Lookback on 2024

Happy Christmas. Once again I'm ducking out of the regular schedule to review the year.

Looking back to the 2023 lookback, I recklessly predicted Gremlin would head straight into the Top 10 of articles. Was I right? This is how the Top 10 has shaken out this year.

	2022	2023	2024
1	Ultimate Play The Game/ACG/Rare	The Edge/Softek	The Edge/Softek
2	Software Projects	Ocean	Ocean
3	Mirrorsoft/Imageworks	Melbourne House	Mastertronic
4	Durell	Odin Computer Graphics/Thor (Computer Software)	Melbourne House
5	Design Design/Crystal	Ultimate Play The Game/ACG/Rare	Ultimate Play The Game/ACG/Rare
6	Elite	Elite	Durell
7	Melbourne House	Software Projects	Odin Computer Graphics/Thor
8	Micropower/Program Power	Durell	Graftgold
9	Silversoft	Design Design	Mirrorsoft/Imageworks
10	Denton Designs	Silversoft and Mirrorsoft/Imageworks	Imagine

I was wrong about Gremlin. They didn't get into the Top 10 although they've been popular and would get into a Top 20. If I could be bothered to extend the chart that far.The other two most popular new articles were the ones on Newsfield, and Red Shift, apparently this blog has a lot of crossover appeal with Tripods fans.

Durell climbed back up the Top 10 after to a link from Reddit, r/ZX Spectrum (thanks AlanWardrobe). Mastertronic went straight to number three after the good people at the Mastertronic Collectors Archive linked to the post. The other new entries are Graftgold and Imagine which both put on a surge of popularity this year although I don't know why. Ocean and The Edge both look pretty nailed on at the top of the chart. Ocean was boosted by a link from the Ocean Software group on Facebook, and Pete Prodge did me a solid favour by dropping a link to the Edge article at the World of Spectrum Facebook group. I don't think I have any big and obviously well known software houses left to cover, so how the 2025 list will look is anyone's guess. The Edge/Softek at the top followed by Ocean, is my guess.

In last year's Lookback I put together a list of games which pressed my nostalgia buttons especially hard. This year, I've decided to go even more self-indulgent with five articles I'm pleased with; in no particular order:

CRL: This article nicely walks the line between writing about the history of a company and actually carrying out this blog's mission statement and tracking down a picture of the now 16 year demolished CRL House.

Odin Computer Graphics/Thor: It was a bit of effort to put together the timeline of Odin games but I thought that worked really well.

Denton Designs: It was fun writing up my frantic search for the locations of the photos CRASH used in their two interviews. Plus, I was really happy to be able to talk about Oliver Frey's cover for the June 1985 issue of CRASH and just rave generally about Frankie Goes to Hollywood which I maintain is a game that doesn't get anywhere near enough critical respect and love. If I've had too much BEER I'm liable to describe it as the Singing Detective of computer games.

Design Design/Crystal: More fun tracking down places like the Junction Inn, the Design Design local, and I remain stupidly proud of finding the location of the cover photo for Forbidden Planet. And going there. Now, I've previously described travelling through Wales to take a picture of the empty space where BP Baglan Bay used to stand as the stupidest thing I've done for this blog. It's probably now the second stupidest thing (spoilers for 2025).

Newsfield: Ludlow remains the loveliest place I've visited and I like the subsequent write up because it's a bit more personal and tries to deal with my stupid booze-addled emotions.

That's enough Christmas nonsense. For balance, next year, I talk about five posts which I don't much like.

This blog wouldn't be possible without the Internet Archive and their astonishing collection of old computer magazines and the work they do with the Wayback Machine to preserve websites. If you have the opportunity, please consider donating to help cover their running costs.