State Soft

Business & Technology Centre, Bessemer Drive, Stevenage, SG1

This is where I rectify a mistake made in the planning stages of this blog. I wanted an early entry to cover a company responsible for a notable Commodore 64 game, and Boulder Dash was always an unmistakably C64 title for me; probably because of trips to a friend's house where the game was always on the menu. However because my background is the C64's bitter rival the ZX Spectrum I defaulted to the World of Spectrum entry for my research and concluded Front Runner was solely responsible for all UK versions of Boulder Dash. It wasn't. It turns out Boulder Dash in the UK has the most convoluted licencing history possible with every version released by a different company; C64 (State Soft), Spectrum (Front Runner), Amstrad (Mirrorsoft), BBC (Tynesoft), MSX (Orpheus). It's tempting to wonder what First Star (the original USA publishers) were thinking but I suspect they were thinking, "cor, aren't we making a lot of money licencing this game."

Having established we need to talk about State Soft. The next question is, is it Statesoft or State Soft? Even State Soft don't seem sure. In this advert  the name is given as State Soft but the logo reads Statesoft. The loading screen for Frak plumps for Statesoft and the title screen immediately contradicts this with State Soft. Pick a lane guys. For the purposes of this entry, I've gone for State Soft because that's how its recorded at Companies House and bureaucracy always wins. All this discussion about the name is ironic because State Soft is surprisingly anonymous. I haven't been able to track down a single interview or magazine profile, and this seems odd considering ZZAP64's obsession with Rockford the star of Boulder Dash.

So, I'm thrown back on my own resources. What do we know?

March 2022

There must have been something in the air in late 1983/early 1984 because several companies all had the same idea at the same time; to make money by importing games from America and flogging them in the UK. US Gold obviously spring to mind, incorporated on 30th January 1984; but Software Projects also had a go with Lode Runner; and System 3 distributed Juice, Suicide Strike, and Motocross from a company called Tronix. There was also, as the name suggests, State Soft a company set up by distributor Spectrum Group and run by John Fletcher, former software manager of Coventry based PSS. The company was short lived. Mobygames lists its entire output as five games but the reality is a little more complicated. There seems to be four imports of First Star titles from America; Boulder Dash, Flip and Flop, and Astro Chase for the C64 only, and Bristles, C64 with a conversion for the ZX Spectrum. There was Icicle Works, a game published on the C64 by Commodore themselves and converted to the Spectrum and MSX by State Soft. And finally there was Frak! a well regarded C64 conversion of a BBC Micro game, originally published by Aardvark Software. 

Stevenage is the home of the ExoMars Rover, according to a big sign on of one of the Airbus buildings. It seems like a security conscious area so I was slightly worried about wandering around and taking pictures of buildings. I wore my good coat to look more respectable. The Business and Technology Centre is an odd two-tone building a short walk from the train station. There's a two story yellow brick extension facing Bessemer Drive and behind that is a larger, grey and white three story section. Neither looks like it was around in 1985; the grey and white section looks like a 1990's leisure centre, and the yellow brick bit looks like an early 2000's leisure centre. 

March 2022

Round the back of the centre is a car park with workshops around the edge. Again, none of this looks original and I suspect the whole site has been redeveloped since State Soft were there in 1985. What happened to State Soft? Who knows. It's notable they didn't distribute First Star's other well known game Spy vs Spy. According to this report in POPULAR COMPUTING WEEKLY (15-21 November 1984 page 5) John Fletcher was quoted, "First Star did offer us Spy vs Spy and while we considered it, we didn't feel we could do justice to it." First Star, in keeping with their anonymous profile stopped publishing some time in 1985, unnoticed by any magazines. Although Companies House does note State Soft was not dissolved until 1991.