Whatever Happened To… Uridium Advance

Jester Interactive had big plans for Graftgold’s back catalogue, but ultimately only one of its proposed updates was completed. John Mcmurray looks back at his unreleased GBA follow-up Uridium Advance

Why this promising GBA shooter was canned

AWords by Rory Milne

t the turn of the century, Steve Cain, Scott Johnson and coder

John Mcmurray left Liverpool’s Rage Software to form Tin Tiger, and as John tells us, the firm’s first big project was a Game Boy Advance update of Uridium for Jester Interactive. “Through our various connections in the industry we got this offer,” John says of the deal, “so I sat down with a

C64 emulator and played Uridium.

I soon realised that it was a very difficult game, and that it needed some of the edges taken off it.”

Based on his research, John decided that his GBA follow‑up should revolve around speed and weapon upgrades rather than deadly obstacles. “My main aim was to create a game that really encouraged you to go fast,” John enthuses.

“You still hit things, but when you were chasing after power‑ups you really went for it.”

Of course, John didn’t want to make his update too easy, and so he configured its raised structures to repel the player’s Manta ship when it collided with them. “The idea was that what used to be ‘insta‑death’ would become obstacles to be negotiated,” John reasons. “So you could be flying away from a mine and hit an object, and then you could bounce back into the mine. The physics were actually quite advanced, but in a Heath Robinson kind of way!”

In keeping with the original, John gave his enemy Dreadnoughts on‑board components, although these would be targeted with bombs, not blasters. “We put bombs in because you had the extra button,” John explains, “so you would be chasing things up and down the levels with a set target to blow up on the decks. There was a damage meter, and when that started flashing you could land.”

A further enhancement followed in the form of a reward system, which connected dispatching opponents to bombing Dreadnought defences. “Your bomb meter would go down, but when you shot aliens it would go back up,” John remembers. “That was just to introduce a little more purpose to the whole thing.”

As well as tying his game’s mechanics together, John also created new alien craft to complement his GBA versions of the original Uridium’s enemies. “I had

decided that we would still have the original opponents, but I thought I’d also throw in some Galaga‑esque waves,” John recalls. “I wanted there to be more to do, and we could display a lot more sprites.”

But while John added balletic foes to the original game’s design, he left out one element of the C64 classic from his GBA follow‑up – Uridium Advance. “We cut the sideways flying because it was actually quite hard to make things out on a GBA,” John notes. “You didn’t have that level of precision, so Uridium Advance became more of a shooter than Uridium, which was more of a negotiation.”

Uridium Advance also became less confined than its predecessor, as John opted to make his Dreadnoughts wider than the GBA’S screen. “It gave you that extra bit of space to manoeuvre,” John observes,

“and it added a little more exploration when you were looking for those last few targets to destroy.”

Besides developing his Uridium follow‑up’s core levels, John also reimagined the original’s bonus stage as a tribute to a classic movie. “The decision to have an actual reactor was partly because I’d seen Return Of The Jedi,” John acknowledges.

“It was like a big ball of energy, and when you hit it there was a massive explosion.”

Once completed, Uridium Advance received Nintendo’s approval, as did John’s second GBA title Paradroid, which was going to share a cartridge with its Graftgold counterpart. “I think on its own Uridium Advance was too slight to release as a full‑price game,” John speculates, “hence the idea of doing the two‑game bundle.” Jester’s former creative director Tim Wright adds: “Jester went bust around that time. Paradroid only got as far as ‘Milestone 3’, and since the two games were meant to be a combined ROM the project died.”

Decades after its completion,

John still fondly remembers his unreleased GBA Uridium, and is satisfied that he created a successor that he can be proud of. “There are always going to be things that you want to change,” John reflects,

“but the art of finishing something is saying: ‘That’s enough.’ So

I’m proud of Uridium Advance. I wanted it to be a game deserving of the name Uridium, which in my mind was one of the most iconic titles of 8‑bit gaming.”

“Uridium Advance became more of a shooter than Uridium, which was more of a negotiation”

John Mcmurray