Indholdsfortegnelse for No. 257 i Retro Gamer

DARRAN JONES Issue 82’s Mario advent calendar. It’s probably the most creative thing I’ve ever birthed from my tired old brain. Expertise: Juggling a gorgeous wife, two beautiful girls and an award-winning magazine, all under one roof! Currently playing: Ender Lilies: Quietus Of The Knights Favourite game of all time: OutRun 2006: Coast 2 Coast ANDY SALTER 236. I love the Ryu pixelart cover along with the accompanying subs cover. Expertise: Modding games, no ‘vanilla’ versions for me, thanks! Currently modding: Total War: Rome Remastered – RTR: Imperium Surrectum Favourite game of all time: Rome: Total War although I guess it’s the Remastered edition now DAVID CROOKES Issue 19: following fears Retro Gamer had ended after a good run under Live Publishing, saviour Imagine stepped in. We haven’t looked back since (well, we…

Official PlayStation Magazine “By rights it shouldn’t even be called a game. It’s a slap in the face of games.” What has drawn OPM’s ire? A release of Dragon’s Lair on Blu-Ray, which scored 1/10. “It’s a shame our scoring system doesn’t go any lower,” it concludes. Official Nintendo Magazine “I feel sorry for Bradley Wright-Phillips. Why does Ian never appear in adverts with him?” asks forum user Wreck_and_Rule, who claims “comedy football appeals as much to me as having my eyeball perforated with a rusty needle”. Official Xbox 360 Magazine “I have spent £83.86 on your magazine,” says reader TKC Dr Zoidberg, who claims to be a student that can’t regularly afford games. “I really like your magazine, but I could buy both Guitar Hero II and Command &…

PRESUMABLY, YOU’RE A FAN OF THE MSX? I got my first MSX computer in 1985 and I’ve been hooked ever since then. It’s not a ‘retro’ thing for me since I have never stopped using MSX machines. WHAT MEMORIES DO YOU HAVE OF THE ORIGINAL MAGIC KNIGHT GAMES, PARTICULARLY SPELLBOUND? Believe it or not, I only discovered Spellbound a few years ago. I bought Knight Tyme back in the day and found it hypnotic and fascinating. Later, I got a pirated copy of the other Magic Knight titles that were available for the MSX. However, Knight Tyme was the only Magic Knight game I ever managed to finish. WHAT DO YOU THINK MAKES SPELLBOUND SO SPECIAL? Spellbound established a new genre that we’d never seen before – a mix between…

DUST-UP IN THE DESERT ■ Dust and its Middle Eastern setting actually originates from the cancelled Team Fortress 2: Brothers In Arms. Screenshots of this never-to-be-released Valve sequel were actually used by the map’s creator, Dave Johnson, to recreate textures used in Dust. ALPHA PROTOCOL ■ With only two entrances into bomb site A, if the CTs can get there quickly enough to defend it the Terrorists will have a tough time planting the bomb here. PEEK-A-BOO ■ The archways and doorways of Dust add an iconic look and feel to the map, but also give the opportunity for those handy with a sniper rifle to hold their positions securely. BETA BOMB ■ Bomb site B, which is also the CT spawn, is intentionally protected with these weapon crates that…

What was the starting point for Counter-Strike? I had previously worked on a mod called Action Quake2 that had a lot of elements that I borrowed from. Notably, it had realistic weaponry, and it was a Round-Based game that didn’t have player respawning. Shortly after finishing Half-Life, Valve announced they would be releasing an SDK that would allow modders to create mods for the game engine. I immediately began creating art assets such as weapons and characters. It took me several months to create an initial prototype. After a few weeks, I was contacted by Jess Cliffe who was a huge fan of Action Quake2 and had previously hosted a community website that showcased the best user-created levels for AQ2. He was quickly able to convince a few mappers to…

“ONE OF THE FOUNDATION STONES OF THIS WORLD WAS YOU SHOULD BE ALLOWED TO BE WHOEVER YOU WANT TO BE”PETER MOLYNEUX There are few releases which can be said to have had as much of an impact on the games industry as Fable, a title that upended the RPG rulebook by focussing on emergent gameplay rather than grand quests, all with a healthy dose of British humour. Its influence is plain to see in later games like Mass Effect, with its choice between good and evil paths, but its creation was far from smooth. Peter Molyneux traces the origin of Fable back to the time when Bullfrog, the company he founded, was developing the 1997 PC game Dungeon Keeper. He recalls discussions with designers Mark Healey and Simon and Dene…

