Mastertronic: Ricocheting the MAD Bulldogs of Entertainment (They Sold Millions, Part 2)

MAD (First Generation) Top 10

The first iteration of the Mastertronic’s Added Dimension (MAD) label saw a very different layout with pop art style being at the forefront of the games’ covers, and indeed each game on each format having, in theory, its own unique catalogue number.  However, that did not always happen and some releases, confusingly, have the same catalogue number, which is always a puzzle to keep an eye on along the way.  Only nine games in all were in this generation, incidentally.

For these charts we are just looking at this first generation first, and in a lot of cases they would be the highest selling MAD games across all the formats.  The third and fourth MAD generations were part of the main catalogue in terms of numbers (or indeed late conversions of games that featured on earlier MAD generations, such as Knight Tyme for the Commodore 64, or 180 for the MSX), which made them somewhat harder to distinguish.  So here goes:

Spellbound on the Spectrum just about edges it over The Last V8 on the Commodore 64 in terms of overall sales – and these were the first MAD releases for each format as well, with some symmetry there. Third place goes to the excellent Bandits at Zero, an excellent Shaun Southern game for the Commodore 16 and Plus/4 – and in fact the only MAD first generation release on that format too. The Amstrad does well with three of the top ten, and The Last V8’s appeal spread well to the Atari XL/XE, where it features. Seven of the nine games themselves feature here, the only exceptions being Con-Quest and Sport of Kings.

MAD (First Generation) Top Sellers by Format

The top five for the three main formats, starting with the Commodore 64 (due to the first release MAD1 being The Last V8) are like this.  In fact, two of the games were also released on disk, but the sales of those were not very good to say the least.   Spellbound surprisingly sold less than you think, especially given the Zzap! 64 Sizzler review and an iconic Rob Hubbard soundtrack.

As for the Spectrum, like with the Commodore 64, these were the only five MAD releases in this packaging. Con-Quest and Sport of Kings would be released on the MAD label but a later generation for the Commodore 64 and Amstrad.

In fact, the Amstrad had six of the nine games released for that system, so we may as well include all six here.  Note the difference in sales for Hero of the Golden Talisman compared to the Commodore 64 version:

As for other formats, the MSX only had Knight Tyme released (sales of 25,980) and as well as The Last V8, the Atari XL/XE had Spellbound too which sold 24,698.  In addition, the two Spectrum 128 only versions of Spellbound and Knight Tyme sold 2,301 and 7,403 copies respectively – the higher figure for Knight Tyme can be accredited to the fact that the Spectrum 128 was the first release of the game, with the 48K version coming soon after that.

MAD C (Second Generation) Sales Stats

The second generation of MAD games was a pretty short-lived one.  In fact, the MAD C may have indicated that originally the games had been released by Creative Sparks first, although only a couple of these were the case.  It remains one of the mysteries why it was so short-lived, with no surprises for guessing that the darts game 180 features heavily here – but please note, only the releases on the MAD C label itself figure here.  Due to MADC 5 being missing, which potentially may have been the former Creative Sparks game Wing Commander that got a normal Mastertronic label release, only seven games feature, so here they all are.

Hole in One, despite it not being a very good golf game, sold surprisingly well, mainly due to the price and not being as expensive as Leaderboard – which became the de facto standard for golf games across the 8-bit systems.  Over half the MADC releases were on the Commodore 64, and only 180 was released on multiple formats in this generation, with MSX and Atari XL/XE to come later, no doubt based on the good number of sales here.

Later MAD generations became part of the standard Mastertronic range, with the third generation taking the same packaging style as the second, minus the MAD catalogue number, and the fourth one having MAD down the side spine, like later Mastertronic games packaged around 1988 onwards. Certainly, an interesting tale to tell.

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