![]() Issue 1 cover | |
Editor | Roger Kean (Feb '84 – Aug '85) Graeme Kidd (Aug '85 – Mar 87) Roger Kean (Apr '87 – Sep '87) Barnaby Page (Oct '87 – Mar '88) Steve Jarratt (Apr '88 – Jul '88) Dominic Handy (Aug '88 – Mar '89) Stuart Wynne (Apr '89 – May '89) Oliver Frey (Jun '89 – Mar '91) Richard Eddy (Apr '91 – Oct '91) Lucy Hickman (Dec '91 – Apr '92) Chris Wilkins (Dec 2020 – present) |
---|---|
Categories | Computer games magazine |
Frequency | Monthly/Quarterly |
Circulation | 101,483 (peak) |
First issue | February 1984 |
Final issue Number | April 1992 (originally) 98 (originally) |
Company | Newsfield Publications Ltd Europress Fusion Retro |
Country | United Kingdom |
Language | English |
Website | http://www.crashonline.org.uk/ |
ISSN | 0954-8661 |
Crash is a magazine dedicated to the ZX Spectrum home computer, primarily focused on games. It was published from 1984 to 1991 by Newsfield Publications Ltd until their liquidation, and then until 1992 by Europress. It was relaunched as a quarterly A5 magazine in December 2020 with the backing of the original founders.
The magazine was launched to cater for the booming Spectrum games market. It was immediately popular owing to its quality of writing and distinctive, though occasionally controversial, artwork created by Oliver Frey. By 1986 it had become the biggest-selling British computer magazine with over 100,000 copies sold monthly, but struggled towards the end of the decade after other magazines put cassettes of games on the front cover. In the 2010s, a number of retrospective issues were created via a kickstarter campaign leading to the new publication by Fusion Retro.
Crash was launched in 1983 in Ludlow, Shropshire by Roger Kean, Oliver Frey and Franco Frey. The trio had met the previous year when they were working for newspaper publisher Alan Purnell, learning how to write and produce a magazine from scratch. Franco Frey had worked for an electronics company, and had been asked by one of his business contacts if could get hold of video games. Kean remembers that "The High Street was ignorant of computer games" and they wanted to source titles and sell them. [1] They set up a mail order catalogue called Crash Micro Games Action and advertised in contemporary computer magazines such as Computer and Video Games . [2] It was immediately successful, so by late 1983, they decided to launch a dedicated magazine, forming the company Newsfield to do so. [1] Kean and Oliver Frey wanted a catchy title for the magazine, choosing "Crash" after J. G. Ballard's novel of the same name. [3]
Though he had regularly played video games throughout the 1970s, the middle-aged Kean realised that the target market for the magazine was teenagers and young men, and the writing needed to accommodate this. Consequently, he hired teenage staff writer Matthew Uffindel and the pair recruited local schoolchildren to review the games, including Ben Stone and Robin Candy. [1] To produce screenshots, a camera was set up to directly capture the television set or monitor that the Spectrum was plugged into. The film was then processed in-house, printed and delivered to a local print shop to prepare the final page. [3]
The first issue was intended to be published in November 1983, in time for the pre-Christmas trade but owing to a conflict with retailers WH Smith it was published in February the following year. [4] The magazine maintained focus squarely on Spectrum gaming. It was an instant hit thanks to Oliver Frey's artwork and Kean's writing, assisted by Uffindel. [1] Kean and the Frey brothers would continue to be involved with the magazine throughout its lifetime. [5] [6]
Reviewers would give their direct opinions on whether a game was good or not, regardless of advertising or any pressure from software houses. Though publishers sometimes tried to bribe the magazine editors to give games good reviews, the children would not do that, and once gave a game a low score of 9%. This honesty gave Crash a good reputation and made it highly influential in the games industry. [1] [7] If a game was awarded a "Crash Smash" (an overall rating of 90% or above), the industry believed it was genuinely good and it would sell well. [1] Notable Crash Smashes included Jet Set Willy , [8] Sabre Wulf [9] and Head over Heels . [10] A games compilation "Four Crash Smashes" was produced, capitalising on the award's importance. [11]
In October 1986, Crash reported sales of over 100,000 copies. [12] Its ABC figure of 101,483 copies a month for the period of January to June were claimed by the magazine to be higher than any other British computer magazine. [13] [14]
By 1989, rival Spectrum magazine Your Sinclair regularly came with a free cassette attached to the cover that contained a complete game and various demos. [1] Crash had occasionally featured cassettes on the cover, but began to lag in circulation. It was relaunched that June with a free cover-mounted cassette with a number of complete games, which continued as a regular feature. This came at the expense of page count and editorial content, both of which were reduced. [1] [15] Kean was annoyed by having to put tapes on the cover to keep up with the competition, as it increased costs and obscured Frey's cover artwork. [1]
