Wednesday 23 February 2022

My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.20

Terra Cresta

Imagine

1986

Massively underrated by ZZAP! IMO, this is a great little game with nice graphics, a superb Galway soundtrack and addictive gameplay that captures the feel of the original very effectively.

 


My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.19

Rampage

Activision

1987

A solid conversion of the arcade hit with lots of fun to be had eating people, bringing down helicopters and smashing up buildings. Most fun when played with friends – unless you were the kid playing on the keyboard!

 


My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.18

Slap Fight

Imagine

1987

A vertically scrolling shooter not a million miles away from Terra Cresta, Slap Fight is another quality conversion from Imagine. Challenging but addictive it was well revieved by most mags with C&VG awarding it a 10/10 HIT.

 


 

My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.17

Yie Ar Kung Fu

Imagine

1985

Another Imagine conversion (and another by Dave Collier who’s already got 2 on the list and we’re only up to 17) YAKF is a sound conversion of the hugely influential arcade game. Nice colourful graphics, ace music and plenty of enjoyable arcade action.

 


My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.16

Commando

Elite, 1985

Instantly addictive with nice graphics, an amazing Rob Hubbard soundtrack and gameplay that’s not as ridiculously hard as the arcade original, Commando could’ve been the perfect arcade conversion – if only it had another 5 levels! Check out the recent ‘Arcade’ update to see what might’ve been.

 


My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.15

Tapper

Sega, 1984

An early C64 arcade conversion, Tapper is a superb home remake of the arcade classic. Lovely colourful graphics featuring big lovely sprites, and simple but highly addictive gameplay, make for lots of fun arcade action.

 


My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.14

Spy Hunter

Sega 1983

Another early arcade conversion, Spy Hunter is a excellent version of the racing, chasing, smashing, spinning and oil slicking classic. Addictive gameplay, nice graphics and a great rendition of the super cool Peter Gun theme tune.

 


My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.13

Bionic Commando

Go! 1988

Another game with awesome music (6 superb SIDs in all), BC is s cracking conversion from Software Creations. Instantly playable, hugely addictive and captures the spirit of the coin-op perfectly.

 


My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.12

Salamander

Imagine 1988

One of the C64’s best shoot ‘em ups this is a fantastic conversion – especially the infamous lava level which is stunningly recreated. It would no doubt be top 5 if I’d had a disk drive, but the tape version multiload was an absolute killer.

 


 

My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.11

Combat School

Ocean 1987

Joystick abuse was back in vogue with the arrival of this excellent conversion from Ocean (Dave Collier’s 3rd game on the list already!). A cool mix of running, shooting and beat ‘em up-ing, it’s tough but great fun.

 


My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.10

Rainbow Islands

Ocean 1990

This superb conversion (Ocean again) would’ve been higher in my list if I’d played it more as by the time it came out I’d gone Amiga and only played this at a mate’s house. Fantastically colourful and brilliantly playable.

 


My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.9

Ikari Warriors

Elite 1988

By ’88 run & gun games had become old hat but this cracking conversion with it’s co-op gameplay, brought new life into the genre. Difficult but highly addictive, it’s best played with a buddy.

 


My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.8

Arkanoid

Imagine 1987

Who’d thought that 10 years after Breakout, bat and ball games would be massively popular again? This was of course due to the superb Arkanoid. A fab conversion of the simple but mega-addictive original.

 


My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.7

Operation Wolf

Ocean 1988

A few eyebrows were raised when Ocean announced they were bringing this state-of-the-art arcade game to 8-bit micros, but the Manchester software house proved the doubters wrong with this superb all-action conversion.

 


My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.6

Green Beret

Imagine 1986

WOOOOOO! WOOOO! Green Beret is a cracking conversion of the arcade game (also known as Rush n’ Attack – subtle, eh?). Commie killing action (a game that probably couldn’t have been made in any other decade!) at its best.

 


My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.5

Buggy Boy

Elite 1987

An interesting one this. Not a conversion that looks much like the original, the Thomas brothers (Staff of Karnath, Entombed) made a game inspired by the arcade original. And what a brilliant game it is too. Top fun.

 


My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.4

Gauntlet

US Gold 1986

While graphics & sound are a bit meh, the excitement and fun of the original is captured perfectly in this superb conversion. With so much on screen at once it’s technically very impressive & with a mate it’s brilliant fun.

