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115-632: Zool: Ninja of the Nth Dimension is a platform game written for the Amiga by Gremlin Graphics and published in 1992. It was marketed as a rival to Sega 's Sonic the Hedgehog . Zool was ported to other platforms and followed by Zool 2 in 1993. The game is a platform game , relying on smooth, fast-moving gameplay. Its protagonist is Zool, a gremlin " Ninja of the Nth Dimension" who

230-508: A VDSL2 line to a roadside cabinet. The cabinets were linked to Virgin Media backhaul via new fibre laid by Vtesse Networks through BT's local exchange, 5 km away. As well as broadband, Virgin Media offered its full range of TV services, including high definition and on demand, over the new infrastructure. On 11 March 2010, Virgin Media announced a six-month trial using telephone poles to deliver 50 Mbit/s broadband and TV services to

345-608: A true 3D platformer is a French computer game called Alpha Waves , created by Christophe de Dinechin and published by Infogrames in 1990 for the Atari ST , Amiga , and IBM PC compatibles . Bug! , released in 1995 for the Saturn , has a more conservative approach. It allows players to move in all directions, but it does not allow movement along more than one axis at once; the player can move orthogonally but not diagonally. Its characters were pre-rendered sprites, much like

460-488: A "running/jumping/climbing game" while developing it. Miyamoto commonly used the term "athletic game" to refer to Donkey Kong and later games in the genre, such as Super Mario Bros. (1985). Donkey Kong spawned other games with a mix of running, jumping, and vertical traversal, a novel genre that did not match the style of games that came before it, leaving journalists and writers to offer their own terms. Computer and Video Games magazine, among others, referred to

575-452: A 1980 arcade release by Universal , is sometimes credited as the first platformer. Another precursor to the genre from 1980 was Nichibutsu 's Crazy Climber , in which the player character scales vertically scrolling skyscrapers. The unreleased 1979 Intellivision game Hard Hat has a similar concept. Donkey Kong , an arcade video game created by Nintendo and released in July 1981,

690-401: A 2D plane are called 2.5D , as they are a blend of 2D and 3D. The first platformers to simulate a 3D perspective and moving camera emerged in the early-mid-1980s. An early example of this was Konami 's Antarctic Adventure , where the player controls a penguin in a forward-scrolling third-person perspective while having to jump over pits and obstacles. Originally released in 1983 for

805-698: A 3D Sonic game, Sonic Adventure , for its Dreamcast console. It used a hub structure like Super Mario 64 , but its levels were more linear, fast-paced, and action-oriented. Virgin Media Virgin Media Limited/Virgin Media O2 Limited is a telecommunications company from Britain, founded in 2007, which provides telephone , television and internet services in the United Kingdom. Its headquarters are at Green Park in Reading , England. It

920-462: A balance between open-ended and guided exploration. Another platform-adventure released that year, Pony Canyon 's Super Pitfall , was critically panned for its vagueness and weak game design. That same year Jaleco released Esper Boukentai , a sequel to Psychic 5 that scrolled in all directions and allowed the player character to make huge multistory jumps to navigate the vertically oriented levels. Telenet Japan also released its own take on

1035-481: A bouncing car that jumps on various platforms such as buildings, clouds, and hills. Jump Bug offered a glimpse of what was to come, with uneven, suspended platforms, levels that scroll horizontally (and in one section, vertically), and differently themed sections, such as a city, the interior of a large pyramid, and underwater. Irem's 1982 arcade game Moon Patrol combines jumping over obstacles and shooting attackers. A month later, Taito released Jungle King ,

1150-525: A brief burst of episodic platformers where the first was freely distributed and parts 2 and 3 were available for purchase. The abundance of platformers for 16-bit consoles continued late into the generation, with successful games such as Vectorman (1995), Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest (1995), and Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island (1995), but the release of new hardware caused players' attention to move away from 2D genres. The Saturn , PlayStation , and Nintendo 64 nevertheless featured

1265-551: A change-of-ownership clause written into the agreement for UKTV , a joint venture with Telewest's Flextech content division. To prevent this, Telewest instead acquired NTL. In December 2005 NTL:Telewest and mobile virtual network operator ( MVNO ) Virgin Mobile UK announced that talks had taken place regarding a merger. Virgin Mobile's independent directors rejected the original bid of £817 million ($ 1.4 billion), taking

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1380-470: A common term for the genre by 1989, popularized by its usage in the United Kingdom press. Examples include referring to the " Super Mario mould" (such as Kato-chan & Ken-chan ) as platform games, and calling Strider a "platform and ladders" game. The genre originated in the early 1980s. Levels in early platform games were confined to a single screen, viewed in profile, and based on climbing between platforms rather than jumping. Space Panic ,

1495-546: A cost of £110m. Since the announcement, Virgin Media has confirmed that it now plans to also upgrade 50 Mbit/s customers to 120 Mbit/s at no extra cost, in effect cutting the monthly fee for existing 100 Mbit/s customers. On 11 November 2013, Virgin Media announced its 152 Mbit/s downstream broadband service, featuring 12 Mbit/s upstream rates, which started rolling out to customers from 28 February 2014. The company also upgraded existing customers, from 30 Mbit/s to 50 Mbit/s, 60 Mbit/s to 100 Mbit/s, and 120 Mbit/s to

1610-472: A form of bandwidth throttling whereby customer bandwidth was reduced temporarily after a threshold was reached during peak periods. The company experimented with and revised all parameters involved in the throttling, such as threshold size, peak period definitions, throttling percentage and duration. Separate thresholds were applied to upstream and downstream, and thresholds varied between packages. In 2013, Virgin Media changed their traffic management policy to

