Time: 00.00. We hear a radio jingle overlaid on the title screen for Imagine's late 1983 game Alchemist.
"Chiiiiip Shop". We're zero seconds in and I'm already confused because in the autumn of 1984 BBC Radio broadcast two different series called Chip Shop. The series seem to have been paired, both were broadcast on Saturday. The Radio 4 one, presented by Barry Norman probation handled the more serious subjects. The other, on Radio 1, was presumably more frivolous and about games.
"Chiiiiip Shop". We're zero seconds in and I'm already confused because in the autumn of 1984 BBC Radio broadcast two different series called Chip Shop. The series seem to have been paired, both were broadcast on Saturday. The Radio 4 one, presented by Barry Norman probation handled the more serious subjects. The other, on Radio 1, was presumably more frivolous and about games.
After the jingle, we hear a fragment from a weekly software chart. I know this comes from PERSONAL COMPUTER NEWS because at the top of their chart they print: "As featured on Radio l’s Saturday morning Chip Shop."
The Radio 1 Chip Shop was presented by David Freeman and broadcast as part of the 6am Mark Page show. A voice, presumably David Freeman, says "And last week's number one down to number two, Underwurlde from Ultimate." That neatly dates this extract to the chart printed in the issue dated Saturday December 1 1984. Commercial Breaks was being completed less than two weeks before transmission.
00.03. A young man plays with a Commodore 64 in a shop we'll later learn is Boots.
00.20. This Christmas we'll spend over thirty million pounds on home computer games," says narrator Hugh Sykes.
About three months ago some bloke called Jeff Grubb made several wrong-headed posts on Bluesky in which he attempted to position the 1983 American console market crash as a global event and perpetuated a whole bunch of US-centric myths that wind up old farts like me. This including a statement that "The [UK] home computer scene created a different set of tastes unaffected by a crash, but it *was* merely a scene." Thirty million pounds of sales in Christmas 1984. The UK computer game market might have been globally small but it *was* more than merely a scene.
The pictures are from one of WH Smith's big in store computer shops, probably Manchester given the way filming was completed.
00.28. Still in WH Smith. A kid checks out the box for Frantic Freddie by CDS, for the Commodore 64.
00.40. The episode title is overlaid on footage from Ah diddums. An Imagine game which has a good claim to be one of the worst released for the ZX Spectrum.
01.03. There's a sneaky edit here to avoid copyright problems with the backing music, Space Age Whiz Kids by Joe Walsh. Lost is around 40 seconds of a montage which provides background on Imagine; footage of Mark Butler (one of the founders) driving around Liverpool; fast cars; and newspaper clippings. A considerably more murky off-air recording was uploaded to Youtube 18 years ago and it includes the bit the BBC has edited out.
01.04. Mark Butler and an Imagine branded Suzuki motorcycle at a TT bike race. According to CRASH's article The Biggest Commercial Break Of Them All (December 1984 page 60):
"[Director] Paul Andersen and the BBC crew were at the Isle of Man TT races in June filming at a time when Imagine was already in serious trouble and teetering on the brink of a crash. Mark did suffer a crash. Ironically, he was driven to the dismemberment of his empire swathed in bandages."
`
01.19. Footage from the Spectrum version of Cosmic Cruiser another rotten Imagine game, released around May 1984.
01.22. A glimpse of World Series Baseball on the Commodore 64. Ocean would release this in 1985 on their relaunched Imagine label; they brought various Imagine assets from the receiver.
Hugh Sykes tells us "by May 1984 [Imagine] has grown so rapidly that it employs over seventy people." Back in March 1983 Mark Butler told HOME COMPUTING WEEKLY:
The number of staff will never exceed 25 -'more than that and it would start getting less efficient'.
(March 8-14 page 26)
By the end of 1983 Imagine were advertising "urgently" for 30 programmers (POPULAR COMPUTING WEEKLY 29 September 1983 page 46) to write games for their £11 million deal with publisher Marshall Cavendish to produce games for INPUT; a partwork magazine about programming printed from 1984-85. The collapse of the deal contributed to the failure of Imagine because none of the new staff were let go. Instead they were funnelled into the megagames project and contributed to corporate overheads and rising costs at a time when not much income was being generated.
