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I’m going to go with Final I could lie and say something
Fantasy VIII. It has one of the else, but it’s Final Fantasy VII. Obviously it’s FFVIII – it had such
best opening sequences of I was so engrossed that I took a profound effect on me growing Fantasy XII for no other reason than my
any videogame. my PlayStation on holiday so I up. I used to wear multiple belts
Expertise: could keep playing it. to be like Squall – no regrets. cousin wouldn’t stop going on about
Expertise:
Juggling a gorgeous wife, two
beautiful girls and an award-
Expertise:
Owning five Master Systems Bailing out on deadline it (he’s very pleased about the new HD
winning magazine (I sold two) Currently playing:
Fire Emblem Echoes:
update by the way) so I wanted to see
Currently playing: Currently playing:
Final Fantasy Fables: Puyo Puyo Tetris Shadows Of Valentia what all the fuss was about.
Chocobo Tales Favourite game of all time: Favourite game of all time:
Favourite game of all time: Sonic The Hedgehog Final Fantasy VIII It felt quite unlike any other Final Fantasy
Strider game I’ve ever played, particularly when
it came to the game’s combat, and while
I never completed it, I enjoyed what I
experienced and it was clear to see that it
was taking both the genre and the series in
very exciting directions. So this month, we
not only have a feature on the creation of
Square’s original PlayStation 2 release (the first
time a PS2 game has featured on the cover
I might add) but we have also put aside ten
additional pages to celebrate the franchise’s
SAM RIBBITS DAVID CROOKES GRAEME MASON 30th anniversary.
Even though I owned both a Final Fantasy VII made RPGs Final Fantasy VII on the
PSone and PS2, I’d somehow popular, so it has to be a PlayStation. I remember being But don’t worry, if you can’t tell your Squalls
managed to unitentially avoid favourite just for being so stunned by the sheer breadth of
all the mainline FF games. I genre-defining. it, as well as the amazing art. from your Clouds and have no idea what a
did enjoy Final Fantasy Tactics Expertise: Expertise:
Advance a lot, though. Amstrad, Lynx, adventures, Adjusting the tape azimuth with
Chocobo is, as there’s still plenty to sink your
Expertise: Dizzy and PlayStation (but is it a screwdriver teeth into this issue. We take a look at the
Pixels retro? Debate!) Currently playing:
Currently playing: Currently playing: Rage entire 8-bit Codemasters range, go behind
Pokémon Silver Darwinia Favourite game of all time:
Favourite game of all time: Favourite game of all time: Resident Evil 4 the scenes of StarCraft and Obsidian, and
Croc: Legend Of The Gobbos Broken Sword
celebrate the 35th anniversary of the mighty
Commodore 64. There’s plenty more too,
covering all generations of
retro. In short, there’s a little
something for everybody.
Enjoy the magazine!
26
56 Peripheral Vision:
Control Stick
The Making Of:
15 Collector’s Corner
Sophie Tabak’s haul is enhanced by the
power of glove
A close look at Sega’s quaint official
controller for the Master System
Final Fantasy XII
Samuel Roberts reveals how this forward-thinking JRPG came to be
66 Pushing The Limits:
16 Back To The Noughties The Lost World
The sun shone brightly in June 2000, but we How Appaloosa’s film tie-in pushed the 38
embraced Perfect Dark… Mega Drive to new heights
68 Licence To Thrill:
Platoon
REVIVALS Andrew Fisher finds out if the videogame
renditions of this cinema classic feel like Hell
18 Keystone Kapers
Darran remembers Activision’s Atari 2600 80 Minority Report:
hit platform game Sega Mega Modem
Nick Thorpe looks at the results of a
78 Wizkid Nineties experiment in downloadable
The follow-up to Wizball was anything games for the Mega Drive
but sensible…
4 | RETRO GAMER
Su e ! V
Don’t forget to follow us online for all your latest retro updates
Fr O P
BS e S I N
RetroGamerUK @RetroGamer_Mag
Cr TA Y L
Retro Gamer Magazine @RetroGamerMag darran.jones@futurenet.com
IB r F I G
e W U
TO A R
Ultimate Guide:
86
DA rS E
The Ninja Warriors
y !
72 The Making Of: StarCrat
REVIEWS ESSENTIALS
102 WipEout: The Omega
Collection 92 Subscriptions
These savings are no fantasy
106 Homebrew
Wolfenstein 3D on your Commodore 64?
58 Jason Kelk reveals all
110 Mailbag
Where we switch roles and let the
104 Nex Machina readers do the writing
114 Endgame
Proof positive that some people just
can’t be helped…
35 Years Of
The Commodore 64
Rory Milne celebrates the anniversary of the
bestselling computer in history
RETRO GAMER | 5
give us two minutes and we'll give you the retro world
DISCOVERING
SKY SKIPPER
Van Burnham charts the restoration of a lost classic
he year was 1981; Donkey Miyamoto, with engineering assistance
6 | RETRO GAMER
VISIT RETROGAMER.NET/FORUM TO HAVE YOUR SAY RETRORADAR: DISCOVERING SKY SKIPPER
ROGUE
Sky Skipper was a confusing Julian Eggebrecht had seen Sky Skipper at
NOA and had a favour to ask of Nintendo: if
thematic mess with hip gorillas and Factor 5 managed to ship Rogue Leader on
schedule, he requested NOA let him borrow
Alice in Wonderland card rabbits the machine for the F5 arcade. The challenge
was accepted, they miraculously shipped
Howard Philips on time, and Sky Skipper was delivered to
Factor 5. But when they fired up the game
many players off. It also had a lot going it tested so poorly. Popeye was approved the colours looked wrong. Opening up the
on, possibly too much, which may have for production and released in 1982. machine the team realised one of the colour
depressed appeal. According to Howard, (Interestingly, Popeye was licensed by PROMs was dead. Julian reached out to
“Sky Skipper was a confusing thematic Atari for exclusive release in the UK.) Genyo Takeda, then head of hardware for
mess with sneakered hip gorillas, Sky Skipper, along with Popeye, Nintendo Japan and one of the directors
Skip-To-My-Lou music, and Alice In was ported to the Atari 2600 by Parker of Sky Skipper, who managed to locate the
Wonderland card rabbits.” Bros., but aside from that cartridge original files in their archives enabling Julian
The next game on deck was Popeye, it was otherwise lost to history. The to repair it. Regarding Takeda, Julian said, “He
licensed from King Features. Nintendo test cabinets were destroyed, existing fondly remembered Sky Skipper since it was
had a long history of licensing popular boards repurposed to play Popeye, the only time Miyamoto-san worked for him.”
characters for its products, most notably and the arcade game was quickly and Suddenly those gorillas make a lot of sense.
» The reveal of Sky Skipper is documented at the Southern
its deal with Disney in the Fifties to unceremoniously forgotten. Fried Gameroom Expo in Atlanta.
distribute Mickey Mouse playing cards That is, until a team of inspired
and later Game & Watches. According to collectors rescued it from extinction. and the two collectors hatched a very game they were able to scan the artwork
Miyamoto, the Popeye characters were In 2015, UK collector Alex Crowley ambitious plan. Their dream? To recreate on the cabinet and finally recreate Sky
actually slated for an early iteration of was searching for Sky Skipper to a Sky Skipper upright cabinet as originally Skipper’s unique marquee, control
Donkey Kong, but Nintendo wasn’t able complete his Nintendo arcade collection designed by Nintendo. panel, and side art. From those scans
to secure the license at that time. – which already included such rare early The only image that existed of the the artwork was restored in Photoshop
Also designed by Miyamoto and games as Space Launcher and Sheriff game was a tiny black-and-white photo by Olly Cotton – not an easy trick given
Genyo Takeda, Popeye was a sweet – and he finally found what appeared to from the sales flyer, so it was difficult that colours had faded and stickers were
horizontal platformer with multiple levels be a Sky Skipper boardset at a retired to know what colours were used in worn – in partnership with Richard Lint of
that pitted Popeye against Bluto in a operator’s warehouse in Newcastle. the design. Then a rare Japanese flyer This Old Game who produced the final
battle for Olive’s heart… literal hearts, Soon after he bought another from a was found that included a larger colour reproduced art for Sky Skipper.
that is, which floated down through the collector in Sweden. picture of Sky Skipper. It was a start. The first completed game was
playfield and had to be rescued before They were both original ‘TNX’ boards – But they needed much more. Whitney revealed on 10 June at the Southern
they perished in the water below. Popeye the production code given to Sky Skipper had a feeling that Nintendo Of America Fried Gameroom Expo in Atlanta and
could punch objects and eat spinach to – that were factory-converted to Popeye might be able to help them and enlisted the second Sky Skipper will debut in
make him invincible. back in 1981. videogame player of the century and star the United Kingdom at Play Expo in
Popeye was put out to test and fared The boards were handed over to of King Of Kong, Billy Mitchell, to put him Manchester on 14 October. Now you
much better than Sky Skipper on location. engineer Mark Whiting, who was in touch with executives at NOA who have an opportunity to play Sky Skipper
Given the low earnings, it was decided to given the difficult task of deconverting graciously researched its archives. and decide for yourself if it deserved its
abandon Mr. You and focus on Popeye them back to Sky Skipper. After a few As it turned out, NOA still had one day at the arcade.
and pals. Don James, NOA’s executive months of arduous engineering they of the original Sky Skipper cabinets in
VP of operations, and employee number were miraculously able to boot and play storage. Serial #00001 had been saved! For more information head to
two, confirmed that the only deciding Sky Skipper once again. The second Now with the help of NOA and access skyskipperproject.com and
factor in scrapping Sky Skipper was that board was then sold to Whitney Roberts to the only known surviving original playexpomanchester.com.
RETRO GAMER | 7
Dispatches from the frontline of retro gaming
NEWS WALL
SEGA
STALLS
NEW SEGA PROJECT
FALLS FOUL OF FANS
8 | RETRO GAMER
THE VAULT
the cool retro stuff that we’ve had our eye on this month
10 | RETRO GAMER
COLUMN
Featuring Digitiser 2000’s Mr BiFFo
Here’s my bio… Paul Rose
Paul Rose is probably better known as Mr Biffo – the creator and chief writer of legendary teletext
games magazine Digitiser. These days, he mostly writes for kids TV, but can still be found rambling on
about games, old and new, for his daily website, Digitiser2000.com.
12 | RETRO GAMER
A MOMENT WITH...
Showing off cool retro-themed Stuff that’S going on
Eugene Jarvis
The legendary game designer on joining forces with Housemarque to bring us Nex Machina
READ
ast year, Sony revealed
L
» [PS4] Eugene Jarvis is taking an advisory
role. Think of his as Yoda, but not the rubbish
THE FULL
that Housemarque, the
developer behind the
CGI version from the prequels. REVIEW:
Defender-inspired Resogun, p104
is teaming up with Defender’s
creator, Eugene Jarvis, to create
a brand-new twin-stick shooter,
called Nex Machina. We caught up
with the legendary game designer to
find out how things were progressing.
How did the collaboration with » [Arcade] Robotron remains one of the most influential
shooters of all time, spawning the twin-stick concept.
Housemarque came about?
I met the Housemarque guys at DICE seemed so much easier to whip out
in Vegas a couple years back and my keyboard and lay down some
we were kicking back more than a righteous code, but I soon realised
few pints at the bar riffing on how that 1) the Housemarque coders
awesome Resogun was and where crank out some of the tightest mind-
was the next killer move. We started blowing algos I’ve ever seen, and 2)
fantasising about a Robotron-inspired, unfortunately in the last few decades,
twin-stick shooter, and when I woke I’ve crossed over that very same
up I was on a 14-hour flight to Helsinki event horizon a few too many times
with one hell of a hangover. to create anything resembling a robust
routine, much less an actual coherent » [PS4] Like Resogun before it, Nex Machina is powered
Do you personally view Nex thought! It was a total rush to work by voxels. Expect some impressive looking explosions.
Machina as a spiritual successor to with the Nex Machina creatives. There
Robotron: 2084? were times when I felt a telepathic
It’s kind of like finding the next Dali connection with Harry [Krueger] and
Lama. Is the iPhone the spiritual his team as we hashed out the story
successor to the Apple II? At some of the game and some of its basic
point, if they’re successful, new infrastructure, which then had to be
creations become their own thing! As pushed to the nth power.
we dial in Nex Machina, each new
build is more insane than the previous How does working on Nex Machina
one – with tech that is maybe a billion compare to the creation of your
times more powerful than the original earlier games?
Robotron. The challenge is no longer It’s a different experience, a different
how to make the game challenging role. Kind of like the difference
enough to take the player to the brink between Yoda in Star Wars, and
of sanity; no, it is more of an effort to Seventies cop hero Dirty Harry. In my
keep the player’s consciousness from earlier work I’m Dirty Harry, the badass
crossing over the event horizon and control freak street cop with total
irreversibly sucking into the imploding domain over my beat, making my day
dark matter of oblivion. Nothing will taking out street punks and code bugs
matter after that. with my massive Smith and Wesson
.44 magnum. Today, I’m some kind
What does your role as a creative of spiritual guru dude sipping lattes frame lag could be even quicker with
consultant entail? Were you not and evil Finnish homebrews trying to our alt-beast liquid metal cooled arcade
tempted to do some coding?
There were a few times when it just
impart the wisdom of the ages onto
code slingers and pixel wranglers
In my earlier PC. The truth will come out.
RETRO GAMER | 13
COLLECTOR’S CORNER
Spotlighting the greateSt retro collectorS out there
THE
The Harvest
LEGEND OF
ZELDA: A LINK TO
THE PAST SUPER
“I got it from a flea market about an MARIO BROS
Moon Hero
Readers take us through the retro keyhole
hour’s drive from me – but this made
it well worth it! It includes the official
guide, which has the backstory and
beautiful artwork.”
PAID: $50
TELEPHONE
“I got this from a Salvation Army
thrift store while dropping off
donations. It’s a great find, and
people always comment on it
when they see it.”
t’s not always about the size of a collection
I
PAID: $10
to us here at Retro Gamer, but also the
stories behind the games, and the personal
meaning behind some of the items. Sophie,
from Ontario, Canada, has a strong affinity with
the Nintendo Game Boy, a connection that has
seen her through some difficult times in her
life. “I had mild hearing loss growing up,” she
explains, “and ended up rupturing both of my ear
drums, causing severe hearing loss. It’s rare for
it not to return, but unfortunately mine didn’t.”
BIO
NAME: Sophie Tabak
Today Sophie wears a pair of sophisticated
hearing aids, but over ten years ago she had
to cope with the loss of a critical sense while
studying for her exams. She rewarded herself for
her perseverance with a copy of Harvest Moon
LOCATION: on the Game Boy, a franchise she has adored
Ontario, Canada since. “They turn everyday life into a fun and
exciting adventure,” she smiles when recalling
ESTIMATED VALUE: the series, “and the games teach us about
$2,500 (CAD) caring for nature and establishing and maintaining
friendships. And it also gives some really great
FAVOURITE SYSTEM: tips on love.”
N64 While the Game Boy was Sophie’s first games
machine, and her first game for it Kid Icarus: Of
FAVOURITE GAME: Myths And Monsters (‘The music is amazing
The Legend Of Zelda: A and the gameplay crazy fun’), the Nintendo 64 HARVEST
Link To The Past remains her favourite console of all time. “It MOON 64
brought the Nintendo characters we grew up
with in 2D into 3D, showing us new ways to JEWEL IN “I bought this at the grand
HARVEST
MOON 15TH GAME BOY
ANNIVERSARY ART MICRO FAMICOM
COLLECTION EDITION
“I love to paint and draw and wanted “I got it from a local seller after
this book as a reference for characters hunting for a long time. I don’t use
and scenes from the series. I love looking it that often because I’m afraid
back through it, although it’s all in of damaging it!”
Japanese so I have no idea what PAID: $150
it says!”
PAID: $30
RETRO GAMER | 15
JUNE 2000 – With a
news drought ahead of
E3, players had to rely on
June’s releases to keep them
amused. Would this bold
plan work? Maybe, if you
didn’t own a PlayStation.
Join Nick Thorpe to
find out why…
NEWS
JUNE 2000
Two TV shows shocked
British audiences this month.
On 4 June long-running soap
Coronation Street had 13-year-old
[N64] It’s lovely to look at, but Kirby 64 is easily one of gaming’s biggest pushovers.
character Sarah Platt gave birth to
16 | RETRO GAMER
BACK TO THE NOUGHTIES: JUNE 2000
JUNE 2000
NINTENDO 64
1 Pokémon Stadium
[Dreamcast] Ecco sure looks lovely, but playing the game
can be a frustrating experience. (Nintendo)
2 The New Tetris (Nintendo)
well-suited to the modest 8-bit platform.
3 Star Wars Episode I: Racer
More surprising was Driver, an excellent
(LucasArts)
top-down version of the car chase game
that had excited players on the more 4 F-Zero X (Nintendo)
[N64] Perfect just about summed it up – Rare’s latest first-person shooter was as good as they got. powerful platforms. The weighty feel of 5 Star Wars: Rogue Squadron
the Seventies muscle cars was just right, (LucasArts)
beautiful, but eternally divisive, Ecco managed to realise and blend several and the large maps were a joy to play on.
The Dolphin, back on our screens after a ideas tried to no avail in other titles, and Meanwhile, SNK served up the PLAYSTATION
five-year hiatus. “The detail on the coral has come up with a possible prototype all-female brawler Gals Fighters and 1 WWF Smackdown
is as beautiful as the real thing, one of for the future of the genre,” Edge puzzler Magical Drop Pocket for the (THQ)
the most stunning displays ever seen in enthused, awarding the game 8/10 while Neo-Geo Pocket Color, but also a rare
2 Syphon Filter 2 (Sony)
a videogame,” noted Arcade’s review. cautioning that it was “no title for the misstep in the dull submarine strategy
“The efforts of its animation team are Command & Conquer dilettante”. game Dive Alert. 3 Medievil 2 (Sony)
impossible not to applaud,” agreed Edge. Game Boy Color owners were So ends a relatively quiet month, then. 4 F1 2000 (Electronic Arts)
However, players were often left with serviced with more pocket-sized versions However, just around the corner we’ve 5 Toy Story 2 (Activision)
only the vaguest of hints as to what to of PlayStation hits this month. Rayman got the delights of E3, which promises all
do. “The level designers needed to lead was an obvious choice for the conversion manner of exciting developments. Until PC
players by the (bottle) nose. They chose process, as the platforming action was next month, time travellers!
