Australian Gaming Database and magazine cover scans at RGA

Posted Monday, 9th April 2012 under Video game websites
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[Source: Australian Gaming Database]

Just wanted to give props to Retro Gaming Australia’s latest additions – they’ve just release an excellent wiki-based database relating to the gaming sector in Australia (including some excellent coverage of Hyper, Sega Megazone and The Zone, three of my favourite slices of Australian gaming media), as well as an archive covering magazine cover scans.

These both join their excellent/extensive Google docs-based Australian game magazine score review archive, TV ad archives and video game magazine ads.

In a perfect world of course, we would be able to grab all the back issues of Hyper and Sega Megazone in a PDF-like format to capture the history of gaming magazines in this country perfectly, but that’s unlikely to happen unfortunately. I for one would love to see some conversions of the old print masters into PDF to peruse on my PC or iOS device, but the return on the investment would probably not be sufficient given the time needed to do this.

Now if only I hadn’t sold off all my video game magazines when I got to Uni! I had piles of delightful magazines in there – C+VG’s from 1992-1993 and several issues of MEGA, Megatech, Sega Zone, Sega Force, Mean Machines Sega and the Official Sega Saturn Magazine from the UK (I owned Sega consoles if you couldn’t tell ;)), [Sega] Megazone 20-55 (the final issue), smatterings of Hyper from 1993 and 1994, then every issue from December 1995 to mid/late-1998… would make for some great reading going back and checking all of those out now 😀

More (Australian) retro gaming blogs

Posted Wednesday, 13th July 2011 under Video game websites
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Last week I posted about some retro gaming blogs I’ve been reading of late, but two other have caught my attention:

• Retrospekt – Coming out of Adelaide, Retrospekt features reviews, tidbits, guides and other thoughtpieces on retro gaming in Australia. Of special note is its coverage of DJ TR!P’s Ultracade series, and entertaining ventures to local specialty stores. The recent C64 special (part 1) also gave me the warm fuzzies.
• Retro Game On – Written by Brendan, who happens to be from Perth and enjoys wearing pants. He’s also recently taken steps to attack a mangled Game Gear with a soldering iron (good luck! My soldering iron and I regularly catch up to discuss current events and make smelly burning solder smells) and bought Dreamcast games in France for a good price from a reluctant business owner.
• Retro Gaming Australia – As the name suggests, this blog is about retro gaming. In Australia. I found this one while procrastinating, and I’m very impressed. The daily video game ads are a great trip down memory lane, especially when they’re coupled with topical humour relevant to Australian Dreamcast fans from 1999. But for those who fondly remember when the illustrious video game magazine of the 90s ruled supreme, you’re in for a treat as they’ve compiled a massive list of game reviews spanning a rather large gamut of Australian publication; being irrational, I checked to see if the score for Rocket Knight Adventure from Sega Megazone was there, and voila:

  

  Gold!

That reminds me of the time when I made a poster of Rocket Knight Adventures back in 1993. It was hand-drawn and everything, and included a quote from the Sega Megazone review that mentioned it being far more enjoyable than a night with Cindy Crawford and a barrel of jellied eels. I’m sure my parents were delighted that their 11-year-old son would put such a memorable comment on a poster about a video game in 1993.

Now I feel sad because it reminds me that I sold off all my video game magazines for practically nothing on eBay when I started Uni in 2000 in an effort to have something of a right-of-passage and farewell High School Sean, as well as scrape some extra cash for Uni life (a serving of chips and gravy from the Unibar made for a cheap but tasty lunch). Now as a man-child in their late-20s (with an understand wife), I regret selling everything off. But I rest at ease in the hope that someone else is dancing a merry jig with their bargain purchase.