Villordsutch reviews The Little Book of Sinclair ZX Spectrum Games by Chris Wilkins…
I’m a big fan of nearly everything to do with Sinclair Computers. It’s something I’m fairly open with and if you wander into my dining room you’ll see safely secured to my wall – in a nice little corner – a timeline of Sir Clive’s masterpieces from the ZX80 to the ZX Spectrum 128K+ “Toast Rack”. To go with this adoration when I see that another book has arrived on the scene, that celebrates anything to do with any of of these machines, I do like to bury my nose in it. So when I discovered that Chris Wilkins from Fusion Retro Books had released The Little Book of Sinclair ZX Spectrum Games I practically snapped the postman’s hand off when I had to sign for it at the door.
The “Little Book” is as it says little! Measuring at 15cm x 15cm and with 145 pages between the Spectrum-striped, hard-backed cover, you’re not going to get cramp from holding this book aloft for any length of time. Each page comes with a nice sized, brightly-coloured screenshot of a game, along with a description of the each title from the Chris’ own perspective. Plus to go along with this we’re given the Software Publishing house, the year of release and the scores given from Crash Magazine which on occasion can be considered criminal – Arkanoid 59%!? These all rest comfortably within a cluster of gaming genres selected by Chris, which include Arcade Adventure, Fighting and Puzzle etc.
On the topic of Crash Magazine, the art for the genre changes is delivered from one of the most memorable artists from the ZX Spectrum era, Oliver Frey. His classic work is added to separate the Sport from the Arcade Adventure and the Flying from the Puzzle games. It doesn’t matter if you were a Your Sinclair or Crash Magazine fan ,there’s no denying that Oliver Frey’s work is quite fantastic and it’s a pleasure to see this anywhere.
There is a very wide and excellent selection of games in this book; they’re not all classics and you may cry foul when you favourite isn’t listed like Clive Townsend’s Saboteur, but Jonah Barrington’s Squash is. With the likes of The Pyramid, Green Beret and 4D Timegate balanced against The Hobbit, Ikari Warriors and R-Type the list moves across the ZX Spectrum’s gaming history, pulling out cassettes from a huge box and dusting off some true memories. My only issue I have with the selection of games given is that the Adventure Games section is very limited, there was no mention of any Zenobi Games and also one of my favourites, Rigel’s Revenge wasn’t listed either. This could be down however to Chris Wilkins not being much of an adventure gaming fan on his tromp through the 80’s.
If you have a retrogaming loving Father, Mother, Brother, Sister, Cousin that you’re currently racking your brains to think what additional present would be fantastic for the upcoming holiday season or birthday buy them this, or if you even fancy just treating yourself…Ta-darrr! Whatever the moment is, buying The Little Book of Sinclair ZX Spectrum Games is certainly a great idea, as it is an excellent look back at the ZX Spectrum’s gaming history.
The Little book of Sinclair ZX Spectrum Games is now available to buy at Fusion Retro Books priced £8.99.
Rating: 8/10
Originally published October 9, 2016. Updated April 16, 2018.
