Ultimate Play the Game

 In the year 1982, Ultimate Play the Game was founded in Ashby-de-la-Zouch, Leicestershire, by Tim and Chris Stamper. [8] Their friends John Lathbury and Tim's girlfriend, Carole Ward, founded the business. Others Stamper family members were involved in the beginning of the running and supporting of Ultimate Play the Game which was first located adjacent to a family-run newsagent. Chris and Tim had both worked on the development of arcade games such as Konami's Gyruss. Chris claimed to have been the "most knowledgeable arcade videogame design team in Britain". After getting tired of working for other companies and leaving, he founded Ashby Computers and Graphics. The first business ACG traded was arcade conversion kits. Then, ACG moved into the home software market and developed games under the Ultimate Play the Game brand. Ashby released four arcade games: Blue Print for Bally-Midway, and Grasspin, Dingo and Saturn for Jaleco.Ultimate's first release was Jetpac in May 1983, for the 16K Spectrum. In an interview from 1983, Tim Stamper said that they decided to target 16K machines because their smaller size meant development time was much shorter, claiming they could produce two games with 16K resolution in one month and one game that was 48K. Jetpac was a huge commercial hit. It sold more than 300,000. Spectrum versions alone. Jetpac, Pssst and Tranz Am were among the ten games ever released in 16K ROM format. The games were also republished on cassette, with distinctive silver inlay cards, by Sinclair Research for inclusion in ZX Spectrum bundles.Ultimate's first 48K releases included Lunar Jetman - a sequel to Jetpac and Atic Atac both of which were released in the late summer of 1983. Both games were very well-liked by the gaming press. CRASH magazine praised Ultimate's use of the extra memory Lunar Jetman included. [15] Sabre Wulf appeared in 1984. It was the first Sabreman game, and the first to be released at a recommended retail cost of PS9.95. The Ultimate games were originally priced at PS5.50. This was the norm for Spectrum arcade-style titles at the time. The price increase was made to deter piracy. The players wouldn't be inclined to share copies with a higher cost. This was also the time of the introduction in Ultimate of the exclusive "big box", packaging. This packaging was offered for every Spectrum releases , except for Gunfright. The strategy paid off because Sabre Wulf went on to sell over 350,000 copies on the Spectrum on its own. The game was released in late 1984. Sabreman Series' next two installments came out. Underwurlde was quickly followed by Knight Lore. Knight Lore was something of a revolution in the home computer game market, utilizing a forced-perspective, isometric perspective branded Filmation that was the model which would be extensively copied in different games, some notable examples being Batman and Head Over Heels from Ocean Software. Knight Lore, and some of its Filmation sequels, like Alien 8, was actually completed before Sabre Wulf but Ultimate decided that it could have a adverse effect on sales of the more basic Sabre Wulf, so it was put off until late in 1984.