Title screen of Dark Knight: Shadow of Madness: Reward Edition
When Mananuk released Dark Knight: Shadow of Madness in July 2024, he also gave people who had paid for it an exclusive version of the game, named the Reward Edition. Now he has released the Reward Edition for free – although you can offer a donation if you wish. As the original version of the game was inspired by Batman, the Reward Edition features Robin as the protagonist. The difficulty has been increased, but the gameplay and level design seem to have remained unchanged.
NoRecess has announced on the CPCWiki forum that development of SonicGX (a conversion of Sonic the Hedgehog to the GX4000, in case you haven’t been following its development over the last number of years) is more or less finished. All the level designs have been completed and the game is fully playable from beginning to end. Any work over the next few months should be concentrated on bug fixes and minor gameplay tweaks.
NoRecess’ aim is to release SonicGX on the 1st of November 2025, so put the date in your diary! If you haven’t seen the most recent preview yet, or you want to watch it again, you can watch it on YouTube.
The fifth annual Amstream Amstrad Video Game Awards (better known as the Sugars) were streamed last Friday on Xyphoe’s YouTube channel. Fifteen games were nominated for nine categories – this year’s ceremony included a new category of “best arcade action game”. The winners were:
Best puzzle game: The Key: Episode 1 and Episode 2
Congratulations to all of the winners! You can watch the awards show below or on YouTube.
The Sugars 2024-2025 on YouTube
Inufuto’s games now available for Plus machines
Japanese developer Inufuto has released 18 games so far for a huge variety of 8-bit computers, including the Amstrad CPC. Now he’s gone one step further and converted several of his games to the Plus range of machines. There’s no significant improvement in the look of the graphics, but they make use of hardware sprites, so they move much more smoothly than in the original CPC464 version – and Inufuto has also fixed the keyboard scanning bug, so the games can actually be played properly on Plus machines.
Inutufo’s games can be downloaded from his site, although they’re currently only available as CDT cassette images. At the time of writing, the following games have been converted:
Screenshot of SkillTeam
A new puzzle game for the Amstrad CPC has just been released. It’s called SkillTeam, and it’s based on an online game of the same name by LukaszM. There are 60 levels, and on each one, you must shift crates and create a path to the chequered flag that marks your goal and lets you proceed to the next level. If you’ve played the classic game Sokoban, then the concept should be very familiar. You can also acquire different skills by collecting coloured crystals; for example, the light blue crystal enables you to pull crates instead of push them, and the red crystal lets you destroy crates. Each level has a password, and the programmer, David Crespo, has even provided the ability to skip a level if you find it too tough, although you can only use this option three times.
SkillTeam can be downloaded from itch.io, and it can even be played online through the RVMPlayer emulator.
Physical editions of Harrier Attack Reloaded now available
Harrier Attack Reloaded cartridge in box
Physical editions of Harrier Attack Reloaded, Chris Perver’s recently released conversion of Harrier Attack for the GX4000 console and Plus machines, are now available and can be purchased via eBay for £37.12 (excluding shipping costs). You’ll get the cartridge in a very nice-looking case, complete with an 8-page instruction booklet that includes an interview with the author of the original version of the game for the CPC464.
Phantomas en el Museo
Screenshot of Phantomas en el Museo
The Mojon Twins have released another new game. Phantomas en el Museo is the latest in a series of platform games to feature Phantomas, who first starred in an Amstrad CPC game in 1986 with the release of Phantomas 2 (known as Vampire outside of Spain). Phantomas en el Museo was released for the ZX Spectrum back in 2012, but it has only made its way to the CPC 13 years later. The background story is that the IAACC Pablo Serrano museum on the planet of Zaragoza has been taken over and looted by a criminal gang known as the Malotes. Most of the artefacts have been destroyed, but five of them remain intact, and Phantomas must retrieve them.
I rather enjoyed playing Phantomas en el Museo, and the graphics and music are fantastic. You can download it from itch.io and try it out for yourself.
Following a discussion on the CPCWiki forum about the ratings of some reviews on this site, I have revisited IK+ and rewritten my review.
Bomb Jack Extra Sugar
The wait is finally over; Anthony Flack has released his eagerly anticipated remake of Bomb Jack! It’s been in development for over two years, and Xyphoe played and streamed a preview of the game back in November 2023. The original Amstrad CPC conversion of Bomb Jack is fairly decent, and it received a rating of 8 out of 10 on this site, but Anthony felt that it was possible to develop a version that was more faithful to the original coin-op, and Bomb Jack Extra Sugar is the result.
The most noticeable thing about this remake is the outstanding graphics, which use stippling effects in the CPC’s medium-resolution Mode 1 to provide the illusion of additional colours. The status displays at the top and bottom of the screen feature even more colours! There are also a wide variety of extra options, including four difficulty levels, three game modes (including a ‘remix’ mode that features new backgrounds and level designs), different ways to collect the bombs, and saving of high scores to disc. There’s even the ability to earn trophies for achieving specific goals, but you’ll need to be pretty skilful to obtain them!
Bomb Jack Extra Sugar is one of the best-looking and polished games to be released for the Amstrad CPC for a while, and it’s definitely not to be missed. You can download it from itch.io.
The Great Sphinx of Giza
The Acropolis
The Eiffel Tower
Uluru/Ayers Rock
Screenshots of Bomb Jack Extra Sugar
Street Fighter II
Screenshot of Street Fighter II demo
Augusto Ruiz and DaDMaN have been working on an Amstrad CPC conversion of Street Fighter II for some time – I don’t know how long, but Cepeceros Podcast uploaded a preview video to YouTube in 2021. Now they’ve released this beta preview so you can see for yourself what it’s like! Five of the eight characters are available for selection, but there’s only one background and no sound effects or music. The graphics and animation are breathtaking; the static screenshot shown here simply doesn’t do it justice.
You can go to Cepeceros Podcast to download the beta preview. Note that it requires at least 128KB of RAM. The developers have also pointed out that they are now using a different game engine, so future versions of the game will probably look different to what you see in this demo.
Longato
Screenshot of Longato
Retro Parla has released a puzzle game called Longato, which is an Amstrad CPC conversion of the online game Longcat by Swedish developer Martin Magni. It’s a puzzle game in which you control a cat that actually behaves like a snake – as you move it around the screen, its body keeps growing, and the aim in each of the 50 levels is to make the cat fill the entire area of the level. It’s another puzzle game with a simple but addictive concept that makes you want to keep trying. You can download Longato from Retro Parla’s site, and you can even play Longato online as well!
Master Piece
Screenshot of Master PieceTartessos Games has released another new game for the ZX Spectrum and Amstrad CPC. Master Piece is a puzzle game that uses chess pieces. The aim in each of the 199 puzzles is to move one chess piece and capture another piece each turn, until only one piece remains. Each puzzle has a 4-digit code so you can return to it without having to redo all the previous puzzles. It looks nice, but I’m not sure level 6 can be completed. It’s shown in the screenshot on the right, but counterintuitively, the pawn can only move upwards; normally, computer chess games have the black pieces oriented at the top of the screen, so the pawns move downwards. Master Piece can be downloaded from itch.io.
The Cepeceros Podcast has uploaded a video of a recovered Amstrad CPC game to YouTube, which you can watch below. Vidy Vody was written in 1986 by Damian Scattergood, who programmed a few other games for the ZX Spectrum and CPC, such as Moonwalker and Vigilante. The game sees you controlling an astronaut wearing a jet-pack, and it was originally meant to be controlled using a handheld device to thrust and a helmet that would move the astronaut as the player tilted their head! Unfortunately New Concepts, the company behind the game and the device, went bankrupt, so it was never released.
Gameplay footage of Vidy Vody on YouTube RetroManiac magazine has a feature article about the making of Vidy Vody, although it’s in Spanish. As for the game, you’ll have to wait a little longer, but Damian intends to publish it on the Scattergood Studios itch.io page in the next few days – and you can now control the astronaut using more traditional methods.