1 Star Wars: Force
not to,” lamented Edge. “When you
Commander (Activision)
do manage to solve a puzzle it’s more
likely to be by fluke than by skill,” Arcade 2 Soldier Of Fortune
remarked. Edge offered a 7/10 score, (Activision)
whereas Arcade gave it just 2/5. 3 The Sims (Electronic Arts)
Quietly, PC owners were having a
4 F1 2000 (Electronic Arts)
pretty good month, due in large part to
the introduction of Shogun: Total War. 5 Star Trek: Armada (Activision)
This strategy game from The Creative
MUSIC
Assembly set the action in feudal Japan,
and was the first release in what was to 1 Spinning Around
become the developer’s defining series. (Kylie Minogue)
“Troops react like real soldiers – they 2 You See The
get tired, their morale can change and Trouble With Me
they can even get scared and run away (Black Legend)
when faced with a dangerous situation,”
3 Sandstorm (Darude)
noted Arcade, which gave Shogun the
top score of 5/5 and its PC Game Of 4 It Feels So Good (Sonique)
The Month award. “It has successfully [PC] Simulating massive battles with dinky sprites was fashionable again, thanks to Shogun. 5 Babylon (David Gray)
RETRO GAMER | 17
18 | RETRO GAMER
Keystone Kapers
ARCADE FUN ON YOUR HUMBLE ATARI
» ATARI 2600 » 1983 » ACTIVISION value that always had me returning for one more
» RETROREVIVAL
Activision seemed untouchable go. I love fast-paced action games, particularly
during the early Eighties. shoot-’em-ups and many of Activision’s releases
Formed by a bunch of scratched a very important itch for me.
talented, and disgruntled, I personally first encountered Garry Kitchen’s
Atari employees, it started off game during the mid-Eighties and was instantly
creating games for the Atari 2600 before moving grabbed by how slick and polished it was. The
across to other formats. playable police officer and the robber he was
Activision was one of the first companies I pursuing were not only well animated, but also
actively recognised as a youngster and one of moved at a tremendous rate, easily matching the
the first to aggressively promote its coders – it speed and fluidity of the popular arcade games
was lack of recognition for developers at Atari at the time. Having the levels split into several
that led to the company being formed in the sections meant you’d need to use the in-game
first place – and their grinning faces could be minimap to best plan your route to your wily foe,
found in the instruction book of each game. But, while a stream of incoming projectiles and
then, the likes of David Crane, Bob Whitehead point-based items to pick up ensure your
and Larry Kaplan had plenty to smile about reactions were always being tested.
because the output of their games was generally I absolutely used to adore playing Keystone
considered to be of an incredibly high standard. Kapers back in the day, and returning to it now
Take Keystone Kapers, for example. Like the for the purpose of this Retro Revival proves
best arcade games of the time it had a simple that Garry’s enjoyable game has lost none of
concept at its core: catch a robber as quickly as its appeal. In fact, it would probably make for a
possible, but it also boasted that important replay pretty interesting making of, don’t you think?
RETRO GAMER | 19
T HE M A K IN G O F
20 | RETRO GAMER
THE MAKING OF: FINAL FANTASY XII
ILLUSTRATION: © 2006 YOSHITAKA AMANO
inal Fantasy is well known for Final Fantasy XII was the bravest
throwing out its characters game released in the series. It jettisoned
and worlds between entries turn-based combat for a real-time
and starting again. To an system that had no random encounters.
outsider, it might look like Enemies were instead spread across
they’re just swapping one set of sprawling fields, and the transition
melodramatic, spiky-haired and buckle- between combat and exploration was
clad teenagers for another, but this is far seamless. Using a smart new system
from the only thing that changes in this called Gambits, you could program your » [PS2] Random encounters were done away with for
RPG series. From 1988’s Final Fantasy II characters to automatically execute Final Fantasy XII. Instead, enemies patrolled the world.
onwards, Squaresoft would reinvent the perfect party strategies, telling them
underlying systems of the combat and exactly when to attack, heal or cast a as Hiroyuki Ito, who was in charge of
character progression in every sequel. spell. Even by the standards of a series many of the battle designs for previous
Yet it would still retain a very traditional built on reinventing itself, it was radical. numbered Final Fantasy titles, and had a
turn-based battle system right up until FFXII came from the lineage of the clear vision of what we had to do up to
Final Fantasy X on PS2 – a predictable PSone’s Final Fantasy Tactics and Vagrant the game’s launch, so the development
sequence of random encounters, an Story, sharing their setting of Ivalice, as of the game or the overall vision was
iconic victory theme and some form of well as their character designer (Akihiko not really affected,” says FFXII’s project
levelling up. For a long time, all of this Yoshida) and game director (Yasumi manager, Hiroaki Kato.
seemed resistant to change. Matsuno). Several years into a long, five- It’s previously been reported that
year-plus development cycle, Matsuno after Matsuno departed the project, the
dropped out of FFXII reportedly due to development team was restructured,
health concerns. While much of the story but Kato denies this was the case. The
surrounding Final Fantasy XII’s creation project was extensively delayed from
became about Matsuno’s departure, he a targeted summer 2004 release date,
was joined as codirector of the project eventually reaching Japan in May 2006 –
by long-time Final Fantasy battle design but this was due to the ambition behind
mastermind Hiroyuki Ito. This meant the the project rather than his leaving. “That
vision of the game didn’t change too reorganisation of the development team
much when Matsuno left. did not actually happen, so no differences
» [PS2] Vaan and Penelo are your typical ‘fish-out-of- “We had many experienced in the process arose from this,” Kato
water’ protagonists. development staff in the team, such says. “The biggest challenge in Final
RETRO GAMER | 21
Fantasy XII was transitioning from the by many more abilities, customisable
menu-based battle system separated conditions and additional Gambit slots.
from the exploration in previous Final It’s very basic programming, but it’s
Fantasy titles, to seamless, real-time also more complex than anything Final
battles using the Gambit system. Fantasy had challenged players with
We also added in a great many more before at that time.
elements for replay value, such as the
bounty hunts, so we needed to adjust epending on the player,
and balance out the game itself and with their individual tastes
the battle system, and that is what we and preferences, some of
needed the time for.” them may feel Final Fantasy
The Gambit system lets players XII ’s game system is too
choose their abilities, and when to complicated,” Kato says.
execute them. You can set your “However, from a development
» [PS2] FFXII’s visual style still looks great today, a
characters to automatically attack point of view, rather than seeing it fantastic mix of sci-fi and traditional fantasy.
enemies on less than 50 per cent health, as complicated, we feel that these
for example, or to heal allies who are on different opinions come from how exploration. I feel that the players have
less than 30 per cent health – then you well different players can get used gotten used to playing these kind of
can prioritise these commands to achieve to the new systems that have been games, so from that perspective I don’t
the best results. The fighting plays out implemented,” he continues. “When think Final Fantasy XII is a complicated
automatically, but you can also manually you look at current-generation games, game. I recognise Final Fantasy XII as
select moves if needed. The Gambits there are many games released with an a game that has depth and that lets
start as simply as characters attacking open-world setting and real-time battles, players enjoy many playing styles.”
the enemies who are nearest to them, where the character development is He’s not wrong – that flexibility
though it’s later made complicated deep and players can really enjoy the and strategy is why Final Fantasy XII
is so exciting. The Gambit system is
coupled to the License Board, which
lets players unlock the new abilities they
acquire throughout the world, as well
as powerful attacks and summons. It is
a little trickier to grasp than something
like, say, Final Fantasy X, where all that’s
required to use an ability is to unlock it,
then select it in battle. But the nature
of Gambits means the player gets
the pleasure of building a sequence
of intricate strategies, then watching
them play out. There’s far more tactical
scope to it than mainline Final Fantasy
typically offers.
With no random battles, the
continuous cycle of fighting and
exploring offers a very different pace
to previous games, where battles are
■ Vaan’s childhood friend and famously heightened with dramatic
» [PS2] The
transition from marginally more interesting music and punctuated with the
freely wandering than him, she gets dragged into aforementioned victory theme. This only
around into battles
is seamless. the war as well. Penelo dreams plays infrequently in Final Fantasy XII.
of becoming a dancer, and her You can chain combos of enemies
Quickening attacks – FFXII’s to obtain better loot, and take part in
equivalent of Limit Breaks – bounty hunts for specific monsters.
reflect that. What this seamless design does is
create a more tangible world, and the
22 | RETRO GAMER
THE MAKING OF: FINAL FANTASY XII
open-world in the way 2D characters battled in a turn-based the setting was revisited yet again in this sequel to
that something like Skyrim system, while Final Fantasy XII was the GBA game, which retains its in-depth job system
does now, it’s leagues reproducing Ivalice’s environments in and tactical combat but with a few tweaks. This was
ahead of the small pockets of towns 360 degrees with real-time movement the last FF Tactics game. It’s long overdue a revival at this point.
and pared-down world maps seen and battle progression. So you could
in previous Final Fantasy games. The say it is only natural that Final Fantasy XII
architecture of towns in FFXII is dense, required a greater density of information ■ This tower defence/RPG fusion came out near the
and shops are filled with objects. Ivalice in the art.” Being fully 3D makes a huge end of the Noughties, at the height of the TD genre’s
is portrayed in a complete-feeling way. difference, and more in line with the popularity, and was released on every console from
This setting had previously appeared RPGs we’re used to today – you could the previous generation, as well as smartphones.
in several other games created by spin the camera around and enjoy the It’s no one’s favourite FF spin-off, though, and other
detail of the world for the first time. It’s games in this list offer far more comrehensive visions of Ivalice.
helped the game age incredibly well.
FFXII’s combat and exploration offsets
some of the game’s weaknesses, like its
thoroughly boring protagonist, Vaan, and ■ Technically not set in Ivalice, this well-loved MMO’s
an overplayed, dry story of a resistance recent expansion will feature a 24-person raid called
group ousting an occupying evil empire. Return to Ivalice, which will explore that world once
Your hero is overshadowed by the cast with creative oversight from Yasumi Matsuno. FFXIV
that surrounds him – including rightful has built up a reputation as a great fan-service MMO
heir to the Dalmascan throne, Ashe, and – this can only add to that.
» [PS2] Balthier and Fran remind us of Han and Chewie…
only they’ve been kicked through JRPG Design 101. Han Solo-esque sky pirate Balthier.
RETRO GAMER | 23
There’s also the memorably weary
wanted man Basch, alongside Vaan’s
slightly-less-dull-friend Penelo. Balthier’s
partner, the rabbit-like member of the
Viera species, the ludicrously dressed
Fran, helps make Ivalice feel like a varied
backdrop with a deep, pre-existing lore.
ll of this is lifted by a
localisation job that’s
significantly better than
that seen in Final Fantasy X.
The drama is professionally
constructed, one-liners land
well and the cast is memorably varied
in nationality. It doesn’t sound like bad
anime, basically, and that makes a huge
difference. “I think Final Fantasy X’s
voice acting was good as well,” says English, British English, Latin American
Kato when we point out criticism of the English and Northern European English)
game. “The reason Final Fantasy XII got depending on the character’s origin and
■ What if Han Solo was British,
great reviews was because we learned race, to give the game more realism.”
and he flew a sweet airship from our experiences of doing the voice The Viera have Icelandic accents, for
instead of the Millennium acting on Final Fantasy X. I mean, Final example, while the decision to make the
Falcon? This is the question ■ And what if Chewbacca Fantasy X was the first ever numbered Archadian Empire British and Dalmascans
asked by the existence of sky was an absurdly dressed Final Fantasy title that implemented American was borrowed straight from
pirate Balthier, who’s clearly bunny lady? Fran is voice acting! We had more experience Star Wars, according to a US Gamer
the most entertaining and Balthier’s partner on the in development on the PlayStation 2 interview with translator Alexander O
well-drawn character out of Strahl. She’s a Viera, a kind hardware, so we were able to create Smith and casting director Jack Fletcher.
XII’s fairly dry cast. of Amazonian rabbit-eared smoother character expressions with That said, the story generally has a bit
species, though she’s voices, and the localisation staff that of Star Wars feel, with its big-dreaming
considered an outcast by were working on this game were protagonist, and obvious analogues to
her people now. excellent. I think another big point was Princess Leia and Han Solo in Ashe and
that we used different voice actors with Balthier respectively – particularly as the
different accents (such as American latter pilots a cool airship.
24 | RETRO GAMER
THE MAKING OF: FINAL FANTASY XII
RETRO GAMER | 25
FINAL FANTASY II FINAL FANTASY IV FINAL FANTASY VI
■ Our very first named hero ■ This brave Dark Knight ■ Final Fantasy’s first
is the archetypical holder FINAL FANTASY III is neither arrogant nor FINAL FANTASY V female protagonist is a FINAL FANTASY VII
of the role – loyal to his ■ Better known as Luneth outspoken, despite his ■ Without much purpose powerful esper whose ■ This mercenary isn’t
family and country, with a to those who have played role as one of the king’s other than wandering abilities are hijacked for interested in much other
strong desire to do what is Final Fantasy III’s remake, elite soldiers. He’s a much the world, Bartz is an harm by the Empire. During than getting paid, until
necessary to protect them. this chap has courage in better fit for his role once he easygoing soul whose life her quest, she struggles to he hooks up with the
Supposedly, he’s got a bit of spades but is just a bit too questions his loyalties and changes after his encounter regain her memories and environmentalist resistance
a weakness for women. eager to act at times. As the becomes a paladin. with a crashed meteor. This reconcile her humanity with group AVALANCHE and
first character spoken to by multitalented hero has a her magical abilities. discovers that his past
the crystals, he becomes notable fear of heights due might not be what he
his party’s de facto leader. to a childhood fall. thought it was.
FINAL FANTASY XIII
FINAL FANTASY X ■ This determined, fierce
FINAL FANTASY VIII ■ As a Blitzball star, Tidus hero is bound up in a quest
■ A loner at heart, Squall is athletic and upbeat to to save her sister, Serah.
finds leadership thrust upon a fault, but he’s got some She’s a rollercoaster of
FINAL FANTASY XV
him as part of his duties in rather severe daddy issues. emotions, too – initially cold
FINAL FANTASY IX FINAL FANTASY XII ■ Heir to the kingdom of
the SeeD military academy. He’s also a pretty handy and distant, she opens up in
■ This diminutive thief is a ■ Being the self-appointed Lucis, Noctis is the son of
Thanks to his rival, Seifer, swordsman, and has a the second game of the Final
real ladies’ man who sets guardian of a group of King Regis, and has to deal
he bears a rather distinctive laugh that has made him Fantasy XIII trilogy only to
out to kidnap a princess. orphans, Vaan is a natural with the aftermath of a
facial scar. famous all over the world. lose her emotions again.
Confident and competent leader. A life of poverty coup. He’s aloof and prickly,
the majority of the time, any hasn’t ground him down, but his heart is in the right
insecurities that he holds and he’s a bit of a dreamer, place. He’s supported and
are generally things that he constantly thinking of the constantly propped-up by
tries to deal with himself. day he’ll own an airship. his three good friends.
here are few series of games
that are unavoidably big, but
Final Fantasy is definitely
one of them. Even if you’ve
There’s more to Final Fantasy than
somehow missed all of the main
videogames – check out these
entries in the series, there are the
excursions into the world of cinema
spinoffs, the cameos, and even films to
With Final Fantasy games offering more plot talk about. With over 100 million games
depth than the typical videogame, particularly sold, discussing Japanese RPGs without
during the early years of the series’ history, including Final Fantasy is like excluding
there’s some sense to adapting them to film – Mario from a conversation about platform
but straight adaptations have actually been few games, or ignoring Street Fighter in a
and far between. chat about fighting games.
Final Fantasy’s first foray into the movie In 1987, Squaresoft was anything
market came with the 1994 release of Final but unavoidably big. It was struggling
Fantasy: Legend Of The Crystals, a four-part to make headway as a publisher on
anime video series that followed the events of Nintendo’s market-conquering Famicom,
Final Fantasy V, albeit 200 years in the future during a time when the platform was
with mostly new characters. This one’s not very at its most lucrative. With little money, » [NES] The Warriors Of Light do battle against a sparse
easy to find anymore – the only English language the company was in a jam – but then, backdrop in the very first Final Fantasy.
release was a North American VHS run back so was game designer Hironobu
in the late Nineties. An even more tenuous Sakaguchi. His previous games hadn’t hit the team, such as game designers Koichi
connection is found in the anime series Final major commercial success, and he was Ishii and Akitoshi Kawazu. Programming
Fantasy Unlimited, a 2001 series that borrows contemplating leaving the games industry was handled by new hire Nasir Gebelli,
some elements, such as Moogles, without to return to university. He had wanted who had taken the Apple II scene by
relating to any particular game. to create a role-playing game, and met storm with his action games. Yoshitaka
resistance from management. External Amano, who provided character designs,
events would break down barriers for had been a freelancer before joining
Sakaguchi, as the success of Enix’s Square for Final Fantasy; Sakaguchi
Famicom RPG Dragon Quest proved that has said that he had dismissed Ishii’s
the market for a console RPG existed. suggestion to use Amano due to failing
Even then, putting the game together to recognise the name, only to be told
was no simple task. Sakaguchi has that the magazine clippings he’d been
confided that his internal reputation using for inspiration were Amano’s work.
hampered his initial attempts to form a When the resulting game finally
team for the ‘Fighting Fantasy’ project – made it to market in December 1987, it
Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within wasn’t based he was considered a rough boss, and as was known as Final Fantasy – a name
on a game, and was far more ambitious. Directed his games struggled to sell, staff opted change necessitated by the existence
by Hironobu Sakaguchi and released by in-house for other teams. Just three people joined of the Fighting Fantasy gamebooks,
group Square Pictures, the tale of a future Earth his team initially, and he had to put out with the word ‘Final’ chosen due to the
ravaged by aliens was one of the first films to feelers before gaining key members of precarious position of both Sakaguchi and
attempt photorealistic CGI depiction of humans. Squaresoft. However, the market was
Despite impressive scenes and an A-list voice ready for a new RPG, and Final Fantasy
cast, it only made $85 million at the box office had key advantages over the likes of
in 2001 – not nearly enough to recoup the film’s Dragon Quest, particularly when it came
production budget of $137 million. to its more elaborately told plot, which
A more modest CGI effort followed in the involved the Warriors Of Light banding
form of Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, a direct together to battle the evil knight Garland.
follow-up to the videogame that arrived in 2005. Instead of playing as a single hero, Final
Released straight to DVD, this features many of Fantasy allowed the player to form a four-
the characters from the original in a world now character party from six character classes
ravaged by the mysterious Geostigma. This was with unique attributes and abilities –
a big seller, leading to a special extended Blu-Ray Warrior, Thief, Monk, Black Mage, White
edition in 2010. In 2016, another CGI movie titled Mage and Red Mage. The game was
Kingsglaive: Final Fantasy XV and a free anime a swift success, selling 400,000 copies
series titled Brotherhood: Final Fantasy XV served on the Famicom, paving the way for an
to expand the universe of the new game. MSX2 conversion in 1989 and an English
translation for the NES in 1990.
When the time came for a sequel,
Squaresoft took some unusual steps that
» [Famicom] Work started on a translation of Final Fantasy II, would come to be recognised as part
but was abandoned due to concerns over release timing. of the Final Fantasy design philosophy.