■ “It’s not going to be a Fable 4, or 5, or whatever,” says Peter about the game Project MOAT being developed by his studio 22Cans. “But this notion of creating a game within the world of Albion, I think is a really fascinating one. Albion has stayed with me in my mind. “The original Fable had some fantastic simulations in it,” he continues, citing the rumour system that would prompt residents to talk about your past deeds when you strolled into town. “So we’re using a lot of simulation stuff.” He adds that Project MOAT will feature some “pretty unique mechanics”, although the team is currently “still prototyping and experimenting and exploring”. Peter might have learnt from previous mistakes when making bold claims about unfinished games (see the Promises,…

■ DAYTONA USA: CHAMPIONSHIP CIRCUIT EDITION [1996] SATURN ■ SONIC 3D BLAST [1996] SATURN ■ SONIC R [1997] SATURN ■ JET SET RADIO [2000] DREAMCAST ■ METROPOLIS STREET RACER [2000] DREAMCAST ■ HEADHUNTER [2001] DREAMCAST ■ JET SET RADIO FUTURE [2002] XBOX ■ PURSUIT FORCE [2005] PSP ■ STARSHIP TROOPERS [2005 WINDOWS ■ OUTRUN 2006: COAST 2 COAST [2006] PLAYSTATION 2, PSP, WINDOWS ■ MASS EFFECT [2007] XBOX 360 ■ 007: BLOOD STONE [2010] XBOX 360, NINTENDO DS, WINDOWS ■ SONIC: FREE RIDERS [2010] XBOX 360 ■ FORZA MOTORSPORT 4 [2011] XBOX 360 ■ SONIC: GENERATIONS [2011] PLAYSTATION 3, XBOX 360, NINTENDO DS, WINDOWS ■ LITTLEBIGPLANET PS VITA [2012] PSVITA ■ SONIC & ALL-STARS RACING: TRANSFORMED [2012] PLAYSTATION 3, NINTENDO DS, WINDOWS, IPAD ■ SONIC BOOM: SHATTERED CRYSTAL [2014] NINTENDO…

Blaze Entertainment’s first Evercade cartridges of 2024 are finally with us so let’s dive in with the reviews. Fans of the Commodore 64 will be delighted with some of the titles that have been crammed onto TheC64 Collection 3. Hewson is well represented here, with highlights including Heavy Metal Paradroid, Exolon, Cybernoid II: The Revenge, Cyberdyne Warrior and Netherworld. The puzzler Anarchy and adventure Deliverance: Stormlord II are also included. There are four Epyx games featured in the 13-strong collection as well. Jumpman Junior is a fun single-screen platformer, Summer Games II is a polished sports game, Break Dance is a dull music game and Super Cycle is a brilliant riff on Hang-On. That leaves Street Sports Soccer and the excellent Boulder Dash. >> Score 83% The star of Indie Heroes…

Since we’re celebrating our 20th anniversary, we thought we’d take another chance to be just a wee bit self-indulgent and celebrate some of the best work to have appeared in Retro Gamer – as well as remembering some of the tougher tasks we’ve crossed paths with. NICK It’s not an easy question since we’ve got over 250 issues to choose from, but what are some of your favourite Retro Gamer features? DARRAN If we’re talking cover features I’d probably pick the recent Rare article we did for issue 250. Looking back at older articles, Craig Grannell’s Pac-Man Making Of from RG 61 is one of my personal favourites. TIM If we’re not talking cover features, then it’s the A Tribute To ones listing loads of games with developers’ recollections on most…

RETRO GAMER ISSUE 1 If you want to head back to where it all began you won’t need too much cash. Complete copies typically hit £20, while the reprint (shown here) from issue 100 is considerably cheaper, so make sure you’re getting the right version. TEMPEST 2000 Jeff Minter’s tube shooter remains one of the Jaguar’s best games with mint copies costing over £70, boxed copies around the £40 mark, and loose carts selling for £25. Now get blasting! FABLE This classic Xbox adventure won’t take much from your gold stash as copies can be bought for under £4, while complete copies rarely go for more than £7. COUNTER-STRIKE There’s no need to get blown away reloading your Xbox with this iconic shooter. Used copies can be found for about…

» Cool Spot is cool. How do we know this? Well, because it’s in his name. He also wears sunglasses all the time, and he’s red like a Ferrari. Still, he has a nagging feeling that things aren’t quite right, so he sets off to rescue his fellow flat, disc-shaped brethren and maybe find out what’s bothering him. Let’s see how that goes, shall we? » Having completed his quest, Cool Spot must now face the judgement of The Council Of Spots. It’s all very well for him to say he’s cool, but everybody knows that it’s your peers that decide if you’re actually cool. » Things are looking good – he’s got the “Coooo” bit down, but Cool Spot mustn’t get presumptuous. The Council has been known to bust out the old…

