1
00:00:02,000 --> 00:00:07,000
Downloaded from
YTS.MX

2
00:00:08,000 --> 00:00:13,000
Official YIFY movies site:
YTS.MX

3
00:00:12,895 --> 00:00:15,035
Our object is to find people's real needs

4
00:00:15,175 --> 00:00:18,355
to develop products which have real benefit to people

5
00:00:18,975 --> 00:00:20,075
in whatever way.

6
00:00:20,295 --> 00:00:23,035
And to do that at a price that they can afford to do

7
00:00:23,035 --> 00:00:25,075
for Tempe, what anyone can do for a pound.

8
00:00:27,815 --> 00:00:29,675
My father was always thinking about the next

9
00:00:29,675 --> 00:00:31,555
invention, new ideas.

10
00:00:32,025 --> 00:00:34,075
They were pretty much constantly in his mind

11
00:00:34,135 --> 00:00:36,875
and always tinkering with the next big thing.

12
00:00:38,135 --> 00:00:40,075
He played poker and cards a little bit,

13
00:00:40,175 --> 00:00:43,075
but um, didn't have much hobbies outside

14
00:00:43,095 --> 00:00:44,915
of the inventing and the designing.

15
00:00:44,915 --> 00:00:46,995
So, uh, that was where his heart was. I think

16
00:00:46,995 --> 00:00:49,675
What drove Clive professionally was he's an ideas person,

17
00:00:49,735 --> 00:00:51,515
so he wanted to come up with something completely new

18
00:00:51,625 --> 00:00:54,355
that everybody would adopt, often price-based.

19
00:00:54,375 --> 00:00:56,075
So what really interested him was to come up

20
00:00:56,075 --> 00:00:57,595
with something really low price point

21
00:00:57,655 --> 00:00:59,395
and with really clever engineering.

22
00:00:59,735 --> 00:01:01,035
That's really what his goal was.

23
00:01:01,035 --> 00:01:03,475
To have a product that everybody wanted and everybody needed

24
00:02:08,235 --> 00:02:08,915
A precious,

25
00:02:29,635 --> 00:02:30,275
a precious,

26
00:02:43,505 --> 00:02:44,435
it's a precious

27
00:03:18,775 --> 00:03:20,455
Clive Sinclair we knew about

28
00:03:20,455 --> 00:03:21,815
because he would be on the news.

29
00:03:22,235 --> 00:03:25,375
You knew who he was, some great British inventor,

30
00:03:25,515 --> 00:03:26,575
but I don't think we sort

31
00:03:26,575 --> 00:03:28,655
of realized at the time the significance of

32
00:03:28,655 --> 00:03:31,775
what he was innovating in and what it would lead to.

33
00:03:32,115 --> 00:03:34,855
One of the strengths of Clive was that he was newsworthy.

34
00:03:35,075 --> 00:03:37,615
He could capture a lot of Colin inches.

35
00:03:37,675 --> 00:03:40,055
He was a personality, he was a bit of a maverick.

36
00:03:40,055 --> 00:03:42,175
People wanted to know what was he gonna say,

37
00:03:42,205 --> 00:03:43,255
what was he gonna do next?

38
00:03:43,435 --> 00:03:46,055
And people interviewed him, people wrote about him.

39
00:03:46,115 --> 00:03:47,575
And by attracting

40
00:03:47,575 --> 00:03:50,335
and absorbing that interest, of course he brought business

41
00:03:50,395 --> 00:03:51,575
to Sinclair Research.

42
00:03:51,795 --> 00:03:53,895
He sold the products through his own persona.

43
00:03:54,145 --> 00:03:56,575
Clive started in journalism, so he would write

44
00:03:56,595 --> 00:03:58,775
for practical electronics or practical wireless.

45
00:03:59,115 --> 00:04:01,015
And one of the first products he did

46
00:04:01,015 --> 00:04:02,335
was actually called the Micro Midget.

47
00:04:02,335 --> 00:04:04,815
That was like 1958, which was a predecessor

48
00:04:04,815 --> 00:04:06,335
to the Micro Matic, but it was a similar thing.

49
00:04:06,335 --> 00:04:07,335
It was a matchbox size radio

50
00:04:07,795 --> 00:04:09,815
and it took him a while to commercialize.

51
00:04:09,815 --> 00:04:12,935
But, um, this product was hugely successful by mail order.

52
00:04:13,395 --> 00:04:16,815
PLA always had a very strong preference for mail order.

53
00:04:16,945 --> 00:04:19,615
There isn't a lot of inventory sitting out there,

54
00:04:20,235 --> 00:04:22,615
and if you can advertise very effectively,

55
00:04:23,115 --> 00:04:25,535
you are giving up less of your profit margin than

56
00:04:25,535 --> 00:04:26,655
you are to a retailer.

57
00:04:27,405 --> 00:04:29,935
Part of the reason why this was so low cost was

58
00:04:29,935 --> 00:04:32,775
because he found out that transistors that were thrown away

59
00:04:32,895 --> 00:04:34,215
as rejects, you could test them

60
00:04:34,215 --> 00:04:36,135
and they're actually good enough to use in a radio.

61
00:04:36,235 --> 00:04:38,015
So he'd buy these transistors for next to nothing,

62
00:04:38,555 --> 00:04:40,735
And then hobbyists could buy those

63
00:04:40,875 --> 00:04:42,335
and you'd buy them by the thousand

64
00:04:42,335 --> 00:04:45,175
or something, separate them into little bags, test them,

65
00:04:45,195 --> 00:04:47,695
and then sell 'em as tested components.

66
00:04:48,135 --> 00:04:50,455
I think the strategy was to make things were small,

67
00:04:50,965 --> 00:04:53,655
make things that were appealing to an audience

68
00:04:53,655 --> 00:04:54,815
that we already knew,

69
00:04:55,435 --> 00:04:58,895
and make them have better margins built into them.

70
00:04:59,235 --> 00:05:00,295
So you had to make them

71
00:05:00,845 --> 00:05:03,015
with cheaper components if you could find them

72
00:05:03,115 --> 00:05:05,575
and make them in ways that would be easier

73
00:05:05,755 --> 00:05:06,855
for them to put together.

74
00:05:06,995 --> 00:05:09,655
So we didn't have too much to spend on repairing.

75
00:05:10,155 --> 00:05:12,495
So Clive used to do mail order amplifiers.

76
00:05:12,875 --> 00:05:15,375
So if you wanted to build a set a PA system in the,

77
00:05:15,375 --> 00:05:17,655
in the sixties, you could buy one of these electronics kits,

78
00:05:17,835 --> 00:05:19,615
get some speakers, and you've got a PA system.

79
00:05:19,715 --> 00:05:22,935
And one of his early customers, in fact was Alan Sugar.

80
00:05:22,935 --> 00:05:24,895
So Alan Sugar used to turn up at the Sinclair office,

81
00:05:24,915 --> 00:05:27,295
he would buy all the reject amplifiers, repair them,

82
00:05:27,365 --> 00:05:28,775
then sell 'em on the market stall.

83
00:05:28,875 --> 00:05:30,295
And that was quite something

84
00:05:30,295 --> 00:05:33,015
because obviously Alan Sugar did his own range

85
00:05:33,015 --> 00:05:34,375
of stacking Hi-Fi,

86
00:05:34,395 --> 00:05:35,575
and then obviously Amstrad

87
00:05:35,575 --> 00:05:36,815
became a competitor against Sinclair.

88
00:05:36,815 --> 00:05:37,815
Later on,

89
00:05:38,885 --> 00:05:42,215
When I first met Clive, it was obvious immediately

90
00:05:42,215 --> 00:05:44,815
that he was an incredibly bright guy.

91
00:05:45,385 --> 00:05:49,535
Clive always read an enormous amount of technical journals

92
00:05:49,535 --> 00:05:53,015
so he knew what was going on in numerous fields

93
00:05:53,155 --> 00:05:55,255
of electronics, display technology,

94
00:05:55,315 --> 00:05:57,325
semiconductors, et cetera, et cetera.

95
00:05:57,705 --> 00:06:01,045
All the technical stuff. He would read the the literature

96
00:06:01,105 --> 00:06:02,765
and could pick it up very quickly.

97
00:06:03,305 --> 00:06:07,245
But his bookcase at home was heaving with techie stuff.

98
00:06:07,365 --> 00:06:10,245
I know when he designed the square eel, which was one of the

99
00:06:10,805 --> 00:06:13,325
satellite dishes, he had a book on the kitchen table,

100
00:06:13,835 --> 00:06:18,445
four inches thick, something like, uh, the theory of

101
00:06:18,585 --> 00:06:20,285
of satellite dish design.

102
00:06:20,985 --> 00:06:25,005
And, you know, he could read that style of book like a novel

103
00:06:25,235 --> 00:06:28,085
Live Sinclair started his own company in the 1960s

104
00:06:28,625 --> 00:06:31,365
and his first breakthrough was the small pocket calculator

105
00:06:31,425 --> 00:06:32,805
in 1972.

106
00:06:33,185 --> 00:06:38,085
The executive calculator builders the world's slimmest

107
00:06:38,645 --> 00:06:40,605
lightest calculator.

108
00:06:41,195 --> 00:06:42,605
It's a really, really nice design

109
00:06:42,705 --> 00:06:44,365
and it's got this really clever way

110
00:06:44,505 --> 00:06:46,725
of just recessing these little round buttons

111
00:06:46,725 --> 00:06:48,885
inside a square recess there to give the feel

112
00:06:48,885 --> 00:06:50,125
that the buttons are bigger than they are.

113
00:06:50,225 --> 00:06:51,885
But actually the moving part is only

114
00:06:51,905 --> 00:06:53,205
the, the round bit in the middle.

115
00:06:53,385 --> 00:06:54,765
And it sold incredibly well

116
00:06:54,995 --> 00:06:56,445
From an engineering point of view.

117
00:06:56,445 --> 00:06:59,165
It was very interesting because they had to turn it on

118
00:06:59,185 --> 00:07:01,045
and off with a certain frequency

119
00:07:01,265 --> 00:07:02,485
and that would allow you

120
00:07:02,485 --> 00:07:04,965
to use it just operating from batteries

121
00:07:04,965 --> 00:07:06,645
and not, uh, power supply. You

122
00:07:06,645 --> 00:07:08,165
Were talking about calculators that sat on your desk

123
00:07:08,165 --> 00:07:09,325
plugged into the mains.

124
00:07:09,585 --> 00:07:11,245
So these things were quite big

125
00:07:11,505 --> 00:07:14,165
to have the pocket calculator like this one

126
00:07:14,345 --> 00:07:17,165
and such a thin pocket calculator of

127
00:07:17,165 --> 00:07:18,885
that other calculators at the time

128
00:07:18,955 --> 00:07:20,725
that would come out later were much deeper.

129
00:07:20,865 --> 00:07:22,285
You know, this was a, a real triumph.

130
00:07:25,085 --> 00:07:27,325
I think that if you had told Clive

131
00:07:27,435 --> 00:07:31,365
that all he could ever do was build calculators,

132
00:07:32,205 --> 00:07:36,045
albeit more advanced calculators, the thought of

133
00:07:36,045 --> 00:07:39,165
that would've been too terrifyingly boring to him.

134
00:07:39,465 --> 00:07:42,045
He was very interested in display technology.

135
00:07:42,515 --> 00:07:46,565
He'd had a small TV previously in the late sixties

136
00:07:46,715 --> 00:07:49,005
that had not been a commercial success.

137
00:07:49,545 --> 00:07:53,325
He had ideas about semiconductors, about televisions,

138
00:07:53,325 --> 00:07:54,805
about electric vehicles.

139
00:07:55,025 --> 00:07:59,245
So Clive was thinking about those things years, years ahead

140
00:07:59,785 --> 00:08:02,165
and was always anxious to take whatever

141
00:08:03,115 --> 00:08:06,045
financial success he had in any one area

142
00:08:06,545 --> 00:08:11,525
and start investing in his next projects.

143
00:08:13,955 --> 00:08:16,045
This is the newest way to tell the time

144
00:08:16,745 --> 00:08:20,005
the Black Watch developed in Britain by Sinclair.

145
00:08:20,665 --> 00:08:24,565
Its electronic, its moving parts digital

146
00:08:25,225 --> 00:08:29,005
to tell you the time precisely and quartz controlled.

147
00:08:29,105 --> 00:08:31,325
So you are sure that time is right. In

148
00:08:31,325 --> 00:08:33,005
Fact, well, the Black Watch had some issues

149
00:08:33,005 --> 00:08:34,605
with chip shortage problems at first.

150
00:08:34,665 --> 00:08:36,885
One of the suppliers pulled out, uh, which caused lots

151
00:08:36,885 --> 00:08:39,885
of issues, but also the very first black watch is if you

152
00:08:39,885 --> 00:08:41,605
went in there was static, it would reset the time

153
00:08:41,605 --> 00:08:42,645
and that was a major issue.

154
00:08:42,755 --> 00:08:44,005
Very unfortunate for Sinclair

155
00:08:44,085 --> 00:08:47,125
because they sold a huge amount and got a huge amount back.

156
00:08:47,305 --> 00:08:50,085
The black watch very easily got zapped

157
00:08:50,145 --> 00:08:51,605
by static electricity.

158
00:08:52,545 --> 00:08:55,725
So if you had too much nylon in your carpet, your watch

159
00:08:56,245 --> 00:08:59,205
suddenly would be, you know, not reading the correct time

160
00:08:59,385 --> 00:09:00,405
or any time at all.

161
00:09:00,405 --> 00:09:01,765
It is zero zero out.

162
00:09:02,245 --> 00:09:04,965
I think even getting too close to a television

163
00:09:04,965 --> 00:09:06,485
with the black watch could be a problem.

164
00:09:06,635 --> 00:09:08,325
There's a problem they fixed quite soon,

165
00:09:08,505 --> 00:09:10,565
but it caused major issues for the business.

166
00:09:11,245 --> 00:09:13,205
A design modification was made,

167
00:09:13,325 --> 00:09:15,645
which involved putting some sort of shield

168
00:09:16,465 --> 00:09:18,125
inside the plastic case.

169
00:09:18,385 --> 00:09:21,365
And this made it very, very difficult to assemble

170
00:09:21,365 --> 00:09:24,765
because the case had not been designed to have room

171
00:09:24,825 --> 00:09:26,845
for a a shield inside it.

172
00:09:27,025 --> 00:09:28,805
But again, when sold in kit form,

173
00:09:28,805 --> 00:09:30,725
that became the buyer's problem.

174
00:09:30,835 --> 00:09:33,245
That wasn't a Sinclair problem any longer.

175
00:09:33,505 --> 00:09:35,645
It was a story where somebody sent back a black watch

176
00:09:35,645 --> 00:09:37,485
and the song was, came with a letter that said,

177
00:09:37,485 --> 00:09:38,805
we've solved the problem on the black watch

178
00:09:39,225 --> 00:09:41,725
and had a great nail hammered straight through the

179
00:09:41,725 --> 00:09:42,725
Thing. I mean, I laugh

180
00:09:42,725 --> 00:09:44,805
about it and I don't feel guilty about it

181
00:09:44,805 --> 00:09:47,685
because I know from having talked to many, many people

182
00:09:48,315 --> 00:09:51,485
over the years who say, oh yeah, I I've still got one

183
00:09:51,485 --> 00:09:54,565
of your black watches waiting for me to finish work on.

184
00:09:55,365 --> 00:09:56,805
I know that they enjoyed it.

185
00:09:57,065 --> 00:09:58,845
If it was too easy to put together,

186
00:09:58,865 --> 00:10:01,405
they'd have got no satisfaction out of it at all.

187
00:10:01,705 --> 00:10:03,445
So the actual people were sort

188
00:10:03,445 --> 00:10:04,725
of happy putting them together themselves,

189
00:10:04,745 --> 00:10:06,725
but it was right at the end of Sinclair Radionics

190
00:10:06,725 --> 00:10:08,445
and they did have a lot of problems financially.

191
00:10:08,635 --> 00:10:11,365
That was when cl thinking about doing computers quite early

192
00:10:11,365 --> 00:10:13,725
on in the seventies, he decided if he was gonna do

193
00:10:13,725 --> 00:10:15,365
something, the next big thing it needs to be on,

194
00:10:15,465 --> 00:10:18,085
on a completely another level being the XX 80.

195
00:10:18,745 --> 00:10:22,205
So the Mark 14 I think was a sort of almost stopgap product

196
00:10:22,265 --> 00:10:23,525
to get a bit of turnover in.

197
00:10:23,625 --> 00:10:25,205
And there was a couple of other products around at

198
00:10:25,205 --> 00:10:27,165
that time, like the risk calculator watch again,

199
00:10:27,165 --> 00:10:29,285
it was a sort of quickly hashed together product

200
00:10:29,305 --> 00:10:31,325
to get some turnover in with

201
00:10:31,325 --> 00:10:33,485
what re limited resources they had at the time.

202
00:10:33,785 --> 00:10:36,205
But really what client had been planning for years is

203
00:10:36,205 --> 00:10:38,005
to do a, a low cost home computer,

204
00:10:38,325 --> 00:10:40,205
a very slick design, local cost home computer.

205
00:10:40,625 --> 00:10:41,965
And he'd been talking about it for some time.

206
00:10:42,465 --> 00:10:44,005
So back in the middle of the seventies,

207
00:10:44,005 --> 00:10:45,525
we didn't have computers at home,

208
00:10:46,025 --> 00:10:49,285
so Apple was doing their first things in us.

209
00:10:49,795 --> 00:10:52,325
Commodore Atari in Europe.

210
00:10:52,455 --> 00:10:55,245
Clive Sinclair realized he could, uh, try to,

211
00:10:55,425 --> 00:10:57,565
to do something in that field also.

212
00:10:57,835 --> 00:10:59,845
Well, it was a new market which was dominated

213
00:10:59,845 --> 00:11:02,525
by the Americans and where

214
00:11:03,915 --> 00:11:06,965
clearly if the cost could be reduced substantially,

215
00:11:07,425 --> 00:11:08,925
the the market could be expanded.

216
00:11:09,385 --> 00:11:12,965
It seemed to me that the prices then being charged were such

217
00:11:12,965 --> 00:11:16,525
that the appeal was the sales were going more

218
00:11:16,525 --> 00:11:18,565
to the small businessmen than to the,

219
00:11:19,185 --> 00:11:20,325
the man in the, in the home.

220
00:11:20,435 --> 00:11:22,365
They had been designed origin of the man in the home,

221
00:11:22,465 --> 00:11:24,485
but small businesses were proving the biggest market

222
00:11:24,885 --> 00:11:26,845
'cause they're really just too expensive for personal use.

223
00:11:27,625 --> 00:11:29,805
So I set about seeing if there was some way

224
00:11:29,805 --> 00:11:31,045
of really bringing the cost down

225
00:11:31,105 --> 00:11:33,405
by a major factor, and that's what we achieved.

226
00:11:33,425 --> 00:11:34,425
Of course,

227
00:11:41,345 --> 00:11:45,525
Let me tell you about the most exciting ad

228
00:11:46,265 --> 00:11:48,845
that's ever been printed anywhere in the history

229
00:11:48,845 --> 00:11:50,205
of the universe was

230
00:11:50,205 --> 00:11:53,965
that 39 pounds single board computer.

231
00:11:54,265 --> 00:11:57,845
And it was just like suddenly there was something that was

232
00:11:58,355 --> 00:12:00,405
like potentially within my budget.

233
00:12:01,025 --> 00:12:04,205
And as it happened, you know, it was a full six months

234
00:12:04,775 --> 00:12:07,525
after ordering it, before I actually had it in my hands.

235
00:12:08,185 --> 00:12:11,045
But this is Sinclair in a nutshell, wasn't he, uh,

236
00:12:12,005 --> 00:12:13,365
bringing us to the future early?

237
00:12:13,795 --> 00:12:17,085
Because there was this amazing chip

238
00:12:17,115 --> 00:12:20,365
that we used in the MK 14 that we knew that there was

239
00:12:20,885 --> 00:12:22,605
a greater level of interest in that

240
00:12:22,605 --> 00:12:24,125
because it was called a computer.

241
00:12:24,655 --> 00:12:27,125
Clive had a good idea of what was going on with some

242
00:12:27,125 --> 00:12:29,285
of those early computers,

243
00:12:29,585 --> 00:12:32,525
but basically his method of competing was

244
00:12:32,545 --> 00:12:34,885
to steer away from them, never

245
00:12:35,145 --> 00:12:37,125
to go head on against somebody.

246
00:12:37,825 --> 00:12:40,605
So his goal had been, well, I'm just gonna make something

247
00:12:41,265 --> 00:12:43,965
way smaller, way less expensive,

248
00:12:44,105 --> 00:12:47,245
and um, affordable to a much bigger mass market.

249
00:12:48,005 --> 00:12:49,845
I knew what computers were, I didn't understand

250
00:12:49,865 --> 00:12:52,645
how they worked, but there was something about

251
00:12:52,645 --> 00:12:53,685
them that I knew I wanted.

252
00:12:53,925 --> 00:12:55,965
I knew they could make decisions for you

253
00:12:56,705 --> 00:12:58,365
and that fascinated me.

254
00:12:58,745 --> 00:13:01,125
But how it was done wasn't clear to me

255
00:13:01,185 --> 00:13:02,565
how you would program a computer

256
00:13:02,665 --> 00:13:07,205
and that I didn't figure that out until I had an MK 14.

257
00:13:07,755 --> 00:13:09,245
That, that was my moment

258
00:13:09,305 --> 00:13:13,165
of enlightenment was following the manual for the MK 14,

259
00:13:13,435 --> 00:13:15,885
getting numbers to go in and stay in.

260
00:13:16,115 --> 00:13:18,245
Okay, that was the first part of it.

261
00:13:18,265 --> 00:13:19,965
And then discovering

262
00:13:19,965 --> 00:13:22,565
that those numbers could represent decision points.

263
00:13:22,835 --> 00:13:25,085
It's a very rudimentary design.

264
00:13:25,465 --> 00:13:27,645
So you've got this little display here,

265
00:13:27,735 --> 00:13:30,885
which is actually the same display as used in calculators.

266
00:13:31,345 --> 00:13:32,645
So that's where that comes from.

267
00:13:32,905 --> 00:13:34,405
And you have these little bubbles

268
00:13:34,405 --> 00:13:36,245
that go over the, the segments there.

269
00:13:36,265 --> 00:13:37,765
So they look bigger than they really are.

270
00:13:38,065 --> 00:13:39,845
The little magnifying glasses on each one.

271
00:13:39,845 --> 00:13:42,645
Little tiny touch keyboard, nice and cheap there.

272
00:13:42,745 --> 00:13:44,485
And it's based around this chip here,

273
00:13:44,485 --> 00:13:47,485
which is colloquially known as the scam chip, SEMP.

274
00:13:47,545 --> 00:13:48,885
And if you wanna program this thing,

275
00:13:48,945 --> 00:13:50,565
you're programming in machine code.

276
00:13:50,905 --> 00:13:54,085
So you were typing in hex codes here for the op codes

277
00:13:54,225 --> 00:13:55,245
and you only had

278
00:13:55,245 --> 00:13:57,965
that little tiny LED display there to get the results back.

279
00:13:58,265 --> 00:14:01,365
You got involved in the assembly process

280
00:14:01,665 --> 00:14:03,885
and you've got a much more intimate connection

281
00:14:03,885 --> 00:14:06,485
with the product that eventually arose from it.

282
00:14:06,925 --> 00:14:08,565
MK 14 was a, uh,

283
00:14:08,685 --> 00:14:11,125
a build it yourself fun thing with a difference.

284
00:16:06,725 --> 00:16:08,385
So I was born in 1969.

285
00:16:08,935 --> 00:16:13,225
What you without face, you look so young. Yeah, 1969.

286
00:16:13,725 --> 00:16:17,065
So I was like 1110 in 79

287
00:16:17,695 --> 00:16:20,065
when things like the Atari 2,600 were dropping

288
00:16:20,205 --> 00:16:21,345
and what we now consider

289
00:16:21,345 --> 00:16:24,065
to be the modern video gaming age was starting.

290
00:16:24,285 --> 00:16:27,305
And what you've gotta remember is this was completely new.

291
00:16:27,585 --> 00:16:29,465
I sort of envy my kids 'cause of their youth

292
00:16:29,805 --> 00:16:32,065
and the standard of the video games, the quality of

293
00:16:32,065 --> 00:16:34,825
what they get to experience now and the ease of multiplay

294
00:16:34,825 --> 00:16:36,665
and organizing your friends and all joining up

295
00:16:36,665 --> 00:16:38,265
and running around these incredible worlds.

296
00:16:38,325 --> 00:16:40,665
But I wouldn't change it for what we had,

297
00:16:40,665 --> 00:16:43,065
which was a perspective of no video games.

298
00:16:43,645 --> 00:16:46,105
And then that extraordinary change happening

299
00:16:46,105 --> 00:16:47,145
because it was just

300
00:16:47,725 --> 00:16:50,825
Insane, ho ho, ho. It's

301
00:16:50,955 --> 00:16:51,955
Magic.

302
00:16:52,925 --> 00:16:53,545
You know,

303
00:16:59,815 --> 00:17:00,985
it's magic.

304
00:17:05,475 --> 00:17:07,305
Never believe it's

305
00:17:12,555 --> 00:17:13,555
Never been away.

306
00:17:14,835 --> 00:17:19,505
Never seen A day winning on my pillow in the

307
00:17:19,775 --> 00:17:23,425
Morning, lazy day in bed.

308
00:17:24,435 --> 00:17:25,865
Music in my head.

309
00:17:26,715 --> 00:17:29,025
Crazy music playing in the

310
00:17:29,055 --> 00:17:30,055
Morning.

311
00:17:33,965 --> 00:17:38,585
Oh it's magic. You know,

312
00:17:57,745 --> 00:18:00,885
The 1970s was so analog in so many ways.

313
00:18:01,305 --> 00:18:02,445
It was so real.

314
00:18:02,545 --> 00:18:06,125
You know, g plan furniture and like very simple food.

315
00:18:06,545 --> 00:18:08,845
If your town had a cappuccino bar,

316
00:18:09,025 --> 00:18:10,445
it was like living on the Riviera.

317
00:18:10,545 --> 00:18:14,405
It was so unusual. From that came the kind of neon,

318
00:18:14,575 --> 00:18:18,165
crazy multicolored world of eighties and computer gaming.

319
00:18:18,585 --> 00:18:20,645
It, it's like being smacked in the face

320
00:18:20,705 --> 00:18:22,165
by the tango character.

321
00:18:22,165 --> 00:18:25,045
It's like, it was so vivid, multicolored

322
00:18:25,065 --> 00:18:28,045
and extraordinary both in terms of the features

323
00:18:28,045 --> 00:18:29,405
that the new world

324
00:18:29,405 --> 00:18:31,725
of consumer electronics were suddenly delivering

325
00:18:32,265 --> 00:18:33,325
in place of what?

326
00:18:33,325 --> 00:18:35,405
Nothing. It was it, it was like new

327
00:18:35,745 --> 00:18:37,045
but also the design,

328
00:18:37,065 --> 00:18:38,685
the product design that we were getting.

329
00:18:38,825 --> 00:18:41,885
So my first memory of owning, not just seeing

330
00:18:41,885 --> 00:18:44,205
but owning a personal computer was a ZX 80.

331
00:18:44,345 --> 00:18:46,685
And I bought option number two, the cheaper version

332
00:18:46,785 --> 00:18:49,605
or other than my dad did, which was a bag of parts

333
00:18:49,665 --> 00:18:51,205
and I assembled it with my dad.

334
00:18:52,795 --> 00:18:54,525
They needed to have a computer that was going

335
00:18:54,525 --> 00:18:56,005
to appeal to the masses.

336
00:18:56,225 --> 00:18:58,605
The X 80 is that step towards

337
00:18:58,995 --> 00:19:00,485
what would later to be the X 81,

338
00:19:00,985 --> 00:19:01,985
ZX 80. I remember

339
00:19:01,985 --> 00:19:05,005
by that stage he'd left Sinclair Radio ons

340
00:19:05,005 --> 00:19:08,005
and set up his own new company, Sinclair Research

341
00:19:08,145 --> 00:19:09,925
and moved to much smaller offices.

342
00:19:10,145 --> 00:19:12,205
So we're away from the big St I'S office

343
00:19:12,385 --> 00:19:13,885
and just in basically a couple

344
00:19:13,885 --> 00:19:17,125
of rooms in Kings Parade Center of Cambridge, he realized

345
00:19:17,195 --> 00:19:20,525
that the computer would be a huge hit if only it was

346
00:19:20,525 --> 00:19:23,885
affordable by just average normal families.

347
00:19:23,905 --> 00:19:26,045
If you can get that market, it's massive.

348
00:19:26,265 --> 00:19:28,685
So I think he was concentrating on, I know

349
00:19:28,685 --> 00:19:31,685
what the price needs to be then work backwards from there

350
00:19:31,685 --> 00:19:34,365
for on all of the components to get that price point.

351
00:19:34,685 --> 00:19:36,005
A proper computer. Uh,

352
00:19:36,005 --> 00:19:38,045
affordable prices. No one had done that before.

353
00:19:38,625 --> 00:19:40,245
The Z 80 chip was brilliant.

354
00:19:40,465 --> 00:19:42,645
Uh, XOG licensed the design,

355
00:19:42,705 --> 00:19:45,205
so it was available from multiple number of foundries.

356
00:19:45,265 --> 00:19:46,765
So there was competition in the market.

357
00:19:46,905 --> 00:19:49,805
You could get the Z 80 at really a quite reasonable price.

358
00:19:50,925 --> 00:19:55,085
Secondly, the Xog Z 80 did help pave the way certainly

359
00:19:55,085 --> 00:19:58,365
for Sinclair to reach the price points for the Z 80

360
00:19:58,625 --> 00:19:59,845
and ZX 81.