 


My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.3

Ghosts N Goblins

Elite 1986

Like Commando this is an abridged version of the original but thankfully Chris Butler crammed much more of the arcade game into this. An awesome conversion, it’s tough but great fun and has an ace theme tune to boot.

 


My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.2

Hyper Sports

Imagine 1985

A fabulous conversion of the Track & Field sequel, Hyper Sports captures the original game perfectly. Brilliant gameplay, ace graphics & an amazing Galway soundtrack – an Olympic gold standard game.

 


My favourite C64 Arcade Conversions – No.1

Bubble Bobble

Firebird 1987

One of the greatest C64 games ever - simple as that. A flawless conversion. Beautifully made,  incredibly playable & plays just as well today as it did 35 years ago. There aren’t many games you can say that about. Magnificent. 



Monday 21 February 2022

My Top 20 C64 Racing Games

My Favourite C64 Race Games No.20

Pole Position

Atarisoft

1984

A solid conversion of the game that launched a thousand racers, with colourful graphics, good sound & decent gameplay. It was quickly overtaken (see what I did there!) by better racers, but when first released it was pretty darn cool.




My Favourite C64 Race Games No.19

Out Run

US Gold

1988

Converting the state-of-the-art arcade sensation to a 6-year-old 8-bit micro was never going to be easy. C64 Out Run is fast & initially good fun but the ropey controls and linear gameplay (you can’t choose your route) is disappointing.

(Link to the fascinating backstory of C64 Out Run)

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2019-10-13-the-boy-behind-the-biggest-coin-op-conversion-of-the-80s





My Favourite C64 Race Games No.18

Super Sprint

Electric Dreams

1987

The classic 2D overhead racer got a sound C64 conversion that looks a lot like the original with cool car sprites & well drawn tracks. Instantly addictive & fab in 2 player mode, its marred by dodgy collision detection & a few annoying bugs.    





My Favourite C64 Race Games No.17

Kik Start

Mastertronic

1985

Okay, it can be frustrating as hell, but Kikstart is top fun when you get the hang of it. Graphics & sound are unspectacular but the gameplay is fantastic and at £1.99 it was crazy good value. Wooooooooooo!  





My Favourite C64 Race Games No.16

Tour de France

Activision

1985

Cars and motorbikes dominate the racer genre, but there are a few cycling titles out there and this is one of the best. Colourful, detailed graphics, nice music and lots of good old-fashioned joystick waggling gameplay. Tres Bon!





My Favourite #C64 Race Games No.15

Alleykat

Hewson

1986

Some may argue that Alleykat is a shooter, but it’s a future sport about racing, so I’m including it here. Incredibly polished with superb presentation & brilliant graphics, Alleykat is a tough but highly rewarding game.  




My Favourite C64 Race Games No.14

Professional BMX Simulator

Codemasters

1988

The BMX Simulator sequel has better graphics, more varied courses, & superb presentation (including slo-mo action replays), but the best thing about it is the simultaneous 4 player gameplay. Fantastic fun.





My Favourite C64 Race Games No.13

Revs

Firebird

1986

Revs is a serious racing car simulator that requires a bit of time & practice before you reap its rewards. Brilliantly presented, and with excellent 3D graphics and highly compulsive gameplay, it’s a terrific racer.



My Favourite C64 Race Games No.12

Ivan 'Ironman' Stewart's Super Off Road

Virgin

1990

This quasi-3D Super Sprint / Racing Destruction Set mash-up is excellent. Smashing & jumping your way around the track & racing your opponents to the finish is fantastic fun. Still plays well today esp against friends.



My Favourite C64 Race Games No.11

Spy Hunter

Sega

1983

Like Alleykat, Spy Hunter is an exciting mix of racing and blasting. Very impressive for 1983, it has nice graphics, super-cool music and immediately compulsive gameplay. An excellent conversion.



My Favourite C64 Race Games No.10

Speed King

Digital Integration

1985

Inspired by Pole Position and the Speccy game Full Throttle, Speed King is a cracking motorbike racer that’s superbly presented, has fast 3D graphics and very good sound. Instantly addictive and great fun, it’s a top game. 



My Favourite C64 Race Games No.9

Trailblazer

Gremlin

1986

A kind of cross between of Pitstop 2 and Bounder, this split-screen 3D racer is very fast and enormous fun – especially in head-to-head mode. Simple but effective, it’s hugely addictive & incredibly enjoyable.