WHAT WAS IT LIKE WORKING ON RETRO GAMER AS A STAFF WRITER? It was pretty good at the start, but things started to go downhill quickly as I was out of my depth. I wasn’t a gamer. Not really. I was more interested in hardware, but people were still making software for the 8-bit computers that I grew up with, so I wanted to write about those new games. Although I was only there for nine months, and most people don’t know that I contributed anything to RG, I had a small but significant influence on the magazine and I think retro gaming in general, in the sense that people now take new software for 8-bit machines more seriously. WHICH OF YOUR FEATURES ARE YOU MOST PROUD OF? The feature…

Mark Kendrick had worked at Newsfield and both he and Damian wanted Oliver’s art for certain issues of the magazine. We rarely commissioned new pieces, instead asking him to adapt classics covers like RG 142’s shmup special (the last cover he did for us). We like to think Oliver’s fantastic art helped convince readers to pick up the magazine in those early years and it’s great to see them still being used on the modern versions of Crash and Zzap!64.…

WHAT WAS IT LIKE BEING PART OF THE RETRO GAMER REVIVAL? Bittersweet. I’d lost money when Live Publishing folded. Once I was staff I realised that in-house writers mainly handle the back-end bits, while freelancers do the cool features. Myself and freelancer Ashley Day joined Imagine Publishing at the same time and flat-shared; he’d always hide the trash bags! WHAT FEATURE ARE YOU MOST PROUD OF? In The Chair With Dale DeSharone from RG 31. He had a long career in games, making classics like Below The Root on the C64. Later he developed Faces Of Evil and Wand Of Gamelon for CDi – people criticise them, but I love those Zelda games. No one had ever thought to ask him how they were made. It doesn’t matter what you…

HOW DID YOU START WRITING FOR RETRO GAMER, KIM? I was a freelancer writing PlayStation guides for Live Publishing when Retro Gamer was launched with Martyn Carroll at the helm. I pitched a few ideas and wrote the article interviewing David Crane about Little Computer People and went on from there. When Darran Jones took over the magazine after Live Publishing went under, he approached me to become a freelancer which I gladly accepted. I haven’t written professionally for about seven years due to changing health circumstances but I still read every issue of the magazine and I’m glad I got to be a part of it for so many years. WHAT’S IT LIKE TRACKING DOWN DEVELOPERS TO INTERVIEW? It can be a bit challenging trying to find the right…

WE RECALL YOU HAVING TWO DIFFICULT COVERS WHEN YOU FIRST STARTED… My first cover was a triple embossed, gold-foil Zelda cover, which was a real baptism of fire! I’d never set up that kind of artwork before, I was so nervous I’d mess it up! That was swiftly followed by the foil gatefold Sonic cover which was a challenge too but was really fun to design. Both turned out well, and over a decade later they still remain some of my favourite pieces of work. WHAT WAS YOUR FAVOURITE ASPECT OF WORKING ON THE MAGAZINE? Despite not being a gamer, I really enjoyed diving into the weird and wonderful worlds of the games and bringing them to life on the page. RG was fun to produce as it involved so…

WHAT WAS IT LIKE WORKING ON RETRO GAMER? Unlike some of the other magazines I worked on, there was a consistently engaged and always-growing community of retro fans, some of whom would directly contribute to the magazine. So despite being a commercial product, it never really felt like one; we were always able to publish much more freely based on what we were interested in because almost none of it was based on any kind of external schedule like industry events or new releases. HOW DID RETRO GAMER COMPARE TO OTHER MAGS YOU PROOFED? Considerably lengthier! In terms of pure content density and word count, RG has always been a titan. Other magazines would have features usually running between four and eight pages, while RG could easily go up to…

I’ve always known that readers love Retro Gamer. I saw it when the magazine first launched while working on games™. I also remember reading forums when Live Publishing shut down, and seeing the discussions about readers banding together to buy RG’s rights so the mag could keep going. Readers are genuinely passionate about the magazine and it’s an honour to be a part of it. We’re now 20 years and 257 issues down the line and that love for the magazine is as strong as ever. We’ve been on quite the journey these past two decades and the current version of RG is very different to what Martyn and his team first launched in 2004, but we’re still here, we’re still creating amazing features and we’re still hungry to share…

I’ve been playing a lot of old games recently – more than usual – due to capturing game footage for my YouTube channel (new series Digi Level 2 is out now… excuse the plug). My exploration isn’t limited to the usual paddocks, but ventures down the lesser-travelled paths of gaming history. It’s proving to be a challenge because so many classic games, especially the home-computer games of the Eighties, are borderline unplayable. Yes, this might be considered heresy in this magazine, but it’s the truth. We need to admit it to ourselves. Many games were punching so high above their weight that they broke their arms. If you’re using emulation, the experience is somewhat improved – you can use controllers or keyboard layouts that aren’t completely illogical. However, if you’re…

