SnackSurprise - The December Box: Spain

Rather more promptly than expected, the latest SnackSurprise box landed just before Christmas. Due to having rather more traditional fare to consume over the festive period, my good lady and I decided to wait until after the Christmas to sample the delights held within this blue and orange box of delights.

Another good selection of snacks.

As you can see, another decent selection that covers savoury and sweet snacks, as well as the ever present drinks can. Here are the relevant pages from the pamphlet.

The usual pamphlet.

So, in fitting with our usual pattern, we decided on the savoury snacks first.

Meaty Quavers... mmmm.

Boca Bits are crispy salted wheat snacks with a rather delicate meat flavour. As you can see, they look very much like Quavers and, taking away the slightly different texture due to their wheat origin, that's precisely what they are. Very pleasant and with a good crunch, their flavour doesn't sit too long on the palette. A very good start to the box.

I didn't mean to make it look like he has a cheesy goatee...

Pandilla (by Cheetos) are another bag of crisps, this time in the shape of ghosts. These are very crunchy and have an almost mature cheese flavour, certainly in the aftertaste, which lingers a good while. Definitely one for lovers of cheese flavoured crisps, though if you're on the fence about that flavour, maybe these aren't the ones for you. 

They at least look nice...

The first of the sweet snacks now and we have Palmeras. Described as a crunchy puff pastry topped with a sugar glaze, these were the first disappointment in the box. The are certainly soft, almost falling to pieces when we tried to remove them from the packet. They are also crunchy, what with that glaze too, but they also have a greasy texture - you get the buttery feel of the puff pastry, but that is so strong, it becomes greasy. That sugar glaze doesn't go well with the grease either. Neither of us were enamoured with these though to it's credit, I can understand why they might go well with coffee.

These are fun sweets, and tasty too.

Fini Galaxy Mix are a strawberry flavoured mix of very chewy gummy sweets. The initial impression is of intense sourness that soon gives way to a punchy strawberry flavour, a combination that is really quite refreshing. We couldn't manage more than one before giving up, as they really do pucker the cheeks, but they do what they set out to do.

Lovely sour balls of gummy juice...

Pikotas next, and these feel very much like Jawbreakers until you actually try one and crack that firm but thin outer shell where you then get a lovely gummy centre. The cherry flavour is quite strong with just a hint of sourness that is far less over-powering than the Galaxy Mix. Very good little sweets.

Simple and straight forward.

Fini Sparks are tiny, multi-flavoured candy pieces that have a nice, punchy taste, but one that doesn't last too long. This is a good thing, as they are a tad sour (there is a pattern here), but for what they offer, another good sweet.

What are these? Only Smarties have the answer...

Lacasitos = Smarties. 'Nuff said.

Cakey goodness or pink coated turd... You decide...

Pantera Rosa is a cake bar that encases a soft sponge and cream filling in a pink coloured shell. The outer covering is a sweet as it is pink, but get past that and you have a deliciously moist sponge, with the cream centre adding that extra layer of texture to complete a very nice snack. This is definitely one for elevenses with either tea or coffee.

Baggsie the double one!

The Filipinos biscuits were another delight - small round chocolate covered treats with a good snap and plenty of crunch. The balance between the biscuit and chocolate is just right and these are snacks highly recommended to accompany your mid-morning brew of choice.

That texture adds to the pleasure... of the taste, obviously!

Tokke is the penultimate snack and can best be described as a Time Out with extra rice pieces included. These add even more texture to the mild milk chocolate shell and crunchy wafer inside. An intriguing combination and one that felt right, but also a tad off. Still, definitely a nice choccy bar.

A glass of something quite unremarkable.

Finally, we have La Casera, a fizzy drink that is said to be one of the most popular soft drinks in Spain and a great addition to wine or beer. What you actually get is carbonated water with a tiny (and I mean tiny) hint of lemon. It's not an offensive taste, so does better than some drinks we have from previous snack boxes, but that is its problem - there is hardly any taste there. So whilst you could say it's refreshing, it achieves this by tasting of neither nowt nor summat. Having said that, we can certainly see how this drink would turn a glass of wine into a spritzer or a beer into a shandy, if such things float your boat. 

So we once again come to the end of another Snack Surprise box and, for the second month running, a box that has exceeded expectations. With only a couple of items that didn't suit us, this was another good selection. Let us see what the new year brings for the January box.We are certainly looking forward to it.

