Julian "Jaz" Rignall
@jazrignall.bsky.social
45 years ago, Taito's Space Invaders Part II was released. It was fundamentally the same as the original, but featured aliens that sometimes split into two when shot, a high score capability of 99,990 plus player initials, and very simple between-screen intermission sequences.
35 years ago, these were the hottest console games of the month. I loved Master System Pro Football (AKA Walter Payton Football), which was an excellent American football game. Twin Heli on PC Engine scratched that shooter itch, while Spellcaster was a fun action-adventure.
One of these was a bomb-proof arcade controller; the other was the perfect stick for flight sims and more gentle gaming. One could be thrown against the wall and would just keep on going. The other would spontaneously fall apart as you reached for that copy of Decathlon... 😁
40 years ago, rather than use a lag-free joystick, you could instead set up this "sensational advance in computer game technology" and speak into a microphone to control your games. Which was never laggy, and always, always 100% guaranteed to understand your every command. 🤣
Rando Sunday coin-op: Gun Fight
Follow the genealogy of any modern-day PvP shooter, from Fortnite to Call of Duty, and it'll lead you here: Taito-Midway's 1975 Gun Fight, the first game to both depict and facilitate human vs. human combat. It sold an impressive 8,600 cabinets!
Interesting, but this was less an actual PlayStation and more half a Venn diagram of a peripheral and a console that barely crossed over.
This 40-year-old Imagine ad is not actually an Imagine ad. The company had just gone bust and sold its catalog to record company Beau Jolly, who would continue to buy up back catalogs throughout the 80s and by the end of the decade became one of the premier compilation companies.
40 years ago, it was the end of the road for the Dragon, which had essentially been dead for months. More interestingly, we see early UK software biz consolidation as Argus buys out Quicksilva. And apparently there was nothing new at CES!
35 years ago, Firebird was advertising its ports of Irem's Mr. Heli, one of several very appealing "cute 'em up" coin-ops that appeared in the late 80s/early 90s. The home computer versions were decent, but I put the most time into the PC Engine iteration, which was top-tier!
35 years ago the 8-bit market was entering its "re-release" phase when big hits of earlier years were released as budget titles. All the main companies were doing this - and this was Elite's effort, which it kicked off with a bunch of old Durrell Software titles and a few others.
Thanks. This is useful and I'll add it to my file. A lot of this info is very hard to come by, so nuggets like this can help build a bigger picture when comboed with the slightly more prevalent UK/FR/DE stuff.
Thanks for the info. Always find it interesting, and yes, there was definitely a huge generational difference in the 80s-90s, with people basically switching from computers to consoles pretty much in a single generation. Was quite amazing how fast it happened.
Heard similar things anecdotally. Would be interested to see some actual credible data.
Have you seen that retro radio set? Next on my list. Lovely to look at, and seriously cool tech too!
I thought console sales were pretty negligible in that territory until the 16-bit systems came along. Up until that point, wasn’t it dominated by home computers?
Of course, we'd easily have been able to work that out had they not completely nuked Gamepro when they closed it down. 🙄
Lol. That was so much fun. I can't remember what you dropped on me in return. Was it like, Farming Sim or something?
35 years ago, Sega dropped a second Direct Hits ad (prior month's version on the right) that added another four titles to its summer of 89 lineup. Since NES games were still slowly trickling out in Europe, the Master System really did feel like the console to have.
I have a new cat. It's made out of LEGO. It's seriously brilliant and twice as big (and heavy) as I thought it'd be.
I love that LEGO can still keep me entertained more than half a century after being given my first set as a very wee kid one Xmas. 👍😀👍
Nah. It's like school. You're learning stuff. Utterly pointless, will-never-actually-need-it stuff, but it's stuff all the same. I mean, it is pretty crazy to think that batteries are almost 200 years old, and their lead-acid functionality is pretty much identical to today's equivalents!
His invention was commercially available within months. Rechargeable batteries have been around for a very, very long time.
Yeah, you're just a tad off. Gaston Planté invented the first rechargeable battery in 1859. 🤣
Yeah. Quite considerably. Old batteries also used to get incredibly hot while charging. They still do, but back then the charger had a huge fan in it to prevent them from overheating.
They were a thing back then too, and it ate through them much faster than normal batteries. I was literally charging 12 batteries a day for my commute to and from work. It just wasn't practical.
35 years ago, James Bond was on CVG's cover. Top reviews: NES SMB 2 (97%), Amiga New Zealand Story (88%), Datastorm (95%), Zork Zero (94%), and Test Drive II (90%), and Rick Dangerous on Spec/C64/Amiga/ST (all rated 87%). We also had the first European review of the Game Boy!
35 years ago I saw the Atari Lynx for the first time, which was called the Advantage at that point. Its tech specs were amazing and its games were incredible. It felt like the future of handheld gaming. Well, at least until I discovered just how insanely battery-hungry it was.
