RISE OF THE BEDROOM CODER

By 1983, the golden age of US arcade gaming was waning, and the videogame The meagre output of UK and European coin-op and console developers did little to negate this implosion, and the Japanese games industry was largely focused on its home market. But as seasoned developer David Perry explains, an unlikely solution to this seemingly hopeless situation lay in the hands of youthful home computer owners. “I grew up in the middle of nowhere, and it was freezing cold outside!” David says of his northern Irish childhood. “So I got a ZX81, and I had a little black and white TV in my bedroom. I was making these little games, and I sent one to Interface magazine. As a kid I was just so excited to be in a magazine, but I didn’t understand that I was going to be paid. I think my first cheque was for £450. That was something that I wasn’t expecting, and it turned me into a bedroom coder.”