PCEngine

The The PCEngine was only ever released in Japan, and was tiny. Around hand size, it was far smaller than the American version the TG16. A protable version also came out, and had the best screen around at the time. It also played the same games as its T.V. counterpart.

The Beast (TG16)

All the new graphics were created by Martin Chudley, now owner of Bizzar Creations; creator of games like Metropolis Street Racer on the Dreamcast and Project Gotham Racing on the XBox.

The Complete History of
DMA Design
By
Mike Dailly

Chapter 3
Part 5

The TurboGrafx16 (TG16)

When June arrived, so did some new hardware. Dave got another new contract for "Shadow of the Beast" from Psygnosis, this time for the PC Engine. The PC Engine was an obscure, but very smart little console by NEC, which Dave was in love with at the time, so he leapt at the chance to program it.

Dave was threatening to program it himself, but Mike immediately jumped up and protested, saying that this CPU was his speciality, so he should be allowed to do it.

Once the hardware arrived, Dave had by then decided to let Mike tackle it, while he carried on with Lemmings and his Monster Cartridge. The "Monster Cart" as it became known, was proving to be very tricky. Dave had already talked to Datel who owned the Action Replay series for the C64, and they were keen to get this for the Amiga version.

But the same problems kept cropping up, and invariably it would just fail to work right 100% of the time. Unfortunately for Dave, someone else beat him to it, and Datel bought that one instead. Dave did eventually find out what was wrong, but it was too late, and Dave regrettably put aside his toy, and returned to Lemmings.

The PC Engine (or TG16 as the Americans call it) hardware had arrived, and Mike started programming a framework on the 23rd of July. It only took him a week to get the basics running, ready for the rest of the game to be started. So a week later on the 30th, Mike started what was to be his most hated project.

Shadow of the Beast - TG16

Brian meanwhile took over the ST version of Lemmings, and using Mike's code as a framework, set about improving it. Not much was left of the original code by the end of it, but it did allow Brian a good starting block from which to begin. For some reason however, Mikes name appeared in the final manual as the main programmer, even though it was Brian that did most of the work!

Dave was now thinking about sound, and Scott's brother Brian was able to provide them. At first they were to be 60's style TV theme tunes, but this soon proved to be a problem due to copyright issues. So, Dave decided that anything without copyright should be used.

Richard and Steve were still busy coding Beast on the C64, and that was going fairly well, when Mike started his version, there were only 6 weeks to go. That proved to be somewhat optimistic.

Several revisions were done, including the introduction of some new technology that Mike had come up with for his version. The game would go through several redesigns before finally being finished.

This year, the summer in Dundee was hot, too hot. And one afternoon, while baking away in the small and not well ventilated office, Dave decided everyone needed some ice-creams. So Mike was sent the local paper shop to get a stack of them to save the troops.

This had been done several times before, only this time, it wasn't enough. Dave declared that it was too hot, and we should all go and have a day outside playing golf! Dundee is blessed with several public golf courses, so off we went for a relaxing day outside, away from stuffy offices.

The TG16 was the first to get a CD-ROM addon

Gary turned out to be a natural, and although Mike's putting was fine, he managed to lose more golf balls than anyone else. Dave as usual won the round, but Mike would get his revenge in years to come when Dave decided to take up badminton.

Brian now started on the now legendary sound effects, with the lemmings "squeeks" originally coming from Brian and Scot's mother! Dave added them into the game with appreciative laughter coming from the team.

DMA Were expanding, and outgrowing their small office, so Dave decided to take the plunge and move. He looked at the Dundee Technology Park, but was told they were too small a company this development.

So, he found another place in town, at 49 Meadowside, and moved everyone all there. The new office had 4 rooms, and was high up on the 4th floor of an old office block. Moving in proved to be a chore since the lift only went to the 3rd floor, meaning everything; machines, disks, books, desks and chairs had to be carried up a flight of stairs.

On moving in, they discovered that one of the rooms had an old kitchen, and looked out over the back of an old pizza chain; The Pizza Gallery. Mike got this room, and the smells sent him into a pizza frenzy every lunchtime - a fact he reminds everyone when they look at old picture of him.

In the last office, Dave always had to throw Gary and Tony out when Psygnosis came to visit, so they could talk business, and so this time, Dave took a whole room to himself, right in the middle of the office. Gary and Tony went into the one closest the door, and it was here that Gary started to accumulate stuff he wouldn't part with for many years to come.

The restroom however was a disaster, since it set the whole building shaking when it was used, due to some dubious pluming! And finally realising that an office full of young males isn't the tidiest in the world, Dave also hired a cleaner.

C64GS: Shadow of the Beast

Russell had finally finished his degree course, and had rented some space from Dave in the final room, and had started the PC version of Lemmings, a game he would end up rewriting for several years.

Psygnosis and Ocean had just done a deal to publish Shadow of the beast for the new C64 GS console. This ment that that game would now come out on cartdrige only. Richard now got access to fast loading times, and was able to take advantage of this in several areas.

Steve also got to exercise his writing skills, by doing small storys that were to be displayed while the game loaded. Steve perfered writing to anything else, and wass used by DMA over the years for any number of storys, the most notable being the Hired Guns story.

The Beast (Amiga)

All the Graphics on the PCEngine version were improved upon, including the beast itself.

The Beast (C64)

Steve converted all the graphics for Beast on the C64, but it was only recently that he actually recieved a copy of the game on cartridge, when Mike managed to get hold of 2 from ebay.