Nz17
04-12-2019, 04:56 AM
Ready to spend gigabytes of data to play kilobytes of games? Get ready for Antstream!
The service, which will cost about $7.50 per month, will allow subscribers to play thousands of retro games on the modern devices of their choice. These include things like smartphones, tablets, desktop, and laptop computers as well as Xbox One. Unfortunately (to me), instead of the service allowing you to download ROM's to play with the emulators / original hardware of your choice, instead this is a video game streaming service that sends an audio/video feed to you while you send a feed of controller / keyboard / touchscreen inputs to it. In other words, this is like Google's Stadia but for retro games such as those for the Amiga, C64, BBC Micro, ZX Spectrum, Acorn, Archimedes, and arcade. Antstream has a 2020 release date.
There are some notable people that are a part of Antstream's team. They write:
Antstream as a company has been in existence since 2014, but the first line of code dates back to 2008! It started as a bedroom project for Steve Cottam, who is the CEO and founder. One of the original anecdotes that drove this idea was noting how at gaming / entertainment conventions the arcade cabinet running something like Pong would be the biggest draw every time! He realised then that retro was cool, it was desired, but it was not easily accessible…and so Antstream was born.
Obviously Steve has needed help along the way, and the team you see have a wealth of experience and credits to their names. The team is made up of poly skilled engineers who cover a wealth of programming languages covering classic and modern computing environments, as well as infrastructure engineers, and operations experts. Not to mention content and licensing specialists, and UX consultants to make sure everything works together to provide a good user experience, which is after all what Antstream is all about. The team have written games/worked for companies like Nintendo, Sega, Atlus, Square Enix, Ocean, and Konami, as well as more than a dash of the corporate and financial worlds in Fidelity, Goldman Sachs and Compaq / HP.
The wider team (some not shown) include the co-founders of Playdemic, and TT games, the ex-CEO of Sega Europe, and the lifetime president of Eidos, who is our Chairman Ian Livingstone CBE.
Some interesting facts about the team:
They have worked on AI for spacecraft systems
They have worked on hits such as the Repton series, Ravenskull and Pipeline Plus
They have remixed C64 tracks for Chris Abbott's "Back in Time" albums
They have written emulators for the Spectrum and BBC Micro
Written game scripts, and articles for publications like Retro Gamer, Retro Survival, and Edge
Produced arcade conversions for Midnight Resistance, Cabal, and Road Runner
Been programming games for more than 30 years
Won ENnie awards as a fantasy illustrator
Earned a Guinness world record for Dragon's Lair being the largest video game ported to the ZX81
One of them even wrote and sang the theme tune for a glove puppet called Helix D Monster!
As you can see, it's a multi-talented and broadly skilled team, and there is a clear flare for gaming and specifically retro games.
Interestingly, one of its tiers is for a lifetime subscription. That would be worth it if you are planning on playing the service for more than 3.5 years as after about 3.4 years it would be "free!"
List of games for which they have licenses: https://www.antstream.com/gameslist
Kickstarter page: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/234135283/antstream-retro-gaming-reborn
Stats: $36,911 has been pledged of its $65,385 goal by 383 backers with 28 days to go.
The service, which will cost about $7.50 per month, will allow subscribers to play thousands of retro games on the modern devices of their choice. These include things like smartphones, tablets, desktop, and laptop computers as well as Xbox One. Unfortunately (to me), instead of the service allowing you to download ROM's to play with the emulators / original hardware of your choice, instead this is a video game streaming service that sends an audio/video feed to you while you send a feed of controller / keyboard / touchscreen inputs to it. In other words, this is like Google's Stadia but for retro games such as those for the Amiga, C64, BBC Micro, ZX Spectrum, Acorn, Archimedes, and arcade. Antstream has a 2020 release date.
There are some notable people that are a part of Antstream's team. They write:
Antstream as a company has been in existence since 2014, but the first line of code dates back to 2008! It started as a bedroom project for Steve Cottam, who is the CEO and founder. One of the original anecdotes that drove this idea was noting how at gaming / entertainment conventions the arcade cabinet running something like Pong would be the biggest draw every time! He realised then that retro was cool, it was desired, but it was not easily accessible…and so Antstream was born.
Obviously Steve has needed help along the way, and the team you see have a wealth of experience and credits to their names. The team is made up of poly skilled engineers who cover a wealth of programming languages covering classic and modern computing environments, as well as infrastructure engineers, and operations experts. Not to mention content and licensing specialists, and UX consultants to make sure everything works together to provide a good user experience, which is after all what Antstream is all about. The team have written games/worked for companies like Nintendo, Sega, Atlus, Square Enix, Ocean, and Konami, as well as more than a dash of the corporate and financial worlds in Fidelity, Goldman Sachs and Compaq / HP.
The wider team (some not shown) include the co-founders of Playdemic, and TT games, the ex-CEO of Sega Europe, and the lifetime president of Eidos, who is our Chairman Ian Livingstone CBE.
Some interesting facts about the team:
They have worked on AI for spacecraft systems
They have worked on hits such as the Repton series, Ravenskull and Pipeline Plus
They have remixed C64 tracks for Chris Abbott's "Back in Time" albums
They have written emulators for the Spectrum and BBC Micro
Written game scripts, and articles for publications like Retro Gamer, Retro Survival, and Edge
Produced arcade conversions for Midnight Resistance, Cabal, and Road Runner
Been programming games for more than 30 years
Won ENnie awards as a fantasy illustrator
Earned a Guinness world record for Dragon's Lair being the largest video game ported to the ZX81
One of them even wrote and sang the theme tune for a glove puppet called Helix D Monster!
As you can see, it's a multi-talented and broadly skilled team, and there is a clear flare for gaming and specifically retro games.
Interestingly, one of its tiers is for a lifetime subscription. That would be worth it if you are planning on playing the service for more than 3.5 years as after about 3.4 years it would be "free!"
List of games for which they have licenses: https://www.antstream.com/gameslist
Kickstarter page: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/234135283/antstream-retro-gaming-reborn
Stats: $36,911 has been pledged of its $65,385 goal by 383 backers with 28 days to go.