DC Thomson’s long-running weekly comic The Dandy was relaunched as the fortnightly Dandy Xtreme this month, after almost 70 years of publication. The new magazine format shifted comics to a central pull-out section, with the rest “packed with the stuff the kids need to stay in the loop” according to editor Craig Graham – a change emphasised by Bart Simpson’s turn as the cover star. The Dandy returned to its original title and format in October 2010. High School Musical 2 premiered on the Disney Channel on 17 August, achieving a record basic cable viewership of 17.2 million viewers, with subsequent weekend showings bringing in an additional 15.8 million viewers. It also drew 1.2 million viewers to the UK’s Disney Channel. Rhys Jones was murdered in Liverpool on 22 August,…

The first 18 issues of Retro Gamer were published by Live Publishing, a small magazine house that collapsed in August 2005. Yet before its demise, a 19th issue was fully completed, waiting to be published. When the magazine was resurrected at Imagine Publishing later that year, with current editor Darran at the helm, a new 19th issue was published featuring fresh content. So what became of the articles in that original issue 19? Writers, particularly freelance writers, and especially freelance gaming writers, are a resourceful bunch, so you’ll be unsurprised to hear that many of the articles appeared elsewhere. A number of them were included on Retro Survival, a CD-based project released in November 2005 and put together by the freelancers who lost out financially when Live went under. Chief…

» ARCADE » 1993 » TOAPLAN I like to think I’m pretty open in my tastes, but I haven’t always paid equal attention to certain genres, and one that I neglected for quite a while as a kid was shoot-’em-ups. I’d enjoyed games like R-Type on the Master System and really loved playing Bio Hazard Battle with my dad, but general interest in the genre was fading and I never ended up with any shoot-’em-ups on my Mega Drive or PlayStation. [Outrageous – Ed] As a result, I was absolutely floored when my friend James introduced me to bullet hell with Giga Wing on the Dreamcast. Games like Mars Matrix and Gunbird 2 soon taught me that this was the norm in modern shoot- ’em-ups, and I quickly embraced it.…

Arguably more than any other genre, the first-person shooter has perhaps seen more evolution and change throughout the history of the industry than any other. Some of that is down to technological improvements, some is a result of innovative game design, while some is even the fickle cause of ever-changing trends. But what’s particularly interesting for those that have paid attention is how the humble FPS hasn’t gradually changed via subtle improvements and steady progression, but in periodic leaps and bounds as one major release drops and suddenly changes everything. Counter-Strike is one such game, which put the nail in the coffin for the classic arena-style deathmatches of Quake and its ilk, championing a new way of playing online shooters. Even on an aesthetic level, Counter-Strike was a pioneer in…

Counter-Strike has been a funny one. It’s not so much that sequels are developed and released, but the same core game is gradually updated over the course of years and even decades until, creaking under the weight of the engine it’s powered by, an all-new game is released. That’s what happened with Counter-Strike: Global Offensive and it’s what happened in September 2023 when the game was updated to become an all-new game: Counter-Strike 2. That was the main bugbear for the community, since through this process Valve essentially chopped off the head of its behemoth FPS so that another could grow in its place. CS:GO became unavailable overnight, and the players were not happy. Add in a high number of bugs and instability issues and the player review bombing on…

» MANUFACTURER: Nintendo » YEAR: 2001 » COST: £129.99 (launch), £60+ (today, boxed), £35+ (today, unboxed) The GameCube doesn’t look conventional, with its little carry handle and memorable purple casing. However, compare it to the N64 and it certainly feels that way – the use of optical discs and a fairly standard controller layout indicating that Nintendo was no longer leading the console market. After a couple of generations trying to provide the most powerful console, Nintendo aimed for the GameCube to be the cheapest, a fact underscored by its decision to drop the price of the console weeks before its European launch, in response to an Xbox price cut. Bolstered by some great games, the GameCube set a new record for UK launch weekend sales with 69,000 consoles snapped…

F1 CHALLENGE ■ Richard’s very first credit at Sega was for this Formula 1 racer for Sega’s Saturn. The game’s soundtrack has a distinctly Japanese arcade sensibility, up-tempo drums punctuating a synth guitar reminiscent of musical styles that would gain popularity in later Sega games. SONIC R ■ Super Sonic Racing was the very first song written for the Sonic R soundtrack. The optimistic lyrics and upbeat sounds of Super Sonic Racing and Can You Feel The Sunshine? have given these songs iconic status in the Sonic The Hedgehog series. PURSUIT FORCE ■ The Sony PSP action game, Pursuit Force, features a sweeping orchestral score which beautifully accentuates the gameplay. The Pursuit Force series can now be played on PS4 and PS5 through Sony’s online Classics Catalogue. SONIC & ALL-STARS…

<BODY> This updated Hewson book starts with an introduction to Z80 machine code. The new chapter by Jim Bagley reworks certain routines for the Spectrum Next before a memory map and list of the Z80 instructions. An entry program helps you type in the main routines, split into scroll routines, display routines, routines to manipulate BASIC programs, and toolkit routines. A new Appendix lists ZX Spectrum Memories from the Elite Kickstarter backers. This book won’t teach you everything Z80 – but it gives a structured approach to building your own work. </BODY>…