28 | RETRO GAMER
30 YEARS OF FINAL FANTASY
» [SNES] Mid-battle dialogue can turn what seems to be a hostile encounter into a gut-wrenching moment.
» [Famicom] Final Fantasy III holds the record for longest time between release and English translation, at 16 years.
Though the heroes of the Final Fantasy series are busy saving the world, they can always find time for minigames. Here are five of the best
30 | RETRO GAMER
30 YEARS OF FINAL FANTASY
gamers loved the complex character include trains and drills, as well as coal
building, it’s just not accessible enough to mining. The story follows Terra Branford,
the average gamer.” a human-esper rescued from her Imperial
captors by a resistance group. Technical
inal Fantasy V was also the first advances over the previous SNES games
game in the series to spawn were limited, and character customisation
a direct spinoff story, in the was once again simplified, allowing for
form of an anime video series characters to add equipment rather than
titled Final Fantasy: Legend going through job changes. Still, the
Of The Crystals. However, this game was exceptionally well-crafted, with
was another major step in establishing amazing music, a lengthy main quest and
the identity of the Final Fantasy series memorable characters, particularly the
– spinoffs have become as big a deal main villain Kefka Palazzo. 2.62 million
and abilities were removed – including as the main games themselves, and copies shifted in Japan following the
the consolidation of various status they’ve proven incredibly versatile. “That game’s April 1994 release, and a further
healing items into one catch-all remedy is probably because the series has such 860,000 were sold in North America.
– items were made cheaper, and secret a strong foundation in the first place Though the first six games were
passages were made visible. Fans and fans have such positive memories obviously successful, Final Fantasy
should seek out one of the more recent of the worlds and characters in them had been primarily a Japanese
re-releases instead. that they always want to spend more phenomenon for the first decade of its
Final Fantasy V followed the story of time there,” Hashimoto assures us. life. North America had received patchy
Bartz Klauser, a wanderer who becomes Indeed, the number of non-crossover support, and Europe hadn’t been let in
wrapped up in a royal family’s quest spinoffs lends weight to his argument – on the fun at all. This would all change
after happening upon a meteorite that many characters and stories have even with the introduction of Final Fantasy VII.
had struck the planet. Mechanically, the returned for their own individual follow-up It was an important game in many
biggest thing about Final Fantasy V is its projects, including the likes of the respects – it introduced 3D models
incredibly expansive job system – you can episodic game Final Fantasy IV: The and FMV to the Final Fantasy series,
assign one of 22 classes to any member After Years, the handheld sequel Final and marked the series’ proper debut in
of your party, giving you more choice than Fantasy XII: Revenant Wings and the CGI Europe. Perhaps most significantly,
any other game in the series thus far. movie Final Fantasy VII:
When it was released in December Advent Children.
1992, Final Fantasy V became the series’ Final Fantasy VI was the
bestselling game in Japan by selling 2.45 final game of the SNES
million copies. Unfortunately, Final era and one that started
Fantasy V was the third game not to to shift the series away
» [PlayStation] Final Fantasy IX was the
receive a timely English translation. from traditional high-fantasy last of the highly stylised games, and
Though it was being worked on, Square settings towards more used humour liberally.
once again felt that difficulty was an sci-fi-influenced worlds –
» [PlayStation] Custom scenes like this
issue – translator Ted Woolsey told Super technological advances on were only possible with the adoption of
Play that “although the more experienced display in the game’s world 3D character models.
32 | RETRO GAMER
30 YEARS OF FINAL FANTASY
RETRO GAMER | 33
We investigate the many spinoffs of the Final Fantasy universe
34 | RETRO GAMER
30 YEARS OF FINAL FANTASY
RETRO GAMER | 35
CLASSIC MOMENTS
Starglider
» Platform: ATARI ST » DeveloPer: ARGONAUT » releaseD: 1986
S Attack Vehicle, to civvies like you – just don’t cut it. Sure,
you might be able to take out a walker or stomper with them,
but by the same token you can rust a hole through an iron plate
if you leave it out in the rain for long enough. Unlike rain, your laser energy
is in short supply. So what is a pilot to do?
The answer comes in the form of the Television Guided Missile
System, a piece of heavy ordnance composed of a proton missile with
a high definition video camera attached. The only problem is that it’s a
bit like a wayward child – the missile might claim to be guided, but it
basically does its own thing and you provide it with helpful suggestions it
may or may not follow. So when one corkscrews out of the launcher and
blows a nearby walker to smithereens, well, even bitter old pilots like us
have to crack a smile at a sight like that.
BIO
With 3D wireframe visuals that moved smoothly
across the screen, Starglider was a remarkable
display of how advanced the 16-bit Atari ST and
Commodore Amiga were, as compared to their
8-bit predecessors. Equally remarkable was the
fact that designer Jez San was barely an adult
when Starglider took the computer gaming
scene by storm in 1986, having turned 20 years
old just months prior to finishing the game. The
success of the game would result in a 1988
sequel, Starglider 2, and established developer
Argonaut as a leader in 3D game development
on home systems during the late Eighties and
early Nineties.
34 | RETRO GAMER
MORE CLASSIC
STARGLIDER MOMENTS
Chasing The Starglider
Starglider drones are
dangerous, and information
in the silos suggests that you
shouldn’t engage. But hey,
you’re a brave AGAV pilot – no
recommendation is going to
stop you from tailing that sucker and ensuring that it never takes
flight again. You’ll have to fly fast and be prepared to take some
damage, but they’re immensely satisfying targets to take down.
Kaboom!
While this may look like a
shower of rectangles, we’ll
have you know that it’s a
symbolic shower of rectangles.
Starglider could have gone with
a simple explosion sprite to
denote an enemy going down, but that wasn’t enough. Instead
the designers went for a geometrical shattering effect that looked
cool and made blowing up enemy craft extremely satisfying.
Making Dock
Your laser energy is down
to nothing and your shield is
low. You see the entrance to
dock into a silo, but it’s facing
the wrong way and there are
two missile launchers in your
midst. As you hold out long enough for the entrance to rotate
and allow you to dock, replenishing your energy, the relief that
overwhelms your entire being is incredible.
RETRO GAMER | 35
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38 | RETRO GAMER
COLLECTING CODEMASTERS
COLLECTOR Q&A
Budget game fan Guy Black owns hundreds of Codemasters titles…
B
was going ater a complete set.
CPC] Crystal
had one clear objective when they Kingdom Dizzy
established Codemasters in October was not only the
1986: “To sell only the best possible last 8-bit Dizzy
game, but also
games at the best possible price.” There’s no full-priced. Seymour or the disk version of Rock Star for
question that they achieved the price promise, I have a full set of Codemasters games for the the Spectrum, my wallet may take a beating.
with their range of 8-bit games retailing for the BBC/Electron, Commodore 16, Atari 8-bit and
standard budget price of £1.99, eventually rising to MSX. My Spectrum set is one tape (Sergeant
£2.99 and £3.99 as the market matured. As for the Seymour Robotcop) and one disk (Rock Star
quality of the games, well that’s clearly subjective, Ate My Hamster) away from completion. I’ve
yet it’s generally accepted that Codemasters were just recently started grabbing a few tapes for
one of the more reliable publishers of original the Amstrad CPC as well, and have around 30 I really like the Seymour games and think
budget games. It released a few scrappy titles for so far. they are up there with the Dizzy franchise,
sure, but most were good and some were great. and inding the rarer titles can be both fun and
Overall, you were unlikely to feel ripped-off when frustrating in equal measure. I used to buy
you handed over some loose change for the latest quite a few of the Quattro packs when I was
Codemasters release. younger. They were a good way of getting four
For collectors, quality is something of a moot Prices have been going through the roof for games for little money.
point anyway, as the simple aim is to collect them some games. The rarer titles are some of the
all, whether that’s the full range on one format, or later Spectrum games that were released in
the complete 8-bit set. Codemasters’ main 8-bit 1992-1993, towards the end of the format’s
platforms were the ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64 commercial life. DJ Puff is particularly hard
and Amstrad CPC, and it released (excluding to ind, along with a couple of the Seymour There’s a lot of interest out there in Codies
compilations) 110, 100 and 91 titles for those games. Myself, I paid less than a tenner for games. Look for bundles on auction sites and
machines respectively. It also released a handful Grell & Fella a few years ago. I paid £35 for check out some of the groups on Facebook.
of titles for the Commodore 16, Atari 8-bit, MSX Stuntman Seymour last year and I think the There are many collectors in those groups
and BBC/Electron. Crucially, the majority of the most I’ve paid is £50 for the CD Games Pack. who buy bundles of games and sell of their
games were issued in single jewel cases with Although I suspect if I ind a copy of Sergeant duplicates at very reasonable prices. There’s a
uniform white inlays, so they look great on a shelf. very friendly community of collectors out there
It’s not hard to see why Codemasters is a big draw who really like to help each other out.
for collectors.
One issue for collectors is that the games are
not conveniently numbered. Most titles have a
four-digit product number displayed on the spine I love collecting budget re-releases. I rarely
– beginning ‘1’ on the C64, ‘2’ on the Spectrum, bought full-price games as a young ’un. I
‘3’ on the CPC, and so on – but there’s no obvious have been collecting Hit Squad, Kixx and
sequence to the numbering. As such, it can be Mastertronic titles for years and almost have
difficult to build up a complete and verified full sets of each. They are generally cheap to
pick up and take up little space, being single
cassette cases.
» [Amstrad CPC] The Oliver twins were extremely prolific on the Codemasters
label. This is the rather entertaining Grand Prix Simulator.
RETRO GAMER | 39
catalogue of all releases. The list that follows
this feature has been compiled from multiple The highest prices
sources and we believe it to be 100 per cent
complete and accurate for all seven 8-bit formats are typically reserved
that Codemasters supported.
for the Spectrum
versions
A
s with all collections, the prices
vary wildly. The majority of releases
– such as the many ‘Simulator’
titles which became synonymous
with Codemasters – are hugely abundant and One thing to note is that the highest prices are
can usually be picked up for around the same typically reserved for the Spectrum versions. The
price as they originally retailed for, or even price of Spectrum games in general is rocketing
less in some cases. This means that the bulk at the moment, no doubt due to the buzz around
of the collection can be amassed with little the various Speccy devices in development, and
outlay. However, some releases are much this is causing the price of the rarest Codemasters
scarcer and therefore command far higher releases to rise and rise. Some titles in the
prices. Codemasters continued to support the Amstrad range can also command decent prices,
8-bit computers until 1993, by which point the although not in the same league as the Spectrum
market had shrunk dramatically and the later equivalents. At the other end of the scale is the
titles sold in much smaller numbers. Therefore C64 where, for reasons unknown, the releases just
you may have pay upwards of £100 to obtain don’t attract the same attention. A case in point: the
some of these titles. sixth Dizzy game, Dizzy Prince Of The Yolkfolk, will
fetch £50 minimum on the Spectrum any day of the
week, yet on the C64 it can be grabbed for around
£5. If you’re looking to collect Codemasters without
breaking the bank then the C64 is the format to
go for – and as an added bonus, there are some
quality, exclusive titles not available on the other
formats, like Lazer Force, Thunderbolt and Slicks.
We mentioned Dizzy just now, and for most
people the Dizzy series will be the cornerstone of
any Codemasters collection. The first four titles in
the adventure series, along with the various arcade
spin-offs, can be picked up easily and cheaply. The
fifth, sixth and seventh games – Spellbound Dizzy,
» [C64] The ubiquitous BMX Simulator was Codemasters’ first mega-hit » [Amstrad CPC] When you’re done with Dizzy, you should spend Dizzy Prince Of The Yolkfolk and Crystal Kingdom
and set the company on the road to success. some quality time with the Seymour games. Dizzy – are relatively rare and require deeper
1989 1992
■ The novel compilation featured ■ Playing second fiddle to Dizzy
30 games on a CD-ROM that could but still a draw for collectors, the
be loaded into your computer five Seymour games were gathered
via a standard CD audio player. together for this compilation that
It originally retailed for £20 and was sold in the run-up to Christmas
these days it will fetch around 1992. It’s typically worth £30 and
three times that amount, although upwards these days, particularly if
only if it comes complete with the the original poster and collectable
data transfer cable, loader tape cards are included. That may
1988 and manual. It’s common to find 1991 sound expensive, but it’s certainly 1992
■ This special version of Rock Star examples with bits missing, typically ■ The sixth game in the series cheaper than collecting the ■ As with Prince Of The Yolkfolk,
Ate My Hamster was created for a the cable. originally debuted on the 1991 individual releases. this first appeared on a compilation
promotional competition that ran collection Dizzy’s Excellent Adventures, (Superstar Seymour) before being
in The Sun newspaper. The game and despite the promise that it was released separately. This doesn’t
featured unique content and just ten exclusive to the pack, it was released appear in trading circles too often, so
copies were produced for the lucky as a standalone title in 1992. This it’s difficult to gauge its current value,
winners. A copy of the Spectrum short and sweet adventure now but it’s certainly rare and would set
version popped up on eBay in July fetches £50-70 on the Spectrum. Its you back £60 minimum. This is for the
2016 and went for £125. If another immediate predecessor, Spellbound coveted Spectrum version, of course
appears, it’s likely to top that, with Dizzy, is also a target for collectors – you could snap up the other versions
speculation that it may hit £200. and commands a similar value. for less.
40 | RETRO GAMER
COLLECTING CODEMASTERS
» [ZX Spectrum] Miami Chase was one of the few Codemasters games to
not appear on the Amstrad.
» [ZX Spectrum] You’ll need to pay the ferryman handsomely if you want to own the Speccy version of Dizzy Prince Of The Yolkfolk.
pockets, particularly on the Spectrum. There budget games, only they were renamed BMX
are other sets to collect too, like the five games Simulator 2 and Championship Jet Ski Simulator,
starring Seymour – although some of those are as so collectors will need to grab both versions. On
sought-after as the later Dizzy games, once again the C64 Super Dragon Slayer was initially released
on the Spectrum mainly. A less expensive target as a ‘Plus’ game before being re-released at the
is the numbered ‘Cartoon Time’ titles, of which regular price, albeit with the same title in this case.
there are five to collect, including Olli & Lissa 3 Then there’s the ‘Gold’ range, which comprised
(the sequel to the earlier Telecomsoft games) and just two titles: 4 Soccer Simulators and Rock Star
Frankenstein Jnr (which was actually a reskin of Ate My Hamster. Both were released at full-price
CRL’s Bride Of Frankenstein). (£9.99), and on the Spectrum and Amstrad they
were the only instances where disk versions were
n 1988 Codemasters released its ‘Plus’ range also issued (on the C64, several of the earlier titles
1992
■ Of the five Seymour games, this 1992 1993
and Sergeant Seymour are the ones ■ The final Dizzy game for 8-bit ■ Codemasters leapt on the wrestling
that attract the most attention from computers broke the budget trend bandwagon with this cut-price,
collectors. This platformer appears and retailed at full-price when it was low-rent copy of Ocean’s WWF
on eBay from time to time and its released in late 1992. This no-doubt WrestleMania games. Quality counts
price just keeps going up. In the past affected sales and now Dizzy’s for nowt however as this was one of
six months, the Spectrum version seventh adventure is perhaps the the firm’s last 8-bit releases, arriving
has gone for between £89 and £113. most sought-after of the whole series. in early 1993 and making it a target
This range is probably a good price 1992 On a good day you may be able to bag 1993 for collectors. It’s not super rare, but
guide, but don’t be too surprised ■ Another late era release that most the Spectrum version for around the ■ This sequel to Little Puff sneaked when it does swap hands it can fetch
to see it creep up to £120 in the gamers will be unfamiliar with, £80 mark, but it has been known to go onto the Spectrum in 1993, almost up to £30, and sometimes even more
near future. but Codies collectors will know all for up to £120 in the past. three years after the original, and if it’s the Spectrum version.
about this one as it’s on many a will have therefore escaped the
‘most wanted’ list. This cartoony attention of many gamers. It’s a
adventure (which is actually titled different story these days as many
Grell & Falla in-game) doesn’t come collectors are trying to track down a
up for sale regularly and when it does, copy. It’s hard to say how much the
you can expect it to go for £80-120 Spectrum version is worth, but it’s
on the Spectrum. A C64 version possibly the rarest of all the regular
was developed but not released at Codies 8-bit releases. You’re talking
the time. at least £120.
RETRO GAMER | 41
ZX
CODEMASTERS
CHECKLIST Whether you’re looking to collect one format or the complete 8-bit set, this list will prove invaluable
CPC C64 C16 A8 MSX BBC
42 | RETRO GAMER
COLLECTING CODEMASTERS
Phantomas
Poltergeist
Prince Clumsy
Pro Boxing Simulator
Pro Golf Simulator
Pro Powerboat Simulator
Pro Skateboard Simulator
Pro Tennis Simulator
Professional BMX Simulator
Professional Ski Simulator
Professional Snooker Simulator
Pub Trivia Simulator
Quattro Adventure
Quattro Arcade
Quattro Cartoon
Quattro Coin-Ops
Quattro Combat
Quattro Fantastic
Quattro Fighters
Quattro Firepower
Quattro Megastars
Quattro Power
Quattro Racers
Quattro Skills
Quattro Sports
Quattro Super Hits
Race Against Time, The
Rallycross Simulator
Red Max
Robin Hood Legend Quest
Rock Star Ate My Hamster
Rock Star Ate My Hamster (Gold)
SAS Combat Simulator
Sergeant Seymour Robotcop
Seymour Goes To Hollywood
Seymour Stuntman
Sky High Stuntman
Slicks
Slightly Magic
Smash 16
Soccer Pinball
Spellbound Dizzy
Spike In Transylvania
Star Runner
Steg The Slug
Street Gang Football
Stryker In The Crypts Of Trogan
Super All-Stars
Super Bike TransAm
Super Dragon Slayer
Super Dragon Slayer (Plus)
Super G-Man
Super Hero
Super Robin Hood
Super Seymour Saves The Planet
Super Stuntman
Super Tank
Superstar Seymour
Tarzan Goes Ape
Terra Cognita
Thunderbolt
Tilt
Tornado ECR
Transmuter
Treasure Island Dizzy
Turbo Chopper Simulator
Turbo The Tortoise
Twin Turbo V8
Vampire
Wacky Darts
White Heat
Wild West Seymour
Wizard Willy
Wrestling Superstars
Titles in italics are compilations.
RETRO GAMER | 43
Mega-CD
» Manufacturer: Sega » Year: 1990 » cost: Launch: ¥49,800 (approx £270), Today: £100
ack in the early Nineties it seemed like always the best from a gameplay point of view,
44 | RETRO GAMER
HARDWARE HEAVEN: MEGA-CD
Mega-CD fact
■ Numerous companies built additional variations
of the Mega-CD. Victor combined it with the
Mega Drive to create the Wondermega,
while Aiwa added the combination
to a boombox.
