How we used to buy games in the 90's...

[nebraska182]

Anyone remember using this company?

I remember ordering my Megadrive games in the mid 90's like this - phoning up,filling out that form,sending a cheque - and then waiting 2 weeks for it to come haha!! How times have changed - not your debit card is already registered online - one click,and youve downloaded a full game in 30 minutes...

 

[Daz...]

I used to go to the computer/game shop in town during the 80's-90's, when I dragged my mum in there!

 

[Darren S]

Looks very similar to one I used all the time called Special Reserve. Used to get a magazine/catalogue sent out monthly (iirc?) with games lists on there and also PC systems.

Like you - I remember paying for stuff then eagerly waiting days for it to turn up. None of this next-day Amazon Prime malarkey!

I also used Britannia once too. Where you could buy 3 or 4 games at heavily reduced prices - but then you had to buy I think 6 full priced games from them over the next 12 months. A good business model, but a pure con. The introductory games on discount were the very latest and massively appealing. Then the follow up list you got of full price games to pick from, left a lot to be desired. That said, I remember going Microprose crazy with my first purchase - buying Civilization, F-15 Strike Eagle III and 1944 - Across the Rhine.

Good times - in a bizarre way...

 

[MarkCup]

"ACCESS - your flexible friend" - I haven't seen that logo for a loooong time.

That makes me feel really very very old!

 

[nebraska182]

Looks very similar to one I used all the time called Special Reserve. Used to get a magazine/catalogue sent out monthly (iirc?) with games lists on there and also PC systems.

Like you - I remember paying for stuff then eagerly waiting days for it to turn up. None of this next-day Amazon Prime malarkey!

I also used Britannia once too. Where you could buy 3 or 4 games at heavily reduced prices - but then you had to buy I think 6 full priced games from them over the next 12 months. A good business model, but a pure con. The introductory games on discount were the very latest and massively appealing. Then the follow up list you got of full price games to pick from, left a lot to be desired. That said, I remember going Microprose crazy with my first purchase - buying Civilization, F-15 Strike Eagle III and 1944 - Across the Rhine.

Good times - in a bizarre way...

Yeah Special Reserve...that was the other one! With the red ink splat logo hehe.

I always wanted a game to be a delivered on a saturday morning when i wasnt at school...it happened just once with Madden 97 haha.

I used to go to my local computer games guy in the town market for Megadrive swaps aswell. The feeling of wonder when you saw the game you wanted in the shelf!! Those times are sadly missed...

 

[DrR]

256kb memory card lols

 

[bashracing]

We had some awesome second hand game shops in York, I spent most of weekends in them trading games and playing on the latest Snes when it had just come out,
Great memories.

 

[Darren S]

Yeah Special Reserve...that was the other one! With the red ink splat logo hehe.

I always wanted a game to be a delivered on a saturday morning when i wasnt at school...it happened just once with Madden 97 haha.

I used to go to my local computer games guy in the town market for Megadrive swaps aswell. The feeling of wonder when you saw the game you wanted in the shelf!! Those times are sadly missed...

I remember going into to one store in town where they had a copy of Gauntlet II on the Amiga for £13.95. I wanted it - but not at that price. It didn't sell for weeks and then one day there was a £4.99 sticker on it. Took it to the counter and they actually accused me of taking a £4.99 sticker from another game and swapping it! It wasn't until another another member of staff interrupted and said that it had been discounted the day before, that they let me buy it.

Weird stuff that you remember all these years later.....

 

[oska]

15 quid for a 1MB memory card lol. To be fair on the game front prices aren't massively different considering how good they look nowadays compared.

 

[Clio_fool]

I remember going into to one store in town where they had a copy of Gauntlet II on the Amiga for £13.95. I wanted it - but not at that price. It didn't sell for weeks and then one day there was a £4.99 sticker on it. Took it to the counter and they actually accused me of taking a £4.99 sticker from another game and swapping it! It wasn't until another another member of staff interrupted and said that it had been discounted the day before, that they let me buy it.

Weird stuff that you remember all these years later.....

There was a game shop in Leeds called microbyte that you could get away with doing that! In the atari st/amiga days we used to go to a computer club and swap copies, came home every week with a box full of floppy discs full of new games. I was lucky with the snes as my mum worked at comet so all my games were cheap. Wish I'd kept it now.

