Acorn Launches World First in Computer Games 

Acorn Computers is using the Gamesmaster Live Show at Birmingham to unveil a 
major step forward in computer games technology.   

The first interactive computer game incorporating video clips stored on a 
floppy disc is to be shown at the exhibition. The popular Quest for Gold 
game has been updated to include Acorn Replay video clips of athletes such 
as Linford Christie, Colin Jackson and Fatima Whitbread giving support and 
encouragement to the competitors, as well as announcing the final positions 
of the players in each track and field event featured in the athletics 
simulation game. This new version is being demonstrated on an Acorn A3010 
computer which sells for just #499 (inc VAT). 

Acorn Replay is a full motion video system which differs from other FMV 
systems in that it reads highly compressed data from mass storage devices in 
real time on a standard product with no additional hardware assistance, yet 
maintains a constant frame rate. It features a data compression technique 
which relies on calculating the redundancy between successive video frames. 
The software decompression algorithm runs in real time on all Acorn's 32-bit 
RISC-based Archimedes computers with a minimum 2MB of memory. 

Acorn's Consumer Sales and Marketing Manager Richard Percy was quick to 
point out that new game technologies incorporating full motion video could 
well form the basis of the next generation of computer games.  "Replay will 
add a sense of realism to games undreamt of by today's programmers which 
will even surpass the capability of the dramatic but expensive 
laserdisk-based arcade games. " he said. 

"This system has enormous potential. Games running only off floppy disks 
will be dramatically improved, whilst the capability of games running from 
hard disks will take on a totally new dimension. And as CD-ROM technology 
becomes more widespread the possibilities could be almost limitless with 
at-least 60 minutes of real time video included." 

Already Acorn Replay is being used in a number of applications including 
CD ROM-based curriculum support products, encyclopaedias and various 
multimedia packages. 

ENDS 

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