EDITOR’S CHOICE
Thunderhawk
This helicopter-based blaster was
one of the best-looking games on
Sega’s add-on and a clear indication
of what was possible when
developers could be bothered to
push the limits of the system. Unlike
many Mega-CD games of the time,
Thunderhawk’s impressive-looking
visuals would have been impossible
to achieve on a standard Mega Drive,
ensuring owners of the game would
have felt understandably smug.
RETRO GAMER | 45
Want to be a spaceman and work in the sky? The CPC-only
jet pack game Obsidian ofered you that very opportunity,
but, boy, was it hard. Creator Tony Warriner talks to David
Crookes about the game which sent his career skywards
hen you play Obsidian, it’s easy to seemed to be magical” – and he had vowed to save
46 | RETRO GAMER
THE MAKING OF: OBSIDIAN
» [Amstrad CPC] Grab the teleport disc and place it here to ensure all
systems are go.
RETRO GAMER | 47
More aMSTrad
excluSiveS back and forth trekking as you collected items
from hanging gravity containers before using them to
Don’t want an Amstrad? Read this list and report back… solve puzzles and open doors. The decision to steer
away from a strictly linear path was a deliberate one.
CroCo Magneto “I wanted the backtracking and the feel of the world
■ Created in France and released into the public domain,
expanding on multiple fronts simultaneously,” Tony
Croco Magneto was slapped on to the covertape of issue 80
muses. But it meant players were stabbing in the dark,
of Amstrad Action. It deserved its wider audience. Although
to an extent.
simple – players controlled a constantly moving ball up and
down across 24 screens in order to collect up to 96 blocks
hat’s because the puzzles, as we touched
SorCery+
– it was highly polished and fiendishly addictive.
FluFF
■ Created by the talented Rob Buckley for the Plus series
of CPC computers, Fluff was a cute 1995 platformer which
sought to be the Amstrad’s equivalent of Sonic. It didn’t
quite achieve that (there was a lack of speed for starters)
but the screens were busy and the enemies plentiful. Sadly,
it sold catastrophic numbers.
xyphoeS FantaSy
■ Produced in 1991, Xyphoes Fantasy has drawn
comparisons with Shadow Of The Beast, not least because
it’s graphics and animation will cause your jaw to drop.
Spread over a couple of discs and four lengthy levels, it
used overscan screens, detailed sprites and ear-pleasing
music while mixing shooting with sword fighting.
» [Amstrad CPC] There was no way for your character to shoot at enemies.
■ Many parts of Obsidian require nerves of steel, good timing ■ Again, this is all about being patient but getting the timing just ■ You may have thought there was nothing to see or do on the
and a rapid response. Watching this enemy obstacle nip back and right. The idea is to hop onto that ledge while avoiding the nasty previous screen, but there actually was. That green block with the
forth is quite hypnotic, but stick to the left-hand side and wait for thing that is whizzing about the top of the screen. Don’t be tempted star in it? Fly up to it and you will be taken to another area of the
the moment it starts to head right and make your move upwards. to just fly left and up in one fell swoop because you’ll inevitably cry game. Now it’s time to fumble around for the teleport disc and then
Done it? Phew! at the loss of a life. locate the teleport switch.
48 | RETRO GAMER
THE MAKING OF: OBSIDIAN
picked it up, you could just swap it back again if it easier to control. People have a very low tolerance for
wasn’t what you wanted.” hard controls today, at least compared to the Eighties.”
All of this would have been easy enough if it wasn’t All of this resulted in a great loss of life, so many
for the many obstacles to contend with. Death was gamers tipped their hats to reader Tony Brown of
all-too-frequent and, to make matters worse for the Newport for a lovely, short type-in poke published in
player, there was no way to shoot at the enemies. “I the July 1986 edition of Amstrad Action which granted
» [Amstrad CPC] There was so much to think about in Obsidian, from
probably decided against giving the character the ability them infinite lives – a massive relief from the built-in deactivating lasers to collecting items.
to fire at the robots because the project was stretched value of five. Those who didn’t cheat found the game
as far as it could go already,” Tony says. “I think another hard to complete – especially as they also had to “The bas-relief look was inspired by this game,” he
layer of complexity would have brought the whole thing contend with the frustration of the nitro fuel running says. “I remember being obsessed by the Braybrook
down. It was all on a knife edge, to be quite honest.” out. Players would have to consider the location of the Diaries in Zzap!64 mag.
Yet it worked. The fact you weren’t blasting around refuelling points. Figuring when to use your jet pack and Less impressive was the limited sound, but Tony
the place kept you on your toes and made the game when to leave it well alone, was also important to avoid admits that it wasn’t his forte. He describes it as both
special. It didn’t matter that the security droids were risking an end-game. “programmer sound” and “functional”, adding, “I
getting close to your ass or that laser beams were had no one to help.” Tony battled on, though, and six
strewn across your path. You were an ordinary Joe, he idea was that, as a player, you’d draw months of evening and weekend work ultimately paid
heart-in-mouth and bottom burning, carrying out your
task in the most effective way you could think of.
Even so, trying to judge getting past a rapidly moving
object in order to find an item and then easing past a
second, third, fourth and maybe fifth time was no mean
T a map as you explored, and on it you’d
mark out the fuel points,” says Tony.
“Then you’d need to be aware of what nitro
you had remaining, compared to where you wanted to
go. In a way, the placement of the recharging points
off for the developer. He sent six or so demo tapes to
various publishers, one of which was Artic Computer
“which my mother found in the Hull telephone
directory”. Arctic boss Charles Cecil snapped it up and
the team began refining it. “They kept breaking it which
feat. It was made harder by a set of controls that were gave you a clue, as presumably you could bank on the meant I had to fix the bugs and pop another cassette in
rather sensitive, something picked up on by reviewers. game being possible if you went the right way. It was the post – I was truly baffled that there might be bugs
Tony defends them, to a degree. “I think they were okay deliberate.” Thankfully, Amstrad Action printed a handy unbeknownst to me,” Tony says.
for the time,” he says. “Now I’d make the game far, far map packed with objects in February 1985 giving its He remembers there being a big countdown to the
readers a bit of a leg up. But there was no hat-tip for asteroid self-destructing in the final phase of the game.
omitting to mark the nitros on this occasion – you’d still “But they kept telling me it didn’t work and I ended up
have to find them for yourself. stripping it out.” Eventually, though, it was released as a
Still, gamers could console themselves that they CPC exclusive. “I think it’s a real shame there was not
were gazing at some fantastic graphics which Tony a Spectrum version – I really regret never doing one,”
created himself. “I wrote an editor in BASIC that I Tony rues. Not that it damaged his prospects. Sales
used to plot all the pixels out. It was very crude and may have been poor (his first royalty cheque was £60)
time consuming, but I didn’t know of any alternative at but it got an AA Rave in Amstrad Action and landed
the time,” he says. Tony used the CPC’s four-colour him a job at Artic. Tony and Charles eventually joined
Mode 1. “It seemed like a slightly different way to forces and set up Revolution Software with Charles’
go than the multicolour Mode 0 route that was more then-girlfriend Noirin Carmody. Gaming really was to be
popular at the time. I figured that I had a unique look his future. “Obsidian was the first game that I actually
» [Amstrad CPC] By using the 320x200 pixel Mode 1 of the CPC, Tony was that I could actually draw, so it felt like the right thing to finished and which was good enough to be published,”
limited to four colours on each screen. do.” He drew a lot of visual inspiration from Paradroid. Tony finishes, modestly.
■ You’ll need the lock decoder here; you’ll find it in the container to ■ Now, imagine getting rather far into the game, knowing the end ■ Certain objects activate particular functions, and the idea is
the left to access a crucial area of the game by dodging the spikes is in sight. You’ll be on this screen thinking all you need to do is get figuring which ones will have the right effect. The Engine Comp
to the left as they move up and down. You’ll have figured by now past this moving object. But no, you die over and over again. There here needs the Turbine Disc, for example, in order for it to be
that timing is, again, key to a lot of the puzzles. The other tricky are frustrating bugs in the emulated game. Solve them entirely by initialised. You can only carry one object at a time, so you need to
thing is figuring what unlocks what. playing the original on a CPC. go back and forth lots to gather the right items.
RETRO GAMER | 49
so t w are
cc es sful
m o s t su m e rica n the early Eighties, California-based Softsel
When
o ne of t
c om
h e
p a n ies in N orth
eo g
A
am es I had quickly become one of the leading
software distribution companies in the
whole of North America. Jumping in while
the market was hot and growing exponentially, it had
t rib ution o w n vid rig ht? rapidly become one of the most successful companies
dis it s tee d , in its sector. But it was soon very clear that it couldn’t
to create g u ara n
as
manage this rapid growth without bringing in some
more expertise, especially when the team was looking
s
decide b e sn ’t to expand into the fastest growing market of all:
then s
u
dis c over ht…
colleague they turned to first. That man was John
aw xt
were two guys who used to work with me and for me
Kie t se l and they had left about a year before I did and had started a
company called Softsel. At this company, they created
RETRO GAMER | 51
MONETARY
ed th at MONOGRAM
y lear n
ic kl The lipside of Tronix was Monogram, the
gam
us why Monogram was his baby at Sotsel,
“Tronix were always a bit of a distraction
for me sadly, I knew that Sotsel could
take advantage of this market and make a
much larger proit than they could with just
distributing them. It was always Monogram
I was most interested in as that was my
preferred ield. Programs like Dollars And
Sense were also much cheaper to make and
they made much more money over a longer
period of time, so this area was always my
primary focus. Dollars And Sense was a
great product too, I still knew people who
were using it ten years later!”
» [C64] Despite having exclusivity on the game, Tronix eventually turned
down Jimmy Huey’s platformer Trolls And Tribulations. still have all the original artwork that Marc Eriksen did
for us up on the walls in my games room at home.
would put tons of stock into stores. But this was on So every time I go in there for a game of pool, I look
the back of an agreement that they could return any up and see the memories of those Tronix days and
unsold stock during the next quarter. This was a real my first foray into videogames!” Marc Eriksen himself
learning curve for me as I thought we were making remembers the day he hooked up with Tronix well. “In
millions of dollars but didn’t count on large amounts of September of 1982 I was contacted by Rich Taggart
it coming back. Thankfully, I learned this quickly, unlike of a company called Tronix Publishing, a new game
many other software companies of the time.” As harsh development group which was creating videogames
a lesson as this was for John, he was more staggered for use on the Commodore 64 system,” he says.
by just how much work was involved in putting together “The C64 had been introduced in January 1982 by
the product in the first place. “Videogames wasn’t my Commodore International at the Consumer Electronics
background, and nobody told me that it took around six Show that month, in Las Vegas, Nevada. I had begun
to nine months to come up with a product! The holiday to develop a reputation for creating effective colour box
season was coming up, so I found some programmers and sleeve art after working for the Carlston brothers
and then hired some guys to do art and packaging.” It at Brøderbund. Prior to that I had been freelancing was set up by Sof
tsel to supply
a big success and
would be the latter of these that John soon capitalised illustration in the San Francisco Bay area, creating » Monogram was business world.
to the
on to bring success to Tronix. technical and advertising art for clients like Intel, Varian, computer software
“One thing I quickly learned was that good art helped Trans Pacific Airways, United Airlines, San Francisco
sell games,” enthuses John, before adding, “in fact, I
A M E S
ING G
DEFIN r hea
r
d
k
, but the
se
you
turned ld your attent
ion
artwo t he
Tronix’se games tha
were th
S
peaking of Jimmy Huey, he became
Tronix’s first hire in the programming
department, but his route into
the company wasn’t very straight
forward, as he tells us: “I was just a basement
» [Atari 8-bit] Abuse was a rather unusual piece of software that saw you
programmer as they called us, although in Los
compete in a battle of insults with your computer! Angeles there are no basements! I had saved up
money to buy an Ohio Scientific computer and started
Magazine and a broad array of other corporate, making games for that machine, which I sold via mail
design, sports and editorial clients. Even while I was order using small ads in Micro Magazine. It was a really
creating game art from 1982 to 2002, I was also doing obscure computer, that was probably only sold in the
mainstream commercial illustration.” As this art became states. When the VIC-20 came out I went ahead and
such an important part of the Tronix identity, we were bought one of them and then decided to make some
intrigued to know more about the processes involved. games for it. I programmed one game completely in the
“Tronix used to contact me from Ingleside in Southern mini-assembler, but a friend of mine helped me set up
California by phone and then explain the game to me,” a cross-development system using an Apple II, which
Mark informs us. “They would then send me some I used from then on. We (Hal, Jim, Corey and I) were
printed screenshots of the action by courier. In 1982 no self-publishing our games under the moniker ‘Interesting
one was communicating by email and all the art needed Software’, advertising mainly through magazine ads.
to be created in paint or pencil on paper or illustration But we soon realised we had to find ourselves a proper
board. I quickly drew some sketch possibilities and distributor. Hal had a contact at Softsel, who, it turned
sent them to him by fax. This served us well, although out, had a subsidiary that was starting up called Tronix.
we were restricted to only black-and-white imagery. So we signed a deal with them to publish our games
Anything in colour needed to be sent for next-day
delivery by messenger. My first piece was a game
and pay us royalties based on their sales, we were just
looking for a distributor originally but ended up having
TIMELINE
called Swarm!, created by a young developer called Tronix publish the games for us instead.” We were ■ Softsel Products Inc. is formed in Inglewood,
Jimmy Huey, who also created the games Sidewinder keen to find out exactly how this arrangement worked. California to distribute a wide range of software
19
81
and Galactic Blitz, which I also did the art for.” With “I continued working from home and was bouncing products across North America.
all this in mind we were also interested to know how back and forth between my house in Los Angeles,”
much Marc charged for his work. “In the beginning, Jimmy says, “which was only a couple of miles from ■ Deciding to also develop its own products,
the prices I charged for these new videogame clients, Tronix’s offices and Orange County where Jim and Hal Softsel creates two new labels in Tronix, for
like Tronix, generally ran far less than I was receiving also lived. Eventually I moved to Orange County
19
computer software.
described as a cross between Q*bert and Pipe Mania as you jump well before Gauntlet there are few as accomplished as this on
85
teleport on each side of the screen can also be used to get you out real challenge on your hands with Scorpion. This is another great
86
RETRO GAMER | 53
too, which made things even easier. I did everything the company in profit. But it wasn’t that long before
in the game back then including the graphics. I’m not some creases started to appear in the fabric as the
an artist, but the art was simple enough back then, so various people within the company had different ideas
I was able to get by sufficiently.” Luckily, finding the about how to move forward. John laments to us about
programmers and games Tronix needed wasn’t as his acrimonious departure from Tronix and what led
hard as John initially feared. “It was quite easy to find up to it, “Softsel were doing so well that they decided
games to publish on the Tronix label as Softsel already to become a listed company. The problem was that,
all these people who were sending in products for us to even though both Monogram and Tronix were doing
distribute, so instead of just distributing these products really well, the new investors didn’t see a future in the
we offered them a lump sum to buy the program and company creating its own software, so quickly decided
publish under the Tronix label. I didn’t concentrate much that this division should be sold off. Unfortunately, I
on the quality of the games or the technicalities of them, didn’t see eye to eye with the new owners, we just
I was focused on finding people who could supply them couldn’t agree how to take the company forward and » [C64] Platformer Waterline was the very last game to be
and people who could create the packing for me so it increase growth. They went through about five different published under the Tronix label in 1984.
looked great on the shelf.” chairmen after me, but none of them lasted long, and
Tronix was ticking along nicely, John had a great team within a couple of years they were gone from the smaller, local company. I never made much money
in place and the steady flow of games was keeping market completely.” But John wasn’t the only one who on it, though, and by the time I got around to doing a
was in disagreement with his bosses at Tronix. Star C64 game John was already gone. Tronix had a first
programmer Jimmy Huey also had his eyes on different right of refusal on all my games for a certain amount of
avenues as he wistfully explains, “Tronix were moving time, they had obviously passed on my Apple II game,
full steam ahead into making C64 and Atari games so and then declined my first C64 game too, which later
John was pushing me to put out a C64 game for him became Trolls And Tribulations by Creative Software.”
instead of VIC-20. But I got it in my head that I wanted
to develop an Apple II game instead. John thought it ven though Tronix’s life proved to be
was a horrible idea and, in retrospect, he was totally
right! So I spent probably the better part of six to eight
months working on an Apple II title without a publisher!
I eventually did get it published through a company
called H.A.L. Labs, not the well-known one but a
E fairly short there were still plenty of
great stories that came out of the
team’s exploits. John is particularly proud
of one of them, and eager to tell us about it. “The one
story I really remember from that time was when Steve
Jobs over at Apple had come up with a new computer
called the Macintosh,” he smiles. “We were all very
interested in this new computer and managed to be
one of the very first companies to get some decent
software onto it. Many people still say that we helped
create the so-called Apple evangelists of today, which
started back then with the Mac.” Jimmy’s first story
is pretty shocking and he still can’t believe it to this
day. “As I said previously my friends and I were selling
our games mail-order but, unbeknownst to us, Rabbit
Software had become our UK distributor,” he says. “I
OF TR
folks’ games. We only found out they were doing this
when we connected with Softsel to see if they could
DNA
» The former home of Tronix – 5231 West distribute our games. As it turned out they were starting
83rd Street in
Los Angeles, California.
er
e the publish
t ma d
asp ects tha he crowd
The ut from t
stand o
54 | RETRO GAMER
FROM THE ARCHIVES: TRONIX
ive
» Tronix constantly advertised in
u t
magazines in order to show off its
bo
ha
latest releases.
thr ou g of
w en t no n e
“They m e, but
en a ter n R ee se
chairm ng ” - Joh
la sted lo
them
WHERE ARE
up Tronix and they mentioned to us they saw our games
in the UK. I guess the owner of Rabbit knew he was in
THEY NOW?
trouble. He flew out immediately and pleaded ignorance JOHN REESE
and agreed to stop selling the games! A good way to ■ Since stepping down as chairman
make money, I guess.” Jimmy’s Tronix days actually of Tronix, John has worked in a
seem to be totally caught up in controversy as he also number of different roles within the
offered up this zinger: “I remember we all made quite a » [VIC-20] Gold Fever is a fun platformer for the VIC-20 inspired by educational and business software
bit of money on the first three cassette games and we titles such as Miner 2049’er and Lode Runner. industry. After a four-year period doing consulting
quibbled a lot over the royalties. In retrospect, the royalty work, John took up the position of President at TRW
percentage was extremely high and John’s argument in particular, were brilliant, in fact for their time they were Financial Systems where he stayed for four years
was that they were taking all the risks in advertising and remarkable. At my current company, Parchment, we before moving on to become the CEO and founder
publishing and so on. But on the second set of games, actually have a games room which includes a couple of iSearch, a leading supplier of recruitment tools.
which were cartridge-based, they came out around the of those original Atari computers, along with some of Then, in 2003, he formed Docufile, which later became
time of the videogame crash and we ended up getting those games we published, and all the kids really love known as Parchment, a company that transformed
a bill from Tronix! I wasn’t sure if it was an accounting playing on them when they come in!” Jimmy’s own the management of education credentials and
thing or if they were serious about collecting on it but memory of days gone by at Tronix are quite sorrowful, manuscripts. While he took up the role of Director at
we just totally ignored them!” “I sort of regret not hanging out there more. I have several educational institutions, he still remains CEO of
always been an introvert and I think that at the time I Parchment to this day.
ith many of these companies valued just working on my own more than being part
MARC ERIKSEN
■ Very little has changed over the
years for Mark. He is still creating
a wide range of original art for just
about every type of company you can
think of. Although he no longer creates artwork for
videogames he still regularly attends conventions in
the US where he sells full-size signed editions of his
pieces and tells some tales of his days in the games
industry. You can find a full portfolio of Marc’s extensive
range of artwork, including game boxes for companies,
such as SNK, Tengen and Brøderbund, over at his
website, marcericksen.com.
