''Daley Thompson's Decathlon'' is an Olympic-themed sports video game developed and released by

Ocean Software Ocean Software Ltd was a British software development company that became one of the biggest European video game developers and publishers of the 1980s and 1990s. The company was founded by David Ward and Jon Woods and was based in Manchester. ...

in 1984. It was released in the wake of Daley Thompson's popularity following his gold medals in the

decathlon The decathlon is a combined event in athletics consisting of ten track and field events. The word "decathlon" was formed, in analogy to the word "pentathlon", from Greek δέκα (''déka'', meaning "ten") and ἄθλος (''áthlos'', or ἄθ ...

at the 1980 and

1984 Olympic Games The 1984 Olympics may refer to: *The 1984 Winter Olympics, which were held in Sarajevo, Yugoslavia *The 1984 Summer Olympics The 1984 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the XXIII Olympiad and also known as Los Angeles 1984) were an intern ...

. The game is based on the gameplay format established by 1983 arcade game ''

Track & Field Track and field is a sport that includes athletic contests based on running, jumping, and throwing skills. The name is derived from where the sport takes place, a running track and a grass field for the throwing and some of the jumping eve ...

''. A second game, ''Daley Thompson's Super-Test'', was released the following year. The third title, ''Daley Thompson's Olympic Challenge'', was released in 1988 to coincide with the 1988 Olympic Games.

Gameplay

The player takes part in the ten events of the modern decathlon: *Day 1:

100 metres The 100 metres, or 100-meter dash, is a sprint race in track and field competitions. The shortest common outdoor running distance, the dash is one of the most popular and prestigious events in the sport of athletics. It has been contest ...

long jump The long jump is a track and field event in which athletes combine speed, strength and agility in an attempt to leap as far as possible from a takeoff point. Along with the triple jump, the two events that measure jumping for distance as a gr ...

shot put The shot put is a track and field event involving "putting" (throwing) a heavy spherical ball—the ''shot''—as far as possible. The shot put competition for men has been a part of the modern Olympics since their revival in 1896, and women's ...

, high jump, and

400 metres The 400 metres, or 400-meter dash, is a sprint event in track and field competitions. It has been featured in the athletics programme at the Summer Olympics since 1896 for men and since 1964 for women. On a standard outdoor running track, it is on ...

*Day 2: 110 hurdles,

pole vault Pole vaulting, also known as pole jumping, is a track and field event in which an athlete uses a long and flexible pole, usually made from fiberglass or carbon fiber, as an aid to jump over a bar. Pole jumping competitions were known to the My ...

, discus,

javelin A javelin is a light spear designed primarily to be thrown, historically as a ranged weapon, but today predominantly for sport. The javelin is almost always thrown by hand, unlike the sling, bow, and crossbow, which launch projectiles with t ...

, and

1500 metres The 1500 metres or 1,500-metre run (typically pronounced 'fifteen-hundred metres') is the foremost middle distance track event in athletics. The distance has been contested at the Summer Olympics since 1896 and the World Championships in Athle ...

The player starts the game with three lives; failure to reach the minimum standard in an event results in the loss of one life. Success in the 1500 metres event results in the game returning to Day 1 to repeat the events with more difficult qualification criteria. Depending on the computer, running is simulated by hitting two keys (representing the left and right leg) alternately and as quickly as possible or by moving the joystick from side to side as quickly as possible. The game rapidly gained a reputation among players as a "joystick killer" because of the constant vigorous waggling of the joystick required during many of the events. The Spectrum version was the first game to use Speedlock, a fast loader on the computer.

Music

The soundtrack of the C64 version of the game was composed by David Dunn. The introduction music, by Martin Galway, is based on the 1978

electronic music Electronic music is a Music genre, genre of music that employs electronic musical instruments, digital instruments, or electronics, circuitry-based music technology in its creation. It includes both music made using electronic and electromech ...

piece " Rydeen" by

Yellow Magic Orchestra Yellow Magic Orchestra (YMO for short) is a Japanese electronic music band formed in Tokyo in 1978 by Haruomi Hosono (bass, keyboards, vocals), Yukihiro Takahashi (drums, lead vocals) and Ryuichi Sakamoto (keyboards, vocals). The group is cons ...

(YMO).

Reception

''Daley Thompson's Decathlon'' was the ninth best-selling computer game of 1985 in the United Kingdom. '' Sinclair User'' gave the game a score of 8/10. The game won the award for Best (Overall) Arcade Game in the '' Crash'' magazine Readers Awards 1984 and was the Best Arcade-Style Game of the Year at the

Golden Joystick Awards The Golden Joystick Awards, also known as the People's Gaming Awards, is a video game award ceremony; it awards the best video games of the year, as voted for originally by the British general public, but is now a global event that can be vot ...

. '' The One'' magazine in 1991 rated the game two out of five stars for the

Amiga Amiga is a family of personal computers introduced by Commodore International, 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 sign ...

and Atari ST. In 1985, Ocean acquired the rights to produce official conversions of Konami's games starting with the arcade follow-up to ''Track and Field'', ''

Hyper Sports ''Hyper Sports'', known in Japan as is an Olympic-themed sports video game released by Konami for arcades in 1984. It is the sequel to 1983's ''Track & Field'' and features seven new Olympic events. Like its predecessor, ''Hyper Sports'' has t ...

''. Their officially licensed versions of ''Track and Field'' were finally released for the Commodore 64 in 1987, and

Amstrad CPC The Amstrad CPC (short for ''Colour Personal Computer'') is a series of 8-bit home computers produced by Amstrad between 1984 and 1990. It was designed to compete in the mid-1980s home computer market dominated by the Commodore 64 and the S ...

and

ZX Spectrum The ZX Spectrum () is an 8-bit home computer that was developed by Sinclair Research. It was released in the United Kingdom on 23 April 1982, and became Britain's best-selling microcomputer. Referred to during development as the ''ZX81 Colou ...

in 1988. In 2017, the game was placed on ''

Eurogamer ''Eurogamer'' is a British video game journalism website launched in 1999 and owned by alongside formed company Gamer Network. Its editor-in-chief is Martin Robinson. Since 2008, it is known for the formerly eponymous games trade fair EGX ...

s "10 games that defined the ZX Spectrum" list.

References

External links

* *{{WoS game, id=0001217, name=Daley Thompson's Decathlon 1984 video games Amstrad CPC games Athletics video games Commodore 64 games Thompson Thompson Golden Joystick Award winners Multiple-stage competition video games Ocean Software games Sports video games Video games based on real people Video games featuring black protagonists Video games scored by Martin Galway ZX Spectrum games Video games developed in the United Kingdom