Apple Cider Spider

Apple Cider Spider

Game No.	181
Voting	6.50 points, 14 votes
Developer	Ivan Strand
Company	Sierra On-line Inc.
Publisher	Sierra On-line Inc.
Musician	Ivan Strand
Release	1984
Platform	C64, Apple II
Genre	Jump'n'Run
Gamemode	Single player 2 players (in turns)
Operation
Media
Language

Description[edit | edit source]

The aim of the game is to lead a small white spider safely through the apple cider factory. You start at the first of three screens at the lower right, where the finished bottles leave the factory. The way leads further past the filling system to the juice squeezer (obviously they do fermenting in bottles here), behind which you find the climb to the second screens. On the way through the factory the spider must layaway along loose-hanging threads, walk on conveyor belts opposite the running direction and avoid several objects and enemies without falling down or hitting a corner. The enemies, which get more depending on the difficulty grade, are hopping frogs, as well as wasps and birds that fly around.

Design[edit | edit source]

... screen 1, the juice squeezer and the filling system

Regarding the style, the game is typical for the C64 titles of the early 80s. The Hi-Res graphics are kept clear and simple, the game figures are unicoloured and good to identify. The factory with its different machines is realised well and demands from the player some skill, to adapt to its rhythm and avoid the passing apples at the right moment. The game has nothing to offer concerning the music, apart from a small melody at the start. The SFX are simple and sufficient.

Hints[edit | edit source]

... screen 2, the apple cutter

The game is controlled with the joystick in port 1. After pressing the fire button you can set the options 1 or 2 and after that the difficulty grade 0-6 with joystick foward or backward. The spider follows the joystick movement and jumps in walking direction by pressing the fire button. You climb up and down by pressing the joystick forward/backward. In the two-player mode the players play in turns. The highscore list is saved on disk.

Solution[edit | edit source]

There is no time limit, but certain passages need to be played through fast, due to the course of the obstacles.

Cheats[edit | edit source]

... The end scene ...

Voting[edit | edit source]

Voting of the C64-Wiki users (10=the best vote):
6.50 points at 14 votes (rank 640). You need to be logged in to cast a vote.
Lemon64	6.60	21st July 2013 - 24 votes
Ready64	8.00	21st July 2013 - 2 votes

Reviews[edit | edit source]

Telespielator: "A cute little game, which has the lot, if you want to make it to the attic of the cider factory in the highest level. For this you need to have your joystick under control and concentrate on the actions in the factory and the wildly hopping and flying animals. I like these inventive Hi-Res games of the early 80s! One realizes, that the programmers could not bring the new computer to its limitations yet, but they had a lot of funny ideas as a chance to prevail, before sound and graphic orgies later set new standards. With only three screens, the game is rather short, however, one can spend a while with it. Unfortunately, the highscore saver is broken in my version by German Cracking Service. I would give 7/10 points!"

TheRyk: "Which game idea is more obvious than the spider in the apple cider factory... an almost minteresque idea, which Heinz Schenk probably would have liked! And then the nice rhyme in the title! Promising. Unfortunately, the arachnid can bear disappointingly little damage, and already dies when failing the smallest jumps. Furthermore, it would have made more sense to let the player choose the start screen instead of the speed (speed ZERO = ...zZZz...) before the start of the game; because in my opinion it makes especially with such puzzle-and-fiddle-by-doing platformers more sense than to start from zero again and again, compare e.g. to Madness. Behind the background of the year of publication, there is not much to nag about concerning the realization, there surely were worse platformers also after 1984 (thanks to Datasoft), but before that there were also better ones, as e.g. Lode Runner. Playable for my taste, but not really good, on the one hand too fiddly and on the other hand to short to rate above average. I would only recommend it to collectors of quirky game titles and concepts. I give only 5 points."

Miscellaneous[edit | edit source]

Played through with the version by "Desperado (ASS)" from Gamebase64 and there were no mistakes found, also the highscore list is saved correctly on disk. These can be set to zero by deleting the file "SCORES A.C.S.". (HtW)