| Miner 2049er | |
|---|---|
 Atari 8-bit cover | |
| Developer(s) | Big Five Software |
| Publisher(s) | Big Five Software |
| Programmer(s) | Bill Hogue[1] |
| Platform(s) | Atari 8-bit computers, Atari 2600, Atari 5200, ColecoVision, Super Cassette Vision, Commodore 64,[2] TI-99/4A, IBM PC, Apple II, VIC-20 |
| Release |
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| Genre(s) | Platform |
Miner 2049er is a platform game developed for Atari 8-bit computers by Bill Hogue and released by his company, Big Five Software, in 1982. The player controls Bounty Bob through multiple levels of a mine, with the goal of traversing all of the platforms while avoiding or defeating enemy mutants. At a time when "climbing games" such as Donkey Kong had four screens, Miner 2049er had ten.
The game was Hogue's first for the Atari 8-bit line, and his first in color, following a string of games for the black-and-white TRS-80. It shipped on a custom 16 kilobyte ROM cartridge compared to the standard 8 kilobyte Atari computer cartridges. The game was ported to the TI-99/4A, IBM PC compatibles, Apple II, Commodore 64, and VIC-20 computers as well the Atari 2600, Atari 5200, ColecoVision, and Super Cassette Vision consoles. The Atari 2600 version was split into two separate releases, each containing three levels.
Miner 2049er received positive press throughout 1983, appearing on best-of lists, with critics complimenting its colors, game design, and originality. The game influenced other platform games of the 1980s, such as Manic Miner. Video magazine's editors commented on the game's popularity in January 1984, declaring it "the most widely played home electronic game of all time" and that "no home-arcade title has had the impact" that Miner 2049er had.[3] While the game received positive reviews in retrospectives from IGN and AllGame, Richard Stanton, in his book A Brief History of Video Games (2015), stated that Miner 2049er ended up mostly forgotten in the wake of Super Mario Bros. (1985).