Sham Mountebank
@shammountebank.bsky.social
Sub par since 1989
https://whereweretheynow.blogspot.com/
https://whereweretheynow.blogspot.com/
Reposted by Sham Mountebank
"YOU'VE PULLED OUT MORE THAN COD, FISHERMAN!" - #Discourse2000 struggles to discuss the B-Movie inspired COLONY EARTH! - by Jim Watson, and the first ever writer/artist strip in #2000AD. Will a horde of angry Colony Earth stans come after me?
freakytrigger.co.uk/wedge/2025/1...
freakytrigger.co.uk/wedge/2025/1...
December 2, 2025 at 2:10 PM
"YOU'VE PULLED OUT MORE THAN COD, FISHERMAN!" - #Discourse2000 struggles to discuss the B-Movie inspired COLONY EARTH! - by Jim Watson, and the first ever writer/artist strip in #2000AD. Will a horde of angry Colony Earth stans come after me?
freakytrigger.co.uk/wedge/2025/1...
freakytrigger.co.uk/wedge/2025/1...
I love The Visible Man. The perfect way to give kids a PG rated page full of body horror. I've been looking forwards to reading this article and it doesn't disappoint.
Is he visible? Listen bud, you can see circulating blood - #Discourse2000 reaches THE VISIBLE MAN, a minor gem from early #2000AD by Mills, Trigo and Montero. Features discussion of superheroes, girls comics, and much more
freakytrigger.co.uk/wedge/2025/1...
freakytrigger.co.uk/wedge/2025/1...
November 28, 2025 at 10:44 PM
I love The Visible Man. The perfect way to give kids a PG rated page full of body horror. I've been looking forwards to reading this article and it doesn't disappoint.
Reposted by Sham Mountebank
BBC Genome has flagged this entry for Monday 3rd December 1990 as containing "language that some may find offensive."
Is the algorithm worried about the presence of Googie Withers?
Is the algorithm worried about the presence of Googie Withers?
November 27, 2025 at 8:48 PM
BBC Genome has flagged this entry for Monday 3rd December 1990 as containing "language that some may find offensive."
Is the algorithm worried about the presence of Googie Withers?
Is the algorithm worried about the presence of Googie Withers?
Reposted by Sham Mountebank
A new #Discourse2000 post - DAN DARE is back, and he's here to tell #2000AD readers "we have Star Wars at home". Plus horror in space and the unspeakable menace of - THE SNAPPERS!
freakytrigger.co.uk/wedge/2025/1...
freakytrigger.co.uk/wedge/2025/1...
November 25, 2025 at 7:15 PM
A new #Discourse2000 post - DAN DARE is back, and he's here to tell #2000AD readers "we have Star Wars at home". Plus horror in space and the unspeakable menace of - THE SNAPPERS!
freakytrigger.co.uk/wedge/2025/1...
freakytrigger.co.uk/wedge/2025/1...
Pet Shop Boys fans. Your thoughts please on this Top of the Pops performance from 29/11/1190.
m.youtube.com/watch?v=EGp0... 1/2
m.youtube.com/watch?v=EGp0... 1/2
Pet Shop Boys - Being Boring on Top of the Pops 29/11/1990
YouTube video by PetShopBoys Parlophone
m.youtube.com
November 26, 2025 at 8:44 AM
Pet Shop Boys fans. Your thoughts please on this Top of the Pops performance from 29/11/1190.