Newsfield was suffering increasing financial difficulties by the early 1990s. The last edition of Crash published by the company was in September 1991. Following the company's liquidation, the magazine was relaunched by Europress that December, continuing until the final issue in April 1992. After this, Crash was bought by EMAP, publisher of Sinclair User, who merged the two magazines. In practice, this meant little more than the appearance of the Crash logo on the front cover. [1]
In May 2016, No. 2 King Street, Ludlow was awarded a Blue plaque as the premises of Newsfield while it was publishing Crash and ZZap!64 from 1984–9, which both hired pupils from Ludlow Church of England School alongside professional journalists. [16]
In 2017, the magazine was commemorated in a special exhibition in Ludlow Buttercross Museum documenting Newsfield's contribution to the local industry. [17] The same year, a special edition of the magazine was issued following a Kickstarter campaign that raised £12,000. [13] Kean, Oliver Frey and Nick Roberts all returned to contribute to this issue. [18] The following year, a similar campaign led to the 2019 Crash annual – issue 100. [19] The magazine was relaunched as an A5 quarterly publication in December 2020.
Crash featured distinctive cover art, mostly drawn by Oliver Frey. Much of his work was published in book form for the first time in 2006. [20]
The cover of issue 18, July 1985, which depicted a scantily clad sorceress with a man on his knees in collar and chains, was considered provocative by some shops who moved it to the top shelf. [21] Issue 31 in August 1986 was criticised for the front cover featuring staff writer Hannah Smith in a swimsuit mud wrestling with an alien. [1] The cover of issue 41, June 1987, was a particularly violent image depicting two barbarians fighting, with one about to slit the throat of another. The picture was deemed too strong by W H Smith and that issue was relegated to the top shelves. [21] However, these controversial covers helped boost the sales of Crash, particularly doubling the circulation from 1985 to 1986. [1]
Much editorial content (such as previews and responses to readers' letters) was credited to Lloyd Mangram, a fictional character, although written by members of the editorial staff. [22] He was created by the team simply to make the magazine look more important and professional by appearing to have a greater number of writers, and named after golfer Lloyd Mangrum. [1] On one occasion, Mangram was depicted visually in the magazine by a sketch of a man wearing a paper bag over his head with holes cut for eyes, [23] and was reported to work on a Hermes typewriter. [24]
The "Playing Tips" section featured solutions to games cheats to make them easier. Candy was a regular host of this section in its early years. Issue 27 in April 1986 included a special "Robin Candy's Playing Tips" supplement of cheats and game modifications, including a room editor for the Crash Smash game Sweevo's World. [25] Following Candy's departure, Hannah Smith ran the section as a self-styled "girlie tipster", establishing a rivalry with fictional Melissa Ravenflame from Computer and Video Games. [1] [26] Nick Roberts began his role in the magazine editing this section after Smith, and stayed for the remainder of its run, working out POKEs (alterations to the game's machine code in memory that allowed a player to cheat) using a Multiface, a Spectrum hardware add-on. [1] The magazine also covered technical information and stories about future hardware and peripherals in its "Tech Niche" and "Tech Tips" sections, the latter frequently written by Simon N Goodwin. [27] [28] In 1988, a special "Tech Tape" was released, containing utilities and programs associated with this section. [29] Crash included the occasional column which seemed unusual for a computer magazine. Its first year saw the launch of both the Lunar Jetman strip (written and illustrated by John Richardson, based on the character from the games by Ultimate Play the Game) [30] and The Terminal Man, an original piece of fiction written by Kelvin Gosnell and illustrated by Oliver Frey. [31] Later years would see a brief revival of The Terminal Man, as well as Mel Croucher's comic story Tamara Knight, both of which ended mid-run. After the closure of Newsfield's short-lived lifestyle magazine LM, Crash inherited its video reviews for a short period. [32] [33] [34]
The August 1985 issue of Crash featured "Unclear User", a spoof on rival magazine Sinclair User . This led to a successful injunction being taken out against the magazine two days before the official publication date on the grounds of copyright infringement. [1] [35] Copies were withdrawn from newsagents and an apology published in the following issue. Readers were also offered to buy a back issue with the offending pages removed at a reduced price and priority delivery. [36]
Starting in 1984, the magazine published an annual readers awards article, based on votes from the readers.
