Discovering the ZX Spectrum for the first time

[Neb6]

Growing up in North America, we didn't have ZX Spectrum machines available to us (that I know of).

I'm just starting to delve into the games on this machine and I'm really impressed.

They're very playable, and the colour clash creates a really cool look to a lot of the games. Oh, and the music and sounds are really neat too.

Any fav games that people would recommend for the Speccy?

[importaku]

All of the games in the the dizzy series are fun.

This is the best resource on the entire net for spectrum information & games.
http://www.worldofspectrum.org/index.html

Still play spectrum nowdays but via emulation which is just as good as when i had a +3

[blue lander]

I went through this same "Discovery" of the speccy as a US gamer a few years ago. I can recommend anything by Ultimate Play the Game (which became Rare) as well as most Codemasters titles. Many games released by Hewson as very good as well. Go to World of Spectrum and read the reviews out of the old Crash and Your Sinclair magazines, they'll steer you in the right direction.

It's difficult but not impossible to get an actual Spectrum in the US. Don't bother with the US released Timex Sinclair one as it isn't fully compatible. Get an Amstrad built Spectrum +2 rather than a Sinclair one as they're more reliable and have a built in cassette deck. If you're importing a computer from the UK, tell the seller not to send the power brick. It's heavy and expensive to ship, plus you need a step down converter to make it work over here. It's easier to just build a power supply yourself with parts from Radio Shack. Lastly, you'll either need a TV that supports PAL or make an RGB converter to use it with an Amiga style 15khz monitor.