1725-450: A forward-scrolling effect similar to Sega's 1985 third-person rail shooter Space Harrier . 3-D WorldRunner was an early forward-scrolling pseudo-3D third-person platform-action game where players were free to move in any forward-scrolling direction and could leap over obstacles and chasms. It was notable for being one of the first stereoscopic 3-D games . Square released its sequel, JJ , later that year. The earliest example of

1840-549: A free speed boost from their M500 package to their new M600 package, replacing 516 Mbit/s download and 36 Mbit/s upload with 636 Mbit/s download and 41 Mbit/s upload. The free upgrades were completed for all customers by 31 March 2021. M600 is only available through the Ultimate Oomph package bundle. Virgin Media maintain on their consumer website that they do not throttle users' download or upload bandwidth. However, Virgin Media did originally employ

1955-503: A further 40 stations by the end of 2012. The service, which gives access to mobile internet via a TfL portal offering travel, news and entertainment bulletins, will remain free for Virgin Media customers, along with customers of partnered companies, such as Vodafone and EE , after the 2012 Summer Olympics . Other users will only be able to access a limited amount of free content on the TfL portal, with full mobile internet services offered on

2070-609: A high quality of animation. The 1988 shareware game The Adventures of Captain Comic was one of the first attempts at a Nintendo-style platformer for IBM PC compatibles . It inspired Commander Keen , released by id Software in 1990, which became the first MS-DOS platformer with smooth scrolling graphics. Keen's success resulted in numerous console-styled platformers for MS-DOS compatible operating systems, including Duke Nukem , Duke Nukem II , Cosmo's Cosmic Adventure , and Dark Ages all by Apogee Software . These fueled

2185-495: A minimum payment guarantee included in the contract meant that the actual amount due would exceed twice the payment. The EPG name for Sky News was replaced with Old Sky Snooze . On 2 March 2007, the National Consumer Council accused Sky and Virgin of "behaving like children" and stated that it would consider whether or not to raise a super-complaint against them "that will help to knock heads together" by

2300-559: A named character—Mario, which became a mascot of the company. The term platform game gained traction in the late 1980s, as did the alternate form platformer . During their peak of popularity, platformers were estimated to comprise between a quarter and a third of all console games. By 2006, the genre had experienced a decline in sales, representing a 2% market share as compared to 15% in 1998. In spite of this, platformers are still being commercially released every year, including some which have sold millions of copies. A platformer requires

2415-594: A non-cable telephone line). Virgin Broadband in cabled areas is marketed as "fibre optic broadband". It is a Hybrid fibre-coaxial network, where fibre optic trunk lines are used to connect the area's headend to cabinets on the street. In July 2009 and 2010, Virgin Media Broadband came first in an Ofcom broadband speed test in the UK. Ofcom tested typical speeds of broadband services provided by most ISPs in

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2530-631: A number of successful 2D platformers. The 2D Rayman was a big success on 32-bit consoles. Mega Man 8 and Mega Man X4 helped revitalize interest in Capcom 's Mega Man character . Castlevania: Symphony of the Night revitalized its series and established a new foundation for later Castlevania games. Oddworld and Heart of Darkness kept the subgenre born from Prince of Persia alive. The difficulties of adapting platformer gameplay to three dimensions led some developers to compromise by pairing

2645-737: A pay-as-you-go basis. On 11 February 2010, ntl:Telewest Business was rebranded as Virgin Media Business , marking the end of the NTL and Telewest brand being used by the company. The company provides dedicated internet and telecommunications services to businesses. Virgin Phone offers landline telephone services; it ranks as the number two service behind the former UK state monopoly, BT Group . On 1 April 2010, Virgin Media began to offer free home phone to mobile calls. Virgin Phone customers are able to call Virgin Mobile customers at no charge, within

2760-496: A result of this, 30 Mbit/s or higher packages were only throttled on the upstream, where as 20 Mbit/s or below packages were throttled on both the upstream and the downstream. Sometime after this Virgin Media changed their policy again due to further feedback from customers, and they now state on their website that no matter what broadband package users have taken, they will not be subject to any bandwidth throttling. Virgin Media customers may use Usenet servers ( NNTP ) with

2875-470: A shift in design. Later 3D platformers like Banjo-Kazooie , Spyro the Dragon , and Donkey Kong 64 borrowed its format, and the "collect-a-thon" genre began to form. In order to make this free-roaming model work, developers had to program dynamic, intelligent cameras. A free camera made it harder for players to judge the height and distance of platforms, making jumping puzzles more difficult. Some of

2990-406: A side-scrolling action game some platform elements: jumping between vines, jumping or running beneath bouncing boulders. It was quickly re-released as Jungle Hunt because of similarities to Tarzan . The 1982 Apple II game Track Attack includes a scrolling platform level where the character runs and leaps along the top of a moving train. The character is little more than a stick figure , but

3105-581: A similar package called NTL Freedom . Telewest and NTL began discussions about a merger in late 2003. Thanks to their geographically distinct areas, NTL and Telewest had co-operated previously, as in redirecting potential customers living outside their respective areas. On 3 October 2005, NTL announced a US$ 16 billion purchase of Telewest, to form one of the largest media companies in the UK. The merger agreement as structured would have required NTL to negotiate with BBC Worldwide (the BBC 's commercial arm) due to

3220-725: A teenager with a rebellious personality to appeal to gamers who saw the previous generation of consoles as being for kids. The character's speed showed off the hardware capabilities of the Genesis, which had a CPU clock speed approximately double that of the Super NES. Sonic 's perceived rebellious attitude became a model for game mascots. Other companies attempted to duplicate Sega's success with their own brightly colored anthropomorphisms with attitude. These often were characterized by impatience, sarcasm, and frequent quips. A second generation of platformers for computers appeared alongside

