COLUMN
Who is Paul Rose?
Paul is probably better known as Mr Biffo – the creator of legendary teletext games magazine Digitiser. These days, he mostly writes his videogame ramblings over at Digitiser2000.com. If you want more Biffo in your eyes, you can catch him as the host of Digitizer The Show at www.bit.ly/biffo2000
One of the unexpected positive consequences of accidentally becoming a games journalist during the Nineties – arguably the most exciting time in gaming ever – was getting to play everything. It came with the territory that we’d either be given, or be bought, review hardware.
Not just the heavy-hitters, of course, but the ones that got away. The almost-rans, who made a play for glory. Those games systems that promised so much, and fizzled away with barely a sputter. Had I been just a punter, like most of Digitiser’s readers, I doubtless would’ve stuck with my Mega Drive, Game Boy and Super NES, and looked upon the 3DO, the Jaguar and CD32 with the disdain that they maybe semi-deserved. I say only semi-deserved, because even the worst systems had things to recommend them.
I don’t recall us ever actually being given a Jaguar review machine, but I believe Atari loaned one to us – which then had to be given back when the company choked on its own misfortune. Though it had few must-play games during its brief existence, the Jaguar was so clearly a powerful machine that who knows what it could’ve achieved, if there’d been an incentive for more studios to develop for it? Alien Vs Predator was obviously the must-play title, with Tempest 2000 a close second. Go back to either now, and the untapped potential of the system is self-evident.
The 3DO I remember being extremely excited about. I’m not sure why looking back, but whatever message it was selling had certainly chimed with me. Ironically, its best games – Star Control 2, Cannon Fodder, Out Of This World – were ports, and didn’t stretch the hardware. Nevertheless, Need For Speed, Road Rash, Return Fire, Space Hulk: Veng
