Bill Darrah

Bill Darrah (1962-2021) was a professional puzzle designer who is best known in the CC community for designing approximately 1/3 of the original Chip's Challenge levels, as well as 7 levels that were included in Chip's Challenge 2.

"I hired [Bill] as a contractor to design levels for CC1. He was the only contributor who wasn't a full time Epyx employee. I knew him, because we were already friends and he had a passion for designing puzzles, and had written for 2 text adventures."
-- Chuck Sommerville

Bill's level design style is often distinctly recognizable for its homogeneity, mathematical precision, and emphasis on sprawling mazes. His levels in many cases are known for being equal parts beautiful, tedious, and difficult.

Trivia

• Darrah had an online shop called Yorkhouse Puzzles and Surprises where he designed and sold mechanical puzzles. The logo bears an obvious resemblance to the castles in the CC1 levels Yorkhouse and Castle Moat.

• According to Joshua Bone, there is a word-of-mouth story from Chuck Sommerville about the level Castle Moat. Darrah reportedly designed the level, and Sommerville later inserted the now-infamous water shield shortcut without telling him.

Levels in official packs

Chip's Challenge 1

It is not known exactly which levels in CC1 Bill Darrah designed, as even he does not fully remember. In a series of emails with Joshua Bone in 2020, Darrah was able to confirm the following levels with varying degrees of certainty.

Levels Darrah is certain he made

#	Name	Darrah's comments
18	Castle Moat	Absolutely sure it's mine
23	Blobnet	Absolutely sure it's mine
65	Amsterdam	Absolutely sure it's mine
73	Morton	Absolutely sure it's mine
88	Spirals	Absolutely sure it's mine
105	Short Circuit	Absolutely sure it's mine
136	Doublemaze	Absolutely sure it's mine
138	Partial Post	Absolutely sure it's mine
139	Yorkhouse	Absolutely sure it's mine
142	Pentagram	Absolutely sure it's mine

Levels Darrah thinks he probably made

#	Name	Darrah's comments
10	Brushfire	Mine, I think
16	Cellblocked	Pretty sure it's mine
25	Blink	Sure looks like mine
30	Mishmesh	Sure looks like mine
32	Scavenger Hunt	Sure looks like mine
44	Refraction	Pretty sure this is mine.
47	Pier Seven	Pretty sure this is mine.
61	Rink	Sure looks like mine
67	Chipmine	Sure looks like mine
81	Writers Block	Probably mine, not sure
85	Telenet	Probably mine, not sure
100	Colony	Sure looks like mine
101	Apartment	Sure looks like mine
103	Memory	Sure looks like mine
143	Stripes?	Probably mine
144	Fireflies	Looks like mine
147	Force Field	Sure looks like mine

Levels Darrah thinks he might have made

#	Name	Darrah's comments
19	Digger	Could be mine. I wanted to make a level that could be played boldly and fast or safely and slow
22	Forced Entry	Might be mine, not sure
28	Ping Pong	Might be mine. not sure
31	Knot	Might be mine. not sure
50	Digdirt	Might be mine, not sure
51	I Slide	Looks like mine, not sure
72	Reverse Alley	Might be mine, not sure
75	Steam	Might be mine, not sure
80	Vanishing Act	Might be mine, not sure
94	Now You See It	Might be mine, not sure
115	Oversea Delivery	Might be mine, not sure
130	Ice Cube	Might be mine, not sure

Levels Darrah isn't sure if he made

#	Name	Darrah's comments
14	Teleblock	This doesn't look like style, but it does seem like my kind of theme
21	Iceberg	No memory
64	Spooks	?
91	Jumping Swarm	No memory
148	Mind Block	Might be mine, probably not

Levels Darrah thinks he did not make

#	Name	Darrah's comments
37	Seeing Stars	I doubt this is mine
53	Traffic Cop	I doubt this is mine
87	Cityblock	I think this is not mine
97	Metastable to Chaos	Not mine. I should remember who, but I don't
98	Shrinking	I doubt this is mine
117	The Marsh	This resembles my kind of level, but I don't think it is
134	Pain	I doubt this was mine
146	Cake Walk	I doubt this was mine

Chip's Challenge 2

#	Name
8	Swivels
107	Wing and a Prayer
122	Fire and Ice
127	Bomber Maze
156	In the Slime
196	Swamp
198	Chip Off the Block