(March 8-14 page 26)
By the end of 1983 Imagine were advertising "urgently" for 30 programmers (POPULAR COMPUTING WEEKLY 29 September 1983 page 46) to write games for their £11 million deal with publisher Marshall Cavendish to produce games for INPUT; a partwork magazine about programming printed from 1984-85. The collapse of the deal contributed to the failure of Imagine because none of the new staff were let go. Instead they were funnelled into the megagames project and contributed to corporate overheads and rising costs at a time when not much income was being generated.
01.36. More footage from inside the Imagine offices; probably Tithebarn House on the corner of Chapel Street and Old Hall Street.
01.38. The first mention of Imagine's megagames.
01.40. David Ward of Ocean wanders round the offices at 6 Central Street, Manchester. Although this footage is edited in alongside material dated as May I think it was taken much later in the year, around August or September.
I don't think any of the Ocean material was part of the original pitch. CRASH starts The Biggest Commercial Break Of Them All by saying:
I don't think any of the Ocean material was part of the original pitch. CRASH starts The Biggest Commercial Break Of Them All by saying:
Early in the new year of 1984... At the time when Paul Andersen approached them. Imagine was working on the concept of the megagames... For the TV director the megagames also offered an essential linch pin on which to hang his programme
The original idea was probably a much more of a straightforward from-design-to-product story about Imagine and Bandersnatch. The CRASH article ends with the note that:
With the finish of Imagine, the TV programme may have looked as though it was over too. However Ocean bought a major portion of Imagines assets and so Paul Andersen had a finale thrown in his lap. Filming continued at Ocean's offices in Manchester, as they worked on Hunchback II.
I'd wondered about the logistics of filming across two cities at the same time. It makes more sense for production to be simpler; filming in Liverpool from May to July and Manchester from August to November, after Imagine collapsed. Or is this nonsense speculation? What a shame the BBC Written Archive doesn't hold a production file for this programme.The Ocean footage is edited in here to avoid having to introduce the company much later in the programme. The offices we see were at 6 Central Street, Manchester. Around May 1984 Ocean moved across the city from their first offices on the other side of the River Irwell in the Ralli Buildings, Stanley Street, in Salford.
Post-Imagine was when Ocean began to grow into the giant it would become. The company was founded as Spectrum Games in March 1983. The rebrand to Ocean came in September 1983 after it was pointed out that software carrying the name Spectrum Games would confuse owners of other home computers. Presumably, once filming began at Ocean the intent of the documentary changed to compare and contrast the glitzy showbiz hype of Mark Butler's Imagine with the quiet professionalism of David Ward's Ocean; two very different companies in neighbouring cities.
01.43. David Ward is looking for Bill. I don't know who Bill is, or indeed who a lot of these people are. If you do, please leave a comment so I can fill in more details.
01.48. David Ward has a letter "[Andrew Taylor]'s also sent his new game... Castle Capers." The game, for the C64, is rejected by Ocean. Games That Weren't has the story of what happened next.
02.02. What is that poster on the wall behind David Ward? Is it for Eskimo Eddie.
02.29. "Sixteen year old Jonathan Smith has just walked in with Pud Pud. A game that he wrote at home." Again, this points to filming in the early autumn to match Pud Pud's release date at the end of 1984. If this was May, why would Ocean sit on a game for nearly half a year?
Jonathan "Joffa" Smith was one of the greats of Spectrum gaming. He specialised in arcade conversions for Ocean's relaunched Imagine; Green Beret, Hyper Sports, and Mikie were all astonishing pieces of work. He spun gold out of the unpromising licence for Cobra and unexpectedly turned that into a great, frantic, arcade game. Sadly, he died way to young in 2010. You can read an obituary here.
02.45. Sales director Paul Finnegan watches Jonathan Smith demonstrate Pud Pud. On the wall behind him are a couple of screen dumps; the top one is the damn pit from Hunchback. I don't recognise the one underneath.
03.34. Back in Imagine's offices. The Battle For Santa's Software has so far been shot on film but this footage, dated to May, looks like it was recorded on video. Does this matter? Not really, it's just odd to suddenly have a videotaped segment in a documentary predominantly shot on 16mm film. It's unusual to change production methods but maybe the film crew was elsewhere.
