Jacaranda Jim

Crashing your spaceship on a strange planet and formulating some sort of escape plan is a longstanding convention in science fiction literature, film and games. This game begins with Jacaranda Jim's spaceship crashing on Ibberspleen IV and there the conventions evaporate: his antagonists? A fleet of homicidal beechwood armchairs. It's all right, though -- with your constant companion Alan the Gribbley and the assistance of Mavis, a cow, you will help Jim navigate Ibberspleen's strangely familiar village marketplace, hunting for legendary treasure and, ultimately, a return to outer space.

The game Jacaranda Jim was originally named "Derek the Troll" after a campus personality from Graham Cluley's stint at the Guildford College of Technology, during which an early version of the game was first written on a PRIME minicomputer. Having second thoughts about committing his mockery of a peer to the public record (and then asking people to send him money for it!), it was refashioned "Jacaranda Jim" and rewritten in Pascal for the PC; the irritating character of Derek was transformed into Alan the Gribbley, ultimately retaining only a handful of Derek's original accounting-related tics.

Some work was done on a planned sequel to JJ, entitled "The Case of Spindle's Crotchet", but it was set aside and, later, forgotten in favour of Humbug.