If you played ‘ Ghosts’n Goblins ‘ the first game in the Ghosts ‘n Goblins franchise on systems such as the Amstrad, Amiga, Atari, C64 and ZX Spectrum, or the more recent arcade overhaul that was released for the Plus/4. You’ll be interested to know that as of just recently, JOTD has finally released the eagerly awaited Ghosts’n Goblins AGA for the Commodore Amiga. An enhanced version for the Amiga 1200 and above bringing it more in line with the Arcade classic.

Left Original / Right AGA

Originally the game was being worked on by Skyzoo73 in the Scorpion Engine. However with his blessing as the game wasn’t going to go any further, JOTD continued his work from scratch without the Scorpion Engine all fully transcoded with a final release today. In fact not only does the game look graphically superior compared to the original OCS version by Elite which was already very good, but it now features music by IM76, and as noted by JOTD previously “kicks ass with new new things like interrupt-based blitting and corkscrew”

The post HOT NEWS as Ghosts’n Goblins has arrived as a Commodore Amiga AGA edition via JOTD! appeared first on Old School Gamer Magazine.

Sonic the Hedgehog has made its way onto the ZX Spectrum Next in an exciting new release titled Sonic Spectrum Next, developed by prominent retro community creator dave18. The game is a direct conversion of the classic Sega Master System (SMS) version. This ambitious port follows hot on the heels of the developer’s prior game, where they successfully translated the brilliant Sega Master System shooter Astro Warrior over to the advanced FPGA architecture of the Next. To coincide with this exciting news story, Saberman has done a gameplay video.

Developer dave18 shared that this new venture was born out of the technical wisdom gained from their previous port in which he states “My new project, following on from what I learned letting Astro Warrior from the SMS to the Spectrum Next, I thought I’d try my luck with Sonic.” Because the Sega Master System and the ZX Spectrum Next share architectural similarities, developers are finding innovative ways to bridge the gap between these two systems.

• Controls – Kempston Joystick in Port 1 (left port) or Keyboard Q,A,O,P,M
• On title screen Press O for Options

Links :1) Source

The post Sonic Spectrum Next – Sonic The Hedgehog comes over to the Spectrum NEXT via dave18 appeared first on Old School Gamer Magazine.

Old School Gamer: What inspired this game?

Zack Johnson: I’ve always felt like the Wild West genre was underrepresented in RPGs.  I think it’s very similar to medieval fantasy in a lot of ways: a comprehensible level of technology (guns instead of swords,) a dangerous environment (snakes and outlaws instead of dragons and brigands,) and a primal, hero-centric mythology (gunslingers instead of knights.)

Old School Gamer: What games did you play as a kid? How did they play a part in this?

Johnson: The game that was probably the most influential on West of Loathing was probably Hero’s Quest (later renamed to Quest for Glory.)  It’s an adventure game with significant RPG elements that change the way the gameplay and the story unfold.  I also played a lot of the Space Quest games, which I’m sure influenced the tone and humor of my games, and the early entries in the Might and Magic series, which were the beginning of a life-long fondness for RPGs.

Old School Gamer: What has the development process been like?

Johnson: We spent a few months working on our backend tools and data structures before we hired the engine programmer.  Developing content for this game is very data-driven, and therefore very quick and easy for the content team to do.  Likewise, we nailed down a really straightforward art pipeline early on.  At this point, we’re just busily making new content while adding new engine features as we need them.

Old School Gamer: How would you describe this game to someone who has never played it?

Johnson: It’s a hybrid adventure / role-playing game with stick figure art and a very silly tone.  It’s like Skyrim with beans and big hats.

Old School Gamer: What do you think makes this game special?

Johnson: Our writing team has been working together for 13+ years, and we’ve gotten really good at doing what we do.  If you like our sensibilities, our games are the only place you’re going to find them.

Old School Gamer: Bottom Line, why should someone play this when it’s released?

Johnson: Because it’s fun and it’s funny and in spite of its silliness and low-fi graphical style, its RPG gameplay is surprisingly deep.

Old School Gamer: What are your goals for this game?

Johnson: After more than a decade of working on the same very old MMORPG, I’m hoping to prove that our team can produce a smaller, standalone game in a more modern gameplay idiom.

Old School Gamer: What’s next?

Johnson: Well, assuming West of Loathing sells well enough to justify keeping the team together, we’d love to continue making games in the engine we’ve developed for this one.  A hypothetical second game would probably either be a Lovecraftian horror game set in the 1920s, or a Flash Gordon-like space opera.

