Commodore 64 Nostalgia Time
- Scribbled on February 19th, 2007 by Jonah Falcon
- Filed in Retro
I owned a Commodore 64 - it was my first true computer. Yes, I owned the Coleco Adam, but I didn’t really treat it like a computer - I treated it like a ColecoVision writ large. (I did spent $200 on the Adam’s floppy disk drive and never used it. Argh. And the high-speed tape drive included? It destroyed my Super Dragon’s Lair.) However, the C-64 was the perfect meld between console and computer, and one of the major reasons for The Great Video Game Crash of 1983. Heck, it allowed me to use my Atari 2600 joysticks with it. But it had the greatest library of games, ever, which no console or single OS will ever match, especially in the role-playing game and sports genres. It was unparalleled. I loved my Amiga even more, but that’s a sad story that shall be discussed later.
(One interesting note about the C-64: as awesome as it was, the initial batch of C-64’s had a whopping defective unit rate of 33% of released machines. One-third! And people complain about the Xbox 360 and PS3 breaking down and overheating. The first batch of C-64’s were practically stitched together with duct tape and baling wire.)
I’m bringing this up because Hiive Books has announced a new book all about the gray plastic wonder, called The C64 Book - 1982-199x written by Andrew Fisher, a follow up to another book called The ZX Spectrum Book 1982-199x, but practically no one in the United States owned one of those. It’ll talk about the history of the system and focus on roughly 200 of the best games.
Those of you who still fondly remember your C-64, what were the games that really floated your boat? Comment away!
February 20th, 2007 at 3:57 am
Ghostbusters - a truly classic game
Transformers - as a game, it sucked like there was no tomorrow, but it was TRANSFORMER, so I spent about a bajillion hours playing it.
Phantom of the Asteroid - a game that doesn’t seem to get anywhere near the respect it deserves. The most amazing soundtrack of any C64 game I’ve ever played.
February 20th, 2007 at 10:30 am
Two great games by Jeff Minter: Attack of the Mutant Camels (first game I ever had) and Hover Bovver.
May 7th, 2008 at 10:15 am
[...] you want, you can read an ode to the C-64 posted here over a year ago for a sampling of retro love. Share and Enjoy: These icons link to [...]
May 7th, 2008 at 3:09 pm
Sid Meier’s Pirates. Nuff said.