Video - The Evolution of Game Music

This violin guy is amazing! I love his Tetris. And Plants vs. Zombies. And Metal Gear Solid.  :-)

Ramble: Retro Gaming Consoles!

This week the PlayStation Classic was announced - a teeny cute PS1 that will set you back £89.99.  This joins a long list of re-issued consoles.  I hadn't realised exactly how many there are now!

Here's the lowdown of a few that are in the shops now (and the little we know about the new PS).  Of these, the Nintendo ones are classy machines, the C64 is fun but a little nerdy, and the Mega Drive is apparently not very good (emulation issues and bad controllers).  But I've heard the Atari machine is fun! 

Of all the consoles, the C64 is the only one that leads you load additional games (via ROMs) - it's not possible to download additional games to the Nintendo or PlayStation consoles...

The Mega Drive and Atari machines are made by Atgames, whose efforts seem a bit hit and miss.  The C64 Mini was made by RetroGames.

We have some old consoles in the house, but there always seem to be issues - with modern TVs, lost cables, or even sadly weird decay in the controller leads.  For many people, these retro consoles are the best way to experience their past gaming experiences.  And introduce their kids to 'what the world used to be like'.  To be honest, I'd probably find it hard to go back to some old games.  The romance is better than the reality.  But hey.  The consoles I'm listing here are (in age order!):

Atari 2600 (1977)
C64 (1982)
NES (1985)
Mega Drive (1988)
SNES (1990)
PS1 (1994)

PlayStation Classic

£89.99 RRP, out 3rd December!
Comes with two wired controllers and an HDMI cable.
It will come with 30 pre-loaded games, including Final Fantasy VII, Jumping Flash, R4 Ridge Racer Type 4, Tekken 3 and Wild Arms.

The Nintendo Classic Mini: Super Nintendo Entertainment System

£79.99 from Nintendo (with USB power adapter).
Comes with two wired controllers and an HDMI cable.

It comes pre-loaded with 21 games:

• Contra III: The Alien Wars
• Donkey Kong Country
• EarthBound
• Final Fantasy III
• F-ZERO
• Kirby Super Star
• Kirbys Dream Course
• The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past
• Mega Man X
• Secret of Mana
• Star Fox
• Star Fox 2
• Street Fighter II Turbo: Hyper Fighting
• Super Castlevania IV
• Super Ghouls ’n Ghosts
• Super Mario Kart
• Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars
• Super Mario World
• Super Metroid
• Super Punch-Out!!
• Yoshi's Island

The Nintendo Classic Mini: Nintendo Entertainment System

£67.99 from Nintendo (with USB power adapter and second controller).
Comes with two wired controllers and an HDMI cable (it is also available with one controller and no power adapter, but this is the box with the extras...).

It comes pre-loaded with 30 games:

• Balloon Fight
• BUBBLE BOBBLE
• Castlevania™
• Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest™
• Donkey Kong
• Donkey Kong Jr.
• DOUBLE DRAGON II: THE REVENGE
• Dr. Mario
• Excitebike
• FINAL FANTASY®
• Galaga™
• GHOSTS‘N GOBLINS™ 
• GRADIUS™
• Ice Climber
• Kid Icarus
• Kirby’s Adventure
• Mario Bros.
• MEGA MAN™ 2
• Metroid
• NINJA GAIDEN®
• PAC-MAN™
• Punch-Out!! Featuring Mr. Dream
• StarTropics
• SUPER C™
• Super Mario Bros.
• Super Mario Bros. 2
• Super Mario Bros. 3
• Tecmo Bowl™
• The Legend of Zelda
• Zelda II: The Adventure of Link

Sega Mega Drive Flashback

Comes with two wireless controllers.  As well as built in games it has a classic Mega Drive cartridge slot, and it also has controller ports.

It has 45 pre-loaded Mega Drive games, as well as some Master System ones, Game Gear ones and 29 random 'extras' (so the '85 built in games' is a bit misleading; you're not getting 85 Mega Drive games. 
£79.99 at Argos.
(They've also made a "Sega Mega Drive Ultimate Portable Games Player", which is £59.99 at Argos.)

