It might look like an outdated pile of crap by today’s standards but Addictive Software‘s 1982 game, Football Manager, was a massive hit on the ZX Spectrum at the time.
Tag Archives: strategy
SimCity, Commodore 64
This classic city-building game was originally devised by creator Will Wright while he was working on the classic C64 shooter, Raid On Bungeling Bay. Wright found that he enjoyed making the overhead cities for the game – using his self-made editor – more than he enjoyed playing the game itself, so he set to work creating a game that would allow players to do the same.
SimCity was originally developed for the Commodore 64 and was initially released for that system in August of 1989, but was quickly ported to pretty much every video gaming system known to man at the time. It also spawned a long-running series, and provided a strong base from which developer/publisher Maxis would grow – specialising in “sim“-type games that would become its main market for decades to come.
Royal Stone, Game Gear
Royal Stone is a tactical, turn-based fantasy RPG with combat and magic that was released for the Game Gear – in Japan only – by Sega in 1995. Thankfully, an English fan translation does exist, so that we – non-Japanese-speakers – can now understand the storyline and enjoy the game in full.
Populous, Archimedes
The Archimedes has a flawless version of Populous – Bullfrog‘s seminal God sim – that was programmed by Richard Walker and published by Krisalis Software in 1992.
Colonization, Amiga
Also known as Sid Meier’s Colonization, this turn-based strategy game is based on the European colonisation of the New World, starting in 1492 and lasting until 1850. It’s essentially an updated and more-developed version of Sid Meier‘s previous game, Civilization. Which is no bad thing since Civilization is a superb, classic strategy game.
Herzog Zwei, Megadrive/Genesis
Developed by Techno Soft and first published in 1989, Herzog Zwei is an early real-time strategy game, predating Dune II by three years. It is the sequel to Herzog on the MSX2 and it shares the same DNA as that game.
Ghostbusters, Sega Master System
The 1987 Sega Master System conversion of David Crane‘s classic Ghostbusters is… Okay. It’s actually got a few enhancements over other versions that make it a bit more of a challenge, although it does have its down sides.
Ghostbusters, NES/Famicom
The Nintendo Entertainment System version of David Crane‘s Ghostbusters is known for being a bit of a mess, compared to all the other versions.
It was initially released in Japan in 1986 and later in North America in 1988. Why the two year delay? Probably something to do with the fact that the game is terrible…
Ghostbusters, PC
This 1986 PC Booter version of Ghostbusters won’t run in MS-DOS, but it is easy enough to get working in DOSBox, by simply adding a “BOOT” line to the config file.
To get the game running in colour (ie. not horrible CGA) I had to use the “pcjr” graphics option and set CPU cycles to 240. Otherwise the game would run too fast.
Ghostbusters, Amstrad CPC
The Amstrad CPC version of Ghostbusters was only ever released in Europe. Alongside the MSX version it was one of only two Ghostbusters conversions that were never released in North America.
