Two donkeys go into a pub. When they get in, what do they order? According to The Man’s Daddy – an oddball with a penchant for telling nonsensical jokes – the answer is chicken. And if you laughed at that, then it’s highly likely you’d have enjoyed Digitiser, an offbeat, surreal videogames magazine broadcast on Teletext in the UK between 1 January 1993 and 9 March 2003.
Daddy was a pixellated character who graced Digitiser’s on-screen pages, but he wasn’t the only one. There was The Man himself (aka The Man with a Long Chin), Zombie Dave, Insincere Dave and the innuendo-laden Chester Fisho. They formed a little world of their own alongside sword-selling Britt Slaps, prankster Phoning Honey and Mr and Mrs Nude. Readers would also be treated to appearances by Mr T. He’d warn people to stay away from his bins.
If all of this sounds bizarre, then rest assured it was, yet it attracted readers in their droves. At its peak, Digitiser was pulling in an audience of 1.5 million people each week and, while a good number were tuning in for the gaming news, reviews and tips, huge numbers were simply there for the subversive humour, whether that was a fake advert for a breakfast product – Lard-O’Corn – or Zombie Dave commenting on news stories in his own inimitable style (“Rrr rnlrr wrrnt thrr rrdurlt chrnrlz”).
Heading up the mayhem was Mr Biffo and Mr Hairs, otherwise known within the Teletext offices as Paul Rose and Tim
