The Amtix Annual 2023 is out now

07 December 2022

When I was a kid, I always looked forward to the Christmas issues of computer magazines, such as Amstrad Action, Amtix, and the ZX Spectrum title Crash. They were often bumper issues, sometimes with a cover tape attached, and unashamedly Christmassy. Snow on the cover, Christmas puns inside, and sometimes with a festive type-in, too. With the globalisation of magazine sales, few titles do a proper Christmas issue now, because it's dead on the news-stand when it lands in Australia in February.

This Christmas, there's a treat for Amstrad fans with the release of an Amtix CPC hardback annual. It collects some of the best features and reviews from the magazine this year, and also includes exclusive content created for the annual. The annual features my articles about speech synthesis and pop music in games from earlier this year. I also wrote a new article, daringly taking another look at Cassette 50. It's a tape of 50 games I got for Christmas in 1985. I remember enjoying it at the time, so my question was: does Cassette 50 deserve its terrible reputation? To find out, you'll need to read the annual!

The Amtix annual was originally sold through a Kickstarter campaign, but a softback edition is being produced for sale through WH Smiths.

Find out more about the Amtix 2023 Annual and see some sample pages here.

If the Amstrad CPC isn't your machine of choice (whyever not?!), there were also annuals produced for Crash and ZZap 64. For more details on all the books, visit Fusion Retro Books.

While I'm writing about Christmas treats, let me tell you about some other Christmas features on my site. You can play my Christmas version of Hangman, Snowman, here and play my Christmas Pairs game here. You can find a new Scratch project or asset each day in my advent calendar, too. My shop has books about Scratch, Python, and Excel that make excellent Christmas gifts. And Virtual Sean has his Santa suit on! Ho, ho ho! Happy Christmas, everyone!

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