Demolition

Demolition is a 1987 Breakout variant for the Commodore 64, also released under the more descriptive title Demolition Construction Set. It belongs to the wave of bat-and-ball games set off by the arcade hit Arkanoid: a paddle, a ball, and a wall of bricks to be smashed down to the very last one.

What sets it apart is the orientation of the playfield. Your paddle sits at the side of the screen rather than the bottom, much like in Krakout, so the ball travels horizontally and every reflex you have trained in other brick-breakers suddenly works sideways. The bricks are not all equal either: some vanish after one hit, some take several, and a few cannot be destroyed at all, which turns the later screens into small spatial puzzles rather than simple demolition work. Destroyed bricks occasionally drop letters that modify your paddle, change the ball’s speed or simply add bonus points — the genre’s classic toolkit.

The real selling point, though, is the level editor that gave the game its subtitle. You can lay out your own screens in minutes, and on a home computer in 1987 that was a welcome extra most rivals did not have.

To be honest, the ball handling is not the sharpest. Rebounds often feel more random than the angle of impact would suggest, so the deliberate, aimed returns that expert Arkanoid play is built on never quite click here. Demolition is a decent mid-table entry in its genre: solid craftsmanship with one good idea on top, rather than a classic. If you enjoy brick-breakers, though, the sideways paddle pleasantly scrambles your habits and the editor keeps the game alive longer than its built-in screens alone would.

You can play it directly in your browser on oldgame.cz, no installation required.