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Jazz score

Each chapter of the game – of which there are six main ones and three bonus ones – features two to three planets, each with two levels, followed by a boss fight. The planets have specific themes some even involving water and swimming, with corresponding music, enemies, and even colour schemes.

Jazz Jackrabbit 1994 Epic Megagames

No Acme dynamite for this bunny

The levels consist of Jazz running, jumping and shooting his way past various enemies, grabbing carrots for points, collecting ammo and power-ups. Power-ups include "rapid fire" upgrades, invincibility, and the standard speed boots. Collecting a red gem gives me access to a 3D bonus level where I can get my paws on even more goodies.

Jazz Jackrabbit 1994 Epic Megagames

Airbourne assistance

The points help give the game epic re-playability, together with that crystal meth obsession of finding every item and killing every enemy in each level – I'm a pretty twitchy bunny. Oh, and don't forget to free a caged hip hop for some bird based back up!

Jazz Jackrabbit 1994 Epic Megagames

Boss battles are a little unsophisticated by today's standards, but there are difficulty levels

The game-play is enjoyable and fairly simple, my only quibble with it is that it's a little too simple when it comes to the boss fights, but I can choose from four different difficulty settings including turbo which pictures Jazz as a muscle-bound Rambo type.

Jazz Jackrabbit 1994 Epic Megagames

Hi-tech tortoise hell-bent on global domination – seems perfectly feasible

The graphics are eye bleedingly bright and colourful with a level of detail that still looks good nearly 20 years later. The game play animation is smooth and on re-inspection surprising unglitchy.

I can rely on Jazz Jackrabbit for hours of enjoyment over the Easter holidays and, seriously, how many games these days can boast slow-motion rabbits and 3D level design? Now where did the ferrets hid my Gravis PC gamepad? ®

Antique Code Show is published every two weeks on Wednesdays

Developer Epic Megagames, Arjan Brussee
Publisher Epic Megagames
Year of release 1994
Platforms DOS/Windows

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Jazz Jackrabbit

I know exactly where my Gravis pad is- it's next to my Gravis Ultrasound card- but I can't plug either of them into my laptop!

I think I lost the little joystick adaptor it came with though, along with that cute screwdriver that came with my Gravis Joystick (not black but the limited edition transparent version).

It was a different age of PC gaming!

http://www.armchair.mb.ca/~dave/shust/

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Another golden oldie is

One Must Fall...

a fighting game with robots...

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Today it does sound a bit like

a lady's private accessory that takes batteries. NSFW.

I'm not sure how long that particular design has been rabbiting on.

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Here I am, posting to agree with a down-voted comment.

Platform games on the PC were far and few between at this time. We had some Amiga ports, such as Flasback and Zool, plus some homegrown efforts - Jill of the Jungle, and Duke Nukem, but really, consoles were where it was at for platformers. Sonic was smoother, faster and more polished; Jazz even borrowed the fluffy woodland theme!

Don't feel bad though- we had flight sims, racing games over null-modem cable - and we were soon to get Doom : D

If anything, it seems today's console games are all in the 90's PC genre.

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Never had a PC to play it on,

but screenshots always made me think someone should have told the designer that the three settings for 'Red', 'Green' and 'Blue' in the palette aren't _meant_ to be mutually exclusive...

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