Any memories of the old shops we used to visit?

[Mr Plow]

I genuinely came in here looking for Software Plus! Awesome little place!! I used to go to the one in the corner, at the front of Liberty Hall in Basildon. Was there another in Southend?

mom another note, Liberty Hall was also the only place locally to have Arcade machines. Awesome selection too!! 30 years later I’m starting to buy the boards.

Indeed there was, it was located on the top floor of what is now known as the Victoria Shopping Centre (we just called it the Precinct back in the day). I can't seem to find any pictures of the old shop but I recall it having a yellow theme inside.

 

[Chris [BEANS]]

Indeed there was, it was located on the top floor of what is now known as the Victoria Shopping Centre (we just called it the Precinct back in the day). I can't seem to find any pictures of the old shop but I recall it having a yellow theme inside.

Yes!! The one in Basildon was yellow too!!!

Can you imagine a yellow shop these days?!? The 90’s were a savage time!! (Late 80’s even??)

 

[turbot1984]

This is where I bought all my (cheap) pc gear late 90's .... Sham Shui Po Hong Kong

 

[gazzaa]

There were loads in Leicester in the 80s/90s we had mays computers,data next,bits and bytes, commodore centre/cavendish commodore,dimensions,Beatties,the pd shop that was full of Amiga stuff in the market,Alpha discounts had a great selection of gaming stuff for the 8 bits and 16 bit machines and all the big franchises like future zone ect.

 

[montymint]

I remember getting most of my snes and megadrive carts from car boot fairs and side ally second hand shops that sold VHS and brick-a-brack.

If I got to get a game new I had:

Woolworths
Chips
An electronics store that I think was called Tandys
Dixons
Blockbuster Video for cheat ex-rentals

 

[Emlyn_Dewar]

Back in Aberdeen there used to be a very small shop called Solid Gold Games Centre, had some consoles set-up and did sell some new games I think. It was mostly for trading in games, or buying used (before Game/Gamestation were around).
Got quite a few good games for the NES and Mega Drive in this store. Plus it was good to be a store where they had consoles set-up to play things.
Aside from that one, there was only Electronics Boutique specifically for games when I was young. Boxed Amiga and PC games!

 

[Firestar_3x]

Walked through this door so many times, so much money spent, happy days!



No idea why I took this photo, but found it the other day.

 

[KraniX]

I genuinely came in here looking for Software Plus! Awesome little place!! I used to go to the one in the corner, at the front of Liberty Hall in Basildon. Was there another in Southend?

Liberty was such a weird collection of odd shops, I'm sure there was stuff like a tattoo parlour, joke shop, wig shop... etc.

I do remember a game/software shop in the corner, if it's the same one it was on the right hand side (looking towards the entrance from outside), I think this is where I bought SF2 and a 6 button pad for the Mega Drive.

 

[Chris [BEANS]]

Liberty was such a weird collection of odd shops, I'm sure there was stuff like a tattoo parlour, joke shop, wig shop... etc.

I do remember a game/software shop in the corner, if it's the same one it was on the right hand side (looking towards the entrance from outside), I think this is where I bought SF2 and a 6 button pad for the Mega Drive.

yep!! Joke shop, fishing shop (that sold pellet guns to underage idiots like me!), SoundZone record shop, dodgy cafe at the back with arcade machines, and software plus right where you described it (these may have all been at different times during the life of Liberty Hall!)

 

[scubes]

Planet games Blackpool model shop belfast game belfast worked there 2002 2003.

 

[jaybee]

Electronics Boutique
Our price
Virgin megatore
Woolworths
MVC
Dixons
Allders (electronics level had shedloads of PCs in the 90s)
Local independent record and games stores
Safeways
Beejams
Maplins
Allied carpets
Intersport, Olympus and old sports shops before sports direct took over

 

[Ravenger]

I also remember during the PS1 days the street traders selling pirated games. Once when I walked past one of these impromptu stalls they spotted a policeman approaching and they scarpered, giving boxes of games to some teenage accomplices who ran off. Within about 5 seconds there was no sign the stall had ever existed.