My Favourite C64 Race Games No.8

Cosmic Causeway

Gremlin

1987

A very worthy sequel to Trailblazer, Cosmic Causeway looks, sounds and plays even better than its predecessor. Stunningly fast 3D, exhilarating action and superb Space Harrier influenced gameplay make it an absolute beauty.



My Favourite C64 Race Games No.7

Rally Speedway

Commodore

1985

Simple but ridiculously playable, Rally Speedway is an absolute gem. It has basic graphics & sound but the gameplay - in 2 player mode especially – is amazing. Bags of humour and a track editor too. What more do you lot want?!



My Favourite C64 Race Games No.6

Stunt Car Racer

MicroStyle

1989

Geoff Crammond’s second entry on the list is a highly original and technically astounding game. Whizzing around rollercoaster tracks performing outrageous jumps and causing spectacular crashes is as much fun as it sounds.  



My Favourite C64 Race Games No.5

Kikstart 2

Mastertronic

1987

Shaun Southern was the master of the C64 racer. This is his 4th game on the list! (Kikstart, Trailblazer, Cosmic Causeway) and what a beauty it is. Slick presentation, great graphics, an ace track editor and brilliant gameplay. All for under £2? Shut up!



My Favourite C64 Race Games No.4

Racing Destruction Set

EA

1985

Racers are often at their best in two player mode and this is no exception. Chasing your mate around the track & smashing them off the road, dropping oil slicks in front of them & out jumping them on 0 gravity tracks is some of the best fun you can have with a C64. 



My Favourite C64 Race Games No.3

Super Cycle

Epyx

1988

The breadbin’s answer to Hang-on is an excellent game with the usual Epyx high standards of graphics, presentation and gameplay. Fast, thrilling and instantly addictive, it’s by far the best bike game on the C64.



My Favourite C64 Race Games No.2

Buggy Boy

Elite

1987

More about fun and less about serious racing simulation, Buggy Boy is a brilliant game that’s stood the test of time incredibly well. Graphics and sound are good but it’s the outstanding gameplay that makes it. Timeless.



My Favourite C64 Race Games No.1

Pitstop 2

Epyx

1984

Part-coded by Impossible Mission’s Dennis Caswell, PS2 was mind-blowing in 1984. The speed, the exhilarating, cramp-inducing head-to-head action & the risk/reward strategy place it in pole position on my list of fave racers. Magnificent.



Wednesday 15 January 2020


Saturday Afternoon Fever

Since as long as I can remember Saturday afternoon has been synonymous with shopping in the town centre.  When I was between the ages 8 and 10 this was a torturous ordeal which involved being dragged around town by our Susan (my big sister) to allow mum to get on with the cleaning in peace while dad disappeared somewhere for the day – apparently to his allotment.  Susan - seven years older than me - like many teenage girls in the 80s, enjoyed looking around the clothes shops such as Chelsea Girl and Clockhouse.  As an eight or nine year old boy I enjoyed it somewhat less and reluctantly traipsed behind her as she fluttered from shop to shop like a fashion butterfly. After what felt like a lifetime of window shopping (I don’t remember her ever buying much more than bits of cheap jewellery) we’d catch the 575 from the bus depot up to Chorley New Road near Bolton School to my Gran’s on Curzon Road. Once there, if we hadn’t grabbed a Greenhalgh’s pasty from the Arndale earlier, we’d be filled up with a Goblin pudding each and left to our own devices until Mum and Dad arrived at tea time.

There was never anything to do at Gran’s.  No friends lived nearby, there was no bike to go out on, no football and only a few old and bettered board games to play with - nothing in the way of electronic entertainment that’s for sure. In fact, gran didn’t even have a vacuum cleaner but still used a carpet sweeper which seemed to just spread the dust around the room rather than clean it up.  There was a telly (and it was colour) but on a Saturday afternoon in the early 80s all it had to offer was Grandstand or World of Sport which only seemed to show an endless stream of horseracing and wrestling.  I have to say that after a busy week at school, Saturday morning wasn’t the most exhilarating start to the weekend.

To be fair to our Susan it was probably worse for her. Not only did she have a grumpy little brother to look after who spoiled her Saturday shopping spree with his miserable face but she also had to spend the afternoon in the rather gloomy and fun free house of our strict Gran – it couldn’t have been much fun for a teenager.

