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Back in 1985, Melbourne House, publishing part of Beam Software, released a game for the Commodore 64 called,
The Way of the Exploding Fist. The game was a beat 'em up and the goal of the game was simply to defeat as many
opponents as possible to improve your rating. It was a huge success and in 1986 WotEF became the best selling C64 title
throughout Europe, with over half a million units sold.
1987 came, and the Nintendo Entertainment System gain popularity all over the world. Beam Software jumps the wagon and while the
first years went along developing for other publishers, Beam obtained a license for the Australian market in 1991, using a
subsidiary called LaserBeam Entertainment, which had one goal in life, to publish Nintendo games.
in 1992, LaserBeam released 2 NES games Australia, Aussie Rules Footy and International Cricket. Both games reached a #1 position
in Australia. Therfore LaserBeam decided to extend the license to cover all of Europe, East Asia and Australia.
But one game they had started working on years earlier, in 1990, called Exploding Fist, never saw the light of day. The game was designed and
developed in-house at Beam Software, programmed by Andrew Davie.
Back in 1990, Beam had no license to publish the game themselves. Serveral attempts were made to sell the game, both in Europe and the US. Beam representative
Dick Lehrberg had ordered a single cartridge manufactured, which he then would show to publishers. Unfortunately the NES era was dead before the development of
the came was complete, therefore no buyer, and the game was canned. Why exactly LaserBeam didn't release later themselves, it is unknown.
Programmer Andrew Davie lost the source and binary for the game a long time ago and the game had more or less dissapeared from the face of the earth, and people's
minds. Well that was until a cartridge was found at a Preston flea market in the UK.
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