Subscriber copies are set to start dispatching from Saturday 18th February 2023

The issue will be on general sale w/c 27th February 2023.

COVER FEATURE: ACTION BIKER – CLUMSY COLIN
Back in 1985, the UK scoffed millions of packets of KP Skips crisps (potato -chips), and then had the chance to play as its fumbling mascot Clumsy Colin in Mastertronic’s budget success, Action Biker. Selling over 251,000 copies, it’s a budget game worthy of a FREEZE64 retrospective and cover feature.

Now – I’m sure most of you have also played Action Biker many times over throughout the years, and so, instead of sharing my usual cover feature retrospective, I have something a little different for you this time round…

JOHN ROWLANDS’ APEX ARCADE – THE DEVELOPMENT OF MAYHEM IN MOSTERLAND
In this exciting installment, John explores the inspiration behind Apex’s final C64 title, Mayhem in Monsterland. And not only the inspiration but as-yet undisclosed details on why he and Steve released the game themselves, as well as their relationship with Thalamus and how that played a part in their decision to self-publish. It’s the final and exciting chapter in the Apex story.

JULIAN RIGNALL’S ZZAPBACK!
Julian checks out the SIZZLERS and Gold Medal-winning games from ZZAP!64 issue 38, which was released back in June 1988. The top-scoring games include Impossible Mission 2, Alien Syndrome, Target Renegade, Gryzor, and Echelon.

SECRET SQUIRREL INVESTIGATES
Two brand new case files to check out: Mario Bros. (1987) from Ocean Software, and Turbo Kart Racer (1991) from Players Software – both with very different styles of hidden messages!

DEVELOPERS’ DEN: IAN POTTS
Our main focus at FREEZE64 has always been to capture Commodore 64 game development history – be it games and programmers that you’re all familiar with, and also those that are a little more obscure that you may not have even heard of…

In this installment of Developers’ Den, we introduce Ian Potts, who back in 1986 started programming games for the Commodore 64 as part of his entry for Your Commodore magazine’s Programmer of the Year competition. From there he produced game listings for us all to type in, and eventually moved into developing games for the commercial market. We find out a little more about Ian and his journey into the commercial world of C64 game development.

FRANK CHATS… THE DEVELOPMENT OF HAMMER DOWN
Back in the early 2010s, our very own Frank Gasking regularly met up with the late, great Jason Kelk – along with C64 musician Sean Connolly. During these meetings in Canterbury, Frank got to witness the creation of Jason’s recent Psytronik release, HAMMER DOWN. This feature is a unique insight into the creation of Jason’s final game for the Commodore 64.

OUT OF THE ‘MOULDY CUPBOARD’
This time round, we’re checking out ROAD ROLLER, which is a 1984 release from KnightSoft. It’s a quirky little arcade game programmed by I.M. Scull (is that even a real name?!), which is a mixture of Pacman and a Potty Painter type game. We find out if Road Roller is good enough to stay out of The Mouldy Cupboard… or bad enough to be thrown back in and banished for eternity?

LET’S HACK… HAMMER DOWN
How could we discuss Jason’s fab game and not share some cool exclusive POKES ‘n’ CODES with you? Lots of fun to be had with a few extra features such as infinite lives, infinite fuel, freeze timer, ride through walls, invincibility, game-ending, and color changes.

DIARY OF A GAME – TRAN BY STEVE COLLINS
We catch up with Steve and the development of TRAN as he makes an error and overwrites some of his game data. Oops!

 

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