Joel J Games One of my favourites was the Bubble Bobble cover feature from a few years back with the break down of the (many) ports. Jeff Bone The history of Ninja Turtles in videogames. It got me excited and ready for The Cowabunga Collection that was coming out. Lee Jackson The behind the scenes feature for NiGHTS Into Dreams in issue 45. As someone who didn’t know much about the game at the time, it was a fascinating read and one that lead me to actually buying a copy. Nowadays, it’s one of my favourite games so thanks, Retro Gamer! Martin K Dodd One of the early issues had a feature on how to build your own arcade machine step by step. With all these mini arcades appearing perhaps…

Iowe a huge debt of gratitude to Martyn Carroll, the first editor of this marvellous magazine. In 2004, I’d spotted a small news item in the British journalism trade magazine, Press Gazette, heralding the first issue of Retro Gamer and I immediately approached Martyn with an idea: an article about Dizzy. I’d freelanced as a writer before, for Amstrad Action and Amiga Format, both in my teenage years. From memory, it had taken about 12 months of pestering (and, believe me, pestering is the right word) in order for AA’s editor Dave Golder to cave in and give me an opportunity. When approaching Martyn, I didn’t have the energy for such a pursuit again and decided it would be ‘one approach, one rejection’ and that would be that. To my…

For our 20th anniversary we felt like doing something a little different, a little indulgent. In your hands is a behind-the-scenes look at your favourite magazine, and while it won’t be filled with salacious content and controversies, it should hopefully offer a better insight into what it’s like working on a magazine like Retro Gamer and the challenges (and fun) we have making it on a monthly basis. Martyn Carroll, Nick Thorpe and myself will guide you through the various stages of the magazine, from its inception at Live Publishing to working in a post-pandemic environment and we’ve also reached out to numerous other ex-staff members who have worked on the magazine during its 20-year lifespan. I’ve been lucky to have been involved in Retro Gamer for over 18 years…

The best received articles were those that covered Mastertronic (RG 1), The Mega-Tree (RG 5), Konix Multisystem (RG 8), Nintendo Game & Watch (RG 10) and Skool Daze (RG 17). The Construct Your Own Coin-op guide in RG 6 was also surprisingly popular, and seemed to inspire quite a few readers to dig out their toolboxes and disappear into their sheds. Personally my favourite features were Paul Drury’s Desert Islands Disks. For me his very human, very funny stories were - and still are - the highlight of each issue.…

When the receivers arrived at Live on 22 August 2005, I’d love to say it was similar to what happened at Imagine Software, with employees hiding in toilet stalls, balancing PCs on their knees. But no, I just burned a CD containing all the stuff I was working on, grabbed my desk cactus and left. It was a relief in some ways, as the final few weeks had been rough, but at the same time I was saddened by the circumstances. Retro Gamer was still a profitable title with a lot of goodwill, but its stablemates were mostly PC mags that couldn’t compete with the internet. It’s telling that of all the mags that were put up for sale, only RG found a buyer. A few weeks later I found…

One of Darran’s proudest moments was interviewing Chris Stamper for the Spectrum Legends feature in RG 29. After repeatedly contacting them at Rare, he received a lovely reply saying that while they appreciated the interest, they liked to look forward rather than back. A compromise was reached where Darran wouldn’t contact them for six months if they agreed to answer three questions, which Chris agreed to. The Stampers left Rare shortly afterwards and Darran hasn’t been able to get hold of them since (not through lack of trying).…

CVG was Stuart’s favourite magazine to read growing up. At one stage he even tried convincing Darran that it would be a good idea to include a yellow-papered insert in RG dedicated to arcade machines, as CVG had done for a time. Because of this, getting Paul Davies (its former editor) to join the team as a columnist was all sorts of amazing for Stuart. For him, it was like working with his hero. “The nap room wasn’t being cleaned at all. One morning staff woke us up and told us that the room smelled like a zoo”YOSHIO SAKAMOTO ON LATE NIGHTS WORKING ON SUPER METROID (RG 65)…

Working at pace, errors would occasionally find their way into the magazine, and it was always gutting if they slipped through into print. There was one that Stuart would make at least once every few months: getting the names of Crash and Zzap!64 magazines mixed up. It was comical, to the extent that, for him, it became the writing equivalent of pushing against a door that clearly states you need to pull its handle.…

Four cover options every month meant many options were never used. Some ideas have been revisited in recent years (the Earthworm Jim subs cover for RG 230 and the Turtles cover for RG 241 for example), but many have been lost forever. For a brief period, we did share them in the Mailbag section of the mag. Some were good enough for release, while others weren’t. Here are a couple of our favourites that didn’t make the cut..…

