Mel Croucher goes Back to the Future

DIE? NO. SOAR!

Well, I guess this is where I came in, still crazy after all these years, still trying to flog my music in the guise of game soundtracks, and still trying to force-feed my writing to an audience more interested in instant gratification than mere words. Luckily, retro games are back in fashion, so for me retro is the new tomorrow. It’s a bit like all those clapped-out old rock bands going off on a final pension tour. Like them, it seems all I had to do was fail to die and hang around long enough to be rediscovered, and not just as a dinosaur, but a dinosaur with a fan base. (Check out Den of Geek’s 7 incredibly weird and innovative 80s videogames.)

Not that I’m ungrateful, merely a bit bemused to find myself as a little footnote in books about video games, and a bit amused to learn that some of my stuff is being taught on university courses in ancient centres of learning like Prague, and a bit confused to discover examples of my stuff on exhibition behind a glass case in the Museum of Arts and Crafts, Paris.

I thought I’d have a go at encapsulating the story of the UK video games industry in a no-holds-barred book, and I’ve been trying to get the final chapter finished for far too long. But it wasn’t until I was asked to write this piece that I realised there is no final chapter! In which case, I’m going to call the book The Best Game You’ve Never Played In Your Life and leave the ending for the readers and players to decide.

My video games company Automata has been reborn, and the wheel turns full circle. First time round, a seventeen year-old school-leaver called Andy Stagg was on a government Youth Opportunities Scheme when he programmed a game for me called Deus Ex Machina. This time round he is not only a grandfather but he is also Managing Director of the company. And after a slight delay of only three decades we’re about to release a brand new sequel to Deus Ex Machina in celebration of still being alive and kicking.

Mel (right) has signed up the best in the business for his new soundtrack

First time round I hired ex-Doctor Who John Pertwee to be the narrator of the game, and I cobbled all the music together myself because there was no money left to do anything else. This time round I’ve got the best voice on this planet to narrate for me, Sir Christopher Lee, and as for the music, I’m allowed to do my Jeff Beck impression backed by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. But in essence, nothing really changes for me and my team, all the time the old enthusiasm keeps on burning.

Birth of a notion. The original opening sequence of Deus Ex Machina as rendered in 16 colours

And now in utero maximus

What has changed is the fact that players can now get involved during the creative stages and not afterwards, and I welcome that. Should we do a new version of PiMania, who knows? Well, the potential players know, that’s who. So we can ask them first, using ready-made mechanisms like Kickstarter and Facebook.

For a while, a generation ago, the UK led the world in video game creation and innovation. It may not have been structured or planned, but whatever it was, it’s back. I sense the same sense of energy, fearlessness and fun that we enjoyed in the early 1980s, remixing and peddling our four basic elements of chess, dice, ping-pong and bunkum.

I believe there are boundless possibilities with home-grown success for video games creators who have the audacity to question the status quo, and who have the will to try their luck without recourse to worn out organisations like agencies and banks. Let the good times roll, all over again. With Automata back in business after a gap of a quarter of a century, I’m relishing this new opportunity to be in direct contact with players all over again. Not so much Back To The Future, as Future To The Backer. Time will tell.