RIP The Ultimate Warrior

You may have grown out of it as you grew older - others still love it, but when we were kids WWF (WWE) Wrestling was a huge part of our childhood!  These guys were heroes, they were full of muscles some were large and some were small but each had charisma and their own style and personality. 

We grew up with these guys bashing the hell out of each other with their fists, chairs and anything that they can get their hands on.

We each had our favourites but nobody can deny that The Ultimate Warrior was everything every childhood wrestling fan wanted. He weighed in at a huge 275 pounds, 6ft 2" tall,  
 had muscles on muscles and with his multi coloured facepaint and over the top intensity he was pure awesomeness. 

Many wrestlers couldn't stand up to his power and strength and he feared nobody! His career peaked when he took on possibly the most iconic wrestler of all time Hulk Hogan at Wrestlemania V1 headlined as the Ultimate Challenge!

In this huge match up the Warrior defeated Hogan for (both WWF Belts) with his trademark Gorrila Press move and then continued to own the ring in a hail of applause and fireworks for sometime after.

The Ultimate Warrior is a WWE icon and hero to many, every child of our generation will have memories running down to the ring at 100 MPH shaking the ropes and striking fear into his opponent, he even beat Andre the Giant in 30 seconds!   Who else could do that!!!

So today just take a minute close your eyes and remember the man from parts unknown!

We will always believe

#RIPWarrior

Unusual Railway Pubs - Retro Memories by Bob Barton

Writer Bob Barton, author of ‘Unusual Railway Pubs’ (Halsgrove Publishing), explains how an interest in model trains led to him travelling full-size tracks and playing pub games. Read his memories and then enter our prize draw to win the book and a Hornby train...

I've loved model trains for as long as I can remember. Grandad nurtured my interest, getting the eight year-old me a Hornby Dublo electric train-set one Christmas. He  then got the bug and built me a room-size Tri-ang Hornby layout, which he enjoyed as much as I did. I liked the realistic scenes and couldn't understand why school pals wanted to deliberately crash the trains. The Pullman express would be set up to go steaming into the back of a goods train, sending wagons flying in all directions and plastic people dying at frightening rate. As an accompaniment, a vinyl sound effects record would be interspersed with Beatles singles on my parents’ Dansette record player.

This was around 1964, long before electronic games hit the shops. Instead we had to combine three-dimensional objects with lots of imagination. Shortly after, Rovex (the company behind Tri-ang Hornby) did cotton-on to the demand for drama by bringing out some items of fictional military rolling stock. Called ‘Battle Space’, the range included spring-loaded missile launch wagons, a box car which exploded while on the move; another had a pop-up sniper in the roof. There were working searchlight wagons and low-loaders from which a helicopter or satellite would take off. Mates and I set up scenarios such as our train patrolling the West German border and being hi-jacked by the Soviet enemy (the Berlin Wall had yet to fall). Grandad’s enthusiasm grew with mine, his police pension regularly being stretched to the limit in Seymour’s model shop at Harrow-on-the-Hill (no bargain eBay purchases then). I was devastated when he died suddenly aged 70.

In the 1968 catalogue, Tri-ang Hornby advertised its trains jointly with Minic Motorways. Moving trains and cars could be combined on townscapes of tracks and highways. Minic was similar to Scalextric except it used the same 00 scale as the trains. It had level crossings where we engineered heart-stopping near-misses between steam locomotives and Porsches (please don’t try it on the real railways). Of course this was before the age of the microchip. The height of technology at that time was the R406 Automatic Train Control set. One train could be used to start and stop another and control signals and points, using a solenoid relay that the train tripped using trackside contacts.

There were board games as well and my favourite was ‘Go’, the International Travel Game by Waddington’s. You could travel the world by train and ‘plane, exchanging currency and buying tickets as you went. But real journeys beckoned. Grandad had done with travelling and dad was wedded to his car, so I had to wait until I was about 13, old enough to take long distance trains by myself or with schoolfriends. It engendered a wonderful sense of freedom to travel the country, checking timetables as I went. Mum’s Marmite sandwiches accompanied me to the wilds of Cornwall, North Wales and the Scottish Highlands. If you knew which rover ticket to buy (at half fare) you could travel hundreds of miles for little cost. There were more trains at night in those days, so there was no need for expensive hotel rooms.