WHAT WAS IT LIKE WORKING ON RETRO GAMER? It was a great experience and a job that I loved. From starting out as a staff writer, finding my feet and trying to hone my writing at pace, to ending my time as a features editor six years later. Darran was a great editor, always supportive of new ideas and trying out new things, and we had similar ambitions for the magazine. We wanted RG to feel like the gaming mags we loved reading growing up, filling each issue with variety, passion and character. We were fortunate enough to have a pool of amazing freelance writers that made this job easier. WHAT CHALLENGES DID YOU FACE? There was a lot of pressure each month to deliver an issue that covered the…

Named after Darran’s favourite substitute for nouns he can’t remember, this tome contains quotes from everyday work life. Printable highlights include Drew admonishing Darran, “All I’ve been getting from you today is sausage, sausage, sausage, it’s been relentless” and Andy describing Luigi as, “Basically the Milhouse of the Mario brothers.” The best? Darran, in full ‘ghost’ voice, telling an accident claim telemarketer, “I am the ghost of the person who died, please don’t call me… I will haunt you… Oooooo…”…

The introduction of exclusive subscriber covers in 2018 was the result of a happy accident. While trying out concepts for The Chaos Engine in RG 180, we found that a design inspired by the box art looked fantastic, but didn’t leave much room for the cover lines that are necessary on shop shelves. The solution was to give subscribers the cover we had, and create another one for retail. The experiment worked well, so we’ve been doing it ever since.…

Retro-gaming fans were dealt a double blow in December 2023, when two well-respected UK game developers passed away. Anthony Taglione and Ross Goodley both crafted their love and skill for games in the early Eighties and went on to write some classic 8-bit and 16-bit titles. Anthony Taglione was known as Tag to his close friends and work colleagues and is probably best remembered for the 16-bit RPGs Bloodwych and Legend, and later for kick-starting the Total War series on the PC for Creative Assembly. However, his catalogue of titles can be traced back to the very early Eighties and includes some memorable early games and conversions of well-known 8-bit games for the ZX Spectrum and Commodore 64 for Incentive and Beyond Software. He was extremely talented and went into…

Following a successful crowdfunding campaign that has raised over £110,000, TR Fight Stick is preparing to launch the Octopus – a multiformat arcade stick supporting Dreamcast, Neo Geo, Xbox, NES, SNES, PlayStation consoles, Switch, PC and more. Yunus Emre Sogukkanli and Dan Morelle tell us about how the company first formed and its plans for the future. How did TR Fight Stick first get started? Yunus: My main job is actually director and stunt coordinator, and arcade games were my hobby when I was a kid, and I was creating some wooden stuff for myself because in Turkey there are no original arcade machines. Then there is a community on the internet, and talking with them everybody asked me, “Can you create these things and sell them to us?” In…

XBOX 360 1 – Forza Motorsport 2 (Microsoft) 2 – Shadowrun (Microsoft) 3 – Pirates Of The Caribbean: At World’s End (Disney) 4 – Command & Conquer 3 (EA) 5 – Gears Of War (Microsoft) PLAYSTATION 3 1 – Pirates Of The Caribbean: At World’s End (Disney) 2 – Spider-Man 3 (Activision) 3 – MotorStorm (Sony) 4 – Resistance: Fall Of Man (Sony) 5 – The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (Ubisoft) WII 1 – Wii Play (Nintendo) 2 – Mario Strikers Charged Football (Nintendo) 3 – Pirates Of The Caribbean: At World’s End (Disney) 4 – Sonic And The Secret Rings (Sega) 5 – The Legend Of Zelda: Twilight Princess (Nintendo) MUSIC 1 – With Every Heartbeat (Robyn with Kleerup) 2 – The Way I Are (Timbaland ft. Doe/Keri Hilson)…

Seeing you’ve joined us for such an important issue, it seemed only right that we look at the many great games that have defined our hobby over the decades. Readers, developers and Retro Gamer contributors have told us about the games they feel have helped define the industry and we’re delighted to share them with you here. Many of the games on this list are true trailblazers in their respective genres. Some kick-started the very genre itself, while others built on the work of previous games to shape the genre for the better or take it in new and exciting directions. Of course, not every game necessarily fits this ideal, some define convention or feel so detached from a genre’s staples that they need their own new subcategory to define…

DESERT ISLAND DISKS: THE PICKFORDS PAUL DRURY ■ Drury, in a pub with John and Ste Pick ford, chatting about their careers and the games they’d take with them to a desert island. Doesn’t get much better. Read it now in the published RG 19. KNIGHTMARE: WATCHERS OF ILLUSION DAN WHITEHEAD ■ A peek behind the scenes of the ITV show, featuring interviews with producer Tim Child, Hugo Myatt and one of the winning dungeoneers. Later published in Cult Times issue 122. GLOBAL GAMING: BRAZIL JOHN SZCZEPANIAK ■ The globe-trotting series stops off in Brazil to report on the country’s gaming culture. John’s original text was extensive and it was cut down to fit into four pages. It was reduced again to two pages for RG 20.…

