Firebird
History
Firebird was the main label of Telecomsoft, the software arm of UK phone company, British Telecom. Elite was their biggest hit although their versions of the Acornsoft original didn't start appearing until mid 1985. Elite was published under the "Gold Edition" branding, a premium product line which was soon superseded by Telecomsoft's other premium label, Rainbird. Other Firebird sub-labels included "Hot" (full-price), "Super Silver" (mid-price), and the "Silver" budget range which started off at £2.50 but was soon reduced to £1.99 to compete with other budget publishers like Mastertronic. The budget range was relaunched as Silverbird in 1988, but lasted less than a year before being sold off by MicroProse when they bought Telecomsoft in early 1989. MicroProse continued to use the Firebird and Rainbird labels for several years. The most notable hit from the MicroProse Firebird era was Rick Dangerous, developed by a group of former Gremlin employees called "Core Design" who would go on to create Tomb Raider.
Note
The figures for Months in the Top 10 and Months at No. 1 are based on the All Format and Multi Format chart only.
Columns are sortable, sorting by the cover column will sort by chart appearance date.
