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Paradroid
''Paradroid'' is a Commodore 64 computer game written by Andrew Braybrook and published by Hewson Consultants in 1985. It is a shoot 'em up with puzzle elements and was critically praised at release. The objective is to clear a fleet of spaceships of hostile robots by destroying them or taking them over via a mini-game. It was later remade as ''Paradroid 90'' for the Commodore Amiga and Atari ST home computers and as Paradroid 2000 for the Acorn Archimedes. There exist several fan-made remakes for modern PCs. In 2004 the Commodore 64 version was re-released as a built-in game on the C64 Direct-to-TV, and in 2008 for the Wii Virtual Console in Europe. Gameplay Enemy forces have hijacked a space fleet by turning its robot consignment against the crew; the job is to neutralize all the robots, thereby rescuing the humans. The players control a prototype influence device that allows them to control the hostile robots. The game is set on a spaceship viewed from a top-down perspective. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Graftgold
Graftgold was an independent computer game developer that came to prominence in the 1980s, producing numerous computer games on a variety of 8-bit, 16-bit and 32-bit platforms. History The Hewson Era The studio Graftgold was formed in 1983, when Steve Turner quit his day job as a commercial programmer to concentrate on producing computer games. When the work became too much for him to do alone, he hired a close friend, Andrew Braybrook, to work for him. After a small period of time developing games for the Dragon home computer, Graftgold soon turned their attention to the more lucrative Commodore 64 and ZX Spectrum markets. Much of Graftgold's early success came about through their association with Hewson Consultants. Formed by Andrew Hewson in the early 1980s, Hewson Consultants became one of the UK's most successful computer game publishers. Whereas many publishers at the time relied on larger parent companies to handle the manufacturing of their products, Andrew Hewson owned ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Andrew Braybrook
Andrew Braybrook (born 1960) is a software engineer and former game programmer. He created video games such as ''Paradroid'', ''Gribbly's Day Out'', '' Fire and Ice'', ''Uridium'' and ''Morpheus''. He also programmed the Commodore Amiga and Atari ST conversion of the arcade game ''Rainbow Islands''. In 1986 Braybrook was voted Best Programmer of the Year at the Golden Joystick Awards. Career Braybrook started out writing accounting programs for GEC Marconi using COBOL in 1979. In his spare time he wrote games in BASIC for the ZX80, ZX81 and Dragon 32. His first foray into professional games came while he was playing bass guitar in a rock band with Steve Turner. Turner was writing games for the ZX Spectrum in his spare time and decided to make his break into full-time games production by starting the company which went on to become Graftgold. A few months after its inception, Turner asked Braybrook to join him in September 1983. Braybrook was commissioned by the magazine ''Zzap ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Zzap!64
''Zzap!64'' was a computer games magazine covering games on the Commodore International series of computers, especially the Commodore 64 (C64). It was published in the UK by Newsfield Publications Ltd and later by Europress Impact. The magazine launched in April, with the cover date May 1985, as the sister magazine to ''CRASH''. It focused on the C64 for much of its shelf life, but later incorporated Amiga game news and reviews. Like ''CRASH'' for the ZX Spectrum, it had a dedicated cult following amongst C64 owners and was well known for its irreverent sense of humour as well as its extensive, detailed coverage of the C64 scene. The magazine adopted an innovative review system that involved the use of the reviewers' faces, artistically rendered by in-house artists Oli Frey and Mark Kendrick, to express their reaction to the games. These eventually evolved into static cartoons as the magazine began catering for a younger market. By 1992, the magazine had changed so dramatically i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
C64 Direct-to-TV
The C64 Direct-to-TV, called C64DTV for short, is a single-chip implementation of the Commodore 64 computer, contained in a joystick (modeled after the mid-1980s Competition Pro joystick), with 30 built-in games. The design is similar to the Atari Classics 10-in-1 TV Game. The circuitry of the C64DTV was designed by Jeri Ellsworth, a computer chip designer who had previously designed the C-One. Tulip Computers (which had acquired the Commodore brand name in 1997) licensed the rights to Ironstone Partners, which cooperated with DC Studios and Mammoth Toys in the development and marketing of the unit. Released in late 2004, QVC purchased the entire first production run of 250,000 units and sold 70,000 of them on the first day that they were offered. Versions There exist multiple versions of the C64DTV. DTV1 (NTSC television type) comes with 2 MB ROM. It first appeared in late 2004 for the American/Canadian market. DTV2 (called ''C64D2TV'' sometimes) is a revised version for the Eu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hewson Consultants
Hewson Consultants were one of the smaller software companies which produced video games for home computers in the mid-1980s. They had a reputation for high-quality games which continually pushed the boundaries of what the computers were capable of and can be compared favourably with other ground-breaking software houses like Ultimate Play the Game and Beyond. Fourteen of their games were awarded "Megagame" by ''Your Sinclair''. Hewson was founded by Andrew Hewson in the early 1980s. He became interested in computers while working at the British Museum when their first machine arrived. After learning to program, Andrew wrote the programming guide book ''Hints and Tips for the ZX80''. Following the publication, bedroom coders began to send Andrew the games they had programmed on cassette tape, giving Andrew the idea to publish the games. Hewson Consultants was born, and initially released games via mail order advertisements in computing magazines. Andrew was also a columnist in ' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Retro Gamer
