The Fall Guy Challenge

[Ikrananka]

I've been exploring the prototype Fall Guy game to see if there is a fully playable game there or not.  While the driving section of the game seems to be complete, I'm not convinced the platforming section is.  Check out my post on the instructions for the game to which I have also added a map for the driving section which is invaluable as it's easy to lose your bearings and go around in circles.  With the map it only takes at most about 5 minutes to find which warehouse the criminal is holed up in.

 

So, in the platforming section (warehouse) of the game, the object is to get to the bottom of the warehouse to catch/arrest the criminal.  For some bizarre reason you enter the warehouse by climbing a rope to the top floor!  However, the criminal seems to be holding a gun so not sure how the apparently unarmed Colt Seavers is supposed to take him down.  Frustratingly, I have not been able to complete this part of the game and am stuck on the middle level and am looking for help.

 

I just can't get past the section where there are two "crates" stacked on top of each other.  Starting from the far left of the middle level I've successfully landed on top of the wide lower crate but any attempt to summersault from there results in me hitting Colt's head on the ceiling and losing a life.  Similarly, starting from the far left of the middle level I can also land on top of the higher narrower crate.  But again any attempt to summersault from there results in me hitting Colt's head on the ceiling and losing a life.

 

Many years ago someone prepared a hint sheet for this part of the game as follows:

Quote

In the warehouse screen, when you land on the second floor, go all the way to the LEFT. Then run RIGHT and JUMP.
Now you should be on top of the first crate, so run RIGHT. You should fall through the hole on the right, when you fall adjust it so that you land on your feet. The last floor you should be able to handle.

 

To me this makes no sense because if you "run RIGHT" after landing on top of the first crate then Colt just dies!!!!  And trying to summersault (or run and summersault) from there also just makes him die (he always hits his head on the ceiling).  Agghhhh - I need help.  The hint sheet infers that the warehouse can be completed - but HOW?????

 

So, I'm throwing down a challenge.  Can anyone figure out exactly what you need to do to get past the middle level of the warehouse.  To help, I've attached a snapshot file for CoolCV with Colt Severs standing ready at the far left of the middle level.  Simply place this snapshot file in your CoolCV directory.  Start CoolCV, load the ROM file for the game (also attached) and then press F2 to load the snapshot.

 

Good luck!!!!!!

Fall Guy (1983)(20th Century Fox)(proto).bin coolcv_snapshot.bin

Edited August 7, 2021 by Ikrananka

[Falonn]

Here's a snapshot on the bottom level.

 

The trick: you can walk right off of a ledge, which appears to dump you right into the death animation... but you can still control your "jump" and land right-side up.

 

So on the middle platform: jump onto the highest point, walk off the right edge, and spin yourself upright.  That way you don't hit your head on the ceiling.

 

Now for the bad news: touching the person on the lowest level just restarts the car section again with zero fanfare of any kind. ?

coolcv_snapshot.bin

[Ikrananka]

Oh wow - thank you ??????

 

OMG, what bizarre and deceptive movements (animation) Colt Seavers has.  So, he runs off the top of crates stacked two high and launches himself forward, with a horizontal posture, looking like he's dead.  Hence my confusion which I think is understandable.  He hardly looks like he's still alive.  Particularly as flies forwards with enough momentum to reach the gap in the floor and falls rapidly down to the bottom floor.  Not in a million years would I have guessed he was actually still alive and just needed to be told to summersault upright.  Good grief.  Well kudos my friend for so quickly figuring out what I totally failed to do.  ?

 

This has allowed me to progress further into the game.  The next time you find a warehouse with a criminal inside I was totally surprised to find that it has a completely different layout with windows that you have to summersault through.  Once you capture that criminal it's back on the road for another adventure.  After driving more to find another criminal the warehouse layout reverts back to the original one with crates, but this time the criminal at the bottom is firing his gun horizontally to the right at regular intervals.  So you have to really time your summersaults carefully to avoid the bullets.  I'll continue on in the game to see what else happens.

 

I think I'll make a video about this game as it does seem to be complete and has some depth to it.  Really quite a cool and very different game.

[digress]

The Fall Guy was my must watch show for the years it was on. 

 

Apparently the show got approved without an actor attached or even a script. They just played the theme song for the executive and that was enough. Similar to sponge bob.

 

Doing the flips and landing on your head in this level is hilarious. Looks like another decathlon event that could have been added.

 

Nice to see another level is buried in the rom.

[Tempest]

So this is starting to look like a mostly complete yet unpolished prototype.  Probably in the 90% or more range?

 

TCF was really doing some interesting games for the Colecovision.  I know early on they had planned to take Sirius's Squish 'Em and turn that into The Fall Guy for the Atari 2600 (like they had done with other Sirius titles) but Sirius either never made a 2600 port of Squish 'Em or it was decided not to release it for some reason.

 

Have you ever looked into Yolks on You?  I wonder if there's more stuff hidden in that game than the one level demo.