361
00:19:59,845 --> 00:20:02,245
And as you know, it was used by a lot

362
00:20:02,245 --> 00:20:03,885
of other home computer makers as well.

363
00:20:04,305 --> 00:20:08,605
The Z 80 was so general purpose that it was used in

364
00:20:09,125 --> 00:20:10,925
thousands and thousands of different applications.

365
00:20:11,045 --> 00:20:14,285
I mean the, you know, the ZX 80 was in those days one

366
00:20:14,285 --> 00:20:16,125
of thousands of different applications.

367
00:20:16,545 --> 00:20:18,045
So for us, the Z 80

368
00:20:18,585 --> 00:20:22,005
was using high volume in the first chess game

369
00:20:22,075 --> 00:20:24,085
players in 1980.

370
00:20:24,085 --> 00:20:28,325
When the ZX 80 came out, the highest volume application was,

371
00:20:28,385 --> 00:20:30,965
uh, chess game that that spoke to you,

372
00:20:32,185 --> 00:20:33,885
One C three number

373
00:20:34,765 --> 00:20:37,485
R two seven, you know,

374
00:20:38,585 --> 00:20:39,965
the computer voice.

375
00:20:40,625 --> 00:20:43,725
It was kind of fun. And they were making hundreds

376
00:20:43,725 --> 00:20:46,405
of thousands of those a quarter in those days.

377
00:20:46,405 --> 00:20:48,110
Those were high volume application.

378
00:20:48,110 --> 00:20:50,845
Today you laugh because, you know, with cell phones

379
00:20:50,845 --> 00:20:52,845
that you make, uh, millions a day.

380
00:20:52,985 --> 00:20:53,985
You know,

381
00:20:55,305 --> 00:20:58,045
CEX eight is a complete computer selling

382
00:20:58,045 --> 00:20:59,165
for just under a hundred pounds

383
00:20:59,225 --> 00:21:00,405
and it's applied with a manual.

384
00:21:00,825 --> 00:21:03,165
It plugs straight into a conventional television,

385
00:21:04,085 --> 00:21:05,125
straight into the aerial socket.

386
00:21:05,125 --> 00:21:06,605
There's no modification of the set.

387
00:21:07,105 --> 00:21:09,805
And if you wish to record your programs into

388
00:21:09,885 --> 00:21:11,205
a standard cassette recorder.

389
00:21:11,905 --> 00:21:14,685
And the great thing about the ZX 80 is that

390
00:21:15,005 --> 00:21:16,845
although there were computers before that were available

391
00:21:16,985 --> 00:21:19,805
to individuals to buy, they cost several hundreds of pounds.

392
00:21:20,095 --> 00:21:21,285
We've brought it down to a hundred,

393
00:21:21,365 --> 00:21:23,325
a hundred pounds without any sacrifice.

394
00:21:23,665 --> 00:21:25,085
You can learn the program on it

395
00:21:25,185 --> 00:21:27,805
and subsequently use it perhaps in your job or at

396
00:21:27,805 --> 00:21:28,805
Work. The ZX 80

397
00:21:28,805 --> 00:21:31,205
is certainly not a powerful machine,

398
00:21:31,465 --> 00:21:34,525
but it was a very influential one and a very popular one.

399
00:21:34,625 --> 00:21:37,285
It was also very influential on Jack Tramel.

400
00:21:37,315 --> 00:21:40,005
When Jack Tramel decided that he wanted to do the VIC 20,

401
00:21:40,585 --> 00:21:41,765
it was essentially

402
00:21:41,765 --> 00:21:44,525
because he'd had a trip to the United Kingdom

403
00:21:44,745 --> 00:21:46,285
and he'd seen the ZX 80

404
00:21:46,665 --> 00:21:49,365
and he'd seen that this computer was being bought by people

405
00:21:49,585 --> 00:21:52,085
and sold at a very affordable price

406
00:21:52,355 --> 00:21:53,725
that wasn't making a loss.

407
00:21:54,065 --> 00:21:56,045
So he went back to his people and,

408
00:21:56,105 --> 00:21:59,085
and that was his famous phrase, we want to produce computers

409
00:21:59,085 --> 00:22:01,885
for the masses and not the classes. It

410
00:22:01,885 --> 00:22:04,245
Was white with a white clean keyboard

411
00:22:04,665 --> 00:22:06,285
and white has a real

412
00:22:07,045 --> 00:22:10,045
seventies science fiction association XX 80 straight

413
00:22:10,045 --> 00:22:11,125
outta 2001.

414
00:22:12,005 --> 00:22:15,125
I got it. And I remember thinking it pretty futuristic

415
00:22:15,355 --> 00:22:17,925
that I remember showing it to a, a, a friend of mine saying,

416
00:22:17,925 --> 00:22:19,085
do you believe this is a computer?

417
00:22:19,675 --> 00:22:21,125
He's sort of looking at it going, uh,

418
00:22:26,265 --> 00:22:29,515
When I saw the ZX 80 for the first time, I was astonished

419
00:22:29,515 --> 00:22:31,315
because the computers I'd been used

420
00:22:31,315 --> 00:22:34,315
to from nearly 10 years earlier, you'd need

421
00:22:34,315 --> 00:22:35,715
to load up the programs

422
00:22:35,715 --> 00:22:37,715
with paper tape than you could run it.

423
00:22:37,715 --> 00:22:40,635
Whereas the ZX 80, you connect it to the tv,

424
00:22:40,815 --> 00:22:42,355
you plug it in and it just works.

425
00:22:42,455 --> 00:22:44,595
It sits there waiting for you to type things in.

426
00:22:44,595 --> 00:22:45,995
And I thought, well, you know,

427
00:22:45,995 --> 00:22:47,235
where's the paper tape reader,

428
00:22:47,295 --> 00:22:49,875
the punch card readers sort of things. I had

429
00:22:49,875 --> 00:22:51,875
A friend who had a ZX 80, that's

430
00:22:51,875 --> 00:22:54,075
where I first started dabbling with programming at home.

431
00:22:54,075 --> 00:22:55,955
That wasn't at the school or anything.

432
00:22:56,355 --> 00:22:59,395
I adored it, I covered it. I really, really wanted it.

433
00:23:00,575 --> 00:23:04,275
The ZX 80 is really something that change, uh, and

434
00:23:04,535 --> 00:23:08,435
and demonstrated to Clive Sinclair that he was right.

435
00:23:08,525 --> 00:23:12,395
There was a market, an opportunity for launching computers.

436
00:23:12,615 --> 00:23:16,515
But when we look at it even now from the 21st century,

437
00:23:16,665 --> 00:23:19,675
when we look at it and we realize we're talking about a

438
00:23:19,845 --> 00:23:23,795
black and white computer, no sound one k of memory

439
00:23:24,345 --> 00:23:27,155
with this very, uh, I wouldn't say annoying

440
00:23:27,155 --> 00:23:30,795
because I think it is fascinating feature when you press a

441
00:23:30,855 --> 00:23:32,795
key, the screen flickers.

442
00:23:33,055 --> 00:23:36,275
So all these kind of things show how limited it was

443
00:23:37,055 --> 00:23:41,635
and at the same time it shows you that if that had success,

444
00:23:42,475 --> 00:23:44,555
anything that you could evolve on top

445
00:23:44,555 --> 00:23:46,845
of it would have a huge potential.

446
00:23:46,845 --> 00:23:47,845
Obviously the journey

447
00:23:47,845 --> 00:23:50,165
of computing has been about the cost coming down,

448
00:23:50,345 --> 00:23:52,245
the size coming down and the power going up.

449
00:23:52,265 --> 00:23:54,085
That's been something that has been iconic within

450
00:23:54,225 --> 00:23:55,365
the journey of computing.

451
00:23:55,505 --> 00:23:57,045
And no other industry really does that.

452
00:23:57,225 --> 00:23:59,645
So the importance of the processes,

453
00:23:59,675 --> 00:24:01,805
because it was the microprocessor revolution

454
00:24:01,905 --> 00:24:04,725
that's kickstarted this entire industry.

455
00:24:04,825 --> 00:24:07,045
So having AZ 80 processor that you could buy

456
00:24:07,045 --> 00:24:09,485
for a few pounds enabled this.

457
00:24:09,985 --> 00:24:12,285
Now Richard, you divided what's available on the market

458
00:24:12,395 --> 00:24:14,005
into three broad sections.

459
00:24:14,025 --> 00:24:15,165
So where does the newcomer,

460
00:24:15,165 --> 00:24:17,205
who knows nothing at all about computers start?

461
00:24:17,595 --> 00:24:19,805
Well, for the newcomer, I'd recommend this first category,

462
00:24:19,805 --> 00:24:21,645
which really covers machines from 50

463
00:24:21,705 --> 00:24:23,805
to a hundred pounds and far and away.

464
00:24:23,805 --> 00:24:26,165
The best example here is the Sinclair's XX 81.

465
00:24:26,395 --> 00:24:28,445
Over half a million of them have been made and sold.

466
00:24:28,545 --> 00:24:29,565
Now, uh, I'D

467
00:24:29,565 --> 00:24:31,965
Really, the X 81 was designed to be sold

468
00:24:32,185 --> 00:24:33,805
to your average person on the street

469
00:24:33,805 --> 00:24:35,325
that had an interest in computers

470
00:24:35,545 --> 00:24:37,645
but didn't necessarily know what they wanted from it.

471
00:24:37,785 --> 00:24:40,925
So this term home micro computer was out there,

472
00:24:40,925 --> 00:24:42,005
it was in the news all the time.

473
00:24:42,545 --> 00:24:43,845
So this had to appeal to them.

474
00:24:44,065 --> 00:24:46,165
And the way this was packaged in the small box

475
00:24:46,165 --> 00:24:48,525
with this manual, everything you needed just plug it into

476
00:24:48,525 --> 00:24:50,565
your tv fitted that bill the case.

477
00:24:51,425 --> 00:24:54,485
Now we've got something that looks actually really nice.

478
00:24:54,875 --> 00:24:57,405
It's still small, it's still got the same kind of keyboard,

479
00:24:57,905 --> 00:24:59,525
but this fills a bit more finished,

480
00:24:59,755 --> 00:25:02,325
more like a general product that you would buy in the shop.

481
00:25:02,435 --> 00:25:04,205
This thing was sub 100 pound.

482
00:25:04,415 --> 00:25:07,205
Other things out there were 200, 300, 400 pound.

483
00:25:07,475 --> 00:25:09,205
It's not like they just saved a few pound off.

484
00:25:09,715 --> 00:25:12,165
This thing was really, really cheap in comparison.

485
00:25:12,295 --> 00:25:15,005
These were in boxes on the shelves in W eight Smiths

486
00:25:15,185 --> 00:25:16,685
and Boots and places like that.

487
00:25:17,145 --> 00:25:18,685
And people were picking up those boxes

488
00:25:18,865 --> 00:25:20,245
and saying, I'd like to buy one of these.

489
00:25:20,595 --> 00:25:22,165
That hadn't really happened before.

490
00:25:22,505 --> 00:25:23,645
You know, this was one of the

491
00:25:23,645 --> 00:25:24,685
first machines to be doing that.

492
00:25:25,345 --> 00:25:27,805
So when you opened that box, you wanted to see something

493
00:25:27,805 --> 00:25:29,245
that looked the part like a piece

494
00:25:29,245 --> 00:25:30,805
of consumer electronics and you

495
00:25:30,805 --> 00:25:34,285
Did And you could code it

496
00:25:34,665 --> 00:25:36,005
and to begin, there was no software.

497
00:25:36,005 --> 00:25:37,085
You just wrote your own.

498
00:25:37,585 --> 00:25:39,445
And an awful lot of people have started

499
00:25:39,445 --> 00:25:43,205
to buy these weak computers in order to learn to program,

500
00:25:44,345 --> 00:25:46,085
not to play games or anything like that.

501
00:25:46,145 --> 00:25:50,125
The same with Spectrum. And the point was the price point

502
00:25:50,945 --> 00:25:53,845
was accessible to core a families

503
00:25:53,945 --> 00:25:55,885
who could never have afforded hundreds

504
00:25:55,885 --> 00:25:57,685
of pounds on a personal computer.

505
00:25:58,055 --> 00:26:01,605
Clive Sinclair, I didn't really know anything about him,

506
00:26:01,905 --> 00:26:04,245
but all I knew about was that in the magazines

507
00:26:04,245 --> 00:26:05,285
of these little adverts

508
00:26:05,285 --> 00:26:07,605
for a ZX 80 little advert for E ZX 81.

509
00:26:07,665 --> 00:26:11,375
So eventually I went, yeah, okay, that I can afford.

510
00:26:11,755 --> 00:26:12,975
We were all in our mid-teens.

511
00:26:13,955 --> 00:26:18,375
So we were all just beginning to get into this whole idea

512
00:26:18,375 --> 00:26:19,895
of home computing.

513
00:26:20,365 --> 00:26:21,695
When I started, I started

514
00:26:21,695 --> 00:26:23,135
with the Sinclair Aesthetic City one.

515
00:26:23,135 --> 00:26:25,735
I like to talk when I give speeches about what that meant

516
00:26:25,735 --> 00:26:28,135
to be, trying to make a game in one K of memory

517
00:26:28,395 --> 00:26:31,335
and then show how we went from one K to 16 K

518
00:26:31,755 --> 00:26:33,855
and how mind bending that was

519
00:26:33,875 --> 00:26:36,975
to go 16 times more in one leap.

520
00:26:37,035 --> 00:26:38,255
It was such an enormous leap

521
00:26:38,255 --> 00:26:40,775
that people started making things like flight simulators

522
00:26:40,835 --> 00:26:42,575
and I shield them screenshots

523
00:26:42,575 --> 00:26:46,045
of the sign on flight simulator running in 16 K.

524
00:26:46,465 --> 00:26:48,085
But then I show them the eBay logo

525
00:26:48,265 --> 00:26:51,165
and I go, this eBay logo takes more than 16 K.

526
00:26:51,585 --> 00:26:53,765
And so in the space of that eBay logo,

527
00:26:53,765 --> 00:26:55,565
they wrote an entire flight simulator.

528
00:26:55,585 --> 00:26:57,165
It starts to put it all into perspective

529
00:26:57,185 --> 00:26:58,285
and people go, I get it.

530
00:26:58,465 --> 00:27:00,645
It was such an amazingly different time.

531
00:27:00,905 --> 00:27:02,405
We looked at what everybody else was doing

532
00:27:02,425 --> 00:27:04,645
and what had gone out there and we would try to figure out

533
00:27:04,645 --> 00:27:06,845
how it was done, but we didn't know whether something was

534
00:27:07,045 --> 00:27:08,685
possible or not possible until we actually

535
00:27:08,755 --> 00:27:09,805
went and and did it.

536
00:27:09,825 --> 00:27:13,485
So we were never stymied by can't be done.

537
00:27:13,825 --> 00:27:15,525
It was always how can we do it?

538
00:27:15,985 --> 00:27:19,245
XX 80 and the XX 81 gave rise to that scene

539
00:27:19,335 --> 00:27:22,285
where you could create your own gaming invention,

540
00:27:22,545 --> 00:27:23,725
record it and distribute it.

541
00:28:08,385 --> 00:28:09,965
So when the ZX 81 was launched,

542
00:28:10,025 --> 00:28:11,565
of course we read the reviews.

543
00:28:11,785 --> 00:28:13,645
Um, we knew that sales were going well,

544
00:28:13,745 --> 00:28:16,405
but we were very much focused on

545
00:28:16,515 --> 00:28:17,885
what was gonna be the next machine.

546
00:28:18,105 --> 00:28:20,125
And you have to remember that we'd launched two

547
00:28:20,125 --> 00:28:22,205
machines in two years running.

548
00:28:22,865 --> 00:28:26,525
We knew that in 12 months time, the whole world, the market,

549
00:28:26,745 --> 00:28:29,725
all the zx 80 81 fans would expect a new model.

550
00:28:29,785 --> 00:28:31,405
So yeah, we were very much heads down

551
00:28:31,505 --> 00:28:33,685
and I was starting to think together with Jim

552
00:28:33,685 --> 00:28:35,845
and Clive, what sort of a machine would this be?

553
00:28:35,905 --> 00:28:39,125
So we knew we had to launch something at the 1982

554
00:28:39,375 --> 00:28:40,405
April exhibition.

555
00:28:40,505 --> 00:28:42,605
We knew that it had to be better for games players

556
00:28:43,025 --> 00:28:45,405
and also better for those that wanted to learn programming.

557
00:28:45,465 --> 00:28:47,165
So we decided we needed color,

558
00:28:47,345 --> 00:28:49,805
we needed high resolution graphics, we needed sound

559
00:28:49,905 --> 00:28:52,165
and we needed something of a moving key keyboard.

560
00:28:52,425 --> 00:28:55,645
So those were the basic specifications regarding the name.

561
00:28:56,045 --> 00:28:58,525
I think probably everybody assumed it would be ZX

562
00:28:58,525 --> 00:29:00,205
82, you know, one a year.

563
00:29:00,425 --> 00:29:02,925
But we quickly realized that we were making a rod

564
00:29:02,925 --> 00:29:04,885
for our own backs as soon as that was launched,

565
00:29:04,985 --> 00:29:06,485
of course then we'd be expected

566
00:29:06,485 --> 00:29:08,365
to make another one 12 months later.

567
00:29:09,185 --> 00:29:11,725
So we needed a name that would

568
00:29:12,245 --> 00:29:14,845
describe the product rather than the year of its launch.

569
00:29:14,945 --> 00:29:16,605
So Steve and I came up with Rainbow.

570
00:29:16,745 --> 00:29:18,525
We loved the idea, we wanted to call it the rainbow.

571
00:29:19,055 --> 00:29:22,485
Clive came up with a much more scientific technological

572
00:29:22,485 --> 00:29:23,725
sounding name of spectrum

573
00:29:23,985 --> 00:29:26,165
and of course that's the one that stuck. But

574
00:29:26,165 --> 00:29:29,245
The other thing you need to understand about Clive was

575
00:29:29,245 --> 00:29:32,565
that he was fiercely, fiercely patriotic.

576
00:29:33,025 --> 00:29:36,285
He would do anything he could not

577
00:29:36,305 --> 00:29:38,925
to be dependent on Japanese technology.

578
00:29:39,425 --> 00:29:40,925
And he would try to buy

579
00:29:41,855 --> 00:29:44,925
chips from the few British manufacturers

580
00:29:44,945 --> 00:29:48,525
who were still making chips like Ferranti

581
00:29:49,165 --> 00:29:52,005
Ferranti were really benefiting from the success

582
00:29:52,065 --> 00:29:53,205
of the ZX 81.

583
00:29:53,205 --> 00:29:55,725
You know, they were selling their ULA in in volumes

584
00:29:55,725 --> 00:29:56,925
that they'd never appreciated

585
00:29:56,925 --> 00:29:59,445
before they'd got into the consumer market.

586
00:29:59,785 --> 00:30:02,645
And they were determined to bend over backwards

587
00:30:02,645 --> 00:30:04,405
to roll out the red carpet to give us

588
00:30:04,925 --> 00:30:06,965
whatever help we needed to ensure

589
00:30:06,965 --> 00:30:08,565
that the ZX spectrum was a success.

590
00:30:09,065 --> 00:30:13,605
He wanted to do something for high technology in Britain.

591
00:30:13,905 --> 00:30:18,525
He wanted manufacturing to be done in Scotland, which it was

592
00:30:18,625 --> 00:30:20,565
as long as it possibly could be.

593
00:30:20,905 --> 00:30:22,365
It was only with reluctance

594
00:30:22,365 --> 00:30:24,565
that he gave into commercial pressures

595
00:30:24,565 --> 00:30:28,165
and realized that global economics dictated

596
00:30:28,165 --> 00:30:30,565
that assembly jobs got done elsewhere.

597
00:30:36,465 --> 00:30:37,765
The spectrum compared

598
00:30:37,765 --> 00:30:40,565
with the ZX 81 right from the off it was going

599
00:30:40,565 --> 00:30:45,565
to be color for games.

600
00:30:46,055 --> 00:30:48,525
Color seemed essential and better graphics.

601
00:30:48,865 --> 00:30:52,765
So that needed different hardware, it needed extra software

602
00:30:52,785 --> 00:30:54,005
to deal with the fact

603
00:30:54,005 --> 00:30:57,205
that pixels had colors associated with them.

604
00:31:00,745 --> 00:31:01,925
So that meant

605
00:31:01,925 --> 00:31:05,405
that it certainly needed extra memory allocated

606
00:31:05,465 --> 00:31:06,605
to the color information

607
00:31:07,145 --> 00:31:09,685
and it needed some extra code for dealing

608
00:31:09,795 --> 00:31:10,965
with the different colors.

609
00:31:11,675 --> 00:31:14,525
That was a big thing. It was gonna be the colored ZedX 81.

610
00:31:15,065 --> 00:31:16,605
So one of the reasons that we decided

611
00:31:16,625 --> 00:31:18,645
to have high resolution pixels

612
00:31:18,645 --> 00:31:21,045
and lower resolution color was based on

613
00:31:21,105 --> 00:31:22,205
the way the human eye works.

614
00:31:22,255 --> 00:31:24,205
Human vision can resolve

615
00:31:24,205 --> 00:31:27,085
to much finer detail brightness luminance, if you like,

616
00:31:27,085 --> 00:31:28,405
than we can resolve color.

617
00:31:28,745 --> 00:31:32,845
And the PAL TV system took advantage of that so that the,

618
00:31:32,865 --> 00:31:35,005
the bandwidth of the luminance signal was three

619
00:31:35,005 --> 00:31:36,285
or four times greater than the

620
00:31:36,285 --> 00:31:37,405
bandwidth of the chromate signal.

621
00:31:37,625 --> 00:31:39,805
And we also knew at that time that the Oracle

622
00:31:39,945 --> 00:31:43,165
and CFAs TeleTech standards also followed a similar pattern.

623
00:31:43,235 --> 00:31:45,125
They set color per character,

624
00:31:45,145 --> 00:31:47,685
but of course you could address individual pixels.

625
00:31:47,745 --> 00:31:49,045
So that was the background

626
00:31:49,225 --> 00:31:52,885
and the reasoning behind choosing high resolution pixels,

627
00:31:52,885 --> 00:31:54,405
but lower resolution color.

628
00:31:54,495 --> 00:31:56,765
We've got the color clash. You know, why did you do that?

629
00:31:57,145 --> 00:31:58,725
So why did we make that compromise?

630
00:31:59,425 --> 00:32:00,685
We had to meet a price point.

631
00:32:00,905 --> 00:32:02,805
The spectrum was made by some,

632
00:32:02,805 --> 00:32:04,445
within a different kind of mos entirely.

633
00:32:05,185 --> 00:32:08,205
It was, um, what would give our features in a minimal sort

634
00:32:08,205 --> 00:32:09,525
of way, rather than doing color per

635
00:32:09,525 --> 00:32:10,725
pixel, it was color per block.

636
00:32:11,265 --> 00:32:14,205
And that's, that's okay, but it's, it's a hack.

637
00:32:14,795 --> 00:32:17,405
It's kind of will get us to the end cheaply kind of way.

638
00:32:17,785 --> 00:32:20,085
We could have gone for hardware sprites,

639
00:32:20,105 --> 00:32:22,525
the chips were available, we could have put special chips

640
00:32:22,525 --> 00:32:23,685
and additional memory in so

641
00:32:23,685 --> 00:32:25,685
that we could have multicolored sprites,

642
00:32:25,705 --> 00:32:28,725
moving invisibly across a background without

643
00:32:28,745 --> 00:32:29,925
any degradation of color.

644
00:32:30,105 --> 00:32:32,565
We could have gone for something that approximates

645
00:32:32,565 --> 00:32:34,245
to much later computer standards

646
00:32:34,245 --> 00:32:36,165
where every single pixel on the screen has

647
00:32:36,185 --> 00:32:37,325
its own color palette.

648
00:32:37,325 --> 00:32:39,605
But again, think of the additional memory that's needed.

649
00:32:39,605 --> 00:32:41,845
Think of the additional chips that would be needed

650
00:32:41,905 --> 00:32:44,285
for all the address mapping, all of the video buffering.

651
00:32:44,335 --> 00:32:46,085
Again, we needed to meet a price point.

652
00:32:46,145 --> 00:32:47,285
So that was the compromise.

653
00:32:55,385 --> 00:32:59,085
So it used cassette tapes for storing programs

654
00:32:59,305 --> 00:33:02,205
and that had been a bit crude on the ZX 81.

655
00:33:02,345 --> 00:33:04,965
So on the spectrum that was much improved.

656
00:33:05,065 --> 00:33:07,885
You had headers so that the programs had names

657
00:33:08,105 --> 00:33:09,925
and you could look for the one you wanted.

658
00:33:10,465 --> 00:33:12,925
And when you're loading from Tate, there are lots

659
00:33:12,925 --> 00:33:14,005
of signals coming through.

660
00:33:14,305 --> 00:33:16,965
And the spectrum we found, if you fed that through

661
00:33:16,985 --> 00:33:19,525
to the TV display, you know, pretty patterns

662
00:33:19,525 --> 00:33:21,365
but you, you could also see what was going on.

663
00:33:21,605 --> 00:33:22,885
Sinclair didn't wanna sell you a

664
00:33:22,885 --> 00:33:24,005
cassette deck that you didn't need.

665
00:33:24,285 --> 00:33:25,725
'cause again, it's a huge piece

666
00:33:25,725 --> 00:33:27,005
of money on the end of the price.

667
00:33:27,105 --> 00:33:28,925
So let's use something that's already out there.

668
00:33:29,105 --> 00:33:30,965
The home cassette recorder that everybody had them.

669
00:33:31,155 --> 00:33:33,645
This was all about getting into the hands of people

670
00:33:34,195 --> 00:33:35,725
that may have been on the fence

671
00:33:35,825 --> 00:33:37,805
and may not have got into computers at

672
00:33:37,805 --> 00:33:39,645
that's fine by keeping it cheap.

673
00:33:39,905 --> 00:33:42,085
Our object is to find people's real needs

674
00:33:42,225 --> 00:33:45,405
to develop products which have real benefit to people

675
00:33:45,985 --> 00:33:47,085
in whatever way.

676
00:33:47,265 --> 00:33:49,845
And to do that at a price that they can afford to do

677
00:33:49,905 --> 00:33:52,045
for Tempe, what anyone can do for a hand.

678
00:33:52,335 --> 00:33:55,165
Steve and I joined Clive for the launch.

679
00:33:55,545 --> 00:33:59,085
And I have to say I was blown away by the popularity.

680
00:33:59,325 --> 00:34:01,365
I knew that we had something special for the whole morning.

681
00:34:01,505 --> 00:34:03,765
The crowds were four deep around our stand.

682
00:34:03,815 --> 00:34:05,725
Clive had offered that first thousand people

683
00:34:05,825 --> 00:34:06,845
to order a spectrum

684
00:34:07,065 --> 00:34:08,685
and offer cash would get it, uh,

685
00:34:08,685 --> 00:34:10,085
with an accelerated delivery time.

686
00:34:10,105 --> 00:34:12,445
People were just queuing up with money to spend.

687
00:34:12,625 --> 00:34:15,165
But it wasn't just the volume of interest,

688
00:34:15,165 --> 00:34:16,525
it was also the level of detail.

689
00:34:16,745 --> 00:34:18,525
We were behind a couple of teenagers and,

690
00:34:18,525 --> 00:34:19,525
and we just listened.

691
00:34:19,525 --> 00:34:21,725
They enthused about the Zuck

692
00:34:21,845 --> 00:34:23,005
spectrum, you know, which was great for us.

693
00:34:23,065 --> 00:34:25,125
But what amazed us was they knew

694
00:34:25,735 --> 00:34:27,885
every single detail of the spec.

695
00:34:28,185 --> 00:34:29,605
It had only been launched that morning.

696
00:34:29,705 --> 00:34:31,525
It had been a secret the day before,

697
00:34:31,525 --> 00:34:32,765
but they'd absorbed everything

698
00:34:32,765 --> 00:34:33,885
and they were interested in it.

699
00:34:36,905 --> 00:34:40,165
The release of the spectrum changed the nature

700
00:34:40,345 --> 00:34:42,485
of the UK games industry

701
00:34:42,635 --> 00:34:46,725
because with the ZX 81, it was still a little bit geeky

702
00:34:46,905 --> 00:34:48,285
and a little bit hobbyist.

703
00:34:48,785 --> 00:34:51,925
But with the spectrum, all of a sudden you had kind

704
00:34:51,925 --> 00:34:53,285
of mass market products.

705
00:34:53,545 --> 00:34:56,365
The look of the spectrum really was driven by necessity

706
00:34:56,715 --> 00:35:01,045
because the whole drive behind it was to create a computer

707
00:35:01,105 --> 00:35:02,765
as cheaply as possible for the masses.

708
00:35:03,345 --> 00:35:06,605
So the Commodore 64, which did look like a proper computer,

709
00:35:07,075 --> 00:35:08,245
obviously retailed

710
00:35:08,245 --> 00:35:10,205
for a lot more than the spectrum ever did. The

711
00:35:10,205 --> 00:35:14,405
Commodore 64, remember it costs less than two 30 pounds.

712
00:35:14,625 --> 00:35:17,365
And don't forget it has the enormous memory.

713
00:35:17,945 --> 00:35:21,725
And I think as a result of this necessity, they actually,

714
00:35:21,725 --> 00:35:22,885
whether you call it by accident

715
00:35:22,885 --> 00:35:25,645
or design, they actually created something

716
00:35:26,155 --> 00:35:27,685
that became uniquely iconic

717
00:35:27,795 --> 00:35:29,885
because it did look different from everything else.

718
00:35:30,285 --> 00:35:32,005
I remember just being really struck

719
00:35:32,145 --> 00:35:34,645
by the form factor and the design.

