1993 Codemasters
Platform: Amiga
Many of you growing up with Codemaster’s 8-bit budget games may remember a quirky title called Tilt, where you control a 3D maze and rotate it in various directions to guide a ball to an exit point, whilst avoiding a range of obstacles.
Sounds very simple, but it was a deviously addictive title which scored well across the different formats it was released on. It even featured Commodore Format’s very own Roger Frames on the front cover, proudly declaring its “Corker” status from its 93% score. You can read more about the C64 game here: https://commodoreformatarchive.com/1-tilt-codemasters-version-93-issue-1/
Around a year or so after the release, it was oddly to be the turn of the 16-bits with the release of an Amiga budget conversion (it is unknown if an Atari ST version was ever planned/started).
Created by Michael Troughton (who would eventually become lead programmer for Psygnosis’ Brian the Lion) whilst he was in University, the game was reviewed in issue 9 of Amiga Power by Stuart Campbell (see below).
According to Michael’s brother Robert (who brought the conversion to our attention), the game *may* have been one of the first games on the Amiga to have proper 3D graphics running at 50FPS – helped likely by the fact that Michael had experience within the demo scene at the time. Although visually it looked quite crude (as with the originals), it received a more than reasonable 73% and was available for the bargain price of £7.99 too.
Although fully paid for his efforts, unfortunately, this was to be the last time the conversion would ever be seen again, with it never surfacing or appearing in shops. Why was this? We’re not exactly sure – even David Darling was at a loss as to why it was cancelled when Robert asked him directly.
Actually, it seems that it could have been down to a trademark issue with the name “Tilt”. Italian-based Genias would release a different maze-based puzzler around the same time, which would ironically review the very next issue of Amiga Power. The much cheaper Codies budget game would come out on top out of the two titles, but it would be just the Genias title that would surface. So was it Genias who perhaps put a stop to the Codemasters game?
This seems to be the most plausible reason so far, though nothing was communicated back to the developer. Sadly as the years have gone on, Michael no longer has anything of the conversion. So the hunt now begins to see if it can be saved.
Review copies are very likely to have long gone, with Amiga Power seemingly the only reviewer too. Often they were sent back to the companies afterwards or binned after various clear outs over the years.
Codemasters though have recently been sifting through their vaults, so we will try to see if they can take a look. It all depends though if the game ever got to a mastered stage, or just remained on a master disk. It is alternatively hoped that friends of Michael may have obtained or kept a copy of the game themselves, and will someday surface in that way.
If you know anything more about the conversion – then please do get in touch! With thanks to Stephen Stuttard for the hi-res scans.
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