 

[glenn_adam_doble]

We had some awesome second hand game shops in York, I spent most of weekends in them trading games and playing on the latest Snes when it had just come out,
Great memories.

used to go to the one on the corner of monk gate/lord mayors walk, some little gems in there

 

[Short Norman]

it was common to buy the PC games that came on a cassette tape, take them home record them on a hi-tech twin tape deck then take them back and exchange them for something else.

 

[jonno_c]

I remember pre ordering Forsaken on the N64 (sending cheque off to Gameplay!) and being so so hyped when it came through!
Put it in, played around 10 mins and felt so so sick - I just watched this trailer, and it's bringing back that sick feeling!

 

[nebraska182]

I remember buying the £3.99 Commodore 64 games on cassette...1991/92 it was.

Also the free demo tapes you got on the magazines...god i feel old haha.

 

[Darren S]

I used to like having a wander into some computer shops to see what they had, software wise. Most had the mainstream titles of the day, yet others coughed up a few rare gems. Strangely, HMV in Manchester in the underpass facing Boots often had really quite obscure games in that weren't common. I recall buying Shogo Mobile Armour Division from there for pence and a few others. The heavy hitters with their large boxes containing manuals, maps, keyboard overlays and sometimes novellas, were another favourite purchase of mine.

When I was at uni in Plymouth, there used to be a small computer shop not too far from the bus station. Went in there one day and they had Star Control II for a couple of quid and thought it was worth a punt. Remember - these were pre-internet days. You either read a review in a mag, or at a pinch, one member of staff might have played and be able to recommend it. Otherwise, it was a gamble as to whether or not the game was worth it! Took it home and the core game was excellent - but as a side-game they had the even more excellent Super Melee mode. Quite a few post-pub sessions where expletives, shouting and screams of "utter b****cks" came from all four of in the house due to that game. Brilliant for its time - one player on a pad, the other on the keyboard. Two more taking the piss while they were waiting for their turn. :tongueout:

 

[Darren S]

I remember pre ordering Forsaken on the N64 (sending cheque off to Gameplay!) and being so so hyped when it came through!
Put it in, played around 10 mins and felt so so sick - I just watched this trailer, and it's bringing back that sick feeling!

Strange how different games affect different people. My mate feels sick within a few minutes of the majority of FPS games. Yet he has been an avid fan and player of all the Wipeout games. You would have thought that would have sent him hurling within seconds!

 

[bashracing]

used to go to the one on the corner of monk gate/lord mayors walk, some little gems in there

Yeah that was Bulmers, shut down finally about 6 months ago for development,
The one on Gillygate was the best and the lads behind the counter weren't quite as grumpy!

 

[jonno_c]

Strange how different games affect different people. My mate feels sick within a few minutes of the majority of FPS games. Yet he has been an avid fan and player of all the Wipeout games. You would have thought that would have sent him hurling within seconds!

Very true. I prefer fps to be honest!!

 

[Marky_]

I never used these mail order places. We used to go to GAME/Virgin Megastore/Woolworths for our games. Remember all these type of adverts in the back of magazines though!

 

[nebraska182]

I never used these mail order places. We used to go to GAME/Virgin Megastore/Woolworths for our games. Remember all these type of adverts in the back of magazines though!

I couldnt afford the extra £8.

I used to do a paper round where i rode 3 miles a day,6 days a week...and got a fiver for it haha.

 

[Ay Ay Ron]

I didn't really start buying games until the like of the Megadrive and SNES and then they were traded in at our local shop. Mega bits I think I was called ( I know @16v_er spent most of his money there)

I also remember going to computer clubs with my dad buying Amiga Games and people taking boxes upon boxes of 3.5 inch floppy disks in with them.

 

[jamesycc]

Me and my mate would go halves on a new amiga game and copy it for the other one. Then the next the other would have the copy. Used to love going to game and seeing all the huge boxes with 3.5 floppies rattling around in em.

 

[mace¬]

Used to go a church hall, everyone would turn up with all their gear, Monitor, extension leads, boxes of blank floppy disks etc and you setup your Amiga 500 then had a 2 hour free for all swapping and copying games before handing them back.

2 nights stick in my head.
1) The older chap knocking a young kid out for having Animal Farm p**n and the younger kids all crowded round looking.
2) Police shut down raid. But the fact they didn't really understand piracy back then, they just asked everyone to pack up and go home and seized nothing.

 

[Mr Burns]

I remember buying the £3.99 Commodore 64 games on cassette...1991/92 it was.

Also the free demo tapes you got on the magazines...god i feel old haha.

