How to play the 2005 Minigame Multicart online
- Pick a game in the menu and play: arrow keys to move, Space bar to fire or jump
- Reset: F12 (the console’s Reset switch)
- Save and load your progress: Ctrl + 0–9 saves to a slot, Alt + 0–9 loads it
All seven games are for one player with a joystick.
The seven games
- Hunchy – based on the 1982 arcade game Hunchback. Guide Quasimodo across the rooftops of Notre Dame to rescue Esmeralda, dodging guards and missiles over 16 screens. You have unlimited lives.
- Jetman – inspired by the 1983 computer game Jetpac. As a gas station attendant in outer space, you refuel rockets while under attack, over 16 increasingly hard missions.
- Nightrider – ride on across rough ground to escape helicopters. You must never stop, and the further and faster you go, the more you score.
- Zirconium – a space shooter. Fight through blockades of geometric mines, collect power packs to keep your armour up, and reach the alien mothership.
- Rocket Command – in the spirit of Missile Command, shoot down molten invaders rising from a volcanic crater with your rocket batteries. Doing well earns you extra rockets.
- M-4 – based on Midway’s 1977 tank arcade game. You have 90 seconds to score by hitting walls, enemy tanks, cars and planes.
- Marble Jumper – the classic peg solitaire puzzle on a 33-hole board. Jump marbles over each other, as in checkers, until only one is left. There are 24 starting layouts, including the traditional one with only the centre hole empty.
Tips
- Read the menu instructions. They tell you each game’s goal before you start.
- Use Hunchy’s unlimited lives to practise. You can learn every screen’s timing without ever seeing a game over.
- In Marble Jumper, clear the edges early. Marbles stranded near the edges are the hardest to remove.
About the Minigame Competition
The Minigame Competition challenged homebrew programmers to write complete games in very little space. The 1K limit is tight even by 2600 standards, so each game here is cut down to its core idea. The same year, Chris Walton also released the larger Hunchy II, another Hunchback-style game.