Starting work at the age of 16, I was introduced to the world of pubs and, for a while, was a keen darts player. Pub games are a world of their own, with toad-in- the-hole, devil-among-the-tailors and several varieties of skittles also played widely then.
In later years. whenever I was travelling on business I went by train if possible: it was interesting checking out the pubs and refreshment rooms on the stations. Many hailed from the early days and were very ornate, though run-down. It was the era before today’s real ale and craft beer revolution. Today historic stations have been smartened up but even a decent coffee was hard to find back then.

When I was made redundant from my job as a press officer in 2007 I was looking for a project and decided to combine my twin interests of trains and pubs. I researched a guide to the best railway pubs, which no one had done before. Published by Halsgrove in 2013, ‘Unusual Railway Pubs’ (www.halsgrove.com) also provided an excuse to travel on some of the preserved heritage railways, which often have great pubs with steam trains passing outside.

Models and pub games are a feature in some railway pubs. Among those in my book is one, on the line from King’s Cross, with an 0 scale model railway running below the ceiling and tunnelling through a wall. Another, in Huddersfield, Yorkshire, is a cross between a railway museum, model shop and games room. Yet another is a brewery in a quirky Lincolnshire windmill. As well as relaxing with a drink in the circular bar, customers can try their hand at traditional pub games now rarely seen, such as shove shive, target bowls and cheese skittles.  

Win a copy of Bob’s book and a retro Hornby train in the free-to-enter draw on www.facebook.com/railwaypubs

Now we’re off to the Fantasy Zone…by Stu Rankin

It all started for me when I visited Blackpool in 1986. Everything changed that time. Although, not all at once.
Let me explain. Being a fan of arcade gaming since a younger age, I was excited at a week in Blackpool. To me, the ‘arcade crash’ that people talk of in the States hadn’t happened, as all the arcades in those days were teaming with cool games as well as the early classics. So, I set off looking to find me a Star Wars cabinet. My friend at school had played it and said it was great. I wasn’t a fan of vector based things in those days but decided I had to give it a go. So, after working my way North, I trolled the arcades playing things like Ikari Warriors, Galaxian, Pac-Man etc. until I got to a place called Mr.B’s. In there, they not only had a Star Wars cockpit, but a sit down “Captain’s Chair’ version of Sega’s Star Trek. Wasn’t very good at that so decided to go back to Star Wars. My school friend was right. It WAS amazing.At any rate, over a couple of days I kept hearing this ‘Aaaargh’ sound coming from the pier arcades, and wondered what the hell it could be. So, on the second or third day, I headed over to the pier (I think it was the central pier) and entered an arcade. And there it was , with a crowd of people around it. Sega’s now classic, Space Harrier…

…Welcome to the Fantasy Zone! I stood for about an hour mesmerised by the Rolling Type cabinet, first I had ever seen and was utterly amazed at this cross between a game and a carnival ride! Amazing. Did I play it? Nope. Too many people in big crowds around it, and I was like 13 and a bit shy at the time!
However, the seed had been sown in my mind. So that Christmas, I made sure I got Elite’s version for my Amstrad CPC and was well stoked! I also got a Quickshot II Turbo joystick for it too, but typical Amstrad didn’t like that stick too much… At any rate I played that game with it’s quirky mix of raster and vector graphics, and had gotten used to the way it looked. (To be honest I still play it now and again today as I like the speed and the music is not too bad for Around ’88 or ’89 I cant remember which, I finally managed to complete it! I was over the moon. The first time I had ever completed a game.

Then came the 90’s with Mega Drive. Bundled with Sonic of course. Total fluke here, but again my mother had gotten Space Harrier II for it for my Christmas. Yay! Happy days were here again. I had previously bought Space Harrier II for my Amstrad under a frenzy of excitement, cause the graphics were all raster and no vectors to be seen! I though this is amazing. But then I loaded it up and put it off after five minutes. Good grief. Were they kidding?? How slow was that? It was so slow, it was almost unplayable. GRANDSLAM'S SHII sucked. Not a patch on Elite’s earlier coin-op licence. So, I was happily blasting through Fantasy Land on my Mega Drive and all was right with the world again. Not too long after that I completed that game also. Well being fair it is a bit easy…

So for years, I would play SH II and that was great. By Late nineties, I started collecting retro games (yes, they did exist in the 90s- they were called Master System titles) and of course I had too get Space Harrier and Space Harrier 3D.

