Collapse!

Collapse!
COLLAPSE! Cover Art COLLAPSE! Cover Art
Developer(s)	GameHouse
Publisher(s)	GameHouse (RealNetworks)
Designer(s)	Ben Exworthy, Garr Godfrey (orig.)
Platform(s)	Windows, Mac OS X, Browser (Flash), Game Boy Advance, Nintendo DS, Mobile, iPhone, Smartphone, Facebook
Release	1999
Genre(s)	Puzzle
Mode(s)	Single Player

Collapse! generally refers to a series of award-winning puzzle games by GameHouse, a software company in Seattle, Washington. In 2007, Collapse! 3 became the first game to win the Game of the Year at the inaugural Zeebys.

Gameplay

The classic Collapse! game is played on a board of twelve columns by fifteen rows. Randomly-colored blocks fill the board, rising from below. By clicking on a group of 3 or more blocks of the same color, the whole group disappears in a collapse and any blocks stacked above fall down to fill in the vacant spaces. If a whole column is cleared, the elements slide to the center of the field. If one or more blocks rise beyond the top row of the board, the game is lost. If the player manages to survive a specified number of lines without losing, they win the level and are awarded points for successful completion.

A level usually begins with a few rows of blocks using a starting set of colors (typically red, green, and blue). One after the other, new blocks are added to a "feed" row below the board. When the feeder row has filled, all of its blocks are moved up, to the active board, shifting the field of remaining blocks higher. During the course of a level, the rate of new blocks entering the feed increases. New colors may also be introduced, making it more challenging for the player to find groups that are large enough to be collapsed.

In higher levels of the game, "bombs" appear, mixed among the blocks. The bombs are common black (in which case clicking on them causes the surrounding blocks to disappear), or are the color of one of the groups of bricks (in which case clicking on the bomb eliminates all bricks on the board that are the same color). Black bombs have the additional quality of serving as a bridge between bricks of the same color; if two or more bricks of the same color are touching a bomb, then clicking one of those bricks has the same effect of clicking on a group of three or more bricks of the same color, although this feature was removed in Super Collapse 3.

When a player completes a certain number of "even-numbered" levels (i.e., from level 2, 4, 8, 10 and so on), he or she can head over to the bonus level. In the bonus level, the player must clear all the colored blocks in fifteen seconds to clear the bonus level successfully. If the player clears all the blocks, he or she gets a certain amount of bonus, regardless of the common usage.

History

Web & Super Collapse!

In late 1998, Ben Exworthy and Garr Godfrey worked together to release the original Collapse! a web-based game that, through distribution arrangements with major online game portals such as Microsoft Zone, quickly grew in popularity. Alongside other seminal games like Bejeweled (PopCap), Collapse! helped to boost the early popularity of the "match three" genre of casual games.

In 2001, following the success of the web-based Collapse!, GameHouse developed and released Super Collapse!, a standalone download for Windows PCs. While the gameplay remained identical to its web-based counterpart, this new version offered enhanced graphical resolution, animations, sounds and music, at a price of US$20. Afterwards, GameHouse would continue to use the word "super" in the titles of its download games, as a way to distinguish them from the simpler web-based versions.

Super Collapse! II

In 2002, one year after the release of Super Collapse!, GameHouse would create the first true sequel in the series, Super Collapse! II. In addition to the classic gameplay, Super Collapse II would offer "Relapse", "Strategy", and "Puzzle" modes.

Super Collapse! III

Super Collapse! 3 continued expanding the work of previous Collapse! games. In addition to three new modes (Slider, Continuous, Countdown), Super Collapse! 3 introduced a "quest" mode where players progressed through a whimsical world, unlocking new levels as they go.

Versions

Title	Date	Platforms	Game Modes
Collapse!	1998	Web (Flash)	Classic
Super Collapse!	2001	Win 95/98/ME/2K/XP	Classic
Super Collapse! II	2002	Win XP/2K, Mac OS X	Classic ("Traditional"), Puzzle, Relapse, Strategy
Collapse! Crunch	2005	Win XP/2K, Mac OS X	Crunch, Big, Zigzag, Perplexor
SpongeBob SquarePants Collapse!	2007	Win XP/2K, Mac OS X, Web (Flash)	Classic
Super Collapse! 3	2006	Win XP/2K, Mac OS X	Classic, Quest, Relapse, Strategy, Puzzle, Slider, Continuous, Countdown
Collapse!	2006	Facebook (Flash)	Classic, Rolling Rainbow, Easy Street, Crunch, Race, Blockbuster, White Shepherd
Super Collapse! Puzzle Gallery	2007	Win XP/2K, Mac OS X	Puzzle
Collapse! Chaos	2008	Mobile & iPhone	Classic, Quest, Strategy, Puzzle, Panic Attack, Continuous, Countdown
COLLAPSE!	2009	Facebook (Flash)	Weekly and daily tournaments
COLLAPSE!	2009	Win XP/2K/Vista/7, Mac OS X, Mobile, iPhone	Classic, Relapse, Strategy, Continuous, Double Classic, Double Relapse, Double Strategy, Double Continuous, Puzzle, a Quest Mode and "Boss Battles".

External Links

Get more information and links to play the game at http://www.collapse-games.com.