m.youtube.com/watch?v=EGp0... 1/2
m.youtube.com/watch?v=EGp0... 1/2
Reposted by Sham Mountebank
A 1984 arcade game of a Jackie Chan movie kicked off the beat-'em-up genre. Then those who made it and its ports took what they learned to Street Fighter, Super Mario Bros., and a Windows rival that briefly had Microsoft worried. New post on Kung-Fu Master:
www.superchartisland.com/kung-fu-master
www.superchartisland.com/kung-fu-master
Kung-Fu Master – “Martial arts experts and demons of every description”
In 1982, Takashi Nishiyama directed an arcade game called Moon Patrol, for Irem. It featured a moon buggy which moves constantly across a lunar landscape, where you have to jump over holes while sh…
www.superchartisland.com
November 24, 2025 at 7:01 AM
A 1984 arcade game of a Jackie Chan movie kicked off the beat-'em-up genre. Then those who made it and its ports took what they learned to Street Fighter, Super Mario Bros., and a Windows rival that briefly had Microsoft worried. New post on Kung-Fu Master:
www.superchartisland.com/kung-fu-master
www.superchartisland.com/kung-fu-master
Reposted by Sham Mountebank
#Discourse2000 is back! This intro post sets the scene for the 1978 posts with an overview of the different tribes of early #2000AD creators - the professionals, the rebels, the fans and the outsiders - and their visions of what the comic is
freakytrigger.co.uk/wedge/2025/1...
freakytrigger.co.uk/wedge/2025/1...
Dance Our Way Out Of Our Constrictions: INTRO ’78
Previously on Discourse 2000: After successfully helping launch war comic Battle, editor Pat Mills had the opportunity to launch a new kind of boys’ comic at publishers IPC – Action, a title which tur...
freakytrigger.co.uk
November 23, 2025 at 6:26 PM
#Discourse2000 is back! This intro post sets the scene for the 1978 posts with an overview of the different tribes of early #2000AD creators - the professionals, the rebels, the fans and the outsiders - and their visions of what the comic is
freakytrigger.co.uk/wedge/2025/1...
freakytrigger.co.uk/wedge/2025/1...
A blog update about Orpheus who released a game based on The Young Ones back in 1986.
whereweretheynow.blogspot.com/2025/11/orph...
#Commodore #ZXSpectrum #Amstrad #MSX #RetroGaming #RetroComputing
whereweretheynow.blogspot.com/2025/11/orph...
#Commodore #ZXSpectrum #Amstrad #MSX #RetroGaming #RetroComputing
Orpheus
whereweretheynow.blogspot.com
November 23, 2025 at 5:56 PM
A blog update about Orpheus who released a game based on The Young Ones back in 1986.
whereweretheynow.blogspot.com/2025/11/orph...
#Commodore #ZXSpectrum #Amstrad #MSX #RetroGaming #RetroComputing
whereweretheynow.blogspot.com/2025/11/orph...
#Commodore #ZXSpectrum #Amstrad #MSX #RetroGaming #RetroComputing
Reposted by Sham Mountebank
Riding high after The Way of the Exploding Fist, Gregg Barnett and Greg Holland turned to pro wrestling. They made "the first truly 3 dimensional" combat game, complete with player wrestler Gorgeous Greg. The results were... mixed. New post on Rock'n Wrestle:
www.superchartisland.com/rockn-wrestle
www.superchartisland.com/rockn-wrestle
Rock’n Wrestle – “He knows all the moves”
The Way of the Exploding Fist was early enough and good enough to be ahead of the trend on martial arts and fighting games and to be a huge success. It was the UK’s best-selling game of 1985, and a…
www.superchartisland.com
November 17, 2025 at 7:01 AM
Riding high after The Way of the Exploding Fist, Gregg Barnett and Greg Holland turned to pro wrestling. They made "the first truly 3 dimensional" combat game, complete with player wrestler Gorgeous Greg. The results were... mixed. New post on Rock'n Wrestle:
www.superchartisland.com/rockn-wrestle
www.superchartisland.com/rockn-wrestle
ZX Spectrum software. A story in two acts.
November 16, 2025 at 11:39 AM
ZX Spectrum software. A story in two acts.
Reddit is making me feel impossibly ancient today.
November 14, 2025 at 2:19 PM
Reddit is making me feel impossibly ancient today.
Reposted by Sham Mountebank
Reposted by Sham Mountebank
I've had an idea...
Someone told me that cos there are nearly 800 episodes of the Simpsons, it's possible to describe all other shows with a clip from a Simpsons episode. So with that in mind, I'm going to use a freezeframe/gif to describe every classic Dr Who serial 😁 1 season per day...
