Fantasy World Dizzy

An egg as a hero? Why not — and Dizzy took it all the way to becoming one of the most beloved characters of the British eight-bits. Fantasy World Dizzy is the third instalment of the series and, for many fans, the very best.

The game combines a platformer with an adventure: you control the rolling egg Dizzy, jump over chasms, avoid traps and, above all, collect and combine items to solve logic puzzles scattered across a sprawling fairytale world. Typical for the series is the limited inventory space — you can carry only three things at once, which turns planning what to use where into a pleasant brain-teasing challenge. The goal is to rescue your beloved Daisy and defeat the evil wizard Zaks.

Behind Dizzy stand the Oliver brothers (Philip and Andrew), whose studio Codemasters turned the cute egg into a literal cult phenomenon. The Dizzy games were famous for their excellent price-to-fun ratio — they came out as cheap budget titles and yet offered hours of content, colourful humour and catchy music.

Fantasy World Dizzy from 1989 was released on a whole range of platforms and was among the enormous commercial hits of its time. The series as a whole became one of the most successful British gaming ventures of the late eighties, and Dizzy still stirs strong nostalgia to this day — new fan instalments are even being made.

The game's magic lies in the combination of accessibility and depth: a platformer that looks simple at first glance conceals an elaborate puzzle system that rewards attention and experimentation. Together with the characterful cartoon world and humour, this makes Fantasy World Dizzy one of the peaks of the whole series.

Why play it: For the best combination of jumping and puzzles from the legendary Dizzy series, full of British charm and nostalgia.