Simon Roberts (b. 1957)

Simon is a British illustrator who painted box art for UK publishers for the Commodore 64 and other home computer systems in the late 1980s. Prior to his contributions to the UK gaming industry, Simon worked as a technical illustrator in Munich, Germany for some of the biggest names in the automotive industry, including Audi, BMW, Jaguar, and Land Rover. He returned to Bristol, UK in 1984. Fittingly, many of Simon’s gaming illustrations feature planes, cars, and other vehicles. Simon has led a global career and now lives in the south of France and works predominantly as a storyboard artist for TV series and movies. He remains an auto enthusiast.

OVGA has included Simon Roberts’ full known box art catalog:

1. Acrojet (MicroProse Software, Inc. | Amstrad CPC, Commodore 64 | 1986)
2. Mean Streak (Mirrorsoft Ltd. | Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum | 1987)
3. Revs+ (Firebird Software | Commodore 64 | 1987) Box art is the Revs logo, for which Simon is credited
4. Sidewize (Firebird Software | Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum | 1987) 
5. Fusion (Electronic Arts | Amiga, Atari ST | 1988)
6. F/A-18 Interceptor (Electronic Arts | Amiga-EUR | 1988)
7. Action Fighter (Firebird Software | Atari ST-EUR, Commodore 64-EUR, ZX Spectrum | 1989)
8. Rotor (Arcana Software Limited | Amiga, Atari ST, DOS | 1990) 

Simon’s art for Action Fighter first appeared in 1987 as advertising art for Autoduel, a title from Origin Systems that appears to have been distributed in the UK by MicroProse. Simon would sometimes sign his work with the initial ‘R’ for his last name, as can be seen in this Microprose multi-game ad from 1988. Simon illustrated a prominent ad for MicroProse’s Gunship and likely had a hand in other advertising pieces for the company, such as this separate 1988 ad.

In addition to box and advertising art, Simon illustrated cover art for several issues of Computer & Video Games magazine in 1988.