Yeah, to me that's proper retro gaming! Remember having to wait impatiently for games to load with that awful racket, only to get a 'boot error' ages later!?

 

[CrippsCorner]

Electronics Boutique

Remember walking in there and seeing Tomb Raider being played for the first time... mind blown!

 

[Gally]

Good times. Some of my fondest memories were gaming related in my early years!

 

[terryc101]

Electronics Boutique

Remember walking in there and seeing Tomb Raider being played for the first time... mind blown!

The one in lakeside! Whenever we went over to visit family who lived nearby me and my brothers would be straight in there.

 

[SharkyUK]

Silica Systems anyone?

And a huge hard drive to store your extensive collection on?

 

[Daz...]

I think I had all but about 5 of the games listed on the Super Pack. Most of them in a box of 5.25 floppy discs on my C64.

 

[charltjr]

Silica.... Jesus I remember them!

I was never very patient so I remember one day in my late teens a new Amiga pack had just launched, I think it was the A500+ with some games, and I actually got on a coach from Liverpool to Leeds to go and buy one because they had stock and back then shipping meant waiting a week or so for it to turn up. Can't remember for the life of me which store it was but it was similar to Silica, always advertising in the magazines.

One of my first game buying memories is going down to John Menzies in my home town with my dad and us going halves on a copy of Elite for the Acorn Electron. I wanted to buy something else, I can't remember what now but it was something that didn't have "just rubbish black and white graphics" - clearly remember saying that. We both got hooked on Elite and would take it in turns to play missions, much to my mum's exasperation. It hadn't been out long, so that was probably around 1985.

Things have changed a bit!

 

[Darren S]

Me too - I remember Silica as well. Was it Computer User or Computer Shopper magazine that was literally like half-a-phonebook thick each month and just packed solid with ads such as these.

That hard drive makes me laugh Andy (@SharkyUK ) - I was only this week looking at the 10TB Seagate SATA drives at Scan. Imagine telling the potential buyers of these 5 and 10MB drives what kind of capacities were available in the near future!

 

[nebraska182]

I had ONE cartridge game on my C64 - International Soccer!

There was some really obscure titles on C64 - when my dad bought it me it came with an old cardboard box full of cassettes hehe.....games such as Loco,Buggy Boy,Test Drive,Stunt Car Racer,Annihilator,Kane.

I remember going to the local high street shop and buying Bart vs the Space Mutants - that was rock hard - only ever got to level 2 haha!

 

[riz]

On a tangent i remember a magazine like that where I used to buy pranks from.
Fart bombs, cap guns etc

 

[Stay Puft]

They weren't cheap either!!

 

[Tanim]

Now we get game adverts on game topics online [emoji16]

Sent from Tapatalk

 

[Darren S]

I had ONE cartridge game on my C64 - International Soccer!

There was some really obscure titles on C64 - when my dad bought it me it came with an old cardboard box full of cassettes hehe.....games such as Loco,Buggy Boy,Test Drive,Stunt Car Racer,Annihilator,Kane.

I remember going to the local high street shop and buying Bart vs the Space Mutants - that was rock hard - only ever got to level 2 haha!

Same here! Do you remember that awful grinding crunch noise that you used to hear when putting the cartridge in? It was like gravel on brick - lol.

 

[SharkyUK]

Me too - I remember Silica as well. Was it Computer User or Computer Shopper magazine that was literally like half-a-phonebook thick each month and just packed solid with ads such as these.

That hard drive makes me laugh Andy (@SharkyUK ) - I was only this week looking at the 10TB Seagate SATA drives at Scan. Imagine telling the potential buyers of these 5 and 10MB drives what kind of capacities were available in the near future!

Computer Shopper! I used to pick it up regularly and - yep - it was one heck of a weighty tome! Hundreds of pages of adverts with a handful of reviews and features spread throughout. I wouldn't be surprised if I've still got a few packed away somewhere at my parent's place!

10TB... mental. Only 25 years ago you would be hard-pushed to even imagine those levels of storage capacity!

 

[Marc.]

I remember my dad buying Computer Shopper!

 

[SharkyUK]

I remember my dad buying Computer Shopper!

I definitely feel old now!

 

[16v_er]

I remember having a c64 with ik+ on it and other weird games. Used to love going to my mates house and playing narc on his spectrum zx. Odd memories but good ones. I remember buying dragon ninja from John menzies after playing it in the arcade and was devastated when the graphics were no where close to arcade standard. Same with double dragon. As kids we were so naive.