An exclusive title to GTW and for the Christmas update of 2006. Thanks to Dave Spicer, our next title was originally known only as “Block game” due to not being given a proper name during its development, but we later learn that the game was actually “Push a block”
Push-A-Block was a Pengo-style puzzler which was being coded by Nick Taylor on the C64 and on the Spectrum by David Spicer. Push-A-Block was a working name for their game, and a proper name was never actually created.
The aim of the game is very simple – to push all the blocks Pengo style into the gates whilst avoiding the enemies.
This was to be a rush produced title to be touted around to various budget labels, and would have also been released on the ZX Spectrum. It was produced by Nick Taylor (Who also brought us Bugs Bunny for Hi-Tec), with some level design by Dave (Though at present we’re guessing Dave handled the Spectrum version).
Dave had this to say:
“C64 coding was 100% by Nick, with no involvement from myself. Although I designed a lot of levels, I don’t think we ever got around to moving them over from the Speccy version.
The game was written in 1990 and wasn’t picked up because we never pitched it to anybody. :-) Some ideas for AI pathfinding were later used in Sergeant Seymour. “What AI pathfinding?” you might ask. Well, yea, the block game “AI” is 100% random, but I had written notes guv, honest.”
The game never got to see the light of day or was completely finished due to work on Adidas Football. David stated to GTW that it was hard to try and write two games at the same time, and this is why it never got finished.. Although not the most fantastic game in the world, and even frustrating at times during play – I’m surprised it wasn’t passed onto one of the budget labels. However, it became testing ground for ideas used in Sergeant Seymour.
We hope to cover more ground on this game soon, with Nick giving some info about work on the title.
For now, check it out and enjoy…
Contributions: Dave Spicer
Supporting content
Available downloads
Gallery
Creator speaks
David Spicer speaks about work on Push-A-Block…
“Duing bad times on LFC, myself and Nick Taylor started work on a simple little puzzle game with the plan to sell it to a budget company.
As with LFC, Nick wrote the C64 version with me working on the Speccy. I don’t recollect the exact mechanics of the gameplay, other than it requiring blocks to be pushed around such that certain special items were sent down little trap doors. We never finished it, since we didn’t really have enough time to simultaneously work on two games.
If you’re interested in exhuming the remains of the above, Nick Taylor would be your man for LFC and the C64 version of “Push-a-block”. He might still have the unfinished LFC management section sitting around on a disc somewhere.”
David Spicer.
It would be good to hear from Nick with regards to this game. I can’t help wondering what this game would have been like had it been completed.