Challenger (video game)

Challenger
Challenger package front cover
Developer(s)	Hudson Soft
Publisher(s)	Hudson Soft
Composer(s)	Takeaki Kunimoto
Platform(s)	Famicom Game Boy Advance Mobile phone Virtual Console
Release date(s)	October 15, 1985 (original release)
Genre(s)	Action game Platform game
Mode(s)	Single-player

Challenger (チャレンジャー, Charenjā^?) is a video game developed and published by Hudson Soft in 1985 for the Nintendo Famicom.

The game was originally planned as a port of the ZX Spectrum video game Stop the Express (later released for the Commodore 64 and MSX), which was released by Sinclair Research Ltd in 1983. Stop the Express only contained the first train level, and 3 levels were added for the release of Challenger. The game's title screen displays the slogan "Realtime Action Adventure."

The game is uniquely constructed, where the levels consist of a side-scrolling platform game, a top-view scrolling shooting game, and a fixed-screen action game. The game was also unique for its 100-screen map, which was extensive for its time. The game has been re-released as a mobile phone application, and was made available on the Nintendo Wii Virtual Console for 500 Wii Points in May, 2007. The game was also coupled with Milon's Secret Castle (Meikyū Kumikyoku (迷宮組曲^?) in Japan) and released for the Game Boy Advance as part of Hudson Best Collection Vol. 3 Action Collection compilation on December 22, 2005. A Mobile version was released in 2005 with several changes in gameplay.