Amiga Addict - Issue One Review

Amiga Addict is a new monthly magazine aimed at the Amiga market. Now, stop laughing at the back, such a thing still exists and, given a quick check online, keeps more than a few companies in business, as well as quite a few lawyers but that's way out of scope for this post. As a former Amiga user and someone who still has a passing interest in the format, when I saw this magazine mentioned on Twitter, I thought I would give it a go.

What we have then is a 56 page glossy A4 format magazine in full colour. Nominally priced at £4.99, you'll need to factor in P&P which, for the UK consumer, means one issue will set you back £6.49 whilst overseas customers will pay £9.28. There are subscription options available, UK prices for 6 and 12 month subs are £37.99 and £73.99 respectively. Overseas subs are £52.00 and £101.00 for the same periods, whilst a 12 month online only sub will set you back £51.30. 

First impressions are good. A high quality cover which is glossy and sturdy, and a cheeky coverdisk message as well! Inside, similarly high quality paper is used for the pages and it is clear that nothing has been skimped on the physical side of the magazine.

As for the contents, the production team have done a good job here too. The first issue is divided into five sections, as you can see from the screenshot below.

What is good to see is the mix of topics - you have interviews, articles, reviews and productivity pieces, with the ratio about right in my opinion and there is a great balance here. Everything is well written and informative - the efforts of combat piracy on the Amiga especially so given how blatantly rampant it was just from what I remember when I was at school. Every article is of interest too, the interviews well thought out and the reviews fun to read. Even the adverts are interesting, with a good range of advertisers covering hardware, software, merchandise and repair services. Nothing on a par with Silica Systems but those were the days, my friend...

I also applaud the production team on the layout of the magazine. It has been a thing for quite a while now (especially in wargaming publications but they are not the only ones) for magazines to have a lot of white space (doesn't have to be white but a lot of empty space nonetheless). Personally, I hate that. Fortunately here, the layout is really good - well-spaced text and suitable illustrations, but no honking great white spaces that do nothing to add to the content. 

It's great to see a new print magazine for the Amiga, one that the publishers themselves see as complimenting existing magazines. Much like Archive and Drag 'n' Drop magazines for RISC OS, it's comforting to see that the market for publications still exists in hobbyist computing circles and with such high production values.

As first issues go, this is a brilliant start and I shall definitely be subscribing when issue 2 is announced in January. If you're an Amiga fan or just someone interested in the format, I heartily recommend it. You can find out more about the magazine here.

We Love Atari Volumes 1 and 2 - Book Review

More retro videogames and computing shenanigans now with a review of the two volume set "We Love Atari", written by Karl Morris and published by Zafinn Books. These two volumes cover the products, prototypes and the story of Atari from its founding in 1972 to its demise as a hardware vendor in 1996. 

What a lovely pair... of books

Now I'll make an admission here. I have only ever owned one piece of genuine Atari hardware, a Jaguar that I picked up from Game back in 2002/3 when they sold a load of remainder stock of Jag's and Lynx handhelds over the Christmas period. That's not to say I didn't want Atari consoles or computers back in the day, especially the Jaguar when it was first released, and some of the higher end ST's (the TT and Falcon especially). As it was, I was an Amiga kid back then though I did have a couple of friends who had ST's and I thought the Atari's were pretty cool. 

This set of tomes caught my attention after a perusal through the book reviews section of retrovideogamer.co.uk and, after following the publisher on Twitter, thought these were definitely worth a read. As they are self-published and in a niche market, they aren't particularly cheap - the two book set coming in at €105 (about £97.51 at the time of purchase) including postage. There is the option to buy them separately at €60 a piece but let's be honest here, it's a two volume set for a reason. 

A rather nice selection of stickers

Upon receipt, opening the very well prepared packaging revealed a hefty pair of 21.5cm by 21.5cm softback books, a nice collection of Atari themed stickers and a lovely handwritten card from the author. It's a nice touch.

Unexpected and rather nice.

Volume One then, and this starts in 1972 and ends in 1984 when Warner Communications sold Atari's consumer electronics and home computing divisions to Jack Tramiel. This is very much a visually led volume and whilst there is plenty to read, the focus here tends to drift towards the look of the arcade machines, the advertising and early visual history of the games that made Atari the powerhouse it was. Through the 285 pages, you'll see classic titles, concepts that were never released and get a real feel as to how the company saw itself in it's youthful years. You'll also get a hint as to what was to bring the company to its knees in the 1980's.

