You either love Jeff Minter, or… well, maybe you haven’t heard of him. A grizzled four-decade veteran of the British games scene, Minter has spent most of that time working under the name Llamasoft and producing, among other things, the finest psychedelic tube shooters known to humanity. For my money Space Giraffe is hands-down the most synaesthetic and pure shooter experience games have ever seen.
So if you love Jeff Minter, in other words, you really love the guy. There’s something heartwarming about the unique path he’s managed to shape through an industry that changes with blistering pace, and the manner in which he’s been able to keep pace (in recent times alongside Llamasoft’s Ivan Zorzin). It’s a great story waiting to be told, and director Paul Docherty is trying to raise the cash to do it.
Docherty himself had his ‘first’ career in the games industry of the 1980s, a time when Minter games like Gridrunner bestrode the scene like colossi. Having moved into films, he writes in a bit more detail here about why telling Llamasoft’s story holds such appeal. Here’s the trailer:
Docherty’s after a baseline about 150 grand to make this happen, which is obviously no small sum, but in the context of the film industry is a low budget indeed. If you fancy chucking a few quid at the biopic a British legend deserves, you can do so here.
This post originally appeared on Kotaku UK, bringing you original reporting, game culture and humour from the British isles.
Leave a Reply