Nintendo

Having looked at Atari, and Sony, and SEGA, and 3DO, there's only one possible choice to do next. Nintendo. A company about whom I know very little indeed. I hope this is easier than writing about SEGA. Fortunately for me, much of the initial hard work has been done by some kind soul who created this page. Thank you. I'll try to build on your work and not just copy it.

3DO

Here come some absolutely gross assumptions guaranteed to make experts wince. The Mega Drive and SNES are commonly referred to as part of the fourth generation of consoles, but in the UK it was the second generation at best. The eighties were dominated by 8-bit computers, not consoles. It was only really as the eighties ended that Virgin Mastertronic began to have some success selling the SEGA Master System. Around the same time, home grown companies had a go at cracking the console marker. Konix really tried to be a contender with the Multisystem in 1989. Amstrad had a go with the GX4000 console in 1990. But nobody cracked it because consoles didn't break into the wider public consciousness until the period kickstarted by the release of Tetris for the Game Boy, in September 1990, and consolidated by the June 1991 release of Sonic the Hedgehog. That's when the UK market became ripe for plucking.

SEGA

I assumed SEGA was going to be easy. I sat down with the expectation that I'd have a couple of addresses to check out and then I could move on, job done. I wallowed in my ignorance. What is there to say about SEGA's presence in the UK? Megadrive, Saturn, Dreamcast? That's it, isn't it? Obviously the answer is no. I was dealing with two separate SEGAs and nine addresses after a couple of hours of basic research on Companies House. Plus, I needed not to forget about SEGA World London, and another one in Bournemouth, and Virgin Mastertronic. Pass the aspirin.

Psygnosis

Regular readers of this blog might have worked out the area of my cone of ignorance. I have a very sharp and narrow knowledge of eighties games and software houses which gets wider and hazier into the nineties and fades out almost entirely post-millennium. What company released Rockstar Ate My Hamster? Codemasters! Who released any game in the Call Of Duty series? EA? Activision?

Gremlin Graphics

 Alpha House, 10 Carver Street, Sheffield, S1

It's the eve of the millennium and you fall into conversation with an 8-bit time traveller from 1985. "What happened to all the software companies?" The traveller wants to know. "What happened to Ocean?" "Gone," you tell the traveller. "Lost two years ago."
"US Gold. They must still be around."
You shake your head, "US Gold were taken over by Eidos, who were themselves formed out of Domark."
"Mirrorsoft! A company supported by Robert Maxwell's business empire must be flourishing!"
"Gone, and there's quite a story attached to that."
"Ultimate Play the Game?"
"Gone."
"Melbourne House?"
"Gone."
"I loved Highway Encounter. What happened to Vortex?"
"Gone," you sigh.
"Mastertronic?"
"Gone."
"A&F Software?"
"Gone."
"CRL?"
"Gone?"
"Hewson Consultants?"
"Gone."
"Beyond?"
"Gone."
The traveller looks frightened and lost. "Is there no one left?" They whisper.
"Oh yes," you answer, "there's Gremlin Interactive, although you'd have known them as Gremlin Graphics."
The traveller looks confused. "The Monty Mole company?"

Virgin Interactive Entertainment

@338a Ladbroke Grove, London, W10

This post should have been easy to write. I worked for Virgin Interactive Entertainment for several years but the words seemed to drip onto my keyboard and lacked any real impact. That's wrong for this incarnation of Virgin Games (parts one and two of the story are here) because the company was all about buzz and sensation (or hype and cheap shock tactics, if you are more cynical). Then I found a link to a Kickstarter for Sex, Drugs & Video Games! The 90s Virgin story- London & LA by Tim Chaney, Managing Director. The "warts and all" story of the company's rise to fame "or more correctly infamy," It sounds like an amazing work of gonzo journalism. Hyperbolic. Bombastic. Pyroclastic. It doesn't match my memory of working there but I was in the basement.

Virgin Mastertronic

16 Portland Road, London, W11

 It's a brave person who types the name Virgin into the Companies House register; 6984 matches found. Even the more specific Virgin Mastertronic brings up several pages of results but there's obviously only one of real interest. The company now known as Sega Europe Limited. The story so far: Building work on a London Underground extension unearths some unusual prehistoric remains and a strange rocket-like object that a bomb disposal expert deduces to be an unknown Nazi weapon.... The early days of Virgin are here and, for the completists, this is where you can read about Mastertronic.
NOW READ ON.

Mastertronic

8-10 Paul Street, EC2A

"Pocket money games tapes, at £1.99 each have been launched for sale in video shops, petrol stations, hi-fi stores, supermarkets, and newsagents," was how HOME COMPUTING WEEKLY introduced budget software house Mastertronic; issue 57 (April 10-16 1984 page 1). Fourteen games were released at launch, "eight for the Commodore 64, four for the Spectrum and two for the VIC-20. Another seven will appear by the end of the month and then at the rate of one to three a week." I think those initial 14 games were Vegas Jackpot, Duck Shoot, Bionic Granny, Mind Control, Magic Carpet, Spectipede, Munch Mania, and Space Walk for the C64;  Vegas Jackpot, Gnasher, Spectipede and Magic Carpet for the Spectrum; and Vegas Jackpot and Duck Shoot for the VIC-20.