Superior Interactive (formerly known as Superior Software Ltd) is a

video game publisher A video game publisher is a company that publishes video games that have been developed either internally by the publisher or externally by a video game developer. They often finance the development, sometimes by paying a video game developer ...

. It was one of the main publishers for the

BBC Micro The BBC Microcomputer System, or BBC Micro, is a family of microcomputers developed and manufactured by Acorn Computers in the early 1980s as part of the BBC's Computer Literacy Project. Launched in December 1981, it was showcased across severa ...

and

Acorn Electron The Acorn Electron (nicknamed the Elk inside Acorn and beyond) was introduced as a lower-cost alternative to the BBC Micro educational/home computer, also developed by Acorn Computers, to provide many of the features of that more expensive mach ...

computers in the 1980s and early 1990s, and occasionally published software to the

Commodore 64 The Commodore 64, also known as the C64, is an 8-bit computing, 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 ...

Amiga Amiga is a family of personal computers produced by Commodore International, Commodore from 1985 until the company's bankruptcy in 1994, with production by others afterward. The original model is one of a number of mid-1980s computers with 16-b ...

ZX Spectrum The ZX Spectrum () is an 8-bit computing, 8-bit home computer developed and marketed by Sinclair Research. One of the most influential computers ever made and one of the all-time bestselling British computers, over five million units were sold. ...

and

Amstrad CPC The Amstrad CPC (short for "Colour Personal Computer") is a series of 8-bit home computers produced by Amstrad between 1984 and 1990. It was designed to compete in the mid-1980s home computer market dominated by the Commodore 64 and the ZX Spec ...

. It currently releases games for

Microsoft Windows Windows is a Product lining, product line of Proprietary software, proprietary graphical user interface, graphical operating systems developed and marketed by Microsoft. It is grouped into families and subfamilies that cater to particular sec ...

iOS Ios, Io or Nio (, ; ; locally Nios, Νιός) is a Greek island in the Cyclades group in the Aegean Sea. Ios is a hilly island with cliffs down to the sea on most sides. It is situated halfway between Naxos and Santorini. It is about long an ...

and Android, mostly updates of its original games.

History

Per its original name, Superior Software was founded in 1982 by software writers Richard Hanson and John Dyson, university graduates with degrees in Computational Science and Physics of Natural Resources respectively. They had previously programmed software published by Micro Power, and they wrote Superior's first four game releases for the

; three were written by Hanson and one by Dyson. Describing the early days, Hanson commented: Key management included Steve Botterill as general manager, and Chris Payne as marketing manager. By the end of 1983, the business had grown substantially, but John Dyson was unwilling to commit more fully to the operation, being employed as a technician at BBC Television in Leeds. Thus, Richard Hanson brought his older brother, Steve, into the business, which moved out of the homes of its founders and into dedicated premises.

Releases

In 1983, its unauthorised version of ''

Hunchback Kyphosis () is an abnormally excessive convex curvature of the spine as it occurs in the thoracic and sacral regions. Abnormal inward concave ''lordotic'' curving of the cervical and lumbar regions of the spine is called lordosis. It can ...

'' reached the number one position in the BBC charts. Century Electronics took out an injunction to prevent the game from being sold, later reaching a licensing agreement. In 1986, Superior acquired the rights to use the Acornsoft brand name and back catalogue as Acorn wanted to focus on hardware. This led to the re-release of some of Acornsoft's most popular titles under the joint Superior Software / Acornsoft label, including David Braben and Ian Bell's ''

Elite In political and sociological theory, the elite (, from , to select or to sort out) are a small group of powerful or wealthy people who hold a disproportionate amount of wealth, privilege, political power, or skill in a group. Defined by the ...

'' and Geoff Crammond's '' Revs''. Their best-known games are the ''

Repton Repton is a village and civil parish in the South Derbyshire district of Derbyshire, England, located on the edge of the River Trent floodplain, about north of Swadlincote. The population taken at the 2001 census was 2,707, increasing to 2 ...

'' series of games, which have sold over 125,000 units in total. Other notable Superior Software games for the BBC Micro and Acorn Electron include '' Overdrive'', ''

Citadel A citadel is the most fortified area of a town or city. It may be a castle, fortress, or fortified center. The term is a diminutive of ''city'', meaning "little city", because it is a smaller part of the city of which it is the defensive core. ...