Someone told me that cos there are nearly 800 episodes of the Simpsons, it's possible to describe all other shows with a clip from a Simpsons episode. So with that in mind, I'm going to use a freezeframe/gif to describe every classic Dr Who serial 😁 1 season per day...
November 12, 2025 at 3:17 PM
I've had an idea...
Someone told me that cos there are nearly 800 episodes of the Simpsons, it's possible to describe all other shows with a clip from a Simpsons episode. So with that in mind, I'm going to use a freezeframe/gif to describe every classic Dr Who serial 😁 1 season per day...
Someone told me that cos there are nearly 800 episodes of the Simpsons, it's possible to describe all other shows with a clip from a Simpsons episode. So with that in mind, I'm going to use a freezeframe/gif to describe every classic Dr Who serial 😁 1 season per day...
Reposted by Sham Mountebank
Forget the news about that *other* mascot, not everyone played Nintendo growing up! Unlocked for all, I finally play Alex Kidd in Miracle World and compare it to my own childish assumptions:
Alex Kidd In Miracle World (Sega, 1986) - exp.
Not everyone played Nintendo growing up.
expzine.com
November 12, 2025 at 3:56 PM
Forget the news about that *other* mascot, not everyone played Nintendo growing up! Unlocked for all, I finally play Alex Kidd in Miracle World and compare it to my own childish assumptions:
Reposted by Sham Mountebank
In 1984/5, a spectacular Konami arcade game carved out genre norms for what we'd now call fighting games. Ocean had conversion rights, but were stretched enough that one version ended up subcontracted to a 14-year-old. It still became the UK's bestselling game of 1986.
New post on Yie Ar Kung-Fu:
New post on Yie Ar Kung-Fu:
Yie Ar Kung-Fu – “Hot fighting history”
Ocean’s contract with Konami to port their arcade games under the Imagine label had quickly worked well with Hyper Sports. Even if it did end up competing with Ocean’s own Daley Thompson’s Decathlo…
www.superchartisland.com
November 10, 2025 at 7:16 AM
In 1984/5, a spectacular Konami arcade game carved out genre norms for what we'd now call fighting games. Ocean had conversion rights, but were stretched enough that one version ended up subcontracted to a 14-year-old. It still became the UK's bestselling game of 1986.
New post on Yie Ar Kung-Fu:
New post on Yie Ar Kung-Fu:
Reposted by Sham Mountebank
The Daily Mirror takes a wild stab at estimating of the cost of BBC programming for the 9th of November 1981.
November 9, 2025 at 7:11 PM
The Daily Mirror takes a wild stab at estimating of the cost of BBC programming for the 9th of November 1981.
"We don't need the software profit," was how dk'tronics described their games to CRASH in 1985. A weirdly dismissive attitude considering some of their games were very good indeed.
whereweretheynow.blogspot.com/2025/11/dktr... #C64 #Spectrum #Amstrad #RetroGaming #RetroComputing
whereweretheynow.blogspot.com/2025/11/dktr... #C64 #Spectrum #Amstrad #RetroGaming #RetroComputing
dk'tronics
whereweretheynow.blogspot.com
November 9, 2025 at 6:33 PM
"We don't need the software profit," was how dk'tronics described their games to CRASH in 1985. A weirdly dismissive attitude considering some of their games were very good indeed.
whereweretheynow.blogspot.com/2025/11/dktr... #C64 #Spectrum #Amstrad #RetroGaming #RetroComputing
whereweretheynow.blogspot.com/2025/11/dktr... #C64 #Spectrum #Amstrad #RetroGaming #RetroComputing
Reposted by Sham Mountebank
Unlocked! I've genuinely written the most detailed article there is in English on Ubisoft's very first game, Zombi. The Guillemot family expanded from selling farming equipment to getting a teenager to rip off Dawn Of The Dead for them, and the rest is history:
Zombi (Ubisoft, 1986) - exp.