A
2600, Commodore 64
games for the whole of its history, it with convention is Sega’s choice to place the and more.
should come as no surprise that Sega buttons to the left of the stick. While it might
would introduce an arcade-style joystick be a boon to left-handed players, it’s a totally
for any of its home consoles. What is surprising bizarre design choice which was almost never
is this Master System controller, which broke replicated. In fact, the only other controller we
convention in a number of ways. At the time, can think of that did this was the Sega Sports
most joysticks used either the classic ball-top Pad, a Master System trackball peripheral
design that’s common in Japan, a straighter which was discontinued after a short time. A
stick as was more common in the West, or a more traditional successor called the Arcade
flight-style design with integrated trigger-style Command Stick was advertised in 1988 but
buttons. Sega opted for none of these, instead ultimately never released, and future Sega
employing a unique, but somewhat unwieldy, arcade sticks would all use more traditional
T-grip design with a large cuboid top. parts and layouts.
PERIPHERAL VISION: CONTROL STICK
58 | RETRO GAMER
35 YEARS OF THE COMMODORE 64
RETRO GAMER | 59
» [C64] Tony Crowther created many great C64 games, such as his puzzle
title Bombuzal.
fIrsT sTar sofTware The US franchise-builders whose games shone on the C64
boUlDer Dash boUlDer Dash III
■ Although originally an Atari 8-bit title, Boulder ■ Rockford’s Riot received criticism for being
Dash was a revelation on the C64. Taking its lead identical to Boulder Dash, and so First Star gave
from arcade classics like Dig Dug and Mr Do, this second sequel bas-relief graphics and a
Boulder Dash vastly improves on the size and revamped storyline. Rockford is now mining in
sophistication of those single-screen efforts space, and his adversaries are extra-terrestrial
by adding multidirectional scrolling and fresh mouths and eyes instead of fireflies and
mechanics – such as transforming enemies and butterflies. Ultimately, though, Boulder Dash’s
boulders into collectibles. Like its inspirations, core structure couldn’t be radically changed
First Star’s game combines digging for treasure without breaking it, and so First Star largely left
spy Vs spy with avoiding hazards, but scale and innovation
spy Vs spy: it untouched with the result that Boulder Dash III
■ The pinnacle of competitive two-player
take Boulder Dash to another level.
The IslanD Caper retains the original’s compelling gameplay.
C64 gaming, although Spy Vs Spy’s devious ■ On first inspection, The Island Caper looks
CPU opponent makes its comedic espionage similar to its predecessor: both games share the
an equally compelling solo experience. The same combat system, almost identical character
game combines arcade action with strategy by sprites and interchangeable objectives. But it’s
equipping two spies with booby traps and tasking in its differences where Spy Vs Spy II shines. The
them with collecting the same objects before sequel gives each spy a fresh suite of dastardly
making their escape. A split-screen playfield traps and the challenge of swimming through
allows them to fight and monitor each other’s shark-infested waters between different islands,
actions, which often go unnoticed and leave one and replaces the original’s flick-screen offices
competitor frustrated to the delight of his rival. with a playfield of scrolling island terrains.
60 | RETRO GAMER
35 YEARS OF THE COMMODORE 64
GREMLIN
GRAPHICS
The producer of a wealth of
characters and novel games
THING ON A SPRING
■ Thing may not be as
fondly remembered
» [C64] Archer Maclean’s IK+ topped as Monty Mole, but the
its predecessor by adding an extra spring-loaded hero’s
combatant and new moves.
debut is every bit as
good as his label-
mate’s platformers.
business was shifting from bedroom hackers to a more
professional business that cared about presentation.” I finally got the Gremlin’s C64 original
involves relatively straightforward but demanding
As the quality of games available for the
Commodore 64 improved and the quantity of games chance to play the C64 gameplay, where Thing’s bouncing is more of a visual
than a mechanic. There are numerous pitfalls, however:
switches that have to be triggered in order to overcome
being produced for the system increased, so did
coverage of the C64 in computer magazines. This didn’t – it just absolutely blew certain obstacles, and extensive back-tracking as Thing
attempts to assemble nine jigsaw pieces and confront the
go unnoticed by games developers who had previously
been wary of backing the Commodore 64 given the me away game’s antagonist.
RETRO GAMER | 61
paradroid hit the
The CoDer / spot because it was
DesIGner a bit diferent, and…
Legendary games developer Andrew
Braybrook remembers the C64 very well balanced
what were your earliest Andrew Braybrook
impressions of the C64?
At the time, we had a ZX81, so the I would play games all evening. It was a free arcade,
C64 was clearly more solid and basically.” As well as playing through Zzap’s library, of
professional-looking. The C64 had a course, Jaz was reviewing a barrage of new releases,
floppy disk drive available too, and the games we which, as he notes, had begun to diverge more and » [C64] The Commodore 64 was an absolute beast when it came to scrolling, so
were playing were good. Plus, the Programmer’s more from the coin-ops that had once massively games like Parallax always managed to impress.
Reference Guide provided all the info we needed. influenced C64 gaming. “Certainly by the time we
At the same time, I could see that some other joined Zzap, there were a lot of really interesting new felt among the machine’s UK developers, which
games could do with a bit of polish. This gave me games coming out. People were beginning to riff on programmer Andrew Braybrook attributes to Zzap!64
the confidence to take the career change from arcade games a little bit and produce arcade adventures magazine. “The programmer competitions that Zzap
COBOL programmer to games. like Staff Of Karnath. You began to get more original and set up were key for me, where I got to talk to other
interesting titles like Spy Vs Spy, and things like that.” programmers. Everyone seemed happy to talk about
how did you feel about initially developing stuff. Tony Crowther had just implemented his sprite
spectrum conversions instead of original s 1985 progressed and turned into 1986, multiplexor in a game and told me what it was doing.
C64 titles?
I was quite happy doing conversions to the Dragon
32 because there was a lot of learning to do. I had
to learn assembler, the hardware and how a game
was put together. When I converted [3D] Lunattack
A a string of superlative Commodore 64
games were released, and it became
apparent that C64 gaming was
experiencing a golden age. Jaz’s recollections of
this time are of how exciting it was to go to work each
Once you knew something could be done, you could
usually figure out how to do it, but he told me anyway!”
Zzap’s Jaz Rignall adds: “There was just a really strong
community between the programmers who were
constantly sharing demos and tricks, and pushing the
to the C64, I could see that I wasn’t using its day. “There was just a period of real innovation, and machine forward. I just think that helped keep the
strengths. I suggested a few new features that it was really exciting working on the magazine during system feeling really fresh and exciting.”
would give the game a bit more depth, and used that time. Every day you would come into work and Equally responsible for making UK Commodore 64
the hardware sprites where I could, and that made rush to the mailbox to see what had been sent in for gaming so exciting during this period was the wealth
me hungry to use the C64’s hardware features. review that day. Every month there seemed to be of top-flight US C64 games being imported into Britain.
some amazing new innovation – like Wizball or The Last Graftgold’s Steve Turner puts the radical differences
what was your reasoning for making Ninja – that pushed the design of games and the C64 between American and British C64 titles down to issues
Gribbly’s Day Out so original when many at the same time.” Andrew Braybrook was responsible of scale. “The American market was a huge affair; it was
successful earlier C64 games had been for two of those amazing innovations, but the coder just totally different to Britain. US firms could afford the
coin-op clones? is characteristically modest about his achievements. development because they had this huge sales base,
I was trying to use as many C64 hardware “Paradroid hit the spot because it was a bit different, where we couldn’t afford to spend so much money. But
features as possible, and almost carve a game and turned out to be very well balanced. Uridium then Americans would have never come up with things like
out of that. Gribbly’s had hardware scrolling, hit another spot because it was obviously running at a Wizball, the quirky things that the Brits were really good
sprite-to-sprite collisions, sprite-to-background higher, smoother frame-rate, and had speed and a stark at. We programmed in assembler down to the metal.
collisions, character animation aplenty, in-sprite graphical look.” Head of System 3 Mark Cale puts his They did things more on a professional basis, and used
animation and two clocks. Oddly, those features firm’s exemplary C64 output during this period down to development machines.” Zzap’s Jaz Rignall agrees, and
got cut back as time progressed! prioritising Commodore’s system. “Some would argue highlights additional factors. “A lot of the British people
that we were perhaps the best publisher on the C64. were bedroom programmers. In the UK, there was a
how did you feel about leaving the C64 Our team was so specialised, so that’s why we focused little more desire to really push the machine as far as you
behind ater Intensity? on it. Because we knew our skillsets in terms of what could go. And whereas early American software was
Intensity was my first game using the PDS we could do in pushing the machine.” quite advanced, British programmers caught up then
development system, which made things a lot A contributing factor to the constant evolution of overtook them. I think that had to do with Americans
easier and allowed me to write my biggest and C64 gaming throughout the course of 1986 using disk drives; there wasn’t that same mentality of
most complex program to date. But I had an was a growing sense of camaraderie trying to squeeze everything down on to a cassette.”
Amiga at home and was experimenting with
graphics, and I was therefore finding it quite
difficult to think of new things to do with the C64. » [C64] The C64 received a cracking conversion
Then we got to do Rainbow Islands, and I did the of Taito’s classic coin-op Bubble Bobble.
16-bit versions.
» [C64] Not a C64 original, but Paul Shirley’s
Spindizzy went down a storm on the system.
how would you explain the C64’s lengthy
commercial lifespan?
The C64 hardware was great, well ahead of the
competition. There was excellent documentation,
and you didn’t need too many tools to get
started. Later, different cross-assemblers were
available so you could write on PCs, speeding up
development more.
62 | RETRO GAMER
35 YEARS OF THE COMMODORE 64
HEWSON CONSULTANTS The small UK publisher that punched above its weight
URIDIUM CYBERNOID
■ How do you follow up an instant classic like ■ Commodore 64 conversions of Raffaele
Paradroid? Well, Andrew Braybrook opted Cecco’s Spectrum classics often weren’t quite as
to design a title with little in common with well received as the originals. That is, except for
its predecessor. Visually, the games have Raff’s Cybernoid titles, which went down a storm
similarities, with top-down bas-relief graphics, with Commodore 64 gamers and reviewers
but otherwise they’re worlds apart. Where alike. Given hindsight, this probably makes a
Paradroid defies classification, Uridium is an lot of sense, since the designer’s Spectrum
unapologetic shoot-‘em-up with an emphasis on designs typically involved slow-burn platforming,
high-speed, skilful piloting and marksmanship. whereas Cybernoid is a straightforward
PARADROID Levelling-up requires the dispatch of a set
NEBULUS shoot-‘em-up. The key to the game’s appeal lies in
■ What strikes you when playing Andrew ■ Although Nebulus wasn’t John M Phillips’s
number of foes followed by a tricky bonus stage. its intimidating but always fair difficulty curve.
Braybrook’s Paradroid is that it’s the creation only C64 title, it’s by far his most celebrated game
of a developer who really understands the C64. on the system. At the time of its release, John’s
The game’s iconic graphics and silky-smooth rotating tower-based platformer was nothing
animation are indicators, but its gameplay short of a revelation, which melted gamers
provides irrefutable evidence. Paradroid’s minds by introducing them to three-dimensional
gameplay is brilliant and brilliantly simple; it’s a cylinders. As playable as it is novel, Nebulus
droid war where battles are fought with lasers or challenges players to ascend and destroy
via a sub-game. The game’s hero is comparatively eight diabolically tricky towers replete with
feeble, but sub-games are won through skill with deadly abstract foes, disappearing platforms,
the winner taking control of his opponent. time-saving elevators and ample back-tracking.
T
Crowther’s Wanted: Monty Mole was another. those technical limitations were gone.
released dipped slightly from the fever- The Taskset games had a nice balance of polish
pitch rate of the previous two years, but and playability too. And then Epyx and Lucasilm How did you feel when you moved on
the quality of 1987’s best titles remained got into making really special, high-end games, from creating graphics for C64 games?
sky-high. These were typified by Ron’s genre-defining and it all took of. I was already working on 16-bit platforms by
Maniac Mansion, of which the developer is humble. the time I was asked to create the Exile loading
“We were just having fun making a game and trying not Why do you think that most C64 games screen for the C64, and I knew then that was
to get fired. Not once did it enter our heads we were artists tended to favour the system’s the last chance I would get to make something
doing something that would spawn a whole new genre. lower-res mode? in Paint Magic, so I tried to do something special.
You can’t plan innovation; it just happens and often It wasn’t about pixel count; it was about
comes from people who had no idea what they were colour. The C64 had a unique colour palette at What are thoughts now when you look
doing. It’s easy to look back and see what Maniac the time, which only made sense to exploit. back at the C64 games you designed
Mansion was, but at the time it was just a game.” In multi-colour mode you could have four visuals for all those years ago?
Going into 1988, the flow of great C64 games colours to each 8×8 pixel cell, as opposed to I don’t think it’s any exaggeration to say that
slowed significantly, but the Commodore 64’s just the foreground and background colour per the C64 changed my life. Discovering all of
closest rival received far fewer standout titles, 8×8 in hi-res mode. Plus most C64 owners those games, joining Compunet, getting Paint
as Jaz Rignall recollects. “The Spectrum tapped didn’t want to play games that looked like Magic, getting work creating loading screens,
out fairly quickly. There had been plenty of great Spectrum games. going to Commodore trade shows, working for
Spectrum games, but it wasn’t like people were Firebird and then eventually moving to London
How did you find designing graphics for to work as a C64 graphics artist. I was never
C64 games compared to creating game the same person ater I opened that Christmas
visuals for other computers? present in 1983.
RETRO GAMER | 63
OCEAN
SOFTWARE Moving to the PC, I
The licensing expert with an eye
for great original games really missed some of
WIZBALL
■ For a licensing
the C64 hardware, like
specialist, Ocean
published some sprites and the SID chip
great C64 originals. Ron Gilbert
Take Wizball, a novel
game with a vertical
learning curve. Sensible The options open to developers of full-price C64
Software’s masterpiece games in the face of this fierce budget opposition were
starts with a powerless wizard desperate for power-ups stark, as Graftgold owner Steve Turner admits. “Budget
– he can’t even control his movements or summon his games made it almost impossible to compete. Andrew
cat. Wizball’s pet is essential, as only he can collect the Hewson wanted us just to make budget games. He
colours required to decorate his master’s colourless said: ‘I’ll sell them at £1.99, and you’ll get 10p a copy.
existence. Their world’s other inhabitants prefer grey,
I’ll sell hundreds of thousands of them.’ I was thinking:
however, and shooting them down takes Wizball’s
gameplay from compelling to essential. still finding new tricks to do with it all the time.” Steve ‘Even if you sell hundreds of thousands of them, I’m
Turner of Graftgold concurs that the C64’s custom only getting £10,000. How long can I afford to spend
hardware extended its gaming possibilities. “The C64 working on a game for that?’ So to me it was pulling
HEAD OVER HEELS
■ Ultimate pioneered was ahead of its time compared to the Spectrum. the industry down in that there was so much cheap
the isometric arcade The Spectrum really belonged to a different era, even software that you had to distinguish yourself from. That
adventure, but Jon though they were going head-to-head. The Spectrum meant that you had to spend more time on it, you had
Ritman and Bernie had no sound support, no sprite chips – no graphic chip to have bigger budgets, and no one was going to give
Drummond took the whatsoever.” System 3’s Last Ninja 2 appeared on both those budgets to C64 games.”
concept to new heights.
machines in 1988, but boss Mark Cale concedes his By the tail-end of 1988, the number of developers
Assumptions had been
that the Commodore 64
firm’s focus on the C64. “Perhaps the Spectrum didn’t producing full-price standout C64 titles had decreased
was too sluggish to manage a conversion of Knight get the same love as we gave to the C64. Developers dramatically. Steve Turner’s Graftgold was still ably
Lore, but Jon and Bernie’s Head Over Heels soundly were reluctant to learn other systems because it took supporting the system, but only because the decision
dispelled that idea. By combining an ornate playfield a long time. They preferred to stick to the system they had been taken out of its hands. “We signed a deal with
and bizarre characters with inventive gameplay akin knew, so making the C64 the focus was what we did.” Telecomsoft where we got a down-payment providing
to a surreal treasure hunt, Head Over Heels more than we build a number of games on dual-format. They
justifies its reputation as the Commodore 64’s greatest
ut while outstanding original C64 titles wanted at least Spectrum and C64, and that tied us into
B
isometric adventure.
continued to appear throughout 1988, the machines for absolutely ages. Soldier Of Fortune
the Commodore 64 games market was hardly had any marketing. The C64 version was John
BATMAN THE MOVIE changing dramatically. Designer Ron Gilbert Cumming’s, and he had a job doing it just on his own.
