A&F Software

Unit 8, Canal Side Industrial Estate, Woodbine Street East, Rochdale, OL16

A was Doug Anderson and F was Mike Fitzgerald and when they got together it was murder to establish a software house in Manchester. A&F Software is now mainly remembered for a single game, Chuckie Egg, but the company was more than a one-hit-wonder. It shares some similarities with Silversoft. Both companies were pioneers of the early computer games industry and struggled as the market became more established and professional in the mid-eighties, and finally sold out to a bigger brand. The first question, of course is, is the company called A&F or AF or A+F or A'n'F? The answer, it was known as all four at various times across its history. I'll try to use the correct version as we go on because I find that's the kind of perverse pedantry I find funny.

Activision / Mediagenic / Activision Blizzard

15 Harley House, Marylebone Road, London, NW1

Good grief. No other company has sent me trekking so far around and about London and the outer reaches of the M25. I've occasionally thought I could organise these articles into nice walks. I could do you a trip around Liverpool, or Manchester, or along the line of Domark's southwest London offices. I couldn't do that for Activision. Just the addresses inside the M25 produce a walk 22 miles long. I didn't know true existential despair until I'd compiled all 13* addresses Activision UK used -and continue to use- in their long history. Even now I'm worried I've missed one**. If Microsoft's proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard goes through that could mean another move for the company. Oh god, no. No updates. No updates.

*Wrong. It's actually 16.
** I did.

Molimerx

1 Buckhurst Road, Town Hall Square, Bexhill

I was browsing the first issue of COMPUTER & VIDEOGAMES when I bumped into an advert for a company called Molimerx. I'd never heard of them. I would love to claim my spider-sense tingled and I realised this was something worth writing up, but I didn't. I just moved on to the next page. A few months later I was trying to dig up some information on Program Power and there on page 158 of the August 1980 issue of PERSONAL COMPUTER WORLD was another advert in the same style. A full page advert with eye-catching black and white art, and the slogan "INNOVATIVE TRS-80 SOFTWARE FROM THE PROFESSIONALS." This was odd. Molimerx were old. They were a big professional software house at a time when, my understand was, big professional software houses didn't exist. 

Bitmap Brothers

C1, Metropolitan Wharf, Wapping Wall, London, E1

What's cooler than being cool? Ice cold! Obviously. What did it take to be cool in the 1990s? Shades. Check. A leather jacket. Check. White shirt. Check. Jeans. Check. Helicopter (optional). Check. No one was cooler than the Bitmap Brothers.

Software Creations

2/4 Oxford Road, Manchester, M1

"I can't believe I walked past the Ocean offices for years without realising the significance of the building, likewise Software Creations." This sentence, posted at the Spectrum Computing forum by user Daveysloan sent me into a bit of a tailspin. I'd prepared a trip to Manchester in August 2022, taking in Ocean (obviously), Design Design (also, obviously), Vortex (hopefully), A 'n' F (maybe, if I could make the train to Rochdale work). However the trip was cancelled at the last minute because of the chaos caused by Avanti West Coast's new and improved timetable. The day I should have been in Manchester I read a thread on the Spectrum Computing forum which spun off into a discussion about the addresses of software houses. This was obviously right up my street, until Daveysloan mentioned Software Creations. I could add them to the Manchester list. That wasn't a problem. The problem I'd got was, who the heck were Software Creations?

Domark

Ferry House, 51-57 Lacy Road, Putney, SW15

When I started this blog I diligently wrote out a list of companies I wanted to cover. Some companies went on the list because they hit my nostalgia buttons, some went on the list because they were big names and it would be odd if they were missing, some went on the list because I thought they might be of specific niche interest to some people, some went on the list because I had a story about them I wanted to tell, and -let's not beat around the bush here- some went on the list because I knew they would be easy. Domark didn't make that first list. Or the second one. Or a couple of the subsequent follow up lists. They didn't even make my backup in-case-of-unforeseen-emergencies list. It's clear I really like lists. What is less clear is, why is there a Domark-shaped hole in my nostalgia? 

POWER PLAY magazine: Realtime Games interview

 Fast-paced reality

Where the programmers of »Realtime Games« are at work, the processors smoke. Fast 3D graphics and thrilling games keep home computers busy and players in suspense