Zzap!64 (1985)
Newsfield's Irreverent, Oli Frey-Illustrated Bible of British Commodore 64 Culture
Zzap!64 was the definitive British monthly Commodore 64 gaming magazine, launched in April 1985 by Newsfield Publications in Ludlow, Shropshire under founding editor Chris Anderson. Defined by Oli Frey's vibrant airbrushed covers and cartoon reviewer caricatures alongside editors Bob Wade, Gary Penn, Julian Rignall, and Gordon Houghton, its multi-critic Zzap! Test panels, Sizzlers, and Gold Medals shaped 8-bit games journalism.
Newsfield in Ludlow, Oli Frey's Art, and the Zzap! Test Panel
Created as the Commodore 64 sister publication to Newsfield's ZX Spectrum smash CRASH by directors Roger Kean, Franco Frey, and Swiss-born illustrator Oli Frey—with future Future Publishing founder Chris Anderson editing Issue 1—Zzap!64 rejected stuffy computer-club prose. Every major release underwent a conversational 'Zzap! Test' in which three reviewers debated gameplay alongside expressive cartoon 'mugshot' faces drawn by Frey, culminating in granular ratings for graphics, SID sound, hookability, and lastability. Standout titles earned the coveted Sizzler badge (typically 90% and above), while all-time classics received the revered Zzap! Gold Medal.
Championing C64 Auteurs, Subversive Humor, and Editorial Lineage
Under Bob Wade, Gary Penn, arcade ace Julian Rignall, and surrealist humorist Gordon Houghton, Zzap!64 surpassed 80,000 monthly copies at its late-1980s peak and turned bedroom coders and SID chip composers like Rob Hubbard, Martin Galway, and Andrew Braybrook into household names through developer diaries and cover-mounted Megatapes. Features such as mysterious mailbag caretaker Lloyd Mangram and hand-drawn walkthrough maps forged intense reader loyalty across Europe. Before rebranding into Commodore Force in late 1992, Zzap!64 served as the primary training ground for Britain's golden-age gaming press, directly seeding Mean Machines, ACE, Amiga Power, and Edge.