Sci-Fi-O-Rama

Game Box art produced by Peter Andrew Jones, as used for the 16/8 bit title ‘Artura’, published by Gremlin Graphics in 1989. More on the game here: http://www.mobygames.com/game/amiga/artura

Ok, so straight of the bat this is a complete lift from Jeff’s superb http://ski-ffy.blogspot.com/ - do check that blog out as Ski-ffy features much more raw and original source material than I have managed to muster…

This menacing Illustration from UK artist Jim Burns is  part of the Harry Harrison’s Mechanismo, more on that at Ski-ffy. The jet itself - although much more butch - bares a strong resemblance to the now obsolete Anglo/French “Sepecat Jaguar” more on that here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sepecat_Jaguar

Superb pixel illustration / retro game graphics taken from the ground breaking “Dune 2: Battle for Arrakis” considered by many to be the defining RTS  game (real-time-strategy game). Dune II was released in 1992 by Westwood Studios who later went on to evolve the game concept into “Command & Conquer” and beyond.  These Graphics by Ren Olsen were used to depict the various buildings and units attainable within the game, the actual in game graphics (down to hardware limitations) were representational and quite simple, so  Dune II’s real artwork -  Ren’s lavish animated cut scenes, menus etc - was necessary to set the mood.

Dune II’s was a hugely immersive experience set within the Dune universe but only loosely based on the Frank Herbert Novels. Basically Westwood deployed a shit-load of creative license and all for the greater good, in fact the game was that good I’m pretty certain that (via emulation) the Battle for Arrakis will still be raging on more than one laptop not too far, far away…

Read more here: http://www.mobygames.com/search/quick?q=dune+2&x=0&y=0

Artist Ren Olsen has a website with other examples of his work, heres a link: http://www.renolsen.com/

Images sourced via http://duneii.com/ an excellent dedicated fan site.

I’d just like to note that in terms of design I’ve always thought this rendition of  the Dune desert world and its protagonist’s are - all be it on a smaller scale - every bit of as inventive as David Lynchs much derided 1984 film - and I’ll add also that the depiction of the Saurdakar trooper (2nd down on left) is one of my all time favourite SF designs - dark as hell….

Excellent original Atari Art, I presume for the legendary 2600, that was the wood paneled console with the stiff as hell one button joysticks. The vaporising image is “Defender” and the lower art-  if you’ve haven’t guessed - is “Super Breakout”.

Many thanks to Ben at http://www.buhbomp.com/ for supplying the scans.

Another good example of Roger Dean’s leftfield take on Sci-fi demonstrated here with some slightly Alien-esque artwork for the Computer Game “Obliterator”,   Another classic Psygnosis title which played as a 2d Platform Puzzle / Shoot-Em-Up. More information at http://www.mobygames.com/game/atari-st/obliterator

Some more 80’s nostalgia - Retro Game Box Art from 1985; Mercenary was a very early attempt at FPS Sci-Fi adventuring with 3d wire-frame vectors to describe the game world as shown above. The whole design is of course a stab at virtual reality using an ‘advanced console’ and HUD (heads up display) to explore an immersive game world, ok that console might only of been the humble C64 or Speccy, but that’s not really the point. There’s a pure charm with these early ideas of machine/human interaction mirrored in movies and tv of the time; Tron, Last Starfighter, Airwolf, Firefox etc  - more on these soon…..

Image sourced from Mobygames.com, read more about Mercenary here: http://www.mobygames.com/game/mercenary