Program - The Magazine Of The Home Computer Club

Whilst hunting through more old boxes of stuff at my flat, I discovered an old issue of Program, The Magazine of the Home Computer Club!

(Click pics to make 'em bigger, remember!)

The Home Computer Club was a mail order company that you could join up with, and every month they'd send you this catalogue, from which you could choose which games you wanted to buy....

They'd also send you the games from the Main Selection every month (in this case, The Loopz Collection) whether you'd ordered them or not and if you didn't want those you'd just send them back along with an order for any games you did actually want...

You had to purchase a certain amount of games each year as part of your contract..I can't remember how many...but it wasn't too bad for having some decent games at decent prices, so that wasn't really a problem...

I do remember having some difficulty when trying to leave the club though, and also with returning some of the main selections...the company just wouldn't take no for an answer some times!

Still, it was actually a great way to add some games to your collection, especially at a time when Spectrum games were becoming less easily available in the shops due to being phased out by newer computers...

Occasionally, there'd be Home Computer Club exclusive additions of games too, like the Total Eclipse box, for instance,  that came with Total Eclipse II - The Sphinx Jinx!

I used it to buy a lot of the later Ocean releases too, like Robocop 2, Navy SEALs and Total Recall...and System 3 games like Myth, Vendetta and Tusker! So yeah, it was actually a great thing for me back then, and I was happy to be a member!

Hope you've enjoyed looking through the mag anyway, and that it's stirred up some memories from any other old club members! I'd be interested in hearing about anybody else's experiences with the club, so let me know in the comments below if you have any...

Oh and apologies for the big greasy stain that seems to have seeped through the entire magazine...think it must have been stuck in a box with a misplaced bag of crisps or something at some point in it's life! Oops! ;) 

New Year, New Non-Promises

Hello Stuffers, Countdowners, Creepers and random visitors....and a happy New Year! As you can probably tell by my rather abrupt disappearance from posting in the 13 Days of Creepmas, I was rather busier during the holidays than I had originally thought I would be! Amazingly, it wasn't illness that stopped me from posting this time, but rather other real-life things..the likes of going to parties and concerts, helping people move and various other things that kept me away from the computer...

This of course meant that it was difficult to keep up with posts, and so I decided that I'd just give up trying and leave the blog for a bit until I was able to get back to it. So apologies if you were hanging around waiting yet again for more Gruesome Games or Gift ideas, or Cinema of Stuff or comics or whatever....and thanks for sticking around or stumbling upon the blog to read this....

I also decided in my absence that it was pointless trying to keep posting stuff as regularly as every day, and so from now on, unless I have previously got things ready and pre-written, I'm going to make no promises about when posts will be appearing, and won't be taking part in Countdowns unless I'm totally certain I can put up a post everyday...I also won't be numbering the games, gifts or anything and will just be putting them up when I feel like it. I think the lists are what ultimately drive me crazy with deadlines and make me stress out about things I really shouldn't be stressing about...

So the blog will become more random, and maybe actually more frequent and better without me trying to rush through lists in time for Halloween or Christmas. Hopefully it'll be a new beginning! But don't worry..nothing much is changing really....and I'll still get through all the remaining planned games on the Gruesome list! It's just I'll be writing about other stuff too....

I've no idea what this year will bring, but I wish you all the best and hope that it's a good one for you and me both! 

2016 folks...it's...like...the future! 

And now...

...at the same time!!!