The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 1
Computing counts down the best ever titles released on the Amiga
The Commodore Amiga was one of the dominant home computers of the '80s and '90s, popular for its power, affordability and eventually for the vast array of software that was developed for it.
And while that software included worthy things like word processing application Page Setter, spreadsheet suite MaxiPlan, and Small Business Manager, it was mostly about the games.
The best-selling model, the Amiga 500, featured 512Kb of RAM (an incredible amount when other dominant platforms such as the ZX Spectrum featured a measly 48Kb), and was powered by a Motorola 68000 chip (technically 32-bit, but due to its 16-bit external bus it had to transfer data in two steps, a technique known as multiplexing).
The name 'Amiga', was chosen for its meaning in Spanish (female friend), and because it came before both Apple and Atari alphabetically. So all those people leafing through the Yellow Pages to chose their home computer would at least find the Amiga before its rivals.
There were so many classic titles released for the Amiga in the '80s and '90s, that whittling them down to 10 proved utterly impossible. As did confining them to a top 20. So here, for your reading pleasure, are the top 30 Amiga games of all time (more or less).
Looking for the second part, where we run through 20-11 in this list?
Or what about the final part, where we reveal 10-1?
Or Amiga games not your thing? Here are the top 10 ZX Spectrum games of all time!
30. Batman: The Movie
Batman, also known as Batman: The Movie, is rather unsurprisingly based on one of the Batman films, specifically the 1989 film of the same name starring Jack Nicholson and Michael Keaton. Also released in 1989, on the Amiga, ZX Spectrum and other platforms, it challenges players to complete various stages in a bid to thwart the Joker.
The game is effectively several smaller games in one, with driving, platforming, puzzle and flying levels all occupying significant portions of the overall game.
The final level, which we assume few players ever got to see, such was the overall difficulty, sees the player confront the Joker on top of Gotham Cathedral.
The game was well received at the time, as you'd expect of a major title from respected developers Ocean Software, being awarded Game of the Year in Crash magazine in 1989.
The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 1
Computing counts down the best ever titles released on the Amiga
29. Bubble Bobble
Originally released in 1986 as a free-standing arcade game of the sort you now only find in old-fashioned fairgrounds or on eBay, Bubble Bobble has since been ported to just about any platform you can think of, including a Texas Instruments graphical calculator.
The game tasks twin dragons Bub and Bob to free their girlfriends from the Cave of Monsters, because no self-respecting lizard would allow their mate to languish there.
Interestingly, Bubble Bobble offered multiple endings, depending on what secrets the player discovered, among other things. That gave the game extra replayability value, if the game's 100 levels were somehow not enough already.
Bubble Bobble spawned a plethora of sequels, on top of its proliferation across many platforms. Developer Taito announced in 1996 that they had managed to lose the original source code, so sent Probe Entertainment, who were responsible at the time for home computer conversions, a version of the original arcade game, which they used to produce the game for PC, Saturn and PlayStation.
The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 1
Computing counts down the best ever titles released on the Amiga
28. SWIV
In SWIV, two players control a helicopter and jeep through a scrolling 2D landscape, shooting enemies as they appear. Or, if you're both dexterous and mentally nimble, one player controls both while attempting not to overheat his brain or snap a tendon.
As is de rigueur in such games, some enemies drop power ups, and there are regular bosses. These drop even better power ups, which permanently improve the player weapons.
It received a multitude of glowing reviews, and spawned a sequel ‘Super SWIV', which sadly never made it to the Amiga, finding a home instead on the Super NES. Perhaps if there'd been such a thing as the ‘Super Amiga', history would have worked out differently.
That would have been super.
SWIV was the spiritual successor to Silkworm, a sideways scrolling but otherwise similar game. Like Doom, which was to come many years later, Silkworm's sales were hampered by a long and satisfying demo version, which gave gamers little reason to pay for the full game.
The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 1
Computing counts down the best ever titles released on the Amiga
27. Rainbow Islands
The fact that it's a sequel to one of our other entries in this list becomes more obvious when you give this game its full title: ‘Rainbow Islands: The Story of Bubble Bobble 2'.
Like its predecessor, this Taito title began life as a fully-fledged arcade machine, making its way to the Amiga in 1990, a year after its release on the ZX Spectrum, and three years after its arcade debut.
In Rainbow Islands, instead of Bub and Bob the dragons from Bubble Bobble, the characters are Bubby and Bobby, apparently their human forms. Reassuringly, however, their shirt colours remain the same (green and blue respectively).
The story, involving defeating the ‘Dark Shadow', is just as irrelevant as it was in the first game. What matters is that players shoot rainbows at enemies, which can also serve as platforms to reach other areas.
Like Bubble Bobble, there are multiple endings, with the alleged best ending only available after completing all three secret islands - accessible only after all seven big diamonds are collected. You guessed it, most players never even saw a single secret island, so presumably had to settle for less special endings, like finally getting too frustrated and doing something else instead.
The game was a huge critical and commercial success, garnering reviews scored well into the 90s almost across the board.
The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 1
Computing counts down the best ever titles released on the Amiga
26. Jimmy White's Whirlwind Snooker
You know what real snooker's missing? Cheeky balls that pull faces and blow raspberries at you when you're lining up a tricky shot. Jimmy White's Whirlwind Snooker immediately righted that wrong upon its release in 1991.
