The Pop-Culture E-Zine
Now this is our kind of thing! Firebox is selling an officially licensed Tetris Waffle Maker (£29.99), which can produce seven different cute Tetrimino-shaped waffles in just a few minutes. This would be a great Xmas gift for that special someone that loves Tetris, which is about 40+ million peeps around the world (including us!) 😉
image source: Firebox
We all owe Iain Bennie a lot of gratitude for painstakingly recreating the Commodore 64 User’s Guide and Programmer’s Reference Guide (and the Quick Reference Card)!
We recently had a notification in one of the Commodore 64 Facebook Groups that immediately piqued our interest. It was a post by Iain Bennie that advised the 24,000+ members that after restoring his breadbin 8-bit beauty, he wanted to complete the set with new copies of the (old spiral bound) C64 User’s Guide and the Programmer’s Reference Guide.
Instead of scanning the original guides, Iain re-wrote them from scratch, reconstructing every graphic, including the front and back covers, every register map, block diagram, and every table to then have a wonderful and pristine final result.
This whole process took Iain a number of months, which clearly shows in the end product. Iain also had his re-written guides printed, which we must admit, look amazing – see pics and stop drooling already!
Not surprising, these guides have garnered a lot of interest from the community, which took Iain by (a pleasant) surprise. Iain has kindly made the PDF guides freely available (here) for all of us, which is darn awesome if you ask us. Oh yeah, he even has tips on getting them professionally printed! We and the rest of the C64 community thank Iain for all of his hard work and generosity in making these guides and proving them for free! What are you waiting for, go get them now!
source: Iain Bennie via Facebook
We love all things PAC-MAN! The yellow dot-muncher gave us PAC-MAN Fever 40 years ago, so of course we love this Lego Ideas entry!
If you love Lego and you love PAC-MAN, then you know what to do – hit that SUPPORT button now!
source: Lego Ideas – Pac-Man
Round 1, fight! This awesome limited edition 1oz silver coin celebrates the iconic 1991 arcade game, Street Fighter II™. The first Street Fighter was released by the Japanese game manufacturer Capcom Company in 1987 and gave rise to an entire genre of fighting games and spawned a multitude of sequels.
This precious collectable incorporates the game logo on a mirror finish background, above a coloured image of Ryu and Ken, mid-battle, with Ryu executing the special attack Hadoken. The obverse of the coin features the Ian Rank-Broadley effigy of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, confirming it as legal tender.
image source: NZ Mint
The coin is housed inside a specially designed Street Fighter II-themed box which replicates the arcade cabinet – which is pretty darn cool! It features the coin’s battle image on the display screen and shows the main protagonist of the game, Ryu, on the sides. Confirmation of the coin’s authenticity is printed on its base. Lifting the “cabinet” off the base reveals the coin inside cushioned in black velvet.
Officially licensed, there are only 2,000 available worldwide. This is a perfect memento for those who grew up playing Street Fighter™ or indeed any gaming enthusiasts!
Check it out at NZ Mint here!
We received the following message from a friend on behalf of Jim (from SBOR – Sinclair Book of Remembrance) so we thought we would share with you all as we think it is a great idea for the community to share their memories of Sinclair’s computers and also remembering Sir Clive Sinclair.
The Sinclair Book of Remembrance (SBOR) is a project dedicated to the memory of Sir Clive Sinclair who sadly passed away on the 16th September 2021.
Moved as I was, SBOR has been a personal labour of love, to do something in honour of “Uncle Clive”. It is not a business project. It’s completely free and non-monetised.
The objective is to create a unique digital monument, composed of our shared Sinclair memories encoded together so that the final product represents each and every one of us.
For those thinking this is an NFT thing – it is definitely not! It is an opportunity for each of us to share a memory, and together create a unique dedication to Sir Clive.
I am asking that each of us contribute a Sinclair memory, by simply sending an email with your story (with up to 4 image attachments). By sending your email to [email protected] it will trigger the system to automatically create an entry to the SBOR site – for example: https://sbor.uk/m/1?code=41ce. You will receive a reply containing the link to your contribution, which I would urge you to share far and wide!
At a pre-determined date, say the 1-year anniversary of Sir Clive’s passing, all of the entries will be combined and encoded into a single unique value. This will be unique in the universe and will represent all of our combined memories of what Sinclair meant to us and something we can all share in.
There has been one aspect of classic gaming that we’ve always enjoyed, and that is books! There have been a number of awesome classic gaming books released over the years which we have covered on this site, and we are quite chuffed to review the latest book from Cook and Becker, PAC-MAN: Birth of an Icon.
The iconic PAC-MAN (and his ghostly foes, Inky, Blinky, Pinky and Clyde) needs no introduction, as the arcade game captured the hearts of millions around the world upon its release 41 years ago, and has been played many times over on home systems during the intervening years. There is a reason that the arcade machine is still the number one highest-grossing arcade machine of all time – it was and still is an amazing action maze chase game. Once PAC-MAN crossed over from niche fascination to mainstream appeal, there was no stopping this gaming juggernaut.