03.41. Check out the hand drawn poster stuck to a column by the window, at the top right of the screen. The lovely new high definition transfer allows you to read the poster's banner, "PISS UP".
03.53. I have no idea why Mark Butler is in evening dress.
04.20. Bandersnatch. One of Imagine's two Megagames. Pysclapse being the other which CRASH claimed was "nothing more than a paper idea".
Unless you know differently this documentary contains the only footage of Bandersnatch to exist. It looks a bit like the later Frankie Goes to Hollywood which makes sense considering John Gibson worked on both.
Unless you know differently this documentary contains the only footage of Bandersnatch to exist. It looks a bit like the later Frankie Goes to Hollywood which makes sense considering John Gibson worked on both.
04.28. The camera pans to show the game is running on a ZX Spectrum with a bunch of gubbins stuck in the back. An early version of the fabled hardware add-on that would grant the humble Spectrum the power to run the awesome Bandersnatch. According to this John Gibson interview from 2001, it included a 128K ROM add-on to take the memory of the Spectrum up to 176K. I guess it would have ended up looking like Miko-Gen's Mikro Plus which turned a 48K Spectrum into a 64K machine.
04.41. John Gibson, hard at work writing Bandersnatch. He and Ian Weatherburn were the focus of some of Imagine's advertising for the megagames.
05.31. Mark Lawson hypes up Bandersnatch. "We've got cartoon animation in the game which you wouldn't get in an ordinary computer. We've got real sound." This makes me wonder if the hardware dongle was intended to include a sound booster like this Spectrum add-on advertised by Micro Power. It included an AY-3-8910 chip (as was later added to the 128K Spectrum). Micro Power were selling their unit for £19.95.
05.43. Who are these people? I think the spikey haired woman sitting down is Ally Noble but I'm not sure about the other two.
05.59. A wider shot of the Bandersnatch team. Ally Noble lights up a cigarette. Behind her, facing the camera, is Steve Cain
06.05. Another screen from Bandersnatch, on the monitor on the left.
06.09 A close-up of Steve Cain talking to "Boy Wonder" programmer Eugene Evans.
06.10 As Steve Cain turns his head, there's a glimpse of Ian Weatherburn in the background.
07.05 We're back to Manchester and Ocean, and the production returns to 16mm film. Someone has been forced into an ape suit. "If you want to come to the show with me you have to wear that outfit." That would be the PCW Show which ran from 19-23 September 1984.
I guess this is promotion for Kong Strikes Back. Written by Nigel Alderton (Chuckie Egg) and Jonathan Smith.
07.22 "Eighteen year old Tony Pomfret is one of the eight resident programmers at Ocean". He's working on Hunchback II: Quasimodo's Revenge. What's going on with the left-hand plug socket behind the TV. It has two cables coming out of it. Has someone double-wired a plug to power two devices?
07.31 "Depressing isn't it" reads a close-up of the code on Tony Pomfret's screen. Who's a fan of Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy, then?
08.33 A close-up of a beautifully drawn storyboard for Hunchback II.
09.11 Back to footage shot in June. Birmingham city centre in 1984. A rhapsody in concrete. It doesn't look like that any more.
09.29 Imagine sales manager Sylvia Jones is driving to meet their Birmingham distributor. She talks about the state of the UK software market:
It's never been as slow as it is now. Never. It wasn't like this, this time last year. It slowed down dramatically in the last three months, not just for Imagine, for everybody. Probably because there are a lot more software houses now producing goods than there were this time last year.
09.53 "Sylvia has come to see Imagine's Birmingham distributor. He wants to discuss the slow selling old games. But Sylvia would rather interest him in the Bandersnatch megagame."
CRASH elaborated on the stock problems Imagine was experiencing:
In 1982 there had been a software shortage in the shops. 1983 was to be a boom time and Imagine decided on a clever ploy to foil the duplication of their rivals tapes. Ahead of time they booked the entire duplicating capacity of Kiltdale, one of the biggest duplicators for the software business. The idea, obviously, was to make it impossible for other major companies to get enough tapes duplicated for the Christmas rush. On paper it looked like an elegant piece of industrial sabotage. In practice it backfired. Imagine ended up hiring a warehouse for the storage of the hundreds of thousands of cassettes that they ended up with. After Christmas the bottom fell out of the market, and there was no way they could shift the games. This was a principal reason behind the strange move to lower the price of Imagine software. It also backfired because they flooded the shops with non-selling tapes, and then expected everyone to like the fact that the tapes would have to be sold at a price lower than the wholesale price the shopkeepers had bought the tapes in for in the first place.