3335-423: Is forced to land on Earth; in order to gain ninja ranking, he has to pass seven lands, beating a boss at the end of each of them. The game contains a number of embedded minigames , including several arcade games, a scrolling space shooter and a game accessible only by making Zool play a certain tune on an in-game piano or finding certain invisible warp points. George Allan came up with the idea of Zool as he

3450-474: Is in a vector game called Major Havoc , which comprises a number of mini-games, including a simple platformer. One of the first raster -based platformers to scroll fluidly in all directions in this manner is 1985's Legend of Kage . In 1985, Enix released the action-adventure platformer Brain Breaker . The following year saw the release of Nintendo's Metroid , which was critically acclaimed for

3565-520: Is owned by Virgin Media O2 , a 50:50 joint venture between Liberty Global and Telefónica . Virgin Media owns and operates its own Hybrid fibre-coaxial (HFC) and Fibre to the Premises (FTTP) networks in the United Kingdom. Although most of the network is urban focused, the new joint venture, Nexfibre (a 50:50 joint venture between Virgin Media O2 and Infravia Capital Partners ) is expanding

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3680-653: The Advertising Standards Authority upheld claims made by Virgin Media in its marketing, despite a complaint from Sky. Until 2013, the company was listed on the NASDAQ Stock Market and the London Stock Exchange . On 5 February 2013, Liberty Global announced that they had agreed to buy Virgin Media for approximately US$ 23.3 billion (£15 billion) in a stock and cash merger. On 15 April, EU regulatory approval for

3795-626: The Atari 2600 , with 256 horizontally connected screens, became one of the best-selling games on the system and was a breakthrough for the genre. Smurf: Rescue in Gargamel's Castle was released on the ColecoVision that same year, adding uneven terrain and scrolling pans between static screens. Manic Miner (1983) and its sequel Jet Set Willy (1984) continued this style of multi-screen levels on home computers . Wanted: Monty Mole won

3910-568: The Berkshire village of Woolhampton . Virgin Media identified more than one million homes in parts of the UK that could benefit from deployment over telephone poles, without the need for government subsidy. During July the trial was extended to existing commercial infrastructure in the Welsh village of Crumlin , Caerphilly. On 7 October 2010, Ofcom ordered BT to open up its fibre-optic network to competing broadband providers to help drive forward

4025-683: The MSX computer, it was subsequently ported to various platforms the following year, including an arcade video game version, NES , and ColecoVision . 1986 saw the release of the sequel to forward-scrolling platformer Antarctic Adventure called Penguin Adventure , which was designed by Hideo Kojima . It included more action game elements, a greater variety of levels, RPG elements such as upgrading equipment, and multiple endings . In early 1987, Square released 3-D WorldRunner , designed by Hironobu Sakaguchi and Nasir Gebelli . Using

4140-530: The Master System with Alex Kidd in Miracle World . It has horizontal and vertical scrolling levels, the ability to punch enemies and obstacles, and shops for the player to buy power-ups and vehicles. Another Sega series that began that same year is Wonder Boy . The original Wonder Boy in 1986 was inspired more by Pac-Land than Super Mario Bros. , with skateboarding segments that gave

4255-694: The Nintendo Entertainment System in 1985, became the archetype for the genre. It was bundled with Nintendo systems in North America, Japan, and Europe, and sold over 40 million copies, according to the 1999 Guinness Book of World Records . Its success as a pack-in led many companies to see platformers as vital to their success, and contributed greatly to popularizing the genre during the third and fourth generations of video game consoles. Sega attempted to emulate this success with their Alex Kidd series, which started in 1986 on

4370-581: The Office of Fair Trading about BSkyB's move, and would withdraw its attempt to buy ITV plc, stating it did not believe it could make a deal on favourable terms. In November 2006, the company signed a deal with Sir Richard Branson to license the Virgin brand for the combined business. NTL Group's services – previously marketed under the NTL , Telewest and Virgin.net brands were merged with Virgin Mobile under

4485-454: The Sega arcade game Congo Bongo (1983) adds a third dimension via isometric graphics . Another popular game of that period, Pitfall! (1982), allows moving left and right through series of non-scrolling screens, expanding the play area. Nintendo 's flagship Super Mario Bros. (1985) was a defining game for the nascent genre, with horizontally scrolling levels and the player controlling

4600-458: The Sky1 , Sky2 , Sky Travel , Sky Travel Extra , Sky Sports News and Sky News channel content with a standard message. Sky attributed part of the rate rise to the fact that the new deal would also include Sky3 , Sky Arts and undisclosed high definition and video on demand content. Sky said the deal would cost only 3p per customer per day (roughly £35,000,000 per year), but Virgin said that

4715-693: The privatised UK Independent Broadcasting Authority transmission network. In 1998 CableTel adopted "NTL" as its new name. NTL purchased the ISP Virgin.net in 2004, having originally operated it as a joint venture with Virgin Group since it launched in November 1996. It sold ADSL broadband services through BT landlines to those living outside areas served by NTL's cable network and also offered subscription-based and subscription-free dial-up Internet access. Prior to acquiring Virgin.net, NTL offered

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4830-537: The virtual camera , it had to be constrained to stop it from clipping through the environment. In 1994, a small developer called Exact released a game for the X68000 computer called Geograph Seal , which was a 3D first-person shooter game with platforming. Players piloted a frog-like mech that could jump and then double-jump or triple-jump high into the air as the camera panned down to help players line up their landings. In addition to shooting, jumping on enemies

4945-607: The "Virgin Media" brand on 8 February 2007, referred to by Virgin as V Day . Virgin.net was integrated into the new brand as Virgin Media Beyond Cable (later Virgin Media National). In February 2007, Virgin Central, an on-demand service, gained the rights to begin showing episodes of the television show Lost (already shown on Sky 1), and other shows including Alias and The OC . This service extended