Another Atari idea that didn't work out

Volume Two picks up after the crash of '83 and the struggles Atari had to remain in business. There is more text in the 291 pages of this volume and those who like the picture heavy first tome may be disappointed but, for me, this is where the core of the Atari story lies. You get the fight to release a 16-bit computer onto the market, the success that followed, the even more outlandish ideas that did not come to pass and the decline into obscurity as Atari lost its way into becoming a one horse show (which they then shot out back). This is an engaging tale and for those who lived through the 16-bit computer era, is an essential one to read. It's not overly in-depth though, but the bibliography at the back of each volume has some highly recommended reading. 

Over both books, the author's easily readable prose does the job it needs to, with personal interjections and thoughts where it is felt necessary. There is also an impish sense of humour on some of the picture captions that raised a smile and a chuckle.

A great little 8-bit computer

When I think of the Atari from my formative years, I remember the 5200 and 7800 consoles being pushed as Nintendo and Sega grew their market share in the UK. I remember the almost endless variations of the 520ST, STM, STFM, STE etc, but in reality, there weren't that many. I remember the Mega ST and TT, two desktop computers that defined what a powerful computer of the period should look like, at least to me. To this day, the TT remains the second best looking desktop I have ever seen (the Amiga 3000 is third and the Acorn RiscPC is first. You are welcome to disagree, but you'll be wrong... :-)) This is despite the "off-centre" design both looking funky and making the OCD side of my brain freak out at the same time. I also remember looking at the Lynx and wishing I could afford one. Same with the Jaguar, even though compared to its rivals, the Jag was much, much cheaper. Then we have the Falcon, the home computer that was unrivaled (even the Amiga 1200 was a poor second) though that price tag did it no favours. Nor did the lack of advertising or support from Atari themselves. This is all before I mention the portable ST's and the prototypes. For those, well, you'll just have to read the books. 

This is how computers should look!

Overall, these are two wonderful volumes on a period of video game and computing history that does not get much love in the more mainstream market. I enjoyed the telling and greatly expanded my knowledge of Atari in its various forms up until 1996, even with the inevitable sadness that comes with knowing that those in control of Atari (and, in the same sense, Commodore) had great products and knew how to run a business to a degree, but they had zero understanding of who their users were and what made their products great.

As you can tell, I really liked these books and I hope that there will be more reprints in the future (my copies were from the 4th reprint) as these books deserve to be on any video game/computing aficionados bookshelf. The author wanted to fill a gap in his own bookshelf with publications about Atari that begged to be picked up and perused at leisure. He has achieved that and more with two indispensable volumes that are well worth the investment. You can find out more about Zafinn books here, as well as on Twitter, where you can see some news about their latest publication, "50 ST games you have to play". That's definitely on the "to buy" list!

SnackSurprise - The November Box: Denmark

Another timely(!) delivery from SnackSurprise, though there was a bit of warning this time. An email was received advising that due to a query over the quality of one of the items to be included, November's box would arrive slightly later than expected. The honesty of the communication was appreciated and it was with some expectation that we opened the box and found that we had treats from Denmark this month.

The usual, informative pamphlet.

Not a bad looking selection.

As is becoming a bit of a tradition, once we had unpacked everything, my good lady and I decided to start with the savoury snacks first.

A good start to the box.

Snack Chips are pretty much ready salted crisps with the addition of light spicing. First impressions though and they fulfill the promise of being crispy. The crunchiness is sublime and reminded us of Walkers Squares crisps from our childhoods, and not the pale imitation of Squares that you can buy now. The Snack Chips also taste lovely, and that mild spicing adds a depth to the flavour that elevates these crisps to another level (and yes, I have been watching too much Masterchef!). A great start to this month's snack box.

Wotsits with 50% more vowels

We followed up with the Ostepops, a crispy corn-based snack that are cheesy in the extreme. Essentially Danish Wotsits, they're a lovely snack and I would say they taste better than Wotsits. Also a nice surprise (after last month's Patos Rolls disaster) is that the bag is full when you open it. None of that "peering into the abyss" to see the half dozen crisps here.

Your nuts, M'Lord...

