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Jeff Minter on recreating Akka Arrh & coding on Atari Jaguar

Minter talks about bringing back and updating Akka Arrh, along with coding for Atari Jaguar.

Morgan Shaver

February 10, 2023 11:11 AM

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If you’re a fan of classic gaming, particularly on Atari platforms, chances are you might’ve played some of Jeff Minter’s work. Founder of Llamasoft, Jeff Minter has a wealth of coding and game development knowledge dating back to the Commodore PET and Sinclair ZX80. Recently, Minter sat down with Shacknews’ own Greg Burke to talk about breathing new life into Akka Arrh for Atari, and touch on topics including coding for the Atari Jaguar.

Opening the two-part interview, Burke asks Minter about the history of Akka Arrh, noting that the game was “practically done almost to completion, and then it just never came out?” To this, Minter recounts the story of how they’d developed Akka Arrh and it was “very nearly finished” and put out on field tests but the response to these field tests wasn’t very good.

Now, Akka Arrh which gets its unique name from its original designers, is being brought back to life and getting a proper re-release by Atari. In terms of Minter’s involvement, he notes that he’d done updates to various Atari games in the past including doing a game called Tempest 2000 for the Atari Jaguar.

With this experience, Atari had offered Minter the opportunity to update any of the games from their back catalog and told him to “go through that, you fancy doing anything let us know and we can sort something out.” After doing some digging into Akka Arrh including downloading ROMs for emulation and becoming intrigued by the game, Minter decided to give it a go updating the game and giving it some fresh polish.

Minter then goes on to share insight into tackling a project like this from a creative and technical perspective, and in general it’s a fascinating interview that’s sure to appeal to fans of classic gaming, Atari platforms, and seeing games lost to time get a fresh chance at success.

For more on Minter’s work bringing back Akka Arrh and coding for platforms like Atari Jaguar, be sure to check out part one and part two of the interview on GamerHubTV. While you’re there, be sure to subscribe to the channel if you haven’t already to catch even more insightful interviews like the one done with Jeff Minter, and subscribe to the Shacknews YouTube channel for other awesome gaming-related content.

Morgan Shaver

Senior Editor

Morgan is a writer from the frozen wastelands of Maine who enjoys metal music, kpop, horror, and indie games. They're also a Tetris fanatic who's fiercely competitive in games like Tetris 99... and all games in general. But mostly Tetris. You can follow Morgan on Twitter @Author_MShaver.