The Standard Edition
The Collector’s Edition
PAC-MAN’s appeal has transcended generations of gamers, and this officially licensed (by BANDAI NAMCO Entertainment Inc.) book, PAC-MAN: Birth of an Icon, is the ultimate tome that is filled with historical facts about the yellow dot muncher, including; origins of the game (and going from Japan to America), design philosophies, original arcade source code, concept designs, art, archival imagery, marketing campaigns, merchandise and its impact to popular culture to name just a few. PAC-MAN’s story spans decades, touching everything from video games, pop culture to our world today, and PAC-MAN: Birth of an Icon captures it all beautifully in a quality book that has fast become the definitive work on the iconic dot muncher.
Lots of great chapters on all things PAC-MAN!
Go Toru!
Pac-Man Fever!
With every page filled with eye popping art and images, it is the stories told that capture your attention and keep you glued to each and every page till the last word. We absolutely loved reading the journey from creator Toru Iwatani’s “pizza slice” inspiration to the actual game and its inevitable success. The road from Japan to America is another fascinating insight into how Puck Man became PAC-MAN. Oh yeah, to read about Toru’s early life and love of pinball was another cherry on top of an already amazing layered cake. Another aspect that was a pleasant surprise which our inner geek loved, was the PAC-MAN Gameology. This portion of the book lists details about every PAC-MAN related video game from 1980 to today – we were gobsmacked to see (and learned something new!) that PAC-MAN features in so many games!
The design philosophy behind the golden age arcade hero!
The art inspiration of the yellow dot-muncher
The co-authors of this special tome, Arjan Terpstra (Sonic the Hedgehog 25th Anniversary Art Book) and Tim Lapetino (Art of Atari and other books), have captured every aspect of PAC-MAN and translated it all into an amazing, hefty and beautifully presented book which every PAC-MAN fan and video games historians need on their bookshelf. PAC-MAN: Birth of an Icon will reignite your PAC-MAN Fever, so you have been warned!
Pac-Man invades popular culture!
There are two versions of this book that can be pre-ordered right now; the PAC-MAN: Birth of Icon standard edition (AU$89.95) and the limited to 2,000 copies Collector’s Edition (AU$169.95), which includes:
You don’t get too many opportunities to get something special like this book, so if you have the opportunity, we highly recommend either of these editions. And if you were bitten hard by the PAC-MAN Fever back in the day, then we highly recommend you grab the Collector’s Edition – it is amazing!
PS: Australian readers can order either PAC-MAN: Birth of an Icon edition via our friends at PixelCrib!
No matter your language, PAC-MAN: Birth of an Icon has you covered!
image source: Cook & Becker
Disclaimer: The ‘PAC-MAN: Birth of an Icon Collector’s Edition’ book was kindly supplied by Cook and Becker for this review.
If you think you have had enough of video games related movies, then you may want to look away. For those that lap up these types of nostalgia-inducing films, 8-Bit Christmas starting Neil Patrick Harris as a father looking back fondly at the late ’80s Christmas where he desperately did everything he possibly could to get an NES, will be right up your alley! Since we can relate to this tale (we also wanted a NES for Christmas in 1988, alas we didn’t get one then), we are definitely keen on giving this a watch and getting right into the Christmas spirit!
Check out the trailer below to see if 8-Bit Christmas will be on your viewing list his festive season.
source: Warner Bros. Pictures
Remember the Tetris light you could build from tetrominos? Well, now there is a Super Mario Bros. light you can build too!
The Super Mario Bros Build A Level Light is a stackable 16 light-blocks set that features a host of familiar icons and characters from the much-loved Mario saga, which you can arrange as you wish. Each pixelated cube is double-sided and can be stacked in a whole host of combinations to create your own unique Mario level.
With Christmas around the corner, this is the perfect gift for gaming geeks and nostalgia junkies alike, that will brighten up their home or gaming space.
source: Firebox
story source: technabob
There is no shortage of awesome and talented artists in this world. The latest artist to capture our attention is Johan Karlgren, aka: Pappas Pärlor.
Johan’s creations are unique as they are refashioned framed art pieces injected with very clever pop culture themes and franchises, including popular Star Wars and video gaming characters.
Check out all Johan’s art works here. Here are our favourites:
source: Pappas Pärlor
If you are fans (like us!) of the From Bedrooms to Billions film series then you will absolutely love their latest documentary film, The Rubber-Keyed Wonder: 40 Years of the Sinclair ZX Spectrum. To make Anthony and Nicola Caulfield’s film come true, go and check out their Kickstarter!
Coinciding with the ZX Speccy’s 40th anniversary next year (2022), Anthony and Nicola are aiming to release the film by Christmas 2022 – make sure you let Santa know! The Caulfield’s are aiming to make a thorough and definitive film on the ZX Spectrum, going into all the finer details of how and why the ZX Spectrum was created, what impact the computer had as well as the various versions that followed right the way through to the latest iteration of the system with the ZX Spectrum Next.
The film aims to reunite as many of the original ZX Spectrum hardware team and of course many legendary game developers, artists and musicians, and also talk to fans of the ZX Spectrum as to understand the significance of the machine with the masses.
This Kickstarter campaign once again has some stunning artwork from Oliver Frey available as well as some wonderful posters and other add-ons to get your nostagia gland pulsating!
Now, we are Commodore fans, but we are also aware of the significance of the Sinclair ZX Spectrum, so we are quite excited to support Anthony and Nicola on their new project!
image source: The Rubber Keyed Wonder – 40 years of the ZX Spectrum