5060-511: The 22nd best game for the Amiga, noting its "absurdly" high difficulty. Two children's novels based on the games, entitled Cool Zool and Zool Rules , were released in February 1995. They were written by Stan Nicholls and Ian Edginton and published by Boxtree. The Game Maker's Companion (APress, 2010), a book on hobbyist game development, contains step-by-step instructions on how to remake

5175-419: The Amiga original, remixed appropriately for each console's unique sound systems. The original Amiga game was released to critical acclaim, receiving scores of 97%, 96%, 95% from Amiga Computing , Amiga Action and Amiga Format respectively. Electronic Gaming Monthly claimed that Zool sports great graphics, but the character moves too fast with little control. GamePro gave a positive review of

5290-468: The Enchanted Castle , which was only modestly successful. That same year, Capcom released Strider in arcades, which scrolled in multiple directions and allowed the player to summon artificial intelligence partners, such as a droid, tiger, and hawk, to help fight enemies. Another Sega release in 1989 was Shadow Dancer , which is a game that also included an AI partner: a dog who followed

5405-657: The Game Gear version, praising its "great graphics and sound abound", as well as its "crisp" gameplay. Power Unlimited gave the Game Boy version a score of 80% and the Sega Genesis version a score of 81%. The magazine was generally positive to the game, despite noting that the game did not add anything new in the platforming genre. Retrospectively, Virgin Media included Zool on their list of top ten video game ninja heroes. In 2011, Wirtualna Polska ranked it as

5520-456: The Genesis and SNES ports both feature different levels which are structured differently, different background graphics, and unique bosses. The Sega Master System version features smaller, more scaled down stages and a more strict quota on collectible items, but also features unique gameplay moves like a wall climb. With the exception of the CD32 version, all console versions feature the soundtrack of

5635-476: The Hedgehog into 3D. Their project, titled Sonic Xtreme , was to have featured a radically different approach for the series, with an exaggerated fisheye camera and multidirectional gameplay reminiscent of Bug! . Due in part to conflicts with Sega Enterprises in Japan and a rushed schedule, the game never made it to market. In the 1990s, platforming games started to shift from pseudo-3D to "true 3D," which gave

5750-577: The Talk Plan specified periods. Virgin TV , the digital cable television service from Virgin Media, currently ranks as the UK's second largest pay TV service, having 3.6m subscribers, compared to BSkyB's 8.2m as of Q3 2007. Currently 55% of UK households potentially have access to Virgin's network, while anyone in the UK with a line-of-sight view of the Astra & Eurobird satellites at 28.2° east has

5865-427: The UK including Manchester , Leeds , Edinburgh and Glasgow . This is being provided through upgrades to downstream to DOCSIS 3.1, with upload speeds still limited to DOCSIS 3.0 upstream infrastructure. They aim to finish the rollout across the entire Virgin Media network by the end of 2021. On 29 June 2020, Virgin Media announced that customers on their "Ultimate Oomph" broadband, TV and phone package would receive

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5980-459: The UK's 26m homes. On 27 October 2010, Virgin Media announced its 100 Mbit/s downstream broadband service, featuring 10 Mbit/s upstream rates, which went on sale on 8 December 2010. Early service areas were parts of London, the South East and Yorkshire. With the faster upstream rates specifically, it expects the uptake in cloud computing services will also see an increase. The roll-out

6095-468: The UK's first ' quadruple play ' media company, offering television, internet, mobile phone and fixed-line telephone services. The deal included a 30-year exclusive branding agreement that saw NTL adopt the "Virgin" name after it completed its merger with Telewest. NTL:Telewest announced on 8 November 2006 it would change its name to "Virgin Media Inc". On 9 November 2006, NTL announced it had approached

6210-447: The UK, including BSkyB, BT, Tiscali, AOL, TalkTalk, Plusnet, O2 and Orange. Since most broadband connections in the UK are provided by ADSL, and the quality of individual phone lines varies according to distance from exchange, most landline broadband services are marketed as being the maximum speed that the individual's phone line will support, "up to 8 mb". As a result, actual speeds obtained vary greatly, but are always constrained by

6325-487: The UKTV channels on their service with other networks. This led to a backlash by customers with some threatening to leave. The dispute finally ended after three weeks on 11 August 2018 after Virgin Media and UKTV reached an agreement. Virgin Media gradually restored all 10 UKTV channels with their +1 and HD Simulcast channels along with now added simulcast GOLD HD and the reinstalled UKTV Play app. The app now features five times

6440-466: The acquisition of Eurobell , taking the total number of homes past 4.9 million. NTL was established by Barclay Knapp and George Blumenthal in 1993 as "International CableTel", taking advantage of the deregulation of the UK cable market. Initially, Cabletel acquired local cable franchises covering Guildford , Northern Ireland and parts of Central Scotland and South Wales . In 1996, CableTel acquired National Transcommunications Limited (NTL),

6555-529: The acrobatics evoke the movement that games such as Prince of Persia would feature. B.C.'s Quest For Tires (1983) put a recognizable character from American comic strips into side-scrolling, jumping gameplay similar to Moon Patrol . The same year, Snokie for the Commodore 64 and Atari 8-bit computers added uneven terrain to a scrolling platformer. Based on the Saturday morning cartoon rather than

6670-692: The address "news.virginmedia.com". These servers are outsourced to the Highwinds Network Group and are physically based in Amsterdam , Netherlands. Virgin Media also hosts another operational Usenet server previously known as "text.news.ntlworld.com", now "text.news.virginmedia.com", which again has certain restrictions and limits article size to 50 kb. In March 2012, Virgin Media won an exclusive contract to provide Wi-Fi access to London Underground platforms until 2017. The company announced mobile internet at 80 stations by July 2012 and