720
00:35:35,155 --> 00:35:38,365
I've always loved things that look like the future,

721
00:35:38,905 --> 00:35:42,285
but I remember the BBC micro just being this chunky, clunky,

722
00:35:42,335 --> 00:35:44,485
noisy sort of beige

723
00:35:44,485 --> 00:35:46,605
but yellow by the time it hit our classrooms,

724
00:35:46,725 --> 00:35:48,085
machines that weren't attractive.

725
00:35:48,225 --> 00:35:50,765
So the ZX spectrum for me was a revelation

726
00:35:50,765 --> 00:35:53,845
because it was so slim I couldn't understand how it was

727
00:35:53,845 --> 00:35:57,885
so slim and sleek, the little rainbow on the side.

728
00:35:58,365 --> 00:36:00,085
I sort of never understood what that was for,

729
00:36:00,225 --> 00:36:01,325
but I presumed it was

730
00:36:01,325 --> 00:36:04,045
because then the games would be in color, you know,

731
00:36:05,065 --> 00:36:06,805
and the buttons just felt nice.

732
00:36:07,105 --> 00:36:08,445
So I felt like it was something you

733
00:36:08,445 --> 00:36:09,645
could probably put in your school bag.

734
00:36:10,195 --> 00:36:13,925
Five worried a great deal about how things looked.

735
00:36:14,185 --> 00:36:15,925
The external appearance was always

736
00:36:16,155 --> 00:36:17,405
very, very important to him.

737
00:36:17,545 --> 00:36:20,525
And he surrounded himself with very, very good designers.

738
00:36:20,635 --> 00:36:23,685
Rick Dickenson that came on to design most

739
00:36:23,685 --> 00:36:27,445
of the computers was just a brilliant guy at translating.

740
00:36:27,475 --> 00:36:28,885
What, uh, Kai wanted,

741
00:36:30,985 --> 00:36:32,925
And this is one of the things that I think people miss

742
00:36:33,345 --> 00:36:34,805
for me, Sinclair,

743
00:36:35,035 --> 00:36:38,005
it's not about his knowledge of electronics.

744
00:36:38,205 --> 00:36:41,325
I relate to him because of his talent for product design.

745
00:36:41,585 --> 00:36:43,045
The product design that he brought

746
00:36:43,185 --> 00:36:45,885
to everything he did was something that

747
00:36:46,375 --> 00:36:47,725
until Apple came along

748
00:36:47,725 --> 00:36:50,405
and Steve Jobs, I can honestly say I'd never seen. I

749
00:36:50,405 --> 00:36:53,085
Thought it was the coolest thing I had ever seen.

750
00:36:53,505 --> 00:36:54,725
And in a way I still do.

751
00:36:54,825 --> 00:36:55,925
The more I look at this,

752
00:36:56,625 --> 00:36:58,565
the more I can sort of smell my bedroom.

753
00:36:59,885 --> 00:37:01,245
I don't mean that in an unpleasant way.

754
00:37:01,365 --> 00:37:02,765
I mean the, the, the atmosphere,

755
00:37:03,045 --> 00:37:05,085
although I was a teenage boy, I just mean that kind of,

756
00:37:05,625 --> 00:37:08,645
you know, sort of red curtains there.

757
00:37:09,665 --> 00:37:11,485
Ano style bookshelf over there full

758
00:37:11,485 --> 00:37:14,445
of my James Herbert collection bunk beds over there.

759
00:37:15,145 --> 00:37:17,565
Little white MFI computer desk here

760
00:37:17,565 --> 00:37:18,925
with a black and white tell there.

761
00:37:18,925 --> 00:37:21,245
And then this little thing here like that I can, yeah,

762
00:37:21,405 --> 00:37:22,445
I mean that is mad.

763
00:37:22,785 --> 00:37:25,965
That's where Sir Clive Sinclair's understanding of form

764
00:37:26,985 --> 00:37:30,085
the emotional connection we have to objects.

765
00:37:30,085 --> 00:37:33,085
There is something in our genes that, uh,

766
00:37:33,225 --> 00:37:34,885
brings an emotional connection

767
00:37:34,885 --> 00:37:36,365
to certain shapes, objects, and colors,

768
00:37:36,845 --> 00:37:38,645
Regardless of what goes on under the bonnet.

769
00:37:38,645 --> 00:37:40,525
That must be one of the most iconic

770
00:37:41,475 --> 00:37:42,885
designs of the 20th century.

771
00:37:43,465 --> 00:37:45,245
And it is, isn't it? I mean in terms of its impact,

772
00:37:45,245 --> 00:37:47,775
but just in terms of its, yeah, I,

773
00:37:47,855 --> 00:37:49,375
I I shall use the B word I think.

774
00:37:49,495 --> 00:37:50,495
I think it's beautiful.

775
00:37:53,895 --> 00:37:57,455
I think it's a timeless design, what the spectrum gave us.

776
00:37:57,755 --> 00:37:59,855
So I think the work of Rick Dickinson

777
00:37:59,855 --> 00:38:03,695
and his team was amazing from a cosmetic point of view, it's

778
00:38:03,975 --> 00:38:06,415
A balanced, subtle approach.

779
00:38:06,885 --> 00:38:09,735
Nothing shouts at you, it's not fighting for attention.

780
00:38:10,115 --> 00:38:12,775
The famous rainbow in this colored text here,

781
00:38:13,315 --> 00:38:16,095
it just starts singing, it starts coming alive

782
00:38:16,635 --> 00:38:19,215
and that rainbow is synonymous with the product.

783
00:38:19,235 --> 00:38:20,895
People seem to really like it.

784
00:38:21,315 --> 00:38:24,455
The rainbow stripe on the bottom right, it's a thing

785
00:38:24,455 --> 00:38:25,535
of absolute beauty.

786
00:38:25,835 --> 00:38:29,135
And the Sinclair logo itself, the font get out of town.

787
00:38:29,635 --> 00:38:31,735
It was obviously decided for the next iteration,

788
00:38:31,795 --> 00:38:34,895
the color one that we need to up our game slightly

789
00:38:35,105 --> 00:38:36,805
and get some tactile feedback.

790
00:38:37,385 --> 00:38:39,525
And that tactile feedback comes in the form

791
00:38:39,525 --> 00:38:40,765
of an elastomeric

792
00:38:40,785 --> 00:38:43,765
or a rubber keyboard, we'll call it rubber shall we, is not.

793
00:38:43,905 --> 00:38:47,005
And then you've got that popping, that tactile feedback

794
00:38:47,025 --> 00:38:50,845
and you can engineer tune it to get the right feed to it.

795
00:38:51,065 --> 00:38:53,805
But it's still made at a cost.

796
00:38:54,145 --> 00:38:56,245
But clearly it was an improvement over the 80

797
00:38:56,345 --> 00:38:59,605
and the 81 of course it got famously

798
00:39:00,715 --> 00:39:05,685
described in one early review as having all the feel

799
00:39:05,745 --> 00:39:07,165
of dead human flesh.

800
00:39:07,445 --> 00:39:08,845
I think were the words that were used.

801
00:39:11,145 --> 00:39:13,085
I'm one of those that loved the

802
00:39:13,725 --> 00:39:14,885
touching the, the rubber key.

803
00:39:14,945 --> 00:39:18,205
So I don't refer to it as the dead flash experience.

804
00:39:18,525 --> 00:39:20,885
I really enjoyed it because it's what I had. It was magical.

805
00:39:21,185 --> 00:39:24,525
So even if it was not perfect, you don't remember that

806
00:39:24,585 --> 00:39:26,245
and you forget those details very easily.

807
00:39:26,525 --> 00:39:29,725
I found the tactile sense of them really nice, kind

808
00:39:29,725 --> 00:39:31,725
of like rubbing my finger on the edges

809
00:39:31,725 --> 00:39:33,685
of the keys was just really nice for some reason.

810
00:39:34,105 --> 00:39:36,045
But to use not so great.

811
00:39:36,105 --> 00:39:39,925
But obviously Clive Sinclair's little shortcut keys

812
00:39:39,985 --> 00:39:42,965
for programming helped reduce the amount

813
00:39:42,965 --> 00:39:44,085
of keys you had to press.

814
00:39:44,525 --> 00:39:45,965
I had friends with the original rubber

815
00:39:46,055 --> 00:39:47,365
keyed 48 K spectrum.

816
00:39:47,625 --> 00:39:50,125
Um, most of them had trouble loading games

817
00:39:50,125 --> 00:39:51,605
because the J key had gone

818
00:39:51,625 --> 00:39:53,885
and you had to press the J was the shortcut for the load.

819
00:39:54,225 --> 00:39:56,645
And as it was the key that was pressed by far the most.

820
00:39:56,905 --> 00:39:58,485
And when that one went, you were in trouble

821
00:39:58,705 --> 00:40:01,085
and the quotation marks were the next thing to go as well

822
00:40:01,085 --> 00:40:04,245
because to load from tape on the 48 k, it was load, uh,

823
00:40:04,245 --> 00:40:05,725
quotation mark, quotation marks.

824
00:40:05,745 --> 00:40:07,885
So those were the keys that went first. So

825
00:40:08,005 --> 00:40:09,645
There was a whole learning curve with learning

826
00:40:09,665 --> 00:40:12,285
to program using all these shortcut operations.

827
00:40:12,305 --> 00:40:14,885
But at the same time it was a really nice

828
00:40:14,975 --> 00:40:16,365
experience 'cause it was new.

829
00:40:16,605 --> 00:40:18,605
I think the spectrum as a piece of design,

830
00:40:18,755 --> 00:40:20,685
it's unparalleled in what it is.

831
00:40:20,785 --> 00:40:23,845
You see a 48 K ZX spectrum, you immediately know what it is.

832
00:40:24,105 --> 00:40:25,725
In fact with all the different spectrum models,

833
00:40:26,025 --> 00:40:27,485
you know from the design, what they

834
00:40:27,485 --> 00:40:30,325
Are and unusually the Sinclair products were black

835
00:40:30,745 --> 00:40:33,005
and most of the other contemporary products were

836
00:40:33,055 --> 00:40:34,325
beige, weren't they in the day?

837
00:40:34,905 --> 00:40:38,845
The beige kind of dominant aesthetic of computing it is

838
00:40:38,845 --> 00:40:39,965
for the business community.

839
00:40:39,965 --> 00:40:41,965
Whereas Sir Clive wasn't held back by that.

840
00:40:42,105 --> 00:40:45,045
He wanted to make an impact. He understood his market.

841
00:40:46,575 --> 00:40:49,245
There were so many computer companies in the UK

842
00:40:49,265 --> 00:40:51,085
during the early mid eighties

843
00:40:51,585 --> 00:40:52,765
and they all wanted to slice

844
00:40:52,765 --> 00:40:56,205
of the same pie machines like ARI 800.

845
00:40:56,705 --> 00:40:58,645
The revived versions came a bit too late.

846
00:40:59,025 --> 00:41:01,085
The Acorn electron obviously had supply problems

847
00:41:01,085 --> 00:41:04,245
and that arrived about a year too late to make an impact.

848
00:41:04,645 --> 00:41:08,165
BBC Micro was great machine but incredibly expensive

849
00:41:08,225 --> 00:41:10,645
and not many games were available for it.

850
00:41:10,645 --> 00:41:13,365
Very much an educational orientated machine.

851
00:41:13,505 --> 00:41:16,645
So the spectrum just had a clear path, I think, to the home

852
00:41:16,705 --> 00:41:19,085
and the games industry and cut, cut straight through it.

853
00:41:19,505 --> 00:41:22,725
By that time we'd missed out on the BBC contract.

854
00:41:23,055 --> 00:41:24,285
Acorn had got it with

855
00:41:24,285 --> 00:41:26,685
what I considered a much more boring computer.

856
00:41:27,145 --> 00:41:29,685
The government hopes to have a computer in every secondary

857
00:41:29,685 --> 00:41:31,005
school by the end of the year.

858
00:41:32,065 --> 00:41:35,325
But it was classic, it was more boring

859
00:41:35,325 --> 00:41:36,685
because it actually worked.

860
00:41:37,625 --> 00:41:39,245
It could sit in a classroom.

861
00:41:39,785 --> 00:41:41,325
The keys were more reliable,

862
00:41:41,905 --> 00:41:43,645
the whole thing was more predictable.

863
00:41:43,865 --> 00:41:46,125
The BBC was a competitor to it

864
00:41:46,185 --> 00:41:47,965
and Clive was always disappointed

865
00:41:47,965 --> 00:41:52,085
that Acorn had won the rights for the BBC Micro

866
00:41:52,465 --> 00:41:54,605
and the education programs.

867
00:41:54,745 --> 00:41:58,845
But the reality is we sold several times more aesthetic

868
00:41:59,285 --> 00:42:01,925
spectrums without the support of British government.

869
00:42:02,105 --> 00:42:03,645
On the BBC micro side,

870
00:42:03,865 --> 00:42:05,685
I'd say the spectrum was the big one.

871
00:42:06,165 --> 00:42:08,845
Spectrum made the market, whereas BBCB never really had

872
00:42:08,845 --> 00:42:10,325
that same kind of vibe.

873
00:42:10,505 --> 00:42:12,765
The spectrum was a bit more mass markety really.

874
00:42:12,945 --> 00:42:15,725
And the BBB was still a bit kind of, um, snooty.

875
00:42:16,545 --> 00:42:21,165
And this machine is credited as the machine, uh, that sort

876
00:42:21,165 --> 00:42:22,445
of kickstart our games industry.

877
00:42:22,585 --> 00:42:24,805
And people that are working in the games industry now cut

878
00:42:24,805 --> 00:42:27,245
their teeth programming games on the spectrum.

879
00:42:27,905 --> 00:42:30,525
I'm sure the, the spectrum did start the British

880
00:42:30,945 --> 00:42:32,325
gaming and compute scene.

881
00:42:32,625 --> 00:42:35,805
It because it was just so successful.

882
00:42:36,525 --> 00:42:38,885
I think it just came about at exactly the right time.

883
00:42:39,305 --> 00:42:41,285
The spectrum really was the one

884
00:42:41,285 --> 00:42:42,485
that sparked the game scene.

885
00:42:42,625 --> 00:42:44,485
It was affordable. There was a Christmas

886
00:42:44,485 --> 00:42:46,445
where everybody just seemed to get one.

887
00:42:46,445 --> 00:42:47,805
They were selling out everywhere.

888
00:42:48,145 --> 00:42:49,605
You went downstairs on Christmas morning

889
00:42:49,605 --> 00:42:51,245
with your fingers crossed, hoping your parents

890
00:42:51,265 --> 00:42:52,965
had managed to get one as well. It was

891
00:42:53,845 --> 00:42:56,725
December, 1983 when I was surprised at Christmas

892
00:42:57,195 --> 00:42:59,365
with a brand new Spectrum, 48 k.

893
00:42:59,385 --> 00:43:00,845
It was mine and my brother's. That's

894
00:43:00,845 --> 00:43:01,845
where everything really kicked off.

895
00:43:01,945 --> 00:43:03,565
It was in color, it was on your TV

896
00:43:03,565 --> 00:43:04,925
screen and it was beautiful.

897
00:43:05,765 --> 00:43:09,525
I badged my parents who said I might be able to get a, a,

898
00:43:09,605 --> 00:43:10,805
a spectrum for my birthday,

899
00:43:10,905 --> 00:43:12,885
but there was a definite emphasis on the might be.

900
00:43:12,905 --> 00:43:15,405
But then I remember coming home from school a couple of days

901
00:43:15,405 --> 00:43:17,645
before my birthday and my mum said, look down

902
00:43:17,645 --> 00:43:20,005
between the two, between the sofa and the chair

903
00:43:20,145 --> 00:43:23,005
and their in a Boots carrier bag was a brand new ZX

904
00:43:23,125 --> 00:43:24,525
spectrum, 48 k as well.

905
00:43:24,925 --> 00:43:27,085
I did one of these kids go mad things,

906
00:43:27,145 --> 00:43:28,165
you know, like it was mine.

907
00:43:28,185 --> 00:43:30,125
And there it was and I couldn't believe it.

908
00:43:30,225 --> 00:43:32,725
And I was like, wow. And then I set it up then obviously,

909
00:43:32,725 --> 00:43:35,525
and then was on it off until my dad came home from work

910
00:43:35,525 --> 00:43:36,965
and said, right, I wanna watch the TV now.

911
00:43:37,085 --> 00:43:38,645
I really wanted to get the Sinclair spectrum.

912
00:43:38,865 --> 00:43:40,965
And so I had a very strange thing happen to me.

913
00:43:41,225 --> 00:43:43,445
My grandmother, I was at her house one day

914
00:43:43,445 --> 00:43:44,765
and she said, I wanna talk to you.

915
00:43:44,825 --> 00:43:47,525
And I'm like, okay. And she goes to me, you know,

916
00:43:47,825 --> 00:43:49,125
I'm getting pretty old now

917
00:43:49,425 --> 00:43:53,285
and someday I don't wanna think I left you like some pea

918
00:43:53,335 --> 00:43:54,525
Potts or something like that.

919
00:43:54,825 --> 00:43:57,685
And so I want to give you some money just so I know

920
00:43:57,685 --> 00:43:58,845
that you're not gonna end up

921
00:43:58,845 --> 00:44:00,445
with silverware or that kind of thing.

922
00:44:00,705 --> 00:44:04,005
And so she gave him like a hundred pounds or 150 pounds.

923
00:44:04,345 --> 00:44:07,085
And at that time that was a really big deal

924
00:44:07,085 --> 00:44:08,845
because that was my Sinclair spectrum.

925
00:44:09,105 --> 00:44:11,005
And so by buying that computer,

926
00:44:11,515 --> 00:44:13,045
that was the knee in the curve for me.

927
00:44:13,205 --> 00:44:15,885
'cause suddenly I was able to, to take off, difficult

928
00:44:15,885 --> 00:44:17,445
For me to have an insight into

929
00:44:17,555 --> 00:44:19,045
what it meant to other people.

930
00:44:20,265 --> 00:44:24,765
To me it just made it possible for me

931
00:44:24,765 --> 00:44:29,365
to get into computing probably four years,

932
00:44:29,675 --> 00:44:31,605
five years before I might

933
00:44:31,605 --> 00:44:33,365
otherwise have been able to afford it.

934
00:44:33,945 --> 00:44:38,885
It was cheap, it was color and my brother liked it as well.

935
00:44:39,105 --> 00:44:42,925
So did I like the design? Yeah, great.

936
00:44:43,185 --> 00:44:46,485
But I think the first thing I did was open it up.

937
00:44:46,885 --> 00:44:49,525
I had probably in all honesty, more interested in

938
00:44:49,795 --> 00:44:51,765
what was under the hood than anything else.

939
00:44:51,995 --> 00:44:54,325
Like, um, into hardware. The

940
00:44:54,325 --> 00:44:58,125
Machine seemed impossibly small, like how can you pack all

941
00:44:58,125 --> 00:45:02,045
of this power, this obscene amount of ram,

942
00:45:02,495 --> 00:45:04,285
these bitmap graphics and all of

943
00:45:04,285 --> 00:45:06,205
that into this tiny little box?

944
00:45:06,825 --> 00:45:08,005
It was very understated.

945
00:45:08,405 --> 00:45:11,445
I mean, at that time when the leaflet was doing the rounds,

946
00:45:11,445 --> 00:45:14,965
nobody knew just how rubbery those keys would feel.

947
00:45:15,705 --> 00:45:16,965
So it still looked amazing.

948
00:45:17,625 --> 00:45:22,205
So for me it was really, this is an arcade capable machine

949
00:45:22,315 --> 00:45:25,805
that you can have at home at a ridiculous price, which meant

950
00:45:26,595 --> 00:45:30,925
that it was a perfect blank slate for new people coming in

951
00:45:31,225 --> 00:45:33,085
to do things that had never been done before.

952
00:45:43,105 --> 00:45:44,885
The spectrum was incredibly important

953
00:45:44,885 --> 00:45:47,325
because up until that point, whether it's the ZX 80

954
00:45:47,345 --> 00:45:50,205
or the ZX 81, they were black and white.

955
00:45:50,235 --> 00:45:52,805
They didn't have proper keyboards and so on.

956
00:45:52,805 --> 00:45:56,005
And here we had this product in either 16 K form

957
00:45:56,005 --> 00:45:58,805
or 48 K form that had memory to go with it.

958
00:45:58,945 --> 00:46:02,125
So we had for the first time in the spectrum, uh,

959
00:46:02,125 --> 00:46:04,965
products which you could actually do something with.

960
00:46:05,665 --> 00:46:07,125
And what most

961
00:46:07,145 --> 00:46:09,805
of the software developers decided here

962
00:46:09,805 --> 00:46:10,965
was a games playing machine.

963
00:46:11,105 --> 00:46:13,725
So the ZX spectrum became the doan

964
00:46:13,725 --> 00:46:15,885
of the developers of computer games.

965
00:46:16,305 --> 00:46:18,605
And it was the games playing

966
00:46:18,675 --> 00:46:21,725
that really made the spectrum the success that it was.

967
00:46:22,065 --> 00:46:26,805
The spectrum was there at the time when it was affordable

968
00:46:26,825 --> 00:46:28,285
for parents to say, okay,

969
00:46:28,385 --> 00:46:30,405
as a main Christmas present or whatever.

970
00:46:31,275 --> 00:46:32,535
Yet we can stretch to that.

971
00:46:32,875 --> 00:46:35,655
And I think that was the opening for many, many kids

972
00:46:36,115 --> 00:46:37,455
to get not into just games,

973
00:46:37,515 --> 00:46:40,375
but into fiddling about with basic programming.

974
00:46:41,075 --> 00:46:44,175
And it meant because of the limitations of of the spectrum.

975
00:46:44,715 --> 00:46:47,255
The programmers had to be really, really creative

976
00:50:23,385 --> 00:50:25,805
For an aspiring games developer for,

977
00:50:25,905 --> 00:50:28,100
for someone who's interested in that sort of thing.

978
00:50:28,145 --> 00:50:30,645
The spectrum was ideal. You go to a shop, you pick it up,

979
00:50:30,785 --> 00:50:33,765
you unbox it, it's there, you plug it in,

980
00:50:34,045 --> 00:50:36,525
Plugging it in, and then you telly

981
00:50:36,525 --> 00:50:38,485
and then you'd just be sitting there with this in your hand.

982
00:50:42,385 --> 00:50:43,885
It was absolutely nuts.

983
00:50:43,905 --> 00:50:46,165
The notion that this screen would do things

984
00:50:46,165 --> 00:50:47,565
that you'd only seen on films

985
00:50:47,595 --> 00:50:50,685
that you'd only seen on Star Trek was, uh,

986
00:50:50,765 --> 00:50:52,885
I mean it must just have been absolutely mind

987
00:50:52,885 --> 00:50:54,205
blowing, but of course you're there.

988
00:50:54,205 --> 00:50:56,365
You don't realize your mind is being blown.

989
00:50:56,365 --> 00:50:57,885
You just know that you don't wanna look away.

990
00:50:58,565 --> 00:51:01,845
I just became absolutely fascinated by the whole thing.

991
00:51:02,305 --> 00:51:05,965
And I remember like type a small piece of Caribbean

992
00:51:06,505 --> 00:51:08,405
and seeing the result on the screen,

993
00:51:09,165 --> 00:51:10,885
I was absolutely gob smugged.

994
00:51:10,965 --> 00:51:13,485
I couldn't believe it. I thought, wow, this is amazing.

995
00:51:14,025 --> 00:51:17,445
You know, I just like typed in a few lines of something

996
00:51:17,505 --> 00:51:19,565
and this happened on the screen.

997
00:51:20,205 --> 00:51:23,285
I think the best thing about the spectrum was it was a

998
00:51:23,285 --> 00:51:24,365
big box of bites.

999
00:51:24,465 --> 00:51:25,645
You can do anything you want with it.

1000
00:51:25,645 --> 00:51:27,525
Uh, you didn't have to know anything particular.

1001
00:51:27,665 --> 00:51:29,045
And you can make simple basic games

1002
00:51:29,145 --> 00:51:31,285
and then as you progress, you can learn assembly language

1003
00:51:31,705 --> 00:51:33,125
and make more complicated games,

1004
00:51:33,625 --> 00:51:35,045
but you can start making them yourself.

1005
00:51:35,545 --> 00:51:36,885
It was so accessible

1006
00:51:37,075 --> 00:51:39,485
that everyone could make their own games.

1007
00:51:40,625 --> 00:51:43,685
And it came with a very good programming manual,

1008
00:51:43,695 --> 00:51:46,125
which at the back had a reference section

1009
00:51:46,315 --> 00:51:50,125
regarding programming in machine code, which I understood

1010
00:51:50,125 --> 00:51:52,245
that programming in basic alone,

1011
00:51:52,265 --> 00:51:54,205
you couldn't really create decent games.

1012
00:51:54,265 --> 00:51:57,165
It was too slow. So I had to learn machine code

1013
00:51:57,665 --> 00:51:59,645
and that's when I started dabbling

1014
00:51:59,645 --> 00:52:01,125
and trying to get as much information

1015
00:52:01,425 --> 00:52:04,365
as I could about programming in machine code.

1016
00:52:06,255 --> 00:52:08,365
Steve was the author of the manual.

1017
00:52:08,765 --> 00:52:10,445
I edited it, made a few comments.

1018
00:52:10,665 --> 00:52:12,725
It wasn't just aimed at showing people how

1019
00:52:12,725 --> 00:52:14,165
to plug the device in and load games.

1020
00:52:14,265 --> 00:52:16,125
We really wanted it to be an instruction manual

1021
00:52:16,125 --> 00:52:18,725
to help people to learn to program in basic.

1022
00:52:19,945 --> 00:52:22,165
So the Spectrum manual, I approached it more

1023
00:52:22,165 --> 00:52:24,965
or less the same as with the ZX 81 Manual.

1024
00:52:25,105 --> 00:52:26,445
No, no special differences.

1025
00:52:26,625 --> 00:52:28,645
And in fact, some of the material was

1026
00:52:28,975 --> 00:52:30,045
valid for both of them.

1027
00:52:30,345 --> 00:52:33,685
So I I more or less lifted it from the ZX 81 manual and,

1028
00:52:33,745 --> 00:52:34,925
and reused it.

1029
00:52:35,305 --> 00:52:38,565
It reads as though a human being is writing to you.

1030
00:52:39,285 --> 00:52:40,525
I, I wanted to try

1031
00:52:40,525 --> 00:52:42,925
and anticipate what the reader needed to know

1032
00:52:43,705 --> 00:52:45,005
and address that.

1033
00:52:45,705 --> 00:52:47,405
And clearly history has shown that a lot

1034
00:52:47,405 --> 00:52:49,165
of people learn basic through that manual.

1035
00:52:49,385 --> 00:52:51,045
It had a lot of humor in it.

1036
00:52:51,475 --> 00:52:52,925
Steve's particular brand of humor,

1037
00:52:53,445 --> 00:52:55,565
I know Clive wasn't completely happy

1038
00:52:55,565 --> 00:52:57,205
with my style of writing.

1039
00:52:57,545 --> 00:53:01,765
All sorts of completely flaky, extraneous ideas coming in

1040
00:53:01,945 --> 00:53:04,205
and trying to get across the serious ideas

1041
00:53:04,265 --> 00:53:05,365
of how you would use it.

1042
00:53:05,905 --> 00:53:07,165
Bit Monty Python ish.

1043
00:53:07,165 --> 00:53:10,085
Sometimes from time to time I get emails saying I

1044
00:53:10,085 --> 00:53:11,205
so much enjoyed the manual.

1045
00:53:11,345 --> 00:53:12,485
You know, sort of one or two

1046
00:53:16,795 --> 00:53:18,285
Popular computing weekly.

1047
00:53:18,965 --> 00:53:21,085
I think it was one of the best magazines ever.

1048
00:53:21,345 --> 00:53:22,885
It was like a tiny little thing.

1049
00:53:23,265 --> 00:53:25,245
And it was a weekly magazine, which was amazing.

1050
00:53:25,345 --> 00:53:28,245
So we didn't have to wait too long for the next issue.

1051
00:53:29,195 --> 00:53:31,895
And they also covered the machine code.

1052
00:53:31,895 --> 00:53:34,415
They, they used to have a small section about machine code.

1053
00:53:34,515 --> 00:53:39,255
And, and I, I read this article in one issue where it said,

1054
00:53:39,555 --> 00:53:41,855
if you wanna become a really good programmer,

1055
00:53:41,855 --> 00:53:43,015
successful programmer,

1056
00:53:43,315 --> 00:53:45,335
you must forget about the basic language

1057
00:53:45,635 --> 00:53:49,335
and learn machine code without even knowing the difference.

1058
00:53:49,775 --> 00:53:51,055
I said, well that's what I'm gonna do.

1059
00:53:51,355 --> 00:53:53,215
And it was that kind of what people were doing

1060
00:53:53,965 --> 00:53:55,335
with the spectrum and stuff

1061
00:53:55,335 --> 00:53:57,335
that actually got me into doing a little bit of coding.

1062
00:53:57,495 --> 00:53:59,175
I was never good enough or bright enough

1063
00:53:59,175 --> 00:54:02,935
and in mathematics at all to do anything proficient.

1064
00:54:03,835 --> 00:54:06,855
But as a hobbyist, you could explore, you could play around,

1065
00:54:06,995 --> 00:54:11,535
you could take some of the very early computing magazines

1066
00:54:11,535 --> 00:54:14,415
and with their endless long forever pages of listings,

1067
00:54:14,595 --> 00:54:15,975
you would type 'em, they'd never work.

1068
00:54:15,975 --> 00:54:17,415
They would never ever work first time.

1069
00:54:17,415 --> 00:54:19,455
But if you were inquisitive enough, you started playing

1070
00:54:19,455 --> 00:54:20,895
around with that bit of code

1071
00:54:21,035 --> 00:54:22,495
and working out what was going wrong

1072
00:54:22,635 --> 00:54:24,095
and fixing it as you went along.

