In the year of 1987, Computer Novels should have been released a game named ‘Ivanhoe’, but it was never to be released. The Commodore 64-version should have been released in October 1987 and the Amiga-version the next month.
Computer Novels only released The Three Musketeers but they have planned to release more than this, it sadly looks as though they probably went bankrupt.
The Advert for Ivanhoe, which Martin/Stadium 64 scanned from the November-issue 1987 of the Swedish magazine ‘Datormagazin’. The magazine had several notes about this game, unfortunately showing at least one screenshot from the Amiga-version which looked pretty nice.
There is a recent link to American Action, which was a Swedish company based on Malmoe. It seems that the company had some economical problems in the past, but at the time of this game (Autumn 1987) – things had changed for the better. Recently we’ve added who we think were behind the game, thanks to Twoflower.
It was rumoured that a special version was also being made for the C128, so there could be two versions to find. All we have to look at is a possible C64 screenshot, but it looks rather Amiga’ish to me.
Nothing else is known, whether the game was actually completed or why exactly the game was never released. No credits are currently known, though its likely that it would be the people behind Computer Novel’s other C64 games.
One thing which is quite interesting is the Ivanhoe loading music found in HVSC. Something found anyway of the game :-)
A feature appeared in Swedish magazine Datormagazin, issue 7 1987, page 4, with P Diab at publisher American Action which adds a few snippets, where they say:
“We are planning to release the Computer Novels series for all computers I just mentioned [previous passage: Atari 520 ST, Amiga, C64, C128, PC]. This also includes all other games. The Computer Novels series will also be published in special editions for the C128. It won’t be a direct conversion from the C64, more like a Deluxe version of the C64 game.”
Followed by:
“Maybe it’s time for you to say a few words about Computer Novels…
Computer Novels is just a name for a series of games we publish. Another name we use is Action and there’s no doubt about what type of games will be included in that series, right? The Computer Novels series is based on old well-known novels. Within the next months “Ivanhoe” and “Around the World in 80 Days” will be published, all three of which are, as you know, two [sic] very well-known novels. Additionally, we have already published “The Three Musketeers”.
For the game, a little more detail was then mentioned about the style:
“Will “Ivanhoe” and “Around the world…” be in the same style as “The Three Musketeers”?
Well, more or less, they won’t be action games and no text adventures either. “Ivanhoe” will contain 6 different action parts in the vein of “Defender of the Crown”. “Around the world in 80 days” will also contain action parts, plus there will be a time limit hovering over the players, those 80 days you know…”
Was anything ever started, and can anything be found?
Contributions: Martin / Stadium 64, Anders Hansen, Twoflower, Anonymous Contributor
Supporting content
Available downloads
- Music_Ivanhoe.zip (zip)
Gallery
Update history
- 23/10/24 – Update to page with snippets from a magazine.
