Lode Runner 3D

Pros • recalls those classic Lode Runner memories • gradual difficulty ramp • challenging puzzles	Cons • having to repeat the same levels • imperfect control • imperfect camera
Bottom Line A worthy if unspectacular successor to the original classic. When I was in high school computer science, our teacher would not permit the playing of games in the computer science lab (He claimed it was hard on the keyboards). Any time he caught someone playing a game, he would, in one fell swoop, snatch their floppy disc out of the drive and staple it rapidly and repeatedly to the wall. This, naturally, added a little extra intensity to our gaming. Not only did we have to be alert to the game, but we had to be alert to the teacher and to those weeny snitches who might rat us out. You had to be prepared, at any instant, to sound the secret, prairie dog style whistle alarm, switch discs and reboot the computer before the teacher could get to your station, all without looking like you were trying to hide something. I don't think I have ever had more intense, adrenaline charged gaming then I did then, playing Lode Runner on a green screen Apple IIe. Big Bang Software obviously was going to have trouble matching my Lode Runner memories with their 3D version of this classic game. Updating a classic is always risky business. It is nearly impossible to please the old fans as well as appeal to gamers who have never played the original. There is less, frantic running back and forth, digging holes in this 3D version than I remember in my high school computer science lab, but a lot more fiendish puzzle solving, and it works. The game is good, though not likely to be remembered as a classic.

Dig A Pit For Your Neighbour

In the semi-3D world of Infogrames Lode Runner 3D, the Lode Runner runs along the top of blocks looking for gold. The gold is primarily protected by the nature of the environment in which it lies. Much like the Temples of Doom that Indiana Jones made a career of ransacking, the levels of Lode Runner 3D are devious destroyers of would be gold collectors. There are exploding bombs, places to walk off the edge and into a bottomless plunge, and most often, self healing ground. The Lode Runner can dig holes with a handy laser blaster that he totes. Within a few moments, these holes heal over and if the Lode Runner happens to still be in the hole, there he will remain, entombed like a woolly mammoth in the La Brea Tar Pits. Complicating matters are the monks that guard the gold.

These monks aren't very bright, but in the tradition of combative orders like the Knights Templar or the Shao Lin monks, they are very, very tough. If they can lay a finger on the Lode Runner, they capture him. Our Lode Runner is a man of scruples. Rather than turn his blaster on the unarmed monks and be responsible for their deaths, the Lode Runner digs a pit for his neighbour. If the monks should happen to fall in and be entombed by the reforming blocks, well that is their own clumsy fault and the Lode Runner can sleep easy at night with a conscience clear of their demise. Besides, these monks don't really die. They immediately respawn whenever destroyed.

Levels

A game like Lode Runner 3D lives and dies by the creative level design of the developers. The crew at Big Bang must be devious, twisted, intelligent individuals, because the levels of Lode Runner 3D are the same. There are five worlds of 20 levels each. Each world begins easy and builds in difficulty to the bang your head against the concrete floor variety. I found myself strung along through the increasing difficulty levels, always frustrated, but always feeling like I was accomplishing something. The developers have done a marvelous job of continuously adding new elements to the game and the levels maintain an originality that keeps them from growing monotonous. Or, it would, if it were not for a few minor issues:

Do Over

It seems like every level has a bonus life, and there are occasional bonus levels where a few extra lives can be collected. Trouble is, when you first arrive at some of the devious levels that Big Bang has devised, you may easily die twenty times before solving the level. The game can only be saved once every four levels. This means that in order to advance from area to area, the same levels have to be repeated a number of times after they have been solved in order to get past the set of levels with enough lives to attack the next. What adds to this frustration is the less than perfect control and camera work.

The player has control of the camera and can rotate or zoom in and out. Unfortunately, the camera is not sticky and rotates of its own, back to the skewed views. From these views, as the Lode Runner advances along the twisting platforms, the directions are always changing. Forward on the screen shifts from right with the control stick, around to up. This results in fumbles in control and walking into pits or into monks or missing shots that should not have been missed. The game and level design of Lode Runner 3D are good enough to keep me playing for extended periods of time. What drives me away is, over and over, having to repeat levels that I have already completed. Unlimited lives, Oddworld style would have solved all of these complaints for me. The game is more than challenging enough without having to be repetitive. It is still, a great console puzzle game.

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