The clatter of dice on my bedroom floor still echoes in my head sometimes, which probably sounds daft until you realize I'm talking about the sound effects in Shining in the Darkness. That metallic rattle when you'd roll for initiative—pure digital dice music that somehow felt more authentic than the actual plastic cubes scattered around my Dungeons & Dragons books.I stumbled into this gem completely by accident, the way most of the best gaming discoveries…
The Commodore 64 was released in January 1982, although it was in production since Spring 1982. It was released into the market in late August 1982. It utilised a MOS 6510 CPU (a 6502 derivative) operating at 0.985 MHz PAL or 1.023 MHz NTSC frequencies with 64 KB of RAM (38 KB usable for BASIC programs). The Commodore 64’s VIC-II graphics processor supported a 320×200 maximum resolution with 16 colours and 8 sprites. The Commodore…
If you just want the answer, the best Monkey Island game is Monkey Island 2: LeChuck’s Revenge. The Secret of Monkey Island comes a very close second, The Curse of Monkey Island takes third, and Escape from Monkey Island props up the bottom. Getting to that order, though? That nearly ended a friendship. The full list, best to worst, is below, along with why each game landed where it did. Quick Rankings 1. Monkey Island…
You know that weird thing where a smell can transport you instantly? Well, the other day I caught a whiff of something—maybe it was the ozone from an old CRT warming up, or that particular plastic scent of a cartridge slot—and suddenly I was twelve again, sprawled on my mate's living room carpet, arguing about whether Sonic was faster than the Road Runner. That's the magic of the Mega Drive, isn't it? It doesn't just…
Last night I was rifling through a dusty box in the spare room—you know, that archaeological dig we all promise to do "next weekend"—when I found my old N64 cartridge collection wrapped in a tea towel like precious gems. There it was: Mario Kart 64, the plastic slightly yellowed but the label still crisp. I held it up to the light, and suddenly I was sixteen again, cramped on a mate's bedroom floor with three…
Standing in my mate Dave's living room in late 2000, gripping that familiar three-pronged controller with sweaty palms, I had no idea I was about to experience one of gaming's most underrated Bond adventures. Dave had just unwrapped The World Is Not Enough for his N64, and honestly? We were skeptical. GoldenEye 007 had set the bar stratospherically high three years earlier, and Perfect Dark had raised it even further. Another Bond game felt risky—like…
Got it, makes sense. Here’s the merged version with all the original HTML elements dropped back in: — The Console That Invented Home Gaming and the Arcade Aesthetic That Never Gets Old I own a pub in Bristol. The back room is a shrine to arcade cabinets and ancient home systems that actually still work. By day I work in IT. By night I write about arcade gaming and why original hardware authenticity is important…
The Sega Saturn sits in my cabinet like a beautiful, misunderstood artifact from an alternate timeline where 2D sprites ruled the world and marketing departments made sensible decisions. But tucked inside that angular grey shell is something truly magical—a game that shouldn't exist, couldn't have been made anywhere else, and somehow captures the essence of dreaming better than any piece of entertainment before or since.I'm talking about NiGHTS into Dreams, obviously. And if you've never…
I remember the exact moment my childhood died. Not in some dramatic, tear-jerking way—more like watching your favorite teddy bear get caught in a washing machine and come out looking… different. I was nineteen, home from university for the weekend, and my mate Dave had brought round this game he'd bought from some bloke at a car boot sale. "It's got a squirrel," he said, like that explained everything.Conker's Bad Fur Day wasn't supposed to…
I am Samuel, and I need to put an end to a debate that has bothered me since the last time we spoke on team calls. Tim is saying that Marvel vs Capcom games are better now due to their “improved balance” and “more accessible controls”. Tim, you are missing the whole point. While the original Marvel vs Capcom may be the core of the franchise, it is also the most direct example of how…