Milo Mundt, also known as MacGyver to people who are in and familiar with the Commodore C64 scene has recently passed away. The sad news was relayed to me on 14th October 2022. He was just 43 years old, just two years my junior.
He was a long-time and passionate advocate of the famous aforementioned Commodore 8-bit, and I first made contact with him over 20 years ago now, and what different times they were. Back then, I was trying to establish a retro-based fanzine. I didn't want my fanzine to be purely about looking back on this game or that computer, as I knew that the C64 especially, and likely other 8-bit home computers, still had new hardware and software being manufactured, albeit no longer mass produced, but enough was happening to take note of.
After doing some research on my dial-up modem, or maybe an early ADSL line, I produced a small PDF called Retro Computing Today which was picked up by the editor of Micro Mart magazine in the UK (when it was still published by the Trinity Mirror group and was based in Birmingham). The then editor, Simon Brew, phoned me and offered me a weekly column about all of these new 8-bit developments.
One of my first few columns that was printed in Micro Mart, in fact I think my second, covered a game called Bomb Mania, published by the German-based Protovision, of which Milo was an active member. At the time, the weekly circulation figures for Micro Mart was around 25,000. And for the first time since the mid-1990s, new C64 software was being reported in a main-stream IT-based publication, before Retro Gamer from Live Publishing was a thing (of course, there was a Retrogamer fanzine, which I recall being written and published from a guy from Liverpool), and even before the Retro section in gamesTM. It was at this point that I sent a photocopy over to my column to Protovision, which appeared on the fledging official website for the 8-bit software company.
During that time, and through my 9 months or so of being a staffer at Live Publishing's Retro Gamer, I worked closely with Milo and other English speakers at Protovision to try and promote what the group were doing. Milo was always very kind to me, allowing me to know about Protovision's developments for my news columns, and sending me software to review and sometimes even preview. It was thanks to my friendship with Milo (and the fact that I owned a CMD SuperCPU) that I got to review Metal Dust in Retro Gamer, something that I'm still very proud of, and a game that is now something of a C64 legend which people either love or hate, usually for all of the wrong reasons on that latter point.
In I think 2005, I met Milo, Jakob Chen-Voos and Malte Mundt (one of the founders of Protovision and Milo's older brother). The group travelled over from Germany for the CGE UK in Croydon. In person, the guys were very kind to me and I got a free t-shirt in the process. I remember that Milo took a picture of me wearing it.
Unfortunately, my tenure didn't last at Retro Gamer, and not long after I found myself in some personal difficulties. Retraining, becoming a father, and other life events overtook my retro computing hobby, and I faded in and out of the "retro scene". But early in 2022, Milo contacted me to see if I could help with English translations of Protovision news items. Whilst I was happy to commit some time as and when, again real life events got in the way. Sadly I could not contribute as much as I would have liked, but this is something that I am trying to rectify.
Aside from the Commodore C64, Milo was a Social Worker, which is something else that I had in common with him as I had worked for Social Services before becoming a full-time writer. I knew him to be a passionate and compassionate person, and would like to extend my deepest condolences to his family and friends. May he rest in peace.
