Good Deal Games - Classic Videogame Games ARTICLE

Get Your KICKS From QIX!
by Michael Thomasson

The screen flickers “ Your marker controlled with joystick. To draw stix press fast or slow. Claim areas by joining walls with stix. “ Or so the first three simple sentences of the original Qix attract mode boldly stated. It continues, “ Scores based on area. Fast score 250. Slow score 500. ” Ten words on how I am to be rated. Already a sense of urgency is mounting within. However there is more – a SURPRISE... “ Claim more than 75% of playfield for special bonus. ” What could it be? I must know. All that lies between me and the goal are the “ Opponents: Qix, Sparx, Fuse, Spiral Death Trap. “ These odd and abstract antagonists move in such an uncanny manner. What methods do I need to apply to “ Evade Qix ” and “ Dodge Sparx ?” What do I need to do to become a coveted “ Kicker ” member? The fall of 1981 and an eleven year-old boy's mind stumbles with many intriguing questions, including the obvious. How do I pronounce this crazy game, anyway [quix], [squix], [quicks], [kicks]? It is only three letters long and my fourth grade education is already failing me! The true diction is not "QUIX" but “KICKS.” There are two stories that explain the possible origin of how the game was named. As with much lore, the tales should be taken with a grain of salt, and not argued amongst friends at classic gaming expos across the country. The first tales goes something like this: Taito debuted the Qix machine at the 1981 AMOA show. As with such events, the press was on-hand for the event and after Taito unveiled the game, it was made available for play to attendees and honored guests. This was the early eighties and Atari was on top. Much of the camera eye focused on Atari founder Nolan Bushnell. Rumor has it that Nolan took the time to sample Taito's new game, giving the cabinet “kicks” in frustration as he quickly lost his markers to the machine. While it is not wholly unusual for a product to be displayed before a product name has been assigned, and while this event is recorded to have happened, it is probably more plausible that the second account is more accurate. This alternate story reports that co-designer and programmer, Randy Pfeiffer (half of the rhyming husband and wife team of Randy and Sandy Pfeiffer) had an automobile sporting a vanity license plate stating “JUS4QIX.” According to his wife Sandy, Randy enjoyed the phonetically sounding variant so much that he named his game after it: Qix !		HOW TO PLAY QIX AT HOME ORIGINAL QIX Atari 5200 (1982) Atari XE (1982) Tandy (1984) Apple II (1989) Commodore C64 (1989) Commodore Amiga (1989) PC-Compatible [MS-DOS] (1989) Nintendo Famicom (1990) Nintendo Game Boy (1990) Atari Lynx (1991) QIX SEQUELS Sega Genesis (1991) Released as “Ultimate Qix” Colecovision Cix QIX RIP-OFFS Super Nintendo (1993) “Cacoma Knight in Bizyland”
While maze games and intergalactic battles ruled the early arcades, Qix was a breath of fresh air and a shot of originality when it appeared on the scene in 1981. Being the first “drawing game” there was nothing like the title in the arcades, and it was very much ahead of its time. The game was published by Taito, the same company that brought us the fondly remembered Space Invaders in 1979. Unlike Space Invaders and most Taito games, Qix was created in America and not imported from the Japanese market. As the attract mode of Qix implies, it is a simple but very challenging strategy game. The player controls a marker that is shaped like a small diamond that moves around the game screen similar to the popular child's toy, the Etch a Sketch. Using two different speed buttons and a 4-directional joystick, the player tries to gain real estate from the unpredictable moving Qix by enclosing parts of the play area a single block at a time. The player must keep his eye on the countdown timer and avoid working himself into an irreversible death spiral. The player is safe from the menacing Qix while not drawing, but it is pursued by and vulnerable to sparks and fuses that can travel on any player-created line paths. This dynamic of always being safe and in danger at the same time is a unique element and a big (ahem) DRAW to the game! Qix was an immediate hit upon its release. It performed BIG numbers for Taito, especially in more logic-minded location such as on college campuses. Qix was also profitable among older players in bars, where Inebriated clientele fumbled their pocket change into this difficult quarter-eating machine at an amazingly fast rate. The casual gamer, those not wearing “beer-goggles” or of an eager mind were often turned off by the plain nature of the game and color scheme. The early eighties arcade scene, like many other arenas, had its share of societal rules. For games that required a large portion of playing time, it was a trend for eager players to place their waiting quarters against the glass screen of the coin-op machine to imply that they had “dibs” on the next game. Many game players at the time would brag by learning patterns or strategies that would allow them to take enormous amounts of time on a machine, piling up anxious quarters and endearing and frustrating fans. Since crowds entice more to gather, it makes a dynamic and fuels the popularity. This was NOT the case with Qix . The machine was deemed as “simply unbeatable” by masters of the trade because of the random and unpredictable movement of the dreaded Qix . With an enormous amount of possible movement combinations and no patterns to fool the Qix opponent, even the best of players lost interest when they could not improve their scores and best the Qix cabinet. Qix vanished from the arcades rather quickly after a short but modest success. Most machines were converted to better earning Taito titles. The arcade version of Qix is a rare find and is becoming more valuable to coin-op collectors and fans alike. Many enthusiasts have been pursuing the Japanese counterpart of the game, known as “ Volfied .” After offering an enhanced variant that offered a different color scheme, “ Qix II Tournament ,” also by the rhyming couple Sandy and Randy Pfeiffer, Taito placed “ Qix ” in a state of dormancy for years. In 1987, Taito released “ Super Qix ” to little fanfare. Taito also licensed “ Qix ” for release on the Nintendo Entertainment System and Game Boy. Unfortunately, these reissues of the Qix titles sold quite poorly. When the rise in popularity of strategy and puzzle games emerged with the release and continued success of Tetris , Taito chose to revive the series as “ Twin Qix ” in 1995. However, Taito was too late and a slew of other manufacturers had already overcrowded the market with competing games of “ Tetris ” variations or other thinking games such as “ Bust-A-Move ”, “ Columns ”, “ Klax ” and a handful of others. Qix is currently enjoying a loyal cult following In 2004, a small publisher by the name of Mud Duck, quietly released the latest Qix installment, Qix Neo , for the original Playstation. A year later, a classic game compilation that collected twenty-nine Taito coin-ops was released under the moniker Taito Legends . This collection, available on the Playstation 2, X-Box and PC, includes many fantastic games, including Volfied and Super Qix .