Chip's Challenge is free on Steam

Remember Chip's Challenge? Originally released on the Atari Lynx way back in 1989, it was later ported to DOS and Windows then bundled with Windows 3.1, which is where many players will know it from. It's a puzzle game with over 100 levels, some of them mazes, others block-pushers or enemy-dodging challenges, often with harsh time limits to complete them in.

There's a plot involving Nerdy Chip McCallahan collecting computer chips to earn his way into a high school computer club and win the affection of a girl named Melinda the Mental Marvel, but the more memorable story is how the sequel spent over 20 years in legal limbo. While the first game was made in a matter of weeks, the sequel took a couple of years to complete—by which point the trademark had been sold on. Negotiations with the new owners stalled, and Chip's Challenge 2 took 25 years to see the light of day.

Chuck's Challenge 3D, created by Chip's Challenge creator Chuck Somerville, was remastered earlier this year. And now the original Chip's Challenge can be downloaded on Steam for free.

Jody Macgregor
Weekend/AU Editor

Jody's first computer was a Commodore 64, so he remembers having to use a code wheel to play Pool of Radiance. A former music journalist who interviewed everyone from Giorgio Moroder to Trent Reznor, Jody also co-hosted Australia's first radio show about videogames, Zed Games. He's written for Rock Paper Shotgun, The Big Issue, GamesRadar, Zam, Glixel, Five Out of Ten Magazine, and Playboy.com, whose cheques with the bunny logo made for fun conversations at the bank. Jody's first article for PC Gamer was about the audio of Alien Isolation, published in 2015, and since then he's written about why Silent Hill belongs on PC, why Recettear: An Item Shop's Tale is the best fantasy shopkeeper tycoon game, and how weird Lost Ark can get. Jody edited PC Gamer Indie from 2017 to 2018, and he eventually lived up to his promise to play every Warhammer videogame.

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