#0.5 From The Archive

30th November 2023

Wonderful use of PETSCII in Doomed “PETSCII” Pacman. For the PET and I just adore how much character they’ve managed to squeeze into this. (Itch)

Cuthbert’s back again! A remake of Cuthbert Enters The Tombs Of Doom for the Gameboy Colour. I knew this was the year of Cuthbert. Let’s make next year the year of Roland. (Itch)

Retromind is, wait for this, the board game Mastermind reimagined as an Impossible Mission meets Chuckie Egg platform game. That’s videogames, kids! Love ’em. (Itch)

This week’s Bitsy is The Mountain As It Always Was, a short rumination on life and loss. (Itch)

Breakwho is what if Breakout but time travel. A question I’d never stopped to ask but that’s one of the real joys of videogames, someone else surely will and try and answer it too. (Itch)

Dagger Wulf is Ultimate’s Sabre Wulf reimagined in 1k for Pico-8. As usual, playable in a browser. (Itch)

Switch owners, I noticed Tachyon Project is on sale for the next couple of weeks. It took me a few goes to get into but I ended up really enjoying its particular flavour of arcade arena shooting. (Deku)

And a reminder that the fantastic Alien Death Mob is out on Switch now too. I’ll shut up about it now but honestly, it’s so good, (Deku)

I’m incredibly fussy about my gravity shooters/Thrust-a-likes (more out of my own ineptness than any other reason) but Beyond The Scanline’s look at Lunaris for the Spectrum got me. I’ll be giving that a go at the weekend. (YouTube)

Which leads me into a handful of Pico 8 reader submissions for this week. With thanks to Min for these. (Cheers ears)

First up, Oust is a spectacular looking Thrust-a-like written for Pico 8. Look at it go! Blimey. (Itch)

Carnival is a remake of the gallery shooter arcade game from 1980, as with the original you don’t get to pick a cheap fluffy toy if you win but you can still cover yourself in candy floss by accident whilst playing if you fancy. It’s none of my business what you get up to. (Itch)

And finally, I’ve played so much Mappy this year so I’m well chuffed to be able to point you at a Pico 8 remake. I love that little mouse (little mouse!). (Itch)

Again, thanks to Min for those. I spend a lot of time browsing for games but I’m always going to miss plenty so I’m always up for suggestions.

“Save the world with gay trains in 1996” – You know I’m never going to skip over a game with a description that makes me shake the cat off my knee through laughing and here we are with a demake of City Skylines in a Gameboy-esque style. (Itch)

I don’t know about you but I find the idea of The Sentinel in nineties VR terrifying. A scary what could have been. (Time Extension)

Indieretronews report on a 1994 Bomberman clone for the C64, Penguin Tower, being found and available to play. (Indieretronews)

It’s Terror Hawk! Nobody try and invade the Earth whilst I’m trying to get a high score, I get very tetchy and it makes my wires ache. (Itch)

8th December 2023

Digital Eclipse have turned their attention to Yak and Giles for their next Gold Master Release and I couldn’t possibly be more excited for a videogame release. Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story is out next year and will have 42 games in it. Best news ever. (Time Extension)

Still in ‘best news ever’ territory here, Minion has popped out a remake of a fave of mine, New Rally X. It’s such a good game and Min’s remake does it justice and then some. Pico-8 so you can play it on the web if you fancy. (Itch)

More Pico-8 with Neon. Gosh, this is an absolutely beautiful looking, videogamey, videogame. (Itch)

Dolan’s Caddilac is a match 3 game where you have to bury someone alive. I honestly never anticipated writing that this week … or any week, come to think of it. A reader submission so thanks for the tip off. (Itch)

A sim of the old Game And Watch classic, Manhole. (Itch)

Chromanoids is a GB port of a fab recent Spectrum game where the lead character is, wait for this, a slime called Oozy Osbourne. Oh yes. (Itch)

Photon Ball And The Industrial Area may sound like directions you give to a taxi driver when you’re trying to find one of those big kid’s play warehouse things just outside town but it is, in fact, a beautiful looking new arcade game instead. (Itch)

More Gameboy stuff. A GB Colour remake of the proto-pixeljunk-eden Bugaboo The Flea. I loved Bugaboo as a kid, especially once I realised you could finish it incredibly quickly with the correct moves. Ooh, get me, 1984 speedrunner. (Itch)

Time for this week’s Bitsy game and it’s another poem – We, The Guardians Three. (Itch)

You lot are keeping me busy this week. It’s Uridium X, a remake of Uridium now with an X so everything is right with the world. (Itch)

Whilst we’re all impatiently waiting on Digital Eclipse, spend some time with a remake of Gridrunner that throws in some Matrix too for good measure. I am always up for Gridrunner remakes, always. (Itch)

I always wanted to like Profanation but the damn thing was cursed to only load one in five hundred times for me. I could go back and play it through emulation now but I’m still upset about things. Anyway, a remake, including an Android build! (Itch)

Atic Atac remade for the ZX Spectrum Next so it has all the colours now. (Itch)

Goblin Assault, a practice frowned upon in the fantasy world and also a remake of Orc Attack. Bop some clambering pests on the noggin to make a number go up. (Itch)

Gave it a passing mention back in issue #4, happy to say that Blast Arena is now up and playable. It’s an absolutely *beautiful* arena shooter for the Master System. (Itch)