''Crystal Quest'' is an

action game An action game is a video game genre that emphasizes physical challenges, including hand–eye coordination and reaction-time. The genre includes a large variety of sub-genres, such as fighting games, beat 'em ups, shooter games, and platform gam ...

written by

Patrick Buckland Patrick Buckland is a British video game programmer, designer and chief executive officer of Stainless Games, which he co-founded with Neil Barnden in 1994. Career Buckland is a video games pioneer, having been in the industry since 1982. Cr ...

for the Macintosh and published by Casady & Greene in 1987. It was ported to the Apple IIGS in 1989 by

Rebecca Heineman Rebecca Ann Heineman is an American video game designer and programmer. Heineman was a founding member of video game companies Interplay Productions, Logicware, Contraband Entertainment, and Olde Sküül. She has been chief executive officer ...

. Ports were also made to the

Amiga Amiga is a family of personal computers introduced by Commodore in 1985. The original model is one of a number of mid-1980s computers with 16- or 32-bit processors, 256 KB or more of RAM, mouse-based GUIs, and significantly improved graphi ...

, Game Boy, iOS, and Palm. It was the first game to support the color displays of the

Macintosh II The Macintosh II is a personal computer designed, manufactured, and sold by Apple Computer from March 1987 to January 1990. Based on the Motorola 68020 32-bit CPU, it is the first Macintosh supporting color graphics. When introduced, a basic sys ...

. The game was based on the original

shareware Shareware is a type of proprietary software that is initially shared by the owner for trial use at little or no cost. Often the software has limited functionality or incomplete documentation until the user sends payment to the software developer ...

game ''Crystal Raider'', one of the supporters of which had been

Michael Greene Michael Harris Greene (November 4, 1933 – January 10, 2020) was an American actor who was active from the 1960s through the 1990s. Career Greene was born in San Francisco, California, the son of Gladys () and Harry Greene. Early in his caree ...

, founder of Greene, Inc. (later to merge with CasadyWare to become Casady & Greene). A sequel, similar to the original game, ''

Crystal Crazy ''Crystal Crazy'' is an action game, published by Casady & Greene for the Classic Mac OS in 1993. It is the sequel to ''Crystal Quest''. The aim of the game is to collect crystals. Unlike ''Crystal Quest'', which included a "Critter Editor," ''Cr ...

'', was released in 1993. On February 7, 2006 ''Crystal Quest'' was released on Xbox 360 via Xbox Live Arcade.Crystal Quest game available for iPhone, iPod touch
from MacTech Magazine Game Mechanics LLC licensed ''Crystal Quest'' and launched on Kickstarter to raise money to create a new version in February 2015. As of November 23, 2016, ''Crystal Quest'' is available for

Steam Steam is a substance containing water in the gas phase, and sometimes also an aerosol of liquid water droplets, or air. This may occur due to evaporation or due to boiling, where heat is applied until water reaches the enthalpy of vaporization ...

Development

''Crystal Quest'' is easier to play in color mode on the Macintosh version as opposed to monochrome, as more RAM is used, causing enemies to move slower. Improvements and features in ''Crystal Quest'' over its predecessor ''Crystal Raider'' include a two-player mode, support for color, improved sound, and a demo mode. A glitch in the demo mode for early copies of ''Crystal Quest'' caused system errors on one out of ten Mac IIs, and those affected could call Greene Inc. for a replacement copy of the game.

Reception

Macworld ''Macworld'' is a website dedicated to products and software of Apple Inc., published by Foundry, a subsidiary of IDG Inc. It started life as a print magazine in 1984 and had the largest audited circulation (both total and newsstand) of Macint ...

'' reviewed the Macintosh version of ''Crystal Quest'', praising its action gameplay and colorful graphics, stating that ''Crystal Quest'' is "Fast, challenging action ... You learn to play in minutes because the game is so intuitive ... ''Crystal Quest'' is especially fun to play on a color Mac II because the vivid color-cycle graphics rival those of the finest arcade games. ... ''Crystal Quest'' is the first Macintosh game I've found that truly compares in features and quality with a real arcade game." ''Macworld'' also praises the "clever" sound effects, stating that "some of the sounds are droll, and some are gross. Kids will love them." but criticizes one particular sound effect, saying that "The sound that accompanies the player's entrance into the gateway at the end of each wave, however, is a digitized pseudo-female-orgasmic gasp that several women I played it for found offensive."

References

External links

Stainless Games' page on ''Crystal Quest''
*
Game Mechanics LLC
on Facebook
Crystal Quest Classic Kickstarter Campaign 2015

''Crystal Quest'' Steam page
1987 video games Classic Mac OS games Apple IIGS games Amiga games Game Boy games IOS games Palm OS games Video games developed in the United Kingdom Windows games Xbox 360 games Xbox 360 Live Arcade games Stainless Games games {{Mac-software-stub