AMIGA Shadow of the Beast by Reflections / Psygnosis

[reds005]

I got this game with my A500 for Xmas 1990.

I remember being absolutely blown away by it, that pulsating music is awesome. Still does it to me now.

God bless the Amiga

[amaraklov]

(Audio) MOD Files, Amiga was the first platform that had them, and Psygnosis was the first company to use them effectively, and had them un-encrypted on the disc with the game, so you could make a copy and listen to it without the game... Pre - MP3 Synthesized Audio.... Oh I'm so OLD... :D

[angelodomino]

btst #6,#$bfe001 ;-) awesome system...but time changes...and GTX580's are great too nowadays ;-)

[frigginjoe]

When the Amiga came out, the new console was he NES. :O

[steveonlyintheweek]

Still sends shivers down my spine

[osamsing]

ゲームは糞つまらなそうだけど音楽がすばらしいね

[ChathamFr0]

Most amazing system of its time. Music and graphics for the games were completely mind blowing. Even now, going back I totally appreciate how good they were.

[superspec3]

................ :' )

[cyborg00000]

@rastansaga360 Shadow of the Beast was a masterpiece at it's time.

[thorgallpl]

loading times used to kill me....

[kurije]

@rastansaga360

4-planes? Son, can you even count past 4? Furthermore, the jerky part is due to the video recording and emulation; the thing is completely fluid on a real hardware. Also, the actual Amiga hardware was made in 1981-2, and A500 only added more memory.

[ziva80]

@kurije

The Amiga was released in September 1985. I know, because I pre-ordered and then picked up my Amiga 1000 the first day ComputerLand (Remember them?) had it on their shelves. :)

But yes, Comparing Donkey Kong Country, which came out in 1994, to Shadow of the Beast, which came out in 1989, is a bit silly. SofB blew everything away when it was released. (As did many of the Cinemaware games released for the Amiga, as well.) The Amiga was truly way ahead of its time.

[p1xMU51c]

@rastansaga360

Donkey Kong Country was impressive - no doubt, but it is completely unfair to compare games that are more than 5 years apart!

[21jumppp]

someone knows which language was used to programm this game?

[Rebelli0nUK]

@21jumppp : i would guess it was written directly in 68000 assembly language

[21jumppp]

@Rebelli0nUK thanx buddy

[sassahult]

brings back memories.. sweet memories =)

[sheridanmedia]

I would take issue with the "great gameplay" statement. SOTB was at times maddeningly difficult, and whenever you died you had to sit through that LOOONG death screen and start all over from the beginning. But on all other points, I completely agree. This was an awesome way to show of the sound and graphics of the Amiga. In fact, I think I actually bought this game before I owned a machine on which to play it!

[MetatroN197924]

@rastansaga360 do you remember the release year of the amiga 500, it was 1987.the snes released november 1990,its 4 year difference in technology.like compare snes with playstation 1 and wipeout to fzero,before you speak and say bullshit think again,the amiga was the best machine back then.i also had an amiga 500 and snes which was a capable machine.but the amiga make the leap in graphs not the snes.also the quality of the sound in amiga was top.

[XCodium]

@rastansaga360

Lets compare melons to oranges and talk nonsense, good idea! ;)

[macc305]

I HAVE A QUESTION? WHAT ARE YOU CONTROLLING, A MONSTER?

[hoques1432]

@macc305 A beast, apparently ... ;)

[macc305]

@hoques1432 jajajaja

[knortz251]

Great Intro :O

[JoeTheToucan]

Amiga had such beautiful in- game artwork

Just look at that fucking level design

[JapStrangler]

Fugging class...still got the t-shirt

[Nosfera7u2006]

Goosebumps :-)

Amiga was where it's at best games, music :-)

PC's were still making stupid bleep sounds .

Too bad Commodore messed up and went out of business, would love to see how it would have evolved !!!

[bertthedefender]

I'd forgotten how long it took that bugger to load...

[melvoin]

Good graphics, but a very average game. Reminds me of Donkey Kong Country for SNES.

[Arkhandroid]

@melvoin lol. how does it remind you of donkey kong country. the two aren't similar at all.

[r8qt7]

yes still state of the art

[OOverflowW]

When the beast appears in the intro, the music just owns !

I remember launching the game just to get this feeling :)

[tommysize2]

i think the dwarfs faded away 1 by 1. or not?

