(earlier known as '''Code Masters''') is one of the oldest
British Software House s. The CEO is Rod Cousens, formerly of Acclaim. Founded in
1985 by Richard and David Darling (who worked previously for
Mastertronic ), Codemasters quickly established themselves in the growing
ZX Spectrum market, mostly with action games that required the player to solve simple puzzles by combining different objects. One of the best examples of these games are the
Dizzy Series , which turned ''Dizzy'' into the un-official Spectrum
Mascot . While Codemasters found their roots in the ZX Spectrum, they did not exclusively write for this one computer - they also released software (including the Dizzy series) for the
Commodore 64 ,
Amstrad CPC ,
Commodore Amiga and
Atari ST .
They were famous for releasing a long series of games called "Advanced ''Something'' Simulator" or "Professional ''Something'' Simulator". This led to the parody "
Advanced Lawnmower Simulator " being developed, praised to the skies and then published by
Your Sinclair magazine as an
April Fool's Day stunt.
Codemasters' games in the 1980s were also highly acclaimed not only for their quality, but also surprisingly for the fact that they only released budget titles very cheaply. Hence when, in 1992, they began to cut down on the budget releases in favour of full-price titles, they attracted the ire of many fans and the gaming press, the latter questioning the commercial logic behind it as Codemasters had known a great deal of success from their budget titles.
As the 8-bit computer market diminished, Codemasters turned to developing for the 8-bit and 16-bit console markets, as well as moving away from their budget title legacy to more full-price games on the 16-bit computers - 1993 saw the last title in the budget
Dizzy series, ''
Crystal Kingdom Dizzy '', although they released a full-price Dizzy game, ''
Fantastic Dizzy '' later. They had major success with the ''
Micro Machines '' series and ''
Pete Sampras Tennis '' on the Sega
Mega Drive . Both franchises featured the
J-Cart , allowing two extra controllers to be attached to the game cart without requiring
EA 's ''4 way play'' or
SEGA 's four player adaptor.
The company also attracted both smirks and scorn from the gaming press and the gaming public in the 1980s with gleaming quotes that appeared to come from the gaming press on the packaging of their games (e.g. "This game is absolutely brilliant!" on Fruit Machine Simulator) - a standard feature of game packaging. However, on closer inspection, the quote could be seen to be attributed to none other than David or Richard Darling, the founders of Codemasters.
Codemasters is notable for making the large majority of games published by the controversial
Camerica company, which bypassed
Nintendo 's
Lock-out Chip by breaking the
10NES "code" and produced unlicensed NES games. These NES games were known for being shiny gold and silver
Cartridge s that were slightly different than normal NES cartridges in shape, though they still fit into the cartridge slot. Many Codemasters titles were also featured on Camerica's
Aladdin Deck Enhancer .
In
1990 Codemasters developed a device called the Power Pak, later renamed the
Game Genie . It was cheat cartridge for the
NES , released in the US by
Galoob and in
Canada and the
UK by Camerica. Codemasters would later develop a successful game based on Galoob's ''
Micro Machines '' toy range.
Codemasters have since continued to release titles for later generation systems, such as the '''' for Xbox in October 2005.
Codemasters is known to use
Starforce copy protection that installs hidden drivers on a system and is known to cause problems with some hardware and compatibility issues with certain operating systems
The company received a surprising taunt from an unlikely source in early 2006. With the release of Episode 2.3
{Link without Title} of . The time and date: 3pm Saturday the 18th March.
The impression from the team's tone seemed to be fighting talk. However, the cast members (with the exception of Kenny) are clearly men more of wit and charm than of violence. The whole thing could be put down to a publicity stunt, or just an exercise in discovering who'll actually turn up. Though whatever happens, the lads are likely to have someone film the proceedings, with the footage more than likely to feature in the next episode of the show.