But it was far from being about the gimmicks, this was a game that made full use of the 16-bit home computers of the era, with crisp graphics, an intuitive interface, and great 3D modelling, which made the balls behave believably and created a genuine feeling of the real thing.
In fact, coding the physics alone took one-man coding team Archer MacLean several months to complete.
The game was promoted by a novel marketing technique: a snooker tournament played in-game, held in Virgin Stores, Virgin being its publisher. Regional heats were held across the UK, with the winner playing MacLean himself, with Jimmy White commentating. Somehow, we can't help but feel it may have been better the other way around...
The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 1
Computing counts down the best ever titles released on the Amiga
25. IK+
Switching from snooker to a beat 'em up, but sticking with programmer Archer MacLean, who did most of the work here too, we come to International Karate +. Talk to us about retro karate games and we'll likely wax lyrical about the ZX Spectrum's Way of the Exploding Fist, but International Karate + is every bit its equal, and that's high praise indeed.
Released in 1987 by System 3, it appeared first on Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC and ZX Spectrum, finding its way onto the Amiga in 1988.
In the game, three martial artists fight on a beach at sunset, with one or two of them controlled by human players, the third always under the thrall of the computer. In addition to the brilliant gameplay, with minigames where the player must kick away balls or bombs in between the three-way fights, there's also an easter egg where you can press 'T' to make all the combatants trousers fall down. Then they look at you askance.
Why that hasn't taken off as a feature in every game ever published since, we'll never know.
The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 1
Computing counts down the best ever titles released on the Amiga
24. Zool
Zool: Ninja of the Nth Dimension to give it its full title, was released by Gremlin Graphics for the Amiga in 1992.
It's a scrolling platform game where you control Zool, the ninja from the Nth Dimension himself, where he has to jump around a world made of sweets, solving puzzles and killing bosses for various paper-thin story reasons, which really don't matter.
Because who needs an epic narrative when the gameplay is this good? Designed to rival Sega's Sonic the Hedgehog, Zool was ported to a wide variety of other platforms, including Sega's very own Megadrive, but the Amiga was its first home.
Critically and commercially it was a huge success, garnering scores of 97 per cent, 96 per cent, 95 per cent from Amiga Computing, Amiga Action and Amiga Format respectively.
It was followed by Zool 2 in 1993.
The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 1
Computing counts down the best ever titles released on the Amiga
23. Defender of the Crown
The first game from the late, great Cinemaware stable, and for many, one of the best. Released in 1986 on the Amiga (it was subsequently ported to other platforms, but the Amiga was its first home), it drew heavy praise for its high quality graphics, which were seen as revolutionary at the time.
Set in England in 1149, the player is tasked to lead the Saxon hordes in a fight against the Normans and win the country back for the (sort of) natives. The idea is to fight for territorial control, winning castles from enemies (in battle, via sieges, or in jousting tournaments).
It was reviewed extremely positively, with its graphics especially receiving universal acclaim, but some commenting that its various minigames were disconnected, and varied wildly in terms of their difficulty.
This was possibly due to the fact that the developers were struggling for cashflow as release neared, and so pushed it out before it was quite finished, with some features never finished, and others simply switched off for simplicity's sake.
The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 1
Computing counts down the best ever titles released on the Amiga
22. Gods
The appearance of the popular ‘Gods' in the bottom third of an all-time 30 best Amiga games ranking is sure to raise eyebrows and set internet commentators to ‘flame', but yet here it is. A superb title from 1991, developed by the Bitmap Brothers, an outfit who could literally do no wrong in that era, it allows the player to control Greek legend Hercules in his quest for immortality.
Brilliantly, especially for the ‘90s, the AI allowed enemies to adapt not just to the player's positioning, but also to his level of skill, ratcheting the challenge up or down depending on player performance. If only Dark Souls would do likewise...
In terms of gameplay Gods is a platformer, but one where forward-thinking and skill are required more than a desire to rush through a level in the style of Sonic the Hedgehog.
Gods was hugely well received, and praised for its gameplay, graphics, and music - quality across all three being a hallmark of Bitmap Brothers' titles at the time.
The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 1
Computing counts down the best ever titles released on the Amiga
21. TV Sports Football
TV Sports Football is a great game even if you don't care for American Football. If you do, it's an even better game, but the fact that its superb gameplay translates even to the uninitiated just goes to show how well its mechanics work (and you don't have to sit through endless ads every quarter).
The game is framed around a TV show, with presenters introducing you to the game and running you through the teams, and little camera cut-aways during the action (during a break in play you might be taken to a scene where a player waves to the camera and shouts 'Hi mom!', for instance. It could grate, but it's so well presented, and so consistent in tone that it's still clever and cute after years of playing).
Brilliantly, you get to assign stats to your team before you start, bringing in a mild RPG element to proceedings. This is especially useful when you define how good you want your defensive players to be, as when it comes to the game, you can give yourself control of the uber-powerful quarterback sacking linebacker you created, and single-handedly break down the opposition's play consistently.
Or maybe there's a particular offensive play you like, in which case you give your favourite receiver or running back the top stats, and be confident that that play should land you a healthy number of points across the season.
Like most good sports simulations, the replayability comes from the fact that no two on-pitch scenarios are ever precisely alike, and every win is a genuine thrill. The icing on the cake is the beautiful and innovative presentation. One of Cinemaware's oft-forgotten, but greatest titles.