[Ikrananka]

2 hours ago, Tempest said:

So this is starting to look like a mostly complete yet unpolished prototype.  Probably in the 90% or more range?

 

TCF was really doing some interesting games for the Colecovision.  I know early on they had planned to take Sirius's Squish 'Em and turn that into The Fall Guy for the Atari 2600 (like they had done with other Sirius titles) but Sirius either never made a 2600 port of Squish 'Em or it was decided not to release it for some reason.

 

Have you ever looked into Yolks on You?  I wonder if there's more stuff hidden in that game than the one level demo.

It really is a quite interesting game, although the platforming sections are extremely frustrating.  Do you know if TCF had their own development team(s) or were these games subcontracted to external parties?  I wonder who programmed Fall Guy.....

 

Got a lot on my plate at the moment, but will definitely take a deep dive into Yolks on You over the coming months.

[Tempest]

13 minutes ago, Ikrananka said:

It really is a quite interesting game, although the platforming sections are extremely frustrating.  Do you know if TCF had their own development team(s) or were these games subcontracted to external parties?  I wonder who programmed Fall Guy.....

I think they outsourced most of it.

[Ikrananka]

43 minutes ago, Tempest said:

I think they outsourced most of it.

Makes sense.  Now I wonder who they outsourced to.....

 

Did TCF actually publish any games for any system or were they all cancelled due to the crash?

[Tempest]

4 minutes ago, Ikrananka said:

Makes sense.  Now I wonder who they outsourced to.....

 

Did TCF actually publish any games for any system or were they all cancelled due to the crash?

They published games for the 2600 and Atari 400/800.  I believe Romox picked up some for use with their programmable carts and released them for some other systems like the Vic-20 but I'm not 100% sure.

[Ikrananka]

Thanks - I'll have to take a look at what they did.

[phattyboombatty]

2 hours ago, Ikrananka said:

Makes sense.  Now I wonder who they outsourced to.....

 

Did TCF actually publish any games for any system or were they all cancelled due to the crash?

I must have missed it…

 

Who is TCF, and what does that stand for? Were these folks a silent developer who sold their games to Coleco? Or was Fall Guy to be published by this TCF company? Please elaborate. I am unfamiliar with the software developers who farmed out to the publishers in their heyday.
 

Perhaps one of us will start a thread listing all of the software developers for the ColecoVision back in the day. I just think that’d be interesting. 

[Ikrananka]

Just now, phattyboombatty said:

I must have missed it…

 

Who is TCF, and what does that stand for? Were these folks a silent developer who sold their games to Coleco? Or was Fall Guy to be published by this TCF company? Please elaborate. I am unfamiliar with the software developers who farmed out to the publishers in their heyday.
 

Perhaps one of us will start a thread listing all of the software developers for the ColecoVision back in the day. I just think that’d be interesting. 

TCF = Twentieth Century Fox

[phattyboombatty]

Just now, Ikrananka said:

TCF = Twentieth Century Fox

Well duh. Didn’t quite put that together. ? It’s been so long since I tried out these prototypes, that I forgot about that very obvious title screen. Thanks! 

[Swami]

21 hours ago, Ikrananka said:

Thanks - I'll have to take a look at what they did.

There were a couple dozen movie based games. Alien, for one. About half of them are only prototypes though. Alligator People, Porky’s, etc. 

[Tempest]

Just now, Swami said:

There were a couple dozen movie based games. Alien, for one. About half of them are only prototypes though. Alligator People, Porky’s, etc. 

Porky's was released officially. 

 

TCF started out by taking Sirius games and grafting movie properties they owned onto them.  So Spider City became Flash Gordon, Alpha Shield became Spacemaster X-7, Final Orbit became The Earth Dies Screaming, etc.  They did do original games for some movie titles (Porky's, MASH, Mega Force, etc.) however.

[Swami]

17 minutes ago, Tempest said:

Porky's was released officially. 

Right. ColecoVision one was a prototype. Let’s say Planet of the Apes, instead. I checked and there is only 4 or so games only in prototype. 

[Tempest]

9 minutes ago, Swami said:

Right. ColecoVision one was a prototype. 

Yes.  TCF never released any games for the CV, they were all prototypes.

 

I'm curious to where they all came from.  Given how many of them have surfaced I'm going to guess that a former TCF developer leaked them all.

[Swami]

12 minutes ago, Tempest said:

Yes.  TCF never released any games for the CV, they were all prototypes.

 

I'm curious to where they all came from.  Given how many of them have surfaced I'm going to guess that a former TCF developer leaked them all.

Some must have wanted their work known, like Matt Patrol. Other times, they seem to think nothing of it, like Arkyology for the 2600, the guy just had sitting on his computer for 30 years until some people on Atariage started talking about it and he heard about it somehow. A completed companion 2600 game to it, David and Goliath, was lost around 2000, when he threw away some old computer stuff after sitting  on his computer for 15 years. That kind of eats at me.