09.59 Sylvia gets out of her car without locking it or taking the keys out of the ignition.
10.50 A caption introduces Chris Hedges, the managing director of Express Marketing. They were based at 73 Watery Lane, Bordesley. It's a petrol station now. The whole sequence with Chris Hedges is great. He exudes a quiet scepticism to all of Sylvia's statements.
11.10 "That sounds complicated," is Chris' dry reply to Sylvia's statement that the Bandersnatch box will include "twenty five, possibly thirty, items in the box."
11.30 One of my favourite moments of the documentary is the big close-up that captures Chris Hedges' look of disbelief as he is told Bandersnatch will retail for "about forty pounds, thirty nine, ninety five." That's about £130 today.
12.25 Ian Hetherington, Imagine director, holds a mock-up Bandersnatch box. Closest to the camera is Bruce Everiss, operations director.
13.12 This is another favourite moment of mine. The long shot of the man from Kirkdale's, the cassette duplicator, waiting for "fifty thousand pounds that Imagine owes him."
13.15 The CRASH article on Imagine:
Andersen recalls filming a meeting where the bosses sat around disusing how large the megagame boxes should be, whether they should be huge to entice punters to fork out £30 to £40, or whether the large size would put buyers off on the grounds that everyone knows model kit boxes are usually full of air. And this at a time when their empire was literally falling apart through lack of money and mounting debts.
I wonder if that could be this meeting?
Andersen recalls filming a meeting where the bosses sat around disusing how large the megagame boxes should be, whether they should be huge to entice punters to fork out £30 to £40, or whether the large size would put buyers off on the grounds that everyone knows model kit boxes are usually full of air. And this at a time when their empire was literally falling apart through lack of money and mounting debts.
I wonder if that could be this meeting?
14.10 A great, if cruel, editing juxtaposition with a cut from Ian Hetherington saying "I can't stress this too greatly, we must not commit to any expense at all," to the man from Kirkdales kicking his heels in reception.
14.33 That's the November 1984 cover of YOUR COMPUTER. It would have been on sale mid-October which gives some idea of the timescale for editing before broadcast in December.
14.50 The documentary team take David Ward to a street market "outside of Manchester," where he finds a professionally pirated Hunchback and makes some good points about the difference between home copying and large scale commercial piracy. Alas, I fail to listen properly to David Ward because I am distracted looking for clues to the market's location. Check out the sky; grey and autumnal. (although, obviously, it could just be Manchester ).
The segment seems to have been added because on 10 July 1984, the day after Imagine was formally wound up, Ian Hetherington pinned most of the blame for the company's failure on organised crime and piracy.
 |
| DAILY POST 07/10/1984 page 17 |
16.56 A striking jump cut to lift doors sliding open outside Imagine's third floor offices. A caption reads "29 June". No one is working. Bruce Everiss "the only director left on the premises for the past week," guides the crew through empty offices. He looks understandably glum. "No one will supply us with anything, so we've got no cassettes to sell, so the company's come to a full stop." Bruce points to where people have been watching a video of An American Werewolf in London. I hope they weren't watching a pirated copy.
This is one of the most effective sequences in the programme. Imagine is closed down in front of the production team and the documentary shifts into a more news report-like format because that's the most efficient way to convey what's happening and the speed with which events move. In the course of a simple pan down the front of Tithebarn House, Hugh Sykes explains:
"But events take place faster than Everiss predicts. Within hours, he's resigned. And when some of the staff come back from lunch there's an unexpected welcome."
18.06 And almost immediately the programme shifts gears again. What happens next plays out as a series of handheld camera shots with the viewer placed in the middle of the Imagine staff attempting to gain access to the offices which bailiffs have seized. It's grimly funny. The polite but righteous indignation of the Imagine staff ,who are simply trying to retrieve the belongings they left when they went to lunch, is contrasted with the bland indifference of the bailiffs.
