It is with a heavy heart that we have learned of the news that Retro Gamer’s Nick Thorpe passed away yesterday at the age of 38. This was first confirmed by Retro Gamer editor Darran Jones and picked up by Time Extension today; the reason we are giving this a special post is because several of us here knew Nick online, and he used to write for Arcade Heroes between 2008-2012.
Born in the 1980s, he was an avid console and arcade gamer all his life, as shown by the body of his work, and old photos like this one where he was snapped playing Namco’s Final Lap R with his sister. As a writer and features editor at Retro Gamer, he then went on to interview many of the legends that made the games he loved, including names as big as Sega’s Yu Suzuki.
You can see the posts he made on Arcade Heroes before joining Retro Gamer by clicking here. The last one was a tour around the arcades of Clacton-On-Sea in the UK; he also was able to go behind-the-scenes at Sega Amusements Europe and reported extensively on their games like Sega Rally 3 and GRID. His final post on Retro Gamer covered the 25 best PS2 games of all time. Here’s one of the several videos he took at EAG for the site:
I never had the pleasure of meeting Nick in person, but he was always great to talk to online. Others like Ted here at the site also spoke with him and deeply appreciated his knowledge and enthusiasm for gaming. I know that his mother had various health issues that he focused on, but conversation rarely went into personal life.
We express our sincere condolences to any of his surviving family and friends. Our next token spent will be dedicated to you, Nick. RIP.
