Bugaboo (The Flea), created by Spanish programmer Pedro Ruiz, was one of the most infuriating games ever devised and naturally, one of the first games I played on my Commodore 64. Originally released for the ZX Spectrum, it delighted players with repetitive music, panic-driven movement and the constant suspicion that the flea had developed a personal grudge against them.

I attempted to complete its first level countless times, never realising that it was also the last level and that somebody who actually knew what they were doing could finish the entire game in about half a minute. My own attempts generally lasted longer, although considerably less happened. Except feeding the dragon with own body.

Therefore, when I accepted the challenge of creating an adaptation, my first design decision was obvious: multiple levels. There seemed little point in building an entire engine merely to reproduce thirty seconds of gameplay and several hours of emotional damage. Of course, as the Booga levels are very hard to make, three should be enough ...

My main development goal was once again to escape the grid constraints imposed by my own ENGINE, by using the grid in a slightly less obedient manner. A careful observer may notice that the irregular cave formations are assembled from reusable patterns, rotated, flipped and combined into more organic shapes. A background mask then provides the collision data required for sprite-to-cave interaction, allowing the scenery to look irregular while the engine quietly continues counting squares underneath.