| Claim Jumper | |
|---|---|
 Cover art by Tim Boxell [1] | |
| Publisher(s) | Synapse Software |
| Designer(s) | Gray Chang [2] |
| Platform(s) | Atari 8-bit |
| Release | 1982 |
Claim Jumper is a video game written by Gray Chang for Atari 8-bit computers and published by Synapse Software in 1982. [2] It is primarily designed as a two-player competitive game, but includes a separate shoot 'em up mode for either one or two players. [3]
Claim Jumper is a game in which the player is a cowboy collecting gold bars. [4]
Gray Chang previously wrote the two-player competitive game Dog Daze for the Atari Program Exchange. After Claim Jumper, he designed two more games for two simultaneous players: Dog Daze Deluxe and Bumpomov's Dogs.
Chang kept a notebook while writing Claim Jumper which contains nearly 200 pages of code, flowcharts, technical details, and graph paper sketches of the game art. [5]
Allen Doum reviewed the game for Computer Gaming World , and stated that "The graphics and animation in Claim Jumper are very good but, while there are sound cues for most game actions, the sounds are not very imaginative. There aren't many interactively competitive two player arcade-style games, so it is nice to see a company like Synapse release a game like Claim Jumper which fills that need so nicely." [4]
Bill Williams was an American video game designer, programmer, composer, and author born with cystic fibrosis, a genetic disorder. According to a medical encyclopedia Williams consulted when he was 12, people with cystic fibrosis weren't expected to live past the age of 13.
Shamus is a shooter with light action-adventure game elements written by Cathryn Mataga and published by Synapse Software. The original Atari 8-bit computer version was released on disk and tape in 1982. According to Synapse co-founder Ihor Wolosenko, Shamus made the company famous by giving it a reputation for quality. "Funeral March of a Marionette", the theme song from Alfred Hitchcock Presents, plays on the title screen.
Caverns of Mars is a vertically scrolling shooter for Atari 8-bit computers. It was written by Greg Christensen, with some features later added by Richard Watts, and published by the Atari Program Exchange (APX) in 1981. Caverns of Mars became the best selling APX software of all-time and was moved into Atari, Inc.'s official product line, first on diskette, then on cartridge.
Synapse Software Corporation was an American software developer and publisher founded in 1981 by Ihor Wolosenko and Ken Grant. Synapse published application software and developer tools and was primarily known for video games. It initially focused on the Atari 8-bit computers, then later developed for the Commodore 64 and other systems. Synapse was purchased by Broderbund in late 1984 and the Synapse label retired in 1985.
Blue Max is a scrolling shooter written by Bob Polin for Atari 8-bit computers and published by Synapse Software in 1983. It was released for the Commodore 64 the same year. U.S. Gold published the Commodore 64 version in the UK in 1984 and ported the game to the ZX Spectrum. In 1987, Atari Corporation published Blue Max as a cartridge styled for the then-new Atari XEGS.
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Wayout is a 3D first-person perspective video game programmed by Paul Allen Edelstein and published for the Atari 8-bit computers in 1982. It was released for the Apple II and Commodore 64 in 1983. Wayout is among the first maze games to offer full 360 degree 3D perspective and movement, and its graphics were considered state-of-the-art upon its release. There were many pseudo-3D maze games at the time, but they used a fixed perspective and limited the player to four orientations.
Protector is a 1981 scrolling shooter for Atari 8-bit computers programmed by Mike Potter and distributed first by Crystalware and then Synapse Software. A VIC-20 port was published by HesWare in 1983.
Attack at EP-CYG-4 is a shoot 'em up video game created by Mike Edwards for Atari 8-bit computers and published by his company BRAM, Inc. in 1982. It allows two players to cooperatively control the action against a computer enemy, in a fashion similar to Synapse Software's Survivor, also released in 1982. EP-CYG-4 was the first of Edwards' game efforts, and its success led to the creation of Zombies, which was published by Electronic Arts as Realm of Impossibility.
Dimension X is a first person action game for Atari 8-bit computers released in 1984 by Synapse Software. It was designed by Steve Hales, who previously wrote Slime and Fort Apocalypse for Synapse. Dimension X is a vehicle-based, first person shooter with similar gameplay to Atari's Battlezone and Novagen's Encounter. The manual includes instructions for a Commodore 64 version of the game, but it was never completed nor released.
Canyon Climber is a video game designed by Steve Bjork and James Garon for the TRS-80 Color Computer and published by Tandy Corporation in 1982. Ports to other home computers were published by Datasoft. Canyon Climber is a three-screen platform game with an American Southwest theme. Two of the screens are direct analogs of those in Donkey Kong.
Picnic Paranoia is an action game written by Russ Segal for both the Atari 8-bit computers and Apple II and published by Synapse Software in 1982. A version for the TI-99/4A was published by Atarisoft in 1983. Although the gameplay is identical, all three versions of the game utilize slightly different graphics.
Hockey is a ice hockey video game published by Gamma Software for Atari 8-bit computers in 1981. Gamma released the Atari 8-bit game Soccer the following year.
Soccer is a sports video game for Atari 8-bit computers published in 1982 by Gamma Software.
Protector II is a video game written by Mike Potter for Atari 8-bit computers and published by Synapse Software in 1982. It is a sequel to 1981's Protector; both games are horizontally scrolling shooters inspired by the arcade video game Defender. Protector II was ported to the Commodore 64, TI-99/4A, and TRS-80 Color Computer.
Tax Dodge is a maze video game for Atari 8-bit computers published by Island Graphics in 1982. It is the first game created by Free Fall Associates, a developer best known for Archon: The Light and the Dark.
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Dodge Racer is a maze video game programmed by Rob Re for Atari 8-bit computers and published by Synapse Software in 1981. It is a clone of the 1979 arcade video game Head On, where the player drives around a rectangular track, divided into lanes, collecting dots and avoiding collisions. Dodge Racer was the second release from Synapse and the company's first game.