The post Retro Interview: Zack Johnson Talks ‘West of Loathing’ appeared first on Old School Gamer Magazine.

One such game I used to love was that fantastic platformer ‘ Wonder Boy ‘ designed by Ryuichi Nishizawa. A game which started its life as a skateboarding rock jumping and axe bashing platformer, that later became the adventure platformer with RPG elements Wonderboy in Monsterland. And it’s the original Wonderboy which is getting an announcement, as thanks to the creator Benjamin Yoris@BenYoris letting us know, the classic skateboarding platformer which many of us still love to this day, is still coming to the Amstrad CPC as a much improved 128k version!

While this is still demo footage and I’m unsure when it will be released as a final version. Atleast this gives us a glimpse of this 128k remake with highly improved details, sprites, smoother scrolling, and a great soundtrack. A new new remake that is in the works by Ivan Duchauffour (GurneyH) for Code & Optimization, Benjamin Yoris (OneVision) for GFX and Game/Level Design, and the late Stéphane François (e-dredon) for music.

Links 1) Source

The post Wonder Boy Remake – A fabulous remake for the Amstrad 128k is teased again with some demo footage! appeared first on Old School Gamer Magazine.

Following the stall of an ambitious project to remake Manic Miner with enhanced graphics, titled Slick Willy, developer Bob Fossil has integrated the new assets into a playable mod that can be downloaded right now. While the original, high-performance engine overhaul by ParadigmShifter stalled in 2024, the updated, though slightly animated, sprites now offer a fresh visual experience for the classic ZX Spectrum title. To coincide with this news, you can check out the latest footage of this new graphics improvement below.

Here’s the latest from the website linked below “Two years ago I started working on the Spectrum Computing forum lively and productive discussion on the topic «Why not make a modern version Manic Miner, by redrawing the sprites properly?» Started it Gabriel Amore- who we know from a lot of cute Spectrum games: he tried throwing a miner Willie sprite in the AGD editor and shared a piece of work with forum members. Whether for a long time or for a short time, a kind of initiative group was formed under the leadership of someone ParadigmShifter, who decided not to chat, but to get down to business. Namely — remake Manic Miner from scratch, leaving the levels and gameplay intact, but redrawing the graphics, improving the animation, achieving 50 fps and so on and so forth.”

“ParadigmShifter even posted this project on GitHub and… I scored on him almost immediately. There were no more updates, but to the questions «What happened?» the comrade stopped answering, although he calmly appeared on other branches of the forum. Most likely, the person simply ran out of free time, but why he did not inform his colleagues about this after so much work had been done — is not very clear. At the beginning of 2025, another spectrumist, Bob Fossil, decided to put the redesigned graphics into action: he took the original game (more precisely, its mod with AY music during gameplay) and simply replaced a fair portion of the sprites with new ones. True, for the main character it was necessary to cut the animation — in the new version it is animated in 8 frames, and the game supports only 4. The main character began to move a little twitchy, but you can get used to it. So now you can even play Slick Willy — however, this is not the project that was originally conceived, but rather the Manic Miner mod.”

• Code and font: Paradigm Shifter
• Updated Build : Bob Fossil?
• Graphics, animation, original concept: Gabriel Amore
• Additional animations: Li Bi
• Picture for the final level: Dmitry Smolyannikov (Grongy)

Links :1) Source 

The post Slick Willy — A Manic Miner Graphic Improvement Project for the ZX Spectrum appeared first on Old School Gamer Magazine.

Welcome to Block’n’Bubble II, a direct continuation of the classic action gameplay developed by natthrafn. Originally programmed by the author and published in Germany back in 1989 via Markt & Technik Special #30, this updated iteration breathes fresh life into the retro title with enhanced features and an expanded universe. New features and upgrades include : A built-in Level Editor in which players can design, test, and share their own custom stages, two-Player Simultaneous Play, 20 new in-game levels plus 6 new level packs of 20 levels each on the included disk, and a high score table.

The narrative picks up centuries after a disastrous magical mishap. At a grand annual wizard assembly, your character’s spectacular performance accidentally infested the guild’s headquarters with dangerous creatures known as Bubble-Jumpers. Despite successfully clearing the building with the help of peers, the guild ruthlessly expelled you. Now, 1,307 years later, you have broken back into the heavily guarded sanctuary to exact your revenge by exposing the wizards’ secret realm to humanity. To stop you, the Supreme Magician has cast the same forbidden spell, flooding the chambers with treacherous bubbles. Players must clear every room of these bouncing threats to open the gates for mankind.