PlayStation Driver is 25 years old this month. I really loved this crazy mission-based open-world car chase game, despite its later missions getting absolutely insanely rock freakin' hard. It felt like I finished the game using sheer brute force. Much yelling and swearing!
PlayStation Driver is 25 years old this month. I really loved this crazy mission-based open-world car chase game, despite its later missions getting absolutely insanely rock freakin' hard. It felt like I finished the game using sheer brute force. Much yelling and swearing!
Yeah. I got lucky and saw one in the Crystal Room in Leicester Square, London in spring 1985. Played it on two separate occasions before it disappeared and I never saw one again outside of a museum/retro arcade. I think it's elusiveness adds to its coolness. 😀
40 years ago, I Robot was released. It was the 1st commercial game with real-time polygonal graphics/ camera controls. It also featured Doodle City, a 3D drawing mode. As far as I'm concerned, it's the coolest coin-op ever made. Sit down. Shut up. I'm not listening. Lalalalala.😁
Rando Sunday coin-op: Atari's Tempest
I first saw Tempest in a darkened arcade, which showcased its superb, pin-sharp, neon-bright vector graphics. Its tube shooter action was weird, surreal, and very challenging - making it very cool, fun, and unique. A true bucket list game.
Yeah. Same here. Captain Scarlet was top-tier, and then it was just a hop, skip, and a jump to UFO, which had similarly adult themes. Aliens harvesting human organs for themselves? Man, that was both mind-blowing and seriously terrifying to me as a kid. Still absolutely loved it though.
40 years ago, the great Euro Micro Shakeout of 1984 continued apace. Camputers' Lynx hit the skids, while a new MSX-compatible Dragon was touted, but never happened. Also, the Atari 7800 was announced - but didn't actually appear for two years, by which time it was all too late.
Yep. Having worked with this fella, I can attest that, yes, I have - indeed - been subject to these "hits."
Yeah. Nintendo gave Euro distribution to Mattel, who did a very poor job. Esp. considering the NES had a 90%+ market share in the US and Japan. Sega focused on the Master System's coin-op conversions, which made it the biggest seller until Nintendo changed distributors and began to get it right.
No. Actually confusing it with SMB3, which was three years old by the time it was released in Europe. Either way, what I'm really talking about is that many, many Nintendo games were super-delayed in Europe and appeared years after their initial Japanese launches.
35 years ago, SMB 2 was released in Europe. It was fab - but it was also three years old at this point. I mean, I ended up playing SMB 3 AFTER SMW because Nintendo's 8-bit releases were so delayed in Europe! Things would eventually improve, but it really was bollocks at the time.
The C64 version of Rastan was really bad; the Master System was pretty decent. Here are my period reviews of Rastan and Rampage on Sega's 8-bit system:
archive.org/details/cvg-...
40 years ago, Ocean was not yet the full-on licensed games development machine it would become by the mid-late 80s. Instead, they had a mix of licensed and original games - as well as a couple of clones. That would soon change, however, as they ramped up their licensing efforts!
This explosive 35-year-old Sega ad heralded the biggest Master System releases of late spring 1989. As to be expected, the focus is on arcade conversions - the machine's biggest selling point and the reason why it was outselling the NES 2:1 across Europe at this point.
35 years ago, this was Ocean's summer lineup. Robocop was the real standout, although Batman also had some excellent thrills 'n spills in store for players. Bad Dudes vs. Dragonninja was a bit wheezing, while original title Voyager was impressive, but not a huge seller.
35 years ago, these were the top-selling games. A quite spectacular mix of titles, it must be said, including the excellent Robocop, the cheap 'n cheerful Dizzy, soccer games Emlyn Hughes and Football Manager II - plus budget rereleases and even a decent compilation! Not bad!
Yep. They don't make 'em like they used to. Demonstrably. It says so right here.
Yeah. Loved it. Part of that super-cute video game movement of the late-ish 80s. Parodius, Mr. Heli, Bubble Bobble. Lots of really fun stuff!
35 years ago, Ocean was advertising its upcoming conversions of The NewZealand Story coin-op, a terrific platformer that was as rock freakin' hard as it was cute. However! Why on Earth was the Amiga version £25 while the Speccy version was just £9. What an absolute con!
A recent Retronauts' that I was on featuring games based on nuclear holocausts and what it was like essentially growing up during the cold war is now available to listen to for free. It's really entertaining. Guar-on-teeeed!
retronauts.com/article/2250...
Retronauts Episode 614: Video Games and the Nuclear Apocalypse
I dunno, gotta nuke somethin'
retronauts.com40 years ago, Atari (under the auspices of Atarisoft) began porting its coin-ops to non-Atari systems. This was big news at a time when unofficial arcade clones were rife. While they did continue to appear, this was essentially the beginning of the end of truly blatant rip-offs.
Read what I said. I'm simply using word economy because I'm tweeting about something. If you don't like it, please unfollow.