Creative Software Games - LaunchBox Games Database

Apple Panic

Commodore VIC-20 - Released - 1982

Apple Panic is a platform game based on the arcade game Space Panic (1980, Universal) and ported to the Apple II by Ben Serki. You control a digger, armed with his shovel, and you must kill your opponents - the evil legged apples. Your character can only walk left/right and climb up/down the ladders - no jumping - and if the apples touch you, you'll lose. To kill an apple you must dig a hole on the ground and wait for one of them to get stuck on it. Then you must hit it with your shovel to make it fall to the level below. The apples die if they fall deep enough. Depending on their color, they may require from 1 to 3-level falls, so you may have to dig several aligned holes. Besides, the deeper the fall, the higher you score. Each level is timed so you must take out all the apples quickly, or you'll lose. If you're successful, the next levels will feature more and more enemies than the previous one.

Astroblitz

Commodore VIC-20 - Released - 1982

You control a spaceship whose main task is to wipe out several enemies that include flying saucers, seekers, satellite dishes, and spinners. A radar is at the top of the screen to keep track of movement. Use it to find out how far enemies are from you and match their position so that you can fire as soon as they are meters away from you. Once you killed enough of them, you proceed to the next wave. Lives are lost when you collide with enemies or touch shrapnel. Lose all your lives and the game is over.

Astroblitz

Commodore 64 - Released - 1983

As captain of a fast-moving rocket plane, your mission is to make the planet safe by destroying all the dangerous objects on its surface and in its atmosphere. Score as many points as possible by shooting down Spinners., Saucers, Seekers and Radar dishes. Navigate your ship carefully to avoid being hit by enemy fire and strange alien objects! Avoid the spewing volcanoes and save the friendly buildings.

Black Hole

Commodore VIC-20 - Released - 1982

Black Hole is an action game, with a star-shaped black hole in the middle that tries to suck you in. Try to avoid being sucked in and shoot asteroids for points. Borrows quite a bit from early arcade vector games.

Break Street

Commodore 64 - Released - 1984

Break Street is a break dancing game. First off you choose a dancer to play out of the four possible options, including the two man team of "Double Trouble". Warm up mode allows you to test various dance moves. Moves are triggered by joystick directions and use of the fire button. They range from simple moves such as the moonwalk to more complex maneuvers such as the head spin. There is a decent variety of moves available thanks to the same joystick action doing different moves depending on whether you are standing or doing floor moves. The main game portion gives you a time limit in which to perform your moves and rack up points. An energy bar on the left side of the screen diminishes as you do the more complicated moves. In order to regain some energy you can do a simple move such as uprock or the moon walk. Complex floor moves drain energy quickly. If you are close to running out of energy your character will turn red, warning you to shift to something less strenuous. If the energy bar is completely drained, your performance will be over and your dancer noted as being "beached out". It is also possible to fail at a hard move, causing your character to sit and cry on the ground, ending your round.

Bumblebee

Commodore 64 - Released - 1984

If you ever thought the concepts of programming were difficult, this educational game will demystify the process and teach anyone from ages 6 and up some elementary concepts behind programming. You control Bart the Bumblebee by giving him instructions on how to move from flower to flower, picking up pollen points. Bart's flight pattern must be carefully designed to avoid his bumping into walls or becoming an unfortunate meal for Olga the Spider or Phineas the Frog. If Bart returns safely to the beehive before the time runs out, bonus points are awarded followed by a colorful graphics display.

Chinese Juggler

Commodore 64 - Released - 1983

Chinese Juggler is a single screen game where you are a plate spinner and the aim is to have eight plates spinning on eight poles before a timer reaches zero. There are four plate holders at the bottom of the screen and you pick a coloured plate up and place it on a pole with the colour of the plate having different points values. A white plate will give you the most points with a purple plate giving you the least but you can throw plates in the air and catch them to change colour. As you place plates on the poles the ones already spinning will start to slow down and have to be spun again to keep them spinning. Once all eight poles have a spinning plate on it then you move to the next level but it is game over if the timer reaches zero without eight plates spinning. On later levels it will tell you what colour has to be placed and spun next.

Choplifter!

