Ahh, Jumpman... where to begin. First this should definitely be a classic for several reasons. One, it relies on the simple one-screen stage that any classic of that era came to expect. No scrolling and no panning. Two, it uses simple 4 directional control plus an action button. Up, down, left, right and jump. Three, it's name alone describes the game... if you're not jumping the majority of the time, then you're briefly climbing, walking or waiting for an enemy droid to pass by. Four, the antagonists come in two forms, natural and unpredictable, namely gravity and droids.
Gravity is a killer. So are droids. I should add that the killer effects of gravity "realistically" come into effect when you've fallen farther than your character's frame can support. At that point... splat! Oh and the droids can shoot at you too. Avoid those bullets (or single pixel dots) as much as possible.
Since I'm on the point about antagonists in gaming, one complaint about the video game world is that as a character of focus, why is it that we are injured when enemies touch us and they are not harmed at all. If I, as a powerful video game character, am slightly injured when coming into contact with a lowly pawn like creature, shouldn't the other creature die or be equally injured? Nonetheless, Jumpman
does suffer from this typical scenario.
Oh and finally, number five... This game is a classic because of a correct blend of simplicity of play, story and graphics. A little more about the story. From a player’s perspective, the storyline of the game can be summarized by Jumpman trying to save the world by solving puzzles. So in other words, don't worry about the story and just keep on jumping. Gameplay is fun and addicting, at least for a 12 year old boy when I first played it years ago on my Commodore 64. Since then I've found it repackaged to play on dos and windows machines however the nostalgia of playing the original on the Commodore 64 can't be beaten.
I'm not trying to detract from dos or windows machines running the game; the later versions did include sound card compatibility as well as SVGA graphics for its cut scenes. After playing hundreds of games over the past 2 decades, Jumpman should be on everyone’s must have list of classics.