From Bedrooms to Billions

This is a kickstarter-funded documentary covering the rise of British computer & video game development companies in the 1980s. Because of the diversity of the UK computing scene (lots of different computer formats) and the relatively low bar of entry (systems were usually cheap) to get in, there was a ton of creativity in the game community back then. And a lot of companies that rose from...bedrooms...to form part of the industry that is now worth billions. I was recently able to finally watch this and...

Is it possible to think something is well done and yet still be disappointed? If so, that's where I am. In terms of production, the movie is well done, with better production values than I've seen in similar documentaries. As for the rest...

I am a US gamer. 99% of my familiarity with the history of British gaming comes from reading Retro Gamer. I'm familiar with all the big players but am hardly an expert. Still, there wasn't a TON of new information in the movie for me. Not that there necessarily SHOULD be but when you're pitching a product to a niche market, and that market is already going to be very familiar with what you're pitching, it seems like you dig harder for "new" info. Additionally, for a movie whose title is "...to BILLIONS", I expected a little more on the numbers and figures - there were a few mentions but nothing as specific as I would have liked. I did like the flow of the movie as it seemed to do a nice job of moving from one era to another with lots of accompanying game footage to show the improvement in graphics, etc. And the last bit about the increased size in dev teams and the disappearance of so many UK devs was also really good.

In the end, though, this felt "solid" or "good" rather than great. Perhaps it's just too large a subject for 2-1/2 hours to give me the depth and detail I want? I dunno. Not having the Stamper brothers in the film hurt it as well though that's obviously not necessarily the fault of the filmmakers.

Side note: wish they'd done overlays on top of the gameplay footage stating the game and platform.

Bottom line: 7/10, maybe 7.5/10.