Malc Jennings

What can I say? the internet is probably not the best place to tell people every single thing about yourself, things like which bank you use, what your National Insurance Number is or even the password to your home computer and because I'm paranoid 99% of the time anyway, I won't be giving you that kind of detail on this page.

My first home computer was the Amstrad CPC back in 1988, times weren't so great back then so it was quite difficult for my mum to buy me something as expensive as a home computer, I mean back then we are talking a huge amount of money. My uncle, who is only a few years older than me, had loads of computers (can we say spoiled?) from the humble BBC Microcomputer, the Dragon 32 right the way up to a ZX Spectrum. I used to spend hours at my grandmas place playing videogames on those machines, the funniest time being when we could never get a specific game to work on the Dragon and had to slam it against the desk (the cassette) a few times before it actually loaded, a major Fonz from Happy Days moment (haha).

That Christmas, to my surprise as I unwrapped my presents I saw an Amstrad CPC looking back at me, all new, shiny and bundled with an arse load of games (the Amsoft collection) to get started with. I was so happy that I finally had my own machine, and even though it was the less expensive GT65 (green screen) version I could not wait to get home and plug the little guy into the mains and smell that aroma you only get from things that are brand new, ahh memories.

I then spent the next few years, all the way into the early 90s in fact (probably 1992) I loved my little computer, sure some of the guys at High School had the Commodore 64 plugged into a huge ass (then at least) 21 inch TV in the bedroom while others who were quite simply stuck up there own arse had the majorly expensive Commodore Amige and Atari ST, both great machines but you needed 3 bank loans just to afford one in the 80s.

The things you do for games when you're a kid with pennies in your pocket are shocking, how many of you borrowed a game from one of your school friends and tried to "high speed dub" it to another blank 15 minute cassette? I'm willing to bet that most of you did. Didn't work very often did it. So I resorted to another clever little trick, make a non-working clone of the game you just purchased, carefully open the cassette (sometimes they had screws in them for you to do this! duuur!) and swap the reals over before taking it back to the store and telling the shopkeeper it wouldn't load. IF they test it, it actually doesn't work because its your cloned tape, and IF they don't then you get an instant replacement game of your choice! well you did back then.

Later computers that I owned included the rather superb Atari ST which I ditched for an Amiga less than a year later. Why? well it certainly wasn't that my little green desktop friend wasn't powerful enough, certainly not that it wasn't capable of playing the latest generation of titles but rather the simple lack of titles available for it. All my friends had Amigas with only one, maybe two of them owning an Atari ST and both of those being the more powerful 1040 1MB ST (Falcon). Arse.

Why build CPC Zone? well the answer is simple, there are so many VERY high quality websites out there designed for the more popular retro computers from the 1980s, you know, the ZX Spectrum and C64 lovers out there, both very good machines in there own unique way and I can fully understand the need to support them in todays modern world and remember where we started. The CPC however was often overlooked, stuck in the background and pretty much ignored. CPC Zone was and is my attempt at giving those who once owned an Amstrad CPC a place to come and remember the days gone by, yes you all really are that old.

These days sorry to say but I now use consoles for the majority of my gaming kicks, the only gaming computer is any kind of latest PC, which is still good for the odd retail game and fantastic for retrogames via emulation but again the lack of quality titles pushed me towards Microsoft and Sony.

My other hobbies include video editing and creating my own audio remixes and megamixes. Being a MASSIVE fan of the pop legend that is Michael Jackson and base a hell of a lot of my editing on Michael. I tend to spend a load of what spare time I have left juggling between Michael Jackson, gaming and updating this site.

That's all for now I'll come back later and update this, maybe. In the mean time check out the following:

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