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This month in... C&VG '85

Mike Keith

News

After months of teasing, the new look for C&VG was here. It was quite a radical change and still looks pretty decent today.

The excellent "Bored of the Rings" was going to be re-launched by Silversoft and would feature new locations and graphics.

Beyond struck a deal with Mindscape that would see its games distributed in the the US. First up were "Lords of Midnight", "Shadowfire" and "Quake Minus One".

Rumours surfaced that a certain Gary Liddon had secretly added a scrolling text message in "A View to a Kill" while he was still working at Domark, much to the annoyance of management.

People were still raving about the C64 music to "Hyper Sports". The musician was said to be the nephew of James Galway, the famous flautist...

Features

"Shatter" was a new comic that had hit the shelves. This wouldn't have been newsworthy except for the fact that it was the first digital comic - as in, it was all drawn/produced on computer (a Mac) - to be commercially published.

The winners of the Golden Sundial of Pi were interviewed. They were Sue Cooper, a teacher, and Lizi Newman, who was the proprietor of a music shop - both from Yorkshire. The prize was claimed on the 22nd of July, 1985 at the mouth of a horse cut into the chalk hill of High and Over, near the villages of Alfriston and Litlington, in the Sussex Downs. They were greeted by the Piman (Christian Penfold) on what was a very wet day and were treated to a meal at the Seven Sisters Hotel in Seaford. The fact that they managed to solve the puzzle is impressive, as it was rather involved indeed.

The second and final instalment of "Diary of a Game" saw the team finishing off "Space Doubt". The rather odd thing is that no one seemed terribly positive about the game with statements like "It's too late to worry about what might have been." I should've paid more attention before shelling out my hard earned cash for what was a disappointing game. Apparently CRL needed to sell around 8000 copies to break even.

Notable Previews

Notable Reviews

  • "Frankie Goes To Hollywood" Denton Designs/Ocean - C64 9/10 Game of the Month "Bound to be one of the all time classics on the CBM 64."
  • "Spy vs Spy II": The Island Caper" First Star Software - C64 9/10 Blitz Game "The cartoon graphics are every bit as good as on Spy vs Spy and, with seven levels of action, you'll find it a real challenge."
  • "Hyperdrive" English Software - QL 9/10 "It's fast and lots of fun, with some nice looking graphics and neat sound effects."
  • "Mad Doctor" Creative Sparks - C64 9/10 Blitz Game "Mad Doctor is great value and will keep you hooked for ages."
  • "Codename Mat II" Derek Brewster/Domark - Spectrum/Amstrad/C64 10/10 "Codename Mat is an exciting mixture of action and strategy - and will keep you stuck in from of your Spectrum or Amstrad or C64 for many hours of happy zapping."
  • "Profanation" Gremlin Graphics - Spectrum 9/10 Blitz Game "Overall an extremely well presented and entertaining game."
  • "Terrormolinos" Melbourne House - C64/Spectrum 8/10 "Terrormolinos is a fun adventure. It's only a game, but... not having taken my holiday at the time of writing, I'm glad it's Italy for me this year!"
  • "Enthar Seven" Robico - BBC 10/10 "BBC cassette owners - go out and buy a disk drive now."
  • Mordon's Quest" Melbourne House - Spectrum/C64/Amstrad 10/10 "Once in a while, along comes an adventure which halts family life for a few weeks, the sort that demands attention night and day until all its secrets are unfolded, all its locations explored, and all its treasures safely stored!"
  • "Red Moon" Level 9 - Spectrum/C64 10/10 "This game MUST rate as the best adventure I have played this year. It is streets ahead of Level 9's previous games, and they are good enough!"