #16 in Billboard's list of Top Computer Software for the week ending September 4, 1985. [14]

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References

  1. ↑ "Captain Goodnight and the Island of Fear | Video Game | VideoGameGeek". videogamegeek.com. Retrieved 2016-05-29.
  2. 1 2 "Captain Goodnight and the Islands of Fear for Apple II (1985) - MobyGames". mobygames.com. Retrieved 2016-05-29.
  3. 1 2 "Personal Computing". The Best of Personal Computing. Personal Computing Magazine. 9. 1985. ISSN   0192-5490 . Retrieved 2016-05-29.
  4. ↑ "Apple II - The Best Of Games Article Reprint". apple2.callapple.org. Retrieved 2016-05-29.
  5. 1 2 "Captain Goodnight lives | World 1-1". extralives.wordpress.com. 16 March 2008. Retrieved 2016-05-29.
  6. ↑ BOUTILLON Jean-Marc. "Interview: Roland Gustafsson". boutillon.free.fr. Retrieved 2016-05-29.
  7. ↑ "In The 80s - Vintage Computer Games of the Eighties". inthe80s.com. Retrieved 2016-05-29.
  8. ↑ Horvath, S.; Smith, O.; Haske, S. Unwinnable Weekly Issue 13. Unwinnable, LLC. Retrieved 2016-05-29.
  9. ↑ Loguidice, B.; Barton, M. (2014). Vintage Game Consoles: An Inside Look at Apple, Atari, Commodore, Nintendo, and the Greatest Gaming Platforms of All Time. Taylor & Francis. ISBN   9781135006501 . Retrieved 2016-05-29.
  10. ↑ Underdogs. "Home of the Underdogs". homeoftheunderdogs.net. Retrieved 2016-05-29.
  11. ↑ http://apple2.callapple.org/magazines/aar/bestgames.html Reprinted from The Australian Apple Review Vol 3 No 4 April 1986
  12. ↑ "FRGCB - Finnish Retro Game Comparison Blog: Unique Games! - Part 10". frgcb.blogspot.com.au. 11 May 2016. Retrieved 2016-05-29.
  13. ↑ "7 Forgotten Apple II Gaming Classics". PCMAG. Retrieved 2018-03-24.
  14. ↑ Billboard. Nielsen Business Media, Inc. 14 September 1985. ISSN   0006-2510 . Retrieved 2016-05-29.
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