#CPCRetroDev 2023 results


The #CPCRetroDev 2023 awards ceremony took place yesterday (Friday 17th November 2023) and it was streamed live on YouTube. Paulina’s Potions by Leosoft took an early lead, but Sugar City by VoxelTower and Alloy Box by CNGSoft joined the fight in a three-way battle – and towards the end, Alloy Box managed to gain the lead and never looked back. Congratulations to CNGSoft for finally winning #CPCRetroDev at his ninth attempt, and to everyone else who participated!

Here are the results and prizes:

PRO category


  • Best game: Alloy Box (CNGSoft) – €350 prize
  • 2nd best game: Sugar City (VoxelTower) – €250 prize
  • 3rd best game: Paulina’s Potions (Leosoft) – €175 prize
  • 4th best game: Nita (haThus Entertainment) – €100 prize
  • 5th best game: PERAL (TheQproyect) – €50 prize

UA category (for games developed by students of the University of Alicante)


  • Best UA student game: Sheriff Duty (Alakran Studio) – €150 prize
  • 2nd best UA student game: Nuke Bug (Alakran Studio) – €75 prize

Special mentions


  • Best music and sound effects (awarded by César Astudillo, aka Gominolas): Paulina’s Potions – €150
  • Best technical development and artificial intelligence (awarded by Pablo Ariza): Alloy Box – €150
  • Best enjoyment and playability (awarded by Relevo): Alloy Box – €150
  • Best graphical and artistic quality (awarded by 4MHz): Alloy Box – €150

Sponsored awards


  • Most popular game, as chosen by public votes (awarded by AUA): Nita – €200
  • Best multiplayer game (awarded by Genesis8bit): Top Goal (Spaghetti Studios) – €50
  • Best “Opera Prima” (awarded by Blast Annual): PERAL (TheQproyect) – €50
  • Best game made in BASIC (presented by AmstradSakis, Somos de Amstrad and Amstrad Cent Pour Cent): Roberto “El Gorras” (Altanerus Dog) – €80
  • 2nd best game made in BASIC: Shadow Maze (Rayon Studio) – €40

    All of the entries can be downloaded from itch.io.

    However, there is some sad news, in that after 11 years, this year’s edition of #CPCRetroDev will be the last one to be organised by the University of Alicante. Now it’s up to the Amstrad CPC community to ensure the competition continues, and the #CPCRetroDev staff will support anyone who wants to organise further contests.

Bomb Jack remake


Viewers who were watching Xyphoe’s livestream last Friday night were treated to an exclusive demo of Anthony Flack’s remake of Bomb Jack! The version that Xyphoe played (subtitled the Extra Sugar Edition) features music and sound effects that are remarkably close to the coin-op game, and it’s fully playable now. It will require 128K of memory, and Anthony said that it is around 95% complete, although there are still a few bugs to sort out and features to be added, and he expects it to be ready for release by Christmas or the New Year.

You can watch Xyphoe playing the game below, or alternatively, watch it on YouTube (the gameplay starts at 4:33:21).

#CPCRetroDev 2023


#CPCRetroDev logo
The deadline for submission of entries to the #CPCRetroDev 2023 contest was 23:00 UTC yesterday (Friday 3rd November 2023). 30 entries were submitted, which isn’t as high as recent editions of the contest, but it’s enough to keep any Amstrad CPC gamer busy for some time playing all of them! You can download all the entries from itch.io, and the awards ceremony is expected to be held on Friday 17th November 2023 at 18:00 UTC.

Robert Small has reviewed two text adventures:

Tenebra 2


Screenshot of Tenebra 2
Screenshot of Tenebra 2
Almost a year after releasing Tenebra for the Amstrad CPC (which received a rating of 8 out of 10 on this site), Haplo has released the sequel, Tenebra 2. If you haven’t played the first game yet, it’s a puzzle game in which you have to guide the player around a dark dungeon and find the exit – but the player cannot enter dark areas and must use braziers and torches to find their way around. Tenebra 2 contains 35 new dungeons for you to solve, and you can download it from itch.io.

Xyphoe’s Nightmare


Title screen of Xyphoe's Nightmare
Title screen of Xyphoe's Nightmare
Xyphoe’s Nightmare is a platform game that was released exclusively on Antstream in February 2022 and wasn’t available to download anywhere else. However, the author, Yellow Belly, announced in a comment on Xyphoe’s Amstream last Friday that I have now been given permission for Xyphoe’s Nightmare to be made available for downloading, so feel free to read my review of Xyphoe’s Nightmare on this site and click on the title in the review to download the game!

Ghost Trick Delirium Edition


Screenshot of Ghost Trick Delirium Edition
Screenshot of Ghost Trick Delirium Edition
Ayor61 has released a special edition of his recent GX4000 game Ghost Trick in time for Halloween, entitled the Delirium Edition. In this new version, instead of playing Arthur, the knight from Ghosts’n Goblins, you play Mario, and you must leap from platform to platform collecting coins and avoiding various familiar enemies from Super Mario World, such as Banzai Bill, Chargin’ Chuck, and the Thwomp. You can download it from Game Jolt. Let’s hope Nintendo don’t find out about it!

I have reviewed six games:

Forthcoming releases from Play On Retro



Play On Retro are planning to release six Amstrad CPC games on physical cassettes, in a campaign that they have cleverly titled ‘Core Pack Collection’. Each game will cost €9.99 to purchase, and if you want to buy all six games, you will only pay for five and get the sixth game free! The games you can buy are:


Each game will come in a high quality PVC box that is slightly larger than the standard jewel case that is normally associated with physical cassette releases. To order the games, go to Play On Retro’s itch.io page, then click on the Google Forms link to fill in the order form. The deadline for ordering the games is the 13th of October 2023.

Octopus Deluxe


Screenshot of Octopus Deluxe
Screenshot of Octopus Deluxe
Back in July, Team Galaxy and CPC-POWER released Octopus – a conversion of the Nintendo Game & Watch handheld game of the same name – for the GX4000 and Plus machines. Now they have released a deluxe version for the normal Amstrad CPC range of machines, which features beautiful, highly colourful graphics and animated screens drawn by renowned CPC pixel artist Titan, several tunes (including in-game music), and the ability to record high scores to disc.

You can download Octopus Deluxe from CPC-POWER, and XeNoMoRPH has uploaded a video, which you can watch below, that demonstrates the excellent presentation and graphics and lets you see what to expect.

Ghost Trick


Screenshot of Ghost Trick
Screenshot of Ghost Trick
Cyrille Gouret, also known as Ayor61, has released Ghost Trick – a simple arcade game for the GX4000 and Plus machines. It’s a conversion of a mini-game found in the 1999 game SNK vs. Capcom: The Match of the Millennium, which was later released for the Nintendo Switch in 2021. You control Arthur, the hero of Ghosts’n Goblins, and you jump to and fro across four platforms trying to collect bags of money and treasure chests while trying to avoid enemies that move up and down between the platforms. You can download Ghost Trick from Game Jolt.

Mario Bros 2023


Screenshot of Mario Bros 2023
Screenshot of Mario Bros 2023
Jean-Marie Barone has released a reworked version of Mario Bros. The original 1987 release from Ocean was rather poor, receiving a rating of 3 out of 10 on this site, but Jean-Marie has improved it significantly, with new Mode 0 graphics by OneVision and music by SuTeKH. You can visit the CPCWiki forum for more information, where you will also find a link to download the game – and you ought to do this as soon as possible, before Nintendo finds out about it!