Investigating the history of videogames, an in-depth look into their obscure, untold and often troubled development story, trivia and everything else interesting.
Interview with Larry Ahern – Part 1 of 2 – From The Dig to The Curse of Monkey Island In December of 2020 I had the opportunity to talk with Larry Ahern via Skype, we made time for a lengthy conversation on his overall career, from his first interview at Skywalker Ranch all the way…
From its humble beginnings in Francesco Carlà’s private home, seen in Part I, Simulmondo managed to merge talent and business into a successful company which grew almost bigger than the size of a developer like Electronic Arts at the time. From 1992 on, because of the CEO’s stubbornness in continuing to pursue the selling on…
Throughout 2000 years of human history, since mankind understood it was possible to package and sell a work of art, a single struggle has resisted, immortal, rearing its ugly head time and time again: the artist against the system. It’s a timeless tale, used in books and screenplays, that of the desperate toil of artists…
In the history of Italian videogame development, point’n’click adventure games could be considered, perhaps, the quintessential genre. The love for solving riddles and laughing at fourth wall breaking jokes might indeed be stronger than that for soccer and wine and this is where Dynabyte Software comes in. While Sierra Entertainment adventures struggled to find a…
It is fascinating how the history of video games tends to be skewed towards a USA-centric narrative. Still, to this day, it is relatively easy to come across articles – written by Italians of all people – that keep on mentioning the “console wars” in the 90s or the “great video game crash of 1983”,…
Very few people seemed to care about the history of video games in the 90s: everyone just played them. Truthfully though, back then the medium was still in its teenage years; it would be rather unreasonable to expect people to start looking back and think about the evolution of the medium, let alone on the…
In the infamous history of the years long battle of Nintendo versus Sega, the usual narrative depicts two Japanese companies pitted against each other. Personally, I also see a little of “Japan vs USA”. Indeed, both companies saw unexpected success in the ol’ United States during the late 80s and 90s, while trying to appeal…
Everyone happens to get a great idea every once in a while. Those brilliant concepts that almost approach pure genius, at least until they are actually discussed, some time passes and everyone suddenly realizes exactly just how stupid and/or insane the concept actually was and… phew! Aren’t we all glad that no one bothered to…
Everyone had a favorite videogame shop as a kid, where plenty of happy – or perhaps, not-so-happy – memories took place. Maybe it was EG or a Game, if one is UK based, or perhaps a Gamestop, Blockbuster or a mom-and-pop shop even. As for me, well, most of my games, as a child, I…
What do Zombies ate My Neighbors and Herc’s Adventures have in common? Well, not very much one would say. Zeus and Zombies do share the letter Z, but one is the Greek god of everything, the other is a smelly undead being usually hungry for meat/brains. Still Lucasarts would beg to differ, especially Mike Ebert…