I remember the day I got my Amiga 600. It got picked up on a school night, and the next day I wasn’t very well.
What a surprise.
I remember it came with Populus, I don’t recall the other games, so I spent my time doing whatever it was you were meant to do on Populus. I think you played as God, I’m not sure.
What I am sure of is over the next couple of years, there were so many great games that came on those little disks, sometimes on as many as eight disks. I remember the thrill of popping one into the drive and awaiting my fate. Was my new title a banger, like Speedball II? Or was it going to be like Days of Thunder, a game leant to me in exchange for the Chaos Engine, with a promise ‘you can have some fun with that game’. No, I couldn’t.
However, I do remember some of the games I had a lot of fun with which were perhaps not immediate all-time classics, but games which for some reason did grab me and not let go for a while. Which games are they, I hear you ask?
Superfrog
The 16-bit machine was all about the platform game. Nintendo had Mario, Sega had Sonic and the Amiga had a whole host of characters who managed to slip in and out of popularity. I remember Zool being one game that got pushed heavily, before Superfrog landed. The plots were always loosely based on you saving someone or doing something heroic, but back then plots meant very little. All a platformer needed to offer was colour, noise and coins, as well as a likeable protagonist and good gameplay.
Team 17 were the people behind Worms, and they dipped their toe into the traditional platform genre with Superfrog, a hugely underrated hit. It dropped in 1993, and I was instantly hooked. It was lovely and smooth, very playable and most importantly, it wasn’t insanely difficult either. For a short while, me and that little green frog (previously a prince apparently) were close friends.
Brutal Sports Football
It has football in the title, but Brutal Sports Football was a more violent take on American Football, and it was utterly brilliant. Back then, any game that innovated and mashed genres tended to be ground breaking, so sports and violence was always going to excite a 14-year-old me.
It was essentially a seven-a-side game based loosely on rugby, but there were no rules. It was side scrolling which added a certain realism to proceedings which other violent sports simulations (Speedball again) had not been able to achieve. It was a game laced with humour as well, right down to being able to play ‘unfriendly’ matches instead of the usual friendly encounter.
It was mostly met with good reviews, but they didn’t bother me. I spent Friday nights on the local green until 9pm, before coming in and beating up 16-bit football players waiting for Eurotrash to start.
Cannon Fodder
The previous two games might not be considered classics by many, but Cannon Fodder is. It was one of the first squad-based warfare games on the market and whilst it wasn’t online, it was still an incredible experience. Developed by Sensible Software, it bore a strong graphical resemblance to Sensible Soccer, and it impressed gamers just as much.
I’m not sure what was the best aspect of the game. It was innovative and addictive, with a tough difficulty curve and some challenging puzzles. I never worked out if it was a shooter or a puzzler, not that it really troubled me until I wrote this piece. I think the key element of Cannon Fodder which sticks with me was the messages it conveyed, even back then on rather primitive hardware. It personalised all the character you played with, and even gave them gravestones on loading screens if they died in combat. It was a game about war, destruction and devastation which made you think about those you sent into battle, something today’s blockbusters can’t quite convey with the same poignant touches.
