Electric Dreams Software | Code Like It's 198x

Electric Dreams was the label Activision paid for so that British programmers would write for it. Rod Cousens had run Quicksilva until its sale to Argus Press, and in the summer of 1985 he was planning a new software house from an office above an insurance company in Southampton. Activision signed it before it had released a game. Over the next four years it published one of the most admired 8-bit games of 1986, Spindizzy, a pair of rival games of the same film, and the Spectrum R-Type.

Fast facts

Launched: at the Personal Computer World Show, September 1985.
Founder: Rod Cousens, formerly managing director of Quicksilva.
Owner: Activision, which handled sales, distribution and finance.
Base: 31 Carlton Crescent, Southampton. Mail orders went to Activision (UK) Ltd in Wellingborough, Northamptonshire.
Best-known games: I, of the Mask (1985), Spindizzy (1986), Aliens (1987), Super Hang-On and R-Type (1988).
Price: usually £9.99 on cassette for the Spectrum, Commodore 64 and Amstrad CPC.

Out of Quicksilva

In September 1985 CRASH found Cousens “on the top floor of an Insurance company office in Southampton”, after what he called a “period of exile”. He had joined Quicksilva in 1981 and left after Argus Press bought it in 1984 and moved it to London. Earlier in 1985 he had organised Soft Aid, a charity compilation for the Ethiopian famine appeal which CRASH said had passed more than £350,000 to the Band Aid Trust. His new company, the magazine reported, “may well surface under the name Electric Dreams” at that month’s show, with its games chosen by Paul Cooper, formerly Quicksilva’s software editor. “It would hardly be surprising,” it added, “if a few famous names from Quicksilva made their mark on the new label.”

A month later CRASH had the rest of the story: Electric Dreams was signed to Activision, which said the deal fitted a long-term plan to start “a second or maybe a third label”. In 2012 Cousens told Retro Gamer that he had been about to fly to San Francisco to pitch for another company’s European rights when Activision’s Greg Fischbach rang him the day after a meeting and asked: “How would you like to be funded?” Cooper looked after product development, Clare Hirsch ran marketing, and Activision handled the sales, distribution and finance.

Cousens described the label to Your Computer in February 1986 as “an umbrella for beleaguered independents”: “Activision can provide worldwide market support, even in the States. No other software house can provide that.” He promised about three licensed games a year from television, film or pop, and insisted that the former Quicksilva people had come to him, not the other way round. “I see Electric Dreams as taking all the strengths of the old Quicksilva and, well, just carrying on.”

The first games

The first release came from Sandy White, who had written Ant Attack for Quicksilva. I, of the Mask was a 3D maze in which the player collected the parts of a robot, feet first, and finally the mask itself. CRASH reviewed it in December 1985 at £9.95, called the graphics “the most remarkable” one reviewer had seen on a Spectrum, and gave it 92%. Looking back two years later, the magazine said the label’s arrival “smacked of corporation tactics and echoed the music industry”, with a parent company running separate labels, and that “no-one was quite clear what Electric Dreams would do that was different from Activision”.

The film licence came next. Activision had made Ghostbusters, and Your Computer reported that its good fortune there had made Universal Pictures look kindly on its request for Back to the Future. Mark Eyles, another Quicksilva veteran, designed it. He told Sinclair User in 1986 that “it was a bit of a rush. We knocked it out in about two months flat.”

Not everything worked. When Spindizzy reached CRASH in June 1986, one reviewer greeted it with relief: “Electric Dreams have finally put out a good Spectrum product. Spindizzy almost makes up for the crime of releasing Winter Sports.” Amtix! said much the same about the Amstrad version.

Spindizzy

Spindizzy was written by Paul Shirley, with Phil Churchyard credited on the Spectrum version. The player is a cartographer sent to map Hangworld, a landscape of ramps, lifts, catwalks and trampolines floating in space, in a craft called GERALD that can switch between three shapes. Energy runs down all the time, and falling off an edge costs more of it; crystals scattered across the 385 screens buy more time. The view is isometric and can be rotated to four angles, and the craft slides and overshoots with real momentum. CRASH’s reviewers compared it to Atari’s Marble Madness and to Ultimate’s isometric games. ZZAP!64’s preview reported that Shirley had shown the Amstrad original to Cousens, who was impressed enough to sign it straight away.

It was reviewed first on the Amstrad:

Magazine	Version	Score
Amtix!, March 1986	Amstrad CPC	98%
Amstrad Action	Amstrad CPC	96%
ZZAP!64, June 1986	Commodore 64	98%, Gold Medal
CRASH, June 1986	ZX Spectrum	93%

Amtix! thought it would “probably be used as a yardstick for future Amstrad releases”, and its readers voted it the best game of 1986 and gave it their State of the Art award. ACE was still recommending it in 1988, noting that it had taken a year to develop, and put the complete game on its cover cassette that summer.

Aliens, twice

Activision’s connections won Electric Dreams the licence for James Cameron’s Aliens, and the label ended up publishing two different games of it. Eyles designed the British one, in which the player watches the colony through the helmet cameras of Ripley’s squad and switches between them; CRASH gave it 84% in February 1987. Activision’s American game, a sequence of scenes from the film, followed on the Spectrum as Aliens (US Version) and scored 45%. The Aliens entry tells both stories.

By January 1987 Your Computer counted Electric Dreams among “the top eight U.K. software houses”. Cousens was now running all of Activision’s British and European business, and a development centre called Software Studios, set up in April 1986 under Jon Dean and Dave Cummins, was producing Electric Dreams and Activision games for every market outside the United States. Charles Cecil later led it.

