Dec

Twelve Days of Christmas – Day 6 – Andy Remic

By Lee

We’re heading into the final straight, now. Christmas is one week away, people!

Christmas!

One week!

Remember the days when Christmas was simple? No worrying about scheduling the food, or hiding the presents, or wondering how you were going to get the tree home. Remember how you felt about Christmas as a child?

Andy Remic does…

By Andy Remic

I had many a wonderful childhood Christmas, and they were always special for me. It would usually be me, various family members, sparkly decorations, my pet cat Susie and my trusty ZX Spectrum. Turkey and roasties, smothered in thick gravy. Cat by the fire. Tree lights glittering. Snow outside. Lazy aunt pretending to sleep so she didn’t have to do the washing up.

Mom and dad were good at hiding presents (how my dad got a full race bike into the loft without me knowing I’ll never understand!), and much as I liked all the family coming round to gorge on my mom’s extravagant and massive Christmas roast dinners, the highlight was always my Spectrum computer and the games I’d been hoarding as a present to myself (I openly admit I was a Speccy obsessive, probably still am!!). I’d set the ol’ Spec up in the living room (so I wouldn’t be anti-social by sitting in my bedroom), and play wonderful games like Kosmic Kanga, Tom Prosser’s Ice Temple, Geoff Crammond’s Sentinel, Ultimate’s Knight Lore and Sabre Wulf, and Steve Crow’s Starquake.

One of my favourite programmers was the wonderful Joffa Smifff, who wrote Green Beret, Cobra and the superlative Pud Pud. Cobra was a favourite in my house one Christmas, and sitting like little Jabbas stuffed with turkey and new potatoes and brandy pudding, me and my nephew, Paul, and my best mate Ralphy, would take turns controlling a tiny fat wobbling Sylvester Stallone sprite around the screen, head-butting and shooting his way to the rescue of his tiny fat wobbling girlfriend, all to a Christmas hymn soundtrack provided by the TV. However, it must hence be known that Joffa’s game was a cheating bugger of a game, with a scroll routine that scrolled enemies into your sprite even when you’d changed direction, or pressed “Use Your Head”. It was a game that caused much wailing and lamenting, loud enough to drown out bad carol singers at the door!

There were endless Christmas TV shows, Knight Rider and The A Team, and the obligatory James Bond movie after which I’d roam the house with a plastic Walther, shooting “baddies”. Ahh, how the long winter nights just flew by.

Best of all was snuggling up warm and tired in bed late at night, overfull on chocolates and mince pies, new presents hoarded in a pile like an Aladdin’s cave of crap no doubt soon to crumble into kipple. I’ve still got my wind-up Evil Knieval bike, though. That was a tough present we could never break!

Mom and dad were good at hiding presents (how my dad got a full race bike into the loft without me knowing I’ll never understand!), and much as I liked all the family coming round to gorge on my mom’s extravagant and massive Christmas roast dinners, the highlight was always my Spectrum computer and the games I’d been hoarding as a present to myself (I openly admit I was a Speccy obsessive, probably still am!!). I’d set the ol’ Spec up in the living room (so I wouldn’t be anti-social by sitting in my bedroom), and play wonderful games like Kosmic Kanga, Tom Prosser’s Ice Temple, Geoff Crammond’s Sentinel, Ultimate’s Knight Lore and Sabre Wulf, and Steve Crow’s Starquake.

One of my favourite programmers was the wonderful Joffa Smifff, who wrote Green Beret, Cobra and the superlative Pud Pud. Cobra was a favourite in my house one Christmas, and sitting like little Jabbas stuffed with turkey and new potatoes and brandy pudding, me and my nephew, Paul, and my best mate Ralphy, would take turns controlling a tiny fat wobbling Sylvester Stallone sprite around the screen, head-butting and shooting his way to the rescue of his tiny fat wobbling girlfriend, all to a Christmas hymn soundtrack provided by the TV. However, it must hence be known that Joffa’s game was a cheating bugger of a game, with a scroll routine that scrolled enemies into your sprite even when you’d changed direction, or pressed “Use Your Head”. It was a game that caused much wailing and lamenting, loud enough to drown out bad carol singers at the door!