[tommysize2]

i thought i remembered the title screen as:

at night with dwarfs in the foreground on either side around some bushes & trees with a clearing in the center leading up to a castle or a full moon.

i swear beast was in the title but i cant find it!? any ideas? it was either c64 or amiga, more likely amiga

[EnergyOM]

i wonder what happend to the magicians of psygnosis....are they still producing games?

[TheBlackPigeon]

@EnergyOM

Indeed they are. They are now known as SCE Studio Liverpool, and produce games for the Playstation brand. The Wipeout series is one of their more recent success stories.

[TheBlackPigeon]

@EnergyOM

To expand upon the previous comment.

SotB's developer, Reflections, is still kicking as well, now a subsidary of UbiSoft. Their most recent claim to fame is the Driver series.

[joegrafter]

@EnergyOM im sure psygnosis was bought buy sony and now is called sony computer entertainment

[EnergyOM]

If that is so...then it's no wonder why the psx was such a bomb on the market!

[Blurredman]

not by the name of Psygnosis or Psyclapse anymore :( My most favourite company ever!

[Crz2B]

I'll never forget being 13 in '89 and sitting in awe in front of my Amiga 500, playing this game. Damn, those were the days....

[undeaddread]

I remember being mesmerized by this game when i first saw it, pure retro quality!

[Fajjani]

This game is bizarre, banal and it scares me.

[Rochhyjal]

What a great game ! Proving that Amiga was the best a that time... Tear in my eyes...

[Acrimonator]

The game i bought with my Amiga...

[Qualitaeto]

cooles game...aber der gamer hat wohl das pad oder den "joystick" beim daddeln im arsch!

[Kl4pp5tuhl]

ROFL

[dukenukemman]

Fantastic game for the amiga, I remember playing this on my dads amiga 1000 back in the late 80s.

Happy days :)

[Notir072]

J'ai addoré ce jeu, mais il y a un problème avec la musique dans ta vidéo, manque une (ou même 2 ?) voix .

loved the game but there's a problem with the music in that video, 1 or 2 music channels are missing.

[Japestcs]

Those were the days, 3 mins before you get to play the game!

[jbl456]

I got this packaged with my A500 in1990.

It's still talked about today.

Psygnosos FUCKING RULE

[johnnyk427]

Beautiful game but the gameplay wasnt all that great.

[pauladenisefatagnus]

Come on, I admit the sprite 2d collision detection was not that fantastic but the game play was quite decent if we look at the overall size taken by the program and the awesome graphics and sounds.

All combined, it is a perfect masterpiece, I mean no games that top-notch at this time. Right ?

[neomedia74]

The game was programmed by a bunch of 16 year olds... this is damn good if you as me! It blew me away when I played it on the Amiga for the first time. When I read in Amiga Format later that the artists / programmers were young teens it blew my mind further.

[zoidburg111]

the amiga was truely a great computer...i was actually sad when commodore went belly up and there was no more amiga hardware being made

[ChroniclesOfGBear]

The graphics were simply stunning for the time. I remember having a few mates around when it first came out, (none of them had an Amiga and most were still using C64s/Speccys) - I don't think anybody said anything for about 2 mins before looking at each other with amazement on their faces lol That's how groundbreaking the visuals were at that moment in time...a few years ago now :S

[MrPopular22]

unplayable

[pauladenisefatagnus]

Yes over few days it was quiet simple.

The fact is :

How concentrate on the game with such graphics/sounds at this time?...

This is how games should always be, unplayable by their beauties...

[OOverflowW]

so true !

(and your ECS nickname is great ;-)

[pauladenisefatagnus]

So true et sur seulement 2 disquettes en plus !

Merki psygnosis.

T'es frenchy on dirait.

C'est cool pour le nickname... les gens ne comprennent pas toujours le coup du enhanced chipset...

surtout le fat Address GeNerator UnitS ca choque on dirait ;oD

[OOverflowW]

Ce que les gens n'ont pas compris c'est que l'Amiga était loin d'être une "simple" machine de jeu, c'était bien plus que ca ! C'était THE machine, celle où tu pouvais t'extasier pdt des heures devant une anim, une zik ou je sais pas quoi ! Il y avait une âme dans cet assemblage électronique, et on retrouvera plus jamais ca sur les ordis actuels je pense :/

[pauladenisefatagnus]

Ouaip, Machine de ouf, le 680x0 le mieux exploité sur le on ze market... je laissais tourner les rsi megademo et sbires en boucle, les intros de Xenon2, speedball 2, etc..., Je faisais des mods avec pro-tracker et octamed... des c.. enfin, j'me comprends, avec X-Copy (nibble of course XD)... Je faisais des guru meditations(-_-) comme si il en pleuvait, le top quoi...

