''Canyon Climber'' is a video game designed by Steve Bjork and James Garon for the

TRS-80 Color Computer The RadioShack TRS-80 Color Computer, later marketed as the Tandy Color Computer and sometimes nicknamed the CoCo, is a line of home computers developed and sold by Tandy Corporation. Despite sharing a name with the earlier TRS-80, the Color Co ...

and published by

Tandy Corporation Tandy Corporation was an American family-owned leather goods company based in Fort Worth, Texas, United States. Tandy Leather was founded in 1919 as a leather supply store. By the end of the 1950s, under the tutelage of then-CEO Charles Tandy, ...

in 1982. Ports to other home computers were published by

Datasoft Datasoft, Inc. (also written as DataSoft and Data Soft) was a software developer and publisher for home computers founded in 1980 by Pat Ketchum and based out of Chatsworth, California. Datasoft primarily published video games, including home port ...

. ''Canyon Climber'' is a three-screen

platform game A platform game (often simplified as platformer and sometimes called a jump 'n' run game) is a sub-genre of action video games in which the core objective is to move the player character between points in an environment. Platform games are charac ...

with an

American Southwest The Southwestern United States, also known as the American Southwest or simply the Southwest, is a geographic and cultural region of the United States that generally includes Arizona, New Mexico, and adjacent portions of California, Colorado, N ...

theme. Two of the screens are direct analogs of those in ''

Donkey Kong is a video game franchise created by Shigeru Miyamoto and owned by Nintendo. It follows the adventures of a gorilla named Donkey Kong (character), Donkey Kong and his clan of other Ape, apes and monkeys. The franchise primarily consists of plat ...

''. The game was ported to the

Atari 8-bit family The Atari 8-bit family is a series of 8-bit home computers introduced by Atari, Inc. in 1979 as the Atari 400 and Atari 800. The series was successively upgraded to Atari 1200XL , Atari 600XL, Atari 800XL, Atari 65XE, Atari 130XE, Atari 800XE, ...

by Tim Ferris, the

Apple II The Apple II (stylized as ) is an 8-bit home computer and one of the world's first highly successful mass-produced microcomputer products. It was designed primarily by Steve Wozniak; Jerry Manock developed the design of Apple II's foam-m ...

by Brian Mountford, and

PC-6001 The NEC PC-6000 series is a series of 8-bit home computers introduced in November 1981 by NEC Home Electronics. There are several models in this series, such as the PC-6001, the PC-6001 MK2 and the PC-6001 MK2 SR. There is also an American versio ...

. The box art is by Scott Ross.

Gameplay

''Canyon Climber'' consists of three non-scrolling screens that are endlessly cycled through. In the first, similar to the rivet screen from ''

'', the goal is to place

explosive An explosive (or explosive material) is a reactive substance that contains a great amount of potential energy that can produce an explosion if released suddenly, usually accompanied by the production of light, heat, sound, and pressure. An expl ...

charges on both ends of each of four

bridge A bridge is a structure built to span a physical obstacle (such as a body of water, valley, road, or rail) without blocking the way underneath. It is constructed for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle, which is usually somethi ...

s, using ladders to climb between them, then trigger a detonator.

Goat The goat or domestic goat (''Capra hircus'') is a domesticated species of goat-antelope typically kept as livestock. It was domesticated from the wild goat (''C. aegagrus'') of Southwest Asia and Eastern Europe. The goat is a member of the a ...

s pursue the player and can be jumped over. The second screen resembles ''Donkey Kong's'' opening level, with angled platforms and connecting ladders. Native Americans ("Indians" in the manual) on each platform shoot arrows which can be jumped or avoided. The goal is to reach the top. The objective of the third screen is to climb to the top while avoiding bricks dropped by

bird Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweigh ...

s. The soundtrack of the first screen is a musical adaptation of the Prelude section from

Prelude and Fugue in C minor, BWV 847 Prelude and Fugue in C Minor, BWV 847, is a keyboard composition written by Johann Sebastian Bach. It is the second prelude and fugue in the first book of ''The Well-Tempered Clavier'', a series of 48 preludes and fugues by the composer. Ana ...

Reception

The 1983 book ''The Creative Atari'' stated, "''Canyon Climber'' achieves a cartoon-like atmosphere in the rendering of its various screens, to very pleasing effect," concluding "You will spend a while with ''Canyon Climber''." In a review of four Atari 8-bit

games (alongside '' Pacific Coast Highway'', ''Clowns and Balloons'', and ''Shooting Gallery''), Charles Brannon of ''

COMPUTE! ''Compute!'' (), often stylized as ''COMPUTE!'', was an American home computer magazine that was published from 1979 to 1994. Its origins can be traced to 1978 in Len Lindsay's ''PET Gazette'', one of the first magazines for the Commodore PET c ...

'' wrote, "the overall animation and execution are perhaps the best of the four." ''

Electronic Fun with Computers & Games ''Electronic Fun with Computers & Games'' was a video game magazine published in the United States from November 1982 to May 1984. For the last two issues it was renamed ''ComputerFun''. Content The magazine was split up into the following sect ...