Fortunately, my recent move to secondary school signalled an increase in both my age and maturity and it was mercifully decided that I was no longer required to accompany Susan around the shops on a Saturday morning.  Hurrah! It was no doubt an incredible relief for both of us.  Instead I was given £2 pocket money and the freedom to choose my own entertainment.  What a wonderful liberation it was.  This was the autumn of 1985. I had just become a Commodore 64 owner and was hungry for games. My newfound financial and physical freedom couldn’t have come at a better time. 

From then onwards Saturdays were transformed from a nightmare into an absolute dream.  I was master of my destiny.  Bolton was my oyster and £2 was burning a hole in my pocket.  No longer would I suffer the slings and arrows of Chelsea Girl and Clockhouse.  Now I could go where I wanted and do what I wanted with whom I wanted.  It felt wonderful. 

Tuesday 30 January 2018

The History of Zzap! 64 – Part 1

Genesis

Picture the scene. It’s the early 1980s and the home computer boom is exploding across the UK. From John o’ Groats to Land’s End, homes across the country are being invaded by ‘micro computers’ as thousands of British kids excitedly rip open the wrapping paper on a Christmas or birthday present to reveal a ZX Spectrum, Vic-20, Oric-1 or – if they were really lucky – a Commodore 64.

A computer (alongside the snooker table and BMX) was the most coveted present of the 1980s and many parents were more than happy to oblige their children. With little more than a vague notion that owning a computer would equip their beloved offspring with essential skills for life in the rapidly approaching C21st century, mums and dads across Britain parted with quite enormous sums of money (the price of a C64 in 1984 was £230 – the equivalent of £540 today!) to ensure that their son or daughter had a computer at home.

Of course, most teenagers only had one thing on their mind when it came to computers. Learning how to word process, produce a spreadsheet or build a database was no doubt a useful thing to learn, but most kids were interested in one thing – games. Just like the music business in the 1960s, the games industry of the 80s grew at a rapid rate.  By 1984 the biggest selling computer games, such as Jet Set Willy and Daley Thompson’s Decathlon, were shifting hundreds of thousands of units and it was quickly evident that there was a lot of money to be made in the games industry. With sales of computer games growing exponentially it was no surprise that in 1984 dozens of new software houses sprang up and literally thousands of new computer games hit the shelves.

For the game hungry teenager this was both a blessing and a curse.  The good news was that there were hundreds of new titles coming out every month. Never before had gamers had so many games to choose from. However, the bad news was that a very large percentage of them were absolute tosh. A number of publishers were guilty of churning out games to meet demand with little care for quality or the consumer. The average price of a game in 1984 was £6.50 - which was a good few week’s pocket money - so you had to be very careful.  Many a cassette was adorned with awesome artwork that hid an awful game.

In this pre-internet era, game buying guidance was available in the form of computer magazines.  Commodore User, Commodore Computing International and Commodore Horizons were the most widely read C64 magazines of the early to mid-eighties, whilst multiplatform magazines such as Computer & Video Games covered the ZX Spectrum, the BBC, the C64, the Amstrad and to a lesser extent the Oric-1 and Dragon 32.  The quality of these magazines was mixed to say the least, with some having an almost ‘anti-games’ attitude.  Commodore Horizons, for example, contained a thin smattering of half-baked game reviews reluctantly written by journalists who would probably have been much happier writing copy about circuit boards than zapping aliens.

The exception, in the early years, was Personal Computer Games.  Launched in July 1983 this excellent magazine was devoted to the fledgling culture of gaming and - I think it’s safe to say - was the pioneer of the modern videogames magazine.  Its writers were young, witty and, most importantly, understood and loved computer games.  Personal Computer Games (PCG) was edited by Yeovil lad and publishing-millionaire-to-be-Chris Anderson.  Yet, despite its brilliance, by February 1985 it had disappeared from the newsagents’ shelves for ever. Why PCG suddenly vanished is a bit of a mystery - one rumour was that a lack of advertising revenue had killed it off. Whatever the reason for its demise, it was a terrible shame and (as evident in the letters page of Zzap!64 issue one) gamers up and down the country were gutted.


