This week in Wordchazer’s world has been quite a big one.

• Normality returns in the shape of the start of the Formula 1 season.
• The BBC Micro is almost 30, and the local jungle telegraph has been jangling all week with tales of who is going to attend and just how lavish the celebrations are expected to be.
• There is the usual media coverage of retro computer games, which suddenly appear to be cool these days.
• All is not cool at Game, however, as the High Street retailer struggles amid reports of a falling-out with EA.

Firstly, and entirely non-retro related, is that FORMULA ONE IS BACK…

(That’s enough of that, I’m not going to bore you with my petrolheaded tendencies. You just need to be aware that much of this blog will be typed to the revving sounds of redlining engines for the next few months.)

Secondly is that next weekend is the thirtieth birthday of the BBC Micro. Hosted at the ARM HQ in Cambridge, your intrepid blogger has hopes of being able to provide extensive coverage. For more details of the planned mix of guests, speakers and music, visit the Beeb30 website. Tickets are quite expensive, at nearly £80, but I am hearing that the day will be worth it.

Thirdly, out of left field, the BBC News website provided this article from America about the currently running exhibition The Art of Video Games. It traces the history of graphic art as applied to gaming, from Pac-Man, Pong and visible pixels to Flower in 2009, with its smooth lines and computer code for 200,000 3D blades of grass. Associated with that is a gallery of stills from landmark games to give a taster of the exhibition. If you’re in Washington DC between now and 30 September, catch it at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, or on tour thereafter.

And lastly for this round up, Game. Sadly, the problems which stem from the credit issues the chain was having earlier this year have quickly snowballed. Having been unable to react to several launches in the last few months due to lack of credit, this month the store’s management announced an inability to stock Mass Effect 3, (Newsbeat, 29 February 2012).

In the last few days Rory Cellan-Jones for the BBC provided an overview of the current  situation in the UK (12 March 2012), while the business side of the site produced a sobering account of the company’s fall from grace and the potential outcome.

Perhaps the games industry is in for another shakeup, such as that caused in times past by failure to stock certain in-demand machines or games as required?

Time, no doubt, will tell.