Dear reader, this is a story of happiness and more happiness and a little bit of confusion spread over a few hundred words.

All stories have a start, which comes at the beginning – except this one, which begins before the start. Come to think of it, though accurate that opening is too difficult to explain – BUT it’s a good line, so it stays in and the Good Reader will no doubt make much of it.

Thus I went on the internet and bought a new white PC Engine from a mysterious source in Japan (eBay).

Back in the day, games mags would demonstrate the size of new consoles by snapping them next to packets of crisps. Or one mag did once at any rate. C+VG’s famous ‘PC Engine Skips’ shot awed literally dozens of people, and with good reason: it combined exotic 16-bit gaming power with a tasty, tangy product. Nowadays the best you could hope for is a pic of a Playstation 17.1 next to a bowl of WKD. Soullessly we march on.

Anyway, fraught with joy I baffled the delivery man with a delighted trot and scurried my buy to my lair. Sweatily I tore the thing from its over-zealous but supremely conscientious packaging. Behold! The beast was about the size of a cow’s toenail and smelt of a 10-year stretch in an abandoned dampness factory. Not forgetting the horror beams of the midday sun and all their cardboard-print draining devilishness, I whisked the archaic gadget to the sanctity of a reachable wardrobe.

Later, when it seemed safe, I swooped into the local Co-op and found a packet of Skips. (I thought they might have gone bust, like Ceefax.) The result of this seemingly meaningless and bewildering jaunt? Well, if the ‘Choose File’ bit has worked properly you should see for yourself:

– Next Week: A Super Grafx arrives on the same day the Bishop turns up for the annual exorcism…