As Chris cleared out his office, 150 miles away, in the sleepy Shropshire town of Ludlow, freelance artist Oliver Frey, Oli’s brother Franco and their business partner Roger Kean had recently founded the publishing company Newsfield. The origins of Newsfield Publications can be traced back to the late 1960s when Oliver Frey met Roger Kean at the London Film School.  The two quickly became close friends but when the course ended in December 1970 each went their separate ways.  Zurich born Frey, unable to get work in the film industry due to regulations over foreign workers, returned to Switzerland and Kean got a job as an assistant film editor at the BBC.

Yet the two weren’t parted for long. In the early 70s, Roger jacked in his job at the BBC and joined Oli in Switzerland. Together they spent a year trying to get a commercial film company up and running but were ultimately unsuccessful. In the end, Roger returned to England and resumed being a film editor while Oli remained in Switzerland drawing War Picture Library comic book stories for Fleetway Publications.

Again, the separation didn’t last long. Due to the exchange rate between Sterling and the Swiss Franc, Oli was getting less and less return for his work and decided to relocate to England where he was reunited with Roger Kean. The pair settled in North London and Frey found regular work as a freelance illustrator and worked for numerous publishers including IPC Magazines and Oxford University Press.

Throughout the seventies his reputation as an artist grew and the work he was commissioned to do became increasingly prestigious.  He worked on ‘The Trigan Empire’ and ‘SOS International’ taking over from legendary comic book artist Don Lawrence; and then in 1978 his work reached a global audience when he provided the comic book art for the wonderful opening sequence to Superman: The Movie.

In October 1982 Oli and Roger left the hustle and bustle of London for the olde worlde country charm of Ludlow in Shropshire.  A short while later they were joined by Oli’s brother Franco. Franco had developed an interest in the emerging home micro scene and was in contact with a German company who were keen to import ZX Spectrum games. Franco bought himself a Speccy to research the market and, as the three of them play tested games on Franco’s new computer, they had the idea of setting up a mail order service.  A partnership was established in June 1983 and Oli was given the task of drawing illustrations for a magazine advertisement and mail order catalogue while Roger and Franco worked on the business side of things.

Roger and Oli were keen on short, sharp titles, and Kean — as a JG Ballard fan — had always liked the title Crash despite its rather negative computer connotations. A month later, the first ad for Crash Micro Games Action appeared, appropriately enough, in issue one of Personal Computer Games magazine.

Crash Micro Games Action was an instant success with the Spectrum community and within a few months the idea of turning the catalogue into a magazine was born.  Crash was proposed to WH Smith, who immediately accepted and was duly launched on 13 January 1984 at a cover price of 75p.
With its rebellious attitude and brutally honest approach to games reviews, Crash was an instant success and within only a few months it was selling tens of thousands of copies per issue. Oli, Roger and Franco had come up with a winning formula; but not content to rest on their laurels, the Newsfield team looked around to see how they could expand and build on their accomplishments.

The most obvious opportunity beyond the Spectrum world was the rapidly growing Commodore 64 games scene. By 1985 gaming was growing quicker on the C64 than on any other computer on the planet, but existing Commodore mags were reluctant to take it seriously. Commodore User, Commodore Horizons and Your Commodore lacked both a genuine love of games and the energy and wit to write about them enthusiastically.  In fact, other than Crash, the only computer magazine with a genuine love of gaming was Personal Computer Games, so it must’ve been a pleasant surprise when the Crash office phone rang one day in 1985 and on the end of the line was PCG editor Chris Anderson.

On hearing on the grapevine that Newsfield were thinking seriously of launching a C64 magazine, Chris rang Roger Kean from a phone box off Oxford Street and put forward himself as editor. His reasons were several, but principally 1) he was disenchanted with PCG’s publisher VNU; 2) he wanted to concentrate on a single format title; and 3) he hated the daily commute between Yeovil and the PCG offices in London. Roger and Chris discussed the possibility of Chris setting up Zzap! in Yeovil and soon after Chris resigned his PCG editorship and joined Newsfield. It was a great coup for the lads from Ludlow. PCG was a ‘real’ (London-based) magazine and Newsfield had been dubbed by EMAP as ‘rural pirates’. Chris wanting to join Newsfield was both a ringing endorsement and significant recognition of what the Crash team had achieved to that point.

After a few discussions, and an agreement to drop the originally suggested names of ‘Sprite and Sound’ and ‘Bang!’ (one idea was to have three magazines for the Speccy, 64 and Amstrad called Crash! Bang! and Wallop! respectively), Chris threw himself into his new post and within a couple of months Zzap!64 was born.

