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Well, I can't let my site be the "end" of the world wide web, can I?! So for all you link junkies out there, here's a likke list of some fun places to wander over to and examine. Some of these are run by friends, others are sites I use on a regular basis and the rest are just fun things I've found wandering the web, so the mixture is... well, mixed!
PEEPS DOING NEW 8-BIT GAMES
ALEKSI EEBEN OF CNCD
Author of JohnPlayer (a C64 music editor) and some other useful C64 tools, a couple of games and some very nice music demos. But I've added this link more for his fabby unexpanded VIC20 game Dragonwing and the excellent demos - download WinVICE now and get them!
COVERT BITOPS
Lasse Öörni (aka Cadaver) is probably best known for the superb Metal Warrior series of action platform games, his other projects include BOFH - Servers Under Siege, a brutal top-down action game based on a character very close to my heart and the superb GoatTracker which is a PC-based music tracker for writing C64 tunes.
CRONOSOFT
Distributors of newly developed or at least completed 8-bit software including the fabby Rough Justice and soon my very own Reaxion and Cyberwing. Bias? moi?!
CYBERTRONIC STUDIOS
Laze Ristoski's virtual home. Laze has been responsible for some simple but cool games, an excellent tape loader (that i spent days arguing with!) and some much nice cross development tools.
FUNKSCIENTIST PRODUCTIONS
Home to a couple of slightly less than sane developers and a cute-looking frog called "Fletch" who is getting his own platform game with a developers diary at no extra cost!
GAMES THAT WEREN'T
Home of my matey Frank Gasking and a collection featuring some fantastic-looking but sadly incomplete C64 games from legendary coders. Worth a look for the playable previews of Touchlight and Deadlock, the unplayable scrolling demo of Starline or the complete version of Solar Jetman that recently surfaced.
JONATHAN CAULDWELL
Jonathan has been churning out classy Spectrum games for over ten years, the cool Rough Justice (distributed by Cronosoft) being the most recent release. His current project is the spiffy looking More Tea, Vicar? which is a horizontally scrolling shoot-em-up so that's me happy!
MERMAID AND CREATORS
The web home of Mermaid, who is presently working on the excellent-looking Abrakadabra and has screenshots and a preview on her personal site. And check out the other games under development in the Creators part of the site, the screenshots of Armageddon look incredible!
OLDSCHOOL GAMING
Plugging a site i'm involved with... but this one's worth it and i'm not the only person involved so that's okay. OSG is dedicated to reviewing recent titles and providing developer resources for classic computers.
PROTOVISION
Makers of the sexy-looking Enforcer 2 and SuperCPU specific Metal Dust, the distributors of the fab platformer Ice Guys amongst others and most recently Hockey Mania.
STEPHEN ROBERTSON
Not an active 8-bit developer but still involved in commercial games, but his "claim to fame" as far as i'm concerned is being the person who drew the fabby Warhawk loading picture (amongst many others!) on the C64.
SUICYCO INDUSTRIES
Dan Gillgrass may not realise this, but one day he is going to write a C64 game. It has been decreed, it is fate, he'd better get on with it really...!
TROOPER
Long-time friend Trooper (or Paul, as his parents insist on referring to him) got in touch via ICQ a couple of years ago. He's decided that the world of C64 game coding is for him and we're just waiting for the psychiatrist's report...!
SITES ABOUT SPECIFIC ONGOING 8-BIT GAMES
BOINXX (ATARI 8-BIT)
A blog site owned by Heaven that documents the making of his game Boinxx on the Atari. Cool!
IK+ (ATARI 8-BIT)
An ongoing attempt to put Archer Mclean's classic C64 and 16bit fighting game onto the Atari and it's starting to look very solid now.
PINBALL DREAMS (C64)
This is an ongoing conversion of the classic Amiga pinball game that essentially defined how they were done from then onwards being wedged into a C64...! WVL is currently posting updates to the CSDb message boards rather than directly to the site and the latest preview looks bloody awesome! (and i've drawn one of the tables!)
ROBOTFINDSKITTEN (VARIOUS FORMATS)
A site dedicated to one of the most surreal games ever to pass this way, robotfindskitten is described as a "Zen simulation" and, if you play it on one of the many formats it's been or indeed being ported to, you'll probably understand why! "Finding kitten since 1997."