 

[Changesx]

Gamestation!

Buying gameboy colour games from their glass cabinet section. Those were the days

 

[Scania]

I remember I used to go into Boots armed with a blank tape cassette, I’d ask the assistant if I could try whatever was the latest release, he’d give me the cassette, I’d then take it over to the hi-fi’s and copy it, gained many many copies of new releases doing that…

What a villain I was.

 

[Begbie]

Silicon in Edinburgh, I remember vividly getting some RAM at a pretty young age (10, maybe younger) but the shop was such a clutter - Monitors everywhere. It was awesome, used to get such a high as a kid visiting there. No idea how these little IT shops didn't do better than what they could've, not keeping up with the times I suppose.

 

[Ian_Eb]

Silica Shop in Sidcup during the 80's along with the hey day of Tottenham Court road in London being th home of all sorts of imported computer and electronic gizmos, Atari 800 and the ST days foir me. Followed later by Strategic Plus Software (SPS) in Hampton Hill Middlesex, who used to import all the latest PC games from the US months before they were available in the UK as well as being on compuserve and providing patches an updates on 3.5" floppy for customer who didn't yet have a modem.

Happy days!

I used to order stuff from SPS when it was just the guy working from his house (Steve?) i called in a few times and bought stuff. Whenever I was in even the vaguest area for work, I would accidentally divert to the shop to buy something.

Got my Ad-Lib from them and also a load of Infocom, Sierra, LucasArts and Everquest came from their place.

 

[Bluecube]

Silicon in Edinburgh, I remember vividly getting some RAM at a pretty young age (10, maybe younger) but the shop was such a clutter - Monitors everywhere. It was awesome, used to get such a high as a kid visiting there. No idea how these little IT shops didn't do better than what they could've, not keeping up with the times I suppose.

The only reason I opened the local free paper was to peruse the Silicon ads. Great shop, always heaving when you went especially at the weekends.

 

[Begbie]

The only reason I opened the local free paper was to peruse the Silicon ads. Great shop, always heaving when you went especially at the weekends.

Yeah it was awesome back then, first gpu was from them too!

 

[Ravenger]

Silica Shop in Sidcup during the 80's
Happy days!

I worked in the Sidcup shop via the YTS scheme after leaving school at 17. Silica specialised in Atari 8 bit computers which were amazing for the time, especially as they'd originally released in 1979. Far better than the UK computers, but way, way, more expensive, plus at the time most of the software was imported and very expensive.

Some really great imported software for the Atari machines were the Synapse games (Drelbs, Encounter, Necromancer, Blue Max, etc.) and all the big-box Infocom games that you needed an expensive floppy drive to use. I remember the Atari tape decks were very, very, slow and extraordinarily unreliable - far worse than the Spectrum, which explains why most Atari 8-Bit owners had disk drives, despite the expense.

They also sold consoles like the VCS and Intellivision, and later the Colecovision and Vectrex, and also eventually sold the Commodore 64, as well as some more esoteric machines like the Coleco Adam, Mattel Aquarius, Sord M5 and Spectravideo computers.

I remember when the Vectrex was discontinued and all the stock sold off. I wanted to buy one but was on such a low salary I couldn't afford it. I'm kicking myself now as it's such a collectable and unique system.

I really enjoyed working there, and being able to play all the latest games (and classic ones) was really great. Happy memories!

 

[SexyGreyFox]

I remember going to the old OcUK unit on imex business park and being in no way surprised when the phones just rang and rang and rang...

The first two units on IMEX were like Computer Clubs, I would go in at least 3 times a week (I lived 400 yards away) and I could be there for a long time talking geek stuff to both Pete (original owner) and visitors.
When the 3rd Unit was bought (down the middle) Spie got rid of all that and turned it into a proper shop which I agreed with because potential buyers used to come in and were easily put off by all the geeks.