''Dizzy – The Ultimate Cartoon Adventure'' is an

adventure An adventure is an exciting experience or undertaking that is typically bold, sometimes risky. Adventures may be activities with danger such as traveling, exploring, skydiving, mountain climbing, scuba diving, river rafting, or other extreme spo ...

platform game A platformer (also called a platform game, and sometimes a jump 'n' run game) is a subgenre of action game in which the core objective is to move the player character between points in an environment. Platform games are characterized by levels wi ...

, the first video game featuring the character Dizzy, an

anthropomorphic Anthropomorphism is the attribution of human traits, emotions, or intentions to non-human entities. It is considered to be an innate tendency of human psychology. Personification is the related attribution of human form and characteristics to ...

egg. The game was designed by two British brothers, the

Oliver Twins Andrew Nicholas Oliver and Philip Edward Oliver, together known as the Oliver Twins, are British twin brothers and video game designers. They developed computer games while they were still at school, contributing their first type-in game to a ...

. ''Dizzy'' was published by

Codemasters The Codemasters Software Company Limited (trade name: Codemasters) is a British video game developer and former publisher based in Southam, England, which is a subsidiary of American corporation Electronic Arts and managed under the EA Sports ...

and was released in 1987.

Gameplay

The game is a

platform Platform may refer to: Arts * Platform, an arts centre at The Bridge, Easterhouse, Glasgow * ''Platform'' (1993 film), a 1993 Bollywood action film * ''Platform'' (2000 film), a 2000 film by Jia Zhangke * '' The Platform'' (2019 film) * Pla ...

adventure where Dizzy must search the

fairy tale A fairy tale (alternative names include fairytale, fairy story, household tale, magic tale, or wonder tale) is a short story that belongs to the folklore genre. Such stories typically feature magic, enchantments, and mythical or fanciful bei ...

land of Katmandu for a Leprechaun's Wig, a Cloud's Silver Lining, a Vampire Dux Feather, and a Troll Brew and deposit them in a cauldron to make a potion to defeat the evil wizard Zaks. The gameplay involves collecting items and moving to other locations where the item is required; for example, at one point a raincoat is needed to protect against damaging rain. This is made more difficult because only one item can be carried at any given time. The game includes several lines from

J. Milton Hayes James Milton Hayes Military Cross, MC (1884, in Ardwick – 1940, in Nice), known as J. Milton Hayes, was an England, English actor and poet, best known for his 1911 dramatic monologue "The Green Eye of the Yellow God", much parodied by his cont ...

' poem ''

The Green Eye of the Yellow God ''The Green Eye of the Yellow God'', a 1911 poem by J. Milton Hayes, is a famous example of the genre of "dramatic monologue", a music hall staple in the early twentieth century. The piece was written for and performed by actor and monologist Bra ...

'' on banners in certain screens, where they serve as clues on how to solve some puzzles. Unlike later games in the series, which focus more on the inventory-based puzzles, this game features a very large number of hazards that kill the player on contact. With only three lives initially to complete the game, this made the game challenging to complete.

Development

The Oliver Twins said in an interview, on the British television show ''When Games Attack'', that the character Dizzy was originally not supposed to be an egg at all but just a face with hands and feet. They then said they accepted everyone thought he was an egg and decided to go with that. They also said they used to plan out levels on the back of spare rolls of wallpaper. Dizzy gets his name from the character's tumbles and somersaults while jumping, a feature inspired by the Oliver Twins' graphics software ''Panda Sprites'' which enabled them to rotate an image easily so each frame did not have to be manually drawn. The software distorted complex sprites so the character was required to be simple, hence the choice of an egg.

Reception

In 2017, the game was placed on

Eurogamer ''Eurogamer'' is a British video game journalism website launched in 1999 alongside parent company Gamer Network. In 2008, it started in the formerly eponymous trade fair EGX (Eurogamer Expo until 2013) organised by its parent company. Fr ...

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

References

External links

* *
The Oliver Twins website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Dizzy - The Ultimate Cartoon Adventure 1987 video games Amiga games Amstrad CPC games Codemasters games Commodore 64 games Dizzy (series) Europe-exclusive video games Single-player video games Video games developed in the United Kingdom Video games scored by David Whittaker ZX Spectrum games