Ubisoft's first game is far too interesting to be as forgotten as it is.
expzine.com
November 5, 2025 at 3:32 PM
Unlocked! I've genuinely written the most detailed article there is in English on Ubisoft's very first game, Zombi. The Guillemot family expanded from selling farming equipment to getting a teenager to rip off Dawn Of The Dead for them, and the rest is history:
Reposted by Sham Mountebank
Studios Enter Bidding War Over Napkin Stephen King Wrote ‘Ghoul’ On
Studios Enter Bidding War Over Napkin Stephen King Wrote ‘Ghoul’ On
LOS ANGELES—Anticipating the project could be the biggest horror hit of the decade, film studios were reportedly locked in a bidding war Friday over a napkin Stephen King had written the word “Ghoul” ...
theonion.com
November 3, 2025 at 5:00 PM
Studios Enter Bidding War Over Napkin Stephen King Wrote ‘Ghoul’ On
In the UK, the 1984 game Raid Over Moscow provoked a few protests and angry letters. In Finland, it stoked a diplomatic crisis. This is a fascinating Cold War story.
BTW those protests were deliberately stoked by the publisher.
BUT the game also caused a very real diplomatic crisis in #Finland.
THAT is what #finlandization was in practice.
A thread, to help understand why most Finns are critical of oblivious foreigners pushing the same for, say, #Ukraine.
BUT the game also caused a very real diplomatic crisis in #Finland.
THAT is what #finlandization was in practice.
A thread, to help understand why most Finns are critical of oblivious foreigners pushing the same for, say, #Ukraine.
Raid Over Moscow (Access/U.S. Gold, 1984, C64/Spectrum)
#2 for one week in March 1985
Follow-up to Beach-Head. The Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament protested against its insensitivity.
#2 for one week in March 1985
Follow-up to Beach-Head. The Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament protested against its insensitivity.
November 4, 2025 at 4:28 PM
In the UK, the 1984 game Raid Over Moscow provoked a few protests and angry letters. In Finland, it stoked a diplomatic crisis. This is a fascinating Cold War story.
Reposted by Sham Mountebank
Aug 1967 / TV Radio Mirror / A great profile on Leonard Nimoy where he recounts meeting JFK in 1956 when he was a taxi driver—JFK encouaged Nimoy to pursue his dream to become an actor!
Read the full interview here:
Read the full interview here:
November 1, 2025 at 9:02 PM
Aug 1967 / TV Radio Mirror / A great profile on Leonard Nimoy where he recounts meeting JFK in 1956 when he was a taxi driver—JFK encouaged Nimoy to pursue his dream to become an actor!
Read the full interview here:
Read the full interview here:
Reposted by Sham Mountebank
Massimo Belardinelli
November 2, 2025 at 4:37 PM
Massimo Belardinelli
Reposted by Sham Mountebank
Unlocked! I dig into the history of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Halloween for Atari 2600, actually play them (and take them seriously) and learn Charles "Evil Bong" Band's strange, important part in video game history:
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre / Halloween (Wizard Video, 1983) - exp.
Bafflingly, we have Charles Band to thank for these, and, inadvertently, a legendary kusoge.
expzine.com
October 29, 2025 at 3:35 PM
Unlocked! I dig into the history of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Halloween for Atari 2600, actually play them (and take them seriously) and learn Charles "Evil Bong" Band's strange, important part in video game history:
Reposted by Sham Mountebank
An All-New Cinema Limbo takes a journey into the future - a world of towns fuelled by pigpoo, bungee fights and an inadvertant Tommy reunion. @shammountebank.bsky.social joins me to discuss the thrilling adventure and tragic backstory of MAD MAX BEYOND THUNDERDOME! www.podnose.com/cinema-limbo...
126 - MAD MAX BEYOND THUNDERDOME — Podnose - An independent entertainment podcasting network
Jeremy is joined by perennial guest Chris Arnsby to discuss the 1985 sci-fi action sequel Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, directed by George Miller and George Ogilvie and starring Mel Gibson and Tina Turn...
www.podnose.com
October 31, 2025 at 6:31 PM
An All-New Cinema Limbo takes a journey into the future - a world of towns fuelled by pigpoo, bungee fights and an inadvertant Tommy reunion. @shammountebank.bsky.social joins me to discuss the thrilling adventure and tragic backstory of MAD MAX BEYOND THUNDERDOME! www.podnose.com/cinema-limbo...