1073
00:54:24,275 --> 00:54:25,455
And eventually slowly,

1074
00:54:25,615 --> 00:54:28,415
I wrote the most horrendous space invaders again one day.

1075
00:54:28,415 --> 00:54:30,055
And it was just appalling pretty much.

1076
00:54:30,635 --> 00:54:33,815
But, you know, that was, that was my genesis of, of gaming.

1077
00:54:34,235 --> 00:54:35,295
It was an iterative process.

1078
00:54:35,385 --> 00:54:37,215
You'd type it in, then you'd suddenly figure out,

1079
00:54:37,215 --> 00:54:38,695
well it won't run what I done.

1080
00:54:38,955 --> 00:54:40,535
Missed out a piece of punctuation

1081
00:54:40,535 --> 00:54:42,575
and it was scanning down the page trying to find

1082
00:54:42,765 --> 00:54:43,895
what you'd missed and and

1083
00:54:43,895 --> 00:54:44,975
putting it in and getting it working.

1084
00:54:45,235 --> 00:54:47,295
And when you did it, it was a real sense of achievement.

1085
00:54:47,595 --> 00:54:49,375
And so it literally was something that had

1086
00:54:49,375 --> 00:54:51,135
that we had never seen anything like before.

1087
00:54:51,135 --> 00:54:52,415
You know, you sat in front of a TV

1088
00:54:53,075 --> 00:54:54,895
and you know, you just basically consumed the

1089
00:54:54,895 --> 00:54:55,935
output that came at you.

1090
00:54:56,315 --> 00:54:57,695
And that was fun for many decades.

1091
00:54:57,875 --> 00:54:59,815
But the, but the ability to really kind of turn

1092
00:54:59,815 --> 00:55:01,535
that output into input

1093
00:55:01,535 --> 00:55:03,255
and to type in even just a basic program

1094
00:55:03,395 --> 00:55:04,815
or just kind of waggle the joystick

1095
00:55:04,815 --> 00:55:07,335
and see the character move around on, on the screen.

1096
00:55:07,515 --> 00:55:09,295
Arthur C. Clarke has this great quote about

1097
00:55:09,295 --> 00:55:11,495
how any sufficiently advanced technologies

1098
00:55:11,495 --> 00:55:12,775
indistinguishable from magic.

1099
00:55:13,275 --> 00:55:17,415
And at that time when we were doing those basic programs

1100
00:55:17,415 --> 00:55:18,975
and playing those basic games, we'd literally

1101
00:55:18,975 --> 00:55:20,095
never seen anything like it.

1102
00:55:20,095 --> 00:55:22,295
And so it really did feel like a form

1103
00:55:22,295 --> 00:55:23,335
of digital magic to us.

1104
00:55:23,455 --> 00:55:24,455
I think

1105
00:55:24,845 --> 00:55:29,685
Sinclair was still at the stage of the product lifecycle,

1106
00:55:29,855 --> 00:55:33,365
which all products have, where it was still being

1107
00:55:34,225 --> 00:55:36,045
really targeted at the people

1108
00:55:36,305 --> 00:55:38,485
who don't really mind if it works.

1109
00:55:38,955 --> 00:55:41,365
They just like to tinker around until it does.

1110
00:55:41,505 --> 00:55:43,805
And this stage of product lifecycle

1111
00:55:44,545 --> 00:55:46,765
is early adopters, innovators.

1112
00:55:47,385 --> 00:55:50,005
And when he was targeting those people,

1113
00:55:50,375 --> 00:55:51,765
Clive, he was happiest.

1114
00:55:52,055 --> 00:55:55,165
Developing gamers on the Sinclair spectrum in the early

1115
00:55:55,165 --> 00:55:57,045
days was a little bit difficult,

1116
00:55:57,245 --> 00:55:58,725
a little bit uh, unreliable.

1117
00:55:59,085 --> 00:56:03,565
I has a 48 K spectrum with dual ZX micro drives

1118
00:56:03,905 --> 00:56:07,205
and these were amazingly primitive devices.

1119
00:56:07,355 --> 00:56:09,485
Yeah, these little micro drive cassettes which had this

1120
00:56:09,635 --> 00:56:11,805
endlessly of tape going inside them. The

1121
00:56:11,805 --> 00:56:14,565
Micro drive was inexpensive attached to the spectrum.

1122
00:56:14,825 --> 00:56:16,845
It had the right capacity, it had the right speed,

1123
00:56:16,875 --> 00:56:18,565
essentially it was a cassette head

1124
00:56:18,565 --> 00:56:20,205
and that was one of the beauties of it, is

1125
00:56:20,205 --> 00:56:22,805
that Clive had taken some readily available components,

1126
00:56:22,805 --> 00:56:24,520
which were high-tech in themselves

1127
00:56:24,520 --> 00:56:26,020
and leveraged it in his concept.

1128
00:56:26,235 --> 00:56:28,285
It's actually surprising how reliable they were,

1129
00:56:28,645 --> 00:56:30,885
considering how basic the technology was.

1130
00:56:31,425 --> 00:56:33,605
The carts he put in, either you got a,

1131
00:56:33,725 --> 00:56:35,445
a reliable one which you could use a lot,

1132
00:56:35,445 --> 00:56:37,445
or you got an unreliable one, which you really had

1133
00:56:37,445 --> 00:56:38,805
to throw away after a while.

1134
00:56:38,985 --> 00:56:40,405
It was that hit or miss.

1135
00:56:40,725 --> 00:56:43,285
I didn't have too many problems developing.

1136
00:56:43,465 --> 00:56:45,325
It wasn't very fast, but it did work.

1137
00:56:46,085 --> 00:56:48,685
I dunno how well the micro drive did fare in the market.

1138
00:56:49,075 --> 00:56:50,925
It's a very, very flimsy piece of tape.

1139
00:56:50,985 --> 00:56:52,725
If it doesn't go from one reel to another,

1140
00:56:52,785 --> 00:56:54,725
it goes round in a spiral on itself.

1141
00:56:54,725 --> 00:56:57,125
So it has to slip past itself so that there has

1142
00:56:57,125 --> 00:56:58,565
to be some wear and tear. When

1143
00:56:58,565 --> 00:57:00,805
I saw the adverts for micro drive, they seem to be, oh,

1144
00:57:00,805 --> 00:57:02,205
the answer for the spectrum.

1145
00:57:02,565 --> 00:57:05,245
'cause it seems to take ages loading and saving tapes.

1146
00:57:05,375 --> 00:57:07,845
There were these little gizmos which were going

1147
00:57:07,845 --> 00:57:09,085
to be like disc drives

1148
00:57:09,145 --> 00:57:12,005
and they had tiny little cartridges that you could put in,

1149
00:57:12,345 --> 00:57:15,125
but I had so much frustration in trying to make them work.

1150
00:57:15,365 --> 00:57:18,005
I really got near to crunching it with a hammer.

1151
00:57:18,445 --> 00:57:19,845
I really did feel like doing it.

1152
00:57:19,845 --> 00:57:21,645
But they went back to Sinclair

1153
00:57:21,705 --> 00:57:23,325
and I actually got my money back for those

1154
00:57:23,325 --> 00:57:25,045
and I said, they're not for purpose.

1155
00:57:25,425 --> 00:57:26,765
One of the other problems we used

1156
00:57:26,765 --> 00:57:28,925
to have was spectrum overheating all the time,

1157
00:57:28,925 --> 00:57:31,605
especially when you had your gizmos on the back.

1158
00:57:31,885 --> 00:57:34,045
I heard of people kind of standing a glass

1159
00:57:34,105 --> 00:57:35,805
of ice water by them.

1160
00:57:36,145 --> 00:57:38,685
We used to use fans in the office for a while,

1161
00:57:39,225 --> 00:57:41,125
but we used to find that switching on

1162
00:57:41,125 --> 00:57:44,205
and off the fans sometimes could make your machines crash.

1163
00:57:44,305 --> 00:57:46,245
So those weren't terribly popular.

1164
00:57:46,785 --> 00:57:49,565
In the end, I bought another keyboard for the spectrum

1165
00:57:50,065 --> 00:57:52,285
and threw the rubber keyboard away and,

1166
00:57:52,305 --> 00:57:55,365
and the circuit board from the spectrum can of lay right

1167
00:57:55,585 --> 00:57:58,445
inside the other keyboard, which gave it a lot of room.

1168
00:57:58,465 --> 00:58:01,005
And that's how I spent most of my time programming.

1169
00:58:01,185 --> 00:58:03,365
So the rubber keys didn't last sort

1170
00:58:03,365 --> 00:58:04,565
of more than a few months.

1171
00:58:05,315 --> 00:58:08,325
This is the spectrum that an attack, zombie. Zombie.

1172
00:58:08,425 --> 00:58:10,205
And if the mask was written on

1173
00:58:10,865 --> 00:58:13,605
and conveniently the top will come off

1174
00:58:13,785 --> 00:58:17,725
and there's my little modifications

1175
00:58:17,755 --> 00:58:20,165
that allowed mapping the softie in.

1176
00:58:20,275 --> 00:58:24,325
That was a way for me to connect the softie to the spectrum.

1177
00:58:24,865 --> 00:58:28,005
So the advantage of having your work on another machine

1178
00:58:28,055 --> 00:58:32,405
where it'll stay pristine even if this crashes. The beauty

1179
00:58:32,405 --> 00:58:34,245
Of the spectrum in regards to

1180
00:58:35,035 --> 00:58:37,165
that experimental approach was

1181
00:58:37,165 --> 00:58:39,645
that it was a beautiful blank slate.

1182
00:58:40,065 --> 00:58:42,885
It was a block of memory, a block of screen memory,

1183
00:58:43,095 --> 00:58:44,325
block of attribute memory.

1184
00:58:44,465 --> 00:58:47,485
Here's a fast processor, off you go. That was it.

1185
00:58:47,485 --> 00:58:48,605
That's all you had to work with.

1186
00:58:48,745 --> 00:58:51,885
So you had to fashion everything from those raw

1187
00:58:51,885 --> 00:58:53,245
ingredients, especially

1188
00:58:53,245 --> 00:58:55,365
On the spectrum because you didn't have anything.

1189
00:58:55,425 --> 00:58:58,325
No hardware, sports, no nothing. You have to do everything.

1190
00:58:58,385 --> 00:58:59,685
You have to be really creative.

1191
00:58:59,835 --> 00:59:03,765
Technically, all those limitations allowed people like me

1192
00:59:03,905 --> 00:59:05,645
to try unlimited things.

1193
00:59:06,565 --> 00:59:09,885
I always knew the computers for, for having fun

1194
00:59:10,065 --> 00:59:11,085
and entertaining people.

1195
00:59:12,845 --> 00:59:15,705
By the time the Sinclair Spectrum arrived,

1196
00:59:16,205 --> 00:59:17,385
it was Peyton the obvious.

1197
00:59:17,775 --> 00:59:18,825
They were for only one thing

1198
00:59:18,825 --> 00:59:20,785
and that was making interactive movies.

1199
00:59:21,225 --> 00:59:24,845
Of course, not only did we have moving stuff on a little

1200
00:59:24,845 --> 00:59:26,205
screen, it had color.

1201
00:59:26,475 --> 00:59:29,925
This was a toy shop just like Austin Wells must have felt

1202
00:59:29,925 --> 00:59:31,005
when he had Free Reign.

1203
00:59:31,185 --> 00:59:33,365
And if this was gonna be my Austin Wells moment,

1204
00:59:33,615 --> 00:59:34,765
let's make Citizen Kane.

1205
00:59:34,925 --> 00:59:38,885
I thought, yeah, we can do this now We've got a Sinclair 48

1206
00:59:39,165 --> 00:59:42,085
K ZX spectrum, let's go make Citizen came.

1207
00:59:42,265 --> 00:59:46,765
So I feel I could make movies in 1982. Oh boy.

1208
00:59:50,065 --> 00:59:53,685
Now I'd seen a couple of three D games on the ZX 81,

1209
00:59:53,805 --> 00:59:55,725
A little Game with a Tyrannosaur Rex Running

1210
00:59:55,725 --> 00:59:57,685
through a maze was one that I remember.

1211
00:59:58,105 --> 01:00:00,205
And I thought you could do this with the kind

1212
01:00:00,205 --> 01:00:02,765
of shoot 'em up if you kind of had spaceships

1213
01:00:02,785 --> 01:00:04,085
and you were flying into the game.

1214
01:00:04,785 --> 01:00:07,365
It was about the time Star Wars was very big.

1215
01:00:07,365 --> 01:00:10,485
And I thought, ah, if I do a game that's like Star Wars,

1216
01:00:10,485 --> 01:00:11,525
people are bound to love that.

1217
01:00:11,525 --> 01:00:13,285
And I have spaceships flying out the game.

1218
01:00:13,465 --> 01:00:17,325
So three D Space Wars was the concept from the start.

1219
01:00:17,385 --> 01:00:20,525
And to make it feel like a scene in Star Wars

1220
01:00:20,525 --> 01:00:23,125
where you're flying into a crowd of fighters

1221
01:00:23,145 --> 01:00:24,525
and they're all flying around you.

1222
01:00:24,745 --> 01:00:27,045
At that time, no one had done a

1223
01:00:27,045 --> 01:00:28,205
three D game on the spectrum.

1224
01:00:28,305 --> 01:00:30,365
So I thought, right, I'm coming up with something new.

1225
01:00:30,685 --> 01:00:32,285
I think there were a couple that came out

1226
01:00:32,345 --> 01:00:33,645
by the time it was published,

1227
01:00:33,695 --> 01:00:36,725
there was a three D motorbike game where motorbike was kind

1228
01:00:36,725 --> 01:00:38,845
of riding through a forest of trees,

1229
01:00:39,025 --> 01:00:41,565
but there certainly wasn't any around when I started.

1230
01:00:41,745 --> 01:00:43,645
So that gave me a feeling that, yeah, I,

1231
01:00:43,805 --> 01:00:44,845
I was onto something new.

1232
01:00:45,105 --> 01:00:47,405
The sound on the ZX spectrum was really very simple.

1233
01:00:47,425 --> 01:00:49,245
We had a, what we called a little beeper,

1234
01:00:49,355 --> 01:00:52,605
ingenious programmers could develop square waves to drive it

1235
01:00:52,605 --> 01:00:54,405
and create something that approximated

1236
01:00:54,425 --> 01:00:55,965
to different tones of music.

1237
01:00:56,025 --> 01:00:57,645
It, it was very, very simple.

1238
01:00:57,835 --> 01:01:00,165
Well all you can do with a spectrum is um,

1239
01:01:00,385 --> 01:01:03,845
switch the speaker on and off, you know, as one bit

1240
01:01:04,625 --> 01:01:09,365
and an attack just you have to generate a frame of graphics

1241
01:01:09,865 --> 01:01:12,285
and then make some kind of a click.

1242
01:01:12,545 --> 01:01:14,725
You could maybe do a tiny little bit of a beep

1243
01:01:14,785 --> 01:01:15,805
or a little bit of noise

1244
01:01:15,865 --> 01:01:17,725
as you can hear footsteps in anti-tax.

1245
01:01:17,745 --> 01:01:19,245
So it draws a frame of graphics,

1246
01:01:19,995 --> 01:01:22,125
does a tiny bit of white noise.

1247
01:01:24,715 --> 01:01:26,815
I'm often asked whether I can make music as well

1248
01:01:26,815 --> 01:01:28,695
as graphics and code and I can't.

1249
01:01:28,805 --> 01:01:31,015
Someone else supplied the music for Saboto

1250
01:01:31,395 --> 01:01:34,535
and I always wanted to get the music playing

1251
01:01:34,535 --> 01:01:36,415
during the game, but I was new to this.

1252
01:01:36,675 --> 01:01:39,215
So in the game I played some beeps.

1253
01:01:39,275 --> 01:01:40,455
No music, no interrupts,

1254
01:01:40,525 --> 01:01:42,175
just an occasional white noise sound.

1255
01:01:42,245 --> 01:01:43,245
When you kick someone,

1256
01:01:44,355 --> 01:01:47,595
Spectrum sound basically involved, you could

1257
01:01:48,195 --> 01:01:49,195
directly move the speaker,

1258
01:01:49,935 --> 01:01:51,595
but you can only move it in or out.

1259
01:01:51,595 --> 01:01:52,995
You don't have any fine control.

1260
01:01:54,075 --> 01:01:57,695
Now bear in mind that sound continues continuously,

1261
01:01:58,555 --> 01:02:00,895
but you have to do other things like the graphics,

1262
01:02:01,025 --> 01:02:04,245
which take rather more time up than everything else.

1263
01:02:05,535 --> 01:02:09,795
So on the spectrum, any music I played, I had

1264
01:02:09,795 --> 01:02:11,075
to do little bursts of.

1265
01:02:11,255 --> 01:02:15,395
So at each intra, which occur 50 times a second,

1266
01:02:16,075 --> 01:02:18,315
I put some sound out, just a little burst

1267
01:02:18,375 --> 01:02:19,975
of sound at whatever frequency

1268
01:02:19,975 --> 01:02:21,095
it needs to be at that moment.

1269
01:02:25,665 --> 01:02:28,965
So there's this distinct 50 hertz hum

1270
01:02:29,035 --> 01:02:31,285
because the whole sound was being broken up

1271
01:02:31,285 --> 01:02:32,445
into these little chunks.

1272
01:02:32,445 --> 01:02:35,485
Every 50th of a second, which rung

1273
01:02:35,485 --> 01:02:37,805
through everything was never gonna sound that a commodore,

1274
01:02:40,745 --> 01:02:43,765
the color, the sound limited though it was,

1275
01:02:44,425 --> 01:02:47,565
and the memory of the spectrum compared to the 81.

1276
01:02:47,565 --> 01:02:48,725
And the 80 meant

1277
01:02:48,725 --> 01:02:51,525
that there were some really terrific games developed

1278
01:02:51,705 --> 01:02:53,125
for it very quickly.

1279
01:02:53,665 --> 01:02:56,245
And that took off like wildfire

1280
01:02:56,865 --> 01:03:01,165
and Clive's attitude was that it would take care of itself.

1281
01:03:01,345 --> 01:03:03,725
He hadn't set out to develop a machine

1282
01:03:03,725 --> 01:03:05,125
for people to play with.

1283
01:03:05,665 --> 01:03:08,685
He acknowledged that that's what they did do with it.

1284
01:03:08,685 --> 01:03:11,125
And that drove sales and that was all well and good,

1285
01:03:11,625 --> 01:03:16,085
but he let the software people take care of the software.

1286
01:03:44,585 --> 01:03:46,885
So I think for a lot of people, their first experience

1287
01:03:46,885 --> 01:03:48,645
of video games was going into the arcade.

1288
01:03:49,065 --> 01:03:51,725
And the arcade was such an exciting place.

1289
01:03:51,765 --> 01:03:54,485
You've got explosions, grabs, loads of colors,

1290
01:03:55,025 --> 01:03:58,605
but they wanted to recreate that into their home computer.

1291
01:03:58,715 --> 01:04:00,285
Growing up in the early eighties,

1292
01:04:00,505 --> 01:04:01,805
it was all about the arcades.

1293
01:04:01,805 --> 01:04:04,765
That was where the best games were. These amazing games.

1294
01:04:05,135 --> 01:04:07,165
You'd go to the arcades, it would just be rows

1295
01:04:07,165 --> 01:04:09,085
and rows of brilliant arcade games.

1296
01:04:19,065 --> 01:04:21,045
And I was always pestering my parents to go

1297
01:04:21,045 --> 01:04:22,165
to the Seasides or wherever.

1298
01:04:22,265 --> 01:04:24,325
So the opportunity to have a machine

1299
01:04:24,855 --> 01:04:28,805
which could replicate this experience in some form at home

1300
01:04:29,315 --> 01:04:32,765
cheaply and easily was obviously very attractive to me.

1301
01:04:37,705 --> 01:04:39,725
The arcades were incredibly important.

1302
01:04:39,915 --> 01:04:41,325
When you go back to the early eighties,

1303
01:04:41,355 --> 01:04:43,525
it's the golden age of the arcades.

1304
01:04:43,525 --> 01:04:46,205
There are so many games that are so popular.

1305
01:04:46,745 --> 01:04:49,805
And already on the ZX 81, there were versions

1306
01:04:49,825 --> 01:04:51,925
of Space Invaders, very crude,

1307
01:04:52,025 --> 01:04:55,805
but playable versions of games as well as original games.

1308
01:04:55,855 --> 01:04:57,485
Games like three D Monster MAs

1309
01:04:57,485 --> 01:04:59,285
that had their own momentum. The

1310
01:04:59,505 --> 01:05:01,205
ZX 81 died off very quickly.

1311
01:05:01,465 --> 01:05:02,725
The spectrum was coming out

1312
01:05:02,985 --> 01:05:05,405
and Arctic immediately bombed me a spectrum

1313
01:05:05,785 --> 01:05:07,845
and I taught myself how it worked

1314
01:05:07,905 --> 01:05:11,685
by writing an unbelievably bad Space Invaders Clone,

1315
01:05:11,695 --> 01:05:14,525
which was never released, but it taught me how to use it.

1316
01:05:14,625 --> 01:05:17,245
And I went on to writes Cosmic Debris,

1317
01:05:17,335 --> 01:05:20,445
which was Asteroid's claim, all claims in most days.

1318
01:05:21,075 --> 01:05:24,725
Totally unimaginative really, which Arctics sold again.

1319
01:05:24,865 --> 01:05:27,085
But this time on a pretty good royalty deal,

1320
01:05:27,405 --> 01:05:30,485
I was pretty much on 25% verb, all the early games.

1321
01:05:31,065 --> 01:05:33,205
So almost as soon as the spectrum came out,

1322
01:05:33,425 --> 01:05:36,485
you started seeing immediately lots of versions

1323
01:05:36,485 --> 01:05:40,045
of games like Space Invaders, Pacman Asteroids,

1324
01:05:40,155 --> 01:05:41,805
missile Command Logger.

1325
01:05:42,025 --> 01:05:43,445
We ripped off arcade games

1326
01:05:43,515 --> 01:05:46,965
because Arcade Games were the only games that served

1327
01:05:47,025 --> 01:05:48,325
as reference pieces.

1328
01:05:49,065 --> 01:05:50,325
We all went to the arcades

1329
01:05:50,905 --> 01:05:53,285
and we wanted to copy what we saw.

1330
01:05:53,835 --> 01:05:56,165
It's how you learn anything, right? You imitate.

1331
01:05:56,505 --> 01:05:58,325
And you'd have that instant connection

1332
01:05:58,325 --> 01:05:59,365
because you'd see a game

1333
01:05:59,365 --> 01:06:01,045
and you'd go, oh, it's just like Space Invaders,

1334
01:06:01,055 --> 01:06:02,885
which was like Spectral Invaders.

1335
01:06:03,105 --> 01:06:05,645
Or you'd have Defender except instead

1336
01:06:05,645 --> 01:06:07,485
of er on the end it would be a on the end,

1337
01:06:07,485 --> 01:06:09,005
just subtle little changes like that.

1338
01:06:09,145 --> 01:06:11,605
So they did realize early on

1339
01:06:11,605 --> 01:06:13,645
that these games could be replicated,

1340
01:06:13,745 --> 01:06:16,805
but they also realized that the game should be different

1341
01:06:16,915 --> 01:06:19,805
because the way in which we played them was a lot different.

1342
01:06:19,805 --> 01:06:21,165
Instead of being in an arcade

1343
01:06:21,425 --> 01:06:23,565
and shoving coins in a machine to keep going,

1344
01:06:23,905 --> 01:06:26,325
we were at home and the game should be able

1345
01:06:26,325 --> 01:06:28,645
to involve us a little bit more than those arcade games.

1346
01:06:32,505 --> 01:06:36,005
The game design for Chucka came about mostly nicking ideas

1347
01:06:36,005 --> 01:06:37,845
from what I loved playing in the arcades.

1348
01:06:38,075 --> 01:06:40,925
It's a cross between Space Panic, which is a platform,

1349
01:06:40,925 --> 01:06:42,845
letters game and Donkey Kong.

1350
01:06:42,985 --> 01:06:45,125
And then a few ideas that I just chucked in myself.

1351
01:06:45,205 --> 01:06:46,205
A bit of a mishmash really.

1352
01:06:46,645 --> 01:06:49,285
I realized that you could do pixel movements on the

1353
01:06:49,485 --> 01:06:51,845
spectrum, even though the received wisdom was that you,

1354
01:06:51,865 --> 01:06:53,685
you couldn't, everything had to be character movement.

1355
01:06:53,865 --> 01:06:56,725
And so I wanted to do a game, which was pixel movement.

1356
01:06:56,895 --> 01:06:58,525
Pixel movement was an advantage just

1357
01:06:58,525 --> 01:07:00,045
because it was technically superior.

1358
01:07:00,185 --> 01:07:02,165
It would be better to play, it would look better.

1359
01:07:02,425 --> 01:07:03,445
You could make a better game.

1360
01:07:06,085 --> 01:07:08,005
Everyone that owned a ZX Spectrum played Jet Pack.

1361
01:07:08,085 --> 01:07:10,885
There's something about Jet Pack I think that made you feel

1362
01:07:10,885 --> 01:07:14,605
that you were emulating the archaic experience that most

1363
01:07:14,605 --> 01:07:16,045
of us were having in the early eighties.

1364
01:07:16,705 --> 01:07:18,845
And it was an important thing though.

1365
01:07:18,865 --> 01:07:20,885
Can I take that arcade experience Home with Me

1366
01:07:21,365 --> 01:07:22,645
Ultimate or Ultimate Play?

1367
01:07:22,645 --> 01:07:24,325
The Game as they were often known back then,

1368
01:07:24,395 --> 01:07:25,805
were an incredible company.

1369
01:07:25,805 --> 01:07:27,765
Obviously the two stampers behind them,

1370
01:07:27,985 --> 01:07:29,005
The Stamper Brothers,

1371
01:07:29,115 --> 01:07:30,805
they had Arcade experience themselves.

1372
01:07:30,805 --> 01:07:33,445
They had created their own minor arcade games.

1373
01:07:33,705 --> 01:07:36,485
So when they started to make ZX Spectrum games in the home,

1374
01:07:36,675 --> 01:07:39,325
they were really able to bring that experience

1375
01:07:39,325 --> 01:07:41,445
of already making arcade games through to create

1376
01:07:42,085 --> 01:07:43,525
a game in Jet Pack Lap.

1377
01:07:43,525 --> 01:07:46,005
To me, even if it's only in 16 K,

1378
01:07:46,505 --> 01:07:48,725
it feels like not just an arcade game,

1379
01:07:48,725 --> 01:07:51,885
but a superb arcade game that has all the qualities

1380
01:07:52,225 --> 01:07:53,645
that's an arcade game should have.

1381
01:07:53,745 --> 01:07:55,525
And so when Ultimates came out with that,

1382
01:07:55,605 --> 01:07:57,885
I think especially in terms of going

1383
01:07:57,885 --> 01:08:01,445
beyond perhaps Arcade clones, that was a game changer

1384
01:08:01,585 --> 01:08:02,765
for original software.

1385
01:08:03,245 --> 01:08:04,725
Ultimate Play of the Game brought out a load

1386
01:08:04,725 --> 01:08:07,365
of games at once, which worked on the 16 K Spectrum as well.

1387
01:08:07,365 --> 01:08:09,285
Like Trans Am was amazing

1388
01:08:09,285 --> 01:08:12,445
because you had this whole world of driving round America

1389
01:08:12,705 --> 01:08:14,645
and just being able to explore this entire

1390
01:08:14,675 --> 01:08:16,205
land was brand new.

1391
01:08:16,365 --> 01:08:19,685
I I loved that. TransAm, which was a driving game,

1392
01:08:19,685 --> 01:08:22,645
very similar to the Arcade game Rally X by Namco.

1393
01:08:22,665 --> 01:08:24,125
So they weren't exactly original,

1394
01:08:24,225 --> 01:08:25,805
but the games they made were brilliant

1395
01:08:26,065 --> 01:08:27,485
and they looked good as well.

1396
01:08:27,815 --> 01:08:29,205
Attic Attack, I played for hours.

1397
01:08:29,395 --> 01:08:33,125
That was just a simple Maze game with repeating graphics

1398
01:08:33,545 --> 01:08:34,685
and doors in different places

1399
01:08:35,065 --> 01:08:37,285
and that occupied me for just as many hours.

1400
01:08:37,845 --> 01:08:39,765
I never finished it. I think I got pretty

1401
01:08:39,765 --> 01:08:41,005
close, but I never finished it.

1402
01:08:46,365 --> 01:08:48,365
I think Ultimate was the one that you went for for Quality.

1403
01:08:48,705 --> 01:08:51,165
Jet Pack, Luna, jet Man, a Sable Wolf.

1404
01:08:51,345 --> 01:08:53,925
It wasn't just the game, it was the box. It came in as well.

1405
01:08:54,025 --> 01:08:55,485
And they were the ones that you wanted.

1406
01:08:55,485 --> 01:08:57,365
They were a little bit more, but they were worth waiting

1407
01:08:57,425 --> 01:08:58,605
for and worth saving up for

1408
01:08:58,785 --> 01:09:01,325
To really kind of justify the nine pound 99

1409
01:09:01,325 --> 01:09:02,445
that these games were selling for.

1410
01:09:03,925 --> 01:09:05,465
You really got to kind of up your game,

1411
01:09:05,465 --> 01:09:07,145
kinda the beautiful artwork on Night Law

1412
01:09:07,145 --> 01:09:08,505
and Alien eight, et cetera,

1413
01:09:08,805 --> 01:09:11,545
and the kind of expensive looking black box.

1414
01:09:11,925 --> 01:09:13,105
Is this something you wanted to own

1415
01:09:13,205 --> 01:09:14,785
and touch as well as the game itself?

1416
01:09:14,895 --> 01:09:15,785
Plus as well as that

1417
01:09:15,785 --> 01:09:16,945
you knew you were buying a quality game?

1418
01:09:17,185 --> 01:09:18,105
'cause it's ultimate play. The Game

1419
01:09:23,115 --> 01:09:24,985
Night law was an amazing game

1420
01:09:24,985 --> 01:09:28,265
because it suddenly brought cartoon style graphics

1421
01:09:28,605 --> 01:09:31,065
to the spectrum and also in another dimension as well.

1422
01:09:31,145 --> 01:09:32,545
I know Antech had already done it,

1423
01:09:32,605 --> 01:09:34,105
but this was on a different level.

1424
01:09:34,135 --> 01:09:36,105
This was, I think some people compared it

1425
01:09:36,105 --> 01:09:37,465
to a Disney cartoon back then,

1426
01:09:37,465 --> 01:09:39,025
which maybe might have been a bit fanciful,

1427
01:09:39,085 --> 01:09:40,825
but it did really look that good.

1428
01:09:40,845 --> 01:09:42,505
It was a completely different type of game.

1429
01:09:42,765 --> 01:09:45,105
By the time I got a Spectrum, which was about a year

1430
01:09:45,105 --> 01:09:46,665
after night, Laura had come out, a lot

1431
01:09:46,665 --> 01:09:49,385
of other people had worked out how Night Law worked

1432
01:09:49,765 --> 01:09:51,545
and they'd done a lot of similar games.

1433
01:09:51,885 --> 01:09:53,625
So as usual, there were a lot of games

1434
01:09:53,625 --> 01:09:54,745
that were very similar to that

1435
01:09:54,805 --> 01:09:56,705
and a lot of clones of night law.

1436
01:09:57,005 --> 01:09:59,985
But it stands out as the original and also the best

1437
01:09:59,985 --> 01:10:01,825
because it was the game that basically created

1438
01:10:01,825 --> 01:10:03,425
that whole style of gameplay. People

1439
01:10:03,445 --> 01:10:05,785
Who started making games

1440
01:10:05,885 --> 01:10:07,945
and experimenting with the hardware

1441
01:10:07,945 --> 01:10:11,185
that then became available, like the ZX spectrum, you know,

1442
01:10:11,185 --> 01:10:13,505
you were always trying to do something a bit more

1443
01:10:13,825 --> 01:10:15,425
interesting and trying to push the boundaries

1444
01:10:15,445 --> 01:10:17,745
and that is what characterizes the video

1445
01:10:17,745 --> 01:10:19,145
games industry even today.

1446
01:10:19,445 --> 01:10:21,305
So always sort of pushing on those different ways

1447
01:10:21,305 --> 01:10:23,665
of telling stories or different ways of having fun. That's

1448
01:10:23,665 --> 01:10:27,465
Why we had such a wave of creative games in the eighties,

1449
01:10:27,465 --> 01:10:30,425
which probably haven't seen since some of these games were,

1450
01:10:30,805 --> 01:10:32,105
if you had them now, they would be

1451
01:10:32,105 --> 01:10:33,305
groundbreaking at the time.

1452
01:10:33,765 --> 01:10:36,545
It just meant an entirely new world was opened up.

1453
01:10:47,355 --> 01:10:48,825
Manic Minor when that came out.

1454
01:10:48,825 --> 01:10:51,305
Definitely felt like a level ahead of a lot

1455
01:10:51,305 --> 01:10:53,105
of the other games that had come out the spectrum.

1456
01:10:53,505 --> 01:10:56,305
I mean, it wasn't quite inspired by minor 2049

1457
01:10:56,305 --> 01:10:58,225
or a game that Matthew Smith really loved.

1458
01:10:58,285 --> 01:11:00,345
But the way that the game was created,

1459
01:11:00,845 --> 01:11:03,225
it was created in a way to appeal to everybody.

1460
01:11:03,565 --> 01:11:08,105
The reason I find manic miner being such a classic is the

1461
01:11:08,105 --> 01:11:09,745
fact that you are always in peril.

1462
01:11:10,205 --> 01:11:11,585
All the bodies are on screen at once

1463
01:11:11,805 --> 01:11:13,990
and there's about eight of them on most screens.

1464
01:11:14,425 --> 01:11:18,445
So in that little bit of screen real estate, there's peril.

1465
01:11:18,475 --> 01:11:19,805
Like at every point.

1466
01:11:19,955 --> 01:11:21,445
Manning Miner was a genius game.

1467
01:11:21,445 --> 01:11:22,685
Matthew Smith was a legend.

1468
01:11:23,295 --> 01:11:26,125
First level, the perfect entry into any platform game.

1469
01:11:26,335 --> 01:11:27,125
First of all, when you

1470
01:11:27,125 --> 01:11:28,165
played it, you didn't know what you were doing.

1471
01:11:28,165 --> 01:11:29,525
It was a very, very hard level.

1472
01:11:29,625 --> 01:11:31,005
But then eventually you knew where to jump.

1473
01:11:31,385 --> 01:11:33,965
You knew where the floors that collapse were,

1474
01:11:34,225 --> 01:11:36,125
and you could eventually work your way to the top,

1475
01:11:36,125 --> 01:11:38,165
pick up the item, go back down

1476
01:11:38,165 --> 01:11:39,645
to the bottom, get to the next level.

1477
01:11:39,675 --> 01:11:41,245
What it really did well, it kind

1478
01:11:41,245 --> 01:11:42,525
of prepared you for the rest of the game.

1479
01:11:43,015 --> 01:11:45,925
Manic Minor was, you know, probably the the one first game

1480
01:11:45,925 --> 01:11:47,445
that really got me

1481
01:11:47,705 --> 01:11:48,765
and we played it,

1482
01:11:48,965 --> 01:11:51,405
I can't remember like an all summer holiday, you know,

1483
01:11:51,405 --> 01:11:54,645
forever a mother Shane up the stairs, get down, get outside.

1484
01:11:55,365 --> 01:11:57,285
I was like, where your other, including guns.

1485
01:11:58,825 --> 01:12:00,205
For me, I think one of the best games

1486
01:12:00,205 --> 01:12:02,205
of all time is Jetset Willie by Matthew Smith,

1487
01:12:02,345 --> 01:12:04,645
who made the original manic minor, Jetset Willie expanded.

1488
01:12:05,015 --> 01:12:07,605
There was a lot more rooms you could go up down.

1489
01:12:07,665 --> 01:12:09,045
You could change rooms rather than being

1490
01:12:09,045 --> 01:12:11,325
stuck in one room all the time. It was impossibly hard.

1491
01:12:11,975 --> 01:12:13,685
Jesse Willy was the big one, wasn't it?

1492
01:12:13,765 --> 01:12:15,165
A seminal platform game.

1493
01:12:15,355 --> 01:12:18,605
What those platform games did was take the page turning

1494
01:12:18,605 --> 01:12:21,325
element of an adventure, which was obviously my big thing.

1495
01:12:21,325 --> 01:12:23,525
Like what happens next? I get through to the next stage

1496
01:12:23,955 --> 01:12:26,005
with the more basic arcade element.

1497
01:12:26,325 --> 01:12:28,045
I mean, crikey, I played that for hours

1498
01:12:28,145 --> 01:12:29,605
and tried all the pokes as well.

1499
01:12:29,625 --> 01:12:32,125
The little pokes you'd used to do, 'cause it had a bug in

1500
01:12:32,125 --> 01:12:33,125
It. Ingested was a

1501
01:12:33,125 --> 01:12:34,805
very well known bug called the Attic Bug.

1502
01:12:35,065 --> 01:12:37,005
And basically if you entered the attic room,

1503
01:12:37,465 --> 01:12:39,565
it would corrupt many other screens in the game.

1504
01:12:39,985 --> 01:12:42,005
So if you hadn't collected the things you had

1505
01:12:42,005 --> 01:12:43,405
to collect from those screens, the game

1506
01:12:43,405 --> 01:12:44,565
became un completable.

1507
01:12:44,915 --> 01:12:47,485
Also, there was a infinite death routine, a thing

1508
01:12:47,485 --> 01:12:49,205
where if you stepped off a ledge,

1509
01:12:49,265 --> 01:12:50,285
you would fall down a screen

1510
01:12:50,285 --> 01:12:52,125
and then when you died, you would go back to the top

1511
01:12:52,125 --> 01:12:53,645
of the screen and fall down and down

1512
01:12:53,665 --> 01:12:55,045
and down again and lose all your lives.

1513
01:12:55,585 --> 01:12:57,485
So basically the game was incredibly hard,

1514
01:13:02,945 --> 01:13:03,945
Really. It gave

1515
01:13:03,945 --> 01:13:07,485
the tools of production to the hands of millions

1516
01:13:07,665 --> 01:13:09,165
and you made your own fun

1517
01:13:09,505 --> 01:13:12,365
and it enabled you to kind of get your head around, okay,

1518
01:13:12,365 --> 01:13:14,005
well this is a set of instructions

1519
01:13:14,005 --> 01:13:15,125
that I need to give this machine.

1520
01:13:15,175 --> 01:13:18,645
Let's see what I can do. It just fed that curiosity again,

1521
01:13:18,645 --> 01:13:20,525
that creativity, that creative spark,

1522
01:13:20,705 --> 01:13:21,845
that's what drives innovation.

1523
01:13:21,845 --> 01:13:24,965
It's what drives curiosity and creativity. There

1524
01:13:24,965 --> 01:13:27,525
Was a massive variation in the type of games we had.

1525
01:13:27,585 --> 01:13:31,165
So instead of one company making 10 games that everyone had

1526
01:13:31,165 --> 01:13:33,165
to play, there was so many different things,

1527
01:13:33,305 --> 01:13:34,605
it appealed to so many different people.

1528
01:13:34,865 --> 01:13:36,285
So someone who likes football games

1529
01:13:36,545 --> 01:13:38,045
or football would like football games.

1530
01:13:39,125 --> 01:13:41,445
Somebody who likes maths might like a puzzle game.

1531
01:13:42,265 --> 01:13:44,005
So it cater for everyone.

1532
01:13:44,455 --> 01:13:47,805
Other computers have as well, but this was cheap.

1533
01:13:47,945 --> 01:13:51,085
It was in everyone's houses, it was color. It's beautiful.

1534
01:13:53,865 --> 01:13:58,205
The spectrum for me opened my eyes to art in computer games.

1535
01:13:58,645 --> 01:14:00,325
I found it fantastic and amazing.

1536
01:14:00,545 --> 01:14:02,205
The color, the things you could do on screen,

1537
01:14:02,385 --> 01:14:04,005
it was really basic at the time and,

1538
01:14:04,025 --> 01:14:06,685
and the way the colors worked on the spectrum meant you

1539
01:14:06,685 --> 01:14:08,605
couldn't have individual colors or individual colored

1540
01:14:08,625 --> 01:14:11,005
pixels, but it kind of almost made it like a challenge

1541
01:14:11,185 --> 01:14:13,925
to create things that did work within those boundaries.

1542
01:14:14,305 --> 01:14:16,765
So if you've got two colors moving in front of each other,

1543
01:14:16,955 --> 01:14:20,405
then you could still only have those two colors on one

1544
01:14:20,405 --> 01:14:22,565
square, where really you should have three,

1545
01:14:22,905 --> 01:14:24,245
but that is impossible.

1546
01:14:24,505 --> 01:14:27,485
So you'd have all these, uh, graphics changing color

1547
01:14:28,025 --> 01:14:30,005
and taking on the color of the background.

1548
01:14:30,665 --> 01:14:31,965
Um, but we just got used to it.

1549
01:14:32,065 --> 01:14:33,285
It wasn't, it wasn't that bad.

1550
01:14:33,465 --> 01:14:36,125
You couldn't do graphics on the spectrum without knowing how

1551
01:14:36,125 --> 01:14:37,525
to work around tribute clash.

1552
01:14:37,705 --> 01:14:40,965
It started the great video games C Crash I never even knew

1553
01:14:40,965 --> 01:14:43,125
about until I watched YouTube five years ago.

1554
01:14:43,385 --> 01:14:45,925
But I'm telling you what color clash really

1555
01:14:46,115 --> 01:14:47,525
what I don't know what you're talking about.

1556
01:14:48,545 --> 01:14:49,645
And, and I don't care.

1557
01:14:50,365 --> 01:14:52,565
I mean, I was just discovering girls break

1558
01:14:52,565 --> 01:14:54,565
dancing and computer games.

1559
01:14:54,785 --> 01:14:56,605
Do you think I'm gonna care about a color clash?

1560
01:14:57,075 --> 01:14:59,725
This is awesome. It was my opportunity to do

1561
01:14:59,725 --> 01:15:01,965
what I couldn't afford to continue to do in the arcade.

1562
01:15:02,245 --> 01:15:03,805
I could spend all day and all night doing this

1563
01:15:04,175 --> 01:15:05,445
color clash be damned.

1564
01:15:10,305 --> 01:15:12,245
The amount of games that we used to get

1565
01:15:12,245 --> 01:15:13,525
through was just incredible.

1566
01:15:13,535 --> 01:15:15,685
There were so many that we played for five minutes,

1567
01:15:15,915 --> 01:15:18,325
some we played for hours, some we played for days

1568
01:15:18,325 --> 01:15:19,645
and days and days and days and days.

1569
01:15:19,735 --> 01:15:21,685
There was a whole genre around that time

1570
01:15:21,705 --> 01:15:25,485
of things like Jet Set, Willy Manic, minor Monte on the Run

1571
01:15:25,635 --> 01:15:27,405
that were just so good at gameplay.

1572
01:15:27,405 --> 01:15:29,525
They had so much in them, so much

1573
01:15:29,525 --> 01:15:31,085
to look at while you're playing as well

1574
01:15:31,225 --> 01:15:33,245
and could be so frustrating to just get

1575
01:15:33,245 --> 01:15:34,885
that jump pixel perfect

1576
01:15:35,735 --> 01:15:36,735
Daily. Thompson's

1577
01:15:36,735 --> 01:15:38,805
good at track and field daily.

1578
01:15:39,165 --> 01:15:41,525
Thompson's good at track and field daily.

1579
01:15:41,925 --> 01:15:43,925
Thompson's good at track and field daily.

1580
01:15:44,205 --> 01:15:46,245
Thompson's good at track and field, everybody.

1581
01:15:46,245 --> 01:15:49,565
Come on just me then. Yeah, and that's a real thing.

1582
01:15:49,565 --> 01:15:50,965
And I remember that from the playground.

1583
01:15:51,095 --> 01:15:53,205
Daily Thompson's decathlon to me,

1584
01:15:53,725 --> 01:15:56,165
I was a massive athletics fan as well.

1585
01:15:56,625 --> 01:16:00,005
So Daily Thompson was a bit of a hero of mine.

1586
01:16:00,105 --> 01:16:02,485
So when, when there's a game of your hero,

1587
01:16:02,915 --> 01:16:04,405
it's always quite nice Daily

1588
01:16:04,685 --> 01:16:07,565
Thompson's decathlon, that finger bashing exercise

1589
01:16:07,565 --> 01:16:11,005
and that pixel perfect jump to get the long jump right

1590
01:16:11,065 --> 01:16:12,845
or throw the javelin at the right point.

1591
01:16:13,075 --> 01:16:17,125
Fantastic games that that, that really did grab you and, and

1592
01:16:17,125 --> 01:16:18,925
and, and keep your attention for hours.

1593
01:16:19,345 --> 01:16:22,245
One of the most amazing games I ever played was Antech.

1594
01:16:22,425 --> 01:16:23,645
In the early days of the spectrum.

1595
01:16:23,815 --> 01:16:25,725
First of all, I was completely stunned.

1596
01:16:26,325 --> 01:16:28,645
I remember unloading it up where you were given the choice

1597
01:16:28,665 --> 01:16:30,245
of either playing a boy or a girl.

1598
01:16:30,475 --> 01:16:33,365
Obviously these days we we're kind of used to that sort

1599
01:16:33,365 --> 01:16:35,605
of thing, but it was very unusual back in 1983.

1600
01:16:35,865 --> 01:16:38,765
And then you had this really creepy city,

1601
01:16:38,895 --> 01:16:41,525
which is very evocatively shown on the cover,

1602
01:16:41,625 --> 01:16:43,005
and it's full of these giant ants

1603
01:16:43,075 --> 01:16:44,765
Looking at other games that are around,

1604
01:16:44,965 --> 01:16:46,565
I I I really hated things

1605
01:16:46,715 --> 01:16:49,005
that appeared on screen that didn't do anything.

1606
01:16:49,005 --> 01:16:50,165
They were like decoration.

1607
01:16:50,465 --> 01:16:54,085
So I kind of wrote a, a consistent little universe

1608
01:16:54,775 --> 01:16:58,405
where if you could see it, it was there and really worked.

1609
01:16:58,505 --> 01:17:00,005
If it was there, you could climb on it.

1610
01:17:00,095 --> 01:17:01,605
There was no decoration in that.

1611
01:17:01,665 --> 01:17:03,925
It was like a complete little universe

1612
01:17:03,995 --> 01:17:06,645
with a miniature version of physics. So

1613
01:17:06,745 --> 01:17:08,765
Antech was the first isometric game I saw.

1614
01:17:09,125 --> 01:17:10,445
I remember that vividly

1615
01:17:10,675 --> 01:17:15,005
because I found it super confusing when you could rotate the

1616
01:17:15,005 --> 01:17:18,205
camera and you had to, to see things from the other angle

1617
01:17:18,205 --> 01:17:20,285
because the ants could be coming from anywhere.

1618
01:17:20,455 --> 01:17:23,645
Characters were behind things because that never happened

1619
01:17:23,645 --> 01:17:25,485
before with any other game that I knew of.

1620
01:17:25,585 --> 01:17:27,805
And you have to avoid these giant ants

1621
01:17:27,805 --> 01:17:30,045
that are stalking you at every term while you're trying

1622
01:17:30,045 --> 01:17:31,445
to find the boy or the girl.

1623
01:17:31,585 --> 01:17:33,645
So for its time, it's an amazing game

1624
01:17:33,825 --> 01:17:35,365
and I think, I think, yeah, it's,

1625
01:17:35,395 --> 01:17:37,165
it's quite rightly revered today as well.

1626
01:17:40,035 --> 01:17:43,335
One of the games I left a big imprint on me was saboteur.

1627
01:17:43,555 --> 01:17:45,095
And the main reason for that,

1628
01:17:45,195 --> 01:17:47,695
it was the first time I saw environmental

1629
01:17:47,695 --> 01:17:49,415
storytelling in action.

1630
01:17:49,675 --> 01:17:52,255
If you remember, the spectrum was a lot about text.

1631
01:17:52,255 --> 01:17:54,095
Adventure games were very descriptive.

1632
01:17:54,195 --> 01:17:56,495
You will be someone telling you where you are,

1633
01:17:56,915 --> 01:17:58,415
why you're there, where do you want

1634
01:17:58,415 --> 01:17:59,975
to go now, or you have arcade games.

1635
01:18:00,115 --> 01:18:04,135
But Aire was about telling a story without actually

1636
01:18:04,135 --> 01:18:05,175
saying out loud.

1637
01:18:05,515 --> 01:18:07,015
You are certainly up for no good

1638
01:18:07,015 --> 01:18:09,295
because you are getting into a company in the middle

1639
01:18:09,315 --> 01:18:11,295
of the night using a dinghy.

1640
01:18:11,675 --> 01:18:14,775
And then once you are in there, you are killing guards and,

1641
01:18:14,775 --> 01:18:16,015
and there are these dogs around.

1642
01:18:16,075 --> 01:18:18,975
And then you figure out this is an underground facility

1643
01:18:18,975 --> 01:18:21,695
because there is a a, a tube system going from A to B.

1644
01:18:21,715 --> 01:18:24,335
So all these things start to play with my mind.

1645
01:18:24,595 --> 01:18:27,495
And I was building a story of why I was there,

1646
01:18:27,795 --> 01:18:30,615
and that told me so much about game design

1647
01:18:30,955 --> 01:18:34,655
and how to make people get sucked into a universe.

1648
01:18:35,435 --> 01:18:37,805
This is why I hold saboteur in such high esteem.

1649
01:18:38,475 --> 01:18:41,365
Your mission in saboteur is to break into a building,

1650
01:18:41,675 --> 01:18:44,605
find a disc, plant a bomb, and then escape by helicopter.

1651
01:18:44,865 --> 01:18:46,685
If you read the instructions, you'd know that,

1652
01:18:46,745 --> 01:18:47,845
but no one reads the instructions.

1653
01:18:47,845 --> 01:18:49,165
They'll get pirate copies of their friends.

1654
01:18:49,225 --> 01:18:51,125
The number of people who said, oh, it's really easy,

1655
01:18:51,125 --> 01:18:54,405
you just go to the helicopter and, oh, I, I only had a copy.

1656
01:18:54,565 --> 01:18:55,605
I didn't read the instructions.

1657
01:18:56,025 --> 01:18:57,645
One of the things I should have done is say,

1658
01:18:57,985 --> 01:18:59,765
you have failed your mission if you just go

1659
01:18:59,765 --> 01:19:01,885
to the helicopter, but I didn't.

1660
01:19:02,145 --> 01:19:04,965
It says mission successful and it shouldn't. It's a bug.

1661
01:19:05,265 --> 01:19:07,925
The spectrum had a very high resolution for the time.

1662
01:19:08,165 --> 01:19:09,645
I don't think any other computer had

1663
01:19:09,645 --> 01:19:10,885
as high resolution as a spectrum.

1664
01:19:11,305 --> 01:19:14,325
So it did mean that in the hands of talented artists,

1665
01:19:14,705 --> 01:19:17,205
you had some amazing pictures on the spectrum

1666
01:19:17,345 --> 01:19:20,365
and graphics, most notably loading screens,

1667
01:19:20,365 --> 01:19:22,085
which have become an art form in themselves.

1668
01:19:22,265 --> 01:19:23,805
And you had to watch these

1669
01:19:23,865 --> 01:19:25,525
for several minutes while the game loaded

1670
01:19:25,785 --> 01:19:28,085
and the artists often went to town on them

1671
01:19:28,085 --> 01:19:29,885
and made sure that these were absolutely brilliant.

1672
01:19:29,885 --> 01:19:30,885
These loading screens,

1673
01:19:43,435 --> 01:19:45,605
Well a loading screen would be for someone

1674
01:19:45,625 --> 01:19:47,285
to watch while the game loaded.

1675
01:19:47,505 --> 01:19:49,165
If you loaded a game without a loading screen,

1676
01:19:49,165 --> 01:19:50,605
you're sitting there staring at a black

1677
01:19:50,705 --> 01:19:52,285
screen for five minutes.

1678
01:19:52,825 --> 01:19:54,725
And even though it did add to the loading time,

1679
01:19:55,145 --> 01:19:56,165
it was part of the package.

1680
01:19:56,305 --> 01:19:58,885
Uh, I always try to base my loading screens on the artwork,

1681
01:19:58,985 --> 01:20:00,645
so I'd interpret the artwork

1682
01:20:00,665 --> 01:20:02,565
of the game on the screen of the spectrum.

1683
01:20:03,105 --> 01:20:05,165
So I always think it was just like a little bit

1684
01:20:05,165 --> 01:20:07,330
of extra detail that didn't have to be there,

1685
01:20:07,625 --> 01:20:09,805
but gave you just something to look at.

1686
01:20:09,825 --> 01:20:12,125
And so something that looked pretty while you waited

1687
01:20:12,265 --> 01:20:14,005
for three or four minutes for the game load.

1688
01:20:14,785 --> 01:20:17,085
Now what happened with me, I was still at school at the

1689
01:20:17,085 --> 01:20:20,365
time and an early sort

1690
01:20:20,365 --> 01:20:22,125
of proper video game developer in

1691
01:20:22,125 --> 01:20:23,365
Manchester Co binary design.

1692
01:20:24,085 --> 01:20:26,485
I came in work experience for a week

1693
01:20:26,985 --> 01:20:29,845
and now as I could draw graphics a little bit, they said,

1694
01:20:29,845 --> 01:20:32,565
oh, draw a loading screen for this game.

1695
01:20:32,985 --> 01:20:36,285
So I sat down and sat on the spectrum, plug it away,

1696
01:20:36,285 --> 01:20:39,645
drew a loading speed, and he said, oh, that's quite good

1697
01:20:39,645 --> 01:20:42,085
that, um, this is like Wednesday now.

1698
01:20:42,305 --> 01:20:43,965
You ate till five. Could you do another one?

1699
01:20:44,085 --> 01:20:45,165
We've got this other guy. Could

1700
01:20:45,165 --> 01:20:46,205
you do a loading screen for that?

1701
01:20:46,315 --> 01:20:48,765
Yeah, okay, got to Friday.

1702
01:20:50,375 --> 01:20:52,115
Do you think you could stay for another week?

1703
01:20:52,285 --> 01:20:53,755
We've got a load of loading screens.

1704
01:20:53,775 --> 01:20:55,355
And I said, well, I'll ask my mom,

1705
01:20:55,495 --> 01:20:56,755
you know, follow the school up.

1706
01:20:57,175 --> 01:21:00,955
Stayed for for two weeks. I just did loads of graphics.

1707
01:21:01,625 --> 01:21:03,675
Some of the loading screens were beautiful art,

1708
01:21:03,785 --> 01:21:05,035
like, like the covers of crash.

1709
01:21:05,195 --> 01:21:07,715
A loading screen would come up, which served no purpose

1710
01:21:08,335 --> 01:21:11,915
at all except the aesthetic pleasure in the six minute

1711
01:21:11,935 --> 01:21:13,395
or seven minute pause waiting

1712
01:21:13,415 --> 01:21:14,835
for the actual game to kick in.

1713
01:21:15,215 --> 01:21:16,875
And again, it was on your telly

1714
01:21:16,875 --> 01:21:20,355
and you'd put it there, you'd put it on your telly and

1715
01:21:20,355 --> 01:21:21,515
and there it wasn't glorious

1716
01:21:21,515 --> 01:21:23,395
technicolor winking back at you.

1717
01:21:23,415 --> 01:21:25,755
It was, it was like nothing else before or sins.

1718
01:21:32,915 --> 01:21:35,995
Magazines were an easy way of finding an echo chamber

1719
01:21:36,335 --> 01:21:37,515
for people that were like-minded

1720
01:21:37,935 --> 01:21:41,315
and to find out what you should be saving for, maybe how

1721
01:21:41,315 --> 01:21:42,675
to complete a particular game

1722
01:21:42,695 --> 01:21:44,355
or cheat codes, that sort of stuff.

1723
01:21:44,385 --> 01:21:46,355
They had a role to play that well.

1724
01:21:46,355 --> 01:21:47,675
It was impossible to ignore.

1725
01:21:47,885 --> 01:21:50,515
There was a real kind of window shopping thing as well,

1726
01:21:50,645 --> 01:21:52,675
being able to understand what was coming,

1727
01:21:52,675 --> 01:21:54,075
when it was gonna be available, how much it was

1728
01:21:54,415 --> 01:21:55,715
to fantasize about having

1729
01:21:55,715 --> 01:21:57,075
that put it on your Christmas list,

1730
01:21:57,095 --> 01:21:58,435
on your birthday list, whatever.

1731
01:21:59,035 --> 01:22:00,075
Magazines were the only way of doing that.

1732
01:22:00,185 --> 01:22:02,835
They were almost sort of like game of porn, weren't they?

1733
01:22:02,835 --> 01:22:04,835
They, they were so necessary.

1734
01:22:05,115 --> 01:22:08,035
I relied on those magazines as my lifeblood

1735
01:22:08,035 --> 01:22:09,275
to teach me some techniques

1736
01:22:09,275 --> 01:22:13,155
that I wasn't gonna pick up on my own, your computer crash.

1737
01:22:13,655 --> 01:22:16,195
And also to some extent personal computer world.

1738
01:22:16,195 --> 01:22:18,435
They were doing some game reviews quite early on

1739
01:22:18,575 --> 01:22:21,315
and they were small pieces, but they were important

1740
01:22:21,815 --> 01:22:22,815
For me. The amazement

1741
01:22:22,815 --> 01:22:24,115
I got from looking at magazines

1742
01:22:24,115 --> 01:22:25,235
and looking at all the graphics

1743
01:22:25,335 --> 01:22:27,195
and all the ideas that people were coming up

1744
01:22:27,195 --> 01:22:29,155
with was the thing that I looked at back then.

1745
01:22:29,155 --> 01:22:31,875
And even today I'll be drawn to a game on how it looks,

1746
01:22:32,255 --> 01:22:33,595
not necessarily how it plays.

1747
01:22:34,025 --> 01:22:35,995
Getting one of these magazines once a month.

1748
01:22:36,065 --> 01:22:38,675
That was our gateway to find out what was happening.

1749
01:22:38,745 --> 01:22:40,155
They shared lots of tips as well.

1750
01:22:40,175 --> 01:22:41,995
You could write in, you could ask them how

1751
01:22:41,995 --> 01:22:43,235
to expand your spectrum.

1752
01:22:43,415 --> 01:22:45,755
You could ask them what upgrades to get, how

1753
01:22:45,755 --> 01:22:47,035
to plug a joystick in.

1754
01:22:47,035 --> 01:22:48,915
And that was crucial for spreading

1755
01:22:48,915 --> 01:22:50,555
knowledge to the user base.

1756
01:22:50,895 --> 01:22:53,235
And they expanded that into the letters pages.

1757
01:22:53,375 --> 01:22:55,395
So we would write letters. You couldn't go on the internet

1758
01:22:55,395 --> 01:22:56,755
and write a comment on anything.

1759
01:22:56,755 --> 01:22:58,475
You had to write an actual letter

1760
01:22:59,055 --> 01:23:01,595
and send it off to Lloyd Mangram at crash.

1761
01:23:01,735 --> 01:23:03,755
And he would reply in some pithy manner.