■ Ocean’s third C64
Batman title, and
reflects on the situation stateside. “I loved the C64, but Intensity was Andrew [Braybrook]’s last game on the
likely also the firm’s by the time Maniac Mansion and Zak McKracken came C64. Telecomsoft came to us with Rainbow Islands;
most lucrative, was out, at least in the US, the C64 was falling fast and the Gary Foreman did the C64 version, and a pretty good
based on director IBM PC was gaining. So making the jump wasn’t that job he made of that. Bushido was one of the last; that
Tim Burton’s popular hard, given that we wanted people to play our games. was trying to fulfil our contract. I thought it was going
late-Eighties big-screen But moving to the PC, I really missed some of the C64 to make people sit up, but the publishing got delayed.
interpretation of the
hardware, like sprites and the SID chip – it was so much By the time it got out, Zzap!64 was reviewing Amiga
Dark Knight. Following a template that was first used in
Platoon, Ocean cherry-picked key scenes from Burton’s better than crappy PC speaker music.” Jaz Rignall, games, and suddenly you couldn’t impress anyone with
movie and adapted them into distinct, sequential stages. C&VG ’s editor by late 1988, remembers big changes C64 graphics. But Virgin saw Rainbow Islands, and that’s
A variety of genres are tapped to produce the game’s five in UK C64 games at this time. “The market became what got us Ivan Stewart’s Super Off Road.” System 3
challenging levels, which involve puzzles, platforming devalued. I was really surprised at how many rereleases released a string of well-received C64 games between
and vehicle-based challenges featuring the Batmobile and compilations made the charts and how few original 1988 and 1991 without going the budget route; Mark
and Batwing. full-priced games [did]. But the C64 didn’t exactly Cale explains how. “We continued to exploit the C64
collapse; there was still quite a vibrant scene. Budget while it was still a strong machine. It wasn’t just the C64;
THE UNTOUCHABLES titles were being sold everywhere – newsagents and
■ While The
garages – so it was easy for a kid to pick up a game
Untouchables was
certainly an action
with his pocket money pretty much anywhere. They
movie, its action scenes didn’t have to go somewhere like WHSmith to get
were hardly ideal for a games anymore, and a lot of retailers wanted full-price
C64 adaptation. Ocean games to justify the shelf-space. So C64 games
overcame this slight become pretty much a disposable commodity.”
problem, however,
by reimagining the film’s high-octane moments as
game-friendly challenges. So there’s a platforming
warehouse bust, a Gauntlet-esque railway station
encounter, and Operation Wolf-style border raid, alleyway
shoot-out and Eliot Ness vs Al Capone stages. These
distinct levels look good and play well, but they also form
a cohesive and memorable game.
64 | RETRO GAMER
35 YEARS OF THE COMMODORE 64
RETRO GAMER | 65
HOW IT
PUSHED
THE LIMITS…
Rotation
Your motorbike pursuit of a fleeing
dino is spectacular for many reasons,
including the enormous enemy and
smart dithering to avoid trees popping
out of nowhere. But when you lean the
bike to steer, the trees rotate! Superb.
Pseudo-3D
We can’t quite work out the technique
that Appaloosa used to create the rocky
walls that line this river – it’s a seriously
impressive effect that almost manages
to give the early 3D consoles a run for
their money.
» PUSHING THE LIMITS
I
the sight of hundreds of pteranodons
24 years in videogame development – the glory enough, Appaloosa decided to show off years of Mega in flight, both in the sky and reflected
days of Ecco The Dolphin on the Mega Drive. Drive coding skill by putting together some of the most in the water below, is one of the most
The Hungarian developer, known as Novotrade prior to spectacular 3D bonus games ever seen on the console. stunning on the console.
1996, had hit it big with the aquatic adventure and ended Escaping during the flight of the pteranodons is an
up in demand. Konami wanted the studio for its 32-bit awesome sight to behold, with super-smooth animations
Contra adventures, and licensed projects were coming of hundreds of the creatures, and the river chase is
in thick and fast. However, it was one special licensed spectacular too, with your raft bobbing over and under the
project that gave the studio a chance to repay the Mega surface of the water. And the motorbike chase proved to
Drive for its role in the company’s success. be an equally spectacular scene – the Deathchase-style
The Lost World: Jurassic Park was an inescapably pursuit of a rampaging dinosaur featured not only scaling
big deal in 1997. Its predecessor had been a box office trees, fellow bikers and the deadly lizard, but a rotation
smash and as a result, videogame versions were being effect that convinced you that your bike was actually
considered for every platform – even those which were leaning into turns.
somewhat past their prime, such as the Game Boy and As the final Mega Drive game published by Sega, The
Mega Drive. Sega chose Appaloosa to convert Electronic Lost World: Jurassic Park came out to little fanfare. Most
Arts’ PlayStation game to the Saturn, and also to create magazines ignored it and much of the Mega Drive’s Expert sprite work
an entirely original version for its ageing 16-bit console. audience had already moved on, meaning that it tends Thanks to years of experience on the
The result was a top-down shoot-’em-up, not to get unfairly overlooked when the Mega Drive’s most Mega Drive hardware, Appaloosa had an
dissimilar to the SNES version of the original Jurassic incredible technical feats are discussed. There’s no excellent grasp of how to drag the most
Park, but without the cartoonish style. However, while excuse now, though – give it a look! value from its near-decade-old graphics
chip, and particularly its notoriously
limited colour palette.
Oliver Stone’s irst Vietnam ilm provided the material
for a landmark Ocean Sotware release. Andrew Fisher
looks back at how the multi-part adaptation happened
irector Oliver Stone had served arrived in the war zone, watching body Simon Butler was in charge of the
» YEAR: 1986 during the Vietnam War and bags leave. A power struggle between forces Ocean deployed. “I designed
» DIRECTOR: wrote the Platoon script based Sgt Elias and Sgt Barnes played out as the game, I storyboarded it and then I
Oliver Stone on his own experiences. The Taylor started to question the morality oversaw each version as it was being
» STARRING: Tom cast underwent a gruelling training of those around him. Moviegoers and developed, so I suppose I was working
Berenger, William camp on location in The Philippines critics applauded the film’s anti-war in a semi-producer type role.” That
Defoe, Charlie Sheen
before filming, including digging tone, with Platoon going on to win process started with seeing the film.
» BUDGET:
foxholes, jungle patrols and simulated four Academy Awards including Best “I was told I would be going down to
$6.5 Million
attacks. The plot followed volunteer Picture and Best Director. London for a private movie viewing
» BOX OFFICE:
Chris Taylor (Charlie Sheen) as he Ocean’s Gary Bracey explains the for the next game Ocean wanted me
$138.5 Million (US Box
Office), $69 Million (US reasoning behind contacting Orion to design. I felt quite flattered being
Rentals) Pictures. “Oliver Stone was a hot the only person from Ocean to see the
director at the time and the word from film and even though there were two
the US was that this was going to be or three more people in the screening
a ‘biggie’. The film was pretty much room, it still felt very exclusive.” Simon
complete when we licensed and the did have some reservations as he
» YEAR: 1987 buzz was pretty good so we knew it left the screening. “How the hell was
» PUBLISHER:
would be high-profile.” Orion provided I going to translate the level of gore
Ocean / Sunsoft (NES)
some help to Ocean. “We got to attend and dismemberment to a youthful
» DEVELOPER: Ocean
a couple of screenings pre-release and audience on an 8-bit machine?”
» [C64] A blocked exit in the tunnels means you have to
we were provided with the usual sets Mark R Jones was living in the
find another way out. of official stills and the script.” same house as Simon at the time and
68 | RETRO GAMER
LICENCE TO THRILL: PLATOON
TRIP YOU UP
Both sides in the Vietnam War used tripwires. The film still shows a wire
designed to catch a soldier’s leg. The game’s first level features hard-to-
spot tripwires that kill a platoon member instantly, but can be blown up
with a well-placed grenade.
THE VILLAGE
The platoon searches a village suspected of helping the Viet Cong, leading
to brutal tactics from Sgt Barnes. Searching the game’s village, players
must not shoot the villagers and must avoid vicious booby traps in the
huts. The trapdoor leading to the tunnels is found here.
RETRO GAMER | 69
We’ve been kicking other
people’s asses for so long, I figured
it’s time we got ours kicked
Sgt Elias
70 | RETRO GAMER
COMING SOON: ALADDIN LICENCE TO THRILL: PLATOON
THE TUNNELS
to England. Firstly to Telford – to work ■ The tunnel sequence in the film is
on squeezing the tape protection into relatively short, with Sgt Elias exploring
the loading code in the Ablex factory » [C64] The loading screen was an adaptiation of the famous movie poster, depicting the death of Sgt Elias. at a crouch. The longer tunnels level
(another all-nighter); then down to in the game reflects the way the North
London for the launch. I don’t recall sections, provided good value for licensing seriously. We developed Vietnamese Army used tunnels during
much from the launch party – because money.” The reviewers agreed, giving a great working relationship with the war, as
I was exhausted! Oh, and I missed my the 8-bit games high marks, as Simon them and we became their ‘go to’ storage and
then girlfriend’s 21st birthday party recalls, “I was exceptionally happy games publisher for all their big a way to
because of the trip; well at least she with the reviews. I wasn’t particularly films. RoboCop was a result of that.” move troops
forgave me as we’ve been happily happy with the fact that I was never Ocean would return to Vietnam with around.
married since 1995.” mentioned as having designed the title The Lost Patrol, a more mature 16-bit
Gary secured some clever cross- or given any credit. Story, narrative game that featured ideas from the KILLING BARNES
promotion. The loading screens and morals were virtually impossible original Platoon designs. (A 2002 PC ■ In the film, Barnes is killed by Taylor
for the 8-bit versions promoted the on the machines of the day. Reviews strategy game also licensed Platoon.) in revenge for the death of Elias. In the
VHS release, and the VHS of the film stated it was one of the best movie tie- Looking back, Simon says: “I enjoyed game, the player races through the jungle
promoted the game. Mark recalls, in titles, so perhaps we did succeed.” the process, I was happy with the end to the bunker
“The box looked great on the shelf The success of Platoon helped result and it’s one title where I’m more where Barnes
in the shops; you got a poster and a Ocean secure another licence. Gary than proud to say ‘I worked on that.’” is hiding – and
photo of the cast. There was also a says, “Rather than just pocketing War was certainly good for Ocean. blows him up
second audio tape containing ‘Tracks the advance licence fee, Orion made with grenades.
Of My Tears’ by Smokey Robinson, a pretty good royalty revenues from With thanks to Mark R Jones for the
song featured in the film. It formed a sales of the game and they were artwork, and all the interviewees for
nice package and, with all the different probably the first studio to take games taking part.
RETRO GAMER | 71
rcade history is littered with examples
of how the industry used imaginative
technology to enhance the gaming
experience. Think Battlezone’s submarine-
style viewer, Out Run’s iconic car setup, Operation
Wolf’s compact machine gun, and, of course, Space
Harrier’s arcade game-cum-fairground-ride pneumatic
seat. The Ninja Warriors, Taito Corporation’s 1987
arcade game, took the triple-screen setup popularised
by the shoot-‘em-up Darius and blended it into a
scrolling martial arts extravaganza, backed by a bizarre
plot and novel central character concept.
Set in a grim ‘near future’ of 1993, The Ninja Warriors
is, in fact, a tale of anarchy (or terrorism, depending on
your point of view) against an oppressive state under
martial law. The president, known simply as Banglar,
has handed the military complete autonomous control
of the United States; its population subdued, it’s left to
72 | RETRO GAMER
THE NINJA WARRIORS
a bunch of rebel scientists, led by another oddly-named and unrest. The Dom Dam restaurant has had its front
character, to rise up and do something about this window smashed in, other buildings are vandalised or
unpleasant situation. Mulk and his fellow eggheads even half-demolished and the ninjas are soon assaulted
decide their best option is to create two highly-advanced from both sides by the red-eyed and demonic military
androids to wage battle against the devilish army forces forces of America. Armed with knives, rifles and
and destroy the evil president. Codenamed Kunoichi (a grenade launchers, what seems like several platoons
blond red-suited woman) and Ninja (blue-clad male), the of soldiers attack our valiant robots, with an occasional
scientists let the pair loose and sit back, no doubt smug special character entering the fray for that extra
that their robotic offspring is taking care of business, and challenge. To defend themselves, the Ninjas have a pair
their own considerably less robust skins are perfectly of kunai daggers: short knives that are swift, if a little
safe in some underground bunker. limited in terms of range. They also have a restricted
Kunoichi and Ninja commence their mission strolling supply of shurikens that come in handy against those
through the broken streets, a backdrop of social decay opponents that keep their distance such as a sneaky
sniper, dressed strangely as a conniving spiv with
extravagant sunglasses. Hits against Kunoichi and Ninja
deplete their energy bars and in a neat (if obvious)
RETRO GAMER | 73
Be the best ninja with our handy hints
■ The gargantuan tank appears several ■ Wielding the same classical daggers as Ninja ■ Complete with flowing crimson locks and
times, announcing itself with some distant and Kunoichi, this pair of enemies is also dressed ■ This strange creature, like our ninja heroes, beard, this powerful boss spews deadly fire
pot shots before lurching into view. The tank similarly and represent a significant challenge. looks robotic and scurries along the ground breath that can soon turn the player to a crisp.
commander then pops up and fires his machine The duo also sports freaky masks. before leaping into the air. It blocks all attacks He first appears in level two.
gun at our heroes. HOW TO BEAT: Utilise a common tactic and with a pair of robust metallic arms. HOW TO BEAT: Similar to the ninjas, wait until
HOW TO BEAT: Jump over the machine gun somersault over them and stab them from HOW TO BEAT: Wait until it leaps over you and he approaches and attacks, then somersault
fire and onto the tank, stabbing the commander behind, trying to avoid getting caught in the then strike as it slowly turns, either with daggers over him and jam your knife in between his
before he ducks down. Or, use shurikens if you middle. Due to their ability to block, shurikens if close enough, or shurikens at range. Front on shoulder blades. Repeat until he falls over, then
have some left, although he ducks down quickly. are not much use. attacks are useless, thanks to its block. stoke up the barbecue.
74 | RETRO GAMER
THE NINJA WARRIORS
■ This huge boss is not only heavily armoured, ■ At the end of level one awaits this blue-clad ■ The grey-skinned and bulbous so-called
but also wields a bone-crunching wrecking swordswoman with a rather ominous-looking President Of The United States is dressed in a
ball that he swings around his head and uses to sword. Her hair is identical to Kunoichi’s blue suit and red tie, and fires at the player with a
knock out the ninja at distance. apart from its colour. pistol in the game’s final scene.
HOW TO BEAT: With great difficulty! Probably HOW TO BEAT: Due to her sword, shurikens HOW TO BEAT: You’ve done all the hard work
the hardest of the bosses, speed and deftness is are your friend here. Get in close and fling one already. Having beaten of all his minions, the
the key. Either duck under his attack and ping a past her defence from a crouch position. When spineless world leader cowers in a room with
shuriken at his legs or jump toe-to-toe and slash she jumps over you, hurl another at her back, no escape. Approach and slash him, and your
quickly before somersaulting away. Repeat. A lot. avoiding that deadly sword. job is done.
RETRO GAMER | 75
Which version of Ninja Warriors comes out on top?
■ First impressions are quite encouraging, due ■ The 16-bit computer ports were coded by John
to its impressive rendition of the first level’s Croudy and Ron Pieket with graphics by Ned
music on its title screen. Things go downhill from Langman. This Amiga version pips the Atari ST
there, though, with slow gameplay that manages as a few tweaks have been employed in order
to make the laborious original look expeditious. to avoid it being just another port of its fellow
Couple this with dodgy hit detection and it’s a computer. The biggest of these improvements is
duff port, which is a shame because two-player some smooth scrolling and vibrant colours and
action is supported and the graphics are decent the pared down, more electronic, soundtrack
enough, especially the Ninjas’ somersault jump. also perfectly suits the game.
■ A disappointment after the Amiga version, but ■ The Spectrum port of Ninja Warriors lacks the
only superficially. The graphics have a colour of all the other versions, but is otherwise
washed-out feel to them, and the juddery a respectable attempt at bringing the arcade
scrolling hampers the gameplay. However, it game to the home computer. Alas, it does suffer
utilises the same technology as the Amiga called from the problem that many monochrome
Dynamic Loading System, a direct memory games have, in that it is often difficult to spot
access mode that loads data direct from the disc what’s going on, or, more importantly, spot those
as the game runs, as a result it retains much of dangerous bullets. Still, there’s an impressive
the original’s simple-yet-fun gameplay. tank boss complete with turret gunner.
76 | RETRO GAMER
THE NINJA WARRIORS
We talk to Robert Whitaker, the man behind the art of the Amstrad
and Spectrum conversions of The Ninja Warriors
RETRO GAMER | 77
Wizkid
THERE’S NOTHING SENSIBLE ABOUT THIS SEQUEL
» AMIGA » 1992 » SENSIBLE SOFTWARE allow you to juggle balls on your disembodied head or
» RETROREVIVAL
One of the reasons I love grab individual bricks with your teeth – or liquid, which
shoot-’em-up and pinball games is will turn into notes. Defeat every wave of enemies
because I’m a huge fan of chasing found on each stage and you’ll be rewarded with a
high scores. I love games that are large number of coins, which can be used to collect
immediately accessible, and yet offer new items. Additionally, complete the notes found in
insane hidden depths once you begin to properly the stave at the top of the screen and they too will turn
explore them and understand how their mechanics into coins, giving you even more cash to spend.
work. It’s why I’m such a big fan of Wizkid. On the Wizkid is an exceptionally deep and nuanced game
surface it appears blissfully simplistic, but dig a little with countless layers of complexity, and I’ve still not
deeper beneath its gaudy exterior and you’ll find a discussed the secret cats that are hidden on each
monstrously complex game. world, or the many quirky minigames that you can
Ultimately it’s possible to get a fair way into Wizkid discover and play. I’d be loathe to say that Wizkid is the
with very little effort. Each level has a certain number greatest game that Sensible Software ever made, but
of bricks, and once they are all cleared, you can move I certainly feel its one of the most creative games that
onto the next stage. Sure, you’ll need to avoid the many the company released. Wizkid is a wonderful mishmash
enemies that can be found on each level, but their of different genres that’s been injected with the sort of
presence won’t offer too much challenge if you’re good surrealism that makes Matthew Smith’s games look
at action games. Hit the enemies with bricks, however, straight-laced. It might not have been the sequel to
and you’ll discover that you score points. Hit several in Wizball that I was expecting but it proved to be even
a row and you’ll receive even more. Defeated enemies more fun than I’d imagined, and as a teenager with a
will drop bubbles that contain either power-ups – that tiny spending budget: that’s what really mattered.