Watch the way the bailiff conducts himself in the short exchange that starts with him blocking the doorway and saying "you will leave the room." The way he uses his body to control the space, the pointed finger, the firm push backwards, the direct eye contact with the person holding the door open. He doesn't give an inch. The full extent of his words are
Watch the way the bailiff conducts himself in the short exchange that starts with him blocking the doorway and saying "you will leave the room." The way he uses his body to control the space, the pointed finger, the firm push backwards, the direct eye contact with the person holding the door open. He doesn't give an inch. The full extent of his words are
"You will leave the room."
"You will get off that [the door]."
"You will not."
"You will let go [of the door] please, mate."
"You will get your foot off the door please."
"Thank you."
"You will get off that [the door]."
"You will not."
"You will let go [of the door] please, mate."
"You will get your foot off the door please."
"Thank you."
There's a level of polite threat from him which I find more terrifying than outright aggression. He knows how to dominate the situation. He is absolutely in charge. And he's not bothered about appearing on television.
18.27 A thirty second sequence showing various Imagine staff members ineffectually trying to find out what's going on and get back into the office.
Keith Raven, the film editor lets this sequence run cinéma vérité style and the result is more black comedy. And everybody's smoking indoors!
Keith Raven had a long career at the BBC from 1965 to around 1988. He mainly worked in documentaries; Chronicle, The Sky at Night, Tomorrow's World, and Horizon are a few of his credits listed at the IMDB. At the start of his BBC career, he was also an uncredited film editor on The Nightmare Begins The first episode of the mammoth 12 part 1965 Doctor Who story The Dalek's Masterplan. There are also a couple of comedy credits for a BBC Benny Hill Show and Comedy Playhouse, both 1965.
CRASH notes of this sequence:
So closely did TV crew follow the proceedings that they almost had their camera gear locked into the building by the bailiffs!
Keith Raven, the film editor lets this sequence run cinéma vérité style and the result is more black comedy. And everybody's smoking indoors!
Keith Raven had a long career at the BBC from 1965 to around 1988. He mainly worked in documentaries; Chronicle, The Sky at Night, Tomorrow's World, and Horizon are a few of his credits listed at the IMDB. At the start of his BBC career, he was also an uncredited film editor on The Nightmare Begins The first episode of the mammoth 12 part 1965 Doctor Who story The Dalek's Masterplan. There are also a couple of comedy credits for a BBC Benny Hill Show and Comedy Playhouse, both 1965.
CRASH notes of this sequence:
So closely did TV crew follow the proceedings that they almost had their camera gear locked into the building by the bailiffs!
19.21 A montage of newspaper stories about the bankruptcy of Imagine. All the rostrum camera work was done by Ken Morse, a familiar name to anyone who watched television after 1969. His IMDB page, which I refuse to believe is anywhere near complete, lists 322 credits, more than Christopher Lee (290).
The montage is backed by arcade sound effects of a spaceship shooting, and then being hit and exploding. It's cute but maybe the joke is a little too obvious.
The montage is backed by arcade sound effects of a spaceship shooting, and then being hit and exploding. It's cute but maybe the joke is a little too obvious.
19.30 A jump cut to a foam rubber Hulk looming up behind a teen. "Hi I'm the Hulk have an autograph," says the Hulk. Marvel would not approve.
A caption on screen reads "September". Life goes on. This footage comes from the Personal Computer World Show at Olympia.
The Hulk would have been there to promote the Adventure International UK release of his Scott Adams adventure game. In quick succession we see; Jet Set Willy, Software Projects; Sabre Wulf, Ultimate Play the Game; some poor bloke forced to walk around in full American Football kit to advertise the Argus game; a unicycling Policeman, lord knows why, is he "patrolling" the Anirog stand? (Yes- see the comment below); something dull-looking on the Atari 800XL; another poor stand-in dressed as Danger Mouse (Creative Sparks), with the Virgin Games stand in the background; Kong, on the Ocean stand (if you are that Ocean employee please leave a comment); Macbeth, Creative Sparks; and a lovely long tracking shot of the show, taken from an escalator, which includes the Commodore and Acorn stands.
