Latest Retro Gamer

[Gryzor]

Heheh good one

Let us know when you also do a movie!

[chinnyhill10]

Well, maybe it would a good idea to write some good articles for it and this would also increase the percentage of CPC content in it.


Since I don't have to time personally I do at least not bitch at it.

How dare I buy at least 90 issues of their magazine at full cover price and then dare to offer criticism!

[Gryzor]

128 and counting here...

[Bryce]

I'll probably be offline for a while, I'm not happy with the internet, so I'll be building my own for the next while.

Bryce.

[Gryzor]

Well, don't forget to send us a beta invitation, so that if we don't like it we can build our own, okay?

[Bryce]

I'll be starting with the backbone which seems to be a Pr0n distribution system and a big Fibre-optic connection to something called NSA

Bryce.

[AMSDOS]

128 and counting here...

I might have looked at 3 or 4 at the newsagent. 

[Gryzor]

@Bryce : there, you got it wrong. I'm a married man, so I just need it to deliver to my morning inbox all the new TOSEC and ROMset releases. Umph, off to build my own...

@AMSDOS : ok, you got nothing to whine about

[Munchausen]

I agree with TFM in that someone from the CPC community writing a few articles for RG would be really good.

[Bryce]

I agree with TFM in that someone from the CPC community writing a few articles for RG would be really good.

Is that an offer to contribute?

Bryce.

[redbox]

I think you might be being a bit harsh here as I think TFM's point was a good one.

If it's the lack of content that is making Retro Gamer so poor, then why not suggest some new content to them? And as he said, this would also have the benefit of highlighting the CPC as a platform... 

[arnoldemu]

I think you might be being a bit harsh here as I think TFM's point was a good one.

If it's the lack of content that is making Retro Gamer so poor, then why not suggest some new content to them? And as he said, this would also have the benefit of highlighting the CPC as a platform... 

it is already clear that Retro Gamer like the Amstrad. A couple of the writers had one and they mention it quite frequently.

They do review amstrad games when there are new ones. They do show cpc screenshots when showing a game that has appeared on multiple platforms.

So they already do something. The CPC scene generates less games than the other scenes so that is why there is less content on the cpc.

That being said, you could easily write a review for an old cpc game and have it published. Other readers do this. So it's another way to highlight the cpc.

Saying "they need to write more about the cpc" is something I also want to see, but when there is not always that much new in the way of games, and when they have to do a balanced approach and cover other systems I believe is not so easy.

So what is the solution? ?

Make more cpc games then tell them to take a look



EDIT: Also don't forget the range of readership. For some people Retro means CPC, C64, Spectrum, for others it means Amiga, ST and for others it means SNES, Megadrive for some it means Playstation and Xbox. Even PS2 and Gamecube are turning retro.

It depends on your age and the first systems you owned too.

[arnoldemu]

Also, for people who want to make games and are not so good at programming there is AGD!
And on CPC itself there are other creation tools: GAC, Quill, Sprites Alive.
And, there is the help of others here too.

[Gryzor]

But the (lack or not) of CPC articles is not the issue. I agree that, though I'd want to see more material on the CPC, it's been better than in older issues. The problem is that the magazine does not seem to move forward, EXCEPT to embrace newer machines that are nowhere real retro if you ask me.

Also, it's not really about writing a review since RG doesn't really do "reviews", you need to do an in-depth article on a game or a piece of hardware, for which you need time, knowledge and writing flair. Not an easy job.

[Carnivius]

EDIT: Also don't forget the range of readership. For some people Retro means CPC, C64, Spectrum, for others it means Amiga, ST and for others it means SNES, Megadrive for some it means Playstation and Xbox. Even PS2 and Gamecube are turning retro.

It depends on your age and the first systems you owned too.

I think we need new categories for retro.  I've loved my PlayStations but even the PS1 still doesn't feel very 'retro' to me.   But even 'my' own personal definition of retro is quite broad because it includes the 8 and 16 bit eras and while they're similar in many ways for the types of games they produced they're still very different in other ways.

[Gryzor]

Defining 'retro' is very hard to do; I guess fifty years from now retro systems will be the ones we haven't even dreamed of yet. So there's that. On the other hand I feel that in computing it's better to discern and draw a line. Sure, someone ten years younger than I am doesn't even know about the ZX or the CPC but has grown up with much more advanced systems. However, is it really retro just because it's old, when there has been such huge homogenisation in terms of gameplay, gaming genres etc? Just more powerful machines, that's all.

[Carnivius]

I hate that the word retro gets slapped onto any cheaply made modern game that has crude graphics as if that's what games were actually like back then.    Apparently it's not that the game's 'artist' can't draw for shit at all, this game is just RETRO!!!   And then they try to cover up their 5 minute doodles in MS Paint with a lot of modern alpha transparency effects and lighting and whatever fancy crap their game design tools can overlay.   I don't mind if it something like the PSN/Wii/XBLA release of Mega Man 9 and 10 get called retro because they're purposely built to simulate running on the real NES hardware as the previous games in the series did.  That's fine.   Most of the time though I see really bad blocky stickmen or squares (cos they can't even draw stickmen) bouncing about a screen, usually completely misaligned cos they've been pre-drawn all blocky and badly moving on the higher resolution of the system rather than being done more accurately upscaled.   