Year | Best overall game | Best adventure | Best platformer | Best shooter | Best simulation | Best graphics | Best advert |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1984 [37] | Daley Thompson's Decathlon | Lords of Midnight | Wanted: Monty Mole | Ad Astra | Fighter Pilot | Sabre Wulf | |
1985 [38] | Elite | Red Moon (Time and Magik) | Dynamite Dan | Commando | Tomahawk | Fairlight | |
1986 [39] | Starglider | Heavy on the Magick | Dynamite Dan II | Uridium | TT Racer | Lightforce | The Great Escape |
1987 [40] | Driller | The Pawn | Auf Wiedersehen Monty | Zynaps | Gunship | Driller | Game Over |
1989 [41] | Batman – The Movie | Myth: History in the Making | Operation Thunderbolt | Cabal | |||
1990 [42] | RoboCop 2 | Lords of Chaos | Turtles |
The ZX Spectrum is an 8-bit home computer that was developed by Sinclair Research. It was released in the United Kingdom on 23 April 1982, and became Britain's best-selling microcomputer.
Ashby Computers and Graphics Limited, trading as Ultimate Play the Game, was a British video game developer and publisher, founded in 1982, by ex-arcade game developers Tim and Chris Stamper. Ultimate released a series of successful games for the ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC, BBC Micro, MSX and Commodore 64 computers from 1983 until 1987. Ultimate are perhaps best remembered for the big-selling titles Jetpac and Sabre Wulf, each of which sold over 300,000 copies in 1983 and 1984 respectively, and their groundbreaking series of isometric arcade adventures using a technique termed Filmation. Knight Lore, the first of the Filmation games, has been retrospectively described in the press as "seminal ... revolutionary" (GamesTM), "one of the most successful and influential games of all time" (X360), and "probably ... the greatest single advance in the history of computer games" (Edge).
Dizzy is a series of video games, created by the Oliver Twins and published by Codemasters. It was one of the most successful British video game franchises of the late 1980s and early 1990s. Originally created for the ZX Spectrum and Amstrad CPC, the series appeared on multiple home computer and video game console formats, with over a dozen games being published between 1987 and 1992.
Sabre Wulf is an action-adventure game released by British video game developer Ultimate Play the Game for the ZX Spectrum home computer in 1984. The player navigates the pith-helmeted Sabreman through a 2D jungle maze while collecting amulet pieces to bypass the guardian at its exit. The player does not receive explicit guidance on how to play and is left to decipher the game's objectives through trial and error. Sabreman moves between the maze's 256 connected screens by touching the border where one screen ends and another begins. Each screen is filled with colourful flora, enemies that spawn at random, and occasional collectibles.
Newsfield Publications Ltd was a British magazine publisher during the 1980s and early 1990s.
Zzap!64 was a computer games magazine covering games on the Commodore International series of computers, especially the Commodore 64 (C64). It was published in the UK by Newsfield Publications Ltd and later by Europress Impact.
