Catch Em

CatchEm is a 1995 Mac arcade novelty by Joseph Fish, archived in Info-Mac as catch-em.hqx. The submission, dated 28 June 1995, frames it as a quick chase-the-icon diversion: "try to catch the dancing icons," with sound and animation pitched as the main draws.

Gameplay

The premise is one line in the readme. Animated icons dance around the screen and the player tries to catch them, with the fun coming from the audio-visual presentation rather than any deep mechanic.

Prank mode

The author suggests a second use that is purer Mac-era humour: drop CatchEm into a friend's Startup Items folder and let it ambush them at the next reboot, turning the novelty into a desk prank.

Requirements

The readme calls for a colour Macintosh with a 640x480 screen. There is no monochrome fallback documented, so users on small or B/W displays would not see the dancing icons properly.

Distribution

Archived at info-mac/game/arc/catch-em.hqx; the BinHex envelope from jfish@mdminc.pdial.interpath.net is the sole verified source for the description above.