1762
01:23:04,205 --> 01:23:06,725
There was a regular feature in Sinclair user

1763
01:23:06,775 --> 01:23:08,325
where people would send in a list

1764
01:23:08,325 --> 01:23:10,005
of all the adventures they'd completed

1765
01:23:10,145 --> 01:23:11,725
and people would solve your problems for you.

1766
01:23:11,745 --> 01:23:14,125
And I called myself the Perlin goblin

1767
01:23:14,465 --> 01:23:16,565
and a list of adventure games that I'd solved

1768
01:23:17,185 --> 01:23:18,845
and you had to send me 20 pence

1769
01:23:18,955 --> 01:23:20,245
with a stamps addressed envelope

1770
01:23:20,245 --> 01:23:22,885
and I would send back a solution by return of posting.

1771
01:23:23,025 --> 01:23:25,645
So the magazines gave you this sense of being part

1772
01:23:25,645 --> 01:23:27,045
of a much broader community.

1773
01:23:27,345 --> 01:23:29,525
It felt like you were at the frontier of something

1774
01:23:29,545 --> 01:23:32,205
and you were in a way, you were the first generation ever

1775
01:23:32,225 --> 01:23:33,805
to be doing this kind of thing

1776
01:23:33,825 --> 01:23:36,205
and interacting with technology in this kind of way.

1777
01:23:36,205 --> 01:23:37,965
And the magazines almost had a kind

1778
01:23:37,965 --> 01:23:40,125
of a uniting theme to them.

1779
01:23:40,545 --> 01:23:42,685
And I remember inhaling them,

1780
01:23:42,805 --> 01:23:44,365
I remember reading them cover to cover

1781
01:23:45,055 --> 01:23:48,765
Quite a few, um, magazines, computer and video games,

1782
01:23:48,785 --> 01:23:51,125
and a few others had art tools about me.

1783
01:23:51,325 --> 01:23:54,405
I remember one about sto the gist of the article was

1784
01:23:54,405 --> 01:23:57,045
that there was this guy from used to be a seeding fixer

1785
01:23:57,265 --> 01:23:58,445
and now he's running games

1786
01:23:59,155 --> 01:24:01,805
with sophisticated ai Bingo trick.

1787
01:24:01,805 --> 01:24:02,805
Yeah,

1788
01:24:03,435 --> 01:24:06,765
Well it's fantastic fun for a start off to do an interview

1789
01:24:06,785 --> 01:24:08,925
and then see, oh, I did an interview

1790
01:24:08,925 --> 01:24:10,845
and then, you know, the first time you do that, it's like,

1791
01:24:10,845 --> 01:24:12,165
there's me in a magazine.

1792
01:24:12,265 --> 01:24:15,165
Hey mom, look here I am. You know, it was always pleasant.

1793
01:24:15,365 --> 01:24:17,765
I don't think I read a bad review or anything like that.

1794
01:24:20,445 --> 01:24:22,685
I spotted something that looked a bit wilder,

1795
01:24:22,745 --> 01:24:25,125
had this incredible bright, colorful,

1796
01:24:25,255 --> 01:24:27,365
crazy fantasy almost cover

1797
01:24:27,905 --> 01:24:29,925
and it was just called being Bold crash.

1798
01:24:30,825 --> 01:24:35,205
And suddenly I found a spiritual home from me

1799
01:24:35,305 --> 01:24:39,205
and my spectrum in a magazine that celebrated games

1800
01:24:39,225 --> 01:24:40,325
and brought them to life.

1801
01:24:40,825 --> 01:24:44,165
And the interesting thing was that was I think probably the,

1802
01:24:44,225 --> 01:24:46,085
the genius that Roger

1803
01:24:46,185 --> 01:24:49,565
and Ollie had then in that they actually got teenagers in

1804
01:24:49,565 --> 01:24:51,725
after school to play those games

1805
01:24:51,825 --> 01:24:52,885
and give them their comments.

1806
01:24:52,985 --> 01:24:54,285
But you had this injection of

1807
01:24:54,395 --> 01:24:56,885
what people your age actually thought.

1808
01:24:57,425 --> 01:25:00,925
So it talked absolutely directly to the audience

1809
01:25:00,925 --> 01:25:02,525
and it made it so different to everything else.

1810
01:25:03,225 --> 01:25:04,725
But we were also a very small unit.

1811
01:25:04,755 --> 01:25:09,685
It's only me, Oliver, Franco, Matthew Del. And that was it.

1812
01:25:10,205 --> 01:25:12,885
Handling 15 to 20, 14

1813
01:25:12,945 --> 01:25:15,485
to 16 year old school boys as the reviewers.

1814
01:25:15,745 --> 01:25:17,125
It would've been very difficult for us

1815
01:25:17,185 --> 01:25:20,125
to have taken on a multi-format magazine at the time.

1816
01:25:20,505 --> 01:25:22,805
We were aware that the spectrum was doing well.

1817
01:25:22,865 --> 01:25:25,285
It was definitely establishing a, a good sales base.

1818
01:25:25,385 --> 01:25:26,645
So it was all we cared about

1819
01:25:26,655 --> 01:25:28,565
until the 64 came along. They could

1820
01:25:28,565 --> 01:25:29,885
Quite easily make or break a game.

1821
01:25:30,025 --> 01:25:31,525
You had to play the game with them

1822
01:25:31,585 --> 01:25:33,445
and make sure they had early shots

1823
01:25:33,545 --> 01:25:34,925
of the games you were developing.

1824
01:25:35,025 --> 01:25:36,805
You got them involved as much as you could.

1825
01:25:37,105 --> 01:25:38,605
And yeah, it was part of it.

1826
01:25:38,605 --> 01:25:40,445
We got to know these people very well.

1827
01:25:40,745 --> 01:25:42,085
As soon as Saboteur was on sale,

1828
01:25:42,135 --> 01:25:43,725
there was no feedback, there's no internet.

1829
01:25:43,835 --> 01:25:46,165
Gradually people started to write in saying,

1830
01:25:46,185 --> 01:25:48,645
we love your game and Crash loved it as well.

1831
01:25:49,105 --> 01:25:53,205
So the reviews were the main feedback at the time.

1832
01:25:53,625 --> 01:25:55,405
And the great thing about Newsfield,

1833
01:25:55,465 --> 01:25:56,925
it was like a big family.

1834
01:25:57,135 --> 01:25:59,525
Roger Ley took the business very seriously

1835
01:25:59,525 --> 01:26:01,285
of making very good magazines.

1836
01:26:01,285 --> 01:26:03,405
That's what they were super bash at at in terms of

1837
01:26:03,405 --> 01:26:04,845
what it was covering and what it was doing

1838
01:26:04,865 --> 01:26:06,085
and how it was speaking to its

1839
01:26:06,285 --> 01:26:07,285
Audience. And the cover

1840
01:26:07,285 --> 01:26:08,645
had to reflect that it had

1841
01:26:08,645 --> 01:26:10,605
to attract the readership that we wanted.

1842
01:26:10,745 --> 01:26:13,325
And the only way to do that was to be as dramatic

1843
01:26:13,705 --> 01:26:17,085
and in a sense, realistic as possible to attract them.

1844
01:26:20,445 --> 01:26:24,845
I think art was terribly important to burgeoning video games

1845
01:26:25,445 --> 01:26:28,965
industry because given the fact that the, the actual pixels

1846
01:26:29,305 --> 01:26:31,365
and the moving sprites didn't live up

1847
01:26:31,385 --> 01:26:35,365
to whatever the game's title was at all, you needed art

1848
01:26:35,425 --> 01:26:38,445
to create the make-believe in the Player's

1849
01:26:38,445 --> 01:26:40,165
mind was the game.

1850
01:26:40,345 --> 01:26:44,165
So Little Blob here was actually Indiana Jones or whatever.

1851
01:26:44,805 --> 01:26:49,565
I think that governed my entire work with Crash.

1852
01:26:50,185 --> 01:26:51,805
You were sort of carried along on a wave

1853
01:26:52,075 --> 01:26:53,485
because the reviewers

1854
01:26:53,785 --> 01:26:57,285
and the readers who wrote in, they were all enthusiastic.

1855
01:26:57,345 --> 01:27:01,485
So you suddenly felt part of this exciting new thing.

1856
01:27:01,985 --> 01:27:03,325
And to me it was exciting

1857
01:27:03,325 --> 01:27:07,925
because I'd always wanted to make movies and I didn't.

1858
01:27:08,465 --> 01:27:11,685
But this felt a bit like that being part of

1859
01:27:12,205 --> 01:27:14,045
a whole new segment of entertainment

1860
01:27:22,245 --> 01:27:24,765
Spectrum was like a big bang really.

1861
01:27:25,065 --> 01:27:26,885
It really took off from every point

1862
01:27:26,885 --> 01:27:28,685
of view really from the number of games coming out,

1863
01:27:28,685 --> 01:27:30,165
the quality of those games coming out,

1864
01:27:30,345 --> 01:27:31,925
the companies that were getting started.

1865
01:27:32,145 --> 01:27:34,885
And those companies were smarter in terms of knowing about

1866
01:27:34,885 --> 01:27:36,565
how to get their games reviewed, wanting

1867
01:27:36,565 --> 01:27:38,765
to get their games reviewed, advertising

1868
01:27:38,765 --> 01:27:40,005
and marketing their games and

1869
01:27:40,005 --> 01:27:41,285
improving the quality of their games.

1870
01:27:41,465 --> 01:27:42,685
So it really was a big bang.

1871
01:27:49,385 --> 01:27:51,365
So of course you had people creating their own games,

1872
01:27:51,625 --> 01:27:55,165
but we didn't have the means of distribution as we have now.

1873
01:27:55,545 --> 01:27:56,765
Uh, because we didn't have the internet.

1874
01:27:56,945 --> 01:27:58,565
You had to actually physically put,

1875
01:27:58,785 --> 01:28:00,285
put games in people's hands

1876
01:28:00,545 --> 01:28:03,085
In the early days before you had the likes of WH Smith

1877
01:28:03,085 --> 01:28:04,245
and Boots taken on games,

1878
01:28:04,585 --> 01:28:07,005
you had these little tiny independent computer game shops

1879
01:28:07,025 --> 01:28:08,845
and they were just the only real way at the time.

1880
01:28:08,975 --> 01:28:11,125
Apart from mal order, we could go into a shop,

1881
01:28:11,555 --> 01:28:14,685
look at the game, get to know the guy who runs a shop,

1882
01:28:14,755 --> 01:28:16,125
play the games on the computers,

1883
01:28:16,465 --> 01:28:19,165
and really sort of get into the world. The

1884
01:28:19,365 --> 01:28:20,485
Computer shops would've godsend

1885
01:28:20,485 --> 01:28:24,045
because if it wasn't for the computer shops,

1886
01:28:24,165 --> 01:28:25,245
I wouldn't be in the games industry.

1887
01:28:25,305 --> 01:28:26,365
Now, when I went in

1888
01:28:26,365 --> 01:28:29,365
and said, do any computer companies commit into the shop?

1889
01:28:29,555 --> 01:28:31,525
Yeah, I said, can you get me a phone number?

1890
01:28:32,525 --> 01:28:34,525
I went in the next week and he got me a phone number

1891
01:28:34,585 --> 01:28:36,525
and phoned up, said, can I have an interview?

1892
01:28:36,545 --> 01:28:38,725
And basically I was working the next Monday

1893
01:28:39,155 --> 01:28:41,445
They did become beehives of activity.

1894
01:28:41,465 --> 01:28:44,005
Places like Just Micro in Sheffield,

1895
01:28:44,375 --> 01:28:46,525
which eventually became Gremlin just

1896
01:28:46,525 --> 01:28:47,645
Micro stood out to me.

1897
01:28:47,985 --> 01:28:50,005
It looked like a fun shop to be in.

1898
01:28:50,005 --> 01:28:51,125
They were interested in the games.

1899
01:28:51,125 --> 01:28:52,685
They would let me know what was coming out.

1900
01:28:52,685 --> 01:28:54,285
They would let me know what was good, what was

1901
01:28:54,305 --> 01:28:55,305
Bad. We spoke about,

1902
01:28:55,305 --> 01:28:56,405
you know, what it was he

1903
01:28:56,405 --> 01:28:57,485
was making, et cetera.

1904
01:28:57,665 --> 01:28:59,325
And it soon become apparent

1905
01:28:59,325 --> 01:29:01,820
that there was an opportunity there to use this talent

1906
01:29:01,820 --> 01:29:04,605
that was coming into the shop to start summing of our own.

1907
01:29:04,705 --> 01:29:06,285
As well as Pete coming into the shop.

1908
01:29:06,305 --> 01:29:08,965
We had, uh, Tony Crower coming into the shop.

1909
01:29:09,435 --> 01:29:11,445
He'd already been producing some games

1910
01:29:11,505 --> 01:29:13,085
for Alligator Software. I

1911
01:29:13,245 --> 01:29:14,685
Remember the shop quite well 'cause I used

1912
01:29:14,685 --> 01:29:17,045
to have a sat job selling computers just up the

1913
01:29:17,045 --> 01:29:18,085
road in another shop.

1914
01:29:18,145 --> 01:29:19,885
And I just used to go down to the shop

1915
01:29:20,025 --> 01:29:22,885
and load it up on their computers, see what people thought

1916
01:29:22,885 --> 01:29:24,725
of my games before they were released.

1917
01:29:24,785 --> 01:29:26,525
So it was quite fun for that 'cause it was

1918
01:29:26,525 --> 01:29:27,925
before the ages having qa.

1919
01:29:28,505 --> 01:29:31,365
So the QA was going into the shop and letting people play it

1920
01:29:31,365 --> 01:29:32,845
and see what they think or other,

1921
01:29:32,845 --> 01:29:35,045
it was me playing it, you know, how good it is. How did

1922
01:29:35,045 --> 01:29:37,085
We go about building Gremlin?

1923
01:29:37,425 --> 01:29:38,685
I'd already watched the,

1924
01:29:38,745 --> 01:29:40,765
the guys at Imagine Software in Liverpool

1925
01:29:40,865 --> 01:29:41,925
do exactly the same.

1926
01:29:41,945 --> 01:29:43,565
Matter of fact, a guy that used to work

1927
01:29:43,565 --> 01:29:44,765
for Alaska, it's the same as I did.

1928
01:29:44,765 --> 01:29:45,885
A chap called Mark Butler

1929
01:29:46,015 --> 01:29:48,845
where some other guys started Imagine Software.

1930
01:29:49,185 --> 01:29:51,805
And I think it was too good an opportunity to miss.

1931
01:29:51,905 --> 01:29:53,845
And then it was a case of convincing Pete

1932
01:29:53,845 --> 01:29:55,765
that he didn't need to go to university.

1933
01:29:55,915 --> 01:29:57,605
He'd be far better working with us

1934
01:29:57,985 --> 01:29:59,805
and creating computer games.

1935
01:30:00,185 --> 01:30:02,325
One day I went in and Ian Stewart was there

1936
01:30:02,325 --> 01:30:03,765
and he called me over and said, uh,

1937
01:30:03,945 --> 01:30:05,005
can you actually write games?

1938
01:30:05,255 --> 01:30:07,045
Don't know. I'm thinking about writing one.

1939
01:30:07,185 --> 01:30:08,365
And he gave me the idea

1940
01:30:08,465 --> 01:30:10,405
of we're wanting this character Monte Mo.

1941
01:30:10,465 --> 01:30:12,325
So Monte Moley is his, what he looks like.

1942
01:30:12,325 --> 01:30:13,325
He's, he's down to me

1943
01:30:13,325 --> 01:30:15,285
and my mother trying to decide what he should look like.

1944
01:30:15,525 --> 01:30:17,885
I think Pete would've started this when the minor strike

1945
01:30:17,985 --> 01:30:21,045
was first kicking off and Arthur Scargill

1946
01:30:21,045 --> 01:30:23,485
and obviously Sheffield right in the middle of everything,

1947
01:30:23,795 --> 01:30:27,405
just set my brain running as to what this game could be.

1948
01:30:27,585 --> 01:30:29,685
And I suppose we were a little bit brave putting, uh,

1949
01:30:29,905 --> 01:30:31,565
an effigy of Arthur Scargill

1950
01:30:31,565 --> 01:30:32,845
and the product to put, uh,

1951
01:30:32,945 --> 01:30:34,485
it seemed appropriate at the time

1952
01:30:34,745 --> 01:30:37,045
and it gained us an amazing amount

1953
01:30:37,045 --> 01:30:38,685
of coverage with Local Press.

1954
01:30:38,845 --> 01:30:41,085
I think we've got in total about 13 minutes

1955
01:30:41,185 --> 01:30:44,365
of prime news time, including, and finally,

1956
01:30:44,945 --> 01:30:47,245
And finally the latest thing in computer games.

1957
01:30:47,785 --> 01:30:50,645
It may be politically biased, but it is highly topical.

1958
01:30:51,105 --> 01:30:52,205
The villain of the piece,

1959
01:30:52,845 --> 01:30:56,605
a minor called Arthur Scargill, the hero.

1960
01:30:56,815 --> 01:30:58,925
Monty Mole has to get his coal for the winter

1961
01:30:59,025 --> 01:31:02,125
and run a gauntlet of flying pickets and cans of Hairspray.

1962
01:31:02,575 --> 01:31:04,925
Monty winds using a ballot paper.

1963
01:31:05,665 --> 01:31:08,565
Now, once that happened, we started getting demos coming

1964
01:31:08,565 --> 01:31:11,605
through the Post people calling us, people coming

1965
01:31:11,605 --> 01:31:14,325
to Sheffield to bring their demos in, et cetera.

1966
01:31:14,425 --> 01:31:17,605
But what we were quite good at was identifying people

1967
01:31:17,715 --> 01:31:21,445
that had an ability and the skills to join us

1968
01:31:21,585 --> 01:31:23,765
and to start making more products.

1969
01:31:23,995 --> 01:31:26,085
Gremlin used to make some of my favorite games.

1970
01:31:26,185 --> 01:31:28,325
It was really a hotbed for UK games.

1971
01:31:28,595 --> 01:31:30,645
Gremlin Graphics had a great reputation.

1972
01:31:30,795 --> 01:31:31,965
They were a great bunch of people.

1973
01:31:32,035 --> 01:31:33,965
Melbourne House were also a publisher.

1974
01:31:34,075 --> 01:31:36,685
They produced some amazing games throughout the eighties.

1975
01:31:37,585 --> 01:31:40,445
You may have noticed I'm actually wearing a classic Spectrum

1976
01:31:40,515 --> 01:31:42,365
game T-shirt, which is why

1977
01:31:42,365 --> 01:31:43,805
of the Exploding Fist Melbourne House.

1978
01:31:44,365 --> 01:31:47,965
A very early street fighter esque game for the Spectrum.

1979
01:31:48,225 --> 01:31:51,445
It was just a really fun kung fu style game.

1980
01:31:52,675 --> 01:31:55,485
Quicksilver were a very big publisher early on.

1981
01:31:55,485 --> 01:31:57,885
They produced a game called Four D Time Gate,

1982
01:31:57,885 --> 01:32:00,405
which was a very fast space.

1983
01:32:00,405 --> 01:32:03,045
Shoot 'em up. And that was an amazing game for the time.

1984
01:32:03,105 --> 01:32:05,845
And I think that helped establish certainly Quicksilver

1985
01:32:05,845 --> 01:32:07,645
as one of the early Runners Bug Bite.

1986
01:32:07,645 --> 01:32:09,405
They published Matthew Smith's Manic Minor

1987
01:32:09,625 --> 01:32:12,925
and you also had the quirky publishers like Ulta Mater.

1988
01:32:12,925 --> 01:32:15,245
There were a lot of publishers like that, smaller publishers

1989
01:32:15,245 --> 01:32:18,205
that struggled once the spectrum became a

1990
01:32:18,205 --> 01:32:19,285
real commercial concern.

1991
01:32:20,025 --> 01:32:22,685
The real game changer was a company called Master tro

1992
01:32:22,685 --> 01:32:24,725
because Master Tro did a deal

1993
01:32:24,775 --> 01:32:28,605
where their games would be distributed into places

1994
01:32:28,605 --> 01:32:31,325
where you wouldn't normally find video games, for instance,

1995
01:32:31,425 --> 01:32:33,925
the little corner shop where you buy a newspaper.

1996
01:32:34,145 --> 01:32:36,605
So to have these budget games, which retailed

1997
01:32:36,605 --> 01:32:40,045
for 1 99 was a real boon to any spectrum owner.

1998
01:32:47,115 --> 01:32:49,685
There's your classic Master TRO game,

1999
01:32:50,075 --> 01:32:53,765
this is called Tank Tracks one pound 99 for a place called

2000
01:32:54,425 --> 01:32:56,605
Top Fair, which I don't remember, I'm sure

2001
01:32:56,605 --> 01:32:57,645
that's gone by the wayside.

2002
01:32:58,545 --> 01:33:02,565
And a very basic cassette tape instructions

2003
01:33:04,185 --> 01:33:07,485
on Pound 99 Who Caress Brilliant.

2004
01:33:07,875 --> 01:33:10,565
More importantly, the games actually got good as well.

2005
01:33:11,145 --> 01:33:14,445
So what you could buy for 1 99 changed a lot.

2006
01:33:14,745 --> 01:33:17,965
And it changed in 1985 with the release

2007
01:33:17,965 --> 01:33:20,405
of a game called Finders Keepers, which was the first game

2008
01:33:20,405 --> 01:33:22,605
of the Magic Night trilogy coded by David Jones.

2009
01:33:22,875 --> 01:33:25,645
Finders Keepers were so good that Master TRO realized

2010
01:33:25,675 --> 01:33:27,125
that they were doing themselves in a bit

2011
01:33:27,125 --> 01:33:28,925
by retailing these games for 1 99

2012
01:33:29,025 --> 01:33:30,645
and they should create a special label

2013
01:33:30,645 --> 01:33:32,405
where they could charge an extra pound

2014
01:33:32,405 --> 01:33:33,685
because the games were that good.

2015
01:33:33,685 --> 01:33:35,605
And when David Jones produced Spellbound,

2016
01:33:35,695 --> 01:33:36,925
which had the wind motion

2017
01:33:37,055 --> 01:33:38,965
where you could select different things from the menu

2018
01:33:38,965 --> 01:33:40,805
that dropped down, that was another game changer.

2019
01:33:41,125 --> 01:33:43,485
'cause people just realized that you could get a lot more

2020
01:33:43,485 --> 01:33:46,085
value for money for just three pounds. Bell

2021
01:33:46,165 --> 01:33:47,605
Bound was a lot more a eventually than,

2022
01:33:47,605 --> 01:33:51,125
than Fineness Keepers and enabled you to select things and,

2023
01:33:51,125 --> 01:33:53,045
and build up more complicated commands

2024
01:33:53,345 --> 01:33:55,285
and enabled me to input stranger

2025
01:33:55,345 --> 01:33:56,685
and more interesting puzzles.

2026
01:33:56,685 --> 01:34:01,285
In Storm Ringer finished the first

2027
01:34:01,395 --> 01:34:03,565
trilogy of the actual proper venture games.

2028
01:34:03,655 --> 01:34:04,725
Storm Ringer. Sold well

2029
01:34:04,785 --> 01:34:07,685
and had very good previews, very good reviews.

2030
01:34:08,155 --> 01:34:10,645
Even with Storm, I was still a bedroom coder,

2031
01:34:10,905 --> 01:34:13,325
but it was a bedroom in the house I bought from the profits

2032
01:34:13,325 --> 01:34:14,485
of the previous games.

2033
01:34:14,705 --> 01:34:16,965
And all of a sudden I think people realized

2034
01:34:16,965 --> 01:34:19,605
that you could produce these games on a budget,

2035
01:34:20,035 --> 01:34:21,965
sell them on a budget, and make a lot

2036
01:34:21,965 --> 01:34:23,005
of money, sell a lot of units.

2037
01:34:23,345 --> 01:34:25,125
And the games could actually crucially

2038
01:34:25,125 --> 01:34:26,285
be quite decent as well.

2039
01:34:26,515 --> 01:34:28,285
That when Code Masters formed,

2040
01:34:28,395 --> 01:34:30,005
they pretty much made it a wall.

2041
01:34:30,005 --> 01:34:32,005
You know, we'll, we're just going to sell budget games

2042
01:34:32,005 --> 01:34:35,005
because turns out a lot of people are interested in that

2043
01:34:35,225 --> 01:34:37,565
and we can make a lot of money doing that.

2044
01:34:37,625 --> 01:34:41,085
And they did games like Dizzy Professional Ski Simulator,

2045
01:34:41,335 --> 01:34:45,605
grand Prix Simulator, BMX, actually very playable games just

2046
01:34:45,625 --> 01:34:46,805
for a couple of quids.

2047
01:34:47,025 --> 01:34:49,085
And eventually the big labels kind

2048
01:34:49,085 --> 01:34:50,245
of cottoned onto that as well.

2049
01:34:50,545 --> 01:34:53,085
And so you end up with the likes of the hit squad

2050
01:34:53,225 --> 01:34:55,725
and kicks where studios like Ocean

2051
01:34:55,725 --> 01:34:58,085
and US Gold are re-release in their old games.

2052
01:34:58,545 --> 01:35:00,885
So the budget market ends up becoming, again,

2053
01:35:01,005 --> 01:35:03,325
a pretty big thing that helped sustain the spectrum.

2054
01:35:03,905 --> 01:35:05,965
As the night got darker, so to speak,

2055
01:35:13,305 --> 01:35:17,885
It did become obvious to me that software was so important

2056
01:35:18,185 --> 01:35:19,565
to the spectrum

2057
01:35:19,955 --> 01:35:22,405
that we shouldn't just leave it up to other people.

2058
01:35:22,985 --> 01:35:24,965
And I hired someone

2059
01:35:25,345 --> 01:35:29,725
to work at Sinclair whose job was to act as a liaison

2060
01:35:29,725 --> 01:35:31,285
with software developers.

2061
01:35:31,425 --> 01:35:33,885
Uh, and Clive was very, very opposed to that.

2062
01:35:34,005 --> 01:35:35,565
I had a real fight with him over that.

2063
01:35:35,865 --> 01:35:38,525
It was one of the few times that I dug my heels in

2064
01:35:38,525 --> 01:35:41,765
and said, Clive, we are hiring her or I'm leaving.

2065
01:35:42,105 --> 01:35:44,965
The interview with Clive was completely bizarre.

2066
01:35:45,155 --> 01:35:46,325
Well, it was at he's flat

2067
01:35:46,625 --> 01:35:49,725
and he is not a very easy person to talk to.

2068
01:35:49,865 --> 01:35:52,965
He doesn't say anything who have to start going, gab,

2069
01:35:52,965 --> 01:35:54,765
go Gab, which I did nervously.

2070
01:35:54,985 --> 01:35:57,085
He then offered me a cup of coffee

2071
01:35:57,465 --> 01:36:00,885
and I made a huge mistake in accepting

2072
01:36:01,195 --> 01:36:02,605
because he looked furious

2073
01:36:03,425 --> 01:36:05,325
and he then had to make me a cup of coffee.

2074
01:36:05,665 --> 01:36:07,805
And during making me a cup of coffee, he said nothing.

2075
01:36:08,145 --> 01:36:09,405
And I sort of stood in the kitchen

2076
01:36:09,865 --> 01:36:13,605
and then we went into the drawing room, an enormous room,

2077
01:36:14,305 --> 01:36:15,565
and he still said nothing

2078
01:36:15,705 --> 01:36:20,205
and sat at the far end from me miles away, me and my coffee

2079
01:36:20,745 --> 01:36:21,925
and my shaking hand.

2080
01:36:23,625 --> 01:36:28,205
And uh, we sat there and I said, it's lovely room.

2081
01:36:28,685 --> 01:36:30,965
I said, nervously. Hmm.

2082
01:36:31,425 --> 01:36:32,685
He said, and then

2083
01:36:32,685 --> 01:36:34,965
after a bit, I said, do you have much

2084
01:36:35,525 --> 01:36:36,805
software for the spectrum?

2085
01:36:37,185 --> 01:36:41,765
And he said, no, it was peripheral.

2086
01:36:42,235 --> 01:36:46,205
What he was interested in was the hardware and lab

2087
01:36:46,905 --> 01:36:47,925
and the engineers.

2088
01:36:48,465 --> 01:36:52,605
Almost every time the subject of software came up,

2089
01:36:52,685 --> 01:36:57,245
particularly if the software was games, Clive was always

2090
01:36:58,025 --> 01:37:00,565
likely to question the value of doing it.

2091
01:37:00,945 --> 01:37:04,125
It was not our core mission to sell software

2092
01:37:04,625 --> 01:37:07,125
or even to encourage the development of software.

2093
01:37:07,265 --> 01:37:09,605
Our business was to sell computers.

2094
01:37:10,305 --> 01:37:13,685
So I'd say that he accepted the software

2095
01:37:13,745 --> 01:37:15,765
and he accepted the role of the Spectrum

2096
01:37:16,505 --> 01:37:18,805
as a predominantly games playing machine.

2097
01:37:19,225 --> 01:37:21,805
But it wasn't what he'd had in mind when he developed the

2098
01:37:21,805 --> 01:37:23,725
product and it wasn't what he wanted

2099
01:37:23,745 --> 01:37:26,725
to spend his time on when he had bigger

2100
01:37:26,785 --> 01:37:30,245
and better hardware development projects to do.

2101
01:37:33,445 --> 01:37:35,445
I didn't get an induction. I ended up next

2102
01:37:35,465 --> 01:37:38,365
to Jane Boothroyd, who was then UK sales

2103
01:37:38,385 --> 01:37:39,565
and marketing manager.

2104
01:37:39,825 --> 01:37:42,725
And she was responsible for selling the hardware.

2105
01:37:43,065 --> 01:37:44,285
And there was a pile

2106
01:37:44,285 --> 01:37:46,725
of cassettes on the desk, piles on the floor.