'', ''

Thrust Thrust is a reaction force described quantitatively by Newton's third law. When a system expels or accelerates mass in one direction, the accelerated mass will cause a force of equal magnitude but opposite direction to be applied to that ...

'', '' Galaforce'', ''

Stryker's Run ''Stryker's Run'' is a video game designed by Chris Roberts and Philip Meller for the BBC Micro and BBC Master which was published by Superior Software in 1986. It was also later converted to the Acorn Electron. It is a 2D side-scrolling action ...

'', '' Ravenskull'' and ''

Exile Exile or banishment is primarily penal expulsion from one's native country, and secondarily expatriation or prolonged absence from one's homeland under either the compulsion of circumstance or the rigors of some high purpose. Usually persons ...

''. They also published '' Zarch'' for the

Acorn Archimedes The Acorn Archimedes is a family of personal computers designed by Acorn Computers of Cambridge, England. The systems in this family use Acorn's own ARM architecture processors and initially ran the Arthur operating system, with later models ...

, as well as follow-up games using the same engine, '' Conqueror'' and ''Air Supremacy''. As well as original titles, Superior also released a number of official conversions of popular games from other systems including ''

Barbarian A barbarian is a person or tribe of people that is perceived to be primitive, savage and warlike. Many cultures have referred to other cultures as barbarians, sometimes out of misunderstanding and sometimes out of prejudice. A "barbarian" may ...

'', ''

The Last Ninja ''The Last Ninja'' is an action-adventure game developed and published by System 3 (company), System 3 in 1987 for the Commodore 64. It was converted to the Apple IIGS, MS-DOS, BBC Micro and Acorn Electron in 1988, the Apple II in 1989, the Amig ...

'', ''

Predator Predation is a biological interaction in which one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common List of feeding behaviours, feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation ...

'', '' Hostages'' and ''

Sim City ''SimCity'' is an Open-ended (gameplay), open-ended City-building game, city-building video game franchise originally designed by Will Wright (game designer), Will Wright. The first game in the series, ''SimCity (1989 video game), SimCity'', ...

''. They also published a number of educational and utility software titles including the

speech synthesis Speech synthesis is the artificial production of human speech. A computer system used for this purpose is called a speech synthesizer, and can be implemented in software or hardware products. A text-to-speech (TTS) system converts normal langua ...

program ''Speech!''. The "Play It Again Sam" series of compilations included re-releases of their old titles, with four games for the usual price of one. The original ''Play It Again Sam'' featured four Superior games (''Citadel'', ''Thrust'', ''Ravenskull'', and ''Stryker's Run''), while subsequent compilations increasingly featured games licensed from other software houses such as Micro Power or

Alligata Alligata Software Ltd. was a computer games developer and publisher based in Sheffield in the UK in the 1980s. The company was founded by brothers Mike and Tim Mahony and their father J.R. Mahony in 1983. They produced games for a number of home ...

. These compilations also occasionally included some new games that were thought to be not quite up to the standard of their full price games. The series eventually ran to 18 entries for the BBC Micro.

Current activity

Superior Interactive mainly develops and publishes software for computers and devices running

and Android. They have released updated versions of some of their popular 1980s hits for these systems, including the original three ''Repton'' games, additional ''Repton'' levels, ''Galaforce Worlds'', ''Ravenskull'', ''Pipeline Plus'' and ''Ricochet''.

Software

Games

Compilations

* ''The Acornsoft Hits'' (1987) * ''The Superior Collection'' (1987) * ''Play It Again Sam'' (Electron: 1987-1991, BBC Micro: 1987-1993, Archimedes: 1992-1994)

Educational / utility software

* ''Toolkit'' (1983) * ''Assembler'' (1983) * ''World Geography'' (1983) * ''Disassembler'' (1984) * ''Constellation'' (1984) * ''Planetarium'' (1984) * ''UK Geography'' (1984) * ''Speech!'' (1985)

References

External links

Superior Interactive website

Superior Interactive profile
from

MobyGames MobyGames is a commercial website that catalogs information on video game A video game or computer game is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface or input device (such as a joystick, game controller, controlle ...

{{BBC Computer Literacy Project Video game companies of the United Kingdom Video game publishers Acorn Computers RISC OS Video game companies established in 1982 1982 establishments in England