Lazy Jones
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| Lazy Jones | |
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| Developer(s) | David Whittaker |
| Publisher(s) | Terminal Software |
| Designer(s) | David Whittaker |
| Engine | proprietary |
| Release date(s) | 1984 |
| Genre(s) | Platform game |
| Mode(s) | Single player |
| Platform(s) | C64, Sinclair Spectrum, MSX, Tatung Einstein |
Lazy Jones is a computer game for the Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, MSX and Tatung Einstein. It was written by David Whittaker and released by Terminal Software in 1984. The Spectrum version was 'ported' by Simon Cobb.
Lazy Jones is essentially a collection of fifteen smaller sub-games. The game takes place inside a hotel with three floors, connected by an elevator. Your character is apparently a lazy hotel employee, who doesn't much care for his work, but prefers to sneak into the rooms to play video games instead.
The main screen in Lazy Jones is the hotel interior. There, your character can use the elevator to travel freely between the three floors, but he must watch out for enemies: the current hotel manager, on the top floor - the ghost of the previous manager, on the bottom floor - and a cleaning cart (moving by itself, of course) on the middle floor. The enemies only walk around and don't pursue your character, but contact with them is fatal.
Each floor has six rooms, three on each side of the elevator. Each room can be entered once. Inside most rooms is a video game, in which your character immediately begins playing. As well as the video games, there is the hotel bar, a bed, a cleaning closet and a toilet. The bar works like a video game, but the bed, the cleaning closet and the toilet are useless decorations (intentionally added, because David had run out of ideas for new games).
When all rooms have been visited, the game starts over again, but increasingly faster, each time.
[edit] Sub-games
The various sub-games are generally simplified versions of famous 1970s and 1980s video games, such as Space Invaders, Frogger, Snake or Chuckie Egg. Their plots and gameplay are very simple, and in most of them you simply have to avoid incoming enemies long enough to score many points. In some, you have to shoot enemies to score points. The title of one game, 99 Red Balloons, is an obvious reference to the famous 1980s pop music song by the singer Nena.
Each sub-game has a time limit. In some sub-games it is possible to "die", thus ending the sub-game prematurely, while others only end after the time limit expires.
The fourteen video games are as follows:
- 99 Red Balloons: Red balloons continuously fly towards the top of the screen. You have to grab hold of two balloons to fly upwards, to get to kiss a woman. Then you need to grab hold of one balloon to fly back down to kiss another woman. A bow tries to shoot arrows to puncture your balloons.
- Eggie Chuck: A simplified Chuckie Egg clone.
- Jay Walk: A simplified Frogger clone. You have to cross a street without hitting any of the cars, to get to kiss a woman. Then you cross the street back to kiss another woman.
- Laser Jones: A Space Invaders clone where the aliens don't shoot back.
- Outland: A very simple shoot 'em up. Spaceships descend from the skies and you can shoot them to score points.
- Res Q: A game of skill where you have to rescue men trapped in a cave without touching the cave walls.
- Scoot: A game of skill where you have to steer some kind of hovercraft in a cave.
- Star Dust: A shoot 'em up where you can shoot balls of dust.
- The Hills Are Alive: A shoot 'em up very similar to Outland except this time the spaceships fly horizontally.
- The Reflex: Bones fly down from the top of the screen and you have to bounce them back up.
- The Turk: One of the strangest settings. Roast turkeys slide on a conveyor belt and you have to fire a fork at them to score points. A telephone flies diagonally around the screen, getting in the way of your fork.
- The Wall: A simplified Snake clone. You must streer a continuously growing garden wall without hitting yourself, the screen boundaries, or any of the plants.
- Wild Wafers: A shoot 'em up where you can shoot spinning wafers.
- Wipeout: A simplified Breakout clone.
The sub-games where it is possible to "die" prematurely are Eggie Chuck, Jay Walk, Res Q and The Wall.
The sub-games that only end when the time limit runs out are 99 Red Balloons, Laser Jones, Outland, Scoot, Star Dust, The Hills Are Alive, The Reflex, The Turk, Wild Wafers, Wipeout and the hotel bar.
[edit] Trivia
- Music to Lazy Jones was licensed and remixed by the German band Zombie Nation in their music Kernkraft 400. The remixed version became immensely popular around the world hitting number 1 in charts of many places, especially in the United States, where sporting events usually chant to the music.
- The song is widely misidentified as being named Zombie Nation due to the lyrics that mention "Zombie Nation" throughout the song. File sharing networks offering mistagged sound files probably contributed to the misconception as well.
