Taskset is a relative newcomer to the make or break world of home computer games; it's been trading for little over one year. But its protagonists cut their teeth earlier than most by producing games for real arcade machines. Now they've turned their collective attention exclusively to the Commodore 64 and have produced a string of eccentric yet original games that seem to pop up regularly in the games charts. Bohdan Buciak took the stopping train to sunny Bridlington to meet the creators of Rankin' Rodney and Bozo.

Taskset Team
The Taskset Programming Team

Andy Walker was born just down the road from Taskset's new premises on Bridlington High Street. He's managing director of that company, and probably falls into the local-boy-made-good category, whether he likes it or not. He's now in his mid-thirties, sports a Noel Edmunds hairstyle and beard, and has done time working as a civil servant. Not an environment conducive to promoting games mania. So how did he get hooked on computer games?

"I spent a considerable number of years working with computers at a government electronics centre", he declares cautiously. That was a few years back, when microcomputers were just beginning to make their attack on the mainframe and minicomputer market.

Walker saw the potential immediately and became fascinated by micros to the point of distraction. But his enthusiasm couldn't persuade his superiors to send him on small systems courses to find out more about micros. Walker considered that to be somewhat shortsighted, "they didn't believe the future lay in small systems." So he built an antipathy towards the Civil Service and started building his own micros.

He eventually left, having decided that he wanted to do nothing more than devote his time to writing video games. He managed to inspire another programmer and a video artist with his own brand of enthusiasm and together they set up AWL Electronics, a company who's major claim to fame was writing games like Andromeda and The Pit for the true games arcade consoles.