6785-487: The amount of more on-demand content now available. All UKTV Channels and UKTV app were all completely restored to Virgin Media platforms by 15 August 2018. On 7 May 2020, Liberty Global reached an agreement with Telefónica to merge their UK businesses, Virgin Media and O2 , in a deal worth £31bn, subject to regulatory approval by the Competition and Markets Authority . The CMA approved the merger on 19 May 2021, and

6900-415: The basis for the non-linear mission structure found in most open-world, multi-mission, sidequest -heavy games. Another Capcom platformer that year was Bionic Commando , which popularized a grappling hook mechanic that has since appeared in dozens of games, including Earthworm Jim and Tomb Raider . Scrolling platformers went portable in the late 1980s with games such as Super Mario Land , and

7015-484: The combined company. NTL and Telewest formally completed their merger on 3 March 2006, making the merged company the UK's largest cable provider, with more than 90% of the market. The combined company renamed itself NTL Incorporated, with ex-NTL shareholders controlling 75% of the stock and ex-Telewest shareholders 25%. Nine of the 11 directors of the new board came from NTL, with two from Telewest. NTL:Telewest's takeover of Virgin Mobile completed on 4 July 2006, creating

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7130-465: The commercial television broadcaster ITV plc about a proposed merger, after a similar announcement by ITV. BSkyB effectively blocked the merger on 17 November 2006 by controversially buying a 17.9% stake in ITV plc, a move that attracted anger from NTL shareholder Richard Branson , and an investigation from media and telecoms regulator Ofcom . On 6 December 2006 NTL announced that it had complained to

7245-609: The console as the Super Nintendo Entertainment System in North America, along with Super Mario World , while Sega released Sonic the Hedgehog for the Sega Genesis . Sonic showcased a new style of design made possible by a new generation of hardware: large stages that scrolled in all directions, curved hills, loops, and a physics system allowing players to rush through its levels with well-placed jumps and rolls. Sega characterized Sonic as

7360-421: The criteria of a platformer, and was billed as an action adventure . It used true 3D characters and set pieces, but its environments were rendered using a rigid engine similar to the one used by Wolfenstein 3D , in that it could only render square, flat corridors, rather than suspended platforms that could be jumped between. Sega had tasked their American studio, Sega Technical Institute , with bringing Sonic

7475-688: The deal was granted, the final hurdle in the acquisition. On 4 June, shareholders approved the acquisition and the deal was completed on 7 June. On 3 February 2014, Virgin Media acquired Smallworld Fibre , a cable provider based in North West England and Western Scotland, for an undisclosed fee. Smallworld's network was merged into Virgin Media's during 2014. In November 2014, Virgin Media reached an agreement to sell its ADSL business to TalkTalk Group , allowing Virgin to focus on its cable broadband offering. Virgin began transferring customers to TalkTalk in February 2015. On 20 July 2018, it

7590-632: The detriment of their customers. The policy stated a maximum throttling amount of 40% on most services, however users reported being throttled by as much as 54%. Virgin Media's advertisements regarding their "unlimited" broadband services, and their controversial traffic management were investigated by the Advertising Standards Authority, after having previous advertisements banned. From 28 February 2014, Virgin Media announced that they were scrapping traffic management for downstream traffic on 30 Mbit/s or higher packages. As

7705-419: The earlier Clockwork Knight . The game plays very similarly to 2D platformers, but lets players walk up walls and on ceilings. In 1995, Delphine Software released a 3D sequel to their 2D platformer Flashback . Entitled Fade to Black , it was the first attempt to bring a popular 2D platformer series into 3D. While it retained the puzzle-oriented level design style and step-based control, it did not meet

7820-773: The end of 2015. On 22 March 2017, Virgin Media made ultrafast speeds standard with new bundles. 100 Mbit/s entry level rising to top speed of 300 Mbit/s. On 29 April 2019, Virgin Media unveiled a new bundle with a download speed of 500 Mbit/s; due to Virgin Media's practice of over-provisioning, this bundle can expect average speeds of 516 Mbit/s and a max of 575 Mbit/s. On 30 September 2019, Virgin Media announced their new Gig1 package rollout, providing download speeds up to 1,140 Mbit/s (over 1 Gbit/s) and upload speeds up to 52 Mbit/s, starting in Southampton , which has subsequently rolled out to selected major cities and their surrounding areas across

7935-590: The end of that month. Then on 5 March 2007, Virgin Media threatened to take legal action against BSkyB if the matter remained unresolved in 30   days. On 12 April 2007, Virgin Media filed a legal case in the High Court against BSkyB under the UK Competition Act 1998 and Article 82 of the EC Treaty . BSkyB claimed that Virgin Media made little effort to further arbitration. On 9 May 2008, it

8050-521: The first award for Best Platform game in 1984 from Crash magazine. Later that same year, Epyx released Impossible Mission , and Parker Brothers released Montezuma's Revenge , which further expanded on the exploration aspect. The first platformer to use scrolling graphics came years before the genre became popular. Jump Bug is a platform-shooter developed by Alpha Denshi under contract for Hoei/Coreland and released to arcades in 1981, only five months after Donkey Kong . Players control

8165-541: The foreground and background, and the camera panning and curving around corners. Meanwhile, Pandemonium and Klonoa brought the 2.5D style to the PlayStation . In a break from the past, the Nintendo 64 had the fewest side scrolling platformers with only four; Yoshi's Story , Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards , Goemon's Great Adventure , and Mischief Makers —and most met with a tepid response from critics at

8280-470: The game a greater sense of speed than other platformers at the time, while its sequel, Wonder Boy in Monster Land added action-adventure and role-playing elements. Wonder Boy in turn inspired games such as Adventure Island , Dynastic Hero , Popful Mail , and Shantae . One of the first platformers to scroll in all four directions freely and follow the on-screen character's movement

8395-498: The gameplay from its precursor but traded the frog-like mech for a cartoony rabbit mech called Robbit. The title was successful enough to get two sequels and is remembered for being the first 3D platformer on a console. Rob Fahey of Eurogamer said Jumping Flash was perhaps "one of the most important ancestors of every 3D platformer in the following decade." It holds the record of "First platform videogame in true 3D" according to Guinness World Records . Another early 3D platformer

8510-419: The genre are walking, running, jumping, attacking, and climbing. Jumping is central to the genre, though there are exceptions such as Nintendo 's Popeye and Data East 's BurgerTime , both from 1982. In some games, such as Donkey Kong , the trajectory of a jump is fixed, while in others it can be altered mid-air. Falling may cause damage or death. Many platformers contain environmental obstacles which kill

8625-471: The genre as "Donkey Kong-type" or "Kong-style" games. "Climbing games" was used in Steve Bloom's 1982 book Video Invaders and 1983 magazines Electronic Games (US)—which ran a cover feature called "The Player's Guide to Climbing Games"—and TV Gamer (UK). Bloom defined "climbing games" as titles where the player "must climb from the bottom of the screen to the top while avoiding and/or destroying

8740-457: The genre continued to maintain its popularity, with many games released for the handheld Game Boy and Game Gear systems. By the time the Genesis and TurboGrafx-16 launched, platformers were the most popular genre in console gaming. There was a particular emphasis on having a flagship platform title exclusive to a system, featuring a mascot character. In 1989, Sega released Alex Kidd in

8855-412: The genre. A modern variant of the platform game, especially significant on mobile platforms, is the endless runner , where the main character is always moving forward and the player must dodge or jump to avoid falling or hitting obstacles. Various names were used in the years following the release of the first established game in the genre, Donkey Kong (1981). Shigeru Miyamoto originally called it

8970-447: The individual phone line – the quality of which is out of the control of the broadband provider. Cable broadband has no such speed variability caused by connection quality as the network is fully owned and controlled by the cable company providing the broadband – any slowdowns are wholly as a result of traffic shaping, or local capacity being over-sold or over-subscribed. For this reason, the results showed that Virgin Media's broadband speed

9085-454: The levels were open and had objectives. Completing objectives earned the player stars, and stars were used to unlock more levels. This approach allowed for more efficient use of large 3D areas and rewarded the player for exploration, but it meant less jumping and more action-adventure . Even so, a handful of boss levels offered more traditional platforming. Until then there was no settled way to make 3D platformers, but Super Mario 64 inspired

9200-489: The maze game, Namco's 1984 Pac-Land is a bidirectional, horizontally-scrolling, arcade video game with walking, running, jumping, springboards, power-ups , and a series of unique levels. Pac-Man creator Toru Iwatani described the game as "the pioneer of action games with horizontally running background." According to Iwatani, Shigeru Miyamoto described Pac-Land as an influence on the development of Super Mario Bros. . Nintendo's Super Mario Bros. , released for

9315-473: The merger was completed on 1 June 2021. This created one of the UK's largest entertainment and telecommunications companies, to rival BT Group . The resulting company is called VMED O2 UK Limited, operating as Virgin Media O2 . The broadband division combines NTL's cable-broadband operations ( broadband Internet access connections through cable ), Blueyonder (Telewest's cable-broadband operations) and Virgin.net ( ADSL , broadband Internet access through

9430-405: The more linear 3D platformers like Tork: Prehistoric Punk and Wario World used scripted cameras that limited player control. Games with more open environments like Super Mario 64 and Banjo Kazooie used intelligent cameras that followed the player's movements. Still, when the view was obstructed or not facing what the player needed to see, these intelligent cameras needed to be adjusted by

9545-628: The name "Croydon Cable", and was acquired by United Cable of Denver in 1988. The company expanded during the 1990s and adopted the Telewest name in 1992 following the merger of its then-parent TCI and US West . It expanded into cable television access in 1999 by purchasing the remaining 50% stake in Cable London, one of the first cable TV companies in the UK, from NTL, adding 400,000 homes in north London. In April 2000 Telewest merged with Flextech , and in November extended its cable network with

9660-783: The network to more areas which never had access to the Virgin Media network before. As of Q2 2023, it had a total of approximately 5.8 million customers. Since the acquisition of Smallworld Cable in 2014, Virgin Media is the main cable provider in the UK, with the exception of WightFibre on the Isle of Wight , and covers 51% of UK households. Virgin Media competes primarily in broadband with Sky , BT ( EE ) and TalkTalk . The company's origins lie in both Telewest and NTL , which merged in March 2006. Telewest began in 1984 in Croydon under

9775-662: The new 152 Mbit/s service. The rollout completed in early 2015. In February 2015, Virgin Media announced its biggest investment in broadband infrastructure in over a decade. Set to invest £3bn in improving its fibre optic broadband network, Virgin Media will be increasing the network's reach from 13 million to 17 million homes. On 29 September 2015, Virgin Media announced its broadband packages would be rebranded as Vivid. The company will upgrade existing customers from 50 Mbit/s to 70 Mbit/s, 100 Mbit/s to 150 Mbit/s and 152 Mbit/s to 200 Mbit/s. The speed upgrade will be rolled out to 90% of customers by

9890-483: The new wave of consoles. In the latter half of the 1980s and early 1990s, the Amiga was a strong gaming platform with its custom video hardware and sound hardware . The Atari ST was solidly supported as well. Games like Shadow of the Beast and Turrican showed that computer platformers could rival their console contemporaries. Prince of Persia , originally a late release for the 8-bit Apple II in 1989, featured

10005-511: The obstacles and foes you invariably meet along the way." Under this definition, he listed Space Panic (1980), Donkey Kong , and despite the top down perspective, Frogger (1981) as climbing games. In a December 1982 Creative Computing review of the Apple II game Beer Run , the reviewer used a different term: "I'm going to call this a ladder game, as in the 'ladder genre,' which includes Apple Panic and Donkey Kong ." That label

10120-629: The on-demand service previously known as Teleport TV . Teleport TV was renamed TV Choice offering recently broadcast shows and other shows and series. A channel agreement for Virgin Media to keep non-premium Sky channels ended on 1 March 2007. Virgin Media and Sky failed to reach agreement on the issue, and Sky reacted by posting a letter to the public in major UK newspapers on 28 February 2007. Despite Sky's letter, Virgin Media blamed Sky for tyrannizing them and inciting consumers to switch. The companies failed to resolve their differences, and subsequently after midnight on 1 March 2007, Virgin Media replaced

10235-496: The opening title and the first level "Sweet World" have been removed due to the brand no longer being associated with the series. Platform game The genre started with the 1980 arcade video game Space Panic , which has ladders but not jumping. Donkey Kong , released in 1981, established a template for what were initially called "climbing games". Donkey Kong inspired many clones and games with similar elements, such as Miner 2049er (1982) and Kangaroo (1982), while

10350-696: The original Zool game using GameMaker Studio . Zool Redimensioned was released in August 2021, developed by Sumo Digital Academy and published by publisher Secret Mode on the Steam platform. The game was based on the Mega Drive version, which was included as a bonus. For legal reasons, the Chupa Chups brand and logo that have been heavily featured in the Zool series as part of their sponsorship, featured in

10465-512: The original Amiga version to have this. For the Atari ST, the programmers and graphics artists choose to incorporate the redesigned sprites from their upcoming sequel Zool 2 (in development at the time) to use for their star character on the Atari version to address the criticism that the original Zool character sprites were not cute enough. Most computer ports are close to the Amiga original but

10580-408: The platform-action game, Valis , which contained anime -style cut scenes . In 1987, Capcom 's Mega Man introduced non-linear level progression where the player is able to choose the order in which they complete levels. This was a stark contrast to both linear games like Super Mario Bros. and open-world games like Metroid . GamesRadar credits the "level select" feature of Mega Man as

10695-561: The player around and aid in battle. In 1990, Hudson Soft released Bonk's Adventure , with a protagonist positioned as NEC 's mascot. The following year, Takeru's Cocoron , a late platformer for the Famicom allowed players to build a character from a toy box filled with spare parts. In 1990, the Super Famicom was released in Japan, along with the eagerly anticipated Super Mario World . The following year, Nintendo released

10810-405: The player more control over the character and the camera. To render a 3D environment from any angle the user chose, the graphics hardware had to be sufficiently powerful, and the art and rendering model of the game had to be viewable from every angle. The improvement in graphics technology allowed publishers to make such games but introduced several new issues. For example, if the player could control

10925-481: The player to maneuver their character across platforms to reach a goal while confronting enemies and avoiding obstacles along the way. These games are either presented from the side view, using two-dimensional movement, or in 3D with the camera placed either behind the main character or in isometric perspective . Typical platforming gameplay tends to be very dynamic and challenges a player's reflexes, timing, and dexterity with controls. The most common movement options in

11040-498: The player's character upon contact, such as lava pits or bottomless chasms. The player may be able to collect items and power-ups and give the main character new abilities for overcoming adversities. Most games of this genre consist of multiple levels of increasing difficulty that may be interleaved by boss encounters, where the character has to defeat a particularly dangerous enemy to progress. Simple logical puzzles to resolve and skill trials to overcome are other common elements in

11155-1048: The player. In the 1990s, RPGs , first-person shooters , and more complex action-adventure games captured significant market share. Even so, the platformer thrived. Tomb Raider became one of the bestselling series on the PlayStation , along with Insomniac Games ' Spyro and Naughty Dog 's Crash Bandicoot , one of the few 3D games to stick with linear levels. Moreover, many of the Nintendo 64 's bestsellers were first- and second-party platformers like Super Mario 64 , Banjo-Kazooie , and Donkey Kong 64 . On Windows and Mac , Pangea Software 's Bugdom series and BioWare 's MDK2 proved successful. Several developers who found success with 3D platformers began experimenting with titles that, despite their cartoon art style, were aimed at adults. Examples include Rare 's Conker's Bad Fur Day , Crystal Dynamics 's Gex: Deep Cover Gecko and Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver , and Shiny Entertainment 's Messiah . In 1998, Sega produced

11270-553: The project was Pootz . The soundtrack by Patrick Phelan overlaps with the Lotus 3 soundtrack and inspired several modern electro/techno remixes. The game was heavily hyped upon its initial release, including being bundled with the then-newly launched Amiga 1200 , although not the AGA version with enhanced graphics which followed later. In 2000, the Amiga version of Zool was re-released as part of The Best of Gremlin compilation. Zool

11385-460: The rollout of high-speed internet services in the UK. Ofcom further ordered BT to free up access to network infrastructure – including all telephone poles and underground ducts – for the rollout of broadband to areas BT does not plan to reach. Virgin Media confirmed plans to expand its broadband network in the UK by using the infrastructure owned by BT. By using the approach, the company hoped to expand its network to reach as many as 16 million of

11500-438: The same period. The agreements include fixed annual carriage fees of £30   million for the channels with both channel suppliers able to secure additional capped payments if their channels meet certain performance-related targets. As part of the agreements, both Sky and Virgin Media agreed to terminate all High Court proceedings against each other relating to the carriage of their respective basic channels. On 26 August 2009,

