Q*bert - for NES

Q*bert brings one of the arcade's most recognizable characters to the Nintendo Entertainment System in a version developed by Konami and published under the Ultra Games label in 1989. The star is that small orange creature with the trunk for a nose, bouncing around a pyramid of cubes and grumbling in symbols whenever things go wrong. Q*bert began life in the arcades of the early eighties, and the idea has aged remarkably well: an isometric board, one clear goal, and a diagonal jump that takes a few minutes to settle into your fingers and then stays there for good.

Every stage starts with Q*bert at the top of the pyramid, seen from a third person view, and each cube he lands on changes color. Turn every cube to the target color and you move on to the next stage. The complication is everything else sharing the board: creatures that come bouncing down the slope after him, hazards that follow paths of their own, and the spinning discs at the edges that will carry him back to the top if he can reach one in time. Later stages ask for more than a single pass over each cube, so routes have to be planned rather than improvised. Two players can take turns and compare scores.

Q*bert endures because it is arcade design at its purest. One screen, one rule, steadily rising pressure, and a scoring run that lives or dies on whether you can keep thinking in diagonals while something chases you. It is also one of the friendliest ways to show somebody what games felt like before stories and cutscenes, since a first attempt lasts about a minute and a tenth attempt lasts a great deal longer. For collectors, a Konami built Q*bert on the Ultra Games label is a tidy piece of NES history, and the character is famous enough that the cartridge looks at home in any collection.

• Genre: Arcade Platform Puzzler
• Players: 1-2
• Region: NTSC
• Release Year: 1989
• Developer: Konami

Cartridge Only: No Box or Manual
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Condition & Authenticity
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