[bennyzen]

Shadow of the Beast was simply amazing!

but btw, hey dude: you really don't know how to play it. No offense ¦¬]

[youmongrel]

Thanks for the memories - it's amazing how blisteringly unfair the games were back then! Still have my Amiga 1000 in the garage...

[cgrmorta]

Musics of this game was the best music ever made for an amiga game.

[Ziquor]

Yeah but the Amiga version allowed many more sprites on screen at once!

[TheExtremeCore]

Commodore 64 version was miles better, yes graphics are smoother here but the music and experience was much better on the C64

[rabkoi]

graphic and sound were awesome, but the gameplay sucked

[Ziquor]

Oh my GOD - the memories! The Amiga was SOO far ahead of its time. This was one of the 1st home games to use a multi-scrolling (parallax) background. I remember when it 1st was released it was such the technology was extraordinary at the time, though the gameplay wasn't the greatest. The Amiga also had the 1st home game to be made in progressive / non-interlace mode, though I can't remember the title. Unreal maybe? (nothing like the newer version)

[sdemon121]

lol i suppose the parallax scrolling was firstly introduced by Prehistoric rather than by SOTB..

[gotecki]

total classic!

[thoomie]

This game is pure cult. At the time I played it a friend of mine brought it back from vacation in Portugal and had bought it in an abandoned gas station. Very strange game at the time, but I never forgot it.

[thedipmeister]

And what an elaborate method of defending a massive section of planes. Giant spikes. =D

[AmericanHero911]

It must be the work of some giant wizard or demi-god or something cursing the planes to what seems to gaurd what seems to be a forbbiden castle.

The spikes and all that must be animated by magic or something because they only appear when your near by.

[AmericanHero911]

Can someone explain why there might be blimps in the sky over this land please?

[thedipmeister]

Alien blimps, carrying body thetans to be dumped into volcanos.

[AmericanHero911]

Ahh i see - i thought they were signs of mankind scouting out the untamed wilderness.

[deriousx]

this game is to damn so mofo hard beated all the games ever but this is the one i never could

[InfernalNightfaery]

OMG even the C64 cart were faster loading than the Amiga floppy! That makes a change eh, C64 faster than Amiga!

[Ahle2]

There is no loading at all in cartridge based games, just memory swapping, which is almost instant (milli seconds).

[supacoopa]

Graphics by legendary artist Roger Dean, no less

[stunic75]

The graphics in the game were done by Martin Edmunson of Reflections, his dad also helped him out when deadlines were looming. Roger Dean only ever did the Psygnosis logo (owl face) as far as I know it. For BeastII, they brought in a new guy called Philip Baxter that did just about all of the work for 15k per year, then BeastIII and Brian the Lion.

[sunmax1]

thanks for info, art is always interesting

[thedipmeister]

I never quite understood that loading screen right after "Beast" with the mechanical animals.

[AmericanHero911]

They might not be mechanical - think they're just some strange creatures with shiny shells.

I gather it's suppose to represent the untamed ancient world where random creatures came in all shapes, sizes and bizarre forms.

[bub777]

The first time I've seen a game over screen, where the text "game over" is never seen...but you know that's the intention of the screen...

[AmericanHero911]

I spent 30 mins in that tree killing them giant grasshoppers, how many is there?

Never too old to play video games, it's the artwork which excites the soul - you can feel it with the music combined too.

Some rumours suggest that Beast is a reflection of long lost ancient history that only our spirits remember (most humans have trouble accessing their spiritual memory but some lie in dreams).

I had a dream this game was inspired from Irish folklore because the Romans didn't quite get that far.

[cyric792]

I used to adore this game when I was a kid. I really has a lot of style and the music still sounds brilliant.

[pyraplastic]

this game was very hard

[stereo123]

i only played the genesis version, and it was ridiculously hard. It seems the amiga version is tough too, but which nicer graphics and music.

[Jazka0]

I want to go back to the 90's!!!!

[LoranXFM]

I never got past those yellow barbs, nice video!