Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story — Everything We Know

Gaming history buffs, your time has come. Forget combing through the archives, dusting off old vintages off of Reddit, or wherever else you like to get news about the retro era in gaming. With Digital Eclipse, you can access re-released retro games for modern hardware. Most recently, the studio has dedicated its time and money to celebrating gaming icons and their works. 

Take designer Jordan Mechner, who, despite being more popularly known for creating Prince of Persia, actually shot for the sky with his debut game, Karaketa. Digital Eclipse was keen to walk us down the fascinating story behind Karaketa. So, they released their first entry in the Gold Master Series called The Making of Karaketa. To say the entry was a success feels like an understatement. 

Now, to forge on with their collection of interactive documentaries in video game format, they’ve announced the development of the second entry in the Gold Master Series, Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story. So, whenever you're ready for a behind-the-scenes look into Jeff Minter’s story, here's everything we know about the upcoming Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story.

What is Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story?

Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story is an upcoming interactive documentary that walks us down the works and career of Britain’s best-known game maker, Jeff Minter. You’ll get insight into Minter’s influential career as a computer artist and game designer via the Heart of Neon feature documentary. This will include all-new video featurettes and never-been-seen-before design documents that draw us closer to the creative mind of Minter. 

Additionally, you’ll also get access to 42 classic playable games across eight different platforms, all packaged in a virtual museum whose sole goal is to showcase the fascinating story of Jeff Minter’s career.

Story

Digital Eclipse believes that the best way to celebrate video game history is to relive playing the classic video games themselves. So, they launched the Gold Master Series, which plans to include a collection of “interactive documentaries,” kicking off with The Making of Karakata. Thanks to The Making of Karakata’s successful debut, Digital Eclipse is moving on to launch the second entry, Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story.

The game itself will be structured uniquely. You can choose to walk down Jeff Minter’s career, illustrated via design documents and vintage photos. You even get access to all-new video interviews that will let you get inside Minter’s weird and fascinating mind. Alternatively, you can choose to walk in Minter’s shoes by exploring the many wacky games he has created over the years. You’ll have a whopping number to choose from – 42 in total – some familiar, others not so much.

Here’s a list of games you can expect to play by platform:

Sinclair ZX81

• 3D3D
• Centipede

Commodore VIC-20

• Abductor
• Andes Attack
• Deflex V
• Gridrunner
• Hellgate
• Laser Zone
• Matrix: Gridrunner 2
• Metagalactic Llamas Battle at the Edge of Time
• Ratman

Commodore 64

• Ancipital
• Attack of the Mutant Camels
• Batalyx
• Gridrunner
• Hellgate
• Hover Bovver
• Iridis Alpha
• Laser Zone
• Mama Llama
• Matrix: Gridrunner 2
• Metagalactic Llamas Battle at the Edge of Time
• Psychedelia
• Revenge of the Mutant Camels
• Revenge of the Mutant Camels II
• Rox 64
• Sheep In Space
• Voidrunner

Sinclair Spectrum

• City Bomb
• Headbangers Heaven
• Rox III
• Superdeflex

Atari 8-bit

• Attack of the Mutant Camels
• Colourspace
• Gridrunner
• Hover Bovver
• Turboflex

Konix Multi-System

• Attack of the Mutant Camels '89

Atari ST

• Llamatron: 2112
• Revenge of the Mutant Camels
• Super Gridrunner

Atari Jaguar

• Tempest 2000

Reimagined

• Gridrunner Remastered

Gameplay

Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story and the Gold Master Series in general are all about retro, retro, retro. It takes you back to the era of readme.txt, cassette tapes, and photocopied zines. You play games that were released on old systems, like the Sinclair ZX81, Commodore VIC-20, and Atari Jaguar. 

But while most games retain their original streak, Digital Eclipse has included a remastered version of Minter’s signature shooter, Gridrunner. So, you can expect an all-new look with updated graphics and sound. However, the remastered version will still retain the original’s core gameplay from the Commodore 64.

On the Digital Eclipse Llamasoft website, the studio says that the featured games will include new options and quality-of-life features. Further, games like Colorspace and Psychedelia will be optimized for controller-based play. So, perhaps not every game will be a copy-paste of the old.

Oh, and remember Attack of the Mutant Camels for the unreleased Konix Multi-System console? Well, it’ll be one of the games on offer too. Overall, Digital Eclipse’s goal is to blend games and their creators into an “interactive documentary” experience, and by The Making of Karakata standards, we certainly cannot wait to play their newest addition to the series.

Development

Digital Eclipse will be all hands-on deck developing and publishing Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story over the coming weeks or months. Moreover, they have brought on industry veteran Paul Docherty to direct the Heart of Neon “film documentary” part of the game. With over an hour of all-new video interviews, fans and newcomers alike should enjoy wholesome content celebrating Jeff Minter and video game history as a whole.

Trailer

Check out the Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story trailer out now. It’s a pretty detailed one, explaining the thought process behind development. It also reveals sneak peeks into the gameplay you can expect on launch day.

Release Date, Platforms, & Editions

Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story is coming sometime in 2024. While we don’t have an exact release date just yet, we can confirm that the game will launch on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, and PC via GOG.com and Steam platforms. As for the editions that will be available for pre-order, we don’t quite know yet. However, you can always stay up to date via the official website here, while we also keep an eye out for new updates and let you know as soon as they come up. 

So, what’s your take? Will you be picking up a copy of Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story when it drops? Let us know over on our socials here.