SPACE HARRIER (ATARI 8-BIT)
Sheddy is presently in the middle of converting the Sega classic Space Harrier to the Atari 130XE and upwards, the playable preview and video footage look great (and it has the bonus stage, unlike the C64 version!)
YIE AR KUNG FU (ATARI 8-BIT)
A conversion of the arcade classic to the Atari 8-bit series, based mainly on the C64 version and looking more than a little spiffy so far.
GOOD 8-BIT EMULATION SOFTWARE FOR WINDOWS
ATARI 800 WIN PLUS
A popular and pretty close to accurate Atari XL and XE series emulator.
CCS64
One of the two most popular and, for the moment at least, the second most accurate C64 emulator available. Version 3 is a little unstable, but version 2 works on just about anything from a Pentium 2 onwards.
VICE
VICE is the Versatile Commodore Emulator; not only is it the most accurate C64 emu going there are also VIC20, 264 series, PET and CBM series emulators included. The VICE project also covers several platforms rather than just PC.
YAPE
Yet Another Plus/4 Emulator. Except that it's not just "yet another", since it's the most accurate emulation of the 264 series hardware available right now.
GOOD CROSS DEVELOPMENT TOOLS FOR WINDOWS
C64ASM
C64 (and other Commodore 8-bits) cross assembler for DOS that uses Turbo Assembler source formats.
CRIMSON EDITOR
An excellent text editor, brutal for cross assembly, chock full of useful features and very configurable but still uncluttered, fast and reliable.
DASM
Although i don't recommend this one personally, i do use it for 2600 code. It's a multi-format and multi-processor cross assembler for DOS.
MAGICKIT
A useful set of development tools including NESAsm, a decent DOS-based cross assembler for the Nintendo Entertainment System.
PUCRUNCH
Combined data and file compressor for DOS, can crunch a large memory range and outputs for just about any Commodore 8-bit.
STAR COMMANDER
The original and (to my mind) best C64 disk image editing and transfer tool, as well as a useful hex editor.
XASM
Decent DOS-based cross assembler for the entire Atari 8-bit computer range that outputs XEX files
NEWS SOURCES AND FORUMS ABOUT 8-BITS
ATARI AGE
A vast reference and community about just about everything Atari from the classic 2600 up to the later hardware.
C64 SCENE PORTAL
The best open news site for the C64; as well as keeping a running list of all forthcoming parties and the latest releases, the Scene Portal also has an open news service, articles on the C64 and generally keeps a tab on the entire active scene.
C64 SCENE DATABASE
A huge archive of demos, cracks and games produced by that nebulous thing, the C64 scene (not to be confused with the C64 community, guv).
PLUS/4 WORLD
A large archive of Plus/4 games on the net (featuring screenshots, cover artwork, docs and reviews) as well as an online community.
WORLD OF SPECTRUM
A close to definitive archive of Spectrum games on the net (featuring screenshots, cover artwork, docs and reviews) as well as an online community.
PLACES THAT MAKE NICE 8-BIT-RELATED NOISES
GAMING FM
No less than four streams, three for classic console, current console and PC and the fourth is all the others in one place.
HIGH VOLTAGE SID COLLECTION
A truly vast collection of C64 tunes, all ripped and converted to SID for use with tools like SIDPlay 2.
KOHINA RADIO
A mixture of 8-bit and 16bit game and demo tunes.
REMIX 64
Online home of the Commodore 64 remixing community, with forums and editorials from the remixers themselves.
R:K:O
Pretty much the definitive collection of Commodore 64 remixes available for download in handy MP3 format.
SLAY RADIO
Webcasting radio station that pumps out nothing but Commodore 64 remixes. How can y'go wrong with that?!
PEEPS WHAT I USED TO WORK WITH
BRIAN BOYTON (AND FAMILY)
Back when i lived in Kent, i worked in Computerworld and Brian was my boss (the site's under construction).
MICHAEL HUBBARD
Michael's personal site (see O.M.H. as well) containing pictures and stuff.
O.M.H.
The "front end" of the OMH network of sites; reviewing films, food and music.