One of the reasons The Battle For Santa's Software works is because it is willing to engage with the software industry as a games business. At the time, that wasn't common in television. Compare that attitude to this report from Micro Live. Lesley Judd visits the PCW show with computer journalist Chris Palmer, and the report is determined to feature only the dullest parts of the show. Eureka, by Domark, gets a grudging look in at the end only because of the £25,000 prize on offer. Say what you like about Dominic Wheatley and Mark Strachan's ability to release good games but they knew how to grab the attention of the media.
A caption on screen reads "September". Life goes on. This footage comes from the Personal Computer World Show at Olympia.
The Hulk would have been there to promote the Adventure International UK release of his Scott Adams adventure game. In quick succession we see; Jet Set Willy, Software Projects; Sabre Wulf, Ultimate Play the Game; some poor bloke forced to walk around in full American Football kit to advertise the Argus game; a unicycling Policeman, lord knows why, is he "patrolling" the Anirog stand? (Yes- see the comment below); something dull-looking on the Atari 800XL; another poor stand-in dressed as Danger Mouse (Creative Sparks), with the Virgin Games stand in the background; Kong, on the Ocean stand (if you are that Ocean employee please leave a comment); Macbeth, Creative Sparks; and a lovely long tracking shot of the show, taken from an escalator, which includes the Commodore and Acorn stands.
One of the reasons The Battle For Santa's Software works is because it is willing to engage with the software industry as a games business. At the time, that wasn't common in television. Compare that attitude to this report from Micro Live. Lesley Judd visits the PCW show with computer journalist Chris Palmer, and the report is determined to feature only the dullest parts of the show. Eureka, by Domark, gets a grudging look in at the end only because of the £25,000 prize on offer. Say what you like about Dominic Wheatley and Mark Strachan's ability to release good games but they knew how to grab the attention of the media.
20.21 A cut to the Ocean stand where we get a good look at a poster for what was Ocean's actual hit game of 1984, Daley Thompson's Decathlon. Unlike Hunchback II or Kong Strikes Back it did top the PCN charts; from September 13th to October 25th. A seven week run ended only after the C64 release of Jet Set Willy returned that game to number one.
The lack of focus on Daley Thompson's Decathlon also points to the Ocean filming being organised post-Imagine collapse. By September the game was written and on sale and so doesn't fit the brief of being a potential Christmas hit.
The lack of focus on Daley Thompson's Decathlon also points to the Ocean filming being organised post-Imagine collapse. By September the game was written and on sale and so doesn't fit the brief of being a potential Christmas hit.
20.34 Kong and Hunchback together onscreen at last. The guy playing Kong at least has his face hidden. Hunchback has nothing to cover his shame.
20.54 David Ward talks about the advantages of demonstrating an early version of Hunchback II, to get feedback. Behind his head, Cavelon plays on a monitor.
21.22 David Ward: "The figure of Hunchback himself has not been well received... he looks as though he's kind of a... I don't know... a pterodactyl with a green blob on his back."
Myself, I reckon he looks more like a turkey. The body is good but the head is just weird. Quasimodo would be redesigned for the final release, losing a lot of character in the process. I would have tried to keep the body but rework the head. I like the look of the rotund torso sitting on a pair of thin legs, it pre-empts the appealing design of characters like Gru from Despicable Me. Instead Ocean goes for a more bland hero figure.
Myself, I reckon he looks more like a turkey. The body is good but the head is just weird. Quasimodo would be redesigned for the final release, losing a lot of character in the process. I would have tried to keep the body but rework the head. I like the look of the rotund torso sitting on a pair of thin legs, it pre-empts the appealing design of characters like Gru from Despicable Me. Instead Ocean goes for a more bland hero figure.
22.06 A pile of games in the Websters' warehouse. The camera pans by too quickly to make out most of the titles. I can spot Summer Games by Epyx, a 1983 Dragon 32 game called Back Track, from Incentive, and London Blitz from Avalon Hill,
22.17 November 1. Paul Finnegan, sales director for Ocean, demonstrates Hunchback II for Websters. The game footage we see features Quasimodo as both the turkey lookalike and the redesigned sprite. The release date for Hunchback II is given as November 15th.
23.32 "The same evening, at a school near Manchester, one class has stayed being to give Hunchback his sternest test yet." For some reason, the sound of an owl hooting has been added; to allow blind viewers to hear this is a night shot? The closing credits identify the school as Lostock School, Manchester.
