Couldn’t make it to ZZAP! Live this year? Weren’t able to get to Play Blackpool? Unable to travel to the upcoming CRASH Live? Gutted that you’ll have missed out on all kinds of retro gaming chat and shenanigans? Well, fear not, as this Sunday sees an event where you can enjoy all of this and more from the comfort of your own home!
Renowned retro YouTuber Alan ‘Mamemeister’ Stewart will be holding a 12-hour live stream on Sunday 5th November, which will feature more than a dozen personalities from the retro gaming world, all chatting candidly about themselves, their gaming careers, and whatever else comes to mind. The live stream is for a good cause… well, two good causes, actually, as two charities will benefit from this event: Spark, a community in West Lothian which runs events to overcome the impact of loneliness and isolation, and HSTAR (Healed Scars Trauma and Abuse Recovery), which provides a healing environment for women in Scotland with trauma-related issues.
Among the luminaries present will be programmers including the man who became legend across three generations of Commodore machines, Shaun Southern (Kickstart/Lotus Esprit Turbo Challenge), and the most famous floating head of all time, Football Manager creator Kevin Toms. Industry legend/ex-ZZAP!64/C&VG writer and editor Gary Penn will be stopping by, as will two-thirds of podcast extraordinaire The Ted Dabney Experience, namely Missile Command World Record Holder Tony Temple and ultra-renowned games journalist Paul Drury. Closing out the night will be the most Sensible man in Software, Jon Hare, and outwith the poster, the cloven hooves of Llamasoft, Jeff Minter and Ivan ‘Giles’ Zorzin will be last on the menu.
In addition to the sure-to-be-enthralling chats, there will be a number of other entertaining features throughout the day. Nick Sherman, aka Arlasoft, has programmed a C64 conversion of a classic arcade game which will be getting revealed on the day, and he will also be undertaking a challenge to program a C64 game from scratch within the 12 hours, with progress updates throughout the stream. There will be a SID show deconstructing/savaging some of the worst C64 music ever, and there will also be a ZZAP!-style gaming high score challenge between Alan and current ZZAP! 64 reviewer Paul Morrison (yes, I referred to myself in the third person). There’s plenty more fun and daft shenanigans and guests, too, so check out the poster for the approximate running times, then make a date in your calendar for this Sunday 5th November, and pop in any time!
Check out the promo on Alan’s channel here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJihAXIqH6k. His channel’s homepage is here: https://www.youtube.com/@mamemeister
