The “computer game” has been with us now since Space Invaders was released in 1978, 35 years ago, cor blimey. In that timeframe I suspect the number of games that got cancelled for whatever reason outnumber those that got published. This blog is about a ‘failed game’, or more accurately a ‘failed app’, and whilst very simplistic in nature some might be interested in the story, but only because it concerns one of the UK’s most loved game studios… Ultimate Play The Game.
Ultimate Play The Game was the trade name for Ashby Computer and Graphics (ACG) and they were a UK software house set up by the Stamper bothers, Tim & Chris. Ultimate were based in Ashby-De-La-Zouch, and in 1983, from nowhere they burst into the British home computer scene. With their astonishing games, they stole the hearts of the Sinclair ZX Spectrum community, then just three years later they left without even leaving a note!
Today there’s still huge affection for their games some of which were truly revolutionary. If one was to ask “Who was the greatest game developer of the 80’s?” most would say Ultimate, or more specifically the Stamper brothers.
As a child, I have fond memories of Ultimate:
Playing JetPac and finally getting to level 5, ‘Muuuummmm the Spaceship has changed, mum the spaceship has changed’ I screamed like a hysterical mad man, by the time my mum clambered the stairs wondering if I’d fallen under the wardrobe again, the game was over and my achievement was lost from view; ‘Mum, there was another rocket, mum’, ‘Yes dear’
Faking illness and getting a day off school and playing Atic Atac the whole day, I played it so much that I felt unbelievably rough I had to take the next day off school too.
Staring at my copy of Crash magazine trying to desteganographize (yes, I made the word up) a green page, why on earth would they have just a green page for an advert? There must be something there…
For one of my birthday presents, my parents allowed me to have just one computer game of my choosing, so off to John Menzies we went. I chose the brand new orange one. It was the only one in a cardboard box, rather than the usual cassette box, and that box gave no clue to what was inside.
But that was the one I wanted. It was an Ultimate game. My mum freaked out:
How much?!!!! It’s the most expensive game in the whole shop! Why not have this one, or these two, or these three?
Sobbing my eyes out, I refused to leave the shop until I got my orange box containing Knight Lore.
Mum eventually caved, I got my precious and Tim Stamper got his Ferrari…