For those of us old enough to remember, it is exciting and not a little bit sobering, to think that the space-opera, shoot-em-up, asteroid-mining, bounty-hunting, piratical, trading game Elite is now over a quarter of a century old.

If you’re now overcome by the warmth of a hazy, nostalgic glow, you will need no reminding that Ian Bell and David Braben’s masterpiece changed the lives – and ruined a good deal of the homework and exam revision – of countless schoolchildren when it was released on 20 September 1984. Perhaps less well-documented but equally importantly, it also provided many, many hours of ‘elicit’ entertainment for parents who switched the BBC B back on once the kids had gone to bed and the coast was clear. For many, Elite was the first taste of gaming. For others, already versed in the pleasures of interactivity, it was the first taste of gaming on a hitherto unimaginably epic scale.

With its revolutionary real-time 3D graphics and emergent gameplay, Elite seemed way ahead of its time when it was released. It turned out that the reason for this was, quite simply, that it was way ahead of its time. The extraordinary ambition and scope of the gameworld, the sense of place and being-in-the-world, the clearly-felt and subtly articulated consequences of one’s action and inaction remain high watermarks in videogaming history. Equally, telling the backstory and locating the gameplay within a complex moral and ethical framework via a wholly different medium in the form of Robert Holdstock’s The Dark Wheel novella is as bold and forward-looking an example of transmedial storytelling as any vogueish contemporary media project.

Obviously, The National Videogame Archive couldn’t let this momentous event in British game development and popular culture go unmmarked and so, in collaboration with GameCity, we are delighted to announce a series of events that not only celebrate the game but also celebrate and recognise the achivements of all the people that made Eilte what it is.

All the people? That’s right. ALL the people. Live. On stage. Surrounded by thousands of origami models of the spacecraft (using the original designs that had been intended for inclusion in the 1980s BBC package and discussed and demonstrated by their creator Mark Bolitho), to the strains of a choir singing an new arrangement of Strauss’ The Blue Danube, Ian Bell, David Braben and a host of others come together to toast the Silver Jubilee of this most cherished of all British videogames.

We will, of course, be documenting proceedings so if you can’t make it along on the day, we have things covered for generations to come. But really, what are you doing that could be more important than this? Be a Fugitive just for once…

You can read more about the event – and download the first origami model – at the GameCity Squared site.