Although GameClub has only surfaced for a handful of days, they have already made plans to provide the very first legit solution to the enduring legacy issue within the iOS video gaming community. Watching Hook Champ, an early classic treasured by a lot of gamers, become playable once more on modern mobile devices is something that none of us would consider possible just a few weeks before, and is an absolute pleasure to revisit. While I do acknowledge my feeling of nostalgia, I always feel playing through these early iOS releases gives me the same pleasure as if I am replaying a game from the likes of Super Mario World, coming from the fact that each game is just pure pleasure to complete without any complications in gameplay from more modern games. While I absolutely do not want to sound greedy, the question persists in my mind as well as our gaming community, “what’s next?”. Luckily we do not have to wait for a long time to find out. Earlier today, GameClub announced that their next retro game revival would be the classic stone-cold masterpiece of a game, Sword of Fargoal, and it would be available to be accessed early next week.
Out of all the games that fell at the times of Apple’s 32-bit Apocalypse, Sword of Fargoal is most likely one of the oldest. It was launched in 1982 on the old Commodore 64 by Jeff McCord and recently brought back with the support of the mobile game developer Madgarden in 2009. The game went through a complete graphics overhaul, and a lot of new content was added. On iOS, Sword of Fargoal was a huge success from a critical point of view, drawing in old fans as well as appealing to the casual gamers who have never played the genre beforehand. I was the latter, as I only bought console games for about $40 before, and had no idea what a classic retro game with dungeon crawlers like Sword of Fargoal would have in store. It turned out that I have made the right decision to give the game a chance, and it is nice to see one niche iOS title being resurrected by GameClub.
Two major things to be taken from this piece of news: Firstly, GameClub is well aware of which iOS games in particular and mobile games in general, are beloved by gamers. Second, no games are too outdated or lost for us to give up the hope that they can one day make a comeback. In the few recent years, no updates have come to Sword of Fargoal, but GameClub’s developers still found a way to resurrect it. Appreciate your great work, gentlemen - now if only you can overhaul Dungeon Raid for modern mobile devices, and I will be a happy man.