Be Excellent To Each Other

The 8 Bit Challenge is weekly BETEO competition for real gamers. No achievement points, no unlocks, no online multi-player, just pure games.

Each week we will play one game (from the list below in order). Simply post your scores (with a screenshot where possible) before 6pm on Fridays.

The majority of the games will be able to be played online this time around. Although since we have published the list of games, everyone has ample opportunity to get hold of emulators and games ahead of time.

The scores on Fridays are totted up after 6pm and the top 5 positions get points. After 12 weeks we declare who is the king of gamers (or shall we just crown Zaphod now? - Ed)


This week we are playing R-Type on the Sinclair Spectrum

Latest Scores Fri 17:32

Zaphod: 72000
Chinny: 46200
ltia: 37700






League Table

1 - Zaphod - 88 points
2 - Chinny - 44 points
3 - Itia - 43 points
4 - Runcle - 26 points
5 - Devilman - 16 points
6 - Joans - 14 points
7= - Craster - 4 points
7= - Bobbyyaro - 4 points
9= - MYP - 1 point
9= - Doctor Glyndwr - 1 point
9= Anonymous X - 1 point

Last Weeks Scores: (Kwik Snax - Amstrad CPC)


Itia - 52200
Chinny - 39800
Zaphod - 27903
Devilman - 6603







Points:

1st - 10 points
2nd - 6 points
3rd - 4 points
4th - 2 points
5th - 1 point

Games we will play (in order):

Cobra (Spectrum)
Snake Rattle and Roll (NES)
Commando (C64)
Rollercoaster (Spectrum)
Rodland (NES)
3D Deathchase (Spectrum)
Navy Seals (GX4000)
Gun Fright (Spectrum)
International Karate (C64)
Encounter (C64)
Kwik Snax Dizzy (CPC)
R-Type (Spectrum)

hmm, I cant get the game to work, can define my keys and stuff but when the game starts it seems to crash.

That is annoying. Can anyone check it in an emulator?

Ditto with the wos problem. Works okay on zx32, though.

63400 on my first go (which must be rubbish):

This is an ace looking roster of games, Chinny!

71950

Same problems as everyone else for the java version - i found it on one other site but it crashed as soon as it loaded - i've also seen some posts to say that various emulator updates have "fixed" cobra so i assume there was an issue with emulation of it at some point (works fine for me on Speculator)

It's the top 12 games that everyone asked for, so they all should be good. All cunningly randomized by a sinister kindly forum member.

And R-Type for the final showdown, what more could we ask for?

Cobra to not be shit?

Malc

You might think that, but I couldn't possibly comment.

two of my games came through some how, rodland I found magically through searching and seems to be awesome sauce. Bit sad we couldnt have a breakout endurance test.

The c64 and Amstrad versions of Cobra were fecking awful, iirc. The speccy version is still ace/hard though.

So there.

You wait until we play Navy Seals. That is so hard you'll be crying big man tears. Ironically it's a decent game though, just impossibly hard.

24900, cant see me doing much better.

44250 for my first score. I played quite a bit of this back in the day. I think I once even made it to level 3 (the one in Zaphod's pic, I think).

what do you do when that women comes out of nowhere, does she just follow you?

Yeah, she's the woman you're protecting (who I mentally call ADRIAAAAANNNNEEEE). She acts as a life (next time you're hit she leaves but you aren't hurt, and she comes back after a couple more kills).

Bah, the game hangs in Fuse as well. Time to try a PC.

46650 for me.

Devilman is a twat.

upped mine to 42250.

Still time though. I used to be pretty good at Cobra but I struggled to get anywhere on it.

Come On!

53100

About 10,000. I CBA to try and better it, this game was rubbish!

Malc

I couldn't even get the fucking thing to play!

It hasn't aged all that well it seems. Still, at least it's not faithful to the film.

Final Scores:


Zaphod - 71950 - 10 points
Itia - 63400 - 6 points
Runcle - 53100 - 4 points
Devilman - 46650 - 2 points
Doctor Glyndwr - 44250 - 1 point
Malc - 10000




Who's got a link for Snake Rattle And Roll then?

I've got the cart for this so I might try it on my Game Theory Admiral if I can find it.

On the subject of NES games, I see that Dealextreme have another handheld with a NES emulator. However, the d-pad on this one looks ideal.

This link seems to work pretty well.

8500 for me. Won't bother screenshotting, as it was pretty poor.

I had 31500 for my first go I think, I didnt take a screenshot or anything but I think I can beat it anyway. Level 2 is a dick mind.

Bah. I played a bit of Cobra earlier in the week, but I only managed about 20000 or so (I was never any good at it) and forgot all about playing it some more.

64300. I managed to get to Level 3, but died pretty much straight away. I reckon I can do better as well, as I needlessly died so many times on Level 2.

78450

Nice game - i bet there are a million hidden things all over the place and its very unforgiving about falling off the edges :-(

Bah to you, sir!

So what's the aim and what are the controls? I can't seem to jump or fire (if applicable).

X to jump
Z to shoot
Arrow keys to move
Enter is start

Cheers ears.

eat the red balls and your snake gets longer, and theres a set of scales that will open the exit when your big enough.

Ah, cheers.

Without knowing what I was doing I got 13000.

80800

You also get bonus points for yellow and blue balls , there are little trash can lids on the surface - if you hit fire while your on them they will uncover items , some are power ups , some are enemies and some warp you to bonus areas.

159200 - Level 4 is not nice at all.

43500 now I know what I am doing.

139950

I really like this - its a pity it never made it to anything other than the NES

Why is it the Sir Zaphod LXXIXs Roll is a different colour from anyone elses. I call shenanigans.

I'm playing it on an emulator - possibly one with a different colour pallete (I'm using FCE : http://fceultra.sourceforge.net/)

Simple steps to wasting your Sunday morning.

1. Find NES.
2. Find NES Controller.
3. Find NES PSU (from a different room for some reason)
4. Find Snake Rattle N Roll
5. Hook it all up. Wonder why the NES won't turn on.
6. Hunt for another PSU. Eventually find a SNES one.
7. Try that. It works. Try the original one - that works too now.
8. Realise that I've never run anything through RF on the TV since I bought it so faff around tuning it in.
9. Switch off the NES, remove the cart, blow across the contacts before reinserting.
10. Play for a bit and get a little annoyed when it crashes mid-level. Repeat step 9.
11. Eventually get to play for a bit.

(171,650, for those with images turned off. I might try and beat that fourth level later though)

I think a version came out for the megadrive?

Edit - Yeah, it did

Nice - I'll give that a go later.

Heres a better score from me :



201800 - the next level with the flying carpets really turns the difficulty up.

I played this on a different emulator - Nestopia which you can download from here : http://nestopia.sourceforge.net/

It allows you to save a 'movie' of your game in its own format which is tiny and you can pick up here :

http://www.retroleague.myzen.co.uk/Snake Rattle'n Roll (E).nsv

It also lets you save it as an AVI file which i have but its 500 meg , so suggestions for how to shrink it to a more usable size and somewhere to host it would be good :-)

106150