Links :1) Source

The post Block’n’Bubble II – An updated C64 game that seamlessly continues the action-packed gameplay of Block’n’Bubble. appeared first on Old School Gamer Magazine.

Fancy playing a new Commodore Amiga game that smacks of high quality, is fun to play, and well worth keeping an eye on as developments progress, then this game called ‘Double Baboon Ninja’ by Danlabg is just the game for you. An upcoming Arcade game in which you play as The Double Baboon Ninja’s, and must put a stop to an alien invasion terrorizing the city. To coincide with this news, Saberman has provided some footage from Version 7a which has been made available today.

Here’s the latest. “Baboon City sleeps beneath its neon glow…Until an alien invasion turns its citizens into mindless blobs. Hope remains.Two warriors emerge from the shadows. The Double Baboon Ninja strike back!”

Technical notes

• AGA chipset
• 2MB of CHIP
• 68020 with Fast RAM should be sufficient
• Supports one or two button controllers

Credits :

• Graphics & Code by Dan
• Music by Robyn
• PTplayer by Frank Wille

Links :1) Source 

The post DOUBLE BABOON NINJA – This upcoming Arcade game by Danlabg for the Amiga looks fab [Version 7a UPDATE] appeared first on Old School Gamer Magazine.

Shock!! This isn’t a JOTD Arcade to Amiga port! As I’ve found out through our Commodore Amiga Facebook group that Modern Vintage Gamer is not only still working on an Arcade to Amiga port of the top down racing game called ‘Zippy Race’, also known as MotoRace USA in the states, but as of today you can play the first alpha released to the public. A game in which the player controls a racer who must travel on a motorcycle from Los Angeles to New York City. To coincide with this news, MVG has provided a short game play video with inclusive screenshots.

Here’s the latest about the game from the website. “This is a conversion of Zippy Race – an early 1983 arcade game by Irem to the OCS Amiga. Please note, that this is a fan conversion – no reverse engineering was performed in any capacity. This is not a transcoded game and as such the entire game was written by hand to match the original arcade game as closely as possible. There will be some differences. I’ve made a public alpha test release available to get feedback. Please let me know what you think!

Features:

• – Full Zippy Race game with 500cc, 750cc and 1200cc loops
• – All stages faithfully recreated
• – Arcade Music converted to ProTracker format
• – Optimized for speed, runs at 50/60fps on any Amiga with 1Meg

As this is a fan conversion, it is being given away for free. The entire game was written in C with some assembly

Credits and Thanks as follows

• Main Programming – MVG
• Amiga Music/SFX Conversion – Estrayk
• NRV Compression Routines – Ross
• Sprite Loading – Wei Ju Wu

The post Zippy Race as an Amiga 500 port by Modern Vintage Gamer ( WIP ALPHA ) appeared first on Old School Gamer Magazine.

About Ground Zero Hero:

Featuring a vibrant hand-drawn art style inspired by The Simpsons and Rick and Morty, Ground Zero Hero challenges players to explore a post-apocalyptic wasteland as they face off against massive hordes of marauding mutants. Pummel piñatas, crunch candy, and absorb the irradiated guts of monsters to unlock new mutations and become the ultimate mutant.

Old School Gamer Magazine: How was this game born?

Rowan Edmondson: I randomly came across Vampire Survivors before it blew up, and it struck me as something I could put a cool spin on (something about 30,000 other developers also decided).  The immediate things I didn’t like about VS like the lack of animation etc were informative to what I was imagining. 

At the time, VS didn’t actually have vampires in it, so some of the core design ideas were born from “What if Vampire Survivors had vampires and survival”, hence why GZH has a day/night cycle where vampires emerge at sundown, and light survival mechanics (candy meter).

Old School Gamer Magazine:What is your role in the game?

Edmondson: I’m a 100% solo developer – I did literally everything in the game from code to animation to music. (A couple of explosion VFX I paid for but were still heavily modified)

Old School Gamer Magazine:Love the visual identity of the game. What inspired it?

Edmondson: Thanks! It’s probably obvious there’s a huge Matt Groening/Simpsons  influence with a dose of Rick and Morty weird. I don’t really have a default art style – after 15 years as a full time indie, exploring different art styles is something that keeps the process fresh and interesting – but that combination felt
like a good fit for the themes of the game.

Old School Gamer Magazine:How can gamers get their “freak out” in this game? 

Edmondson: It’s all about crafting your ultimate hideous mutant!

Old School Gamer Magazine:What has development been like?

Edmondson: GZH was started almost four years ago, and represents a three year project of effectively working 7 days a week (it takes time when you’re a pedantic perfectionist doing everything yourself). Just about any project spanning that amount of time is going to be a rollercoaster, and this certainly was. 