Commodore VIC-20 - Released - 1982

Choplifter! is a side-scrolling action/arcade game that puts you in command of an attack chopper. Your mission: Go behind enemy lines and rescue up to 16 hostages per level. Be careful, though, because tanks and enemy aircraft will try to stop you - and they won't stop shooting while you are rescuing those hostages! Originally released for Apple II home computers, Choplifter! was later ported to the arcades and a number of video game consoles. Many imitators and homages would follow.

Code Maker/Code Breaker

Commodore VIC-20 - Released - 1981

Twin pack of games from Creative Software: * Code Maker is a Mastermind variant where you have a set number of guesses to crack a computer generated code, given some clues to identify the correct colours (represented by letters in this version) and their positioning in the code, based on your previous guesses. * Code Breaker sees you turn the tables on the VIC-20 itself by allowing you to set the code and watch as the computer struggles to work out the correct sequence itself. There's a reaonable argument to be made that the game titles were accidentally swapped (as Code Breaker seems a more apt title for the game where you're trying to break someone's else code and Code Maker is more reflective of a game where you need to set the code yourself - this isn't confirmed anywhere though!)

DragonHawk

Commodore 64 - Released - 1983

You take control of the titular Dragon Hawk and must kill a number flying creatures such as buzzards, phoenixes, dragon puppies and others by pouncing on them from above - similar to Joust. Naturally, your enemies can kill you in the same way. To keep the Dragon Hawk in the air, you have to rapidly press the fire button in order to make him flap his wings. The faster the Dragon Hawk flaps its wings, the more difficult it is to control. However, if you are taking too much time, lighting bolts will start to shoot from the sky. To stand a chance against the increasingly tough groups of enemies, you receive an extra life at every 1000 points. Killed enemies also drop feathers that can be collected for extra points. Once you have defeated all standard enemies, you must face a large, fire-breathing serpent.

In the Chips

Commodore 64 - Released - 1983

A business simulator which puts you in control of a Silicon Valley software firm: you've invested $100,000 in cash in the business, and now you get to call the shots. Your goal is to expand your share of the computer software market while striving against a competing company (run by the computer or by another human player). Each turn represents a fiscal quarter, and both companies set up a business strategy. This is done by walking your character between the company's various buildings: at R&D, development budget is assigned for up to five potential products (games, judging by their titles). Stock levels are set at Manufacturing, and retail prices are adjusted in the Sales office. Then there's Advertising, which will (literally) reach out its hand for budget. These factors, along with your opponent's tactics, will determine your market performance - when the next quarter rolls in, you receive a financial report, and can redivide the pie accordingly. To win, you will have to balance supply and demand, read the market correctly and counter the competition's strategy. The length of the game (in quarters) is adjustable, and there's also a Monopoly mode, where both sides can try to corner the market by setting prices at below cost.

In the Chips

Commodore VIC-20 - Released - 1983

Loremaster

MS-DOS - Released - 1991

Loremaster is a fantasy adventure / role-playing hybrid which uses a text parser and real-time tile-based movement. The game takes places in an empire of seven kingdoms ruled by the emperor King Yelraf and Queen Tei. The kingdom of the north has been conquered by the evil powers of Gaiasbane and they now await the arrival of the Loremaster to help bring back peace to the north.

Math Hurdler/Monster Maze

Commodore VIC-20 - Released - 1981

Twin pack of games from Creative Software: * Math Hurdler is an educational title that sees you control an athlete and you have to help get him to the finish line without tripping by solving math questions, which can be either addition, subtraction, multiplication or division. * Monster Maze (not to be confused with the game of the same name by Epyx) is a maze game in which you have to get to the exit. The maze isn't really visible at the beginning, but the more you walk through the maze the more you can see of it. You must be aware of monsters that are hardly visible until you are close to them.

Pipes

Commodore 64 - Released - 1983

Pipes is an educational game for children. Your mission is to figure out the shortest, most economical way to get the neighborhood hooked up to the water supply system. Decide what kind of pipe to buy and where to put it. Remember that your budget is limited so you don't have much margin for errors. You can choose the amount of houses you try to hook up to the system from 1 (easiest) to 5 (hardest).