54 | RETRO GAMER
RETRO GAMER | 55
INTERESTING GAMES
YOU'VE NEVER PLAYED
G A MODEM
E G A M E
S Lucky Japanese Miveegda
rs rece
Drive ownaeble games!
download, they
Of course shell out for
needed toice the price
a kit at twidge game,
of a cartr nthly fee
plus a mo ere’s what
of ¥800. H return…
they got in
Pyramid magic
■ DEVELOPER: Sega ■ YEAR: 1991
■ One theme you’ll notice with many of the Mega can be stood on, lifted and carried, kicked about
Drive’s downloadable games is that they’re pretty and even destroyed. What’s more, they’re the only
simple. Of course, they had to be – the console’s thing that will allow your character to duck into
modem worked at 1,200 bits per second, the small spaces, making them a crucial movement
speed which reintroduced loading times not seen tool. At the same time, they’re dangerous – not
since the days of games on cassette tapes. Worse only do they restrict your jumping height, but if you
yet, the Sega Game Toshokan cartridge required fall while carrying one you’ll be crushed. Much of
» [Mega Drive] This kung fu stomp allows you to get rid of unwanted
to download them didn’t have any permanent the challenge of the game is built around moving blocks. Use it with extreme caution so you aren’t left short!
storage, so you needed to download games from the blocks in a way that allows you to move around
scratch every time you wanted to play them. each stage without cutting off your escape route. Pyramid Magic seems to have been one of the
It’s always nice to see a team making the most Another major component to Pyramid Magic’s most popular games on the service as it spawned
of limited resources, and Pyramid Magic is a great challenge is the presence of a mummified ghost at three sequels: Pyramid Magic Special, Pyramid
example of a videogame that does just that. The the exit of each stage. This antagonistic apparition Magic II and Pyramid Magic III. These mostly follow
game, which pits you as an explorer trying to reach serves to make sure you complete the second the same gameplay template as the original, but the
the tomb at the centre of a pyramid, is certainly objective of each stage, which involves opening third adds the complication of an urn full of water,
much smaller than the average Mega Drive game three boxes in order – a wooden crate containing which must be carried to the end of each stage.
in terms of data. The relatively limited set of a red key, a red chest containing a green key, and If you want to play Pyramid Magic today, your
graphics doesn’t change from level to level and a green chest containing a piece of paper that will best bet is to track down a copy of Game No
there’s only one musical theme during gameplay. dispel the pyramid’s curse. Stages are initially Kanzume Vol 1, a Japanese compilation for the
However, the 40 single-screen puzzle levels it simple, but soon require high levels of forethought Mega-CD which includes Pyramid Magic and its
contains can and likely will have you scratching and advanced knowledge of block placement rules. sequels, in addition to other former download
your head for hours. Thankfully, the game is generous with extra lives games such as Hyper Marbles, Flicky, Paddle
The key to Pyramid Magic’s gameplay is the use and even offers players the chance to skip levels by Fighter and four of the Phantasy Star II Text
of movable blocks. They’re versatile tools, which pressing A and Start, but only a total of three times. Adventure games.
80 | RETRO GAMER
MINORITY REPORT: SEGA MEGA MODEM
POINT OF NO RETURN
■ Pyramid Magic offers plenty of one-way PHARAOH’S TREASURE
passages. If you’ve used one and realised you ■ Chests must be opened on every level,
shouldn’t have, the only option is to lose a life and in the correct order. However, not every
and start again by pressing C and Start. chest in the game can be opened – some are
actually a tease for the sequel…
SQUASH IT DOWN
HALF MEASURES ■ Our little adventurer can’t duck at
■ Although levels are designed on all on his own, so he relies on carrying
a strict grid, blocks can actually be heavy blocks to get his body into a
placed on the halfway point between suitably compact form for squeezing
spaces, allowing you to create through small tunnels.
staircases and other structures.
RETRO GAMER | 81
iKaSuze! ai no doKi doKi Penguin land md
■ PUBLISHER: Sega ■ YEAR: 1992
82 | RETRO GAMER
MINORITY REPORT: SEGA MEGA MODEM
Sonic eraSer
■ DEVELOPER: Sega ■ YEAR: 1991
» robo
it’s fair to say ■ DEVELO
T baT Tle
r
that this didn’t set a ■ Even if
PER: Seg
you can
a ■ YEA
R: 1991
■ This little casino compendium offers ■ This air hockey game delivers all the ■ Remember Putt & Putter? Two ■ Based on the infinitely-scrolling
you three games to try out: poker, fun you’d expect, but with a couple of different isometric crazy golf games platform shoot-’em-up from the
blackjack and slots. These are relatively twists. For a start, you get additional for the Master System and Game Eighties, the Mega Drive version of
simple, no-frills implementations of powers here, such as the ability to Gear bore that name, and Putter Golf Teddy Boy Blues is prettier than both
each game, but they’re certainly fun trap the puck for a better aim, or shield is apparently the game that started the the arcade original and its Master
little time-wasters for anyone who loves your goal against incoming shots. whole miniseries. Like its successors, System conversion. The general lack
gambling without the potential to win However, over time both players’ it quickly gives up on providing easy of depth is offset by a neat high score
any money. If you can grind your way goals will widen, ensuring that the introductory courses and cranks up mechanic, in which defeated enemies
up to the magic 100,000 medal mark, game comes to a timely end even the sadism – outlandish hazards like turn into points pickups – you’ll get an
you’ll receive a special ending sequence with two equally skilled competitors. bumpers, ice and lava add immense amazing score if you can manage to
for your trouble, so long as you aren’t Of course, you can also battle the frustration to what is otherwise a pick up over five in quick succession.
playing poker. CPU if you’re antisocial. peaceful, tranquil sport for gentlemen. Play it on Game No Kanzume Vol 2.
RETRO GAMER | 83
Modern games you’ll still be playing in years to come
» Featured System: PC
» Year: 2012
» Developer:
Arkane Studios
» Key People:
Harvey Smith,
Raphael Colantonio,
Viktor Antonov
» [PC] You can find beauty even in a place as downtrodden and bleak as Dunwall City.
62. DISHONORED
THE BACKGROUND Dishonored’s great achievement is to recapture the
The debt that Dishonored owes to the Thief series spirt of those titles and deliver a modern interpretation
This sneaky is obvious – you can tell by taking a cursory look at
it. Stalking through the shadows of the Victorian-
true to the philosophy of the great player-driven RPGs.
with new ideas and codirector Harvey Smith and technical designer
Ricardo Bare worked on previously. That is, the
dream of. At a basic level, you always have a choice
between stealth and violence. This applies to every
that legacy lives on RPGs that gave the player the tools to approach each
objective in the way they saw fit. They encouraged
intricate and subtle ways of killing them than with a
blade across the throat, you can always find a
into the future you to push at boundaries, gave you the freedom
to ignore what characters told you to do, and would
non-lethal option to neutralize them too. When it
comes to navigation, there are many different routes
adapt and reform the experience around your choices to take – balconies and rooftops to hop between,
whenever possible. windows left tantalisingly ajar, abandoned buildings
84 | RETRO GAMER
FUTURE CLASSIC: DISHONOURED
A BEATING HEART
You carry with you a heart
that you can reveal secrets
about people and locations.
It’s a great narrative device
that reveals an extra layer of
Dunwall’s inequality.
HIDDEN CHARMS
The aforementioned Heart
» [PC] The Outsider can transport you to a strange alternate can also be used to help you
dimension where everything is seemingly under his control. discover hidden Runes and
Bonecharms across Dunwall
Arkane found that players would combine – use these to upgrade your
powers and abilities.
RETRO GAMER | 85
T h e M a k i n g O F
86 | RETRO GAMER
Factions Of StarCraft
The major players in the war for the galaxy
Protoss
■ If Terrans are the representatives
of everything a human race often
cerebellum
represents in a game, then the
Protoss are their exact binary
opposite. They are warriors as
IOmIzed
much as the Terrans, but they are stoic and steadfast in their tIssue grOups
cerebral ways. Centuries earlier they were the target of the Xel’naga –
cOrtex
considered in game to be essentially creators of planets and
often races residing on them – which wanted to help create
a race with “purity of form”. This lead to the Protoss gaining
powerful psionic abilities.
OccIpItal
lObe
pItuItary
thalamus
Terrans Zerg
■ Though they’re never referred to ■ These bug-like creatures are
as such, this is the classic Human driven by a search for genetic
race for StarCraft. Descended perfection, able to assimilate
from the humans that sought to advanced species across the
colonise the universe after arriving universe and use their beneficial
on Supercarriers, these Terrans went on to take over three genetic code to evolve themselves into better forms of
different planets. Other than their capability for psionic bIO-nerual themselves. The same Xel’naga that wanted to improve the
10.90
powers, Terrans are similar to any stereotypical human race: Protoss did so with the Zerg, instead aiming to achieve their
industrious, concerned of expansion and cursed by morality. exact opposite: “purity of essence”. The Zerg are fearless
But equally they care for personal freedom and expression, a hunters and – as their moniker as “the Swarm” suggests –
feature not shared by StarCraft’s other races. are capable of producing huge, symbiotic armies.
Know Your Unit
The troops that you will find on the interplanetary battlefield
High Templar
» [PC] The Zerg
■ Despite being the only way to
were in fact a
produce Archons, these units precursor to
can also create hallucinations, Warcraft III’s
Scourge faction,
helping to sow confusion and both races
frustration into the enemy. relying on tainting
the ground to
build structures.
88 | RETRO GAMER
THE MAKING OF: STARCRAFT
» [PC] The pre and post-mission dialogue didn’t match the punch of the CGI
videos, but helped to flesh out the characters all the same.
We were
gobsmacked; we
had been duped into
rebooting StarCrat
Patrick Wyatt
The Birth
modern military setting, it was clear there was one
option for Blizzard from the start – and so initially ‘Orcs
in space’ was the driving goal for the game. “It was sort
Of Esports
of like re-envisioning what would happen if the world How StarCrat helped launch a phenomenon
of Warcraft just went into space,” Patrick says, “and so » [PC] The game featured some excellent set-pieces, such as when this Of the 9.5 million sales that StarCrat garnered, 4.5 million
the perspective was the same, the art style was a bit swarm of Zerg made you panic right before the Dropships came in.
of that were sold in Korea. That’s perhaps testament to
different.” Gone was the natural greens and browns of
how revered the game became, especially since Patrick Wyatt
fantasy-fuelled Warcraft, instead here Blizzard opted for Dominion Storm would. “It was really that we no longer
explains that there was a prediction of only 4,000 sales for the
something more space-like – a horrific blend of putrid wanted to do something that was just going to be an
region for Blizzard. It was a perfect storm for the developer,
pinks, bright blues and garish greens. It stood out, for expansion,” says Patrick when asked of the sorts of
though: the country was suffering an economic recession and
sure, but not in a good way. Lucky, then, that Blizzard changes they wanted to bring to StarCraft after their E3
so people would find themselves at PC bangs (a LAN gaming
found itself the victim of trade show disaster as the showing, “it was to do something that was going to
center) to use the computer to apply for work and send emails,
team attended E3 1996 to discover that no one was a be epic in every sense in the same way that Warcraft
ultimately ending up spending extra time there playing games.
fan of what would be the company’s next game. was endeavouring to push on every single bound. If
StarCrat launched around this time, and the ease with which
It was a defining moment for StarCraft, one that – for we’re going to do a space-based RTS, we wanted it to
Battle.net made it to get online meant that it was a popular
as disheartening as it was – bolstered the team. But be really credible and something that players would just
choice for people to play with their friends. Its popularity quickly
the real issue was not the negativity that it was met love and something that we would be proud of. And so
grew until it became a sensation for the country, taking it by
with but, instead, the competition that Blizzard found there wasn’t an official design of what we had to do, it
storm as millions of players went online to play against one
itself facing. One game in particular, Patrick recalls, was was more like ‘we just need to change everything’.”
another. Before long, people were devoting their entire lives
enough to earn the developer some humility: Dominion
to it and, having seen the craze, stores and event organizers
Storm. “It was just down the hall from us and it had a ut what was most fascinating of all
B
would host competitions to make the most of the game’s insane
full isometric perspective, it had a creature that looked was the real truth of the situation.
and sudden popularity. It ended up becoming a lifestyle for the
like a Star Wars AT-AT walking around, and it just looked That Dominion Storm – the game that had
country, and an industry formed around the competitive side
impressive in terms of the technology and the artwork, been such a decisive reason that Blizzard
of the game – replete with superstar players. It would take
and made us feel embarrassed that we were even on was knocked off its feet and forced the dev team
years before the West would catch up with Korea’s industry
the floor.” Patrick explains that the team went back to into overhauling everything – would go on to release
surrounding esports, but it certainly set the standard for how
the drawing board after that, it reset the development roughly a month after StarCraft. A game so seemingly
such events should be handled.
progress and really had to work hard to make this a title robust and ready to go at E3 1996 would still take
that would stand out in the way that they presumed longer to develop and release. The issue, it turns out,
was with problems at Ion Storm, but there was a
bigger surprise for Patrick and the team at Blizzard. “As Yet while this faked E3 presence from Dominion
Ion Storm started to disintegrate due to financial and Storm may have fooled even reputable game
political problems,” explains Patrick, “members of its developers, it was a catalyst that ultimately led to a
development teams left to pursue other opportunities. renewed vigour for the StarCraft project. What was once
From this crew, Blizzard managed to hire Mark Skelton intended as a quick title intended to fill a gap in Blizzard’s
and Patrick Thomas for the company’s then-burgeoning release schedule turned into the sort of epic release
cinematics team, where they worked to produce we’ve now come to expect from the developer. “What
some of Blizzard’s epic cutscenes. At some point I actually happened was that we were then buried in
talked with Mark and Patrick about how Dominion building Diablo at the time,” says Patrick. Blizzard North
Storm knocked us on our heels, and they let us in on was nearing completion of its genre-making action
Ion Storm’s secret: the demo was a prerendered movie, RPG, and it needed a strike team to help things along
and the people who showed the ‘demo’ were just so that it would reach its targeted release date. “A large
pretending to play! It would be an understatement to percentage of Blizzard staff actually started helping out
» [PC] The earlier missions gave a lot of leeway in how your base took
say that we were gobsmacked; we had been duped on that, until finally around December of 1996 basically
shape, but later levels could really kick your ass. into rebooting StarCraft.” everybody at Blizzard was not working on StarCraft
Winning
Strategies Tried-and-tested tactics that
will give you an edge
90 | RETRO GAMER
THE MAKING OF: STARCRAFT
unfinished one. This meant there was always room for Patrick says, “learning the tools – inadequate tools – and
improvements and innovation, and with the rise of CGI discovering how, on a budget, to render these scenes.
it was clear that Blizzard wanted to be at the forefront of We didn’t even have render farms, we sort of built
» [PC] In story missions, those who explored the map were rewarded with this new approach to storytelling if it was to truly present it out of desktops when people weren’t using them
additional – sometimes otherwise-inaccessible – units to add to their army. something that felt believable. “We were certainly sometimes. So it was just a huge challenge being so
looking a lot at what other game companies were doing resource constrained in that era.”
figures for all of Blizzard’s fictional universes – came in to and being inspired by what they did ,” admits Patrick, That devotion ultimately paid off. StarCraft was
create something that was compelling. This meant three “and so it was always a question of how can we take released to immediate success, selling a huge 1.5
different factions to play as, each playing very distinctly this stuff and go to the next level. I mean we had million in its first year before going on to achieve 9.5
from one another. started with WarCraft I doing cinematics with just two million copies sold worldwide. Critics praised the title,
people, and it was amazing for its time and the limited suggesting it was the standard by which all RTS games
uddenly, when we looked back at resources. It was all put together in 8-12 weeks by two will be measured. Today, the concept of a ‘Zerg-rush’ is
» [PC] The higher clarity visuals of the remaster will help make the
game a little more playable in a modern era.
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DAVID KELLY
David Kelly spent 20 years writing for, editing and publishing
games magazines, breaking big stories throughout the Eighties
and Nineties. Paul Drury gets to flick through his back pages
Not a great first impression. We always liked the full-colour covers you had on
They came back from the pub to see me and set me the early issues of the magazine.
the task of going off to interview the man at the BBC Yes, those science fiction covers made the magazine
responsible for the BBC Micro machine. I had to write look ritzy, even though inside the paper was just
a 1,000 words on that, which they were sufficiently newsprint. We commissioned three or four artists
94 | RETRO GAMER
IN THE CHAIR: DAVID KELLY
RETRO GAMER | 95
FIVE TO
to do them in rotation and they produced A3 Were you especially proud of any scoops?
airbrushed originals. Unfortunately, after a couple of We were the weekly in the market so we broke most
dozen issues, things weren’t going so well for us. of the news! For three years, we were the main source
96 | RETRO GAMER
me
Computing Weekly soon beca
» Popularwhere big stories first hit the new
sstands IN THE CHAIR: DAVID KELLY
the place
FROM THE
ARCHIVES
Did you ever receive pressure from a publisher to exclusives they’d got, even if I didn’t read it all. They Treasures from Dave’s work
give a game a good review? were doing a different thing from us. They were like the “When I was a reporter for Popular Computing Weekly,”
It was not uncommon [laughs]. ‘voice of the street’. They began like a fanzine and that recalls David, “I was required to write a page and a half
just wasn’t us. We were the ‘journal of record’ [laughs]. of news and do an interview for each issue. I would
Can you name names? We’d been there a long time before they arrived and get on a train and visit someone, take my camera for
No, because it was pretty much everyone. It’s a we didn’t intend to be as irreverent as they were. We the photos, develop the film at home in the evening
perennial problem for any magazine that reviews were coming from a different place. EMAP was a and it would all go in the magazine. I’ve still got all
anything. You get big multinational companies throwing FTSE-listed company and one of the biggest media the negatives I ever took!” Retro Gamer is, of course,
their toys out of the pram, saying, ‘You’ll never get groups in the country. Some of the things they did, we intrigued by this treasure trove of images from the
anything from us again!’ It’s endless. just couldn’t do! early days of the home computer industry and David
was keen to find a home for this collection. We are
Did you ever tell a reviewer to give a game a better What are your abiding memories of your two delighted to report David now intends to donate
mark than it deserved? years at the helm of Sinclair User? the Sunshine Publications archive to the National
No, never. If you cave once, you’ll be expected to do it Lots of late nights! I remember the games side being Videogame Arcade in Nottingham but not before your
next time and there’s no way back. To be honest, the very, very competitive. We were scrabbling for every favourite retro magazine has had chance to scan
games publishers know if a game is any good or not exclusive. The whole thing was really overheated. its contents. We wondered aloud if there might be
in their heart of hearts. It was usually around games something really revealing in there, like nude photos of
which were linked to other properties, like films. Those Were you especially pleased to secure the Sir Clive Sinclair. “I’m afraid not,” frowns David. “I have
games tended to be produced to a very tight deadline, exclusive on any particular game? got some of him sitting in a C5 but with clothes on.”
and they were almost universally terrible. To be honest, the games I remember tend to be just
before I started on Sinclair User, games like The Hobbit
Plus ça change. and Ant Attack... when they came in to the office, our
We’d get grief from the publishers because they, in jaws dropped and we just wondered how technically
turn, were getting grief from 20th Century Fox or it was possible. Same with Ultimate, when we saw Was it really fun? Didn’t you miss the buzz of the
Marvel or whoever. Jetpac and Knight Lore. It was a step change in terms games industry?
of quality. Huge sprites! The Stampers came from a I think I was able to bring a bit of the fun of the games
Talking of grief, what did you make of the Unclear background in arcade games and it showed. magazines to it. Business magazines can be very
User pisstake that Crash! magazine produced, po-faced, yet the IT guys who were reading PC User
poking fun at Sinclair User? Did you ever interview Tim and Chris Stamper? probably had a Spectrum at some point. I think I
That was just before I arrived but I think the powers I think I did. They were the hardest to get to see, managed to ‘relax’ some of the editorial to make it an
at EMAP sought an injunction to have it stopped. It without a doubt, though. The anonymity was part of easier read. We were based in Clerkenwell [in London]
was difficult because you can’t really have someone their thing. There was a mystique about them. and there was a rave scene going on around that time.
parodying your intellectual property but at the same time, We’d be coming in to work on a Sunday morning and
responding to it makes you the bad, corporate monster. Why did you leave Sinclair User? there would be all these ravers, staggering out from
I was offered a job as editor of PC User. My [team] clubs, who’d not been to bed yet...
