In the darkness of the arcade, the neon phosphor glow of the screen beckons you close. Attract mode flickering like dancing fire, you’re drawn in, digging deep in your pocket for that shiny coin, thumbing it into the slot as the chiptune siren sings the fanfare for your arrival.One hand around the joystick, the other splayed open to rest across the control buttons. Get Ready. 1-Up. Prepare to Qualify. Avoid Missing Ball For High Score. I Hunger…
When I was a kid, I barely made it out of the era of Disco with my sanity intact, and if I hadn’t been bitten by the videogames bug (thanks to Space Invaders, Galaxian, Asteroids, Gorf, Tempest and a million more) I probably would have grown up well-adjusted.
Lucky for me, that bug laid eggs in my brain that later hatched and turned me into the writer of stuff that I am today.
I’m a gamer through and through, from my Binatone TV Master Mk.IV to my bleeding-edge octal-core PC, and so when I heard about m’colleague Jonathan Green’s call for a horror fiction anthology inspired by classic videogames, I had to sign up.
Game Over hits on August 12th from the good people at Snowbooks, and features a dozen tales of gaming made to chill your blood; my contribution is a story called “Screen Burn“, a speculation about the dark truth behind an unsolved mystery dating back to the height of the arcade era.
For more about Game Over, stay tuned to the anthology’s official Facebook page Here and the Snowbooks site Here.
