"Harry may not have a wand, but he sure knows how to handle things."

Ah, Pitfall... Pitfall, Pitfall, Pitfall, Pitfall. One of Atari 2600's best games is now on Intellivision, and it's no worse for it. In fact, the biggest complaint that could be made it that it's too much like the Atari 2600 version, with very few graphical improvements to be seen. But Pitfall is Pitfall, and Activision has delivered here.

The object of Pitfall is to wade through screen after screen of jungle, getting treasures (gold, silver, diamond rings, money bags). It sounds repetitive, and truth be told, it is. However, Activision did a good enough job of making the screens different that you rarely feel like your doing the same thing over and over again. Each screen has some manner of trickery in it, be it logs, pits, lakes, or a great many other things. You can dodge these by either jumping, swinging on vines, or just running like mad. Every once in a while, you'll run into a treasure, which nets you some big points and makes it all worth it. By the way, you'll need to be fast, because you're on a 20 minute time limit here.

In case you didn't gather from that description, Pitfall is fun. It's really addictive too see how far you can go and how much treasure you can get. This is helped by the game's balanced difficulty and smooth curve, so you never feel like you got killed through no fault of your own (well, except if you run out of time. More on that later.)

But as good as this game undoubtedly is, there are a few flaws. You see, the Intellivision disk isn't really the best for of control around, and it does get in the way somewhat here. Making precise movements across the heads of crocodiles is frustrating, and pressing any of the 16 directions on the disk except left or right will bring Harry to a stop. Practice makes perfect though, and you can eventually get good enough to now notice these problems. However, what you won't overcome is that accursed timer. There really wasn't any good reason to put this in the game, and it just put an unnecessary strain on everything.

But overall, Pitfall is a great game that really should be in any Intellivision owner's library. It has that special quality of being a game worth owning on multiple systems, just so you can see the differences. Not many games can be like that.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 11/01/10

Game Release: Pitfall! (US, 1982)