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*******************************
* BYTE BACK 2009 *
* A report for Commodore Free *
* By Andrew Fisher *
*******************************
INTRODUCTION
Mat Corne went to the Fusion event in
2008, and vowed to put on his own
retro gaming show. The end result was
that over 200 people went to Bidds
Live Music Club in Longton,
Stoke-on-Trent to play games and
listen to some fascinating talks on
the weekend of the 7th and 8th of
March 2009.
The venue was split into two rooms.
In the main club were the bar and the
food counter, with the rest of the
room taken up with gaming stands and
arcade cabs. Up on the stage were a
couple of projectors, plus another at
the other end of the room that was
mainly used for Guitar Hero/Rock
Band.
Among the stalls selling things were
Console Passion and Keith Ainsworth
from Retrogamer fanzine (who had a
large number of Commodore tapes and
some cartridges for sale). Commodore
hardware was also present on a couple
of the other stalls. In the main hall
were a couple of Commodore 64's, one
that was running various demos and
games during the day, and the other
that was mainly used for Shredz64
(the Guitar Hero clone). Steve
(StarshipUK) had also bought along
his C64G, which is used as a keyboard
for his emulation PC.
In the "executive suite" was the
homebrew showcase and the stage area
where the Q&A sessions took place.
The Attic Bug were here with many
boxed and original games for sale -
seeing a big pile of those classic
Thalamus boxes, still shrink-wrapped,
was impressive!
Jason Mackenzie was also there with
his Psytronik/Binary Zone stall. The
main machine on here was his hybrid
"Specadore 64", a Commodore 64
repainted in black to resemble a 48K
Spectrum. He also demonstrated The
Last Amazon (soon to be released by
Psytronik with a new third game to
make it a trilogy) and the C64 DTV
(the plug-in joystick). The Shredz64
set-up transferred here during the
Sunday for a while before being
packed up.
Also in the executive suite was the
Commodore Computer Club UK. Among the
machines on this stand were a
Commodore 116 (a rare cousin of the
C16/Plus4 that was loading games from
Compact Flash) and a C64 running a
SuperCPU and CMD drives. This C64 was
actually an old "breadbox" machine
but in a slimline C64C case. Metal
Dust was on show, along with the
patched version of Driller.
HAPPY TALKING
There were four different Q&A
sessions on the Saturday, the first
being Jamie Woodhouse (Amiga coder)
and the last being Paul Drury
interviewing arcade high score
champions Jon Stoodley and Tony
Temple. The other two talks had more
relevance for C64 fans. "Ocean
Reunited" saw four well-known people
take to the stage. Spectrum
programmer Joffa Smiff admitted
beforehand he was very nervous, and
did not take full part in the
discussion. Graphic artists Simon
Butler and Mark R. Jones (most known
for his Spectrum work) were joined by
programmer Jim Bagley who spent
several years at Special FX working
under contract to Ocean.
It was a very interesting talk, from
tales of working in the "dungeon"
with a Quaker graveyard under the car
park, to the implications that
certain games had high review scores
"bought" for them. Simon Butler in
particular had a lot to say about
Total Recall, middle management and
the lack of creative thought in the
industry.
The other Q&A session on the Saturday
took place at 5pm... and I went on to
introduce "The Sensible Guide To Jon
Hare". I have met Jon at several
retro events, and jumped at the
chance to talk to him live with an
audience. I did have a list of
pre-prepared questions, with a
slideshow on the projector
introducing each topic. But as the
talk went on I got more into it,
asking extra questions and debating
key points with Jon. There were lots
of interesting anecdotes, from the
5000 contract for Parallax to the
X-rated scenes in the cancelled Sex &
Drugs & Rock & Roll.
As well as the talks, there were
various game competitions running
over the two days and a charity
auction on the Sunday afternoon. This
included a reproduction poster of the
Wizball artwork, signed by artist Bob
Wakelin (who was there on the
Saturday), designer Jon Hare and
Spectrum graphic artist Mark R Jones.
SHOW TIME
This was a good weekend, although
there were minor niggles. The venue
was not that easy to get to, the food
service was slow (I queued for an
hour on the Saturday) and the state
of the toilets was atrocious. Still,
it was great to see so many old
friends and play so many games. While
organiser Mat is unsure about putting
on another event, there is no doubt
the weekend went well. And best of
all, well over 1500 GBP was raised
for charity - the RSPCA and a local
hospice.
=========================