The 45 Mega Drive games are:

• Alex Kidd in the Enchanted Castle
• Alien Storm
• Altered Beast
• Arrow Flash
• Bonanza Bros.
• Chakan: The Forever Man
• Columns
• Columns III
• Comix Zone
• Crack Down
• Decap Attack
• Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine
• ESWAT: City Under Siege
• Eternal Champions
• Fatal Labyrinth
• Flicky
• Gain Ground
• Golden Axe
• Golden Axe II
• Golden Axe III
• Jewel Master
• Kid Chameleon
• Mortal Kombat
• Mortal Kombat II
• Mortal Kombat 3
• Phantasy Star III: Generations of Doom
• Phantasy Star II
• Phantasy Star IV
• Ristar
• Shadow Dancer: The Secret of Shinobi
• Shining Force
• Shining Force II
• Shining in the Darkness
• Shinobi III: Return of the Ninja Master
• Sonic & Knuckles
• Sonic 3D Blast
• Sonic Spinball
• Sonic the Hedgehog
• Sonic the Hedgehog 2
• Super Thunder Blade
• Sword Of Vermilion
• The Ooze
• Vectorman 2
• Vectorman
• Virtua Fighter 2

C64 Mini

This looks like a C64, but the keyboard is non-functional.  You have to plug in a USB keyboard!  But it does let you program - you can use it as an actual computer, if you want to...  You can also load ROMs that you've put onto a USB stick. 

£69.99 at Argos.

The 64 (appropriately!) pre-loaded games are:

• Alleykat
• Anarchy
• Armalyite – Competition Edition
• Avenger
• Battle Valley
• Boulder Dash
• Bounder
• California Games
• Chip's Challenge
• Confuzion
• Cosmic Causeway
• Creatures
• Cyberdyne Warrior
• Cybernoid II: The Revenge
• Cybernoids: The Fighting Machine
• Deflektor
• Everyone's a Wally
• Firelord
• Gribbly's Day Out
• Hawkeye
• Heartland
• Herobotix
• Highway Encounter
• Hunter's Moon
• Hysteria
• IO
• Impossible Mission
• Impossible Mission II
• Jumpman
• Mega Apocalypse
• Mission AD
• Monty Mole
• Monty on the Run
• Nebulus
• Netherworld
• Nobby the Ardvark
• Nodes of Yesod
• Paradroid
• Pitstop II
• Ranarama
• Robin of the Wood
• Rubicon
• Skate Crazy
• Skool Daze
• Snare
• Speedball
• Speedball 2 – Brutal Deluxe
• Spindizzy
• Star Paws
• Steel
• Street Sports Baseball
• Summer Games II
• Super Cycle
• Temple of Apshai Trilogy
• The Arc of Yesod
• Thing on a Spring
• Thing Bounces Back
• Trailblazer
• Uchi Mata
• Uridium
• Who Dares Wins II
• Winter Games
• World Games
• Zynaps

Atari Flashback 8 Gold

This has two wireless controllers, HDMI output, etc.

£79.99 at Argos.

It has 120 Atari 2600 games pre-loaded:

• 3-D Tic-Tac-Toe
• Adventure
• Adventure II
• Air Raiders
• Air-Sea Battle
• Aquaventure
• Armor Ambush
• Asteroids®
• Astroblast
• Atari Climber
• Backgammon
• Basketball
• Beamrider™
• Black Jack
• Bowling
• Breakout®
• Canyon Bomber®
• Centipede®
• Championship Soccer
• Chase It
• Chopper Command™
• Circus Atari®
• Combat®
• Combat® Two
• Cosmic Commuter™
• Crackpots™
• Crystal Castles®
• Dark Cavern
• Decathlon
• Demons to Diamonds™
• Desert Falcon
• Dodge'Em
• Double Dunk™
• Dragster
• Enduro™
• Escape It
• Fatal Run
• Fishing Derby™
• Flag Capture
• Football
• Frog Pond
• Frogger
• Frogs and Flies
• Front Line
• Frostbite™
• Fun with Numbers
• Golf
• Gravitar®
• H.E.R.O.™
• Hangman
• Haunted House®
• Home Run
• Human Cannonball™
• Indy 500
• International Soccer™
• Jungle Hunt
• Kaboom!™
• Keystone Kapers™
• Maze Craze
• Megamania™
• Millipede®
• Miniature Golf
• Miss It
• Missile Command
• MotoRodeo
• Night Driver™
• Off The Wall
• Oink!™
• Outlaw™
• Pitfall!™
• Polaris
• Pong® (Video Olympics)
• Pressure Cooker™
• Radar Lock™
• Realsports® Baseball
• Realsports® Basketball
• Realsports® Soccer
• Realsports® Volleyball
• Return to Haunted House
• River Raid™
• Saboteur®
• Save Mary
• Sea Battle ™
• Seaquest™
• Secret Quest
• Shield Shifter
• Sky Diver
• Slot Machine
• Slot Racers
• Solaris
• Space Attack™
• Space Invaders
• Space War
• Sprintmaster
• Stampede™
• Star Ship
• Star Strike™
• Starmaster™
• Steeplechase
• Stellar Track ™
• Street Racer
• Submarine Commander®
• Super Baseball
• Super Breakout®
• Super Challenge Football
• Super Challenge Baseball
• Super Football
• Surround
• Sword Fight™
• Swordquest: Earthworld™
• Swordquest: Fireworld™
• Swordquest: Waterworld™
• Tempest®
• Video Checkers
• Video Chess
• Video Pinball
• Warlords®
• Wizard
• Yars' Return
• Yars' Revenge®

So that's it!  (Phew, that was a lot of lists.)  I remember fondly time spent playing things like Golden Axe and Speedball 2.  Aaah....  Maybe I'll be more tempted when the Amiga Mini comes out (now that really would be something!!).

Article - Being 18 in 2018

The Office for National Statistics has just published this article, entitled Being 18 in 2018, and it includes some interesting stats for computing (including social media) and games/computer games.

According to their survey data, 18 year olds today (2014-15) spend on average 29.8 minutes 'computing' compared to 12 minutes in 2000-01, and 41.7 minutes playing games compared to 11 minutes per day in 2000-01.



I would like to see what the original questions for this were, though it certainly shows that people are playing more games.  And also watching less TV and socialising less!  Looking at it as someone who was 21 in 2000, back then gaming wasn't as 'normal' a thing as it is now.  And smart phones didn't exist.  (I wonder if people do more 'socialising' via their phones now, and less face to face, thus affecting the stats?)  At any rate, it's not a surprise that the stats came out like this...

Ramble: National Coding Week!

This week is National Coding Week.  Way back in the mists of time, I was lucky enough to have access to a BBC Micro at my primary school.  Since we didn't know enough at the time to fear it, or consider it 'too complicated', we learned how to program.  We played with Logo, and we learned BBC Basic.  Lots of PRINT "Hello, World" going on there, and similar.  Then, sadly, we moved on to secondary school and learnt little more than boring word processing and other things I could do anyway.  (And thus I lost interest in studying IT at school.)

Now, fantastically, Coding is part of the National Curriculum!  Key Stage 1 kids (that's years 1 and 2) are supposed to have learnt all about algorithms!  And creating and debugging programs!  And logic!  By the end of Key Stage 3 (years 7-9) they should be able to use two or more programming languages (one textual).  I really wish I had had this opportunity at school.

So, why is Coding important?  It can involve maths, art, science, design and technology, music... it teaches you logic, problem solving, and gives you a creative outlet.  It helps with literacy and numeracy.  And the great thing about Coding is that it involves computers, and kids love computers.  You're learning without knowing you're learning.  It's fun, but it's teaching you transferable skills - this isn't only useful if you're looking for a career at Microsoft.

The two main languages learnt in schools are Scratch and Python.  Scratch is a really fun, visual, easy to understand (yet challenging to completely master) programming language.  You can create some really complex stuff with it, but it's easy to get started.  There are loads of brilliant Video Tutorials available on the Scratch website.  Python is harder to get to grips with, though vaguely familiar to those of us who remember BBC Basic!  This is your textual language, then, and though it may be more daunting it's supposed to be fun (it's called Python because of Monty Python, apparently).  As well as school, there are lots of other opportunities for kids to learn Coding, such as Code Club - a free coding club for 9-13 years olds that meets across the country.