Did you read Crash! to keep tabs on the team? went from four to 40, if you include all the marketing
We were in direct competition with them, so yes, I people. It was the biggest business magazine in the UK Were you ever tempted to join them, David?
was interested in what was on their cover and what by ad revenue. It was a huge challenge. but fun. No, the games industry at that time was based on
RETRO GAMER | 97
C&VG did well when there was an
upheaval in the games industry and
people were looking for the next
machine, the next great game
David Kelly
booze! Every industry has a drug of choice and in the days of the ZX81 when it was just blobs moving
the early days, it was always about going for a pint. At about. As games became more sophisticated, there
EMAP, we were right next to the City Pride pub and it was a sense you were taking stills, akin to a movie,
would be straight out the office, into there. And then a which of course is the way it’s gone. It was a reflection
curry. Then to bed and do it all again the next day. of the audience – they didn’t want acres of text, they
just wanted to see the games!
Though still at EMAP, you do return to games in
1993 when you take charge of Nintendo Magazine You were then tasked with relaunching the
System. Did it feel like coming home? granddaddy of games magazines, C&VG. What
Yes, of course. These were entertainment exactly does a ‘relaunch’ involve?
magazines more than information magazines. And Magazines do get tired. It’s like with football clubs:
games publishers are a lot more fun than your you bring in a new manager to reinvigorate the team.
g Computer + Video
nchin
was heavily involved with relau
» Davidwhile average PC manufacturer! Magazines need to follow the cultural zeitgeist. They
mag from 1994-1996.
Games at EMAP. He worked on the
have to be modern and look up to date. You soon know
NMS, along with Megatech and Sega Magazine, if something looks old fashioned. If you look, there must
which you also oversaw, rode the wave of the be eight or nine C&VG logos over the years. You can
SELECTED TIMELINE new 16-bit consoles. Did you feel you needed instantly tell it’s the same magazine but if you compare
a different approach for these magazines from the first to the last, you’ll see how much it’s changed.
PUBLICATIONS those based more on home computers?
■ POPULAR COMPUTING WEEKLY 1982-1986 Absolutely. The readers were much younger. The Were you proud to become part of the first games
■ SINCLAIR USER 1986-1988 core readership was 11-to-16-year-old boys and not magazine in the UK?
■ PC USER 1988-1990 much audience either side of that. Plus consoles were It was great. C&VG was the bedrock of games magazine
■ WHICH COMPUTER? 1990-1993 closed systems so there was no room for coverage publishing… but it was also problematic because it didn’t
■ NINTENDO MAGAZINE SYSTEM 1993-1996 about getting under the bonnet of your machine. The have an obvious solution to the problem of the runaway
■ MEGATECH 1993-1994 magazines were much more like music magazines success of individual machines.
■ C&VG 1994-1996 where essentially you’re reviewing that month’s releases.
■ GAMESPOT UK 1996-2002 Can you explain what you mean by that?
They took a more visual approach to covering When everyone had a SNES, they all wanted to read
games. Were you concerned that editorial was a Nintendo magazine. When I was at Sinclair User, the
being downgraded in favour of pretty pictures? Spectrum was pretty much at its peak so everyone
Not at all! Pictures are editorial. In fact, EMAP wanted to read about their machine and weren’t
pioneered the ‘lots of pictures, few words’ style. There really bothered about what was happening on the
hadn’t been much point using loads of screenshots in Commodore 64. Of course the problem [for
98 | RETRO GAMER
» As well as having overall charge of Sega
Magazine, David had considerable
input on Megatech, which championed the
Mega Drive and Mega-CD. IN THE CHAIR: DAVID KELLY
NICK
Puyo Puyo Tetris
As fun as WipEout Omega
is, it still can’t compare to
sitting down at lunchtime
and soundly thrashing the
guys at this.
▼ SOMETHING NEW
FORMULA FUSION (pc)
raced for the fourth time, having already the Nineties, but unleashing a quake
been available on PSP, PS3 and even on and watching your opponents fly into
Vita as an expansion for WipEout 2048. the air is as satisfying as it ever was,
While it’s always fun to revisit favourite and there’s still little that compares to
tracks from the past, a nagging sense defending your hard-earned first-place
of “been there, done that” can creep in finish from a barrage of rockets as the
when racing these campaigns if you’re music increases in intensity.
a series veteran. Still, improved visual Ultimately, WipEout: Omega
fidelity and more active online servers Collection is the definitive take on
will likely be enough to tempt many WipEout HD, Fury and 2048. We just
experienced anti-gravity pilots over to hope that this is proof of concept for a
» [PS4] This triple rocket blast is a surefire hit – that racer in front is toast.
the latest game, and all will appreciate brand-new game soon, because there’s
the chance to experience 2048 on a only so many times you can blast
Omega Collection shows the PS4 at that you’re being punished for being in huge TV without the slowdown that around Vineta K.
peak performance. Despite the game’s first place. occasionally marred the Vita version.
high-speed racing and weapons-based WipEout’s always been known for If you haven’t played WipEout since In a nutshell
carnage, the framerate stays locked at being a tricky series and that hasn’t the days of the original PlayStation, A generous package, offering a
60fps and if you’re playing on a PS4 changed, but beginners are eased though, you’re in for an absolute substantial amount of excellent
Pro you can experience it all at full 4K into the game gradually through the treat. WipEout: Omega Collection racing content with cutting-edge
resolution. It’s obvious that art has been campaign modes, which start with looks absolutely stunning and has presentation. This would have been
painstakingly reworked to maximise the simple races and time trials on low an appropriately thumping electronic great at full price, so the fact that
benefits of this performance, too. You speed classes before opening up the soundtrack, and the track designs here it’s substantially less than that is
might not notice too much difference fun stuff. Beside the savagery of the are among the best ever included in a excellent too.
between WipEout HD and its Omega faster speeds, you’ll get to enjoy fan WipEout game. The handling model
Collection version, especially at 1080p, favourite modes such as Eliminator isn’t quite as unforgiving as it was in >> Score 90%
but WipEout 2048’s tracks have had a (destroy other racers to win), Zone
huge bump in terms of texture quality (an endurance race with constant
and reworked trackside detail. acceleration) and Detonator (a shoot-
As for the actual gameplay, ’em-up mode). There’s plenty of variety
WipEout: Omega Collection benefits that keeps the game from just devolving
from over a decade of refinement. The into a simple procession of races, and
anti-gravity racers have their classic the presence of challenging targets will
handling model, with floaty turning that keep you coming back. Multiplayer is
requires deft air brake usage at higher offered in both local split-screen mode
speed classes. Weaponry is present for two players and online for up to
and correct, with items divided into eight, and with 26 tracks and 46 ships to
offensive and defensive categories pilot, you’ll be occupied for a long time
and activated on a per-race basis. As no matter which mode you prefer.
usual, the system favours skilled players Ironically, it might be the most
– while lagging racers will get better dedicated WipEout fans who have the
weapons such as lock-on missiles and least to gain from this compilation as the
the classic quake, you never get a sense WipEout HD/Fury content is now being » [PS4] 2048’s environments threw up some unusual graphical challenges – how often do you see grass in WipEout?
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Gamers
» [C64]
Wolfenstein,
as you’ve never
seen it before.
WHAT’S THE
TIME?
Owners of the C64 and a SuperCPU accelerator
will probably want to have a look at Wolf 3D, a
work-in-progress port of iD’s seminal first-person
shooter based on the original game’s source code.
» [ZX Spectrum] If only all Speccy games were this cheerful looking.
Players can choose between four colours with
beeper style sound or 16 colours with sampled
sound and, although the latter’s graphics aren’t
fully supported by Commodore emulator VICE at
the time of writing, the game can still be played.
Kikstart.eu/wolf-scpu goes to the author’s Mysterious Dimensions on the Spectrum
website where there is a download containing (Kikstart.eu/dimensions-spec) caught our attention,
images and loading instructions. so we grabbed developer Yerzmyey for a chat
Who was behind Mysterious black background which is
Yezmyey
assembler coding, hacking was kind of inspired by Gods
the AGD engine and linking from the 16-bit computers.
all the parts into one program. The third level was designed than our previous
VAUS The beeper music is by Mister
Beep project and Jonathan
to be reminiscent of Super
Frog on the Amiga. And the
platform game for
ZX Spectrum from 2012.
SCRAMBLES Cauldwell was a great moral
and intellectual support for us.
last one, for contrast, actually
has the black background but
Which is good, of course, as
our previous platformer was
AWAY The work took us something
like one year or so. We made
it’s because it is supposed to
be ‘dark’, as the action takes a
a real killer and even I cannot
walk through it nowadays even
It’s not finished yet but Arukanoido is a very the program within the activity place in caves. though it has 99 lives, exactly
promising clone of Taito’s classic brick-destroying of Jagiellonian University’s like Mysterious Dimensions.
coin-op Arkanoid, converted to the VIC 20 with UBU-Lab that is dedicated to Were there any high or
extra RAM. The latest version seems to be lacking (among other things) the demo low points during the And finally, is there anything
the enemies but pretty much everything else is scene and retro platforms from development? planned for the future you
present and we were much impressed by both the Eighties and Nineties. We had a big pause from can tell our readers about?
the graphics and ball movement. game-making due to personal At the moment we’re working
The Denial forum thread about the game’s Where did the game’s problems. After some time on an elaborate SF text
development which started way back in unique art style come from? I got back to work and I also adventure for Spectrum 128K.
» [VIC-20] Taking my
August 2015 is behind Kikstart.eu/arukanoido-vic bat and ball, then This is the only style of forced Hellboj to code. I wanted The biggest problem will be
with a link to the most recent build of the code in going home. graphics I’m able to make. the game to be longer and it to translate the game into the
the first post. On the other hand, most was supposed to have two English language, which might
ZX Spectrum games have a more levels. The problem be an expensive undertaking
is, however, at some point I for me, but I hope it will be
realised that I will release only possible and the game might
four levels or otherwise I will even be ready by the end of
never finish the game. this year. The script is ready and
now I’m working on graphics
What kind of feedback have and music so later I will get
you received? talking to Hellboj again, to
» [ZX Spectrum] Everybody needs a
That the game is not that make him code the new
collection of chalices around the house. bad. Also – it’s much simpler game’s engine.
JUBBLES
» forMat: SInclaIr Spectrum » Developer: Jonathan cauldwell » DownloaD: KIKStart.eu/JubbleS-Spec » price: free
The task set out by Jubbles is to There isn’t a time limit to keep an
guide bubbles as they drift from eye on and the bubbles will just keep
» [PC] This boss can be quite tough to defeat. left to right across the screen so coming indefinitely, so the only way
Concentrate your fire to quickly destroy it.
that they pop against the yellow to lose the game is to run out of the
flags and remove them from play. electricity which keeps the fans running
This proves to be easier said than and that’s shown as a gauge to the
done because the player can’t control left of the fans themselves. A bursting
the bubbles directly; instead they float bonus stage pops up regularly where
slowly downwards and there’s a row the player doesn’t have to worry about
of six electric fans at the bottom of the dying as they try to take down as many
» [ZX Spectrum] Marshalling the bubbles as they float screen which can be used to blow air bubbles as possible for extra score
through the level.
» [PC] If it moves kill it. If it doesn’t move, kill it wherever the player sees fit. before the timer expires.
anyway. It’s the only way you can be really sure. The early stages are simple enough We haven’t seen many new
because they’re all about getting the Spectrum games from Jonathan
player used to operating the fans Cauldwell recently, mostly in part
and how the bubbles react – they because he’s been busy working
accelerate and decelerate vertically away on Arcade Game Designer, so
so the overall effect on the bubble it was a pleasant surprise for us to
will differ depending on which fan is receive an email about this one. The
used – but it doesn’t take long before visuals are sparse, but functional,
some of those targets become harder and the soundtrack on AY-equipped
to hit, either, due to their positioning machines is excellent, but as with all
» [ZX Spectrum] It’s always a pleasant surprise to or because they’ve started moving. of Jonathan’s games it’s the gameplay
discover a new game from Jonathan Cauldwell.
Further bubble-bursting obstacles, in where this really stands out and the
the form of static and patrolling objects, unusual control method will keep
arrive shortly afterwards so success players busy for a while.
on the later stages will require some
thought and careful timing. >> Score 91%
STAR LETTER
HANDHELD HEAVEN
Dear Retro Gamer, not enough content for me and I’d
First off, I’d like to say that I love love to see handheld classics like
your magazine. It’s full of interesting Super Mario Land and GG Shinobi
features and I’m always impressed getting their own standalone
by the sheer amount of people you features. I’ve noticed the odd Game
get to talk to every issue. Having Boy Advance piece every now and
said that, there is one area of the then, which is much appreciated,
magazine that I feel you’re rather but what I’d really love to see is big
weak on, namely handheld gaming, pieces on the PSP and Nintendo
which has been a huge part of my DS. One of them was the biggest-
life growing up. selling handheld of all time, so it’s
I can’t remember the last time odd that it’s had very little coverage
you did a big behind-the-scenes in the magazine.
look at a classic handheld game, Jason Cooper
which is quite disappointing as a
long-time reader. I personally love Hi Jason. The main reason we
handheld gaming and it’s clear that don’t cover handheld games
many members of the team do as often as traditional releases
as well, so why is there so little is because of lack of access.
coverage in the magazine? I know There are lots of titles for
we’ve had minority reports on many which we’d love to do making
of the available handhelds, but it’s ofs or ultimate guides, but
we pride ourselves on our
developer access first and Two-page bliss
foremost, and this can be quite I would just like to say I’m really liking » [PC] An article about Call Of Cthulhu: Dark Corners Of The
tough if the games originated the tight two-page spread format used Earth will appear in a future issue of the issue.
CONTACT US
Snail Mail: Retro Gamer,
Future Publishing, Richmond House,
33 Richmond Hill, Bournemouth,
Dorset, BH2 6EZ Future Publishing Limited
Editorial
Editor Darran ‘Master’ Jones
darran.jones@futurenet.com
although I’ve had a dozen consoles I’m sorry that’s not much to go on. 01202 586237
since then. So, the gaming highlight Thanks for any help you can give me. DISCUSSED THIS MONTH Production Editor Drew ‘Puppetmaster’ Sleep
of the last year has been Project ZX Lee Wiseman Senior Staff Writer Nick ‘Red Mage’ Thorpe
Darran’s DS Collection Designer Sam ‘Sky Pirate’ Ribbits
by Richard Langford. I have not seen Not content with collecting original Xbox, Game Photographer James Sheppard
a review and wonder if there are Worry not, Lee, for we know Boy Advance and PS Vita games, Darran has now
Group Editor In Chief Tony Mott
plans to cover this masterpiece? On a exactly which game you’re talking turned his attention to the DS. Originally content
to collect both American and European titles, Senior Art Editor Warren Brown
positive note, I loved the Horace piece about. It’s Olli & Lissa 3: The he had something of a crisis halfway through
recently and thought for a minute you Candlelight Adventure, which his collecting and suddenly decided he could Contributors
only live with the uniformity of the American and Adam Barnes, Sarah Banks, Van Burnham, David Crookes, Paul
were going to find William Tang! was coded by Simon Clarke and Drury, Andrew Fisher, Phil King, Kieren Hawken, Jason Kelk, Graeme
Japanese releases. Who knows what he’ll be
Michael released in 1990. Hope it’s as good collecting next issue…
Mason, Rory Milne, Samuel Roberts, Paul Walker-Emig
From the forum We are committed to only using magazine paper which is derived
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better the speccy was! Buggy NorthWay » [C64] Mayhem and NorthWay are both big fans of at the time of going to press. Future cannot accept any responsibility for
Epyx’s Impossible Mission. We love it, too. errors or inaccuracies in such information. You are advised to contact
Boy showed how a game could Impossible Mission, Dropzone. manufacturers and retailers directly with regard to the price of products/
be translated from the arcade lots of others. services referred to in this publication. Apps and websites mentioned
teachers ater my own). Bubble handcart very quickly. and you’re in this publication are not under our control. We are not responsible for
in a format that was perfect Bobble (i won a copy in a Zzap!64 in the middle of it. their contents or any other changes or updates to them. This magazine
for far less powerful home fredghostmaster is fully independent and not afiliated in any way with the companies
competition all those years ago). mentioned herein.
machines. Wizball – unbelievable Never owned a Commodore Parallax (that title music man...). kiwimike
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game. Chunky graphics but (’coz of the poKe i used to thumping chaos. and Project mrmessy
boy was that an atmospheric use to destroy all enemies on Firestart, for… well, seeing Dropzone. i did not play it back in ISSN 1742-3155
game! also Master of Magic screen (poKe 4242,42 sYs ‘danger’ written in blood within the day. i irst played it about ten
by Mastertronic, as it had that 2128)). Skool Daze (i was still at the irst two minutes means the years ago. To me, it is The stand-
haunting and very long hubbard school, come on – naming the whole thing’s gone to hell in a out game on the C64.
THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ALL YOUR
CHILDHOOD FAVOURITES
Whether it’s Star Wars, SuperTed, Sesame Street or Smurfs, The Ultimate
Retro Collection is a celebration of the movies, music and toys that
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METAL SLUG X
» There’s one simple rule to follow when
dealing with aliens who want to invade your
planet: don’t form an alliance with them.
Unfortunately, General Morden isn’t the brightest
tool in the shed, and has formed a pact with the
Mars People to wipe out the Peregrine Falcon
squad for good. How well does that work out
for him? Let’s skip to the end of this SNK classic
to ind out…
01 02 03
» Ater failing to follow our golden rule, » Having seen Independence Day, the » The Mars People’s transport ship
Morden is somehow still surprised by pilot igured that lying his plane into the manages to detach from the mothership
the consequences of his actions: an mothership’s cannon would bring it down, in time to avoid complete obliteration, but
alien invasion, complete with gigantic and he wasn’t wrong. An enormous it’s still far too damaged to ly away and
mothership. Thankfully, one of his pilots is explosion engulfs the battleield, bringing quickly explodes – and lucky us, there’s
willing to make a heroic sacriice… an end to the interplanetary hostilities. even a special treat inside the vessel!
04 05
» A captive General Morden is ejected from the wrecked crat, » To the horror of his men, Morden falls lat. Now all that’s
to the rapturous applause of the six grunts that didn’t perish let is for the two sides to rebuild their shattered communities
during this insane conlict. Our heroine Fio doesn’t shoot, safe in following this entirely stupid battle – a conlict which could
the knowledge that he’ll easily be taken in alive. Just desserts for easily have been completely avoided if the bad guys had just
instigating this needless war, really. followed a very simple rule. Idiots.