DESCRIPTION

The original monochrome Game Boy edition of Q*Bert may have faded into obscurity with the release of the more recent Game Boy Color edition, but it's an excellent translation with some unique features. Though the graphics are entirely in black & white, they're rendered with a crisp, cartoony detail that gives the characters real personality. The playing fields, now stripped of color, utilize distinguishing tile patterns on the cubes. The cubes themselves are nicely rendered and take on various appearances and textures such as wood, ice blocks, and other patterns.

The characters are also quite distinctive, and include new additions to the game's "cast" to help and hinder Q*Bert. The sounds and music are another great enhancement — lively tunes, which almost seems it should be beyond the Game Boy's sound chip capabilities, permeates the game and some brief animated intermissions. The crowning glory of the game's sound scheme is speech synthesis — or, at least, the same kind of nonsensical "alien language" speech synthesis the arcade edition featured, right down to Q*Bert saying "Bye bye!" when the game ends.

Like the later (but very different) Game Boy Color edition by Hasbro Interactive, the basic "pyramid" playing field doesn't stick around very long, challenging players with new cube configurations. Control is smooth and one needs no special knowledge beyond the basic rules of the arcade game to get started. A delightful and under-appreciated updating of a game that already earned its classic status, Q*Bert is far from simply being the black & white version of a game later re-released in color. ~ Earl Green, All Game Guide