I got them, but no console to play them on. But that would come later, no worries. Skipping a couple of years again and it is now 1998. I had no idea about Sega’s Saturn console or the titles for it until I went nosing around one of these computer game shops that you used to see in shopping precincts. I asked if by any chance he had SH titles and to my surprise, he said he thought he has seen one in his shop not long ago, so he went to look for it. It was on a CD Sega Ages for the Saturn. Again, no Saturn, but no probs. Quick phone call to my mum again and hey presto, stocking filler bought for Christmas again that year. Over the moon. FINALLY at last, Arcade quality Space Harrier at home!!

I’m doing great!!!

Reading the names of the levels, seeing how it should look as I progressed through the game was interesting to me, but then I am an obvious SH fanboy.

I had only known the Amstrad levels, so the fact the there was other villains and entities to be disposed of was awesome. Ida heads, Godarni, Rollies etc., all waiting to do me in. And in those days they did. Frequently. So there I was quite happy with my Saturn set up listening to the remixed tracks from the game, varying the difficulties etc., all marvellous. I would also from time to time, alternate between SH and After Burner II or even a game I got separately entitled ‘A+M+O+K’

The millennium came and went, no Y2K nonsense for me, as I was retro.Then I started a new job, and as it happened Dreamcast was out. So I got one second hand (unbeknown tome at the time, it was previously owned by a guy I worked beside in the new job). Shenmue was the order of the day. Wracking my brains in order to get to You Arcade in Dobuita. Nice made it. Space Harrier for me. 100 Yen? No problems. Here have another 100 yen. The wee dude in the arcade told me I was pretty good and gave me a mini Harrier. Awesome.

And then one day, I decided to go onto Shenmue Passport and check scores. To my utter disbelief, I was ranked #1 in Europe on 50Hz setting, and #3 Worldwide on 60Hz setting. Yaaasssss! I had actually achieved something with my life!!

Dreamcast server eventually shut down, couldn’t look at scores no more, couldn’t show my mates. Oh well, just regretted no getting it on video tape.

So a few months later and I got my first PC. Wow, sucked in by AOL’s free disc trial! Amazing, I’m online now. And paying through the nose for it.

But that was okay as I was discovering new things. I kept hearing about this thing called MAME. I decided to give that a try. Couldn’t get it to work at first. Wasn’t used to Windows. Man I though BASIC was easier… well, maybe not.

In those early days MAME couldn’t handle Harrier, so it was an emulator that could do all the System 16 games. That’ll do. Eventually though, I got it on MAME and have used that since. It wasn’t until a few years ago that I was told about ‘Twin Galaxies’ keeping worldwide scores for Arcade games and console counterparts and I was told to submit my score. At this point I had the Ages 3D version of Space Harrier too. So, between a seven month period, I submitted four scores- MAME32, Sega Saturn, PS2 and Mega Drive’s SH II score.
All of them were confirmed as ranking #1 worldwide and therefor, a new record.  How happy was I? Very happy is the answer. Of course, that long sought after dream of mine to own a Space Harrier original cabinet still eluded me, as did the world record on a cab. My online mate Phil Campbell currently owns that record. At any rate, 27 years after first seeing the Space Harrier cabinet in Blackpool, I have my own mini cabinet at home.

Currently being restored to former beauty, I was lucky in that my particular cab left the Sega factory as an Enduro Racer cab. You see, some Space Harrier cabs were converted to Enduro rather than making a different cab for that game. Harrier side art is printed onto the cabinet, with the Enduro vinyl decals stuck on top. Lucky for me as I say, as the Enduro sticker for the best part, kept most of the Harrier art underneath just this side of mint. It’s not completely A+ as cabs always take knocks out in the big wide world and some times it adds to the charm. Anyway, stripped it down and got new buttons etc.