Kims Nodder is a bag of mixed nuts. With almonds, cashews, pecans and salted peanuts, this is a perfect pub snack bag... when such a thing could be done. Sadly, I don't think they count as a substantial meal but knowing the government's current crystal clear messaging, you never know... Nice nuts, with the right amount of salt and another great snack from the box.

Genetically modified dolphin, anyone???

Flipper next, and this is where things go a little south now. As you can see, it's an approximation of a dolphin. An approximation... yeah. Still, the "classic" foam dolphin let rip a powerful scent as soon as the packet was opened, almost enough to turn the stomach - a dolphin stinking of strawberry, I think. As for the texture, it's quite soft (getting it out of the packet was fun) and chewing it reveals a decent flavour and an experience that reminded us of the white from egg shaped fun gums. It is, however, very sweet, and I struggle to see how any adult (children are different) could handle a whole dolphin(!). 

Bertie transformation not guaranteed.

Pingvin Blanding is anything but bland, a selection of liquorice and gummy sweets. Not much to add here, they taste quite nice and you'll get a similar thing if you mix up bags of Haribo and Allsorts. Now there is an idea!

Be happy I did not have to Google this image...

Now, who doesn't like to get their mouth round a Skipper's Pipe? A strong taste, cloying on the tongue and claggy to the teeth, leaving you with a bitter aftertaste. You'll like it if it's your sort of thing. As for the pipe-shaped sweet...

No plums-based innuendo here - I was worn out after my adventures with the Skipper's Pipe!

This is a stand out sweet from the box: Plum in Madeira. A thin chocolate shell surrounds a disc of marzipan and a layer of Madeira soaked plums. By Jove, it tastes delicious! The chocolate is crisp and in no way overpowers the star of the show: that filling. The highlight so far!

Though we do have chocolate toffee balls... put 'em in your mouth and suck 'em!

The Guld Toffee are more down to earth. A chocolate covered toffee that's hard enough to do service as a musket ball, before the chocolate melts away and you spend the next ten minutes trying to chew the damn thing without it stealing every filling you have. Pleasant enough if that's your thing. 

"There... are... four... fingers!" JLP may have said.

Orangestang looks like an orange flavoured Kit-Kat but it's not. Oh, no, it's a thin strip of chocolate (there's no biscuit) with a hint of crunch in there with an added punchy citrus flavour. Think a slightly sweeter version of Terry's Chocolate Orange and you're about there. As it's rather sweet, it's another one where one finger is enough for all but the sweetest of tooth's but that one you do have tastes lovely.

This is just Doodle Dandy...

The Yankie Bar is a great combination of Milky War and Mars Bar, just a bit smaller than the latter. Apparently the oldest chocolate bar in Denmark, you can certainly see why it's been around for so long. It's a brilliant chocolate bar. The right about of toffee and nougat, it's got a great taste balance and it's another snack from this box that hits all the right notes.

Similar in taste (and alcohol content) to Lambrini (i.e.  none).

Finally, we have Champis. Upon opening the can, you get quite a strong odour but in actual taste, it's very subtle and rather pleasant. The grape is just about noticeable and at a push, could be described as similar to a weak fizzy wine. We found it decent and, it must be noted, one of the first drinks we've had from a snack box that didn't want to make us hurl.

There we have the Danish box and my, what a nice change from the usual. There was nothing in here that we took an instant dislike to and that, gentle reader, is a first for our snack box experiences. True, one or two things might only get a bit of a look in but overall, this was a very good box this month. I would say "roll on December's box" but with Christmas coming up and the usual posting dates, you know it's going to be 2021. Ah well, just in time for the post-festive season diet!

The Blaze Evercade - 7 Months On

You may recall a post I wrote seven months ago about the Blaze Evercade, a then new entrant into the handheld gaming console market. Well, after steady use of the device and a thorough play through of my ever growing cartridge collection, I thought it time to give you an update on what's good about the Evercade, what's bad and what could be improved. 

The original box. It's kept in a safe place.

The good to begin with and it's pretty much as I said in my original post whilst noting that the build quality has stood up to some heavy use, the screen remains as good as ever and even the battery life has held up to around the three and a half/four hour mark even with fairly steady use every week. Controls remain as responsive as ever and I still really like the hardware. One improvement that has been seen is the ease of which cartridges can be swapped, it's loosened up enough not to be an issue any more. Also, revised firmware has been issued so that controls can be remapped. A small feature but one that some have found very useful, so kudos has to be given for listening to the customer and providing that support.

As for the bad, well, there's not much to say. Really, there is nothing that I would call the Evercade out for after several months of use. The only feature I really haven't used more than once is the HDMI port, which is down to me not being overly bothered about connecting the console to a TV, but as I said, that's just me. It's still a nice feature to have.

Improvements, well, that's a more difficult one to discuss. Whilst I would love Evercade to offer a couple of improvements, I am very aware that this is a device aimed at a specific price point and any changes made to the original hardware might affect that price point so adversely that it would defeat the purpose of the device in the first place. First of these would be a proper glass screen cover, rather than the plastic cover that currently ships. A bigger battery would also be lovely but the current one does the job well enough. Finally, a metal cased version would be fantastic but I am sure that would bump the price up into an area that Blaze would not be comfortable with. As it stands then, these are moon on a stick wishes but hopefully there might be some revised hardware in the future. As it stands though, what you can get now is very, very good. 

The complete collection... so far...

Games then, and when I purchased my Evercade, I managed to bag the first nine cartridges. As you can see from the pictures above and below, I have caught up with the release schedule since then and now have all of the currently available carts. And really, it's the most recent four carts that show the true genius of the Evercade system. 

The packaging of the carts still looks cool!

Starting at cart number 11, we have the double pack of Xeno Crisis and Tanglewood, the former an indie  twin stick shooter, the latter a Kickstarter funded Megadrive title that has since gained a wider release. Compared to the other carts, two games might seem a bit stingy but when it's two titles of this calibre, the equivalent of £7.50 per game is brilliant value indeed, especially when you consider the full price of the titles are £15.99 and £13.99 on Steam respectively.

Who doesn't love a bit of Dizzy?

Then you have cart 12 - The Oliver Twins Collection. Who amongst us as 8-bit computer owners used to look forward to some of the games in this collection? The range of Dizzy titles, both old and new is worth the price alone but you also have classics like Super Robin Hood, BMX Simulator and Firehawk! And if that isn't enough, all proceeds from this cart go to the National Videogame Museum - that's icing on the cake, so to speak. 

I wanted an Atari Lynx just for this game.

Carts 13 and 14 have the same theme, they cover a total of twenty five titles that were released for the Atari Lynx. The first volume is centred around the developer Songbird, the second volume covers Epyx. Whilst not all of the titles were originally released when the Lynx was supported by Atari, it is great that the later games have another outlet for people to experience them. As someone who really wanted a Lynx back in the day (and eventually settled on the Nintendo Gameboy and, for a couple of years, the Sega Gamegear), these two carts finally allowed me to try out those titles that looked so good in Computer and Videogames, and Mean Machines magazines.

I have waited a long time to play this. It was worth it!

This is the beauty of the Evercade. You can have original titles from long gone hardware as well as newer games developed for those same formats. You can have modern day indie titles that may have passed you buy and you can have collections from seminal (and world record holding) developers. There is such a wide variety of titles available on all fourteen currently available carts that there is pretty much something for everyone, excluding text and graphical adventures but hey, you never know!

Showing off that lovely screen!

The good thing about the Evercade is the extremely low cost of entry. For the list price of £59.99 (€69.99 or $79.99) including one cart, it really is a bargain. If you can get hold of the Premium pack for £79.99 (€89.99 or $99.99) with three carts included, even better. The cart prices are low too, £14.99 (€17.99 or $19.99) which could be described as not far off pocket money levels. Note, I have not received pocket money since the early 1990's and that was £4 per week, I have no idea what children today get. Overall, this very much falls into the affordable bracket.

It gets even better though, as Evercade have already announced four new cartridges due for release in early 2021 with Jaleco Collection 1, Piko Interactive 2, Indie Heroes Collection 1 (which includes the awesome Quest Arrest) and Worms Collection 1. This bodes well for even more releases next year. And yes, I'll be adding these to the collection, though I may have to find another shelf as there isn't enough room left on the current one.

There you have it then, the Blaze Evercade remains a brilliant little handheld gaming machine and one that will give you hours of enjoyment over the already wide range of carts out there. It's relatively inexpensive and the value for money from the carts is second to none. It's certainly been the best value gaming purchase I have made this year and I look forward to their future announcements.