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Speccy Nation Volume 2: The Digital Decade
The long-awaited follow up to best-selling retro gaming book Speccy Nation!
Join veteran games writer Dan Whitehead on a ten year journey through the dizzying highs and bewildering lows of 1980s pop culture, the cult TV shows, the forgotten cartoons and the blockbuster movies as captured in the bizarre, brilliant and often just terrible tie-in ZX Spectrum games that defined the first ever digital decade.
The 1980s! Nostalgia has made this decade hip again, but for those who were there first time around it was a time of social upheaval, uplifting pop music, bombastic TV, lurid fashion and garish cartoons.
Transformers! Knight Rider! Fighting Fantasy! Top Gun! Geoff Capes! Rambo! Chewits! Grange Hill! Spitting Image! Samantha Fox! Gobots! Danger Mouse! Airwolf! Super Gran! And more!
It was a decade of mass entertainment, of lazy summer holidays, school discos and biking across town on a Saturday morning to spend pocket money on sweets and comics...and maybe a Spectrum game.
Yes, the 1980s was also a decade experienced for the first time through computers, as everything was turned into a game for Britain's children to play along at home.
Join veteran games writer Dan Whitehead on a ten year journey through the dizzying highs and bewildering lows of 1980s pop culture, the cult TV shows, the forgotten cartoons and the blockbuster movies as captured in the bizarre, brilliant and often just terrible tie-in ZX Spectrum games that defined the first ever digital decade.
The 1980s! Nostalgia has made this decade hip again, but for those who were there first time around it was a time of social upheaval, uplifting pop music, bombastic TV, lurid fashion and garish cartoons.
Transformers! Knight Rider! Fighting Fantasy! Top Gun! Geoff Capes! Rambo! Chewits! Grange Hill! Spitting Image! Samantha Fox! Gobots! Danger Mouse! Airwolf! Super Gran! And more!
It was a decade of mass entertainment, of lazy summer holidays, school discos and biking across town on a Saturday morning to spend pocket money on sweets and comics...and maybe a Spectrum game.
Yes, the 1980s was also a decade experienced for the first time through computers, as everything was turned into a game for Britain's children to play along at home.
308 pages, Kindle Edition
Published December 1, 2016
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
July 19, 2017
As with the previous edition, I imagine I would've got more out of a physical version (and owning a Spectrum should help, too), but interesting enough.
January 14, 2019
Another look into the world of Spectrum games, weird and wonderful.
Mostly weird or awful in this book really, there's an awful lot of forgotten titles in this book, and rightly so!
The games are broken down into categories such as TV or music related with a decent chapter at the end which covers some TV shows or films which never spawned a game and possibly should.
A decent read if you like your old skool gaming.
Mostly weird or awful in this book really, there's an awful lot of forgotten titles in this book, and rightly so!
The games are broken down into categories such as TV or music related with a decent chapter at the end which covers some TV shows or films which never spawned a game and possibly should.
A decent read if you like your old skool gaming.
August 19, 2025
It seems better written than volume one. More humour to the reviews. But my main gripe is that he reviews a lot of terrible games and says as much. Who wants to read about naff games? The problem is, there was a lot of terrible games for the spectrum but we don’t need to be reminded about it.
If he stuck to obscure or interesting games, or even good games this could have been a winner.
If he stuck to obscure or interesting games, or even good games this could have been a winner.
January 30, 2017
300 pages of pure nostalgia! It's amazing how many of the games featured in this book are complete rubbish. My recollection of Spectrum games from the 80's is much more positive.
I've given 4 stars simply for the fact that I didn't experience a lot of the games from the book, although a lot of the subject matter was what I grew up with.
I've given 4 stars simply for the fact that I didn't experience a lot of the games from the book, although a lot of the subject matter was what I grew up with.
June 25, 2020
not sure if this has had some updates since 1st reading it as unlimited subscriber and buying it thinking I hadn't read it
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews