Graham Gooch World Class Cricket

Released in 1993 for the Amiga and IBM PC compatibles, *Graham Gooch World Class Cricket* was both developed and published by Audiogenic. The game carried the endorsement of the former England cricketer Graham Gooch. Players could choose between test matches and One Day Internationals, with three bowling styles—fast, spin, and swing—available. Fielding could be handled manually or left to the computer. Three difficulty settings—Amateur, Professional, and World Class—were offered. The graphics were pseudo-3D, with details like player shadows shifting as the in-game sun moved. All test-playing nations from 1993 were included, along with a World XI team, and the game tracked batting averages and other statistics.

Several regional versions and updates followed. In Australia, the game was released as *Allan Border Cricket*. A stripped-down version titled *Battle for the Ashes* was made specifically for the 1993 Ashes series. The South African release was called *Jonty Rhodes II - World Class Cricket*. A later, separate game titled *Brian Lara Cricket* was released by Codemasters for the Sega Mega Drive, not a rebranded version of this title. A later update, *Brian Lara Cricket '96*, kept the same core gameplay but added English county sides; in Australia, this version was released as *Shane Warne Cricket*, with state teams replacing the counties.

Two expansion disks were produced. *Graham Gooch's Second Innings* required the original game and included updated statistics from 1994, and added English county teams. *Graham Gooch World Class Cricket - Test Match Special Edition* combined the original game with the *Second Innings* update.

A port to the Atari Jaguar was in development by Williams Brothers Developments and shown in a non-playable state at SCES '94. Telegames planned to release it in the first quarter of 1995, later moving the target to Q2 1995, but Atari Corporation left the home video game console market and the port was never finished.

Following *Graham Gooch World Class Cricket*, Audiogenic developed *Brian Lara Cricket* for the Sega Mega Drive, which was licensed to Codemasters. In 1996, Codemasters took over the Audiogenic development team and went on to release a series of cricket games under the Brian Lara and Shane Warne brands.