Barbarian: The Ultimate Warrior is a video game first released for Commodore 64 personal computers in 1987; the title was developed and published by Palace Software, and ported to other computers in the following months. The developers licensed the game to Epyx, who published it as Death Sword in the United States. Barbarian is a fighting game that gives players control over sword-wielding barbarians. In the game's two-player mode, players pit their characters against each other. Barbarian also has a single-player mode, in which the player's barbarian braves a series of challenges set by an evil wizard to rescue a princess.
Imagine Software was a British video games developer based in Liverpool which existed briefly in the early 1980s, initially producing software for the ZX Spectrum and VIC-20. The company rose quickly to prominence and was noted for its polished, high-budget approach to packaging and advertising, as well as its self-promotion and ambition.
Oliver Frey was a Swiss artist, who was based in the United Kingdom. He was known for his book and magazine illustrations, especially for British computer magazines of the 1980s. Under the pen name Zack, he became known for his erotic illustrations and erotic comics in British gay male porn magazines of the 1970s and 1980s.
Monty on the Run is a computer game created by the software house Gremlin Graphics and released in 1985 for the Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC and Commodore 16, written by Peter Harrap for the ZX Spectrum with the iconic in-game music on the Commodore 64 provided by Rob Hubbard. It is the third game in the Monty Mole series.
Wanted: Monty Mole is a platform video game published in July 1984 for the ZX Spectrum and Commodore 64 home computers. It is the first game released by Gremlin Graphics and the first game in the Monty Mole series. Monty Mole is a fictional mole created by Ian Stewart, the director of the company.
Amtix is a magazine that originally reviewed Amstrad computer software in the mid-1980s, published monthly by Newsfield Publications Ltd.
Turbo Esprit is a video game published by Durell Software in 1986 for the ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64, and Amstrad CPC. The game was very detailed and advanced for its time, featuring car indicator lights, pedestrians, traffic lights, and a view of the car's interior controls. Turbo Esprit was the first free-roaming driving game, and has been cited as a major influence on the later Grand Theft Auto series.
Europress was a British magazine and software publisher based in Adlington, near Macclesfield, Cheshire. Their magazine publishing business was previously known as Database Publications. The software division was renamed in 1999 to Actualize.
Sega Force was an early 1990s publication that covered the Sega console range.
Daley Thompson's Decathlon is an Olympic-themed sports video game developed and released by Ocean Software in 1984. It was released in the wake of Daley Thompson's popularity following his gold medals in the decathlon at the 1980 and 1984 Olympic Games. The game is based on the gameplay format established by 1983 arcade game Track & Field.
Barbarian II: The Dungeon of Drax is a video game first published in 1988 for various home computers. It was also released as Axe of Rage in North America. The game is the sequel to Barbarian: The Ultimate Warrior, which was published in 1987. In Barbarian II, the player controls a princess or barbarian character, exploring the game world to locate and defeat an evil wizard. The game's plot is an extension of its predecessor, although the gameplay is different. While the first game offers two players the opportunity for virtual head-to-head combat, the second is solely a single-player adventure with fewer fighting moves.
Street Hawk is a video game based on the Street Hawk TV series. It was developed by Ocean Software in the 1980s for the ZX Spectrum home computer. When development on the first attempt stalled in 1985, a new version had to be quickly produced by their in-house team to fulfil orders for Kays Catalogues and never went on general release. This version is sometimes known as the "subscribers edition" as it was offered as a free gift to new subscribers to Crash magazine - the magazine eventually had to offer a choice of other Ocean games - Ping Pong, Movie, Super Bowl and Green Beret - as alternatives.
LM was a short-lived publication from Newsfield, the publishers of computer gaming titles such as Crash! for the ZX Spectrum and Zzap!64 for the Commodore 64. Issue 1 was launched in February 1987 and ran for four editions, although a preview issue 0 was given away with the Christmas 1986 editions of Crash, Zzap! & Amtix.
Friday the 13th: The Computer Game is the first game adaptation based on the films of the same name. It was released in 1986 by Domark for the Amstrad CPC, Commodore 64, and ZX Spectrum. The game was released on floppy diskette and cassette tape. The player's goal is to find and kill Jason, while making sure their friends or they themselves are not killed by Jason.