James Pond. In the days before Austin Powers had graced our theater screens, there existed a character also based upon a 007 quip, a fish who solved puzzles, jumped and fought his way through many a charming 2D adventure. Modern games require such large budgets and development teams, that gone are the days a game could be created based purely upon a wordplay. But the original title became much more than just a witticism, the game was popular, so favored that it spawned two sequels across the many gaming platforms that where available at the time. The series displayed a level of evolution through its different titles, not seen in other games, perhaps due to the happy-go-lucky approach to the game development. This is not to say that the games were particularly good, they stood out more for their anti-humor. The first game James Pond: Underwater Agent was a puzzle game, a colourful affair which saw the player controlling our hero James, as he battled his way through the games many timed stages. The rainbow upon the ever present HUD, reflect the time in gaming perfectly. The HUD was used to view player scores and the time count down of each level, always the same, starting from ninety nine and counting down. Each stage was introduced with a brief text intro outlining the problems that James would be facing, these instructions presumably given by a Q character somewhere. With the second game of the series Mr Ponds character is inexplicably restyled to incorporate the eighties Detroit crime stopper RoboCop. In perhaps the most popular and well remembered title of the series; James Pond 2: Codename RoboCod, our hero returns to fight another day as what appears to be a fish-cop-robot. The game makes significant moves away from the puzzle based gameplay of the original, instead of relying on 2D platforming to progress to the end of each level. The game is set during the Christmas period, a possible Die Hard influence, starting with an outlook of Santas factory, with many doors, each one a new level waiting to be beaten. Each level set to the back drop of a jolly tune, further enhancing the games charm. Mr Ponds robo suit plays a key part in the gameplay. This allows the fish to stretch his torso to impossible lengths, grabbing onto the ceilings of levels, this permits him to drop onto enemies as well as achieving otherwise unattainable positions. The game stuck out from most at the time because of its size, with a total of fifty doors to enter. Each door leads to a large level, as well as boss battles against Christmas toys thrown in, the game was long and not too easy. The third title saw James take on a lunar adventure, Moonraker style, but in keeping with the playful nature of the series: the moon is made of cheese. James Pond 3: Operations Starfish was realised just three years after the original title. The game took on yet more different gameplay elements, borrowing ideas from the popular games of the time. A Mario style over world is used to navigate between levels, and the games pace has been dramatically increased from that of its predecessor. James faster strides combined with a focus upon collecting items, both seen and hidden, give this third contribution to the series a Sonic meets Mario feel. Gone is Mr Ponds robo-suit, it been replaced with another ability. Instead of stretching himself toward the ceiling James is able to walk on surfaces at any angle, even up-side-down. The player could also attain various gadgets that would aid James with his quest through each level. This game was also large, one of the biggest games on the Sega Mega Drive. Despite the good sales Operation Starfish failed to make the same splash with fans as Pond's two other titles, perhaps for this reason, this was to be James last true final outing. Although the original series has long since been put to rest, a much more recent addition has been made to the Pond name. James Pond in the Deathly Shallows was released in 2011 across all iOS device. Unfortunately, although keeping with the unfunny titles based upon current popular movies, this game bears little resemblance to the gameplay, fun and poor humor of the original series. Deathly Shallows even lacks any sort of fun factor that could win James over to a new generation, a poor game all-round. James Pond represents a time, when this sort of game could be made, when a couple of people could create a game that entertained thousands. Any fish-based film puns would be more than welcome in the comments.