Chris Anderson
Three magazines and a publisher, in eighteen months
Editor of Personal Computer Games, launch editor of ZZAP!64 for Newsfield, and founder of Future Publishing — all between 1984 and late 1985, and all documented in the magazines themselves.
Chris Anderson edited three British computer magazines and founded the publisher of a fourth, in the space of about eighteen months, and the period press records each step as it happened.
The sequence
| When | Where |
|---|---|
| 1984 | Editor, Personal Computer Games |
| March 1985 | Announced as heading the ZZAP!64 editorial team at Newsfield |
| May 1985 | Editor, ZZAP!64 issue 1 |
| October 1985 | Amstrad Action issue 1, for his own Future Publishing |
CRASH announced the middle step in March 1985 with a line that also explains it: “Heading up the editorial team is Chris Anderson who was editor of PCG until he heard about ZZAP! 64.”
Five months after ZZAP!64 issue 1 reached the shops with his name on the masthead, Amstrad Action issue 1 reached them with cheques payable to a company of his own, from an address in Somerton, Somerset.
Why the sequence matters
The magazine he launched for someone else and the company he left to start became direct rivals. ZZAP!64 was Newsfield’s Commodore title; Future went on to publish Amiga Format and Amiga Power, which competed with Newsfield’s and then Europress’s output for the rest of the 8- and 16-bit era.
It also puts one person’s name on the founding of two of the three publishing houses this Vault treats as defining the British games press — as launch editor at one and as founder of the other.
⚠ This entry covers only what the library holds, which is his work in the British computer press between roughly 1984 and 1986. Anderson’s career continued well beyond that and well beyond this project’s scope.
See also
- ZZAP!64 — he launched it
- Future Publishing — he founded it
- Amstrad Action — Future’s first title
- Newsfield — the publisher he launched ZZAP!64 for
- Julian Rignall — a ZZAP!64 issue 1 reviewer