Arcade conversions

From the end of 1986 the label turned to arcade licences. Tempest came first, written for the Amstrad and then the Spectrum; CRASH gave the Spectrum version 62%, and Amtix! readers voted it the third-best shoot ’em up of 1986. Atari’s Super Sprint followed in 1987, and Sega’s Super Hang-On at the turn of 1988. Its advertisements sent mail orders to Activision (UK) Ltd in Wellingborough and carried the line “Electric Dreams Software. Authorised User” under Sega’s copyright. Sinclair User gave the Spectrum Super Hang-On 10 out of 10 and called it the best road race on the machine, “and that includes Out Run”. Data East’s Karnov reached CRASH in May 1988 at £9.99.

The biggest was Irem’s R-Type. Activision advertised it for the Commodore 64, Spectrum, Amstrad, Atari ST and Amiga under the slogan “It’s behind you”, and defended the licence hard enough that U.S. Gold withdrew Katakis. Bob Pape’s Spectrum version took 92% from CRASH at Christmas 1988.

Absorbed into Activision

In 1988 Activision renamed itself Mediagenic, and ST Action visited its London offices in Hampstead that September to meet Cousens, now head of Mediagenic Europe, whose “UK interest” included Electric Dreams. In May 1989 CRASH reported that Activision had “turned Electric Dreams into a label for all their original products”. It did not last much longer. Retro Gamer found that the label “quietly disappeared late in 1989”. Cousens explained that it had never taken hold in the United States, and that as Activision’s international head he had “merged the resources and concentrated on the main brand”.

Cousens stayed in the industry. Retro Gamer recorded that he became Activision’s international president, moved to Acclaim in 1991 and became its chief executive in 2003, and was appointed chief executive of Codemasters in 2005; he was awarded the CBE in 2010 for services to the industry. In his view, Electric Dreams had let Activision, “who had a US-skewed product slate”, stay relevant in Europe, and had built a pool of local developers with a global distributor behind them.

Sources

CRASH issue 20, September 1985, p. 104: interview with Rod Cousens (the Southampton office, Quicksilva and Argus, Soft Aid and the £350,000, Electric Dreams and the PCW Show, Paul Cooper).
CRASH issue 21, October 1985, p. 31: news, Electric Dreams signed to Activision; “a second or maybe a third label”.
Your Computer, February 1986, p. 40: Activision UK profile (Cousens on Electric Dreams as “an umbrella for beleaguered independents”, worldwide support, three licences a year, Back to the Future and Universal, carrying on Quicksilva’s strengths).
CRASH issue 23, December 1985, pp. 48–49: I, of the Mask review (Electric Dreams, £9.95; 92%).
CRASH issue 29, June 1986, pp. 16–17: Spindizzy review (Electric Dreams, £9.99; Paul Shirley and Phil Churchyard; 385 screens; Winter Sports comment; 93%).
Amtix! issue 5, March 1986, pp. 16–17: Spindizzy review (Amstrad; “yardstick” and Winter Sports comments). Electric Dreams advertisement, CRASH issue 28, May 1986, p. 41: Amtix! 98% and Amstrad Action 96%, and the Carlton Crescent address.
ZZAP!64 issue 13, May 1986, p. 89: Spindizzy preview (Shirley shows the game to Cousens). Issue 14, June 1986, pp. 108–109: review, Gold Medal; p. 48: competition, “98% no less”.
Amtix! issue 18, April 1987, pp. 41–43: readers’ awards for 1986 (Spindizzy best game overall and State of the Art; Tempest third among shoot ’em ups).
ACE issue 7, April 1988, p. 115: recommended software (Spindizzy “took a year to develop”). Issue 10, July 1988, p. 36: Spindizzy on the cover cassette.
CRASH issue 46, November 1987, “The CRASH History”, p. 26: Electric Dreams launched at the PCW Show, I, of the Mask its first release, the music-industry comparison.
Sinclair User issue 57, December 1986: Mark Eyles on Back to the Future.
CRASH issue 37, February 1987, pp. 17–18: Aliens review (84%). Issue 47, December 1987, pp. 13–14: Aliens (US Version) review (45%).
Your Computer, January 1987, pp. 78–79: Electric Dreams profile (“top eight U.K. software houses”, Cousens running Activision’s UK and European network, Software Studios under Jon Dean and Dave Cummins).
CRASH issue 38, March 1987, p. 26: Spectrum Tempest review (62%).
CRASH issue 45, October 1987, p. 31: Super Sprint.
Sinclair User issue 69, December 1987, p. 16, and ZZAP!64 issue 32, December 1987, p. 73: Super Hang-On advertisements (Activision (UK) Ltd, Wellingborough; Sega copyright; “Electric Dreams Software. Authorised User”; prices).
Sinclair User issue 70, January 1988, pp. 12–13: Super Hang-On review (10 out of 10, “and that includes Out Run”).
CRASH issue 52, May 1988, p. 88: Karnov review (Electric Dreams, £9.99).
Your Sinclair issue 35, November 1988, p. 87: R-Type advertisement. CRASH issue 59, Christmas Special 1988, pp. 26–27: Spectrum R-Type review (92%).
ST Action vol. 1 no. 5, September 1988, p. 27: visit to Mediagenic in Hampstead; Cousens as head of Mediagenic Europe; Electric Dreams as “the other half of Mediagenic’s UK interest”.
CRASH issue 64, May 1989, p. 53: Electric Dreams made the label for Activision’s original products.
Graeme Mason, “From the Archives: Electric Dreams”, Retro Gamer issue 104, 2012, pp. 80–85 (modern, secondary): Cousens’s recollections (the call from Fischbach, the staff, Software Studios and Charles Cecil, the end of the label, its purpose); the label’s disappearance late in 1989; Cousens’s later career.