FLORIN THE DWARF ■ Florin can create magical strength potions to boost Magic Knight’s energy. He’s also good at repairing talismans. THOR ■ Thor’s lost his hammer. Help him get it back, and he can perform various tasks, such as fixing lifts and damaging walls. ELRAND THE HALFELVEN ■ Like Thor, Elrand is good at attacking walls but needs his trumpet. Obviously. Elrand starts the game in possession of Thor’s hammer. SAMSON THE STRONG ■ Samson has mislaid his precious javelin. Return it to him, and he can assist Magic Knight in traversing a cavernous pit. BANSHEE ■ Once released, the Banshee provides clues on how Magic Knight must proceed. Just ask it to help, and a useful tip is yours. ORIK THE CLERIC ■ Orik desires the powerful Book…

Few software houses can boast a history stretching back over four decades and we can think of only one that has remained broadly unchanged, in terms of personnel and its approach to game design: Llamasoft. Founded by Jeff Minter in 1982, his company has spent 42 years making games for a bewildering array of computers and consoles and shows no signs of stopping. “I think part of the reason I call myself ‘Ox’ is that I’ve been persistent, just plodding along, really,” says Jeff, musing on Llamasoft’s impressive longevity. “I’m not a particularly smart beast, but I’ll carry on until I get the job done. And I’ve just been doing that for years.” For over half of those years, he was essentially a one-man band, creating games at home, first…

TEAM FORTRESS 2 ■ Counter-Strike and Team Fortress 2 have shared histories: both had a heritage in Quake modding, both were released as mods for Half-Life and both had their mod teams hired by Valve and incorporated into the company and went on to become one of the most recognisable shooters in gaming history. DEFENCE OF THE ANCIENTS ■ Built on Warcraft III’s engine and leveraging its hero character system to build an RPG-like multiplayer experience, Dota became so widely popular that it would directly lead to the creation of League Of Legends, Dota 2 and from there countless other MOBAs in a craze reminiscent of the RTS boom of the Nineties. THE FORGOTTEN CITY ■ While not as well-known as some of the others in this list, The Forgotten…

COUNTER-STRIKE: CONDITION ZERO ■ The first sequel to the original had an erratic history, first revealed in 2001 and in development at Rogue Entertainment. After that studio closed, Condition Zero went to Gearbox, then Ritual Entertainment before ending up at Turtle Rock who finally kicked it out in March 2004. It was noteworthy due to its 20 single-player missions. COUNTER-STRIKE: SOURCE ■ Named as such for the simple fact that it was Counter-Strike ported over to Valve’s new Source engine that powered Half-Life 2. Source would ultimately release just a few months after Condition Zero due to the latter’s prolonged development. It would go on to become the de facto version of the game for a stint. COUNTER-STRIKE NEO ■ An arcade version of CS developed by Namco Bandai, which…

Prerace Preludes There’s more going on at Virtua Racing’s starting line than a simple countdown. Depending on your chosen mode, you get a pit crew changing your tyres, pigeons scattering as you rev your engine or grid girls strutting towards the trackside. Points Of View You can swap between four viewpoints in Virtua Racing during races, including one where you can assess the road ahead from a bird’s eye view. You can also position the camera just above your car, behind your rear wheels or in your cockpit. Awesome Audio With Virtua Racing’s music, less is more. Instead of playing tunes throughout each race, its virtual band rocks out for short spells after you reach a checkpoint. This allows you to focus on and react to the sound of your…

We asked Richard what sort of advice he’d give to someone seeking to enter the games music industry today. Here are the useful tips he offered. 1 It’s important to have your own musical voice. If you’re just gonna be another composer that sounds like Mr A, or Mr B Hollywood composer, Mr A and Mr B are already doing that. What fresh ideas do you bring? 2 If people don’t know who you are, they can’t hire you. Go to game jams, go to networking events, go to conferences, go to game launches. 3 Be a problem solver. Learn how to do some basic sound design and voice-over editing. Look at the indie sector to try and get a foot in the door, find out what projects are happening.…

>> Will anybody have a name left to take, at the rate that Tekken 8 is kicking asses? It seems rather unlikely, we have to say. Over the page, we’ve got more reviews including the latest Evercade cartridges and the remake of Mario Vs Donkey Kong It’s easy to look at the fighting game scene and think that it’s doing great right now. After all, the last few years have seen Street Fighter 6, Mortal Kombat 1, The King Of Fighters XV, Guilty Gear Strive and more. But those are 2D fighters, and the 3D side of things has been bereft of high-profile releases – we haven’t seen a new Soulcalibur or Dead Or Alive in over five years, and Virtua Fighter 5: Ultimate Showdown is based on a game…

