Crazy Climber
Crazy Climber was first released in Japan by Nichibutsu in 1980, and in the USA by Taito in 1982. Crazy Climber 2, released in 1988, was a Japanese only release and very similar to the original. Fans of this Crazy Climber will remember that the player controlled a crazy daredevil who was attempting to climb skyscrapers amongst a number of different obstacles. The player controlled the daredevil’s movements using two joysticks, each joystick representing the movements of one of the player’s arms. To move higher in the same direction, the player would push both joysticks forward, and to move left or right, the joysticks would be moved left or right in an ordered sequence. Maneuvering in this fashion was hard enough, and the all the obstacles made it all the more difficult. Obstacles included things like closing windows, tenants that would throw things down at the player (flower pots, buckets of water, fruit), a huge bird that would try to hit the player with eggs and poop (yes), a giant punching ape, falling building pieces, hot electrical wires, and falling signs. To help game play, the daredevil can grab a pink balloon that transports him up 8 levels. At the top, there was a helicopter that the player would catch a ride on to end the round.
There were a total of four skyscrapers that could be traversed. Once the fourth one was reached, the skyscraper screen re-started, but the obstacles progressively became more difficult to deal with. This could become a problem when a novice was next up to play after an expert blew their wad of quarters. The game would continue at level of the previous player, which would make the novice blow a quarter in a hurry on their first game.