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This month in... C&VG '88

Mike Keith

News

Stephen Crow's "Starquake" was heading to the ST and Amstrad PC thanks to Mandarin Software.

Hewson were to re-release several classic titles by Gargoyle Games. "Dun Darach", "Marsport" and "Tir Na Nog" would available for a mere £1.99.

C&VG apologised for incorrectly stating the price of "IO" for the C64 last month.

"Stir Crazy" from Infogrames starred a "crazy criminal character" attempting to escape prison.

"Batman: The Killing Joke" by Alan Moore and Brian Bolland was proving quite a hit. The weird thing about this news item was it included a long legal disclaimer about the trademarks of DC - I don't think I've ever seen that before.

TV film "Max Headroom" had been turned into a 6 part TV series.

PSS's next strategy game would be "Power Struggle".

Hewson were releasing three more new budget titles, retailing at £2.99: "Battle Valley", "Subterranea" and "Ocean Conqueror".

Magic Bytes teased their new platformer, "Vampires Empire".

Gremlin was working on a sequel to last year's MASK game called "Venom Strikes Back".

A company called Computer Dial had created a play-by-mail type RPG where players would phone a number and... it was unclear, but it promised "whizzo sound effects".

Palace were about to release "Barbarian II: The Dungeon of Drax".

CRL released the classic C64 footie game "International Soccer" on cassette and disk - prior to this it had only been available on cartridge.

Codemasters were developing a game for the "Race Against Time" charity fundraiser (part of Sport Aid '88).

SSI was porting two of their AD&D games to the Amiga.

New graphic novels on the shelves this month included "Swamp Thing volume 4", "The return of Luther Arkwright", Dave Gibbons's rather mature Superman and the fifth instalment of Moebius's collected works.

Features

Golden Joystick 1988 winners:

  • Game of the Year: "Outrun" US Gold
  • Best Original Game: "Nebulus" Hewson
  • Adventure Game of the Year: "Guild of Thieves" Magnetic Scrolls/Rainbird
  • Arcade Game of the Year: "Outrun" US Gold
  • Strategy Game of the Year: "Vulcan" CCS
  • Programmer of the Year: Jon Ritman
  • Software House of the Year: US Gold

The movies reviewed this month were: "Wall Street", "Broadcast News", "Three Men and a Baby", "Flowers in the Attic", "Promised Land", "The Believers", "Death Wish 4", and "Bellman and True".

A mean machines special on the PC Engine.

Tony Takoushi raved about "The Great Giana Sisters" for the Amiga, and lamented how the spotlight of industry awards and so on had shifted from programmers/artists to marketing people.

Notable Previews

Notable Reviews

  • "Rimrunner" Palace Software - C64 9/10 "Rimrunner was designed by Barbarian wizard Steve Brown and programmed by Binary vision and the end result is a nifty little game. Palace very rarely disappoint with their games and Rimrunner carries on this fine tradition."
  • "Sidewinder" Mastertronic - Amiga 9/10 Game of the Month "The question is, do you have the stomach for a purer arcade experience than Xenon, a game that will, incredibly, only set you back a measly tenner, and one that combines first rate graphics and enormous excitement."
  • "Samurai Warrior" Firebird - C64 9/10 "It's clever, funny and challenging all at once, and breathes new life into the martial arts genre as well as appealing to loves of more complex arcade adventures."
  • "Beyond Zork" Infocom - PC/ST/Amiga/C128 9/10 C&VG Hit "I found it to be one of those rare games that I just kept on and on playing, completely ignoring the deadline for this review until the eleventh hour! After a few 'dodgy' titles from Infocom recently, it is nice to see them back on course, with what is bound to be among their top selling titles."
  • "Sherlock: The Riddle of the Crown Jewels" Infocom - C64/PC/ST/Amiga 9/10 C&VG Hit "Sherlock has all the puzzles and text that go to make a moderately difficult Infocom adventure of the expected standard."