Some fun news for Commodore 64 fans and enthusiasts--the latest beta for the Commodore 64 .prg generator, C64PrgGen, is now available for download! This nifty utility gives you a handy Commodore 64 program development utility for Windows. Put simply, you can type (or copy and paste) in your Commodore 64 BASIC or machine code into C64PrgGen and it will both assemble and run your code with a single click. C64PrgGen automatically generates a .prg file, which can run directly in your favorite Commodore 64 emulator or on the real hardware using the typical methods for transferring and running "ROM" files. Neat stuff and well worth checking out.

Hello again, everyone, I'm back with Episode 2 of "Armchair Arcade TV", this time on Datasoft's 1984 closet classic, Mancopter for the Commodore 64 (C-64). The majority of technical issues from last episode - which were mostly related to a dying hard drive - have been resolved, plus I've gained another episode's worth of experience on Adobe Premiere Elements. I have a proper HD camera coming soon, so that may make it for Episode 3 or 4, improving video quality of the host segments, and after that I'll address the audio issues. In any case, I'm much happier with this episode and look forward to future productions. The full episode transcript is below the video.

Today's casual photos, taken with the Panasonic digital camera, are: WarGames (Coleco, 1984; Atari 8-bit, Commodore 64), D-Bug (Electronic Arts, 1983; Atari 8-bit), and International Sensible Soccer (Telegames, 1995; Atari Jaguar). Commentary and photos below:

WarGames (Coleco, 1984; Atari 8-bit, Commodore 64), is of course based on the classic 1983 MGM film (which itself was based on a book called War Games) starring Mathew Broderick and Ally Sheedy, which made the hacker lifestyle look oh-so-cool and appealing (and on an IMSAI no less, which was as hacker chic as you could get). For Coleco's short time as a prime-time console and computer player, 1982 - 1985, they made, featured or had several classics among the turkeys for theirs and other platforms. Certainly, WarGames (1983), is undeniably a ColecoVision classic, and Coleco fans were lucky enough for them to make it one of the few games they converted for use on computers (they obviously did quite a few Atari 2600 VCS and Mattel Intellivision conversions) before they expired in the world of videogames (Mattel followed a very similar course of action).

Surfing around I ran into this page here. Some amazing guy has enhanched and recoded much of Ultima III for the c64.

So much so, he compressed the original two disks into one disk. Apparently the code was really bad, they left most of the Apple II stuff un optimised, the text notes that the graphics were internally in Apple II format in RAM and were converted on the fly each time the tile was blitted to the screen.. Yikes. No wonder it was super slow.

Anyway, this version plays so much sweeter.

I also like the removal of the forced Sosaria world map save!

Remember those good old days when the next new game for your home computer would come from typing in a listing published in the latest magazine? Well I thought it would be nice to re-introduce those golden days by starting a topic focusing on (mini) listings especially for the Commodore 64 computer.

While not exactly as monumental or groundbreaking as my tongue-in-cheek title would imply, in my small world it's something fun that I wanted to share--original pixel art (much like AA staffer Mark Vergeer's wonderful icons that we often use on blog posting headers, like the C-64 icon to the upper left) not seen since the mid-1980's. Without further ado, here's the public unveiling of original artwork done by myself and late friend, Ed Beck, done back in our youth on the Commodore 64, armed only with lots of time, a joystick and crude, but effective art programs.

Just an FYI, Gamasutra will be running the ongoing A History of Gaming Platforms from myself and Matt Barton, which will be a series of excerpts from my book that has been over two years in the making. They are committed to an initial run of six excerpts (six systems of the 40+ covered in the same detail as this modified C-64 entry). Today it's on the front page of Gamasutra as their cover feature, but the direct link to the article is here. In regards to the book, there have been some issues with the publisher I had (even though it's still listed for pre-order at Amazon and elsewhere), so we are in search of a new one at this time, but there are plenty of prospects out there and I'm certainly curious what the reaction will be to some of these modified excerpts. I can't say the C-64 entry is my favorite entry, but some of the future entries certainly are. I'll be curious to see how my own perceptions gel with public reaction as this will be the first time some of this material will be widely available.

As a heads-up, the next entry will be on the Vectrex and will run sometime next month. I also believe I have finally found a photographic technique I'll be happy with, so you should also see greatly improved images to go along with that. Enjoy and let me know what you think!

(See the prior entries in this ongoing feature)

NOTE: The format of these for now are going to be the REVIEW (semi-walkthrough) portion first, followed by the STORY (fictionalization) portion. Each portion is stand alone and I'll separate them with headers.

REVIEW

(See The premise at the end of this posting for details on this ongoing feature)
OK, I'm sure you're getting tired of "setup" at this point, but this is finally it. Frankly, it was bothering me that I'd have to type on the same system I was using as a display that I was also capturing direct images and videos on, so I decided to be a bit technically poor and split the composite video/mono audio signals coming from the C-128D into two outputs. There appears to be little-to-no noticeable degradation, so there you go. This will now allow me to be as "authentic" as I prefer to be, meaning I'll be playing "Wizard's Crown" on a real Commodore 8-bit system with a vintage monitor, while still having full capture capability on my laptop.

So, once and for all, here are the specs for the review and chronicle: