Darren Edwards

The timing was perfect, or disastrous depending on how you look at it. I had just been paid and was nearing the end of a week off work. I was heading, fiancee in tow, to the UK’s biggest retro video games market. I have been to many collector’s shops, but never anything on this scale; to say I was excited was an understatement.

So, here’s the pitch. You’re a greedy little pea, who simply loves gold. All you can do is run and jump to traverse the Awesome Islands World, avoiding enemies and traps as well as collecting coins and gems on the way. Oh, and did I mention you are almost too cute for words? Now if that doesn’t sound, ahem, appealing, I don’t know what will.

Access Denied instantly conjures up memories of the multiplayer hoot that is “Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes”. In that game you have to work together to disarm a bomb. One player uses a physical instruction manual for direction on how to do this, as the other inputs the commands on screen. The look and feel of Access Denied has a lot in common with that game, but do the similarities only run skin deep?

On Sunday 3rd March at the Doncaster Dome, the UK’s longest running retro video games market in the country will be back, and bigger than ever. There will be all sorts goodies for sale ranging from classic game memorabilia to the latest releases. Private sellers and traders will be out in force, so there’s no finer opportunity to bag a bargain.

Speculation around the announcement of the 7th Splinter Cell game seems to have reached new peaks recently, with many predicting confirmation of the project's existence is imminent. In the meantime, it seems like an opportune moment to recall exactly how we got here. So sit back, slip your night vision goggles on and stock up on sticky shockers, it's time to head back to where it all began.

You’re familiar with the story, boy meets girl. Boy falls in love with girl. Girl gets kidnapped. Boy seeks to rescue girl. It’s all fairly standard stuff, which games have arguably done to death over the years. Predictable plot aside, and with many, many other similar games out there, is JackQuest: The Tale of the Sword worth your valuable time and money?

This remastered bundle provides the perfect reason to revisit Agent 47 in his finest outings, discounting the more recent episodic titles from that statement. It's easy to forget just how long the bald assassin has been silently and ruthlessly bumping off his targets, and he doesn't always make the list when considering iconic gaming mascots. To me, however, he is exactly that. It’s time to dust off your Silverballers, and revisit some classics.

Every now and then a game will appear from seemingly nowhere and immediately catch my eye. Straight away I’ll think, “I definitely want to play that”. Steamroll is one such game.

I’m not quite old enough to have headed out to the arcades to play games; thankfully I’ve always had the luxury of being able to play at home. Part of me wishes I could have been part of that community though, if only for the social aspect, something that is predominantly an online affair these days. Thanks to the wonders of technology though a single disc can now squeeze in 14 of these arcade machines, and 36 home console releases, rather easily. It is here where we see the entrance of Atari Flashback Classics Volume 3 on Xbox One.

The Spyro Reignited Trilogy containing Spyro The Dragon, Spyro 2: Ripto's Rage! and Spyro: Year of the Dragon. It feels like a love letter to fans and a remake we can all agree the gaming masses have a huge appetite for.

One such game that I sank hours into when I was younger was R-Type. I found the combination of frantic action and weird and wonderful enemies, each who had their own behaviours, truly irresistible. It was easy to pick up and play, but just as easy to lose hours trying to conquer this hard-as-nails shooter. It’s for this reason that FullBlast immediately grabbed my attention.

Originally the Doodle God series started life as a mobile game, and has seen several ports and sequels since its inception around 8 years ago. Now though it is moving on to home consoles once more, this time in the form of Doodle God: Crime City, only on Xbox One.

Gaming is a beautifully varied pursuit. You can kill half an hour on your way to work matching fruit or flinging birds around, or you can spend hours, even days, constructing detailed worlds whilst taking great care and pride in your creations. And, of course, there is a vast middleground between those two extremes to be enjoyed as well. One of my favourite ways to lose whole days to gaming is to immerse myself in a simulator. Whether I’m building hospitals, roller coasters or whole cities if the gameplay is formulated properly, I’ll keep coming back for more. So, is Project Highrise worth your free hours and days, and does it tower above the rest?

There was a time when side-scrolling platform games were the dominant genre, and as a result their heroes were catapulted to worldwide fame. They all, however, had a similar formula; battle through various themed stages, fight bosses and collect valuables to eventually defeat your arch-nemesis. As time went by and gaming evolved, it became harder to stand out in this overcrowded space so developers focused their efforts elsewhere, for the most part. Nefarious makes sure to mix things up from the very start.

“Halo, it’s finished”. “No, I think we’re just getting started”. Back in 2001, who predicted just how huge this series would become? I’ll admit that I didn’t. As we find ourselves salivating over the teaser for Halo: Infinite, which dropped at this year’s E3 expo, we can only wonder just how long we will have to wait for the next (and perhaps last) major entry in the franchise. Now seems like a good time to run down the top 5 Halo games of all time, as we cross everything, hoping Infinite will sit right at the top of the pile.