Dizzy: Prince of the Yolkfolk

[Kolzig]

LGW53914gDk

www.eggcitingnews.com

Who remembers these games? I seem to remember playing one of the Dizzy games, perhaps named Fantastic Dizzy or Treasure Island Dizzy on either Commodore 64 or Amiga.

Cool that Codies is revisiting their old properties, but I don't know if the new graphics look worse than the original art? I would love a pixelated look.

Only for Android and iOS, but maybe they would make a 3DS and PC (Steam) release in the future. That would be sweet.

[ThunderPeel2001]

Astonishingly, there's already a Dizzy thread

[Tanukitsune]

I'd say I hope it controls better than most iOS game, but it's a remake of an 8-bit game, which were never known for good controls anyway.

This also explains why none of the Dizzy games have appeared on the official C64 and Spectrum emulators on the iOS system (You can play the obivous rip-off though)

Let's hope they don't go "Squenix" on us and charge 10€ for the game.

I only see stars and cherries on the HUD, did the cherries represent lives in this game or did they make this game easier or something? I guess we'll have to wait to find out?

[Kolzig]

Hah, didn't remember that we had already a Dizzy discussion last year.

[Erkki]

I only played Prince of the Yolkfolk of the Dizzy games, but that was a good one. Not sure I'm interested in a mobile version, though.

[Thrik]

Haha, old Dizzy. I loved those games, but they seriously fucked with my very young mind. I mean they were outright sadistic at times — I remember having to run to get my daddy to do the bit where the massive dinosaur charges at you after the game makes you go into his cave to get some shit.

Treasure Island Dizzy takes the cake, though. That was insanely difficult to the point where it makes today's games literally look laughable, yet you had like three lives to get through the entire game and no ability to save. I mean, the fuck?

As an interesting aside, I read a making-of article in Games™ and apparently the lack of saving was because they only had time to program respawning to a single place and couldn't figure out how to let you do so without breaking the game's logic.

[ThunderPeel2001]

Treasure Island Dizzy takes the cake, though. That was insanely difficult to the point where it makes today's games literally look laughable, yet you had like three lives to get through the entire game and no ability to save. I mean, the fuck?

Three lives?! Right! Try ONE with insta-death. (No energy.) Treasure Island Dizzy way BEYOND sadistic.

As an interesting aside, I read a making-of article in Games™ and apparently the lack of saving was because they only had time to program respawning to a single place and couldn't figure out how to let you do so without breaking the game's logic.

Pretty common for old games to not allow you to save, to be fair

[Thrik]

Oh was it just the one in Treasure Island? That's probably why I remembered it as being particularly hard then. I remember literally crying once after getting really far and getting arseholed. I never did finish it despite it being like my most-played game. I have wonderful yet horrendous memories.

[ThunderPeel2001]

Oh was it just the one in Treasure Island? That's probably why I remembered it as being particularly hard then. I remember literally crying once after getting really far and getting arseholed. I never did finish it despite it being like my most-played game. I have wonderful yet horrendous memories.

Yep, I recall that too. The write up on Wikipedia is actually pretty insightful...

This game is quite different from its predecessor, with a new inventory system and improved animations. The game notably contains fewer enemies than the previous title. It is more centred around inventory based problem solving. The aim of the game is to solve various puzzles in order to obtain a boat so that Dizzy can return to his friends and family, the Yolkfolk. To do this Dizzy must journey through haunted mines, tree villages, as well as underwater. The game also features a subquest (albeit one essential to completing the game) in which thirty gold coins must be collected. Such subquests were found in many of the sequels.

Critics consider this one of the most difficult Dizzy games as the energy bar system of later titles was not yet implemented and Dizzy is provided with only one life—contrasting with five in the first game and three in Fantasy World Dizzy, the immediate sequel, and most subsequent titles. Also unique to this game, the player is unable to select any particular item from the inventory for use—Dizzy simply puts down whichever item is at the top of the list. If Dizzy is underwater and the snorkel happens to be at the top of the inventory list, he will drop the snorkel when the player collects another item and instantly die. Treasure Island Dizzy therefore requires more foresight and planning than the other games in the series.

Adding to the difficulty of the game was the fact that the player had two main tasks to complete; the escape from the islands, and the collection of the thirty coins. Indeed, upon escaping the final island, the Shopkeeper character appears and tells Dizzy that he cannot leave without finding all thirty coins. Given that a number of the coins were hidden behind scenery, this second task proved to be more difficult than the main game. Commodore Format printed a "complete" solution and map which did not include the hidden coins, frustrating many a player.

[ThunderPeel2001]

For anyone who wants to relive the "magic", you can play it online for free here:

http://www.twinbee.org/hob/play.php?snap=treasureislanddizzy

CONTROLS -

Z - Left

X - Right

SPACE - Jump

ENTER - Pickup

Don't press Q! (Instant quit.)

GOAL - Get Dizzy off the island.

And, to make it even "easier" here's a map: ftp://ftp.worldofspectrum.org/pub/sinclair/games-maps/t/TreasureIslandDizzy_3.jpg

Looks simple, doesn't it?

[Tanukitsune]

I got the iOS remake yesterday and beat it, I don't know how much they changed it from the original, but I'm sure they did change a lot.

First, no lives. I doubt modern gamers would put up with a game with a few lives and no continues. The only places you could die where pits and water, if the game had enemies originally they are gone.

I'm sure a few things have changed place since it's no longer screen based and there are new items, once again, I haven't played Prince of the Yolkfolk before, but I'm sure there wasn't an MP3 Player as one of the red herring items.

You have to pick up cherries to make a pie and become prince you can wake Daisy with a kiss. And picking up stars give you "60 seconds before the next hint", but either that feature is broken or I never needed them?

The stars are the score and it decreases as time goes by, so maybe you don't have limited lives, but you can try to max out the score by beating the game as fast as possible?

Since I was aware this was a remake of a very old game and I knew what kind of gameplay to expect I enjoyed it, but I'm not sure how this will appeal to people who have never played a Dizzy game before, I'm sure it would do better than a normal Dizzy game since this has unlimited lives.

The game's logic was kinda straight forward, except for the cage, I had no idea where to use it and got it by dumb luck.

[Kolzig]

Annoying that this game doesn't seem to be available for my phone, even though my phone can surely run it as it can also run things like Shadowgun, Riptide etc.

Looks like it was quite a lot modernized so that drops the interest level down.

[Tanukitsune]

I don't think anybody but a pure retro fan would play a game with very limited lives, no saves or passwords and no continues (or no save states).

But did the original have enemies? Fantastic Dizzy, which is the only one I played, did. If not, it doesn't really matter that much?

[Thrik]

Yes, yes it did.