2107
01:37:47,145 --> 01:37:48,605
And there was no way of knowing

2108
01:37:49,265 --> 01:37:50,485
if there were any good or not.

2109
01:37:50,945 --> 01:37:52,885
So I thought, how do I make a start on this?

2110
01:37:53,645 --> 01:37:55,685
I had no budget, no money to spend.

2111
01:37:55,705 --> 01:37:58,525
It wasn't going to cost anything. There was just me.

2112
01:37:59,385 --> 01:38:03,245
And then I thought, I better get some of the users

2113
01:38:03,705 --> 01:38:05,645
to start testing this stuff.

2114
01:38:05,875 --> 01:38:08,885
Then I set off to the local sixth form colleges

2115
01:38:09,225 --> 01:38:10,405
to find my testers.

2116
01:38:10,945 --> 01:38:14,405
And they each did about 15 cassettes a week.

2117
01:38:14,985 --> 01:38:17,205
And each week they were allowed

2118
01:38:17,205 --> 01:38:18,405
to keep two or three of them.

2119
01:38:18,745 --> 01:38:21,525
The rejects not the real ones, you know, the rejects

2120
01:38:22,105 --> 01:38:23,245
and that's how I paid them.

2121
01:38:23,945 --> 01:38:28,565
But there was this thing about the spectrum was far more

2122
01:38:28,565 --> 01:38:30,125
than just a games machine.

2123
01:38:30,425 --> 01:38:34,525
And it was important for the marketing strategies such

2124
01:38:34,545 --> 01:38:37,925
as there was that we sold it as a workhorse

2125
01:38:37,925 --> 01:38:40,125
that could do useful things in the home

2126
01:38:40,475 --> 01:38:43,405
because that would then support parental

2127
01:38:43,765 --> 01:38:45,005
decisions to buy it.

2128
01:38:45,425 --> 01:38:48,045
And that's what led to my idea

2129
01:38:48,905 --> 01:38:53,605
of developing educational software alongside a respectable

2130
01:38:53,975 --> 01:38:55,085
publishing company.

2131
01:38:55,695 --> 01:38:59,445
There was a wonderful man called Tony Feldman at McMillan

2132
01:38:59,675 --> 01:39:02,405
Education and he'd just been made director

2133
01:39:02,405 --> 01:39:03,805
of their digital division.

2134
01:39:04,385 --> 01:39:06,085
And we developed the range

2135
01:39:06,545 --> 01:39:08,045
and it was all right,

2136
01:39:08,375 --> 01:39:11,205
maybe being respectable made it not very exciting,

2137
01:39:12,025 --> 01:39:13,645
but, um, it was all a bit worthy.

2138
01:39:14,065 --> 01:39:15,485
But that was the whole point of it.

2139
01:39:19,745 --> 01:39:22,045
We then had this amazing launch.

2140
01:39:22,925 --> 01:39:24,805
I couldn't believe we'd swung it.

2141
01:39:25,385 --> 01:39:30,285
Harold McMillan, former Prime Minister was then about 93

2142
01:39:30,745 --> 01:39:33,085
to my astonishment, he agreed to come

2143
01:39:33,105 --> 01:39:34,925
to this pesky software launch.

2144
01:39:35,265 --> 01:39:36,285
He agreed to come.

2145
01:39:36,785 --> 01:39:38,485
And as soon as Clive heard

2146
01:39:38,875 --> 01:39:42,005
that Harold McMillan was coming, he said he'd come.

2147
01:39:42,465 --> 01:39:44,965
And so we had this swanky hotel

2148
01:39:45,385 --> 01:39:48,845
and instead of Computer Weekly and Sinclair user

2149
01:39:49,025 --> 01:39:52,125
and a few sort of trade press people,

2150
01:39:52,625 --> 01:39:54,685
we had the world's press.

2151
01:39:55,025 --> 01:39:57,005
The room was absolutely packed

2152
01:39:57,385 --> 01:40:00,165
and I had no idea what Clive was going to say,

2153
01:40:00,165 --> 01:40:01,445
which applied him with a script,

2154
01:40:01,825 --> 01:40:05,245
but he never used to say the script ever, ever.

2155
01:40:05,785 --> 01:40:09,845
And he got up and said something and then he came to the end

2156
01:40:10,065 --> 01:40:12,245
and he said, well, I'm very honored

2157
01:40:12,385 --> 01:40:14,245
to have Harold McMillan here,

2158
01:40:14,665 --> 01:40:17,445
and I'm sure he would like to say a few words now.

2159
01:40:17,745 --> 01:40:19,605
And he sort of started to sit down

2160
01:40:20,345 --> 01:40:23,645
and there was absolutely no movement from McMillan.

2161
01:40:24,105 --> 01:40:28,005
He sat there and Clive, who I'd never seemed

2162
01:40:28,845 --> 01:40:32,325
disconcerted like that, he sort of said sir

2163
01:40:32,625 --> 01:40:33,845
and tapped him on the shoulder.

2164
01:40:36,105 --> 01:40:37,245
He kind of woke up

2165
01:40:37,585 --> 01:40:41,685
and then very, very slowly stood up,

2166
01:40:41,975 --> 01:40:43,525
great deal of theatrics.

2167
01:40:43,715 --> 01:40:47,725
Then he looked right at everybody and he then made a speech.

2168
01:40:48,585 --> 01:40:50,565
He made a speech about the software,

2169
01:40:51,145 --> 01:40:52,925
he made a speech about the spectrum.

2170
01:40:53,785 --> 01:40:55,205
He spoke without notes.

2171
01:40:56,065 --> 01:40:58,285
It was just fantastic, extraordinary.

2172
01:40:58,475 --> 01:41:00,205
Everybody was mesmerized.

2173
01:41:00,985 --> 01:41:02,205
And he finally said,

2174
01:41:02,205 --> 01:41:04,485
and the thing that pleases me most

2175
01:41:04,705 --> 01:41:09,045
of all is all this has come from where so much

2176
01:41:09,275 --> 01:41:11,605
that is great in the world comes

2177
01:41:12,195 --> 01:41:15,125
including this young man on my right.

2178
01:41:15,225 --> 01:41:19,005
And he tapped, virtually tapped Clive on his bald

2179
01:41:19,035 --> 01:41:21,085
head and everybody went.

2180
01:41:23,185 --> 01:41:26,405
He said, Scotland 'cause of course says Scottish.

2181
01:41:26,745 --> 01:41:27,885
And then he sat down

2182
01:41:28,545 --> 01:41:31,405
and the entire room stood up and applauded him.

2183
01:41:31,715 --> 01:41:32,715
Extraordinary.

2184
01:41:40,865 --> 01:41:42,885
The name Spectrum became used

2185
01:41:42,945 --> 01:41:47,405
for much more than just this rubber key 48 K.

2186
01:41:47,405 --> 01:41:50,325
Most of the times computer spectrum is a name given

2187
01:41:50,425 --> 01:41:54,805
to the plus the 128 K, the plus two, the plus two A

2188
01:41:54,805 --> 01:41:57,405
or plus two B, the plus three and many, many others.

2189
01:41:57,995 --> 01:42:00,765
Another very relevant development

2190
01:42:00,765 --> 01:42:05,685
that five Sinclair did was in 1984, the synco ql

2191
01:42:08,265 --> 01:42:09,965
You are about to witness Sir Clive

2192
01:42:10,015 --> 01:42:11,445
Sinclair's Quantum Leap.

2193
01:42:15,715 --> 01:42:16,925
He's come up with a computer

2194
01:42:17,225 --> 01:42:20,125
to rival these machines at a fraction of their cost.

2195
01:42:20,385 --> 01:42:24,845
The QL was a sad story because it was developed

2196
01:42:24,985 --> 01:42:26,245
and launched too quickly.

2197
01:42:26,965 --> 01:42:29,725
I mean, I literally saw it as a block

2198
01:42:29,725 --> 01:42:32,285
of wood on the boardroom table in November.

2199
01:42:32,665 --> 01:42:34,525
And when I asked when it was going to be launched,

2200
01:42:34,725 --> 01:42:35,805
I was told February.

2201
01:42:36,105 --> 01:42:38,485
And I said, but this is just a block of wood.

2202
01:42:39,105 --> 01:42:42,845
You know, it's a, it was just a visual, just a visual.

2203
01:42:43,265 --> 01:42:46,045
You never had any idea was to how much of it was real,

2204
01:42:46,145 --> 01:42:48,165
how much was really going on. You know,

2205
01:42:48,305 --> 01:42:50,725
The QL was conceived as a business machine,

2206
01:42:50,745 --> 01:42:52,165
so it was a complete break

2207
01:42:52,665 --> 01:42:56,165
and the QL absorbed an enormous amount

2208
01:42:56,165 --> 01:42:57,845
of product development effort.

2209
01:42:58,205 --> 01:43:00,965
I just don't think there was enough time

2210
01:43:01,825 --> 01:43:04,205
to think about the future of the spectrum.

2211
01:43:04,345 --> 01:43:07,805
And if anyone has said the Spectrum could have a very long

2212
01:43:07,915 --> 01:43:11,885
life with upgrades, new versions be backward, compatible,

2213
01:43:12,105 --> 01:43:14,045
run all the old software, et cetera,

2214
01:43:14,105 --> 01:43:15,205
it could have a long life.

2215
01:43:15,665 --> 01:43:18,765
The media objection would've been, well, yeah,

2216
01:43:18,765 --> 01:43:20,045
but who's gonna do that work?

2217
01:43:20,135 --> 01:43:24,845
Who's going to maintain the product with upgrades

2218
01:43:24,905 --> 01:43:28,125
and so on because everyone's so busy with everything else.

2219
01:43:28,625 --> 01:43:32,365
My feeling about the QL was that Clive really wanted

2220
01:43:32,425 --> 01:43:34,685
to come up with a serious business computer

2221
01:43:34,865 --> 01:43:36,005
and he felt the combination

2222
01:43:36,005 --> 01:43:39,085
of a more powerful microprocessor addressing more memory

2223
01:43:39,305 --> 01:43:41,525
and the micro drives made it a business platform.

2224
01:43:41,585 --> 01:43:44,245
You know, if I took away anything from that, I did sense

2225
01:43:44,315 --> 01:43:46,885
that Clive kind of lost interest in the spectrum.

2226
01:43:47,095 --> 01:43:49,045
There was a strong feeling of wanting

2227
01:43:49,065 --> 01:43:50,965
to concentrate on the new stuff.

2228
01:43:51,225 --> 01:43:54,245
We had the qr, but we also had a laptop.

2229
01:43:54,385 --> 01:43:56,325
We had Pandora various sort

2230
01:43:56,325 --> 01:43:58,205
of under wrap pieces of hardware.

2231
01:43:58,625 --> 01:44:02,285
We don't wanna waste time among the, the spectrum is boring,

2232
01:44:02,395 --> 01:44:03,845
it's so last year, you know,

2233
01:44:04,065 --> 01:44:06,605
and of course the fact that we had an installed base

2234
01:44:07,025 --> 01:44:10,645
of millions people to sell add-on products

2235
01:44:10,705 --> 01:44:13,525
to basic portfolio analysis says

2236
01:44:13,525 --> 01:44:17,045
that Stretch was our cash cow that was bringing in the cash

2237
01:44:17,465 --> 01:44:19,565
to fund all these blooming developments.

2238
01:44:19,935 --> 01:44:22,045
There was so much competition

2239
01:44:22,385 --> 01:44:24,565
for the engineering resources as well.

2240
01:44:25,045 --> 01:44:28,965
I was hiring people to work on current projects

2241
01:44:29,065 --> 01:44:33,205
and projects for next year's computers like the ql.

2242
01:44:33,505 --> 01:44:37,005
And the next minute I find out Clive had had a few beers

2243
01:44:37,005 --> 01:44:40,205
within a pub and offered them a job working on some

2244
01:44:41,005 --> 01:44:42,165
artificial intelligence project.

2245
01:44:42,715 --> 01:44:46,005
He'd hired all these engineers, innovators

2246
01:44:46,225 --> 01:44:49,325
to work at the meta lab, million pounds a year.

2247
01:44:49,325 --> 01:44:51,765
It was gonna cost us and fundamentally everything,

2248
01:44:51,785 --> 01:44:53,245
all the attention had been going into

2249
01:44:53,245 --> 01:44:54,405
new, new, new, new, new.

2250
01:44:54,705 --> 01:44:57,765
The main thrust of Meta Lab is now, um,

2251
01:44:57,985 --> 01:44:59,645
as you would would expect to the,

2252
01:44:59,745 --> 01:45:01,045
the the future of computing.

2253
01:45:01,225 --> 01:45:02,965
We have a, a massive program there

2254
01:45:02,965 --> 01:45:05,165
of very advanced computer development works,

2255
01:45:05,265 --> 01:45:06,405
all the things that go with it.

2256
01:45:06,665 --> 01:45:09,085
Um, semiconductor technology, um,

2257
01:45:09,825 --> 01:45:12,005
all the peripherals printers, displays,

2258
01:45:12,005 --> 01:45:13,445
very advanced display technology.

2259
01:45:13,615 --> 01:45:14,885
Every, everything in that field.

2260
01:45:15,225 --> 01:45:16,685
The other areas that were working in there,

2261
01:45:16,685 --> 01:45:19,485
of course are known to principles or television and, and,

2262
01:45:19,485 --> 01:45:20,605
and possibly some vehicle work.

2263
01:45:21,105 --> 01:45:22,405
It really was chaos

2264
01:45:22,705 --> 01:45:25,565
and it was driven by Clive's desire to move on

2265
01:45:25,565 --> 01:45:26,725
to the next big thing.

2266
01:45:27,025 --> 01:45:31,205
And the resources you could have commanded to maintain

2267
01:45:31,395 --> 01:45:33,325
what you'd got, they just weren't there.

2268
01:45:33,705 --> 01:45:36,965
They'd been earmarked for more exciting things

2269
01:45:37,665 --> 01:45:40,205
And meanwhile, if you listened,

2270
01:45:40,945 --> 01:45:42,925
people told you what was needed.

2271
01:45:43,235 --> 01:45:47,205
They needed a spectrum with more memory they needed, oh,

2272
01:45:47,225 --> 01:45:50,085
and with a different graphics and a better keyboard

2273
01:45:50,265 --> 01:45:51,565
and this and that and the other.

2274
01:45:52,065 --> 01:45:54,685
And so we did start rather belatedly

2275
01:45:55,105 --> 01:45:57,565
to produce the products the customers were asking for.

2276
01:45:58,585 --> 01:46:00,725
We should have been doing it the previous year.

2277
01:46:00,995 --> 01:46:04,125
Yeah, we should have, it's a matter

2278
01:46:04,145 --> 01:46:05,925
of regret that we weren't,

2279
01:46:11,395 --> 01:46:13,405
This is the ZX spectrum plus,

2280
01:46:13,895 --> 01:46:15,845
which was CL Sinclair's C quarter

2281
01:46:16,105 --> 01:46:17,325
ZX spectrum with the rubber keyboard.

2282
01:46:17,505 --> 01:46:21,005
The spectrum 48 K plus was an attempt by Sinclair

2283
01:46:21,005 --> 01:46:22,725
to address two of the main criticisms

2284
01:46:22,725 --> 01:46:23,725
of the original spectrum.

2285
01:46:24,225 --> 01:46:27,165
The first one was that there was no power button.

2286
01:46:27,505 --> 01:46:29,925
So every time you wanted to play a new game,

2287
01:46:29,985 --> 01:46:32,045
you literally had to unplug it.

2288
01:46:32,145 --> 01:46:33,765
And the second thing was the keyboard, which

2289
01:46:34,125 --> 01:46:36,805
although we revere it to a certain extent today

2290
01:46:37,105 --> 01:46:40,565
and admire it for its eccentricity back in the day,

2291
01:46:40,705 --> 01:46:42,005
did get quite a lot of criticism.

2292
01:46:42,585 --> 01:46:45,605
So as a result, Sinclair wanted to design a new keyboard,

2293
01:46:45,615 --> 01:46:47,445
which actually came from the ql.

2294
01:46:47,625 --> 01:46:49,525
So they got this keyboard and they put

2295
01:46:49,525 --> 01:46:52,285
that into a new spectrum along with a reset button.

2296
01:46:52,905 --> 01:46:56,725
So the 48 k plus came out in 1984

2297
01:46:57,185 --> 01:47:00,605
and Sinclair, if they weren't working on the 1 2 8 K at

2298
01:47:00,605 --> 01:47:02,965
that point, they must have certainly been thinking about it.

2299
01:47:03,065 --> 01:47:05,165
But by the time 1985 rolled in,

2300
01:47:05,605 --> 01:47:08,725
Sinclair itself was having financial difficulty. The

2301
01:47:08,945 --> 01:47:11,885
QL sales were not as good as they should have been.

2302
01:47:11,945 --> 01:47:15,045
And that frankly was the basis upon which

2303
01:47:15,565 --> 01:47:17,925
Sinclair run into financial difficulties.

2304
01:47:18,025 --> 01:47:19,845
And Robert Maxwell went in

2305
01:47:19,865 --> 01:47:22,685
and all he wanted to do was have the names associated

2306
01:47:22,685 --> 01:47:24,085
with his newspaper. We

2307
01:47:24,085 --> 01:47:27,005
Jolly well heard that Maxwell was interested in buying us

2308
01:47:27,185 --> 01:47:29,285
and everybody ruled their eyes at

2309
01:47:29,285 --> 01:47:30,885
what it would be like to work for him.

2310
01:47:31,665 --> 01:47:35,605
And what caused Clive to break off negotiations

2311
01:47:35,635 --> 01:47:38,565
with Maxwell was that Clive got some sort of deal

2312
01:47:38,565 --> 01:47:42,245
with Dixons, the retail chain, who he had a rather long

2313
01:47:42,385 --> 01:47:44,685
and up and down relationship with.

2314
01:47:45,185 --> 01:47:46,885
But at any rate, Dixon's came in

2315
01:47:46,885 --> 01:47:49,205
and said they would buy large quantities

2316
01:47:49,205 --> 01:47:51,445
of computers from Sinclair

2317
01:47:51,785 --> 01:47:55,525
and they promised a big enough order that it enabled Clive

2318
01:47:55,585 --> 01:47:57,765
to change his mind about Maxwell.

2319
01:47:58,225 --> 01:48:01,805
So they were planning to bring forward the 1 2 8 K.

2320
01:48:02,105 --> 01:48:05,565
And when Dixon's heard that a superior model was coming out

2321
01:48:05,585 --> 01:48:08,325
to the 48 k plus, which they had huge stocks of,

2322
01:48:08,795 --> 01:48:10,325
they understandably weren't that happy.

2323
01:48:10,805 --> 01:48:12,605
I don't remember the exact, uh, sequence

2324
01:48:12,605 --> 01:48:13,965
of events about the 1, 2 8,

2325
01:48:13,985 --> 01:48:17,485
but there was a recognition that, um, the spectrum was,

2326
01:48:17,585 --> 01:48:20,125
was still a success, but it needed more memory.

2327
01:48:20,645 --> 01:48:23,165
Products were competing on the specification

2328
01:48:23,305 --> 01:48:26,005
and that's a good way to, to bring it up to date was to,

2329
01:48:26,105 --> 01:48:28,245
to advertise a spectrum 1, 2, 8.

2330
01:48:28,425 --> 01:48:31,445
So I probably said, look, I can do that. That's no trouble.

2331
01:48:31,585 --> 01:48:33,605
We extended the basic in quite a few ways.

2332
01:48:33,865 --> 01:48:36,525
One of the weaknesses of the spectrum was it didn't have a

2333
01:48:36,535 --> 01:48:38,285
sound chip, it just had a single speaker

2334
01:48:38,315 --> 01:48:39,685
with a single buyer going to it

2335
01:48:39,685 --> 01:48:41,245
and it could make very crude tones

2336
01:48:41,305 --> 01:48:43,125
and it would tie up the microprocessor. So

2337
01:48:43,125 --> 01:48:46,925
This is a ZX spectrum, 128 K effectionately known

2338
01:48:46,925 --> 01:48:48,845
as a toast rack because you've got this kind of

2339
01:48:49,615 --> 01:48:51,485
toast rack style thing on the site.

2340
01:48:52,025 --> 01:48:55,245
Now the benefit of the 1 2 8 k is you got the advanced

2341
01:48:55,245 --> 01:48:56,965
sound chip, the A wire chip. What

2342
01:48:56,965 --> 01:48:59,285
We did was we threw another GI sound chip

2343
01:48:59,395 --> 01:49:02,005
that would generate polyphonic music without the

2344
01:49:02,005 --> 01:49:03,085
processor being involved.

2345
01:49:03,185 --> 01:49:05,805
So you could do more activity in the background.

2346
01:49:05,905 --> 01:49:09,005
And we wanted to tie that chip in with the basics so

2347
01:49:09,005 --> 01:49:10,685
that people could type in commands

2348
01:49:10,685 --> 01:49:11,805
that would control that chip.

2349
01:49:11,905 --> 01:49:13,725
And I wanted them to compose music on it.

2350
01:49:13,965 --> 01:49:15,565
I was kind of interested in the audio again.

2351
01:49:15,565 --> 01:49:19,165
And so synthesizing music was a great appeal to me.

2352
01:49:22,385 --> 01:49:24,365
So the music was infinitely better

2353
01:49:24,365 --> 01:49:25,605
than the original beeper.

2354
01:49:25,835 --> 01:49:28,685
This was great. It kind of competed with the Commodore 64.

2355
01:49:29,145 --> 01:49:31,045
Of course you got an extra 80 k of memory,

2356
01:49:31,225 --> 01:49:32,245
so you could have bigger games,

2357
01:49:32,625 --> 01:49:34,285
you could have music in the games,

2358
01:49:34,465 --> 01:49:35,525
you could have more colors.

2359
01:49:36,185 --> 01:49:39,205
It was just a nice step up before the 16 bit days.

2360
01:49:39,545 --> 01:49:43,525
Having an expansion from the 48 K to the 1 28 K spectrum

2361
01:49:43,875 --> 01:49:45,765
with its greater software capabilities

2362
01:49:45,825 --> 01:49:48,005
and so on was a fairly natural thing to do.

2363
01:49:48,225 --> 01:49:50,285
And it just so happened that along the way

2364
01:49:50,515 --> 01:49:52,725
that we were negotiating with Invest

2365
01:49:53,345 --> 01:49:55,325
to have a Spanish version of it as well,

2366
01:49:55,465 --> 01:49:59,245
The result was that the 1 2 8 K ended up being released in

2367
01:49:59,495 --> 01:50:01,245
Spain Christmas of 1985.

2368
01:50:01,505 --> 01:50:06,365
So the Spanish speaking world got the 1 2 8 K, whereas

2369
01:50:07,165 --> 01:50:09,045
everyone else, certainly in England,

2370
01:50:09,045 --> 01:50:11,125
which was Sinclair's main market, had to wait

2371
01:50:11,125 --> 01:50:12,125
until the following year.

2372
01:50:12,545 --> 01:50:14,605
The fallout from this was, which you could kind

2373
01:50:14,605 --> 01:50:18,245
of see coming, everybody got a 48 k plus of Christmas

2374
01:50:18,245 --> 01:50:21,685
of 1985 when the 1 2 8 K was released in the UK

2375
01:50:21,945 --> 01:50:23,725
in February of 1986.

2376
01:50:24,105 --> 01:50:25,885
All of a sudden we are like, oh mum,

2377
01:50:26,025 --> 01:50:27,245
dad, I'd like this one now.

2378
01:50:27,245 --> 01:50:28,965
And they're like, you've just been given this one,

2379
01:50:28,985 --> 01:50:30,605
you're not getting another one, forget it.

2380
01:50:30,785 --> 01:50:32,045
So as a result, sales

2381
01:50:32,145 --> 01:50:35,805
of the 1 2 8 K spectrum were incredibly poor.

2382
01:50:35,805 --> 01:50:38,485
When the UK in particular, which was a bit of a shame, I

2383
01:50:38,805 --> 01:50:41,605
Realized that things were really over as soon

2384
01:50:41,605 --> 01:50:44,845
as Christmas in 1984 was over

2385
01:50:45,665 --> 01:50:47,645
and the retailers canceled their orders

2386
01:50:47,785 --> 01:50:49,525
and suddenly we were going from selling

2387
01:50:50,145 --> 01:50:54,245
at a very high level, a hundred million a year type turnover

2388
01:50:54,705 --> 01:50:58,085
to suddenly virtually nothing bang like that.

2389
01:50:58,465 --> 01:51:00,885
We had a massive job, we had 18 million

2390
01:51:01,745 --> 01:51:04,885
and the creditors who included Barclays, our bankers

2391
01:51:05,425 --> 01:51:07,165
and our distributors

2392
01:51:07,265 --> 01:51:11,605
and so on, gave us a year to find a,

2393
01:51:11,725 --> 01:51:13,045
a solution for the company

2394
01:51:13,465 --> 01:51:16,085
and to achieve a, a reduction of the debt.

2395
01:51:16,305 --> 01:51:19,245
So Spectrum 1 2 8 was part of that recovery program.

2396
01:51:19,945 --> 01:51:22,165
My job was really focused on Timex.

2397
01:51:22,415 --> 01:51:25,325
Timex had always been our distributor in America.

2398
01:51:25,545 --> 01:51:28,605
And one of the cleverer things we'd done is we hadn't tried

2399
01:51:28,605 --> 01:51:30,845
to sell in America like Acorn did.

2400
01:51:30,945 --> 01:51:33,405
Uh, people tended to lose their shirts setting up

2401
01:51:33,405 --> 01:51:34,845
subsidiaries in America.

2402
01:51:35,225 --> 01:51:39,525
So instead we licensed the spectrum to Timex Corporation.

2403
01:51:41,345 --> 01:51:43,845
If you've been dreaming of a home computer this year,

2404
01:51:44,295 --> 01:51:46,165
Timex has exactly what you need.

2405
01:51:46,525 --> 01:51:49,645
A state-of-the-art 48 k color home computer at a

2406
01:51:49,645 --> 01:51:50,685
very affordable price.

2407
01:51:50,865 --> 01:51:54,165
The thinking was that Timex had their products in

2408
01:51:55,045 --> 01:51:58,445
thousands and thousands of retail outlets,

2409
01:51:58,865 --> 01:52:01,525
not just large chains of stores,

2410
01:52:01,625 --> 01:52:05,285
but they had a relationship with almost everyone

2411
01:52:05,585 --> 01:52:07,685
who retailed anything in the states.

2412
01:52:08,025 --> 01:52:10,405
And when the time came, they wanted to buy us,

2413
01:52:10,755 --> 01:52:13,525
they agreed a deal and Bill, Jeffrey

2414
01:52:13,745 --> 01:52:16,565
and Clive were going to fly over and sign the contract.

2415
01:52:16,945 --> 01:52:20,525
But on the airplane going over there,

2416
01:52:21,375 --> 01:52:22,565
Clive changed his mind

2417
01:52:22,985 --> 01:52:26,165
and apparently what he said to a spitting with rage,

2418
01:52:26,235 --> 01:52:29,525
bill Jeffrey, I'd rather own the whole of a small company

2419
01:52:29,625 --> 01:52:32,845
and start again than known 20% of a large company.

2420
01:52:33,345 --> 01:52:35,765
And they got to Boston and they flew straight back.

2421
01:52:36,155 --> 01:52:38,165
That was on the Thursday,

2422
01:52:38,825 --> 01:52:41,645
we heard about it Thursday evening, senior management team.

2423
01:52:42,385 --> 01:52:43,565
And on Friday,

2424
01:52:44,195 --> 01:52:46,005
because the deal had fallen through,

2425
01:52:46,505 --> 01:52:48,965
the creditors were going to meet round the table

2426
01:52:49,665 --> 01:52:52,285
and we'd probably beginning to put into receivership.

2427
01:52:52,705 --> 01:52:56,405
And then on Monday the staff came to work as usual,

2428
01:52:56,755 --> 01:52:58,085
they were called to the atrium

2429
01:52:58,585 --> 01:53:03,085
and Bill Jeffrey gave us the news and Clive didn't even come

2430
01:53:03,385 --> 01:53:07,245
and tell us himself, which I thought was a poor show.

2431
01:53:07,665 --> 01:53:12,365
And so they told us, I'm afraid this is the end of the line.

2432
01:53:13,265 --> 01:53:14,365
You've all lost your jobs.

2433
01:53:14,985 --> 01:53:17,285
And then did the deal with Amstrad, there

2434
01:53:17,285 --> 01:53:18,685
Are people employed at URA Surge

2435
01:53:18,985 --> 01:53:21,325
who have been involved on the, on the distribution marketing

2436
01:53:21,915 --> 01:53:23,965
side of the company who will no longer be needed.

2437
01:53:24,945 --> 01:53:26,965
Do you feel in any way that you are letting them down?

2438
01:53:27,625 --> 01:53:29,845
Uh, well I always feel sad in this, this situation,

2439
01:53:29,865 --> 01:53:30,925
but change occurs.

2440
01:53:31,455 --> 01:53:34,965
Clive and Alan Sugar could not have been more different,

2441
01:53:35,385 --> 01:53:38,805
and yet Clive seemed to have respect for sugar.

2442
01:53:39,035 --> 01:53:43,725
Whereas although Sugar wasn't technically in Clive's League,

2443
01:53:44,345 --> 01:53:46,965
he did know the electronics business

2444
01:53:47,025 --> 01:53:48,645
and electronic retailing.

2445
01:53:49,065 --> 01:53:51,205
And I think Clive had respect for him.

2446
01:53:51,345 --> 01:53:54,885
It gives us a, uh, a new brand name, uh,

2447
01:53:55,065 --> 01:53:57,925
and a new market, um, for what we class

2448
01:53:57,945 --> 01:54:01,285
as the entertainments of the, uh, home computer business.

