 There's a game, it keeps on calling me Retro games, the place I want to be Every step I make, soon my marriage will end For the 64, CPC and Sparky Maybe tomorrow, I'll play my PS5 Until tomorrow, I'm playing scuba dive Ah, look at the colour and the detail in this game And just think, Crash magazine awarded this 96% They also went on to say, who needs a 16 bit machine When you shouldn't have Raphael Seeker Even today, the animation is really smooth And the gameplay is absolutely massively addictive No wonder then, that your Sinclair voted it 36 out of their top 100 games of all time What an outstanding arcade conversion What a relaxing colour it makes up for in graphical detail More importantly, speed and challenge It's in my top 25 beat'em ups for the ZX Spectrum And I enjoyed playing this conversion Just as much as I enjoyed the Sega Mega Drive conversion It really is a gruesome shooter slash beat'em up Up there with Golden Axe and Operation Wolf They did the coin-up justice Yes, that's right, Outrun makes the list Did you know that US Gold sold over 200,000 copies within the first couple of weeks of its release? By Christmas, it went up to 250,000 And that was just on 8 bit alone Final sales were more like 350,000 It became the UK's fastest selling game And don't get me wrong, the ZX Spectrum conversion is far from perfect But it came closer to the arcade original than the other 8 bits In a nutshell, here's how special Jetpack is on the ZX Spectrum This game alone sold 300,000 copies and generated 1 million in revenue for Ultimate Play the game Even today, the presentation is superb and the gameplay as addictive as ever This is the game that put the Stamper Brothers on the map It was also voted number 73 in the Your Sinclair Readers Top 100 games of all time in 1993 Operation Wolf, excessively violent, powerful and extremely player Your Sinclair loved it as well and they cited Fast and Furious Action Game It won the 1989 Golden Joystick Award It won Game of the Year for 8 bit and Best Coinup Conversion for 8 bit Crash awarded it a Crash Smash and Computer and Video Games awarded it a CVG Hit When you think that the ZX Spectrum had Commando, Green Beret, Ikari Warriors and this It really was the Ultimate Warzone Forget the graphics, this is addictive tremendous fun It's so good that Your Sinclair awarded it 94% in April 1990 And in the Your Sinclair Official Top 100, they rated it number 8 In issue 93 of the same magazine, the Readers voted it the second best game of all time If you said this was the best game of all time, you probably wouldn't get much arguing from me Apart from the lack of colour, it's virtually arcade perfect Chase HQ was so good that only Rainbow Islands topped it in the sales chart In fact, Chase HQ, although an expanded theme on Hillgren, in 1989 was the best so far In fact Crash said it is a great game and the Ultimate Arcade version of Cops and Robbers In fact all three of the ZX Spectrum magazines of the time awarded it 94% for a birth I wonder how the Commodore 64 Arcade conversion turned out Space Cowboys only Now let's just take stock of this In 1984, it won the Golden Joystick Award for Best Original Game Crash gave it the best overall game for 1985 Computer Gamer, they gave it Game of the Year Times Online, most influential video game ever And Stuff Magazine, they said it was number 6 of 100 greatest games of all time That was back in 2008, say no more How is this even possible on the Humble ZX Spectrum? A demanding futuristic racer based on a series of twisting turning looping circuits Edge Magazine did a top 100 games and Stunk Car Racer came in at number 54 And they said circuits all narrower than a supermodel's waist Suffice to say they loved it, but that was the Commodore Amiga version The ZX Spectrum graphics are a lot simpler, but the gameplay is just as addictive Double Dragon 3, the best in my personal opinion on the ZX Spectrum In fact computer and video games, they gave it 83% Your Sinclair gave it 88% and Sinclair User gave it 93% And Your Sinclair said 3rd time lucky for the dragons Not quite the best beat em up of all, but darn close I had it originally on the Amstrad CPC, but it was like wading through treacle So thank goodness I had access to a ZX Spectrum Your Sinclair gave Rodland a whopping 95% But strangely Crash only gave it 88% 88% is still good for Crash because they said a perfect conversion of a fun coinup Grab your magic rod and bash a bunny today Your Sinclair also said ecological it ain't But gruesome it certainly is It's a terrific and highly addictive game And all these years on I still play it, especially on the Amiga and the Nintendo Switch Now this is a weird one because this is one of my favourite arcade racing games on the ZX Spectrum Now the ZX Spectrum version of the game receives 70% from Your Sinclair 78% from Sinclair User and 79% from Crash In my personal humble opinion, this is not a clapped out Robin Mulan In fact the only 8 bit version or 16 bit that betters this is the Commodore 64 Now I originally played this on the Amiga and I have to say no complaints Now the Sinclair ZX Spectrum version when you consider the power difference between this and the Amiga What the programmers have achieved is phenomenal Your Sinclair awarded it 90% and they said a sort of French answer to times of law on a smaller scale But with a much greater variety of gameplay Sinclair User also awarded it 80% Jehangir Khan Squash is one of the best games I've ever played on the subject He's also regarded as the greatest squash player of all time So the programmer behind this, it was just as much a labour of love as it was a job Now practice makes perfect and before long you'll be in the swing of things And whilst the one player experience is fantastic It's the two player experience that takes this to the next level Which ultimately means you can come back to it time after time Fans of the sport will love it Absolutely loved the Joe Blade series The first one was fantastic, the second one was so so But the third one took things to the next level, it went back to the original's formula But this time it was bigger and better There was also a game called Prism Riot which was very similar to the first Joe Blade And allegedly there's a Joe Blade 4 out there that's been distributed on the internet It's a relatively simple game, a relatively simple series But it just works and get a load of this, it's still highly playable today Ah, Pang on the ZX Spectrum Try to look past the awful god awful colour palette I had no idea computers