''Retro Gamer'' is a British magazine, published worldwide, covering retro video games. It was the first commercial magazine to be devoted entirely to the subject. Launched in January 2004 as a quarterly publication, ''Retro Gamer'' soon became a monthly. In 2005, a general decline in gaming and computer magazine readership led to the closure of its publishers, Live Publishing, and the rights to the magazine were later purchased by Imagine Publishing. It was taken over by Future plc on 21 October 2016, following Future's acquisition of Imagine Publishing. History The first 18 issues of the magazine came with a coverdisk. It usually contained freeware remakes of retro video games and emulators, but also videos and free commercial PC software such as ''The Games Factory'' and '' The Elder Scrolls: Arena''. Some issues had themed CDs containing the entire back catalogue of a publisher such as Durell, Llamasoft and Gremlin Graphics. On 27 September 2005, the magazine's original p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Retro Gamer
''Retro Gamer'' is a British magazine, published worldwide, covering retro video games. It was the first commercial magazine to be devoted entirely to the subject. Launched in January 2004 as a quarterly publication, ''Retro Gamer'' soon became a monthly. In 2005, a general decline in gaming and computer magazine readership led to the closure of its publishers, Live Publishing, and the rights to the magazine were later purchased by Imagine Publishing. It was taken over by Future plc on 21 October 2016, following Future's acquisition of Imagine Publishing. History The first 18 issues of the magazine came with a coverdisk. It usually contained freeware remakes of retro video games and emulators, but also videos and free commercial PC software such as ''The Games Factory'' and '' The Elder Scrolls: Arena''. Some issues had themed CDs containing the entire back catalogue of a publisher such as Durell, Llamasoft and Gremlin Graphics. On 27 September 2005, the magazine's original p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Front Line (video Game)
is a military-themed run-and-gun shooter game released by Taito for arcades in Nov. 1982. It was one of the first overhead run-and-gun shooters, a precursor to many similarly-themed games of the mid-to-late 1980s. The original arcade version of ''Front Line'' is controlled with a joystick, a single button, and a rotary dial that can be pushed in like a button. The single button is used to throw grenades and to enter and exit tanks, while the rotary dial aims and fires the player's gun. The game was created by Tetsuya Sasaki. It was a commercial success in Japan, where it was the seventh highest-grossing arcade game of 1982. However, it received a mixed critical and commercial reception in Western markets, with praise for its originality but criticism for its difficulty. The game's overhead run-and-gun formula preceded Capcom's arcade hit ''Commando'' (1985) by several years. ''Front Line'' went on to inspire the SNK shooters ''TNK III'' (1985) and ''Ikari Warriors'' (1986), ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
C64 Paradroid
The Commodore 64, also known as the C64, is an 8-bit home computer introduced in January 1982 by Commodore International (first shown at the Consumer Electronics Show, January 7–10, 1982, in Las Vegas). It has been listed in the Guinness World Records as the highest-selling single computer model of all time, with independent estimates placing the number sold between 12.5 and 17 million units. Volume production started in early 1982, marketing in August for . Preceded by the VIC-20 and Commodore PET, the C64 took its name from its of RAM. With support for multicolor sprites and a custom chip for waveform generation, the C64 could create superior visuals and audio compared to systems without such custom hardware. The C64 dominated the low-end computer market (except in the UK and Japan, lasting only about six months in Japan) for most of the later years of the 1980s. For a substantial period (1983–1986), the C64 had between 30% and 40% share of the US market and two milli ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Imagine Publishing
Imagine Publishing was a UK-based magazine publisher, which published a number of video games, computing, creative and lifestyle magazines. It was founded on 14 May 2005 with private funds by Damian Butt, Steven Boyd and Mark Kendrick, all were former directors of Paragon Publishing, and launched with a core set of six gaming and creative computing titles in the first 6 months of trading. It was taken over by Future plc on 21 October 2016. In October 2005, it had acquired the only retro games magazine Retro Gamer, after its original publisher, Live Publishing went bankrupt. Early in 2006, it further acquired the rights to publish a considerable number of titles including gamesTM, Play, PowerStation, X360, Digital Photographer and iCreate, from the old Paragon Publishing stable of magazines when owner Highbury House Communications went into liquidation, following Future Publishing's withdrawal of its offer to buy the company, due to threats of a monopoly-investigation by the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Black Sabbath
Black Sabbath were an English rock music, rock band formed in Birmingham in 1968 by guitarist Tony Iommi, drummer Bill Ward (musician), Bill Ward, bassist Geezer Butler and vocalist Ozzy Osbourne. They are often cited as pioneers of heavy metal music. The band helped define the genre with releases such as ''Black Sabbath (album), Black Sabbath'' (1970), ''Paranoid (album), Paranoid'' (1970) and ''Master of Reality'' (1971). The band had multiple line-up changes following Osbourne's departure in 1979 and Iommi is the only constant member throughout their history. After previous iterations of the group – the Polka Tulk Blues Band and Earth – the band settled on the name Black Sabbath in 1969. They distinguished themselves through occult themes with horror-inspired lyrics and down-tuned guitars. Signing to Philips Records in November 1969, they released their first single, "Evil Woman (Crow song), Evil Woman", in January 1970, and their debut album, ''Black Sabbath'', was rel ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Logic Gate
A logic gate is an idealized or physical device implementing a Boolean function, a logical operation performed on one or more binary inputs that produces a single binary output. Depending on the context, the term may refer to an ideal logic gate, one that has for instance zero rise time and unlimited fan-out, or it may refer to a non-ideal physical device (see Ideal and real op-amps for comparison). Logic gates are primarily implemented using diodes or transistors acting as electronic switches, but can also be constructed using vacuum tubes, electromagnetic relays (relay logic), fluidic logic, pneumatic logic, optics, molecules, or even mechanical elements. Now, most logic gates are made from MOSFETs (metal–oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistors). With amplification, logic gates can be cascaded in the same way that Boolean functions can be composed, allowing the construction of a physical model of all of Boolean logic, and therefore, all of the algorithms and mathem ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
