15 April 2024, 21:32 | #41 | |
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15 April 2024, 21:42 | #42 |
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C64 is my childhood.
My first computer that I spent countless hours playing games. My favorite games: Elite, Exile, Pirates, Giana, Ghost and Goblins (amazing port from arcade), Wizard of Var, Fantasy world Dizzy (amazing adventure), Creatures 2, Commando, Donald Duck, Bubble Bubble (another amazing port from arcades), Pac Man (and another one)... and many, many more. It was definitely one of most powerful 8-bit machine out there, but I do agreed with some of the comments that his color palette could be much nicer. However, this palette gave it that unique C64 look, where you can pretty much recognize that the game is from C64, only by palette. However most of the games were very smooth, and there was bunch of games that are very very playable. I must admit that my love for my C64 went down a bit, when I saw (for the first time) how games looked on my friends A500. They looked soooo much better. Good thing about C64 is that you can get bunch of games (well, pirated games) very very cheaply, or for free if you exchanging tapes with your friend. How much games could fit per tape? At least 30-40. The annoying thing was, not only loading game, but tweaking that screw in cassette player, until it worked. |
15 April 2024, 21:48 | #43 | |
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That said, I dont have any problem with the C64 palette. It is its signature and give to its library a very distinctive look. I must say that I'm in admiration with what some were able to pull out of this palette. |
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15 April 2024, 21:54 | #44 |
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The purple shade of the blue is due to wrong color palettes used in emulators. A C64 always shows a real blue!
Last edited by Retro-Nerd; 15 April 2024 at 22:09. |
15 April 2024, 21:55 | #45 |
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I had a Spectrum for a short period before it was replaced with a C64.
I didn't like it then and still don't. All I remember from those days was having to run a fan above the spectrum all summer, or else it will show graphics "junk" and crash within a few minutes of use. I guess it was built for British weather The C64 changed my life and is responsible for most of my childhood friends and for my career, its still on my desk and being used. I was never a serious gamer so can't really comment on that, but I liked the C64 games I did play much more than Spectrum ones I had, both in the visual aspect and of course audio. |
15 April 2024, 21:56 | #46 | |
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Impressive - yes, pleasing - IMHO rather not. A bit like playing mods over a PC speaker. Great technical achievement, but not aesthetically satisfying. Pokey always sounds somewhat harsh to me. |
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15 April 2024, 23:07 | #47 | |
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15 April 2024, 23:35 | #48 |
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I've copied PALette (slightly different to Colodore, i.e. yellow tends to be less garish there) on my Ultimate 64 FPGA board and it looks fine on the OLED. It's purely a matter of taste (as long as the colors aren't completely wrong).
Last edited by Retro-Nerd; 15 April 2024 at 23:44. |
16 April 2024, 04:52 | #49 | |
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Here's my idea for a drinking game: go to Lemon 64 Top 100 C64 game's list, crank the votes up to 50 to remove some modern stuff, and have a shot of your favourite poison every time you see an instance of brown, purple(ish) or sickly green, yellow or other normal colour. See how long you can last. That's the reality of how games were made back then. For die-hard C64 fans this might be "realistic", but for everyone else it translates as either "dull" or "weird". Obviously I'm not talking about every single game, since there are many examples of when this palette can work well, and also you could get used to it, but I'm pretty sure that any modern person would pick Atari/CPC (or sometimes even Spectrum) first. |
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16 April 2024, 07:44 | #50 |
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It's as inevitable as the sun rising. Honestly the colour palette on all of them was a bit rubbish. The Speccy/CPC had very saturated colours and missed some useful earthy tones. The C64 had too many grey/brown (and yes, it's red is definitely not red!) colours and it's colour placement constraints only amplified that by tending to use grey everywhere as an accent colour.