The N64 is an odd choice for the Visual Compendium series. Its drab-looking polygons and fog-filled environments just don’t sell the console in the same way as the pixel art of earlier books in the series did, which is a shame. Having said that, the book’s editorial content is superb. While its non-interview anecdotes are fine, the developer input is genuinely outstanding. There’s fascinating insight, particularly from Shigeru Miyamoto and other Nintendo veterans, which instantly separates this lovely tome from similar books on the market; while the sections that look at the machine itself, its controller and add-ons are just as insightful. It might not focus on the entire library of games or be as much of a looker as previous books in the series, but this remains the most…

Chris Jowett I’ve been reading for about five to six years now and it’s the preservation of old titles, developers and software houses that I love and never letting those amazing people and games ever be forgotten. Brian The ONLY gaming magazine I still pay for upon release. It’s filled with content from the best era in videogames. Period. b1rdcor3_games It’s made me realise how much gaming and great games I haven’t played. Definitely expanded my backlog and changed how I view some older systems I missed out on for various reasons. Abel It’s been my personal time machine, and besides, they’re way more fun than the current AAA games. David S Thomas I first discovered Retro Gamer when my wife was pregnant with our son in 2011. It was…

One issue, four at the most. That was the plan when Live Publishing launched Retro Gamer in early 2004. It was felt that a retro title might work, but there was no guarantee because there was no precedent. Highbury-Paragon’s games™ featured a regular retro section (which actually helped float the RG idea in the first place), but that was a multiformat mag focussing on new releases. Was there a market for a dedicated retro-gaming mag? The idea was to find out by producing a single issue. Distributors didn’t particularly like the idea of one-offs, so four quarterly issues were promised. Yet during that first year we put out 11 issues and a ‘best of’ anthology. RG was more successful than anyone expected. These circumstances hopefully atone for the quality of…

Most of Live’s titles featured coverdiscs, to make them appear more ‘premium’ on the newsstand, and Retro Gamer wasn’t able to escape that fate. The initial idea was to just fill ’em with freeware – PC arcade clones and emulators – but we exhausted that idea after about two issues. So we looked to secure back catalogues from publishers and managed to bend some arms, resulting in the Gremlin, Graftgold, Durell and Llamasoft discs. It was a hassle though, and not particularly worth it as the general feedback was, “I can just download those games for free, mate.” One highlight was issue four’s C64 audio CD, which Chris Abbott provided.…

Although it was 19 years ago, I can still remember the first day I started working on Retro Gamer like it was yesterday. It was a mixture of excitement and trepidation – excitement because it was the chance to take a popular magazine and apply my own spin to it, trepidation because I’d never run a magazine before. We had roughly two weeks to get that first issue out before Christmas 2005 and it was a tricky one, requiring lots of extremely late nights and plenty of support. Mark Kendrick, Imagine’s creative director, redesigned the magazine and we would spend a lot of time talking about what it was like for him working on the Newsfield mags, which certainly made that tight deadline a lot less stressful. There were obviously…

Tuesday was the day we had cover meetings and they were easily the most stressful aspect of working on Retro Gamer. The cover is clearly the most important aspect of the magazine as you’re using it to sell the mag. As a result of that, anything you did came under intense scrutiny because it needed to be as good as possible. We’d always take in four options at the beginning of a new issue and would typically have to work on two or three options at a time until we were left with the best option (sometimes till the very last week). The upside was that we had the best possible cover to entice potential readers with; the downside was that we ended up with a lot of wasted covers.…

We wanted to do something special for issue 100 and Damian suggested reprinting the first issue, which was a great idea. We put together all sorts of cool features, including a look at Grand Theft Auto and The Making Of Sonic The Hedgehog, leaving just the cover to sort. When it was suggested we were simply copying a classic cover by The Beatles, Darran replied with, “If it’s good enough for The Beatles, it’s good enough for us.”…

Everyone was worried about Darran when he was hospitalised while making issue 127, but Darran was a bit too worried about the magazine. Trying to make sure everything went smoothly, he sent us an unprompted review of OlliOlli via text message from his hospital bed – an act that earned the team a stern telling-off from our head of HR, who told us to leave him alone while he was recovering!…

Back in 2016, it looked as though Darran might have been leaving us, as Imagine Publishing was planning to launch a new retro-themed magazine. The plan was that he would oversee the new retro department as editor in chief, while Luke Albigés would take over as the editor of Retro Gamer. However, these plans were scrapped as we became part of Future – the new monthly magazine and its accompanying department never materialised, though some great retro bookazines did eventually come out.…