Pitfall!

Pitfall! by Activision arrived on the Atari 800 in 1982 and quickly became one of the proofs that home computers and consoles could offer a sophisticated action platformer with a vast game world. Playing as the adventurer Pitfall Harry, the player pushes through a rainforest full of pits, swamps, snakes, scorpions and burning campfires, swinging over them on vines and searching for treasures hidden in underground tunnels and on the surface. A time limit forces the player to progress efficiently and plan their route, since backtracking through the same area costs precious seconds, and many traps reset again the next time the screen is revisited.

The game worked with an unusually large playing field for its time, made up of dozens of interconnected screens, which made it feel like a genuine adventure rather than a repeating arcade loop. Controls were sparse - jumping, running and swinging on vines - but precise timing of jumps over pits and past enemies required practice and patience. On the Atari 8-bit, the game used smooth screen transitions and a colour palette evoking a tropical setting, while underground tunnels offered faster but riskier shortcuts between different parts of the map. Music and sound effects were minimal, which was common for that generation of games, but the game got by with a distinctive sound signature for jumping, falling or collecting treasure.

Pitfall! is today regarded as one of the key titles of the early platformer era, and its concept of a large interconnected world foreshadowed the genre's later development toward more expansive game maps. Even years later the game remains playable and clear, though its difficulty, driven by the time limit and uncompromising traps, can occasionally frustrate today's players - but that is part of its character and the reason it remains a must-play title for anyone interested in the genre's history and in the early days of Activision as an independent game publisher.

Why play: For anyone interested in the history of the platformer genre and the early days of Activision as a publisher – even though the time limit and uncompromising traps can occasionally frustrate today's players, this is a must-play classic.