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16 April 2024, 10:15 | #51 | |
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Which leads to fans of either CPC/Spectrum/C64 to conclude that their system has the best palette, because it is what they grew up with and loved at the time (and therefore still do). The truth is that AestheticDebris got it right. The 8-bit palettes of these three systems all suck. In their own, special unique ways. Which is exactly why we love them so much |
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16 April 2024, 10:18 | #52 | |
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These are mostly disk-only on the C64 as well, and it's a real pity that disk drives were never really offered as a plug-in upgrade for Spectrums (and went relatively unexploited on the Amstrad by non-French developers as a result). The Spectrum's hardware could have done many of these games were disk drives routinely used (point and click adventures would be challenging due to the Spectrum's colour mapping issues, and I'm not sure DotC (an Amiga original, obvs) would have enough gameplay to overcome the undoubtedly reduced audiovisuals a Spectrum version would have. Related to that - when using a C64 now one big annoyance for me is games which (when ran from tape) load cinematic non-gameplay sections and immediately load again, without having any gameplay or even option selection on that load - mostly but not all American games designed for disks, but Turbo Outrun jumps out as another where the multiload is overambitious and a little disrespectful to the player. I know the C64's special Datasette had motor control, which meant you could show non-interactive sections and not worry about the player having to be present to stop and start the tape manually, but I still find it irritating. Maybe I wouldn't if I had grown up with it though. d4rk3lf's list has some definite classics - there's only Elite and Commando that I'd rather play on the Spectrum than C64, though it's a shame the Spectrum never got Exile, that would have been a perfect fit. Again, mostly arcade-style games though - only Creatures 2 jumps out as something original and innovative that was designed for the C64. I'm not disputing the C64's legacy of adoring fans, the amount of fun people had with it back-in-the-day and beyond, its quality for arcade-style games, and the high quality of many of them. The issue is whether the system really rewarded innovation and invention in game design to the same scale as some other systems. And, linked to this, whether it was the best training group for a new computer user or a wannabe programmer or IT professional. Last edited by Megalomaniac; 16 April 2024 at 10:28. |
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16 April 2024, 10:33 | #53 | |
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ah ah, i was just considering that in first i was playing using a black & white tv that was inside a closet and then a garbage color tv, where the palette was the last of the issues during the Amiga years i had a 1084s, and when i reached to also have another c64 (the later model) i used the extra chroma-luma video cable, and the image on screen was surely better |
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16 April 2024, 11:01 | #54 | |
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I can't really think of any list of top Spectrum/Amstrad games that can't be picked apart in the exact same way as you've done for the C64 examples given. Then, that picking apart could be used to conclude that the Spectrum/Amstrad didn't have that many innovative games and therefore these systems were not innovative/the best training tool/bad for the gaming industry, etc. Just to show what I mean, let me pick out one aspect of your argument (the regional differences between games you talked about): despite what you argue, the US had Z80 based systems, 6809 based systems, 8080/8086 based systems and yes, 6502 based systems. All of these CPU's had popular computer models based on them sold in the US, so the idea that in the US there was only exposure to the 6502 and therefore innovative C64 games from the US don't really count (as they lacked computers featuring different CPU's) is incorrect to start with. In fact, I could make the exact same argument about the Z80 in the UK. Z80 based systems had a clear market majority in the UK for most of the 8-bit home computer era, ergo innovative games originating in the UK for systems with the Z80 don't count - as the UK didn't have enough 6502 exposure for more innovative 6502 games to originate there. Note: I did not make the argument above because I believe it, but instead to try and show you why your argument doesn't work. Last edited by roondar; 16 April 2024 at 11:07. |
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16 April 2024, 11:34 | #55 | |
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I've done some side-by-side comparisons (from YouTube videos) of 3D games available for both systems and well-regarded on both systems (minimum average of 7 on Lemon64): I'd say even Mercenary (designed for the 6502, though for the Atari rather than C64 initially) is more than 20% faster and noticeably smoother on the Spectrum. Fairlight is closer to 75% faster on Spectrum (and looks better on Spectrum IMHO). Head Over Heels is a good 40-50% faster on the Spectrum, but I'm still pleased it averages over 8 on LemonC64 - it shows that a clever, innovative, challenging game can be appreciated even when it's a bit slow and the visuals could be better. The Amstrad version in the best 8-bit one, much as it pains me to say that. The Freescape games are horrendously slow on the C64 and bad enough on the Spectrum, but the general focus on exploration and puzzles rather than 'action' or interaction stops it being ruinous, and obviously everything looks clearer on the C64 - Total Eclipse especially would still be worth playing on the C64 if no other versions existed. Actually, C64 Fairlight feels faster than any 8-bit Freescape game. C64 Elite is visually heavily redesigned to suit the system but is certainly faster than on the Spectrum. Spindizzy (I've never been sure which system that was designed for originally) jumps out as a real achievement on the C64, although the lack of jumps makes it more 2.5D than 3D. I dare say Spectrum owners found it easier than C64 players who were less used to the diagonal controls produced by the isometric view? Last edited by Megalomaniac; 16 April 2024 at 16:36. |
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16 April 2024, 11:36 | #56 |
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When it came to the included BASIC interpreters, the C64 didn't fare particularly well.
But if we're talking BASIC then the BBC beat them all. Edit: Last Ninja 2 was also faster on the Spectrum, if not as pretty to look at. |
16 April 2024, 12:01 | #57 | |
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16 April 2024, 12:19 | #58 |
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this little video just popped out during the nostalgic retrobrowsing
[ Show youtube player ] now that huge floppy drives... |
17 April 2024, 10:49 | #59 |
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While I grew up with the C64 and have a lot of fond memories of it, I barely use it nowadays (unlike the Amiga), and I'm having trouble thinking of iconic on-going game franchises and characters from the system like Mario, Metroid, Zelda, Megaman, Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest, Metal Gear, Castlevania, Kirby, etc. Nothing much is done nowadays with Exile, Paradroid, Mule, Impossible Mission, Bop'n Rumble, Last Ninja, ZigZag, Wizball, IK+, Monty, Zeppelin, Druid, Stormlord... I see the C64 as more foundational and it most certainly inspired a lot of present and past day developers. I'd love to do something with the classic C64 and Speccy characters myself as they're quite charming, but who knows what the IP situation is.
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17 April 2024, 13:20 | #60 |
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I might be wrong here, but weren't these on the Atari 8-Bitters at first?
A lot of the early C64 games originated on the A8s. And even a lot of other "C64 classics" were created on other platforms first on. Like Elite, M.U.L.E., The Bard's Tale, International Karate, Karateka, etc... I had a C64 back in the day, but was never really fond of it.. And now that I have discovered the A8s and finding Jay Miner's handwriting in them, I like these a lot more... |
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