Диззи: 80-90-дардағы британдық ойын франшизасының тарихы

Dizzy is a series of video games, created by the Oliver Twins and published by Codemasters. It was one of the most successful British video game franchises of the late 1980s and early 1990s. Originally created for the ZX Spectrum and Amstrad CPC, the series appeared on multiple home computer and video game console formats, with over a dozen games being published between 1987 and 1992. The series is named for its main character, an anthropomorphic egg, called Dizzy for the way he somersaults and rolls around the landscape. The games are set in various fairytale like locations and typically involve Dizzy trying to save his friends and family, the Yolkfolk, often from the schemes of his nemesis, the evil wizard Zaks. Most of the games in the series were platform adventure games, with an emphasis on puzzle solving, collecting objects and interacting with other characters. In addition to these core adventure games, the Dizzy branding and character also appeared in several action games with unrelated gameplay. Since the demise of the series in the early 1990s, there have been numerous attempts to revive the series. These have included a remake for smartphone platforms, a Kickstarter campaign, and the publishing of several old games that were thought lost. The series has also served as the inspiration for other games, including many fangames.

The games of the Dizzy series are commonly categorised into either two or three groups. Core to the series and comprising over half its titles are the adventure games, all of which have similar gameplay and mechanics. The rest of the games in the series all have different gameplay from the adventure games and from one another, and are connected only by branding, themes and character. These are commonly referred to as the arcade games, but are sometimes further split into arcade and puzzle games. They also relied heavily on object and inventory based puzzles to interact with the environment and non player characters. Additional innovations were added as the series progressed. The ability to carry more than one item simultaneously was added in Treasure Island Dizzy and refined in Fantasy World Dizzy. Collectable items were also first introduced in Treasure Island Dizzy in the form of coins; later games retained the idea but often used other items such as diamonds or cherries.

The main protagonist and player character for the series is the eponymous Dizzy, an anthropomorphic egg with big eyes, a smiley face, boxing gloves and minimal identifying features. Named for the way he somersaults and rolls around the screen, Dizzy's design was kept deliberately simple. The idea was that this allows players to project themselves onto the character, and to imagine a character beyond what could be achieved by computer graphics of the time. Throughout most of the series, Dizzy is joined by a cast of recurring characters, also eggs, known as the Yolkfolk, who make up his friends and family. Not present in the original Dizzy – The Ultimate Cartoon Adventure, the Yolkfolk are first mentioned in Treasure Island Dizzy and then appear on screen in Fantasy World Dizzy. Including Dizzy, there are seven Yolkfolk in total: Dizzy, Daisy, Denzil, Dora, Dozy, Dylan, and Grand Dizzy. Introduced to allow for more story threads and more interesting characters, the Oliver Twins based each of them on a different character from popular culture. For example, Dora was modelled on Velma from Scooby Doo and Denzil on Fonzie from Happy Days. However, she eventually appears as a second playable character in Wonderland Dizzy. Other than the Yolkfolk, prominent recurring characters are the evil wizard Zaks, who was the primary antagonist in several games of the series; and Dizzy's pet, Pogie, a small furry creature known as a Fluffle, who starred in the spin off game Dreamworld Pogie. Prior to Dizzy, they had mostly written simulation games for Codemasters such as Grand Prix Simulator, and they were eager to branch out into different types of games. which could be used to easily rotate images on the screen, and they were eager to put it to use. Trying it out on their new character made him somersault and roll around the screen, which they believed gave him a unique feel and also gave rise to his name, Dizzy. For the game itself, the Olivers aimed to create something with more story and characters than many contemporary games of the time. Their goal was a game that was more akin to an interactive cartoon, hence the game's subtitle, Dizzy: The Ultimate Cartoon Adventure. Originally, it was just going to be called Dizzy 2, but they eventually took motivation from the naming of the James Bond series and decided to name it Treasure Island Dizzy, aiming to make it clearer that the game was a separate, stand alone experience that could be enjoyed without having played the original. The third game of the series, Fast Food, saw a departure from the style of the first two games. Instead of the platform adventure gameplay they had, it was a maze game, inspired by Pac Man. The Olivers have given various explanations for this change in interviews they have given over the years, including a desire to prove that the character of Dizzy was valuable even outside the adventure format, and both Codemasters and the Olivers wanted to expand Dizzy into the video game console market. Not only could this allow them to reach a larger audience in the UK and Europe, but it could also allow them to break into lucrative foreign markets, such as the US. Even so, demand for Dizzy games on the original formats was still strong at the time, and it was Codemasters' biggest series. Spread too thin to work on new home computer titles themselves, the Olivers decided to contract out future development to Big Red Software. Big Red Software created two further Dizzy adventure games, Spellbound Dizzy and Dizzy: Prince of the Yolkfolk, both released in 1991. By this time, they were working almost entirely independently, creating games that fit the pre established formula with minimal oversight or input from the Olivers. Crystal Kingdom Dizzy reached number one in the ZX Spectrum games chart, and ended up being the last Dizzy game. Despite a generally favourable reception, the game sold only a quarter of its predicted half million copies. with twelve games from the series reaching number one in the charts. Speaking in 1992, Andrew Oliver stated that the Dizzy series received more fan mail than all other Codemasters games combined. Four games in the series were included in the Top 50 best games of all time in a special issue of Your Sinclair magazine in 2004. In addition to its success in its home market, the Dizzy games were also extremely popular in Russia and Eastern Europe. Sometimes, modified or themed versions of the games were used, such as Dizzy's Easter Eggstravaganza, an Easter themed version of Fast Food that appeared on a 1993 Amiga Action cover disk. A Crash magazine cover tape from 1991 included Dizzy 3 and a Half: Into Magicland. This was a short game, comprising only five screens, that served as a prequel for Magicland Dizzy, and was not commercially released or made available anywhere else. Crash also published a special edition of Treasure Island Dizzy.

