Psygnosis Games

Psygnosis Big Boxes

Psygnosis Limited or "Studio Liverpool" was a legendary British video game developer headquartered at Wavertree Technology Park in Liverpool, UK. They became world-known by releasing amazing titles for Commodore Amiga. These titles were packed in fantastic big boxes that set the standards for box artwork in the video games industry.

The Short History of Psygnosis

The software house was founded in 1984 by Ian Hetherington, Jonathan Ellis, and David Lawson as a successor of the video game producer "Imagine". In 1993, Psygnosis became a subsidiary of Sony and developed games for the  PlayStation. The cost of the acquisition by Sony was £20 million. Psygnosis later became a part of SCE Worldwide Studios. The Studio Liverpool closed in August 2012.

Psygnosis released several games for the Amiga, Atari ST, IBM PCs, and 8-bit computers. However, they became one of the first software houses to fully exploit the multimedia potential of the Amiga's powerful chipset. Released in 1989, the most iconic title for the Amiga was "Shadow of the Beast" which featured amazing music, hundreds of colors on screen, and multi-directional parallax scrolling.

• The Psygnosis logo was the work of the legendary Roger Dean
• Some video game titles were released by Psyclapse, which was a subsidiary of Psygnosis
• The Swedish team "Digital Illusions CE or DICE" created some amazing titles for Psygnosis
• The British software house "Reflections" created some titles for Psygnosis, including "Shadow of the Beast 1&2"
• The Scottish team DMA Design also created some games for Psygnosis

My Collection of Psygnosis Big Boxes

□ Shadow of the Beast 1

• Released/Developer: 1989 by Reflections
• Platforms: Amiga, Atari ST, Amstrad CPC, Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, FM-Towns, Mega Drive, MegaCD, Atari Lynx, Master System, and PC Engine CD
• Programmers: Phil Betts, Martin Edmondson, Paul Howarth
• Artist: Martin Edmondson
• Composers: Tim Wright & Lee Wright
• Music Tracks: David Whittaker (six main pieces of music sampled at 20 kHz using the Korg M1 synthesizer)
  
• Big-Box Cover Artist: Roger Dean

□ Shadow of the Beast 2

• Released/Developer: 1990 by Reflections
• Platforms: Amiga, Atari ST, Mega Drive/CD, and FM Towns
• Programmers: Phil Betts, Martin Edmondson, Paul Howarth
• Artists: Jim Bowers, Cormac Batstone
• Composers: Tim Wright & Lee Wright
• Music Composer: Tim Wright (Korg M1/R)
• Big-Box Cover Artist: Roger Dean

□ Barbarian 1

• Released/Developer: 1987 by Psygnosis
• Platforms: Amiga, Atari ST, Amstrad CPC, Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, MS-DOS, and MSX
• Programmer: David H. Lawson
• Artist: Garvan Corbett
• Big-Box Cover Artist: Roger Dean

□ Barbarian 2

• Released/Developer: 1991 by Psygnosis
• Platforms: Amiga and Atari ST
• Programmer: Mike Chilton
• Artist: Garvan Corbett, Mike Waterworth
• Composers: Paul Summers
• Big-Box Cover Artist: Chris Achilleos

□ Menace

• Released/Developer: 1988/1989 by DMA Design
• Platforms: Amiga, Atari ST, Commodore 64, and MS-DOS
• Programmers: Russell Kay, Dave Jones
• Artist: Tony Smith
• Music Composer: David Whittaker
• Big-Box Cover Artist: Ian Craig

□ Ballistix

• Released/Developer: 1989 by Reflections
• Platforms: Amiga, Atari ST, Acorn Electron, BBC Micro, Commodore 64, TurboGrafx-16, and MS-DOS
• Programmers: Rick Chamberlain, Paul Howarth
• Artist: Martin Edmondson, Tony Edmondson
• Composer: Martin Edmondson
• Big-Box Cover Artist: Melvyn Grant

□ Second Samurai

• Released/Developer: 1993 by Vivid Image
• Platforms: Amiga OCS, Amiga AGA, Windows, and Mega Drive
• Programming: Raffaele Cecco
• Graphics Designer: Teoman Izmak
• Composers: Matt Furniss and Brian Marshall

□ Cytron

• Released/Developer: 1992 by Lunatic Software
• Platforms: Amiga and Atari ST
• Composer: Matt Furniss
• Big-Box Cover Artist: Peter Andrew Jones

□ Atomino (sealed)

• Released/Developer: 1990 by Blue Byte
• Platforms: Amiga, Atari ST, Commodore 64, and MS-DOS
• Programmers: Rainer Reber
• Artist: Martin Thorsten Knop
• Composer: Hans-Hermann Franck
• Big-Box Cover Artist: Celal Kandemiroglu

□ Infestation

• Released/Developer: 1990 by Psygnosis
• Platforms: Amiga, Atari ST, FM Towns, PC-9800, and MS-DOS
• Coder: Dan Gallagher
• Artist: Roger Dean
• Composer: Sean Conran
• Big-Box Cover Artist: Tim White

□ Lemmings 2: The Tribes

• Released/Developer: 1993 by DMA Design
• Platforms: Amiga, Atari ST, Mega Drive, Super NES, Game Boy, Acorn Archimedes, FM Towns, and MS-DOS
• Composers: Raymond Usher, Brian Johnston, and David Whittaker

□ The Carl Lewis Challenge

• Released/Developer: 1992 by Teque London Ltd.
• Platforms: Amiga, Atari ST, Archimedes, and MS-DOS
• Programmers: Tony Love, Peter Jefferies, John Jarvis
• Artist: Tony Hager
• Composer: Chris Hülsbeck

□ Collection of Psygnosis Big Boxes

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Info Sources:

• Psygnosis.org/games/
• Wikipedia
• Amiga.Abime.net/games
• Lemonamiga.com