ROBERT ROBERTSON
ASP guru and a dab hand with a power drill an' all...
TARSUS MARTEX
The old employers, I did a few odds and ends on this site...
OTHER ODDS AND ENDS
ALTER EGO
A web-based version of Activision's excellent C64 title Alter Ego containing both genders in one; play through an entire life from birth to death as yourself or someone you'd like to be. One word of warning; it's very addictive and takes time to play!
B3TA
Probably one of the scariest sites on this list and I honestly can't describe it; just have a look at the animations, join the mailing list and don't worry about your sanity too much, okay?
THE DARWIN AWARDS
The Darwin Awards honor those who improve our gene pool by removing themselves from it. In other words, a catalogue of some of the stupidest ways to get yourself killed or at the very least getting damned close.
DAVE GORMAN
This man is hysterically funny, check out the Googlewhack Adventure DVD especially because it's almost painful to watch!
DILBERT
Scott Adams' near-legendary exploits of one oppressed cubicle dweller and the assortment of people (and animals) he lives and works with.
DMA DESIGN
An attempt to catalogue the history of one of the U.K.'s most influencial game developers by insiders Mike Dailly and Steve Hammond. For the few who don't know, DMA were responsible for Lemmings.
ENGRISH.COM
A record of Japanese corruptions of English, including some almost poetic works found on hi-fi equipment boxes and restaurants...
GENERAL PROTECTION FAULT
The latest addition to my regular rounds of web comic reading; GPF is sort of like User Friendly on better narcotics, it manages to be funny, ridiculous and sometimes fairly serious...
GOD FUCKING DAMNIT!
Pissed off? Wish you could run over your landlord with a semi? Did your computer crash 30 seconds away from saving your masterpiece? Girlfriend leave you for a circus midget? The GFD regulars feel your pain so why not wander over and tell them all about it?
MEGATOKYO
An ongoing Manga-style web comic featuring Piro, a sensitive, caring guy who is somehow teamed up with a beer swilling l33t-speaker called Largo and a small fairy-esque conscience with a mini iBook called Seraphim.
MUSEUM OF HOAXES
A collection of April Fools jokes, edited photos and sundry other pranks and hoaxes all lovingly documented and sorted by category.
NUKLEAR POWER
Home of the very funny if slightly surreal 8-bit Theater, an attempt to tell a story using ripped game graphics...!
THE REGISTER
The wonderfully sarcastic, sometimes incredibly incisive, well written and above all cynical I.T. news site. Check out Simon Travaglia's Bastard Operator From Hell especially!
SHMUPS
A site dedicated to my favourite gaming genre, the shoot-em-up. Shmups covers most of the major formats from the C64 to PS2 and features reviews of a lot of excellent titles.
SOMETHING AWFUL
A site dedicated to... well, stuff that is awful. Along with a link of the day that rips to shreds some of the poorer efforts online, there's the very silly Photoshop Phriday containing a collection of parodies and twisted jokes supplied by the forum goons, reviews of awful hentai games and bad movies or the Weekend Web just to start with!
TEMPLE OV THEE LEMUR
A collection of oddities (rather like this site but more broad, really!) including the world's most useless e-currency, Gothic Guess Who, the Visible Mars Bar project and the fab I.T. Phonebox Cards. Oh, and they "invented" the Potato-Powered Webserver that fooled a lot of boffins, too!
WEEBL AND BOB
The everyday happenings of Weebl and sometimes Weebl's friend Bob - a tale of two eggs, lots of pie, an ensemble cast of Ninja pirates, DJ bulls and monkeys that defecate wherever they go. To music.
WIL WHEATON DOT NET
Okay, I don't normally recommend celeb sites and I'm a casual viewer of 'Trek, but I rather like this celeb-built site; the artist formerly known as Wesley manages to come across as a nice guy to just about every faction going, possibly even the whiney ST:TNG fans who hated his character!
YAK YAK
A message board for fans of Jeff "Yak" Minter and his works, inhabited by the man himself and a mixture of interesting folk who are both friends and fans at the same time.
Links are hopefully going to be added at slightly more regular intervals now that the whole site is being migrated over to PHP, so if you'd like to see your name up in pixels, email me and I'll 'ave a think about it!
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