11615-489: The time. Despite this, Yoshi's Story sold over a million copies in the US, and Mischief Makers rode high on the charts in the months following its release. The term 3D platformer usually refers to games with gameplay in three dimensions and polygonal 3D graphics. Games that have 3D gameplay but 2D graphics are usually included under the umbrella of isometric platformers , while those that have 3D graphics but gameplay on

11730-437: The video game industry internationally. The following year, Donkey Kong received a sequel, Donkey Kong Jr. and later Mario Bros. , a platformer with two-player cooperative play . It laid the groundwork for other two-player cooperative games such as Fairyland Story and Bubble Bobble . Beginning in 1982, transitional games emerged with non-scrolling levels spanning multiple screens. David Crane's Pitfall! for

11845-474: The view that NTL's bid "undervalued the business". Sir Richard Branson reportedly expressed confidence that a restructured deal could go ahead, and in January 2006 NTL increased its offer to £961 million (372p per share). On 4 April 2006, NTL announced a £962.4 million recommended offer for Virgin Mobile. According to reports, Branson accepted a mix of shares and cash, making him a 10.7% shareholder of

11960-455: The visual flash of 3D with traditional 2D side scrolling gameplay. These games are often referred to as 2.5D. The first such game was Saturn launch title , Clockwork Knight (1994). The game featured levels and boss characters rendered in 3D, but retained 2D gameplay and used pre-rendered 2D sprites for regular characters, similar to Donkey Kong Country . Its sequel improved upon its design, featuring some 3D effects such as hopping between

12075-413: Was Floating Runner , developed by a Japanese company called Xing and released for PlayStation in early 1996, before the release of Super Mario 64 . Floating Runner uses D-pad controls and a behind-the-character camera perspective. In 1996, Nintendo released Super Mario 64 , which is a game that set the standard for 3D platformers. It let the player explore 3D environments with greater freedom than

12190-505: Was a primary way to attack. This was the first true 3D platform-action game with free-roaming environments, but it was never ported to another platform or released outside Japan, so it remains relatively unknown in the West. The following year, Exact released their follow-up to Geograph Seal . An early title for Sony's new PlayStation console, Jumping Flash! , released in April 1995, kept

12305-530: Was also ported to the Atari Jaguar , Atari ST , Game Boy , Mega Drive/Genesis , SNES , Master System , Game Gear , Amiga CD32 , IBM PC Compatibles , and RISC OS , as well as an arcade machine. The Amiga CD32 version has original red book audio tracks by Neil Biggin and has the option to have both sound effects and music. This and the Acorn Archimedes port are the only two incarnations of

12420-562: Was also used by Video Games Player magazine in 1983 when it named the Coleco port of Donkey Kong "Ladder Game of the Year". Another term used in the late 1980s to 1990s was "character action games", in reference to games such as Super Mario Bros. , Sonic the Hedgehog , and Bubsy . It was also applied more generally to side-scrolling video games , including run and gun video games such as Gunstar Heroes . Platform game became

12535-415: Was announced that Virgin Media would stop broadcasting all of the UKTV channels from 22 July 2018 over fees and an issue with Virgin's on-demand broadcasting rights. The companies were not able to agree terms to allow the ten channels and their +1 and HD offshoots to continue to be available on the platform and the channels stopped being available at just after midnight on 22 July 2018 with Virgin replacing

12650-441: Was closer to (although still not 100% of) the "up to" figures it advertised, compared to the other providers tested. While landline broadband providers offered rates of "up to" 24  Mbit/s , the launch of a Virgin's 50 Mbit/s service on 15 December 2008 was advertised as "the UK's Fastest Broadband." On 8 October 2009, Virgin Media began trials to deliver its TV and broadband services at up to 50 Mbit/s downstream via

12765-438: Was criticized on his previous game Switchblade II for having a lack of enemies. In development, Zool could cast spells to get him out of trouble by collecting potions. For example, Zool could escape from pits with high jump spells and cast a shadow spell to make a clone of him that follows his actions (thus doubling the fire power). In the final version, the spells were replaced with collectible power-ups. The very early name for

12880-420: Was expected to be complete by mid-2012. On 11 January 2012, Virgin Media announced plans to double the speeds of selected broadband packages; its 10 Mbit/s package increased to 20 Mbit/s, 20 Mbit/s and 30Mbit/s to 60 Mbit/s, 50 Mbit/s to 100 Mbit/s, and its 100 Mbit/s package to 120 Mbit/s. The roll-out is expected to begin in February 2012 and be completed by mid-2013, at

12995-532: Was found in any previous game in the genre. With this in mind, Nintendo put an analog control stick on its Nintendo 64 controller, a feature that had not been seen since the Vectrex but which has since become standard. The analog stick provided the fine precision needed with a free perspective. In most 2D platformers, the player finished a level by following a path to a certain point, but in Super Mario 64 ,

13110-620: Was reported that Virgin Media and Sky had held talks to resolve the dispute. On 4 November 2008, it was announced that an agreement had been struck for Sky's Basic channels – including Sky1, Sky2, Sky3, Sky News, Sky Sports News, Sky Arts 1 , Sky Arts 2 , Sky Real Lives and Sky Real Lives 2 to return to Virgin Media from 13 November 2008 until 12 June 2011. In exchange, Sky would provide continued carriage of Virgin Media Television 's channels – Living , Livingit , Bravo , Bravo +1, Challenge , Challenge Jackpot and Virgin1 for

13225-418: Was the first game to allow players to jump over obstacles and gaps. It is widely considered to be the first platformer. It introduced Mario under the name Jumpman. Donkey Kong was ported to many consoles and computers at the time, notably as the system-selling pack-in game for ColecoVision , and also a handheld version from Coleco in 1982. The game helped cement Nintendo's position as an important name in

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