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The Commodore 64 Appreciation Thread

Vimster

By Vimster,
in Retro & Arcade Gaming

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Vimster

Vimster

Posted
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I couldn't find anything similar so I thought I'd start it. A thread for all those little bits that wouldn't really benefit from a whole separate topic.

 

First up: The Ultimate Tape Archive

 

https://archive.org/details/ultimatetapearchive

 

From Jason Scott, this is an archive of C64 game tapes including cover scans and tape scans. Crucially you can play the games in browser but they load in real time, tape speed. I'm one of those weirdos who actually likes to see games load from tape, the whole ritual of waiting for the game t load, the border bars, loading screens and, on the C64, loading music.

 

 

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gone fishin

gone fishin

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The beauty of having a C64 with something like the SD2IEC is that the majority of the time you can just fire up the games you want to play and they load really quickly (oh, if you've got a Fast Loader cart, mind!), while the occasion when you've got a little bit more time you can connect the datasette and load a few select from tape, the ones that have loading music, the mini arcade games or even just great pictures. There's nothing more nostalgic than that!

 

The Ocean loaders, quite rightly, get a lot of attention, but as a Speccy owner in the 80s (I didn't get a C64 until about 1994 when I picked one up cheap advertised locally), I loved the US Gold loaders on the C64, especially as the games were typically of much better quality than the Spectrum - or often not even available on the Speccy! 

 

 

Even the "Novaload" beeps brings back memories (written by Paul Woakes of Mercenary, Novagen fame). 

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gunrock

gunrock

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Just bought a breadbin C64 off of Ebay. I need a new Psu and some other bits and bobs, I massively regret selling my C64 to get my Amiga 1000 (sadly also sold). I threw away all my discs in the mid 2000s, another regret, especially as there seems to be software I've not found again and obviously my own basic and 6510 code, all gone. :(

 

I have a MiST fpga and the C64 implementation is really good, but I want to teach BASIC to my kids and keep it very simple and immediate.

 

 

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Lorfarius

Lorfarius

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1 hour ago, gunrock said:

I have a MiST fpga and the C64 implementation is really good, but I want to teach BASIC to my kids and keep it very simple and immediate.

 

 

 

Maybe give them something like this to do:

 

https://scratch.mit.edu/

 

Lots of schools are using it as its a great way of introducing programming to kids. Even one of the Oliver Twins went back and rewrote a Dizzy game in it a few years ago.

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gunrock

gunrock

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Lorf: yeah, I'm well aware of Scratch and Python but I want to give them something initially with low expectations and utter immediacy and not multiple layers of stuff (boot up, login screens, start scratch etc.) Doing stuff in scratch is more rewarding visually, but I want some very simple interaction and I think the limits of 8 bit are are good place to start (if only to understand the unglamorous and unforgiving nature of it).

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ScouserInExile

ScouserInExile

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I think selling my C64(c) setup is my greatest retro regret. I had a 1541-II, an Action Replay cartridge and more games than I care to think about. Sold for £40 in 1994. 

 

I keep thinking I should either get one off eBay, or maybe get on of the minis. Aren't they going to bring out a full sized "mini"? Would love one with a proper keyboard.

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carleton

carleton

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I too regret not owning my C64 these days although for the life of me I can't remember why I no longer have it, I don't remember selling it. I just missed out on a bargain C64 last week which would have been great now that I'm developing C64 games again. 

 

My worst C64 memory is saving up to buy a 3rd party disk drive by Evesham Micros, it cost me £160 back in the 80s and was really unreliable. I lost loads of code and stuff to it and ending up smashing it in frustration.

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carleton

carleton

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I can’t decide between Maclean or Braybrook for my fave developer. The latter had it for really original concepts but the former made brilliant souped up versions of similar games. Dropzone is still excellent but some of the ideas in Paradroid were amazing and made for tense games. I’ll call it a tie.

