Founding Eldritch The Cat, a broke summer in Spain, and a first deal with Electronic Arts How I co-founded the studio Eldritch The Cat and signed with Electronic Arts in 1988 to build Projectyle …
A reckoning in London, too many projects at once, and the company born from the wreckage I join Liverpool studio Denton Designs, finish Crosswize, build Foxx Fights Back on the ZX Spectrum, and found …
The contract, the VIC-20, and the getaway car. Broke after Odin folds, I sign with Firebird to build Crosswize, the ZX Spectrum sequel to Sidewize, and fly to MicroProse in Baltimore. Read Chapter …
Chasing the raster, glimpsing the future, and a critical disagreement. As Odin collapses, I finish the 50fps Spectrum shooter Sidewize unpaid, glimpse the future in the Amiga, and shop the studio to …
Ten games in twelve months, Bertie Big Boy, and the Forbidden Amigas. Odin signs a six-figure Firebird deal, ten games in twelve months, we ship Heartland to a Crash Smash, and I meet the Amiga for …
A reskin, some side quests, and the second album problem. At Odin we reskin Nodes of Yesod into Arc of Yesod, port it to the doomed Elan Enterprise, and ship Robin of the Wood to a 94% Crash Smash on …
A Crash Smash, business trousers, and a dubious charge. I join Odin Computer Graphics in 1985, finish the Crash Smash hit Nodes of Yesod on the ZX Spectrum, and sleep under desks. Read Chapter 7: The …
In trouble with the law for stealing my own trousers Locked out of my own house, I break back in with a van and my boss, and the police turn up for entirely the wrong crime. Read Chapter 6: The Holt …
“The cavemen didn’t need paintbrushes.” Tommy Barton, 1984 Life in the Zoo at Software Projects in 1984: a menagerie of donated computers, a Tatung Einstein boot-disk disaster, and …
A hosiery factory, an earthquake, and the interview that started it all. How a mailed-off ZX Spectrum demo and a Chinese lunch in Liverpool became my first games-industry job at Software Projects in …
Shoveling slag, eating pig lips, and a theft. Summer 1982 spent underground at a National Coal Board pit, then a year at university in Manchester falling apart: a dropout with no plan. Read Chapter …
A computer no one could touch, a lift that never stopped, and the Z80 chip. A school computer locked behind a forbidden door (the RML 380Z), a Paternoster lift, and the Z80 chip that would seed a …
Sheffield steel, Barnsley coal, and a very unstable compound. A working-class Yorkshire boyhood on Sheffield and Barnsley council estates, ending with a school chemistry-lab explosion and the …