Live Magazine October/November 2016 Live Magazine October Edition | Page 32

retro

The Gamer diaries:
Being a high school student with a
job had its ups and downs. On the
one hand, I was able to buy whatever I wanted, and I did! On the flip
side, I had less time to do the things
that I wanted to do. This trend has
continued into adulthood, where
I now find myself writing about
games more than playing them. I’m
not complaining, far from it. I know
my video games will be there when
I have the time, but it’s interesting to
see how life works.
In late 1994 I was finally in a position to purchase a PC that was able
to handle the newest titles on the
market. I ordered my 486DX4-100
and patiently awaited the phone
call to tell me that it was ready to
pick up. Thankfully it was the school
holidays so being available to get it
wasn’t he issue, but transport was.
My father reluctantly took me to
pick up the computer, but the catch
was that I had to stay at my Aunt’s
house while he went to work. My
Aunt lived near his workplace, so it
was a convenient solution for him.
It wasn’t so convenient for me, as
my computer sat in the corner of
her lounge room all day while I sat
around waiting for him to finish work.
I eventually got it home, plugged it
in, turned it on and the phone rang.
My night fill manager was on the
line. He asked if I had picked up the
computer, and I confirmed that I
had. He said “well, that’s a shame,

as we need you to come in tonight
and fill some shelves”. I could hear
the mocking smile in his voice, but I
needed the money.
Before I purchased my PC I had
found a cheap copy of The Lost Vikings at Radio Rentals in Tea Tree
Plaza. I tried to play it on the Amstrad 5286 but the game would
detect the onboard chipset and display a message saying that it would
not run on anything below a 386. I
installed the game on my new 486
and it ran like a dream. The game
is a platform puzzler that features
3 vikings, all with their own abilities,
who are lost in time and space. The
graphics were nice and detailed for
their time, with a decent soundtrack
to boot. The controls are extremely
precise, so while the game is a little
frustrating in later levels, you really
have no one to blame but yourself
if you die. The Super Nintendo version was available, but the PC version was cheaper.
James had started delving into the
world of retro gaming well before I
did. A couple of years prior his parents had bought him an Intellivision
with a bunch of games. I’m pretty
sure they picked it up at a garage
sale. We had played it a few times
over the years, and initially I wasn’t
too impressed. With us abandoning our Amstrad computers, we
seemed to need more of a gam-

1994 - 1995

the continuing story of retro editor, paul monopoli’s gaming journey...

ing outlet than the Super Nintendo
alone. Almost every time I would
visit we would get out the Intellivision for a few rounds of Baseball.
James had other games, but he
seemed really keen on this one. I
remember that Tron Deadly Discs
was another favourite. I found the
circular control a little awkward, but
it is something a person can get
used to given time.

The Bi-Lo supermarket at the Ingle Farm Shopping Centre used to
have a news agency directly across
the mall. There was a hot dog stand
in the middle, where an Italian man
with an afro hair style would serve
hot dogs and soft serve ice cream.
I used to indulge in a ‘dog when I
was working enough hours to require a lunch break. During breaks
or after work I would head across to
the newsagent. While I had stopped
collecting Amstrad Action, and had
sold the Amstrad computer itself, I
still kept up to date with the goings
on in the world of the CPC. Sadly
not much was happening in that
world, and the magazine was filled
with commercial games being rereleased on budget labels and public
domain software. The magazine
was also a lot thinner than the 80+
page issues that I used to buy.
I was looking for a new magazine
to keep me informed about the goings on in the PC scene. I’ve always
loved a good magazine, something
that allows the writers to display
a bit of themselves in their writing. Future Publishing, the makers
of Amstrad Action, had released a
magazine called PC Format. The title seems a little “gamer unfriendly”
but it featured some of the same