The different incarnations of starting as RAD Surivor and releasing as an early demo that was totally ignored. The pivot to renaming it to Ground Zero Hero and completely redoing most of the visuals. Pausing development for a year after a second project found a publisher.

Returning to GZH development after that project was cancelled. Waking up to an email from Acclaim wanting to have a call after I’d totally forgotten even pitching to them 

(pretty sure it was late at night and I was hammered when I sent a demo link) and then the subsequent process of teaming up with Acclaim and being a part of the rebirth of the legendary publisher from my childhood. So yeah, quite the rollercoaster.

Old School Gamer Magazine:What makes this game special?

Edmondson: I think genuinely special games occupy their own creative space. Games like Bioshock come to mind – the intersection of visuals and direction and game feel creating something incomparable. I’d like to think the aesthetic, music and attitude of Ground Zero Hero combine to create something pretty singular in gaming,
despite the saturation of the genre.

Old School Gamer Magazine:What games influenced this one the most?

Edmondson: Vampire Survivors and Fallout are obvious influences. But for the creative direction, Sunset Overdrive was a major influence in terms of the whole “happy apocalypse” vibe: rainbows and candy and bullshit everywhere.

Old School Gamer Magazine:Any fun stories or wild moments during development?

Edmondson: Signing with Acclaim was the most unexpected part of the whole process. When I started development there was no hint of them coming back, so landing GZH with the home publisher of some of my all time favourite games as a kid (NBA Jam, Mortal Kombat, Turok) is still kinda crazy to me.

Old School Gamer Magazine:What were the major lessons learned?

Edmondson: I would probably do a hundred things differently regarding project management in Unity. Also, the nature of the genre meant I learned A LOT about optimisation at the back end.

Old School Gamer Magazine:Do you think preserving older gameplay mechanics in new games is important?

Edmondson: Frankly, no. Of course there are time proven mechanics that will always have their place in the medium, but I don’t view the preservation of older mechanics as something important within itself. 

Old School Gamer Magazine:The marketplace is crowded. How do you think you stand out?

Edmondson: Hopefully the combination of the aesthetic and attitude elevate GZH to be seen as something fresh and fun.

Old School Gamer Magazine:How have your previous experiences in industry helped this game?

Edmondson: This is my 15th year as a full time indie, so it’s hard to concentrate all of that experience into how it manifested through the development of GZH. I would say that in the early years of bootstrapping as indie developers, we could only afford to pay an artist to make a few key assets and I’d then make the rest based on their art style.

Over the years I became fairly profficient at riffing on an existing style, so it definitely equipped me to realise an aesthetic I imagined as a mix of The Simpsons and Rick & Morty. 

Old School Gamer Magazine:How do you want this game to ultimately be remembered?

Edmondson: Ideally it’s remembered as fun, amusing nonsense with a banging soundtrack that sold 10,000,000,000 copies.

Old School Gamer Magazine:What’s next?  

Edmondson: Buy one of them gold plated houses. 

Old School Gamer Magazine:Anything else you’d like to add?

Edmondson: Socks then shoes.

The post Old School Gamer Magazine Exclusive: Inside ‘Ground Zero Hero’ appeared first on Old School Gamer Magazine.

More great news this week as looking through the itch io website, we’ve found out that LC-Games has released the latest game of RandomPac for the Commodore 64. A game that isn’t just a tribute to Pac-Man, an arcade game released by Namco in 1980. But this version of the game has procedurally generated mazes and even bonus rounds to enjoy. To coincide with this news, there’s some footage of the game that can be watched below.

Originally released in the 1980’s as an Arcade game and then ported over to other systems, Pac-Man became one of the most successful American produced games selling over 115,000 cabinets. While many different clones of Pac-Man have appeared over the years, with a large amount appearing on the ZX Spectrum. This version by LC-Games for the Commodore 64 however, is well worth a play with feedback such as “Wow Looks Great” and “Excellent game!.

Although the game was released some time ago, an update was recently made available with the following changes.

• A bug introduced in version 1.3 caused the incorrect generation of random mazes, resulting in poor variety or even repetitiveness. In any case, maze generation has been overall improved, and even symmetrical mazes are now more interesting and varied.
• You can now choose between 5 different shapes for the maze walls.
• Added attract mode.

Links :1) Source 

The post RandomPac – A great tribute to Pac-Man, an arcade game first released by Namco in 1980 [UPDATE] appeared first on Old School Gamer Magazine.