A silent entry into a building, pockets ready for the loot and a guard who mustn't suspect a thing — The Heist is a game that combines action with thinking and bets on the idea that the best thief is the one who can plan every step. This blend of platformer and puzzle was pleasantly unconventional for its time.
You step into the role of a master thief whose task is to penetrate a sprawling building, collect all the valuables and escape. The individual rooms are built like little brainteasers — you have to figure out how to reach the treasure, how to get around the traps and how to avoid the guards. It's not pure reflex action, but rather patient solving of spatial riddles, where every wrong step can mean getting caught.
This very hybrid nature is what makes The Heist an interesting title. Instead of just running and shooting, you have to engage your brain, remember the layout of the rooms and think about the order in which you do things. For players who enjoyed a challenge of a different kind than just fast fingers, it was a welcome change of pace in a library full of arcade slugfests.
On the ColecoVision, the game found a platform that could display the clear layout of the rooms and gave the designers room to layer the puzzles. The console was known for keeping even more complex titles playable and legible, which only benefited a genre of action with puzzle elements.
Today, The Heist is among the lesser-known titles of its day, but for fans of smarter action games it's a pleasant surprise. It shows that even in the early era of home consoles there were games that placed an emphasis on planning and brains, not just on reflexes.
Why play: For an unconventional mix of action and puzzles, where thinking pays off as much as reacting quickly — a welcome change among the arcade classics.
Game 9 of 16 for ColecoVision