That's one of the reasons that motivate my CPC-style projects is that sure they're blocky and perhaps a bit garish but I'm still trying to use those dated specs to produce graphics that actually look like things.  I like to try and prove that those 16 colours on screen (out of the 27) and that chunky wide-pixel resolution of a 30 year old computer can still do better than what most folk today seem to expect of 'prehistoric' 8-bits.

[Gryzor]

I'll agree with what you say about retro-themed games with modern effects; too many remakes have been ruined by using shine with abandon next to pixel art (good or bad).

[TFM]

I think you might be being a bit harsh here as I think TFM's point was a good one.

If it's the lack of content that is making Retro Gamer so poor, then why not suggest some new content to them? And as he said, this would also have the benefit of highlighting the CPC as a platform... 

And I would even do that by myself if the topics I know about would be interesting for more than view. However, one f.e. could provide a background story for the ROM competition. How f.e. did Subrerra Puzzlo evolve? Other versions planned? How strong was the time pressure? Maybe all four finalists can do something together and send it to them. Only bad thing, they already had that topic (I guess). But let this just serve as an example what could be done.


And yes, I fix my sink, and my crap by myself. 

[zeropolis79]

So does it seem a good job my newsagent messed up and not got this months issue.

[AMSDOS]

Defining 'retro' is very hard to do; I guess fifty years from now retro systems will be the ones we haven't even dreamed of yet. So there's that. On the other hand I feel that in computing it's better to discern and draw a line. Sure, someone ten years younger than I am doesn't even know about the ZX or the CPC but has grown up with much more advanced systems. However, is it really retro just because it's old, when there has been such huge homogenisation in terms of gameplay, gaming genres etc? Just more powerful machines, that's all.

It's the same problem as what people define as "Vintage Computer".

Defining 'retro' is very hard to do; I guess fifty years from now retro systems will be the ones we haven't even dreamed of yet. So there's that. On the other hand I feel that in computing it's better to discern and draw a line. Sure, someone ten years younger than I am doesn't even know about the ZX or the CPC but has grown up with much more advanced systems. However, is it really retro just because it's old, when there has been such huge homogenisation in terms of gameplay, gaming genres etc? Just more powerful machines, that's all.

I know people who cannot picture a computer program running on a 64kb machine and even a compiled language which may compile a larger program also seems small, so 16kb of Video Memory is Low-res in whatever resolution you put it.

[awergh]

Sure, someone ten years younger than I am doesn't even know about the ZX or the CPC but has grown up with much more advanced systems. However, is it really retro just because it's old, when there has been such huge homogenisation in terms of gameplay, gaming genres etc? Just more powerful machines, that's all.

You know I am somewhat more then 10 years younger then you , I wonder what this big black thing with red and green and blue keys is  

It's the same problem as what people define as "Vintage Computer".

Mmm well in wintel/ibm pc land I more or less think anything that isnt ATX is vintage  but the ATX standard is almost 20 years old so I might not be able to use that as my definition in the long run, other more interesting computers well none of them really exist unless you play with SPARC or something but thats not really for playing games so I could claim all home computers are vintage at this point unless there is something I don't know

[beaker]

As a general rule of thumb, I'll go on key features and availability rather than age. Regardless of format, the current generation still use optical media so Playstation onwards isn't retro yet as I can still see design aspects that are relevant today. Anything just prior to this, or still being manufactured but no longer widely used such as cassettes, disks or cartridges are retro. I include cassettes as I can still get a tape player from Argos last time I checked, and cassette tapes from Tescos here in Ireland. Anything using obsolete and hard to find items such as punch cards for example would be vintage. Obviously there are probably exceptions but that's it for me 

[Carnivius]

Regardless of format, the current generation still use optical media

Though these days it's mostly optional with a lot of games (particularly smaller ones) exclusively as download.  I don't bother with discs myself these days and replaced most of my PS3 and PSP games with the digital versions where available. 

[Munchausen]

As a general rule of thumb, I'll go on key features and availability rather than age. Regardless of format, the current generation still use optical media so Playstation onwards isn't retro yet as I can still see design aspects that are relevant today. Anything just prior to this, or still being manufactured but no longer widely used such as cassettes, disks or cartridges are retro. I include cassettes as I can still get a tape player from Argos last time I checked, and cassette tapes from Tescos here in Ireland. Anything using obsolete and hard to find items such as punch cards for example would be vintage. Obviously there are probably exceptions but that's it for me 

After you mention PS1 not being retro there's a really obvious exception (problem?) as the nintendo 64, using cartridges, came out almost 2 years after the playstation one, which used CDs. So by your reckoning the newer N64 would be retro and the older PS1 would not!