Today is a special day for all of us here at the Mastertronic Collectors Archive as we are proud to bring you our 200th game review! Since we launched the site almost two years ago, we’ve published a wide range of content dedicated to Mastertronic – features, checklists, a comprehensive history of the company – but the main thrust of the site has been our game reviews.
In that time, we’ve reviewed games on the main Mastertronic range, all of its sub-labels like Ricochet, MAD and so on, plus all of the other ranges that they established in partnership with other publishers such as Americana and Rack-It. But that’s not all… as Mastertronic took control of Melbourne House we’ve also covered releases from them and because the two companies merged we’re also dedicating time on the site to Virgin Games. Finally we’re looking at the modern PC and console games released from the re-launched Mastertronic Group.
If you want to see a full list over everything we have published so far, check out our complete Review Index.
Review 200 Is Something Special…
For our 200th game review, we wanted to bring you all something special so we’re taking a look at one of the best games ever released by Mastertronic Kikstart II for the Commodore 64. Developed by Shaun Southern and a sequel to one of their earlier releases, this improves on the original in almost every way. Not only is it considered to be one of the best budget games ever released, but many consider it to be one of the best Commodore 64 games ever.
Of even greater significance for us is that as well as being our 200th game review, it is also the 64th review on the site for the Commodore 64 making it two milestones in one!
What About The Systems?
In terms of the platforms we’ve covered, we’re working on covering as many computers and consoles as possible. Our team of writers have used and own a wide range of platforms and while we’re slowly working through some of the more niche systems to cover as wide a range of games as possible. So what’s on the site so far?
Commodore 64: 64
ZX Spectrum: 43
Commodore 16: 37
Vic 20: 15
Amstrad: 8
Amiga: 6
Atari: 6
BBC Micro: 5
Atari ST: 4
Dragon 32: 4
PC: 4
Commodore 128: 2
PlayStation 2: 1
ZX Spectrum 128k: 1
There’s still a long way to go, as you’ll see when you look at our checklists, but we’re adding a selection of reviews every week and if there’s anything in particular you’d like us to review, pop over to our ko-fi page where you can choose what we cover.
Upcoming Reviews
So what can you expect in the near future? We plan all our reviews weeks, and sometimes months in advance. This helps us provide a balance between formats and also make sure we can cover different versions of the same game close together. But here’s a quick teaser of what’s coming soon…
Action Biker (Atari)
Action Biker (Commodore 64)
Action Biker (ZX Spectrum)
Flash Gordon (Commodore 64)
Flash Gordon (ZX Spectrum)
Jet Pac (BBC Micro)
Manic Miner (ZX Spectrum)
Questprobe: The Amazing Spiderman (Commodore 64)
Questprobe: The Amazing Spiderman (ZX Spectrum)
And many, many more!
Thank You
Finally, we’d like to thank you – our readers – for all of your support and encouragement since we launched this site. Your support in sharing our content, adding your own scores and comments to our reviews, emails and comments on our social media posts makes all our work worthwhile.
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Thank you for visiting our site and reading this article. The Mastertronic Collectors Archive is run on a voluntary basis, we do have site costs we need to cover. If you are able to help with these, please visit our page on ko-fi at https://ko-fi.com/mastertroniccollectorsarchive – every penny you can spare helps and will allow us to invest in the site and our YouTube channel. The page also has exclusive behind-the-scenes material, so even if you’re not able to donate please give us a follow to enjoy extra free content!
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