The Dizzy Fansite - 25 Years on the Web
Back in 2023, Yolkfolk.com – The Dizzy Fansite celebrated its 25th Anniversary.
We take a look back at our site’s eggcellent journey.
The year was 1998, over 4 years had passed since the Oliver Twins began walking away from Codemasters, and Codemasters themselves had already decided to abandon Dizzy.
Also back then, the Internet was still in its early days and some people were learning how to make their own websites.
One site in particular was “The Dizzy Website“, founded by
Peter Teal.
This site was set up to not only showcase the Dizzy games and the series’ legacy, but to create a community that will bring together as many Dizzy fans as possible.
Around 1999/2000, the site evolved into “Yolkfolk.com – The Dizzy Website“, with the hosting provided by Emu Gaming and a logo designed by Tommy Pereira, a Portuguese Dizzy fan who ran his own site called “Mondo Dizzy“, and even created the Dizzy Petition demanding Codemasters to revive the series.
Soon after, Peter set up a Community Forum and a mini-site called “The Dizzy Community“.
The creation of the Dizzy Community started a rise in fan-made games, artwork, music remixes and even websites like “The Dizzy Zone” by Melanie Hoyle, “Dizzy World” by Philip Ireson and “Dizzy’s Domain” by Sam Partington.
Not only did the community bring together fans from across the UK, but also attracted fans from other parts of the world like Russia, Poland and Romania to name a few.
Later that same year, Peter was contacted by fellow Dizzy fan Andrew Joseph, who at the time ran his own website called the “Dizzy Remix Zone“.
Andrew had saw an opportunity to see if there was any possibility to merge both of their sites together to provide more content for the growing community.
In 2001, Yolkfolk.com became a two-man team with a more polished website design and stronger relationships with other Dizzy sites.
This was also the point where myself (Adam Markey) had discovered the Dizzy Community while I was still in Year 10 at secondary school.
I found “The Dizzy Zone” first, then discovered Yolkfolk via its Links page.
Which means I never had the chance to see the previous version of Yolkfolk (with Tommy’s logo) in all its glory.
In late 2001/early 2002, Peter left the community due to other commitments, with Andrew now running the site by himself.
The Community Forums had mysteriously closed around that time, which led to Melanie from “The Dizzy Zone” starting a new forum on her own site.
With Philip and Andrew Oliver (The Oliver Twins) now showing their full support, the site was soon renamed as “Yolkfolk – The Official Dizzy Fansite“.
In mid-2004, Yolkfolk.com was now running on its own server after a few years of being hosted via Emu Gaming.
What’s more, the Community Forums were now back on Yolkfolk with a small forum team known as “Team Yolkfolk“, which I became a part of after joining the community in mid-2003.
In 2005, the site was given another redesign and was renamed “Yolkfolk.com – The Dizzy Fansite“.
At that point, the activity on the site had slowed down as Andrew had to tend to other matters.
In late 2006/early 2007, Peter returned to the community to assist Andrew with the site’s upcoming revamp.
I was also invited to be part of this project after spending the last few years sending various contributions to the community and running a short-lived mini site called “Daily Keldor“, which later became part of Yolkfolk as “The Keldor Newsletter” until 2016.
My role on the site is mostly adding new fan games, posting any major news and adding new content to various pages.
Not to mention an occasional tidy-up on some pages aswell!
After a few months working behind the scenes, this website relaunched as “The Dizzy Fansite” in April 2007.
To further celebrate the site’s latest incarnation, the “DizzyAGE” website runned by Alexandru Simion was given a new home under the Yolkfolk.com domain, a year after the game engine’s launch.
Over 150 Fan Games have been made using the engine and the number is still rising!
Lots have happened since that relaunch in 2007.
- An annual DizzyAGE Easter Competiton which ran until 2016.
- We saw Codemasters releasing a mobile remake of “Prince of the Yolkfolk” in 2011.
- We saw the rise and fall of “Dizzy Returns”, the Olivers’ attempt to revive Dizzy via Kickstarter in 2012.
- We as Team Yolkfolk met in person for the first time in 2015.
- We helped the Oliver Twins release 4 previously cancelled NES games, including “Mystery World Dizzy” – a game we never knew existed.
- We saw the release of the Oliver Twins book called “Let’s Go Dizzy” by Fusion Retro Books.
- An NES collection of the Oliver Twins games on the Evercade.
- The release of a “Fast Food” remake on Fuze for the Nintendo Switch.
- The release of “Wonderful Dizzy” on the Spectrum, developed by the team who remade “Crystal Kingdom Dizzy” for the Spectrum in 2017.
- Discovered another scrapped game called “Learn With Dizzy”.
- We released a PC remake of “Dizzy the Adventurer” using graphics and music from the cancelled Sega Mega Drive/Genesis version.
- And the release of over 310 Fan Games, which even to this day, the number is still growing!
We like to thank every single one of you who support the Dizzy series
for helping us get to where we are today!
And a personal thank you to Andrew Joseph and Peter Teal for giving me this
opportunity to be part of this eggcellent site and keeping a piece of my childhood alive.
It has been one roller coaster of a ride with many fond memories
and friends along the way, especially the Oliver Twins!
We certainly hope to continue doing what we do best for many more years to come.
Being the hub for all things Dizzy!