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Clipper

Clipper

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I have many soft spots in the 8 bit era but the two main ones are Braybrook and Minter - both on c64

 

If someone forced me to choose I'd say Braybrook.

 

Paradroid is magnificent - when we last did a top 100 in 2015 in the main discussion forum, paradroid was 8th in my list. And that isn't gilding the lily or rose tinted glasses - if you asked me to choose desert island games I'd still pick paradroid.

 

I play it regularly even now - emulated and on real hardware and never bore of it, the game balance of risk/reward between destroying and possessing droids is just perfectly pitched.

 

 

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Vimster

Vimster

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I have a dizzy spell thinking about the C64 stuff I used to have and appear to have lost: complete copy of GEOS with a mouse, C64 Music System (the one with the keyboard that went over the computer keyboard), a copy of Dragon Wars (very late-in-the-day Interplay RPG). Probably the worst though is the though of the boxed 64C that vanished when we cleared my mum's house out in 2011. And the tonnage of tape games I had back in the day, I honestly don't know what came of them either. I guess this is what happens as you get older and move.

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Vimster

Vimster

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I can recommend subscribing to Polaventris on Youtube. He's a Finnish guy who plays C64 games requested by viewers. They're not reviews really. He also does some Twitch streaming of C64 games. I like his style, very relaxed and soothing. He's been doing this for years and he has tons of videos in a similar style. You might find some interesting games from there.

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gone fishin

gone fishin

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Despite originally being a Spectrum owner, I think the C64 now is the pinnacle of 8-bit home computer gaming. Because Commodore didn't scrimp on features at the time (unlike the Spectrum), it makes it easy, and satisfying, to play now. 

 

There's also a really active home-brew scene on the C64 with new games getting released every week and some of them are fantastic quality. 

 

If you've got some time to kill, this guy did a series of YouTube videos called "Mastertronic Chronicles" where he bought, played and reviewed every single C64 Mastertronic release (including Ricochet re-releases). There's a video for every single game, but here's a top ten of original releases

 

 

It's funny watching the Top Ten original releases because there are some games on there that I remember really enjoying at the time on my friend's C64 but were given poor magazine reviews. Like the amazing  Street Surfer which I believe  @Ste Pickford did the graphics for?

 

Here's a focus on Binary Design developed games for Mastertronic, although the output didn't seem as high quality as their Spectrum releases, there were a few great games

 

 

Bit of the opposite with Mr Chip software whose C64 versions were definitely better than the Spectrum versions.

 

 

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Ste Pickford

Ste Pickford

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Street Surfer was done by an American studio (Sculptured Software?  Can't remember).  It came to us at Binary, and Mastertronic asked us to improve the graphics, as they thought they were a bit rough.  I *think* I redrew the main sprites of the surfer?  My memory is shocking though, and I'm not sure.  I don't think my redrawn version was anything special, as I hated doing C64 graphics as the tools were universally awful (a joystick is a terrible input device for creating pixel art).  I definitely did a loading screen for it.  I probably only spent about 1 week working on graphics for this game.

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gone fishin

gone fishin

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Nah, it wasn’t Road Rash... it was Skitchin’!!! 

 

Remember Skitchin’???

 

Its the forgotten Road Rash on Skates game from the 90s (brought to you by the developers of Road Rash)

 

 

 

yeah, Skitchin totally stole all the ideas from street surfer

 

(nobody remembers Skitchin)

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gone fishin

gone fishin

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11 hours ago, Vimster said:

So this is what C64 music legend Martin Galway is doing at the moment.

 

in honour of Martin Galway's outstanding musical achievements on the Commodore 64 here's nearly an hour of his music!

 

 

jump to here to listen to his great version of "It's a Kind of Magic" from Highlander (the music and the cover art were the only good things about that game!)

 

Reading up on him, his last job was Audio Director for Star Citizen. It says something when driving a taxi is more fun and rewarding.

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