Since my Retrospective on the video game Pitfall! was so well received, I found myself delving a bit deeper into the history of the game. In doing so, I was reminded of several things related to it that I had long forgotten, starting with this advertisement that appeared in various magazines around the time of the game's release.
As advertisements go, this one is pretty well done. I especially like the depictions of Pitfall Harry submerged in a tar pit and being eaten by a crocodile.
Speaking of advertisements, the television ads for the game famously feature a young Jack Black in his first acting role:
Pitfall! was successful enough that Pitfall Harry (along with his niece, Rhonda, and pet mountain lion) made an appearance as part of the CBS cartoon, Saturday Supercade, in 1983, alongside other video game celebrities like Mario, Donkey Kong, and Q*bert.
Yes, the 1980s were a weird time.
Pitfall Harry for Super Smash Bros.
ReplyDeleteAlso worth noting, since Pitfall Harry was in Saturday Supercade with Mario, and Mario and Ryu in Super Smash Bros, that means Harry has a Ryu number of 2.
DeleteIn the 1980s, "is there a cartoon?" was the measure of pop culture relevance. D&D? Yes. John Candy? Yes. Airwolf? Sorry, no.
ReplyDeleteI remember that cartoon. I never had Pitfall but Pitfall II was just a fantastic game. It featured Rhonda and Quickclaw (the mountain lion) as goals (you had to find and rescue them), along with a fancy diamond ring and some kind of killer rat that could only be approached from behind (so you could see it from the second screen but couldn't obtain it until the very end). The game came with a manual in the form of Pitfall Harry's journal, which really set the atmosphere for the game.
ReplyDeleteI liked Pitfall II because there was no "game over", really, you just got sent back to the last "checkpoint", with your score plummeting as you "rewound" backwards.
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ReplyDelete> Yes, the 1980s were a weird time.
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Yes, indeed. That *has* to be the understatement of the century.
True... But they were a blast a kid (7-17) growing up in them!
DeleteThey were a great time to grow up and I wouldn't trade them for any other era, weirdness and all.
DeleteBEST.ERA.EVAH. Me, GenXer
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