GameWarp

12 months Launched: 1983
Authentic Worth: £199
Purchase It Now For: £20+
Related magazines: Electron Consumer, Micro Consumer, Acorn Consumer, A&B Computing, Acorn Applications
Why The Acorn Electron Was Nice: The Electron provided the primary performance of the BBC B at half the dimensions, and at a fraction of the associated fee. It had robust software program backing, and boasted among the finest keyboards of any pc, with nice really feel and responsiveness and quite a lot of shortcuts to widespread BASIC instructions. And it was constructed to final, too.

After the roaring success of the BBC Microcomputer, Acorn was an organization going locations. It had conquered the faculties market virtually unchallenged, and with a less expensive, cut-down sibling to the Beeb designed for house use on the way in which, it was massively assured that it may dominate {the marketplace}. 4 months forward of the Electron’s launch, joint managing director of the corporate Chris Curry was in bullish temper. “We aren’t putting any limits on the dimensions we are able to develop to,” he instructed The Instances. “We see the Electron as a really highly effective menace to the prevailing dominance by Sinclair and the Commodore VIC-20. We hope to get half the house pc market.”

“It was completely manic – an insane time actually,” recollects Tom Hohenberg, Acorn’s former advertising supervisor. “There have been exhibitions occurring on a regular basis, and there’d be 50,000 to 60,000 individuals besieging the stands. The BBC Micro was promoting like sizzling muffins – we couldn’t make them rapidly sufficient – so there have been big hopes for the Electron. Half the dimensions, half the value, and the identical kind of energy. We have been buzzing.”

Classes had clearly been learnt from the provision issues that had beset the BBC. Fortunately, because of the machine’s tie-in with the broadcaster, the Beeb nonetheless went on to grow to be very profitable. Six months forward of the Electron’s launch, Curry instructed The Guardian that the brand new mannequin wouldn’t even be marketed, not to mention offered, till they have been “utterly assured that shares can be found”. “Greater than virtually anyone else we have now suffered prior to now from issues of lack of product when the demand is excessive,” he mentioned. “We aren’t going to let it occur once more.”

An expanded Acron Electron (img: John Simpson).

Launch day arrived on 23 August 1983, and anticipation was large. The primary evaluate of the brand new machine was in, and so glowing that Acorn quoted it extensively on the full-page promoting it took out within the newspapers. “In comparison with different micros in its worth vary, the likes of the Spectrum, Oric and VIC-20, the Electron wins on all counts,” What Micro? journal mentioned. “It has higher graphics, a greater keyboard, and quicker and extra versatile BASIC. Acorn had higher be prepared for a rush, there’s going to be one.” If solely Acorn had paid nearer consideration to that final line.

Acorn’s technique was to point out dad and mom that the Electron was a approach of bringing their studying in school on the BBC into the house, and a £300,000 TV advert was commissioned to make the purpose. “It took three days to shoot, and was fairly an epic manufacturing,” says Hohenberg. “There have been numerous youngsters and several other units. We spent £3 million on airtime.” The advertising of the machine was so profitable {that a} reported 300,000 orders have been acquired for the run-up to Christmas 1983.

Considerably gotten smaller from its predecessor, however missing a few of the options and connectivity, the Electron’s dimensions had in reality been primarily based on a tissue field, after Acorn discovered itself sad with the case put ahead by an industrial designer. “It is going to have been six to 9 months to do the essential design, however then there have been issues with the ULA,” says former Acorn {hardware} designer Steve Furber. “We have been geared as much as produce 300,000,” continues Hohenberg, “after which the ULA, the guts of the machine… just one in ten of them labored.”

Electron Consumer was a preferred magazine of the time.

Consequently, solely 30,000 Electrons hit the cabinets on this interval. “All these households had promised the youngsters an Electron for Christmas, and it simply wasn’t obtainable,” says Hohenberg. “We’d get a cargo in, then there’d be a stampede. Individuals have been preventing in Rumbelows.” The Manchester department of WHSmith reportedly acquired 1,500 cellphone enquiries in a single week alone from individuals determined to seek out one in time for Christmas.

Regardless of the manufacturing issues, assist for the Electron steadily grew. Acorn’s software program arm – Acornsoft – led the cost, and its first batch of video games included some excellent conversions: Snapper (a wonderful Pac-Man clone), Meteors (Asteroids) and Monsters (House Panic), in addition to Peter Irvin’s advantageous space-based shooter Starship Command. “I despatched it to a number of publishers who all needed it,” he explains. “However I made a decision to go along with Acornsoft as a result of, though their royalty charges have been decrease, I assumed they have been the higher writer.”

The opposite essential participant on the Electron software program scene within the early days was Leeds-based Micro Energy. Effective conversions of Frogger and Donkey Kong – Croaker and Killer Gorilla – offered nicely, however the true gem was the excellent maze-based shooter Cybertron Mission, closely influenced by Berzerk. Alongside the early software program gamers got here the arrival of Electron Consumer, the one journal devoted solely to the Electron. Launched in September 1983, it grew to become very important to the machine’s person base.

Contained in the Acorn Electron. (picture: Steve Furber).

Late 1983 additionally noticed the primary Electron choices from Superior Software program, an organization that might grow to be a very powerful and long-lasting supporter of the machine. Already energetic on the BBC scene, Richard Hanson’s firm was cautious of Acorn’s provide issues, however dipped a toe into the market anyway. “Richard spent half the evening reprogramming a one-armed bandit simulator,” says ex-Superior man Steve Botterill. “Beeb gross sales have been sensible, nevertheless it took till the top of the yr earlier than Electron gross sales picked up.
We had put about half-a-dozen titles collectively for it to see how it might go.” After small numbers have been initially picked up within the countdown to Christmas, Superior Software program’s huge break for the Electron arrived. “In February, WHSmith ordered 1,000 every of seven Electron titles,” Botterill recollects. “This marked the beginning of the Electron promoting huge numbers.”

By February, a backlog of 200,000 orders for the Electron itself reportedly nonetheless remained. Acorn’s manufacturing troubles quickly eased, however the missed Christmas rush resulted in tens of hundreds of machines arriving into the nation with solely a fraction of the demand for the machine remaining. “We had this warehouse in Wellingborough,” Hohenberg recollects. “Earlier than Christmas, the vehicles have been lining up at one finish desirous to take the few Electrons we had away to shops, however now the vehicles have been all on the different finish, delivering, and the market had utterly dried up. Seeing Electrons piled flooring to ceiling… it was very miserable.”

And the corporate’s troubles didn’t finish there. Shortly after the Electron’s launch, Acorn had tried to capitalise on its anticipated success by promoting 11.23 million shares for buying and selling on the London Inventory Trade. The corporate’s efficiency available in the market was quickly described in The Instances, nevertheless, as “abysmal”. Coupled with ill-fated makes an attempt to arrange operations within the USA and Germany, from a place of monumental monetary energy, the corporate quickly discovered itself in severe problem. Even Acorn’s much-prized contract with the BBC was mentioned to be underneath menace.

Like many 8-bit computer systems of the time, the Electron sported an add-on
cassette deck. (Picture: John Simpson).

The software program marketplace for the Electron was gaining in energy, nevertheless. 1984 noticed the arrival of Acornsoft’s traditional Elite. “The Electron model was extra restricted than the BBC disk version,” says David Braben. “The video {hardware} on the Electron was very poor in comparison with the BBC, and we couldn’t do a few of the trickery we did on the BBC to save lots of reminiscence – this is the reason it was black and white on the Electron.” Even in cut-down kind, Electron Elite stays one of many most interesting technical achievements on the machine, and though Braben wasn’t overly pleased with the model, he and co-author Ian Bell have left one fortunate person a gift: “We by no means purchased an Electron – one was loaned to us by Acorn, and after we completed, we connected a be aware to the within of the case, saying ‘Elite was written on this machine’,” he says. “We each signed it, so someplace, hopefully, it’s nonetheless there in somebody’s machine.”

Different 1984 arrivals included A&F’s Chuckie Egg, in addition to the evergreen (actually) Repton. This Boulder Sprint-influenced sequence was Superior’s greatest vendor, and loomed over the 8-bit Acorn scene all through the Electron’s life. Acorn’s standard Plus 1 and Plus 3 growth packing containers have been launched too, between them including joystick and disk-drive interfaces, in addition to ROM cartridge slots.

Probably spurred on by the steadily growing person base, Acorn seemingly rallied. The BBC contract was renewed, and by September gross sales of the Electron have been mentioned to be over 90,000. A stronger than anticipated Christmas noticed this quantity double, with a Dixons spokesman expressing delight that the Electron was promoting “4 to 5 occasions in addition to we had anticipated”. This despite Acorn sticking to its £199 launch worth, the identical worth because the closely discounted C64, and vastly dearer than the all-conquering £129.99 Spectrum 48K. In January 1985, nevertheless, Sir Clive Sinclair put the squeeze on nonetheless additional, slashing the value of the Spectrum+ to £129.99. Acorn responded instantly, dropping the Electron by £70 to go head-to-head at that worth level, however the brand new mark undoubtedly put additional strain on the corporate – the Electron was extensively recognized to be costlier to provide than the Spectrum.

Regardless of robust Christmas gross sales, the corporate suspended share buying and selling 5 weeks into the brand new yr after its share worth dropped to 28p, down from a excessive of 193p the earlier yr. Redundancies adopted, and Olivetti stepped in to mop up a cut-price 49.3 per cent stake within the firm, elevated to an enormous 79.8 per cent a number of months later. After recording a £10.8 million revenue in 1984, Acorn was now reeling from a £22.2 million loss. “That was grim,” says Hohenberg. “We simply felt like ‘oh my god – we’ve offered out to huge brother’.” Olivetti chairman Carlo De Benedetti criticised the corporate in an interview with The Instances, observing that it’d tried to maneuver into the US market “with forces completely inconsistent with their dimension, and their monetary and managerial energy”. A loss-making sub-£100 price ticket was quickly positioned on the Electron, with the majority of Acorn’s warehoused inventory ‘misery offered’ to Dixons. Earnings have been now not a problem – Acorn wanted money, and quick.

4 Nice Acorn Electron Video games

Boulderdash

Overdrive

Skirmish

Crayzee Rider

Learn the total characteristic in Retro Gamer situation 57, on sale digitally from GreatDigitalMags.com

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