An old-school 2D racer, developed and published for the Super Nintendo by a British company (Gremlin Graphics), way back in 1995.
Top Gear 3000 is a futuristic race game with tracks set on various different planets, with you driving fairly standard-looking sports cars.
By the time Pentagram came out in 1986, famous development and publishing house – Ultimate Play The Game – had been sold off to US Gold. How much of Pentagram was therefore down to Ultimate‘s designers, and how much was down to US Gold‘s programmers, is still a matter for debate. Most likely, Pentagram was a construct of US Gold, with Ultimate providing only the initial ideas, graphics and game engine (the famous Filmation Engine).
The original ZX Spectrum version of Alien 8 was first released in 1985, not long after Knight Lore had already blown the world away with its incredible isometric graphics and characteristic gameplay.
A British programmer/developer who made a name for himself with his very first game, Pud Pud, which was published by Ocean Software for the ZX Spectrum in 1984. Smith was just 17 at the time Pud Pud was released, but was fortuitous in that his pitch to Ocean, and them signing him up as ‘talent’, was all filmed and later broadcast on television in an episode of BBC TV’s Commercial Breaks, which gave him an instant profile to an appreciative audience. Bob Wakelin‘s ace cover art also did Smith‘s early games a lot of good.
Hyper Active is a fairly boring and generic side-scrolling shooter that was given away free with the June 1988 edition of Sinclair User magazine.
Of all his Spectrum games, Firefly was the one that programmer Jonathan Smith said really “came together” during development.
Firefly is an eight-way scrolling shooter with light puzzle elements that was first released by Ocean Software in 1988.
First released in 1988, Ocean Software‘s Batman: The Caped Crusader is not to be confused with Ocean‘s other Batman game, programmed by Jon Ritman. No, this one is the 2D, comic panel animated adventure programmed by Jonathan Smith.
Published by Software Projects in 1987, Hysteria – at first glance – seems to owe quite a bit to Cobra, the infamous scrolling shooter from Ocean. At least graphically (the main character is a spitting image of the sprite in that game).
A conversion of the superb Nichibutsu arcade game, programmed by the late Jonathan Smith and published by Imagine Software in 1986.
A conversion of the infamous Konami arcade game Rush’n Attack (name changed later in the West to Green Beret), by the inimitable Jonathan Smith. Published by Imagine Software in 1986.
The King of Grabs 