Issue 101 Feedback Thread

[Eric]

Enjoyed the Ocean feature. Perhaps a follow up to this with a twin making of the Ocean 8-bit Robocop & Batman: The Movie on Spectrum & Amstrad. Did Mike Lamb & Bill Harbison work on both? Robocop's loading screen by Dawn Drake I think is my top favourite.

[mlucifersam]

Enjoyed the Ocean feature. Perhaps a follow up to this with a twin making of the Ocean 8-bit Robocop & Batman: The Movie on Spectrum & Amstrad. Did Mike Lamb & Bill Harbison work on both? Robocop's loading screen by Dawn Drake I think is my top favourite.

While Dawn did the in-game graphics it was Bill who did the Robocop loading screen

[DreamcastRIP]

I really enjoyed learning more about the BBC Micro in the 'Re-educating the masses' article. In particular, learning of the system's key games developers and publishers, the challenges of making games on it and of the key game releases other than those which have been mentioned previously in the mag', e.g. Repton and Elite.

The 'A life on the Ocean wave' feature was a bloody marvellous read. The sort of article where RG shines most brightly imho. I felt a real sense of what it may have have been like 'on the inside' at Ocean back in those glory days of the late '80s/eary '90s. Cracking stuff!

'The making of... The Hobbit' was a fascinating read that documented things nicely. I've never enjoyed text adventures but that mattered not as I love reading about the development of such historically significant games even if they weren't my cup of tea.

* I didn't particularly care for the '25 years of Metal Gear' feature as it seemed rather a dull read to me
* I now want to get Gynoug on the strength of this month's 'Cheap as Chips' feature
* Loved 'The Classic game... Zaxxon' feature
* Thought Iain Lee's 'retrocolumns' was a waste of a page this month... again
* 'The diary of RG Rampage' was quite possibly the most boring thing I've ever read in RG
* The 'Spacewar! hits 50' write-up in 'retroradar' was a jolly good read
* Not yet read 'From the archives... Beau Jolly' and 'The Making of... Lucky & Wild'
* Definitely looking forward to the 30th anniversary feature on Speccy next issue

[CraigGrannell]

Glad you liked The Hobbit. I got a couple of nice comments on Twitter about it, too, and Veronika was a wonderful interviewee. (Nice also to feature someone who's not a bloke—there were so few women in games back then, and as readers of Develop will note, the situation's still a problem today, albeit to a lesser extent.)

[NorthWay]

* I didn't particularly care for the '25 years of Metal Gear' feature as it seemed rather a dull read to me

Japanese developer interviews are infamous for being like pulling teeth. No surprise the American got dragged into it.

* 'The Making of... Lucky & Wild'

But then again, some time you find some who has a little less group-think.

[DreamcastRIP]

@ CraigGrannell,

That reminds me in a way of Jamie Fenton (GORF, etc) - http://www.fentonia.com/bio/

From memory, I recall Jamie's story having been mentioned in the mag' in the article on GORF some time ago. I don't know of any other transgender game developers of such significant note out there.

Some fascinating life stories out there when it comes to those who've gifted us gamers so much joy over the years.

[Mayhem]

From memory, I recall Jamie's story having been mentioned in the mag' in the article on GORF some time ago. I don't know of any other transgender game developers of such significant note out there.

Danielle Bunten Berry immediately springs to mind. MULE, Seven Cities of Gold, Heart of Africa...

Female developers were a rare breed back then though. Carol Shaw and Carla Meninsky are two notables who worked on the 2600 for example.

[DreamcastRIP]

From memory, I recall Jamie's story having been mentioned in the mag' in the article on GORF some time ago. I don't know of any other transgender game developers of such significant note out there.

Danielle Bunten Berry immediately springs to mind. MULE, Seven Cities of Gold, Heart of Africa...

Thanks. I just read the Wikipedia entry for her. Definitely another great pioneer in video gaming history albeit when male, not that that makes an ounce of difference of course. She seemed to have much personal regret following the gender reassignment and it was sad reading of her untimely death at such a young age.

[CraigGrannell]

Female developers were a rare breed back then though. Carol Shaw and Carla Meninsky are two notables who worked on the 2600 for example.

Mm. Shaw's someone I've been trying to get for an interview since about issue 25. No luck to date, sadly.

[Mayhem]

Sadly, I doubt you would, unless she really changes her mind. I spoke to the Activision guys at CGE the first or second time I saw them in 2003, and asked about the other people who did games for the company in the early days, such as Carol and David Rolfe. Crane, Kitchen and Miller all agreed she was really talented, but also quite private. I also found out she had worked on the same server hardware that I was supporting at the time (Tandem, which was called Himalaya at that moment, and now HP NonStop today) which made things a bit cooler.

[spiderpig0402]

can't wait to get my hands on the new issue. is it out already? i've been busy with everything. didn't have time to check on updates.

[DRS]

I just wanted to say that issue 101 could have been all a bit after the Lord Mayor's show... but far from an anti-climax, it was one of my favourites for a while. Highlights included the comprehensive Ocean piece (nice work Daz and Stu yeah?) and the illuminating BBC piece which was ace - nice work Mike B for that one i think. The Hobbit piece was excellent too - the boy Grannell really got some brilliant insights from Veronika - great work and my only negative comment is that it's a game that is worthy of a cover feature. I'm massively biased as text adventures were what got me into home computers but they really WERE a major force in the early days, lest we forget... I hope more features get in the mag over future years.

Oh and I'm not sure if this counts as trainspotting, but the EndGame bit on New Zealand Story... surely the Jenglish in the last panel actually refers to the two love struck kiwis 'making the story after this' by living out their lives as a couple, feathering their nest together, raising a brood of little kiwis before a mid-life crisis leads to Tiki having a gay affair with a whale. Probably.

[Rory Milne]

Oh and I'm not sure if this counts as trainspotting, but the EndGame bit on New Zealand Story... surely the Jenglish in the last panel actually refers to the two love struck kiwis 'making the story after this' by living out their lives as a couple

It depends, were you wearing something like this when you posted?

[theantmeister]

Jebus, the NES gets a mention in the farking mag and all the spotty computer nerds throw a hissy fit!

I, for one, have eagerly awaited RG's NES Collectors Guide ever since they started doing them.

I have to sit through endless reviews and retrospectives on crusty old Speccy games that I couldn't give two shits about, but you don't hear me complaining like people complain when the NES gets some coverage! Darran and co, please don't let the moans in this thread put you off covering the NES and games that didn't come out of some bedroom in Leeds.

The mag has a wonderful diversity as it is right now (although more PC coverage wouldn't go amiss). Please don't let that change!

[DreamcastRIP]

It would appear you've wholly failed to understand what's been posted in this thread regarding the many failings of this month's 'Collector's Guide'.