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View Full Version : Old BBC documentary about Imagine and Ocean, two big name developers of the 1980s


Bad Sector
08-17-2009, 07:27 AM
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1012096952890708986

I just watched it. It is a documentary about two game development companies (which apparently they shared the same building), Imagine and Ocean. Both were big names in the industry of 1980s.

In early 1984 the Imagine team were working on a spectacular project known as Bandersnatch. The game was to come in an A4 sized box containing around 30 'goodies' including a required additional piece of hardware for your Spectrum computer. The retail price of Bandersnatch was expected to be around £40 and it was to be a completely new concept in computer games. Apparently 10 professional artists were working on the graphics alone. Bandersnatch was never released. On the 9th of July 1984, Imagine went bust after only 18 months of operation. Interestingly, its demise was documented by a BBC television program

(note: i think the game was for Commodore 64 - at least most people seem to use C64 there, although a few ZXs are shown too)

Rapture_Rising
08-17-2009, 08:39 AM
I think (But im not sure if its true or not) that after Imagine's demise they sold Bandersnatch to then Psygnosis (now known as SCE Studio Liverpool (known for the wipeout series)) and they redeveloped using parts of the original Bandersnatch and renamed it Brataccas and was released for the Amiga, Atari ST and the Macintosh in 1986.

I dont know if that was mentioned in the Doco.

I think that the original game was for the ZX Spectrum.