The CRASH article includes a production photo showing the team setting up for filming at Lostock School and the caption notes: "Moving on from Imagine, the BBC crew finished the programme off with Ocean."
The CRASH article includes a production photo showing the team setting up for filming at Lostock School and the caption notes: "Moving on from Imagine, the BBC crew finished the programme off with Ocean."
23.41 The footage of the class is atmospheric and lit only by the glow from television screens. CRASH used to use local schoolkids to review games and this class are a lot better behaved than the shrieking mass who used to descend on the editorial office at 2 King Street, Ludlow. Roger Kean described them to outofprintarchive.com:
In addition to the permanent staff, the place was overflowing with school kids after 4pm and at the weekends and during school holidays. The biggest headache was supplying enough computers for them to play on and then trying to enforce some discipline. The grand staircase of three floors was a marvellous place for rubber-band fights, which raged for months, but somehow the work got done.
25.32 Another caption "23 November". The first copies of Hunchback II are prepared at the duplicator.
25.52 "At a wholesale price of £2.50 these finished cassettes, at fifty pence each, are the dearest part. About forty pence pays for programming which leaves about one pound fifty for marketing, distribution, and a healthy profit." The economics of game production in 1984.
25.59 The Ocean branded van is loaded and driven onto the streets of Manchester.
26.24 Back to where we started. Footage of busy shops, pre-Christmas 1984. WH Smith first, When was the last time you saw a WH Smith this busy?
26.25 Another clip from the Chip Shop software top ten. Listen to the way Hugh Sykes' narration cuts in to obscure the brand names of the companies who compiled the charts; PERSONAL COMPUTER NEWS and RAM/C (whoever they were).
26.38 More footage from Boots. Again, presumably, this is Manchester as the film crew were there covering Ocean.
26.52 "There are more than 200 other games released this Christmas fighting for attention." We see clips of Revenge of the Mutant Camels, Llamasoft, Bruce Lee from US Gold, and Mugsy Melbourne House.
27.24 David Ward sums up the changes that were taking place across the UK software industry in 1984:
This industry has grown from being a cottage industry to being a major supplier in the high street and it requires all the skills of business that being a supplier to high street stores requires. Whether you're supplying them with radios or toothpaste or cornflakes or whatever.
This industry has grown from being a cottage industry to being a major supplier in the high street and it requires all the skills of business that being a supplier to high street stores requires. Whether you're supplying them with radios or toothpaste or cornflakes or whatever.
27.41 We see the same young man from 00.03. He's playing Gremlin Graphics' Suicide Express in Boots.
27.47 Imagine, the postscript. Hugh Sykes explains how David Ward brought the Imagine name from the liquidator to run as a label for Ocean. That sale was reported in the 18-24 October 1984 issue of POPULAR COMPUTING WEEKLY.
John Gibson, along with Ian Weatherburn. Karen Davies, Steve Cain, Graham Everitt and Ally Noble went on to found Denton Designs. They would use the basics of the Bandersnatch engine for their first Ocean game, Gift from the Gods. This actually led to threats of court action by Psygnosis but ultimately it was all hot air and sour grapes," John Gibson said in his 2001 interview
John Gibson, along with Ian Weatherburn. Karen Davies, Steve Cain, Graham Everitt and Ally Noble went on to found Denton Designs. They would use the basics of the Bandersnatch engine for their first Ocean game, Gift from the Gods. This actually led to threats of court action by Psygnosis but ultimately it was all hot air and sour grapes," John Gibson said in his 2001 interview
28.02 The closing titles run over footage from Beach Head, released in the UK by US Gold.
The Battle For Santa's Software never identifies the actual Christmas Number One game. Maybe because it wasn't Hunchback II or Kong Strikes Back. If you go by the chart used in the programme then the number one was Knight Lore by Ultimate Play the Game. If you look at the first chart printed after Christmas, it was Activision's Ghostbusters. More interesting was the chart printed in the week of 5 January 1985 which gave the number one title for 1984. It was an Ocean game but, as I said earlier, not one the documentary makers focused on.
The CRASH article, The Biggest Commercial Break of them All, serves as both a Making Of for the documentary and also goes into more detail about the failure of Imagine. It is well worth a read as a companion piece to the documentary. Roger Kean had an unusual level of access to the production team for The Battle For Santa's Software. The CRASH Christmas Special went on sale on December 13 1984, the same day the documentary was broadcast. Towards the end of the article, Roger Kean notes:
It is a critical time for [Imagine's] directors. Dave Lawson and Ian Heatherington, who are naturally afraid of any adverse publicity.
