Crystal Chamber  (Preview)
Platform: Commodore 64
Gametype: Undefined
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Another previously unknown game which was to be released on the short-lived RetroSoft label back in 2005.

This was a sort of Bejeweled clone on the C64, written by Jason Kelk – and was shaping up very nicely before it’s cancellation.

Overall the game was nearing completion and just needed some basic tidy ups.  Graphically the game is heavily inspired by Reaxion, with similar patterns in the background and using the main sprite temporarily.  The game was fully playable and just required a bit of extra polish really and the implementation of a working score panel.

Unfortunately when things fell through with RetroSoft, so did the game too – and it has remained dormant ever since.   The game thankfully has now been fully recovered and patched up for GTW64 to release into its archives – with no plans to ever finish the game.

It’s certainly fun to play, but the lack of polish shows in places – but it is certainly worth checking out to see what might of been.

Enjoy!

Contributions: Jason Kelk

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Jason Speaks about work on Crystal Chamber:

“Crystal Chamber was started for Retro-soft after their head man (whose name completely escapes me) got in touch asking for something on the C64 to release. It was based loosely on games like  Protovision’s freebie Cascade but with an infinite supply of crystals being dropped into the play area to keep things moving. Selecting a group of coloured gems makes them disappear and, had I got around to it, that would’ve filled the “mass” meter – if it wasn’t full before the timer (which I forgot to add to the status bar so it would’ve needed a redesign) ran out the game would be over, otherwise the next level would start with the gameplay tweaked a little.

It slowly ground to a halt because Retro-soft sort of drifted off and, since I’ve got the attention span of a knat on good days, I’m liable to forget things unless there is at least the occasional nag.

And to be honest I’d become quite worried about how Retro-soft were doing business, they were upsetting people in the Spectrum community in various ways and I wasn’t particularly keen on being associated with them.

Looking at the code now, it would need work (and probably a major rewrite since I’m fairly sure the “find match” code is bugged and the status bar is missing an important element) but who knows… maybe I’ll go back to it at some point.”

http://www.gamesthatwerent.com/gtw64/crystal-chamber/
