The Alligator People 2600

As you know, if you read The Wizard of Vestron blog, I am a huge B-Movie freak.  You may have also surmised that I am also a B-Game freak as well as retro game aficionado....so when I first heard about an Atari 2600 game based off of the 1959 sci-fi/horror flick The Alligator People, I had to track it down.  Much searching on E-Bay and Amazon.com sadly came up empty.  However, after discovering the ultra-awesome website Retro Uprising, I was finally able to play an emulated version of the game.....and I was quite pleasantly surprised by what I found.

In the game you are taking the role of Jane Marvin....which is represented by a syringe.  Six of your friends and colleagues, including her husband Paul Webster (I would assume), have been infected with a serum that will turn them all into alligator people.  Jane must roam the swamp in search of the antidote that will save her companions.  The clock is ticking though and you don't have much time because your companions are transmuting into alligators and once the transformation of all six is complete, it is game over.  

Getting the antidote isn't exactly easy, either.  The swamp is represented by constantly moving walls, which create a sort of ever changing maze....with passageways appearing and disappearing.  Get blocked and you will be crushed to death.  As if this isn't bad enough, there are also alligators after you trying to stop you.  It's a pretty fun game and I found the game play to be quite addictive.

So how come you haven't heard of the game before?  How come you don't remember seeing it in stores?  Well, the answer is quite simple.  20th Century Fox was developing the game in 1983, but it never got past the prototype stage.  It wasn't until about 2002 that the actual prototype cartridge was found by a collector...however there had been whispers of it for years before.  In the 90's, one fellow found a cartridge labeled as The Alligator People, but as it turns out the game in his possession was actually a prototype for another game that never saw the light of day.....Planet of the Apes!