2449
01:54:01,985 --> 01:54:04,525
Uh, Sinclair, uh, has always been recognized,

2450
01:54:04,525 --> 01:54:07,685
certainly in my mind as the, uh, European, uh,

2451
01:54:08,185 --> 01:54:09,205
uh, market leader.

2452
01:54:12,385 --> 01:54:14,035
This here is the ZX spectrum plus two,

2453
01:54:14,065 --> 01:54:16,475
this is the first computer added sugar release

2454
01:54:16,605 --> 01:54:17,915
after he bought out Sinclair.

2455
01:54:17,915 --> 01:54:20,435
It's got a proper keyboard, got a builtin tape deck,

2456
01:54:20,655 --> 01:54:23,355
and now you've actually got joystick pulse in the side.

2457
01:54:23,975 --> 01:54:26,195
So it really is a kind of an Allin one kit.

2458
01:54:26,635 --> 01:54:28,075
I mean, when Amstrad got 'em,

2459
01:54:28,075 --> 01:54:31,035
basically any pretense at all that still existed

2460
01:54:31,135 --> 01:54:35,035
of it being an something you could do word documents on

2461
01:54:35,035 --> 01:54:36,155
or anything outside

2462
01:54:36,155 --> 01:54:38,355
of games went completely out of the window.

2463
01:54:38,425 --> 01:54:41,075
It's like games, games, games, that's it.

2464
01:54:41,615 --> 01:54:44,835
So with that, the spectrum ended up having a life

2465
01:54:44,965 --> 01:54:48,515
after 1985, another six, seven years.

2466
01:55:02,315 --> 01:55:04,615
And obviously growing up in the uk you're only aware

2467
01:55:04,615 --> 01:55:05,935
of the computers you have around.

2468
01:55:06,035 --> 01:55:08,895
So we had all obviously officials, Sinclairs, et cetera.

2469
01:55:09,115 --> 01:55:11,335
And it wasn't until years later when I started sort

2470
01:55:11,335 --> 01:55:13,375
of looking into things you discover, oh,

2471
01:55:13,375 --> 01:55:15,255
these Timex machines in America.

2472
01:55:15,355 --> 01:55:16,655
Oh, it turns out there are spectrums.

2473
01:55:16,765 --> 01:55:19,095
Then you hear of the Scorpion, which is, uh,

2474
01:55:19,175 --> 01:55:20,975
I believe Russian machine,

2475
01:55:20,975 --> 01:55:23,135
which is basically a hardware clone of the spectrum.

2476
01:55:23,795 --> 01:55:25,615
And then this other clones

2477
01:55:25,615 --> 01:55:27,575
and I, the more you look into it,

2478
01:55:27,575 --> 01:55:28,895
you could go down this rabbit hole

2479
01:55:28,915 --> 01:55:32,255
of obviously Sinclair had made such a sort

2480
01:55:32,255 --> 01:55:33,895
of tightly put together machine

2481
01:55:33,965 --> 01:55:36,295
that it could be relatively easily cloned

2482
01:55:36,295 --> 01:55:38,415
and suddenly everywhere in the world seemed

2483
01:55:38,415 --> 01:55:40,015
to have its own version of the spectrum.

2484
01:55:40,435 --> 01:55:42,695
And many of them, uh, to put it politely,

2485
01:55:42,875 --> 01:55:45,005
not passing any money back to Sinclair.

2486
01:55:45,245 --> 01:55:47,685
I, I think is the, uh, most careful I can put that

2487
01:55:53,695 --> 01:55:56,205
Everything we have here are computers

2488
01:55:56,205 --> 01:55:57,605
that look like normal spectrums,

2489
01:55:57,605 --> 01:55:59,485
but none of them is a normal spectrum.

2490
01:55:59,585 --> 01:56:01,565
We have the famous clone made

2491
01:56:01,565 --> 01:56:05,405
by invest the Invest Spectrum Plus, which is a clone

2492
01:56:05,405 --> 01:56:09,885
that was inspired on the board from the 128 K spectrum.

2493
01:56:10,345 --> 01:56:13,285
We have Arab spectrums, they were made in Egypt.

2494
01:56:13,345 --> 01:56:16,805
The distributor would install a certain switch to be able

2495
01:56:16,805 --> 01:56:19,165
to switch between English or Arab.

2496
01:56:19,425 --> 01:56:20,805
We have French spectrums,

2497
01:56:20,825 --> 01:56:25,485
we have all the Brazilian clones from Mical,

2498
01:56:25,875 --> 01:56:28,685
from uh, CPC, uh, even the Ring,

2499
01:56:28,735 --> 01:56:31,285
which is a very uncommon ZX 81 clone.

2500
01:56:31,625 --> 01:56:34,525
We have, uh, machines from Italy, the Anglo Tutor,

2501
01:56:34,535 --> 01:56:37,685
which is a system to learn English

2502
01:56:38,155 --> 01:56:40,925
that is based on the ZX spectrum, the famous

2503
01:56:41,785 --> 01:56:43,445
ZX spectrum, NTSC.

2504
01:56:43,505 --> 01:56:45,245
So used in the states.

2505
01:56:45,665 --> 01:56:48,245
We also have something that is very, very uncommon.

2506
01:56:48,425 --> 01:56:51,165
The Indian spectrum, the DBE Spectrum Plus.

2507
01:56:51,625 --> 01:56:53,445
And so this is just an idea.

2508
01:56:59,465 --> 01:57:02,205
So this is a ZX spectrum clone called the Aerobic.

2509
01:57:02,435 --> 01:57:04,245
It's interesting that a lot

2510
01:57:04,245 --> 01:57:06,165
of the Russian machines particularly were sort

2511
01:57:06,165 --> 01:57:08,205
of very basic clones of the hardware.

2512
01:57:08,205 --> 01:57:10,765
But as time went on and people got uh, sort

2513
01:57:10,765 --> 01:57:13,165
of more into using it, you ended up with these

2514
01:57:13,235 --> 01:57:17,045
what are effectively expanded machines, um, with, I mean,

2515
01:57:17,045 --> 01:57:18,685
appalling artwork on the front with

2516
01:57:18,955 --> 01:57:21,005
what I think is possibly the worst mascot

2517
01:57:21,005 --> 01:57:22,125
that has ever been created.

2518
01:57:22,285 --> 01:57:25,085
A sort of crushed purple owl, fantastic.

2519
01:57:25,945 --> 01:57:28,485
But inside the actual machine itself,

2520
01:57:28,875 --> 01:57:30,165
genuinely quite impressive.

2521
01:57:31,185 --> 01:57:33,565
The Keyboard is pretty good.

2522
01:57:33,865 --> 01:57:37,445
So this actually has 64 K of Ram, which obviously wasn't,

2523
01:57:37,545 --> 01:57:39,685
uh, set up for this an actual spectrum.

2524
01:57:40,065 --> 01:57:41,845
Uh, you've got the built-in joystick port.

2525
01:57:41,845 --> 01:57:45,165
You've even got a built-in, uh, monitor output for RGB,

2526
01:57:45,165 --> 01:57:47,325
which again is something the spectrum itself,

2527
01:57:47,545 --> 01:57:48,925
the original ones didn't have at the time.

2528
01:57:52,345 --> 01:57:56,445
So this is the Dak Tick m it's a Russian clone,

2529
01:57:56,535 --> 01:57:59,365
which is quite a similar size to the spectrum,

2530
01:57:59,705 --> 01:58:02,325
but it hasn't got the standard ULA,

2531
01:58:02,355 --> 01:58:06,485
it's got a Russian made ULA and it's also got 64 K of Ram,

2532
01:58:06,685 --> 01:58:08,725
although only 48 K are used.

2533
01:58:09,265 --> 01:58:10,885
But it's a cologne.

2534
01:58:10,885 --> 01:58:14,765
Other than that is a Russian spectrum in any ever sense.

2535
01:58:16,445 --> 01:58:17,445
I quite like it.

2536
01:58:22,275 --> 01:58:24,205
It's interesting how far these

2537
01:58:24,205 --> 01:58:25,285
different progressions made.

2538
01:58:25,425 --> 01:58:26,605
And I mean back at home

2539
01:58:26,735 --> 01:58:29,565
after a certain amount of time we'd moved on to sort

2540
01:58:29,565 --> 01:58:31,365
of a more high specs computers.

2541
01:58:31,745 --> 01:58:33,005
But in places like Russia

2542
01:58:33,015 --> 01:58:35,165
where perhaps they didn't have the disposable income

2543
01:58:35,185 --> 01:58:37,245
to keep buying these new posh things,

2544
01:58:37,245 --> 01:58:38,845
which weren't even released over there.

2545
01:58:38,845 --> 01:58:41,910
Anyway, these end up with a much, much longer lifespan,

2546
01:58:41,910 --> 01:58:43,925
which is why you end up with these clones

2547
01:58:43,925 --> 01:58:45,525
with all the extra internals.

2548
01:58:45,875 --> 01:58:48,485
Many of these clones were developed mid nineties.

2549
01:58:48,715 --> 01:58:49,845
Some of them were before,

2550
01:58:49,905 --> 01:58:52,965
but some were also during the mid nineties, which means

2551
01:58:53,195 --> 01:58:55,445
that the spectrum was alive for many,

2552
01:58:55,475 --> 01:58:57,685
many more years than it was year.

2553
01:59:04,905 --> 01:59:06,845
Brazil is an amazing story.

2554
01:59:06,875 --> 01:59:07,925
What they did first

2555
01:59:07,925 --> 01:59:11,685
because of one thing in 1981 in March

2556
01:59:12,355 --> 01:59:14,205
Cove Syno launched ZX 81

2557
01:59:14,825 --> 01:59:17,925
in October, 1981 in Brazil,

2558
01:59:17,975 --> 01:59:22,485
there were already unofficial clones of ZX 81 being sold.

2559
01:59:22,925 --> 01:59:25,805
I have no concept that those computers are actually copied

2560
01:59:26,425 --> 01:59:29,845
or clones from Harvard that existed elsewhere.

2561
01:59:30,205 --> 01:59:33,085
I saw a computer with a brand on it, TK 85, a micro digital.

2562
01:59:33,285 --> 01:59:35,285
I think that, oh, someone came up with this mic.

2563
01:59:35,285 --> 01:59:37,445
Digital was the biggest producer of,

2564
01:59:37,445 --> 01:59:38,925
of this kind of computers in Brazil.

2565
01:59:39,065 --> 01:59:42,325
In Brazil, there was a law called Reserve of Federal,

2566
01:59:42,455 --> 01:59:45,125
which was a kind of a protection mechanism,

2567
01:59:46,105 --> 01:59:49,525
not allowing people to import computers to Brazil.

2568
01:59:49,785 --> 01:59:51,965
Why? They wanted to incentivize the national

2569
01:59:52,685 --> 01:59:53,805
industry to create them.

2570
01:59:54,225 --> 01:59:57,325
So they use their creativity in the best possible way

2571
01:59:57,345 --> 01:59:59,405
to come up with computers locally made.

2572
01:59:59,665 --> 02:00:02,525
And then the spectrum was launched in Brazil

2573
02:00:02,665 --> 02:00:04,205
as the TK 90 X.

2574
02:00:06,385 --> 02:00:10,485
So the concept that this was copied from another company

2575
02:00:10,515 --> 02:00:12,085
with no royalties being paid

2576
02:00:12,265 --> 02:00:16,605
and no authorization to do so, was nonexistent at all.

2577
02:00:16,925 --> 02:00:18,965
I only started to learn about the other

2578
02:00:19,205 --> 02:00:20,765
computers probably a year into it.

2579
02:00:20,895 --> 02:00:25,445
There were 40 million clones developed in South America,

2580
02:00:25,825 --> 02:00:28,765
in Africa, in Eastern Europe, and so on. But

2581
02:00:29,065 --> 02:00:30,885
Trying to set up, uh,

2582
02:00:31,225 --> 02:00:34,765
own wholly owned subsidiaries in France, Italy, Germany,

2583
02:00:35,055 --> 02:00:39,645
Spain, and set up exclusive distributors in dozens

2584
02:00:39,645 --> 02:00:42,845
of other countries, and do it quickly, as quickly

2585
02:00:42,945 --> 02:00:44,445
as we needed it to be done.

2586
02:00:44,905 --> 02:00:48,485
But obviously, most of our sales were still in Britain,

2587
02:00:49,465 --> 02:00:53,125
and we didn't saturate any of those markets

2588
02:00:54,105 --> 02:00:57,285
enough to discourage other people from

2589
02:00:57,285 --> 02:00:58,445
coming in with clones.

2590
02:00:58,825 --> 02:01:03,445
We sold 5 million spectrums worldwide, uh, unbelievable,

2591
02:01:03,625 --> 02:01:04,845
uh, sales volume.

2592
02:01:05,065 --> 02:01:09,005
It, and we had 70% of the UK market, um,

2593
02:01:09,065 --> 02:01:10,125
for quite a long time.

2594
02:01:10,665 --> 02:01:12,965
And we had a turnover of a hundred million

2595
02:01:12,965 --> 02:01:14,485
with only a hundred employees.

2596
02:01:14,785 --> 02:01:17,245
The release of the spectrum was huge, is one

2597
02:01:17,245 --> 02:01:19,565
of the cornerstones of the UK computer industry.

2598
02:01:19,675 --> 02:01:22,405
Without doubt, it made a real difference to people.

2599
02:01:22,835 --> 02:01:26,965
It's lovely that a 40 year old computer still has a legacy.

2600
02:01:27,235 --> 02:01:29,365
There's not many early computers

2601
02:01:29,365 --> 02:01:30,725
that can say the same thing.

2602
02:01:30,755 --> 02:01:32,565
Yeah, so it's, it's a nice thing.

2603
02:01:33,105 --> 02:01:36,205
And the spectrum has developed over the years as well.

2604
02:01:36,205 --> 02:01:37,925
We've obviously had the 1 2 8 K models

2605
02:01:38,025 --> 02:01:39,485
and now we've got the spectrum next.

2606
02:01:46,345 --> 02:01:48,525
So this teenager friend of mine, Victor,

2607
02:01:49,025 --> 02:01:51,045
is into hardware ever since we were kids.

2608
02:01:51,385 --> 02:01:55,125
And his passion is about keeping old hardware alive.

2609
02:01:55,585 --> 02:01:58,445
And, uh, his latest creation was this board

2610
02:01:58,445 --> 02:01:59,565
called it the TB blue.

2611
02:01:59,865 --> 02:02:03,005
So you could just buy this board inserted

2612
02:02:03,005 --> 02:02:06,205
inside your old spectrum, and you have everything there.

2613
02:02:06,505 --> 02:02:09,085
So Victor reached out to me then said, Hey,

2614
02:02:09,235 --> 02:02:10,765
this thing's super popular in Brazil.

2615
02:02:10,765 --> 02:02:13,525
Everybody buys it. Do you know someone in the UK

2616
02:02:13,625 --> 02:02:14,805
who could help me out

2617
02:02:14,985 --> 02:02:17,165
and maybe I can sell in the UK as well?

2618
02:02:17,745 --> 02:02:19,685
And I thought of it during the call with Victor

2619
02:02:19,785 --> 02:02:21,765
and I said, you know, Victor, that this won't work

2620
02:02:21,765 --> 02:02:26,605
because the Zac spectrum is this piece of design, this

2621
02:02:27,215 --> 02:02:29,105
full rounded machine, this one thing

2622
02:02:29,105 --> 02:02:30,545
that you get under your Christmas tree

2623
02:02:30,545 --> 02:02:32,905
and you open, you plug it in and it works.

2624
02:02:32,925 --> 02:02:36,105
And that's the memory that everybody has of it.

2625
02:02:36,805 --> 02:02:39,145
The memories of trying to keep this expansion working

2626
02:02:39,245 --> 02:02:40,585
and putting Blue Tech here

2627
02:02:40,585 --> 02:02:42,865
and there, it said, that's not what people want, right?

2628
02:02:42,935 --> 02:02:45,705
They want that thing that you open and the smell

2629
02:02:45,765 --> 02:02:47,145
and the materials and everything.

2630
02:02:47,245 --> 02:02:49,745
So why don't we actually make a computer out of it?

2631
02:02:49,745 --> 02:02:52,705
And while we added it, why don't we make the computer

2632
02:02:52,735 --> 02:02:54,065
that Sinclair never made?

2633
02:02:54,115 --> 02:02:56,345
Maybe we can get the original team to work with us.

2634
02:02:56,355 --> 02:02:58,225
Maybe we can bring in Rick Dickinson.

2635
02:02:58,245 --> 02:03:00,545
And that's how the ZX spectrum next was born, because

2636
02:03:00,545 --> 02:03:04,065
It was designed by the late Rick Dickinson and Phil, and,

2637
02:03:04,285 --> 02:03:06,385
and it just looks amazing.

2638
02:03:06,605 --> 02:03:08,905
We worked on it together, mainly driven by Rick,

2639
02:03:08,985 --> 02:03:11,665
conceptually, because it's his legacy really.

2640
02:03:12,135 --> 02:03:16,145
Rick was asked to redesign it using new technology,

2641
02:03:16,305 --> 02:03:18,545
a new keyboard, how would it look now?

2642
02:03:18,805 --> 02:03:19,865
And this is the result.

2643
02:03:19,965 --> 02:03:21,905
And the keys are the, the main feature.

2644
02:03:22,015 --> 02:03:23,505
They're extraordinary. I love them.

2645
02:03:23,945 --> 02:03:25,265
I really do like those keys.

2646
02:03:25,885 --> 02:03:27,865
The colored plugs on the side are a nod

2647
02:03:27,865 --> 02:03:28,985
to the original rainbow.

2648
02:03:29,405 --> 02:03:31,585
We could not do that. Could we? Really? It

2649
02:03:31,585 --> 02:03:34,785
Looks as you would expect it to have progressed.

2650
02:03:34,885 --> 02:03:38,665
It. It's got the fail of the Sinclair, the brand itself.

2651
02:03:42,885 --> 02:03:46,465
So the ethos behind the ZX spectrum next was that ability

2652
02:03:46,465 --> 02:03:48,265
to take it off the box and use it.

2653
02:03:48,405 --> 02:03:51,105
So we kept everything from the original spectrum

2654
02:03:51,885 --> 02:03:54,625
inside the spectrum next, even the ability to load from tape

2655
02:03:55,045 --> 02:03:57,145
or use it just the way you use it back then.

2656
02:03:57,645 --> 02:03:59,185
And then started to add the layers

2657
02:03:59,285 --> 02:04:02,345
of extra functionalities on top without interfering

2658
02:04:02,345 --> 02:04:03,865
with the backward compatibility

2659
02:04:04,125 --> 02:04:05,125
On the next. You can do

2660
02:04:05,125 --> 02:04:07,625
everything that you could do on

2661
02:04:07,625 --> 02:04:08,705
the original spectrums.

2662
02:04:09,125 --> 02:04:11,145
You can still have your attribute clash if you want it

2663
02:04:11,145 --> 02:04:13,865
as a specky, but it's making it for the next generation

2664
02:04:13,865 --> 02:04:17,185
of kids can pick up and start programming

2665
02:04:17,285 --> 02:04:18,785
and not be stuck by, oh,

2666
02:04:18,785 --> 02:04:20,465
I can't get something moving around on the screen.

2667
02:04:20,485 --> 02:04:21,505
Oh, I'll put that away.

2668
02:04:21,605 --> 02:04:24,385
And I brought the next, it brought back memories

2669
02:04:24,485 --> 02:04:25,585
of my spectrum.

2670
02:04:25,855 --> 02:04:29,225
Days, many hours, many late nights coding,

2671
02:04:29,845 --> 02:04:32,625
but I think the next is in its own league.

2672
02:04:33,295 --> 02:04:34,505
It's really hard to explain.

2673
02:04:34,695 --> 02:04:37,525
It's, it's like going back in time, that magic

2674
02:04:37,595 --> 02:04:39,285
that you had when you were younger,

2675
02:04:39,285 --> 02:04:41,325
when you were first experiment with assembly,

2676
02:04:41,465 --> 02:04:42,925
and it, it's back again.

2677
02:04:43,025 --> 02:04:46,005
You've, you've got a machine, you can start again doing

2678
02:04:46,005 --> 02:04:48,245
that on and, and get that same buzz.

2679
02:04:48,745 --> 02:04:51,085
Oh my God. The difference in quality

2680
02:04:51,505 --> 02:04:52,845
of the Specker games on the next.

2681
02:04:53,035 --> 02:04:55,165
It's something that we all didn't expect,

2682
02:04:55,825 --> 02:04:57,325
and I know we know it's capable,

2683
02:04:57,985 --> 02:05:00,245
but we didn't expect the quality of the games

2684
02:05:00,315 --> 02:05:02,445
that people have been making, even from basic.

2685
02:05:02,665 --> 02:05:05,405
And it, it's, it's been been brilliant.

2686
02:05:05,475 --> 02:05:07,365
It's the whole story of the next.

2687
02:05:07,515 --> 02:05:09,205
It's, it's like I've loved

2688
02:05:09,205 --> 02:05:10,845
every minute of doing the project. A

2689
02:05:10,845 --> 02:05:13,725
Lot of game designers are trying to replicate

2690
02:05:13,755 --> 02:05:15,525
what they did on their 48 k,

2691
02:05:15,985 --> 02:05:18,165
but the next really is bigger than that.

2692
02:05:18,625 --> 02:05:20,405
You can do a lot more on the next,

2693
02:05:20,705 --> 02:05:23,445
and you've got all this extra memory to use.

2694
02:05:23,755 --> 02:05:26,725
Plus you've got the beauty of built-in wifi.

2695
02:05:27,225 --> 02:05:29,245
The eight bit machine isn't dead.

2696
02:05:29,275 --> 02:05:32,085
It's it, it's living on, but this

2697
02:05:32,085 --> 02:05:35,445
Is truly the Specky community, the regional people,

2698
02:05:36,395 --> 02:05:40,765
players, the creators, the fans who come together

2699
02:05:41,145 --> 02:05:42,845
to add small pieces to this project

2700
02:05:42,905 --> 02:05:45,245
and make it all together in a sense.

2701
02:05:45,925 --> 02:05:49,925
I cannot imagine a more original way

2702
02:05:49,985 --> 02:05:52,365
or a more valid way

2703
02:05:52,785 --> 02:05:56,525
of keeping the spectrum alive than the people who enjoy it,

2704
02:05:56,875 --> 02:05:58,005
keeping it that way.

2705
02:06:05,045 --> 02:06:07,645
I think the spectrums remain so popular today

2706
02:06:08,315 --> 02:06:10,645
because it had a certain innocence.

2707
02:06:11,145 --> 02:06:13,805
And obviously we have a nostalgia for anything

2708
02:06:13,805 --> 02:06:15,285
that we played with as kids.

2709
02:06:15,705 --> 02:06:18,165
And like a lot of people, I spent a lot

2710
02:06:18,165 --> 02:06:19,245
of time playing on the spectrum,

2711
02:06:19,805 --> 02:06:21,125
enjoying the games, hours and hours.

2712
02:06:22,145 --> 02:06:23,965
And I think when you look back at those times,

2713
02:06:24,475 --> 02:06:27,565
they're the times that you, you are very nostalgic about

2714
02:06:28,275 --> 02:06:30,405
because they've got a lot of good memories for you.

2715
02:06:30,825 --> 02:06:34,005
And I think particularly these days, we all need a bit

2716
02:06:34,005 --> 02:06:35,605
of those warm, fuzzy memories sometimes.

2717
02:06:36,485 --> 02:06:38,685
I think part of the success of the spectrum was due

2718
02:06:38,685 --> 02:06:39,805
to the, the price,

2719
02:06:39,825 --> 02:06:40,925
but also the wow factor

2720
02:06:40,945 --> 02:06:43,485
of the unboxing really is just like a unique unboxing.

2721
02:06:43,545 --> 02:06:45,245
It was also such a neat little package

2722
02:06:45,505 --> 02:06:47,325
and people fell in love with its personality

2723
02:06:47,345 --> 02:06:50,165
and its rubber keys, but also that it drove creativity.

2724
02:06:50,345 --> 02:06:52,765
And if you spoke this language, which I never did,

2725
02:06:52,985 --> 02:06:54,805
it must have been so liberating.

2726
02:06:54,865 --> 02:06:58,165
It must have felt like the thrill I got from playing a game

2727
02:06:58,395 --> 02:07:00,405
with, which had a sense of adventure and discovery.

2728
02:07:00,405 --> 02:07:02,805
Imagine if you discovered a whole new language

2729
02:07:02,805 --> 02:07:05,765
that allowed you to control events

2730
02:07:05,945 --> 02:07:07,205
on a screen in front of you.

2731
02:07:07,605 --> 02:07:09,125
I think there's so much love for the spectrum today

2732
02:07:09,125 --> 02:07:12,925
because it's a quintessentially British thing.

2733
02:07:13,405 --> 02:07:15,285
I mean that rainbow stripe on the bottom right, might

2734
02:07:15,285 --> 02:07:16,445
as well be a union jack, right?

2735
02:07:17,395 --> 02:07:21,885
It's so British and so uniquely us.

2736
02:07:22,585 --> 02:07:24,925
And it was made by a bloke from Cambridge

2737
02:07:25,065 --> 02:07:27,045
who was a bit posh, and he was ginger

2738
02:07:27,385 --> 02:07:30,485
and he was knighted by a queen, a knighthood.

2739
02:07:30,945 --> 02:07:32,525
That's the spectrum experience.

2740
02:07:33,875 --> 02:07:36,765
Show me an experience like that from another country. Well,

2741
02:07:36,765 --> 02:07:38,045
There's something very British about it.

2742
02:07:38,045 --> 02:07:41,325
The fact that it was assembled in Dundee, like,

2743
02:07:41,325 --> 02:07:42,525
we like to do things differently.

2744
02:07:42,755 --> 02:07:44,485
This is an entirely different machine.

2745
02:07:44,945 --> 02:07:46,245
The way it looked, the way it

2746
02:07:46,245 --> 02:07:47,485
worked, you know, it was different.

2747
02:07:47,865 --> 02:07:50,645
And I don't think there was so much fanfare about him being

2748
02:07:50,715 --> 02:07:52,485
British as opposed to

2749
02:07:52,485 --> 02:07:54,885
what was happening in North America when it came

2750
02:07:54,885 --> 02:07:57,245
to technology, because lots of people, uh, like to claim

2751
02:07:57,245 --> 02:07:58,965
that the games industry started in America.

2752
02:07:59,185 --> 02:08:00,405
But, uh, we know better.

2753
02:08:02,005 --> 02:08:06,085
I think of him as a boffin who understood

2754
02:08:06,315 --> 02:08:07,725
what was important to people

2755
02:08:08,225 --> 02:08:10,685
and how he could bring the future

2756
02:08:11,555 --> 02:08:13,965
into their lives at a decent price.

2757
02:08:14,465 --> 02:08:18,805
So although he was pilloried a lot for his eccentricity,

2758
02:08:19,105 --> 02:08:21,605
it was exactly that which allowed him

2759
02:08:21,605 --> 02:08:23,485
to have such crazy ambition

2760
02:08:23,485 --> 02:08:27,165
and crazy thoughts that resulted in people like me

2761
02:08:27,185 --> 02:08:29,165
and hundreds of thousands of others

2762
02:08:29,735 --> 02:08:32,245
benefiting from his genius of

2763
02:08:33,085 --> 02:08:34,965
democratizing this amazing technology.

2764
02:08:35,435 --> 02:08:39,525
Rick was very generous with praise where it was warranted,

2765
02:08:39,825 --> 02:08:43,125
and he had nothing but praise for Clive Sinclair.

2766
02:08:43,275 --> 02:08:46,325
From his perspective, he owed his first step up a ladder

2767
02:08:46,545 --> 02:08:48,805
for his career to Clive Sinclair.

2768
02:08:48,945 --> 02:08:51,085
He was very protective of Clive

2769
02:08:51,385 --> 02:08:54,005
and really didn't like the negative press

2770
02:08:54,065 --> 02:08:55,245
he got the mocking.

2771
02:08:55,535 --> 02:08:58,885
Clive was an innovator. You need these people.

2772
02:08:58,885 --> 02:09:02,005
They're the engines of industry people that are prepared

2773
02:09:02,005 --> 02:09:03,445
to take a risk, stick their neck out.

2774
02:09:03,445 --> 02:09:05,445
You don't get new products without risk takers.

2775
02:09:06,065 --> 02:09:09,645
And Clive Sinclair, from Rick's perspective,

2776
02:09:10,425 --> 02:09:12,845
was a risk taker in the best way.

2777
02:09:55,525 --> 02:10:00,375
It's the middle of the sun is shining

2778
02:10:00,655 --> 02:10:02,775
brightly my eye.

2779
02:10:33,395 --> 02:10:34,965
Another Wednesday,

2780
02:10:36,635 --> 02:10:40,765
Just Another Wednesday, just another

2781
02:10:41,275 --> 02:10:42,275
Wednesday.

2782
02:10:43,515 --> 02:10:46,685
Five minutes later I sound

2783
02:10:51,895 --> 02:10:52,565
helicopter.

2784
02:11:10,875 --> 02:11:12,725
Just another Wednesday.

2785
02:11:14,275 --> 02:11:16,085
Just another Wednesday.

2786
02:11:17,715 --> 02:11:19,565
Just another Wednesday.

2787
02:11:22,315 --> 02:11:22,925
Wednesday

2788
02:11:31,585 --> 02:11:32,845
As we take on.

2789
02:11:33,545 --> 02:11:36,485
See my manion from the sky.

2790
02:11:38,425 --> 02:11:39,085
10 minutes.

2791
02:11:52,305 --> 02:11:52,525
I'm

2792
02:12:08,655 --> 02:12:09,265
Wednesday.

2793
02:12:13,775 --> 02:12:17,825
Wednesday, Wednesday

2794
02:17:52,625 --> 02:17:52,915
only.

2795
02:17:54,395 --> 02:17:54,515
I.