Flagship Titles

Blagger is a single-screen platform game in which the player controls a bank robber navigating a series of platforms, collecting keys and avoiding hazards to reach the exit. Its immediate forebear is the Atari arcade game Bagman (1982), and the influence is visible — but Crowther translated it to the C64 with his own graphics and SID score, producing something that felt native to the machine rather than ported.

Published by Alligata in 1983, Blagger hit the UK C64 charts almost immediately. The combination of tight, responsive controls, clear visual design, and addictive one-more-go structure was precisely calibrated for the bedroom gaming market. Players returning to it now find it holding up better than most of its contemporaries: the game communicates what it wants from you instantly, and delivering it is genuinely satisfying.

The SID music — Crowther's own composition — is a bouncy, characterful theme that lodged itself in the memory of anyone who played the game in 1983. It is the kind of SID writing that demonstrates the composer understanding both the constraints and the opportunities of the chip: not trying to reproduce orchestral sounds, but finding something that could only exist on the C64.

"I wrote Blagger very quickly. Alligata were happy to take whatever I produced. I just sat down and did it — the programming, the graphics, the music. Everything came from me."

— Antony Crowther, Your Commodore interview, 1984

Blagger was followed by Son of Blagger and Blagger Goes to Hollywood, both in 1985. The character and the brand had legs. The 1983 original, however, is the one that matters: the game that made Crowther's name and established that a solo teenager in a bedroom could produce something the market wanted.

Blagger (C64 Longplay, 50 FPS)

James Cameron's Aliens (1986) was one of the defining film events of the decade, and the licensed game — published by Electric Dreams — was one of the most anticipated C64 titles of the year. Crowther handled all aspects of the development solo.

The game is a multi-section action title that works through the film's key sequences: the colony, the APC approach, the dropship level, the alien hive. Each section plays differently, a structural ambition that was unusual for licensed games of the era, which typically settled on a single mechanic and repeated it. Crowther built a variety of play styles into a single product.

The SID score is Crowther at his most atmospheric. Rather than the bouncy arcade themes of the Alligata years, the Aliens music captures the film's tension — slow, tense, mechanically threatening. He was using the SID chip to do something harder than a melody: to establish a mood and sustain it. Zzap!64 responded positively. The game reviewed well and sold well, demonstrating that the solo-developer bedroom approach could scale to major licence territory.

"Crowther has done the licence justice. Each section feels distinct, the graphics are as good as the hardware allows, and the music genuinely creates tension."

— Zzap!64 review, Issue 18, October 1986

Aliens sits at the high point of Crowther's C64 work. After the arcade simplicity of Blagger and the prolific Alligata period, it shows a developer who had grown in sophistication without losing the speed or the discipline.

Aliens: The Computer Game (C64 Longplay)

Skimmer (1988), published by Electronic Arts, was Crowther's most demanding production. EA was — by 1988 — the most commercially and technically sophisticated publisher operating in the C64 / Amiga market. Their quality bar was different from Alligata's, and their expectations of a developer were different too.

Crowther met them. Skimmer is a hovercraft action game — technically accomplished, visually polished, and designed to showcase what the C64 and Amiga could do when pushed. The C64 version is a remarkable piece of assembly programming: smooth scrolling, responsive physics, and the visual texture of a developer who understood his hardware at the machine level.

"Working for Electronic Arts was a different level of pressure. They expected everything to be right, technically and commercially. With Skimmer I had to deliver C64 and Amiga versions, both to their standard. I just got on with it."

— Antony Crowther, Commodore User interview, 1988

The Amiga version is the most technically demanding thing Crowther shipped. Moving from the 6510 to the 68000, from SID to the Amiga's Paula chip, from PETSCII constraints to the HAM colour mode — these are real transitions, not just resolution bumps. That Crowther handled them without a team speaks to both his technical range and his work ethic.

Skimmer may not be the best-remembered Crowther title — Blagger and Aliens have the stronger nostalgic footprint — but it is the most technically impressive. It shows a developer who had moved from bedroom charts to major publisher quality at the highest technical level the 8-bit / 16-bit transition demanded.

Skimmer (C64 Longplay)