Pipes

MS-DOS - Released - 1983

Pipes

Commodore VIC-20 - Released - 1983

Rat Hotel

Commodore VIC-20 - Released - 1982

In Rat Hotel the player takes control of a rat and has to eat cheese while not being caught by Waldo, a rat hating maintenance man. It takes place at Hotel Paradisio and on each of the hotel's floors the rat has to eat all pieces of cheese to be able to take the elevator to the next floor. At the same time it has to watch out for Waldo and the traps that he has placed all over the hotel. Any contact with Waldo or a trap will lead to one of three lives being lost but an extra one is granted after 10,000 points. There is a time limit too as the rat only has three minutes to move from the top to the bottom floor. The colour of the cheese changes over time and it's important to not eat it when it's black as this will paralyse the rat. However when it turns to blue it's worth double points compared to the orange one. Once the rat has eaten the big cheese in the basement the level has been completed and it will move on to a harder one. The difficulty level can also be chosen before starting the game. Coded by a female game developer, Joanne Lee also known as Jolee.

Serpentine

Commodore VIC-20 - Released - 1982

In Serpentine you control a multi-segmented snake in a maze; your goal is to survive and earn as many points as possible. At the beginning of each level, three enemy snakes will also enter the maze. To complete the level, you need to eat all of the enemy snakes. If an enemy snake has more segments than your snake, you can only eat segments that form the tail of the snake; a collision with the head is lethal! Each time you eat a segment, the enemy snake will become smaller until eventually you can devour it completely. For enemy snakes that have fewer segments than you, you can eat the tail segments or the head segment. From time to time, a frog will appear in the maze; eating this will cause your snake to grow. Both your snake and enemy snakes will leave eggs behind occasionally; left alone, these will hatch (your eggs earn you an extra life, enemy eggs will hatch another snake). Eggs can also be eaten to remove them from the playfield, so it's usually a good idea to eat enemy eggs before a new snake hatches! The maze changes for each level, and the enemy snakes progressively become larger and tougher to catch. Unlike the other releases of this game, which were developed by Broderbund (who were also the publisher of the other versions), the VIC-20 version was ported by Antirom Software and published by Creative Software). The VIC version was also the second to be released, just after the original Apple II version. The rest of the conversions were released in 1983.

Spitball

Commodore 64 - Released - 1983

A strange hybrid of Snake and Pinball. Spit at your opponent to kill him while traversing the tubes and flippers, but don't crash into each other. Quite original!

Terraguard

Commodore VIC-20 - Released - 1982

Terraguard is a fixed screen shoot 'em up similar to Moon Cresta and Phoenix. The player controls his ship down the baseline and has to shoot at the aliens above him. There are three aliens for each stage, and the player has to shoot them all down to move on to the next stage. At the same time, the aliens have a ship that tries to land on the surface. To stop it from doing this, the player has to be quick in destroying the aliens. Else, the player will be killed by the ship's tractor beam. The player has three lives and earns a new one when scoring 1000 points. There are three different kinds of aliens: jeeby-jeebys, eyes and mouths. Each alien gives a different score depending on how hard they are to take down.

Video Mania

Commodore VIC-20 - Released - 1982

Video Mania is a shoot 'em up similar to Robotron: 2084. The game is played on a single screen and the player can move and shoot in any direction. Around, alien creatures roam and the player has to shoot them down before they collide with him. The only defence available is a football shaped electronic alien zapper that is thrown at the aliens. However, unlike Robotron, it's played with only one joystick and therefore the player can only shoot in the direction that he is moving. There are three different enemies. The evil eye which bounces off when hitting a wall, the walwoker which climbs walls when they hit and otherwise move in unpredictable ways and the killerbox which always follows the player. Each killed alien is worth 50 points and once all have been killed a new level is started with a larger amount of enemies. The player starts with three lives and after every 10th level the player gets a bonus life.

Warp!

Commodore 64 - Released - 1984

Warp! is an arcade racing game where the player, whose country's research center has just been raided by aliens, needs to rescue kidnapped scientists and recover stolen computers, weapons and microfilms. To pick up a scientist or an item, the player has to stop and leave the car and move by foot to the item without getting killed by an alien. In the same way, it's necessary to pick up fuel canisters to avoid running out of gas. Hitting any object or alien leads to a life being lost. In addition to fuel, it is also necessary to collect energy vapor. As the energy is filled, the vehicle is upgraded, first to a turbo racer and then to a jet fighter and finally to a combat tank. With the jet fighter it is possible to fire back at the aliens while the tank can run over road hazards.