Even as I was in London seeing the rough cut of the TV programme. Ian Heatherington was on the phone trying to get hold of Paul Andersen When I returned to Ludlow that Friday evening, I was greeted with a message that Heatherington had rung me to find out the same thing, having heard that we were writing about the Story Unfortunately for him he spoke to our Financial Director, and was told that as he still owed us £5,825, it wasn't sound sense to bother us!
Even as I was in London seeing the rough cut of the TV programme. Ian Heatherington was on the phone trying to get hold of Paul Andersen When I returned to Ludlow that Friday evening, I was greeted with a message that Heatherington had rung me to find out the same thing, having heard that we were writing about the Story Unfortunately for him he spoke to our Financial Director, and was told that as he still owed us £5,825, it wasn't sound sense to bother us!
Obviously, I'd love to know what weekend Roger Kean went to London to see the rough cut of the documentary. My best guess, it was the same weekend he and Oliver Frey went to London to see a preview of The Last Starfighter. The December 1984 issue of CRASH was on sale from 15 November and the editorial starts with a notes that:
AS I WRITE THIS, we are plunged in the gloom of a rainy mid -October day,
Roger Kean possibly saw a rough edit of the documentary somewhere between mid-October and early November (I don't know how much of a gap there was between finishing the issue and it going on sale). The December 1984 CRASH includes a news story promoting the programme and the article in the CRASH Christmas Special.
Tucked away in a corner of page 62 is an interesting photo. A repeated shot of John Gilbert demonstrating Bandersnatch. The photo has been duplicated to look like part of a film strip but, as I noted earlier, this part of the programme looks like it was recorded on video and the CRASH photo is an off-screen still including the early edit videotape timecode.
My article on Imagine in the Christmas Special certainly stirred up a hornets nest of comment, much of it from the city of Liverpool, and ripples are still spreading outwards as I write.
That's how Roger Kean started an editorial update in the February 1985 issue of CRASH. Mark Butler phoned from Odin/Thor where he was now a director.
We were rather startled to receive a telephone call from Mark Butler, now a director of the software company Thor (Jack and the Beanstalk), to say that they would not be paying for their advert in the Christmas issue. He added that there was no point phoning him back as he didn’t want to talk to anyone and that was that. To be fair, another director of Thor when contacted, seemed a bit surprised at Butler’s call but pointed out that the ad was badly placed on a left-hand page, when it is their policy to book only right-hand pages. Our paperwork, confirmations of which they were sent, shows that no special conditions were placed on the booking. Considering how much advertising Imagine placed with computer magazines and never paid for over many, many months, it just goes to show that you can’t teach an old dog new tricks — like behaving decently for instance.
Bruce Everiss also got in touch with a lengthily letter printed in the same issue. It included this memorable paragraph:
When Hetherington says he is sick to death of people insinuating that anything untoward happened at Imagine, I can only assume that he is suffering from amnesia. The lying and deception were almost boundless, as many will testify.
Ian Hetherington and David Lawson went on to found Psygnosis. Which is a story for another day.
I'm pleased with this article. I turned it around in three days, having realised on Friday morning that I should try and write about the BBC Archive upload of The Battle For Santa's Software. Any mistakes are the result of the ludicrous speed of writing and I'm happy to correct them.
Please leave a comment or send an email to whereweretheynow@gmail.com
I am also on Bluesky @shammountebank.bsky.social
I am also on Bluesky @shammountebank.bsky.social
19.30 - The PCW show. The unicycling policeman patrolling the Anirog stand was presumably to promote their C64 game P.C. Fuzz where you play (surprise, surprise!) a policeman on a unicyle!
ReplyDeleteThat’s a great point about why this documentary works so well: the fact that it’s willing to engage with the software industry as a games business. This was a fascinating time in the UK with the birth of a multi-million pounds industry from virtually nothing in a couple of years with a number of success stories set against the depressing backdrop of Thatcher’s Britain. As you say, this is something which programmes like the staid Micro Live missed out on.
ReplyDelete