The Collection Chamber: PITFALL: THE MAYAN ADVENTURE

The legendary side-scrolling jungle game is back, swinging its way onto Windows '95 for the ultimate arcade-action experience on your PC.

Join Harry Jr. as he tracks an evil Mayan warrior spirit to rescue his kidnapped father, Pitfall Harry. Run, swing, skate and bungee through deep dark rainforests, raging waterfalls and Mayan ruins that reek of unearthly dangers... before you face the master of evil - Zakelua.
Thirteen Mayan Levels! Brave thirteen mysterious Mayan world enhanced with sharp 256-color graphics and the incredible 32-bit multimedia power of Windows '95.
Stunning 256-Color Art! Experience the terror of the jungle as eye-popping images and realistically-rendered backgrounds hypnotize you with 256 brilliant colors!
Gripping Gameplay! Explore level after nerve-wrecking level of sinister Mayan spirits, hungry crocodiles, wicked skeletons, lethal traps, secret regions and escape routes!
Feature Film-Quality Animation! Award-winning KROYER FILMS jolts Harry Jr. to life with the fast arcade response and realism that's true to a Windows '95-native game.
Pulse-Pounding Jungle Soundtrack! Featuring authentic sounds recorded deep in the jungles of Central America by Academy Award-winning SOUNDELUX Media Labs.

~ from the back of the box

If you were around in the mid-90s, chances are you remember Pitfall: The Mayan Adventure. Revisiting old IPs was something of a new concept at this time. Around this time, Tempest, Missile Command, Frogger - all the classics were beginning to get updated. But by far the most impressive was Pitfall. Activision took one of gaming's oldest heroes and did made him relevant again in a big way. Well, sort of. The original Pitfall Harry is little more than a damsel in distress this time around, leaving his son Harry Jr. to do all the dangerous work. It was a gamble that paid off. The console versions became some of the most technically and visually impressive platformers of the 16-bit generation, packed with fluid animation, enormous levels and enough challenge to make even seasoned players sweat. Nine months later, Windows owners were finally invited into the jungle too. The question is whether this PC port lives up to that enviable reputation or does it get tangled up in Microsoft's shiny new operating system.

Unlike most PC releases of the era, this wasn't another DOS conversion hurriedly shoved onto CD-ROM. Activision instead enlisted Kinesoft Development to build an exclusive Windows 95 version, releasing it alongside Microsoft's massively hyped new operating system on 24th August 1995. In hindsight, it's a fascinating little insight to how developers viewed this new platform. Built around Microsoft's Windows Game SDK - essentially DirectX before DirectX - it proudly embraces all the features Windows could throw at them. Of course, nobody quite knew what they were doing yet. The game itself survives the transition remarkably well, but when it comes to how the program functions, its an awkward mess. Fortunately, none of them are enough to spoil what is otherwise one of Activision's finest platformers.

The Exploding Stone of Pacal is a powerful screen-clearing weapon (left).
Dodge obstacles and avoid enemies by switching tracks in the obligatory mine cart stage (right).

Better still, this isn't merely a straight conversion of one particular console version. Kinesoft wisely cherry-picked the best bits from several releases. The visuals are based on the superior 32X edition with its richer colour palette, while the additional stages previously exclusive to the Sega CD have also made the trip. The CD-ROM even brings something entirely new to the table with not one, but two Red Book audio soundtracks that gives the adventure a more cinematic feel than the cartridge originals ever managed. Sadly, the physical release lacks a comprehensive manual in favour of a detailed digital Windows Help file. As cool as it is to read, it's disappointing none of this useful information or entertaining flavour text could be read on the dunny.

From the moment Harry Jr. bounds onto the screen, it's obvious where the development effort went. His animation is superb, full of personality without ever becoming distracting, and his moveset is something surprisingly versatile. Our hero can swing from vines, shimmy across ropes, crawl through cramped tunnels, bounce off giant spider webs, slide down ziplines and even bungee jump jungle style. It never feels quite as immediate as something like Donkey Kong Country, mind you. Harry has a little weight behind him, and the game expects you to learn exactly how far he jumps before throwing you into situations where getting it wrong means instant death. Thankfully, the controls can be completely remapped, whether you're using the admittedly strange default keyboard layout or a joystick, this customisation makes the game far more comfortable than many PC platformers of the period.

Special bonus stages has you flip switches in a game of Simon (left).
The original Pitfall is hidden in the game too, though you'll have to go through hoops to officially find it (right).