+ Individual games of the Dizzy series Name Release date Type Formats Notes Refs Dizzy 1987 Adventure CPC, Spec, C64 Subtitled The Ultimate Cartoon Adventure. Fantasy World Dizzy 1989 Adventure CPC, Spec, C64, Amiga, ST, DOS Also known as Dizzy III, remade for NES as Mystery World Dizzy. Kwik Snax 1989 Puzzle CPC, Spec, C64, Amiga, ST, DOS Sometimes considered a sequel to Fast Food. Dizzy 3 and a Half: Into Magicland 1990 Adventure Spec While still an official game, it was released for free in Crash magazine. Serves as an intro to Magicland Dizzy. With only 5 screens, it's the smallest game in the series. Magicland Dizzy 1990 Adventure CPC, Spec, C64, Amiga, ST, DOS Also known as Dizzy IV, remade for NES as Wonderland Dizzy. Dizzy Panic 1990 Puzzle CPC, Spec, C64, Amiga, ST, GG, NES Also known as Panic Dizzy. Bubble Dizzy 1990 Arcade CPC, Spec, C64, Amiga, ST, DOS Spellbound Dizzy 1991 Adventure CPC, Spec, C64, Amiga, ST, DOS Also known as Dizzy V. Dizzy: Prince of the Yolkfolk 1991 Adventure CPC, Spec, C64, Amiga, ST, DOS Remade for consoles as Dizzy the Adventurer, later remade for mobile phones. Also known as Dizzy VI. Dizzy Down the Rapids 1991 Arcade CPC, Spec, C64, Amiga, ST Fantastic Dizzy 1991 Adventure Amiga, DOS, NES, MS, MD, GG Also known as The Fantastic Adventures of Dizzy. Crystal Kingdom Dizzy 1992 Adventure CPC, Spec, C64, Amiga, ST, DOS Also known as Dizzy VII. Dizzy the Adventurer 1992 Adventure GG, NES Console remake of Dizzy: Prince of the Yolkfolk. Dizzy: Prince of the Yolkfolk (mobile remake) 2011 Adventure iOS, Android Remake of the home computer game of the same name. Dreamworld Pogie 2016 Arcade NES Spin off game Kwik Snax, Treasure Island Dizzy, Fast Food, Fantasy World Dizzy, Magicland Dizzy Amiga, Atari ST Dizzy's Excellent Adventures 1992 Kwik Snax, Dizzy Panic, Dizzy Down The Rapids, Dizzy: Prince Of The Yolkfolk, Spellbound Dizzy Amstrad CPC, ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64 Kwik Snax, Dizzy Panic, Bubble Dizzy, Dizzy: Prince Of The Yolkfolk, Spellbound Dizzy Amiga, Atari ST The Excellent Dizzy Collection 1992 Go! Dizzy Go!, Dizzy the Adventurer, Panic Dizzy Game Gear

Name Expected release date Type Formats Notes Refs Learn with Dizzy 1992 Educational Amiga, Atari ST, PC Educational Dizzy game by Codemasters. Untitled Dizzy game Mid 2000s Adventure PS2 Blitz Games pitched a 3D concept to Codemasters including a trailer. Dizzy Returns 2013 Adventure PC, PS3, Xbox 360, Wii U Crowdfunding was set up through Kickstarter in late 2012.

In addition to the official Dizzy games, many fangames have also been created. that enables fans to easily create their own games in the style of the original games. Fans had previously had to use other game engines, which were not always suited to the puzzle style of the Dizzy games. From 2006 to 2016, the makers of DizzyAGE ran a competition each year to find the best game from the previous year, with several of the competitions featuring prizes offered by the Oliver Twins. As of 2018, there are over a hundred fan games listed on the DizzyAGE website.

The Seymour series is a similar franchise, also developed by Big Red and published by Codemasters. The first game in the series, Seymour Goes to Hollywood, was originally conceived as a Dizzy game, but was rebranded due to a desire to keep Dizzy retained to fantasy settings. Wibble World Giddy is a 1993 public domain parody game for the Amiga. It features similar gameplay to the Dizzy series and stars Giddy, an egg very much like Dizzy except that rather than wear boxing gloves he simply had very large hands. A sequel, Giddy 2, was released the following year, also on Amiga, with a third game, Giddy 3, being made in 2000 for DOS, then subsequently ported to multiple other formats. Clover: A Curious Tale is a 2009 adventure game that has similar mechanics to and is considered an homage to the Dizzy series. The PC version was published by Blitz 1UP, part of the Oliver Twins' Blitz Games Studios.