'' described ''Canyon Climber'' as "not quite as demanding as ''Donkey Kong'', but the concept is appealingly bizarre," and called the game "short-term addictive." ''

ANALOG Computing ''ANALOG Computing'' (an acronym for Atari Newsletter And Lots Of Games) was an American computer magazine devoted to the Atari 8-bit family of home computers. It was published from 1981 until 1989. In addition to reviews and tutorials, ''ANAL ...

'' wrote, "The details and playability of the game are very good" and rated the graphics a 10 out of 10. Reviewing the TRS-80 Color Computer version for ''

Creative Computing ''Creative Computing'' was one of the earliest magazines covering the microcomputer revolution. Published from October 1974 until December 1985, the magazine covered the spectrum of hobbyist/home/personal computing in a more accessible format th ...

'', Stephen B. Gray warned, "''Canyon Climber'' is a game for the expert or the masochist." Long after the game's initial release, Keita Iida noted the low difficulty level, calling the game "perfectly suited for beginning players who are just getting into platform/climbing games." Mark Sabbatini, looking at the Color Computer version, agrees: "as soon as you've completed the levels a few times the challenge is pretty much gone." He also disliked the randomness of the

rocks In geology, rock (or stone) is any naturally occurring solid mass or aggregate of minerals or mineraloid matter. It is categorized by the minerals included, its chemical composition, and the way in which it is formed. Rocks form the Earth's ...

and goats, stating "all too often whether you live or die is all about luck and not about skill and planning."

Legacy

One section of Llamasoft's 2011 ''

GoatUp GoatUp is a platform game for iOS developed by Jeff Minter and Ivan Zorzin of Llamasoft and published via the App Store (iOS), App Store in 2011. It is the first platform game from Llamasoft. According to Minter, the three main influences were '' ...

'' game for iOS is an

homage Homage (Old English) or Hommage (French) may refer to: History *Homage (feudal) /ˈhɒmɪdʒ/, the medieval oath of allegiance *Commendation ceremony, medieval homage ceremony Arts *Homage (arts) /oʊˈmɑʒ/, an allusion or imitation by one arti ...

to ''Canyon Climber''.

References

{{reflist, refs= {{cite web, title=The Giant List of Classic Game Programmers, url=https://dadgum.com/giantlist/, last1=Hague, first1=James {{cite book, last1=Small, first1=David, title=The Creative Atari, date=1983, publisher=Creative Computing Press, isbn=978-0916688349, url=http://www.atariarchives.org/creativeatari/Canyon_Climber.php {{cite journal, last1=Brannon, first1=Charles, title=Review: Four Atari Games, journal=Compute!, date=October 1982, issue=29, page=127, url=http://www.atarimagazines.com/compute/issue29/381_1_Review_Four_Atari_Games.php {{cite web, title=Canyon Climber Manual, date=1982, url=https://archive.org/details/CanyonClimber, website=archive.org, publisher=Datasoft {{cite web, title=New iOS game: GoatUp, url=http://minotaurproject.co.uk/blog/?p=140, website=Llamasoft, date=September 6, 2011 {{cite web, last1=Iida, first1=Keita, title=AGH Atari 8-Bit Computer Review: CANYON CLIMBER, url=http://www.atarihq.com/reviews/atari8/canyon_climber.html, website=AtariHQ {{cite web, last1=Sabbatini, first1=Mark, title=Canyon Climber, url=http://www.icepeople.net/coco/reviews.html, website=The Color Computer Games Review Page {{cite journal, last1=Slon, first1=Steven, title=Canyon Climber, journal=Electronic Fun with Computers & Games, date=March 1983 , volume=1, issue=5, page=63, url=https://archive.org/stream/Electronic_Fun_with_Computer_Games_Vol_01_No_05_1983-03_Fun_Games_Publishing_US/Electronic_Fun_with_Computer__Games_Vol_01_No_05_1983-03_Fun__Games_Publishing_US#page/n61/mode/2up {{cite journal , last1=Gray , first1=Stephen B. , title=TRS-80 Strings , journal=Creative Computing , date=March 1984 , volume=10 , issue=3 , pag
241
, url=https://archive.org/details/Creative_Computing_1984-03 {{cite web , last1=Boyle , first1=L. Curtis , title=Canyon Climber , url=http://www.lcurtisboyle.com/nitros9/canyonclimber.html , website=Tandy Color Computer Games {{cite journal , last1=Messina , first1=Tony , title=Software Review: Canyon Climber , journal=ANALOG Computing , date=January 1983 , issue=9 , url=https://archive.org/details/analog-computing-magazine-09/page/n95/mode/2up

External links

at Atari Mania 1982 video games Atari 8-bit family games Apple II games Datasoft games NEC PC-6001 games Platform games TRS-80 Color Computer games Video games developed in the United States Video games set in Arizona Single-player video games