And you'll need every advantage you can get, because The Mayan Adventure is absolutely ruthless in its difficulty. At first glance, each level appears wonderfully open, inviting you to poke around every corner in search of secrets. You quickly realise that's mostly an illusion. There are hidden treasures and optional pickups everywhere, but only one sensible route forward and countless ways to spectacularly fail. Bottomless pits appear with alarming regularity, spikes spring from nowhere and platforms crumble beneath your feet - the game is deliberately designed to be a series of death traps. It's one of those games that seems to delight in letting you discover each one of these trap the hard way and making you try again. Trial and error isn't exactly my favourite style of gameplay, but it somehow didn't irk me as much here. Each death teaches you something, and there's something satisfyingly cathartic when you conquer those impossible-looking sections with nothing more than persistence and muscle memory. Variety helps enormously too. One moment you're exploring forgotten temples, the next you're hurtling through caves in a runaway mine cart, frantically swapping tracks to avoid incoming obstacles. There's also hidden stages which reward you with extra lives after a successful game of Simon.

You'll need those lives too, as this jungle is home to all kinds dangerous residents. Beyond the crocodiles and snakes, you'll encounter skeleton warriors and fire spirits that spit deadly projectiles across the screen. Harry starts with little more than his trusty sling, which doubles as a handy whip for close encounters, but being slow and weak, it's little use to larger enemies. You can charge a throw into surprisingly powerful Super Shots, but you will have to time it right if you do not want to take damage when doing so. You can collect reusable Mayan Boomerangs that hit much harder provided you remember to pick it back up afterwards, and the screen-clearing Exploding Stone of Pacal is always useful in a pinch. Beyond weapons, you can also collect temporary power-ups that freeze time, increase speed or restore your health. They are few and far between, and most likely found when you don't really need them, but it's still good that they're there somewhere.

This is the smoothest setting to play the game in. The ChamberNotes has more info (left).
Entering the Wireframe mode cheat really gives you an insight in how the game was made (right).

As impressive as the bones of the game remains, its Windows skin is where things become slightly less elegant. Rather than including a proper in-game options menu, virtually everything lives inside Windows drop-down menus and property pages. It's very Windows 95, but not exactly immersive. Fancy changing the display mode? Out to the menu you go. Want to alter your controls? Back to the menu again. Stranger still, the game never remembers your preferred fullscreen mode in any particularly useful way. It says it does, but as you need to exit fullscreen in order to exit the game, it will never truly launch in fullscreen mode. And your choice of fullscreen mode dramatically affects performance. During my own testing, Full Screen (Smooth - 320×224) was buggy, failing to fill the display correctly and running at ludicrous speed if the "Sync Full Screen to Monitor" option was enabled, and stuttery if it wasn't. Full Screen (Fast - 320×200) proved far more reliable and, despite the name, actually delivered the smoothest and cleanest experience overall. You'll have to select it every single time you launch the game, mind you, because there isn't even a fullscreen hotkey. Annoyingly, these aren't just modern compatibility problems either. I've found discussions on this very issue when running on contemporary hardware.

Thankfully, once you stop fiddling with Windows and actually start playing, most of those frustrations melt away. Pitfall: The Mayan Adventure is still every bit the beautifully animated, fiendishly difficult platformer it was on the consoles, and this Windows release arguably remains the most content-rich version thanks to its enhanced visuals, additional levels and excellent CD soundtracks. The port is certainly a bugger technically speaking. I spent too long trying to get it to run natively on Windows 11 and even managed it in a preliminary sense. All the same bugs and quirks remained with the added issues of a bugger menu system and a lack of fullscreen and CD music. In the end, DOSBox-X running Windows 95 produced the best overall experience, restoring the soundtrack and making full use of the program's mapper feature. It took considerably longer than I'd care to admit to arrive at that conclusion, but once Harry Jr. starts swinging through vines, narrowly avoiding another bottomless pit that absolutely wasn't there five seconds ago, it's easy to remember why it was all worth it. This remains one of the finest cinematic platformers of the entire 16-bit era - warts, Windows and all.

To download the game, follow the link below. This custom installer exclusive to The Collection Chamber uses the DOSBox-X build of DOSBox 0.74 running Windows '95. Manual and compatible Help file included. Read the ChamberNotes.txt for more detailed information. Tested on Windows 11.

IMPORTANT - Remember to shut down the emulated version of Windows before exiting DOSBox. This could potentially result in errors, lost saves and corrupt data. The program will automatically shut down when you exit the game.

File Size: 255 Mb. Install Size: 453 Mb. Need help? Consult the Collection Chamber FAQ

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