RUN RAMPAGE ACROSS THE ROOFTOPS! GET SAVAGE IN THE SEWERS! HAVE A HAIRY FIT IN HYDE PARK! SPREAD TERROR IN THE TUBE STATIONS! IT MIGHT SOUND LIKE AN AVERAGE WEEKEND IN LONDON, BUT IT’S THE PREMISE FOR A TRUE CULT CLASSIC
Back in the early Eighties, when the bedroom coder revolution was gaining momentum, a young Steve Howard spotted an ad in the local Job Centre that piqued his interest. Having already developed his first game on the Sharp MZ-80K, Steve wanted a job before he went to university and from the advert, successfully applied for a company called Software Workshop. When Steve started he immediately struck up a friendship with an artist who also worked there called Paul Smith. “Paul was a bit annoyed that we did all the work for a relative pittance while our boss got the big money, so he persuaded me to leave, and we would create games and get to keep all the money,” Steve says, reflecting back.
The first game of the new partnership was Bride Of Frankenstein, a modest enough start for the duo, which provided the foundation for their next game, Werewolves Of London. So, let’s start with the inspiration behind the idea, it’s long been thought that this was influenced by the 1981 cult movie An American Werewolf In London, and while Steve admits to having seen the movie “on video I think” before starting work on the game, it was Paul who suggested the proposal. “At the time I thought it was because of the film,”he says. “Paul however had thought of it because of the Warren Zevon song, which the music in the game was also based on. So, it was based on the song, or at least the title was.”
With the song ringing in their heads, they soon got to work with Steve helping with the design and programming and Paul doing all the artwork and handling the business side of things. Working from the base of Bride Of Frankenstein, the way it was rendered was a complete rewrite as the game was evolving as it was being written. As for the story itself, which was set in London, the main character has had a lycanthropic curse placed on him by an aristocratic family resulting in him becoming
