A retrospective of my game development career spanning multiple decades and platforms
Over the years, it has to be said I've written a lot of games, on a lot of systems. I tended to work mainly on ports and conversions from one system to another, so my chances of a big hit were always dependant on how the source material did. But I did work on a number of big selling well reviewed games. The simple fact is though that hit or miss, big sales or not, every project was a means to pay the mortgage, and clear off the debts. Freelancing is always a hand to mouth existence but it does give a degree of freedom that I liked. Regular wages though, in a company that would last 3-5 years were always welcome.
Here's a very incomplete and out of order sample of some of the games I worked on over the years. It's saying something that I have actually forgotton exactly how many games I've done, and also all the different targets(SKU's) I ported them too. For brevity, I've only posted one of the target systems, but frequently I would do multiple versions at the same time, often without credit.
I also had a strange habit when I was young, of hiding my name from credits and using the name Fiz as some kind of pretentious pseudonym. It was my 3 letter arcade high score handle...yeah I remember arcades :D
I'll try to add more as I remember/come across cover images for them.
I also did quite a lot of work as a producer or Project Manager, for different companies, but adding them here would make this page pretty huge so I'll leave them out. I also had roles as Managing Director and CTO in my own and other companies.
Since Jul 2008 I have worked as a Docent at Breda University of Applied Sciences (BUas), teaching Game Programming, with a focus on basic C/C++ skills and game structure, working mostly with 1st years. I've worked with 100's if not 1000's of students in that time on a range of different games, research, and wonderful projects with some truly remarkable colleagues. In Dec 2025 I will be retiring to focus on Personal Projects and support for my books.
Not quite the 1st game I wrote, but probably the 1st where I started to feel I knew what I was doing, written with my dear friend Ian Martin, who passed away a few years later. We were Ti99 fans and wanted to play more games, later we imported and sold games and bought absurdly expensive hardware. Happy days!
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When TI stopped making computers, I set up my own company and switched to Amstrads, this was one of the 1st games I did.
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Basically a simple but playable version of Othello, I have to confess I copied a lot of the logic from a Ti99 game Timeless had released before, but I got it all working well on the CPC and was pleased with it.
This was a text adventure Ian and I did on the Ti99 as well, and I ported to the Amstrad. I can't find a cover pic but here's my company ad that was in the back pages of the games mag at the time. We made the tapes to order.
One of my favourite games, a blatent Boulderdash clone but with nice graphics. There were 10 themes each with 4 levels, split over 2 games.
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Ported from the Commodore version, this was quite a fun game at the time, but Amstrad was a UK system and Baseball just isn't as popular there.
Fun little Platformer, for which I developed a cross platform system for that let me do 3 platforms at once, but didn't get a lot of interest from publishers but was cool to do.
My last ever Spectrum project and it was a stunner! Sadly though, just as I finished it, and it got great previews in the press, the publisher decided the Speccy was dead and it was dropped...I...was...gutted!
My Last title for Software Creations, this created a 2D Platform game engine that was used in a lot of other games by them afterwards.
My First game for Icon design, ported from an Atari version that was a big seller for Mastertronic
I'm associated with Yie Ar KungFu on the Amstrad and Spectrum 48, but in fact I only wrote sprite systems and did graphics on those versions. The 128K however was all mine, and done for Imagine to sell with the new machine.
One of a series of card games I did on GG and GB, this was pretty fun. I also did Poker Face Paul's Gin, same image on cover, different header.
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Aimed at very young kids this was surprisingly popular and even earned me a few bob in royalties, but whoever did the levels(not me) accidently neglected to add a 20th star on one level making it impossible to finish :(
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Cute little game,a selection of simple mini games, featuring a French comic character, one of the oddest Probe commissions I had!
A Monster hit, I was very happy with this, it was a tough challenge to squeeze into a mono GB but it went on to be one of the best selling handheld sports games ever.
The success of MLB meant a sequel on the updated Color version and a few more coders doing some excellent menu work. This also did well.
Another big seller in the US, but almost nothing in Europe. The first of a number of NHL games I did, with Super GameBoy features on some, porting from the SNES version which was a bigger game which somehow I had to fit into a GB.
I can't recall if this was the last I did, I do recall making a start on 97 or 98, but being utterly broken by the demand to put more content into the same Rom space and being unable to complete. It almost drove me insane.
Another game I am associated with but of course it was just a port, but a good one I was very pleased with the result and it sold very well.
Talking of squeezing things into small Rom spaces, this was a nightmare, trying to fit 2 different projects by 2 different coders in to the space reserved for 2 game...but the result was amazing!
Co-written with one of my old employees this was a mad mashup of Top Trumps and SciFi Nerdgasm.
I never did many 'serious games', it's not a concept I like much, but the mortgage was due, and it was actually a nice company to work for so it was more than fun than it seems.
I'm Sorry... I really am..I had no control over the design of this, none..It is truely shocking and terrible, and was one of a series of very fast turnover games I did for a cheap budget. I probably should deny all knowledge..but best I just confess. I did the Phoenix Games Story games. Forgive me!
A nice little DS party game, don't think it sold very well but was nice to do.
Written on the very nice Playstation mobile platform which sadly never took off, this was also ported to IOS, but even though my name is on the credits for that, I honestly didn't write a line of the IOS version.
Another of the Phoenix story games. The idea was actually quite nice, I wrote an engine to play the games and they dropped in new graphics and video, to get different kids games. Should have been a winner but the content was just so dire. I don't know how many they did..but I'm sorry!!
This started life as a jungle warfare 1st person shooter called Operation Shark, but the similarities to Oceans Operation Wolf were too obvious so it was quickly reskinned as a 20's Gangster game.
Another big game that was well received, though in truth it was a hard gig, the CPC just wasn't big enough or fast enough to really do justice to the classic arcade game, we badly overrun the time/budget just trying to squeeze the monster in.
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This was a very odd game, I remember when I was coding it, I had no idea how to play it, it never made sense to me but the designer always seemed to be happy with it.
I can't find images for many games, and my memory is not great on some! I do have a vague memory, of doing a CJ platform game (pictured I think), but can't recall which one and on what platform. Probably on PC. Also from feeble memory: VoidRunner on CPC, Arcade Classics, Mazeman on Ti, Menu Mayhem on PC, Hunt the Wampus on Ti99/4a, and a couple of Disney themed education games.
I tend to write tool for specific games, but as I realised I was doing similar things on each project I needed a few utilities. Grafiz - A utility to convert graphics/tilemap screens. MapEd - part of my GB/GBC toolchain for platform games. Multitool - A small debugger & disassembler, containing the target downloader for Multiface interfaces.
Return of the Tiger - My first attempt a GB project for Gremlin. Wolfenstien 3D on GB - Software Creations let me develop a ray casting game for GB mono. Crazy Golf on DS - This was a sad project that was cancelled despite looking great.
And here is the Gin version of the Poker Face Paul series. This was actually a nice game, the exec producer was a massive fan of the game and was rich enough to basically afford to get this made for his own pleasure.
A compilation of various casino based gambling games I did some (or all, I can't recall) of the card based games, probably got the job because of the Poker Face Paul gigs.
I just got reminded I did another DJ Puff platform game on the CPC, I also did the Spectrum version as well, apparently its quite a rare game now as it was near the end of Codemasters 8bit days and not many were made.
This page showcases just a selection of the games I've worked on throughout my career. There are many more titles, variations, and platforms that aren't featured here. If you're curious about any specific game or platform, feel free to contact me!