Older Posts - Page 42 of 42

Force of the Vulcan (GTW64 highlight)

Posted: by Alex Ross-Shaw

Force of the Vulcan GTW64 review

Alex Ross

Kele Line Games

1987

Kele Line games were a Danish games company, who now are probably most famous for their excellent title, The Vikings. They only released two other games, Tiger Mission and Zyrons Escape, before disappearing into the forgotten mists of C64 nostalgia.

However, they did have another four games slated for release, one of which was Force of the Vulcan. Nothing is known about this game other than its brief mention in issue 2 of Computer Action. It was due to be released in late 1987, the same year as The Vikings and Tiger Mission, but the company went bankrupt towards the end of the year.

Whether this game was due to be a licensed Star Trek game is unknown, though if that was the case then it is likely that there would be more information about the game available. As it is we can presume it would be a sci-fi game, as the reference to Vulcan would suggest (unless its a game about vulcanised rubber).

Its a shame Kele Line didnt manage to make it in the games industry, The Vikings, Kele Lines best received game, was written by Soren Gronbech, who would later go on to program for the Amiga with Sword of Soden possibly being his most famous game.

Posted in Commodore 64 (C64) | Leave a comment

The history of Berserker Works Ltd

Posted: , last updated: by Alex Ross-Shaw

The was originally posted on the central GTW site a couple of years back, luckily for Frank I archive things obsessively and thus still had all the files and details on my computer. Enjoy!

The story of Berserker Works is similar to many software houses in the 1980s. Set up as a small company with only one or two people at the helm, it released several games over the years before running out of steam in the late 1980s, having never managed to secure the major distribution needed to gain a profitable foothold in the industry.

The difference with Berserker Works is that it was created and run by best-selling science fiction and fantasy author, Fred Saberhagen, who by the 1980s had been writing books for over twenty years. He had seen the rising interest in computer games and believed that it would only grow, and felt it would be a good idea to create a story that would make a great computer game. What he came up with, the Book of Swords, was too complex for the technology of the time, but Berserker Works (named after his science fiction series based around a race of death machines known as the Berserkers) was created and he pressed ahead with getting programmers involved to help him realise various concepts he and his wife, Joan, came up with.

Continue reading →

Posted in Commodore 64 (C64), Features, PC | Tagged , | 3 Comments

The Bubbler (C64) released!

Posted: , last updated: by Frank Gasking

The bubbler on the C64After a long rescue mission, at long last the lost C64 conversion of The Bubbler has been found and released. The added bonus is that the game is fully complete, containing the loading picture, music and sfx.

Developer Matt Young, Sailor/Triad and Jazzcat have been busy at work and reconstructing things into its final state, whilst compressing and bug fixing. The download contains two versions, a trained version and the standard version. All instructions are included.

Although the frame rate suffers due to Ultimates demands on how the display worked, it is a massive finding and still as playable as the Spectrum original. Its yet another one for the archives! Go check it out!

http://www.gtw64.co.uk/Pages/t/Review_Thebubbler.php

Posted in Commodore 64 (C64), News | Leave a comment

Meantime – a top RPG lost game

Posted: , last updated: by Frank Gasking

We’ve seen countless many games disappear into the abyss without a screenshot or even a title left behind. This is not the case of Meantime (you may remember this title from GTW64’s coverage), one of the most popular vapourware (not so whimsical actually) according to gamers expectations.

This Interplay RPG evolved from Wasteland engine while sharing same development team, yet its not a follow-up. It came to a halt when the 8 bit market collapsed, bringing the end to the Apple II and C64 editions. It was then later revived in DOS just to come to the same conclusion. With the debut of advanced engines like Ultima VII , the competition would have been very unfair we guess!

Sources

 

Posted in Apple II, Commodore 64 (C64), Features, GTW64 news | Tagged | Leave a comment

Gamma Strike salvaged!

Posted: , last updated: by Frank Gasking

Gamma boxGreat news, but thanks to the games author Simon Phillips, we have managed to preserve possibly one of the only copies and packages of the obscure Gamma Strike game set on the Commodore 64.

What is particularly interesting about this finding is the use of the two guns which shoot plastic pellets, and of which probably caused the downfall of the package and its very limited release.

Now, it is pretty hard to fully preserve this title because of the hardware packaged with it, but by time of the Christmas update we should have a semi-playable download version of the 3 games that you can check out. Also with this will be various high quality photos/scans of the hardware, box and technical details of how the target and gun worked (So maybe you could rebuild the thing! ) to completely preserve this wonderful obscurity.

Look out for the Christmas update of GTW64 for the full story and all the findings, but for now check out the current entry in GTW 64.

Posted in Commodore 64 (C64), News | Leave a comment

Unseen version of Catalypse released

Posted: , last updated: by Frank Gasking

Catalypse was a pretty nifty C64 sideways shooter which challenged the likes of Armalyte and Delta towards the end of the C64s lifetime. Sadly Zzap 64 were strangely critical of the game and gave it a low mark, although the game is quite awesome from its intros, the game and the end sequence.

Recently the guys at ready64.org interviewed Andrea Pompili and managed to get an unreleased version of Catalypse which features a number of bug fixes, some including a level 2 loading screen, fixes to the bosses of 1st and 2nd level, etc.

Grab the new version from here:

http://ready64.org/giochi/scheda_gioco/id/2710/catalypse-1.1

If also you wish to read the interview with Andrea Pompili, then check it out here: (Note that its all in Italian, and you may need to run it through a translator!)

http://ready64.org/articoli/leggi/idart/79/intervista-ad-andrea-pompili

Posted in Commodore 64 (C64), News | Leave a comment

Trojan

Posted: , last updated: by Frank Gasking

1986/87 Durell

Platforms: ZX Spectrum and Commodore 64

Trojan was a Capcom arcade title which was due for conversion across to the likes of the ZX Spectrum and Commodore 64 in 1987. Tasked with the conversion for Elite Software was Durell Software, at least for the ZX edition.

trojan4

For years, much was unknown about it – until in more recent years it was established that Rob Hubbard had composed a some tunes for a game called Trojan. Clive Townsend then confirmed he had also developed the Spectrum edition, and had all of his Microdrive disks backed up by Steve Brown of TZX Vault- which revealed playable remains of the game. Continue reading →

Posted in Commodore 64 (C64), Reviews, ZX Spectrum | Tagged , | Leave a comment