It is currently undergoing or is about to undergo a servicing for the monitor. 27 years on a CRT monitor, and no screen burn. Amazing. They don’t make them like that any longer! So when that job is completed, it’ll be back in and all systems go! Well, I need to source the metal legs for the seat stand that bolts onto the cabinet’s feet first. And that brings me up to modern times. Several home variations of Space Harrier on various formats, various world records verified by Twin Galaxies and my own jewel in the crown of my collection- an original cab by Sega! But don’t think my fanaticism will fade there… oh no. The future is heading toward a custom made Space Harrier Upright cab reproduction complete with bespoke side art and original flight stick and bezel etc. to house all the various versions of the game, to stand in tribute next to the original cab that started it all those years ago. My JAMMA cab and my NARC cab may have come and went, but not the Harrier cab. It will stay with me.

GamesYouloved would like to thank, Stu Rankin, World Record Holder for Space Harrier arcade -   Our Guest Blogger for his RETRO gaming memories.

Stu runs his own dedicated Space Harrier Page here:

Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Squilla/215525788515344?ref=hl

Also - dedicated Space Harrier Group here:

http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/squillaslair/

Thunder, thunder, thunder, THUNDERCATS HO!!

When I thought about writing a blog on the Thundercats my mind began to wander back to my school days, sat in front of the TV, sketchpad on my lap, colouring pens next to me and the screen in front of me alive with talking, fighting, squabbling cats from another world…..

Lion-o, the leader and the hereditary “Lord of the ThunderCats”, Panthro, the tough guy, Tygra, the scientist, Cheetara, the eye candy of the gang (if you like that kind of thing - well the dancers in CATS weren’t bad were they?), Snarf the furry little err… thingy and WilyKit and WilyKat, the “ThunderKittens”, the group’s comedy siblings and mischief makers…..

I had to remind myself what the hell it was all about - I remembered loving it thats for sure and I remember cheerfully drawing and sketching the characters for endless hours during those mid 80’s hours, after the walk home from school but before the fish fingers and homemade chips were put on the table. What I didn’t remember was quite how bonkers it all was….. Check this out:

"As the Thundercats flee their dying home world of Thundera - Jaga, the head of the Thundercats, passes the cudgel to young Lion-O, who is entrusted with the Sword of Omens, which enables him and his comrades to possess super-powers - they wind up on Third Earth chased by an ancient evil mummy known as Mumm-Ra and his team of Mutants…. Mumm-Ra calls upon the power of four ancient spirit idols within the Black Pyramid, transforming him into a massive undead beast. Lion-o calls upon his sword to emit red lightning while chanting “Thunder...Thunder...Thunder...Thundercats, HO!”……"

It all makes The Phantom Menaces midichlorian exposition seem like perfect and total sense doesn’t it. I revisited a random episode on YouTube to see what came back to me and boy, does that theme tune rock! The logo too. Truly classic stuff. Within a few minutes I’d been reminded just how annoying Lion-O could be (he uses words like ‘varmint’ for Gods sake), how scary Mumm-Ra could be, how much I loved to hate his cohorts, seemingly comprised of the less attractive animals in the world - Toadman…. WeaselBoy…. and the ThunderCats crisps I used to demand my parents sought out in Sainsburys came back to mind, as well as the lunchbox and flask that used to accompany me to school every day until I started high school no doubt….

Isn’t it nice what a bit of nostalgia can do for your mood on a Saturday morning…. :) - Now for a search for Pole Position, Cities of Gold and Action Force!

GamesYouloved would like to thank, Damian Smith.  Our Guest Blogger for his RETRO gaming memories.

Damian Smith is a graphic designer and art director at campaignworks.co.uk
www.damiansmithdesign.co.uk

Guest Blog - a generation of games I loved

For me, it all started in the late 1970's, when my dad bought one of those home entertainment versions of Pong, with all different kinds of sports, like hockey and tennis.
We played the hell out of it, I think it's difficult to understand for kids these days how we could have so much fun with only one ball (cube) and a few lines on screen.