One of Crash’s unique features was to use school kids to review games.  The thinking behind it being that reviews would be more credible if they were written by the kind of kids that were buying the games and that this would create a close relationship between the magazine and its readers.  This worked surprisingly well in Crash, but Chris Anderson was adamant that the reviews in Zzap!64 weren’t going to follow the same pattern.  Chris didn’t want Zzap to be written by reluctant game-hating ‘computer journalists’, but neither did he want a bunch of school kids piling into the office at half past three every day.  Chris had brought reviewer Bob Wade with him from PCG, but he wanted two more writers so that each game could be reviewed by at least three people. 

In the end, a solution was found in the form of two nineteen year olds who had recently been finalists in a PCG competition to find Britain’s greatest gamer.  It was a perfect fit as they were both exceptional gamers and also displayed a flair for writing.  Their names were Gary Penn and Julian Rignall.  So, with experienced editor Chris at the helm and the enthusiastic review team of Bob Wade, Gary Penn and Julian Rignall in place, the job of bringing Zzap!64 issue one to life got underway in earnest.

Zzap!64 first hit the shelves on April 11th, 1985.  The cover of Issue One featured a brilliant piece of Oliver Frey art depicting a scene from the game Elite, and the magazine enticed the would-be buyer with the promise of an ‘Incredible 50 pages of reviews’. Issue One was a mammoth 132 pages long and featured 39 game reviews.  The highest scoring was Firebird’s Elite with 95% - Zzap’s first Gold Medal game - and the lowest was Activision’s Web Dimension with a paltry 27%.  In addition to the reviews, Issue One featured:

a highly amusing letters page known as the ‘Zzap! Rrap’
the Zzap Challenge in which Julian Rignall defeated Gary Penn and Bob Wade at Impossible Mission
the Zzap!64 Top 64 (1. Boulder Dash, 2. Impossible Mission, 3. Decathlon, 4. International Soccer, 5. PSI Warrior)
A suitably off beat column by psychedelic programmer Jeff Minter
An in-depth article about the C64 games industry featuring David Tomkins from Commodore, Tim Chaney from US Gold, Ian Stewart from Gremlin Graphics and Andy Walker from Taskset; all of whom waxed lyrical about the 64’s capabilities and its rosy future
An interview with Tony Crowther which revealed that he didn’t actually play games and wasn’t very keen on Jeff Minter
A massive tips section which included beautiful maps of The Lords of Midnight and The Staff of Karnath
An article about music software which judged that Activision’s Music Maker was the best (85%) while Quicksilva’s Ultisynth (46%) left much to be desired
The White Wizard who provided the low down on the Adventure games scene
Zzap! Flash in which ‘Ed Banger’ revealed sneak previews of upcoming titles like World Series Baseball and Thing on a Spring as well as reporting that Boots had cut the in store price of the C64 by £80 to a more family budget friendly £150 
And a little guy in the margins known as Rockford

Packed with content and bursting with a humour and energy that even made Crash look a little tame, it was 132 pages of brilliance.

Compared to its contemporaries, Zzap!64 was light years ahead. Like its big brother Crash, Zzap was designed to promote the thrill of playing games. From Issue One, games were scrutinised by two or three reviewers to present a balanced spread of opinion, and the very best games - the Gold Medals and Sizzlers - had colour coverage of two and sometimes three or four pages in length.  Zzap! captured the spirit of a fanzine but had the substance of a professional publication, and while in the very early days it may have been a bit amateurish in places, it struck a chord with its readers who instantly fell in love with it. Somebody once said that a great magazine is like a good friend dropping by. I couldn’t agree more. Every month I looked forward to Zzap!64 turning up at my front door and I absolutely loved the time I spent reading it. It made me laugh, it made me think and it developed in me, at a young age, a love of reading which I have kept for the rest of my life.

So, there you are – Part One of my History of Zzap!64. I hope you enjoyed it. Join me next time when I’ll be looking at issues 2, 3 and 4. An era of great games – Pitstop 2, MULE, Dropzone, Way of the Exploding Fist and Beach Head 2 – but a tumultuous time behind the scenes with office relocation, editorial disagreements and … well you’ll just have to wait until next time to find out!

Martin C Grundy