In Year 1 at school Seb used various things to learn Coding.  Logo (and the accompanying Turtle) seems to have been replaced by Bee-Bot and Blue-Bot.  These guys can be programmed to complete obstacle courses.  Plus they're kind of cute.  Also he's used apps like A.L.E.X. (PEGI-3), which is a puzzle game where you have to program a robot with a sequence of commands to get him through a level.  After a gentle introduction with things like these the kids move on to using Scratch to do "proper" programming.

I should probably mention Minecraft (PEGI-7) here, too.  With redstone you can build complex circuits to achieve all sorts of things.  With command blocks you can execute commands - any command that is run in your chat window.  You place the block, add a redstone device (like a pressure plate, or lever), and program the command block.  There are plenty of redstone and command block tutorials online.

If you're an adult and you'd like to learn Coding, it's certainly not too late. The tutorials aimed at kids are just as fun for grown ups, and if you want something that looks more impressive on your CV you could always try the courses at Future Learn (such as Game Design and Development: A Bit-by-Bit History of Video Game Music, or Begin Programming: Build Your First Mobile Game.  Or you could see what's available at your local college/adult education centre.

At the start of the home computing revolution, people were making games from their bedrooms.  For a while that stopped being possible.  Now things have come full circle, and people are programming from their bedrooms once more!  So, this Coding week, why not try Coding?  I can't wait for the next generation of Indie games developers.  :-)

Happy Video Games Day!

Apparently it's Video Games Day - who knew that was a thing?!  I don't know who decides this stuff.

Let's drink some GROG! GROG! GROG! to celebrate!

And why not watch the clip in this Tomorrow's World tweet from the BBC Archive, first broadcast June 1980 - how far things have come, eh?

I'll go and play some more video games now, then.  Since it's Video Games Day.  ;-)

September 2018 PS Plus Goodies!

And so, this month's PS Plus games are: Destiny 2 (PEGI-16), God of War III remastered (PEGI-18), Another World (PEGI-12), QUBE (PEGI-12), Foul Play (PEGI-12), Sparkle 2 (PEGI-3) as well as Here They Lie (PEGI-18) and Knowledge is Power (PEGI-3) (which were available before).  Another World and Sparkle 2 are also on PS3 and Vita, QUBE's also on PS3 and Foul Play is also on Vita.  If my attempted explanation of format availability hasn't confused things beyond belief!

The big hitters, then, aren't that family friendly.  But there are some other games here that are worth looking at.

Another World (PEGI-12) hardly needs an introduction. I've always admired it for its aesthetic - the animations are so fluid and the cinematics are really atmospheric.  Basically, it looks great, and when it was first released (in 1991!) it looked AMAZING.  The only problem I have with it is it's SOOOOOOO hard.  I have never managed to get very far in it.  Perhaps if I try again I will get further...

QUBE (PEGI-12) is a puzzle game that will remind you of Portal.  It's a First Person Puzzler, like Portal, and it's based around the manipulation of blocks to solve physics-based puzzles.  It has a story, which might keep you interested if you want to find out what's going on...  A decent game that's worth a play, but it's always going to suffer when compared to Portal.

Foul Play (PEGI-12) is a 'brawler action adventure' that takes place on a theatre stage.  The enemies are actors in (awful) costumes.  Instead of a health bar, the bar reflects how much the audience is enjoying your performance.  There's a lot of button mashing, but that's not a bad thing, especially if you're playing with younger kids.  I have to say it's pretty hilarious.  You can play with a friend (or family member!) locally or online.

Sparkle 2 (PEGI-3) is another puzzle game.  Basically, it's Zuma.  Which is not a bad thing.

So, family pick of the month is Foul Play.  Download it and give it a go!

Completed (for now!) - Motorsport Manager Mobile 3

Definitely up there with Frank Williams and Ron Dennis now. World Champions! Woo!