I was growing up with Space Invaders, Pacman, Donkey Kong, Q-Bert and Galaxians and Phoenix at the arcade machines, and I remember playing the handheld game Gunfighter at the toy department of the supermarket, until my mom came to pick me up. 

One day I got a Sinclair ZX-81, or rather the equivalent Timex 1000. We even had the same computer in our electronics class at school. So when at school, we had to put in some basic commands, to create some loop, boring stuff in my opinion.
 I was more interested in the gaming aspect of the machine, so what did I do?
I had some magazines at home, like Happy Computer (coming from Germany) and Sinclair user....or was it your Sinclair? (Don't remember exactly, memories faded).


Anyway, I took these magazines with me in class, and as the others were trying to find the key-combinations (ZX81 connaisseurs will know what I mean), I started to type in some of these listings from the mags 
20 minutes before class was ending, the whole class was gathering around my table, staring at the screen, screaming "Let me try, now it's my turn!" Even the teacher wanted to steer that.... spaceship (built from three blocks), and destroy the aliens (one block). Can you imagine? 

At home, I had an advanced version of the ZX81, the 16K expansion! that was a whole lot more than the 1K standard.
It only had one problem, when typing those programs, and before it was saved on tape (Aaahh, the mono tape recorder, with those cassette tapes, and the counter to remember where wich program was saved!), when my mom called me for supper, it could happen that when touching my desk too hard, everything was lost.

The 16K expansion didn't have the best contacts, it didn't even help cleaning them, or trying to change position.
 I also tried taping the damn thing to the computer.
 Nothing helped.
 
I mentioned the keys before, each key had three or four possible combinations, you had to press another key first, to get some kind of black & white combination of blocks on screen.
 Did I say press? well you couldn't really "press" a key on the keyboard, because the keys weren't really keys, and the keyboard wasn't really a keyboard also.
The keyboard is a 'touch sensitive membrane', a flexible plastic surface with the actual switches under the surface. 
Amazing when you think about it now!

GamesYouloved would like to thank, Coen Velden.  Our Guest Blogger for his RETRO gaming memories. 

Why do YOU love games?

Why do YOU love games?

One thing we love at GamesYouLoved is the gameplay of course. But it's about the people who really care about the games like us too...  

We really enjoy talking about every aspect of gaming with our friends in the UK and overseas because it's fun, a passion, and something that no-one can take away from us.  It's part of who we are.

Why 'games' some might ask? We will have to ask our audience perhaps - it's a good starting point! 

For us (if you would like to know!) it's for many many different reasons. Of course GamesYouLoved isn't just about us - it's about everyone - but our energy and drive is:

- all about playing, having fun, being competitive...the reasons of why we love the gaming/playing side goes on and on!

- we like most things you like from any genre - video, arcade, handheld, board games, traditional - open to everything and like finding about new stuff we don't know about too!

- gaming mixes up all kinds of creative outputs; TV, Movies, Cartoons, Comics, Music, Art - just about anything

- the memories - seeing a game that you have forgotten about is a very good feeling - it takes you back and makes you smile, laugh and just enjoy what were great times...then...and now!

And its something we can share and talk about...which is very cool. For the last 3 or 4 months that's what we've been doing on Twitter (as little) and Facebook (a little more). With our website coming very soon now, we want to try and make this a really exciting journey for us and everyone who joins us.

We hope you enjoy it too...and thanks 

The GamesYouLoved Team

TV and FILM make up games of the 70s and 80s

Back in the 70s / Early 80 

When the evenings got lighter on a Friday after tea, my friends and I used to go the local park or common and pretend play 'make up games' based on TV and Films of the time... 

Starsky and Hutch was a favourite.

We'd hide down the river ditch to evade the enemy - pretend to catch the bad guys.

One of us used to borrow our big brothers long (way too big for us) wooly jumper like Starsky running around (thinking we were actually him! - but looking just like a kid wearing a jumble sale jumper!)

Sometime our sister would play Charlies Angels - with a cardboard walkie talkie she'd run around pretending to talk to it - crazy but fun!

We also had a mate who'd play Freddie Krueger with plastic knives on their mums glove - chase us around the mad kid!! He's quite normal now...strangely enough!!