had periods until I played this But there's good news, your Sinclair awarded this 94% Computer and video games also awarded it 93% You'll need a 128k specky, but it's one of the best RK conversions to the Humble ZX Spectrum I think I've ever played Also check out the Amstrad GX 4000 RK conversion, it's terrific Now Xout is one of my favourite shoot-em-ups of all time It's up there with the likes of UN Squadron and R-Type Sinclair user awarded it 90% and they also thought it was one of the best shooters of all time The scroll is fast with lovely large animated sprites Your Sinclair gave the ZX Spectrum version a score of 84% Oddly they criticised the monochrome graphics, at that point I would have stopped buying the magazine Another one of my favourites, the Island of Doctor Destructor You've got just 7 days to destroy the island You can do that single player or two player Strangely Crash Magazine only awarded it 38% and Sinclair user only awarded it 70% I guess back then they were just making it up as it went along Probably hadn't played the game, worse still, didn't realise it was two player There's 21 screens and you'll play this for hours on end and keep coming back over and over again A delightful little budget game Good old Jack the Nipper It's still fun running wild through the village, creating havoc with all the items that you pick up and find along the way Finding the bottle of weed killer is still hilarious Crash awarded it 93% and Computer and Video Games gave it a game of the month and a CVG hit In fact the ZX Spectrum version was voted number 40 in the Your Sinclair Readers Top 100 games of all time This is the wickedest and naughtiest child you'll ever meet It's behind you! Ah, our type on the ZX Spectrum Talk about arcade perfect It took the might and all the power of the Commodore Amiga to get anywhere near this arcade conversion Ace Magazine awarded the ZX Spectrum 871 out of 1000 and Crash awarded it 92% Bob Pape you are forever immortalised A true God of War All we need now is a ZX Spectrum Next conversion Please Bob Next up is Cobra from Ocean Software Now Crash gave this one 93% and Your Sinclair gave it 8 out of 10 Some people say it's a mixture of Robocop and Green Beret But Cobra stands up in its own right It's nothing like the movie, thank God, but it's fantastic fun But just look at how fast everything runs out and the detail of the animation It will definitely appeal to arcade fans For everybody else it will feel like a crime or a disease What about Switchblade, eh? Graphically it's really good, there's lots of detail there, it's quite fast If you can ignore the sound, this is an absolute winner and a fantastic massive adventure These days I can do it without a map, it's like it's etched on the back of my hand But back in the day you had to map this game It's just vast, the landscape is huge and there's lots of secret hidden rooms I can't stress enough how playable this game is It really is a worthy addition to anybody's collection Ah Deflector, if you love puzzle games this is the one above all that stud the test of time Computer and video games awarded it 10 out of 10 If you've had a bad day at work it's an enjoyable distraction And it's a worthwhile way to burn lots of time whilst waiting for your PS5 to do its latest update And I think this might be the definitive version as it was coded by Costa Penae himself And get this, there's a practice mode This is the Abbey of Crime, it's one of the best games I've ever played on the ZX Spectrum It looks absolutely terrible but don't let looks deceive you In fact this game is considered one of the perfect 10 games for the Spectrum 128K according to Retro Gamer I think it's best played on the PC as that's got 256 colours But Paco Mendez he was really ahead of the game when it came to isometric adventures Also the Amstrad CPC version is great as well Who can forget winter games and look how well it holds up even today The game is rumoured to have sold 250,000 copies It's a sports simulation at its best There's seven events and a competitive multiplayer mode Sinclair user awarded this one 100% with Crash magazine awarding it 93% And they said every event is of a very high quality Target Renegade I never understood all the fuss about Streets of Rage I used to say to people if you're not played Renegade or Target Renegade on the ZX Spectrum But they were having none of it Your Sinclair gave this one 92% Crash also awarded it 90% and they said Bish Bash Bosch Now this is what I call a beat em up Mike Lamb the guy behind Combat School did the ZX Spectrum and imagine proud And working as a team is much more rewarding than solo play It's hard to believe that Thrust innovative as it is was only £1.99 Now there might only be six levels and whilst it starts over again This time the walls are invisible and gravity reversed Your Sinclair awarded it 80% and they said yes Thrust fails to get mega game rating Because pressing too many keys at once causes it to crash I only played this on the Plus2128K ZX Spectrum and never experienced this Good ol' Turbo the tortoise, every system needs a killer platform game The ZX Spectrum had this in abundance And whilst Triple T is no rival to Super Mario Brothers I just felt it was massively underrated And it's a game that still gives a fantastic challenge even today And it's hard to believe that this was a budget label I mean everything is so well executed It just has a really slick charm about it And if you've never played it please download it And you'll stick with it I promise until the end No this is a strange one And it came towards the end of the ZX Spectrum's life The first two Gauntlet 1 & 2 including deeper dungeons Let's face it were unbelievable But Crash magazine awarded this 90% and they said as addictive and fun to play as ever Gauntlet 3 is the bee's knees and it'll give you a buzz Ross Sinclair also awarded it 89% and they said a Mapper's Delight and a brilliant 2-player game And I can't argue it's absolutely brilliant, love it I couldn't leave Robocop out, no way This game sold over 1 million copies worldwide And in the UK it was the best selling home computer game of the 1980s And according to Wikipedia the ZX Spectrum Robocop is one of the biggest selling games of all time on that platform And remained in the ZX Spectrum software sales chart for over a year and a half Well I hope you've enjoyed this video, these are the games that have stood the test of time in my humble opinion Don't forget to like, subscribe and leave a comment Until next time, Tararabit