Just so you know: this article doesn't mention wasps. It's literally just about games company logos. Please don't mistake it for one of those articles about wasps.
The deep blues, the curves of the lettering, the way the A and the N are conjoined... the subtle flares of light. It's properly lovely, and it worked just as well as a flat, two-colour image.
It also didn't help that the lettering and the background were shades of the same gold/yellow - which made it ugly, and difficult to read at a distance.
Take away the chrome, and there's very little about it which is iconic - save perhaps, for the slanted A. When I got my first job as a graphic designer for Ladbrokes Racing, I was forever trying to recreate Ultimate's chrome look.
The graphics technology we had at Ladbrokes was a step up from teletext software, but still incredibly limited. I gave it my best shot, mind.
It's not even particularly chrome-y; I just like how tactile it appears - I could imagine running my fingers or lips over it. That might sound a bit weird, but... well... it is what it is. At least I didn't say I want to lick a wasp, or something!
In part, this is entirely down to the logo - designed by prog rock cover legend Roger Dean - who also inspired the visual look of the Amiga classic Shadow of the Beast.
It's cold, it's clinical, and virtually impossible to read on first glance, and it has an owl in it - yet it's a masterpiece. But then, I would say that being a shameless prog rock fan. Though that said, I've never much liked Yes. Perhaps they should've changed their name to "Yes?", to which I would've replied "No thanks!".
It's a chart showing a wasp, and two other things: a type of fat wasp called a bumblebee, and a honey bee - another type of wasp, with a furry thorax. None of these wasp-types will be featured in this article. That is the purpose of this chart.
Should you notice this, please don't mistake it as an indication that I am about to begin talking about wasps. The letter W can be used for many different purposes, and I have no intention of featuring wasps in this article. I can't state this enough.
Strangely, while The Bitmap Brothers' graphics were all about that chrome-look airbrushing, they decided that the company logo should have no truck with such things, and fall in step with the prevailing winds.
It's pretty iconic - you could see the hand as the cover of a Joy Division album. Actually, Joy Division is precisely the sort of name you could imagine a 1980s games studio having.
Anyway, he has something to do with The Wielka Orkiestra Świątecznej Pomocy - or WOSP, a Polish charity. While the WOSP isn't the same thing as a wasp, please don't fall into the trap of thinking that the WOSP is going to be the focus of this article, when really it's all about games company logos.
Nevertheless, I do miss the days when the company logos leapt out at you from the packaging, like an old friend bursting from a bush. You look at most modern corporate logos and you might as well be looking at a Shutterstock image of a board meeting, or a financial returns spreadsheet.
How many of today's games company logos can you describe? What about the Ubisoft logo, or the one for Take Two Interactive, or Bethesda? What about Square Enix, or Rovio? It isn't that I want a return to the chrome and airbrushing of yore - I just want designers to look beyond the fonts and Adobe options that are right in front of them, and dig a little deeper into their imaginations.