Was the C64 good or bad for the games industry?

[stx2199]

Originally Posted by TEG

but one rectification : The C64 was f*cking awesome. The Spectrum was f*cking awesome. The Atari 8 bit was f*cking awesome. The 2600 was f*cking awesome. Nintendo Game & Watch were f*cking awesome.


Never had feeling for the Atari 8 bits line.

the Atari 8 bits is the best 8 bits computer from the era, even better than the C64 and the MSX
The atari 8 bits have more vivid colors better resolution and gfx than any other competitor
and about the sound, you could say that it is tied with the c64

it happens the C64 have by far better games and a much larger catalog of games

[Predseda]

I still consider C64 as the best MUSIC computer of all times. No matter if the game was good or bad, I used to load a lot of them only for their tunes.

[Retro-Nerd]

Comparing the Pokey with the SID is a bit ridiculous.

[saimon69]

However the pokey is doing very interesting stuff when well squeezed

[malko]

Originally Posted by dreadnought

Thread: DOA

What's this acronym: DOA ?

[roondar]

Originally Posted by malko

What's this acronym: DOA ?

DOA = Dead On Arrival

[malko]

Originally Posted by roondar

DOA = Dead On Arrival

Thanks

[Amigajay]

The more competition the better for consumers, so it was good both the C64 and ZX Spectrum existed.

In the UK in 1983 when the C64 launched at £300+vat (£345) sales were slow but steady, and a few months later Sir Clive reduced the Spectrum price to £129, it was already the number 1 8bit micro in the UK from the year before, he saw no thread from the C64’s relative high price.

Just 12 months after launch, Commodore had to react to the increasing dominating market share Sinclair was getting by reducing the C64 to £199incVAT.

Had it not been for the ZX Spectrum dominating the sector i have no doubt the price would have stayed much higher and the C64 userbase alot lower.

So it doesn’t matter if you like either Sinclair or Commodore better, both helped drive the 8-bit market to the greatness of what it became.

[Dunny]

Back in the day when I was like 12, you'd see screenshots of C64 games and go "aw yeah that looks amazing" and others would reply "oh you should see it on Atari 8 Bit" and although nobody ever owned one, it was understood that it was superior.

I had Sinclairs FWIW. ZX80/81/Spectrum/+/+2/2a before finally caving and buying my stepdad's A1000 off him as part of the divorce between him and my mum. We had commodores in the house (he was a technophile) but the Speccy was my first love.

[dreadnought]

Originally Posted by Megalomaniac

Which other games that I didn't mention would people recommend to show off the versatility of the C64?

This is the biggest problew with your OP - not anything about "the mood", because of course there are a lot of C64 fans on an Amiga board, but stating that this micro had less innovative games than the other platforms.

I did own C64 bitd, but I don't love it as much as I do ZX Spectrum & Amiga. It's a long story but after upgrading from the ZX after a long beg/borrow/steal battle I was somewhat disappointed by the colour palette, a lot of low-res, games via tape deck being PITA, and started another epic beg/borrow/steal campaing to get an Amiga.

But, despite that, there was of course a reason I wanted C64 in the first place, and that was the "big" games. Spectrum has a huge library full of amazing titles, but the reality was that C64 had The Best Game Ever - Pirates!, plus the likes of Pool Of Radiance et al, Maniac Mansion, Bard's Tale, Defender Of The Crown, Ultimas, The Last Ninja, and heaps of other massive "computer game" style releases from that era (some of which you did mention already, like Wasteland), which were mostly impossible to reproduce on the humble 48K ZX or only available on bigger, more expensive machines, like Apple II.

Many of these trailblazing games (eg Pirates! or Maniac Mansion) have originated on C64, so saying that it lacked in this department is simply a no-no.

All in all, if there was only one machine I could take to a desert island, the heart would say "ZX Spectrum" but the brain "C64", and it would be a right choice.

Originally Posted by stx2199

the Atari 8 bits is the best 8 bits computer from the era, even better than the C64 and the MSX

And so it begins

[chb]

Originally Posted by stx2199

The atari 8 bits have more vivid colors better resolution and gfx than any other competitor

I really like the Atari 8-bit, and they obviously do have a larger palette, a higher resolution through overscan and a nice display list feature, but also several shortcomings compared to the C64. The C64 can give every individual 8x8 block a foreground/background color in 320x200 mode or every 4x8 pixel block 3 individual colors + plus one global background color, while the Atari has only 2 resp. 4 global colors (plus display list, ofc). Also sprites are much more flexible on the C64. In reality games and images look often quite a bit more colorful on the C64. Examples can be seen here:
https://c64gfx.com/release/102354
https://c64gfx.com/release/101406
https://c64gfx.com/release/220164
https://c64gfx.com/release/124002
Also, not all Atari 8-bit models had separate chroma/luma outputs, degrading image quality.

Originally Posted by stx2199

and about the sound, you could say that it is tied with the c64

*Cough* that's a bit of a stretch, really. Pokey can just do simple 1-bit square waves; it has 4 voices compared to the SID's 3 voices, but if you want usable frequency control, you lose half of them. The SID has 12-bit waveforms, ADSR envelope generators with 8-bit volume control, a state variable analog filter that gives you high/low/bandpass with variable filter frequency and resonance (albeit variance between chips is quite high for the older 6581 SID, restricting the filter's usefulness), some extra goodies like hardsync and ring modulation. It's pretty close to a typical analog synth of that time like the Minimoog.

I think the C64 was the first home computer (or even home gaming system) were game publishers really started to pay attention to music. So in that aspect it helped the games industry to evolve.

[Adropac2]

Originally Posted by stx2199

the Atari 8 bits is the best 8 bits computer from the era, even better than the C64 and the MSX
The atari 8 bits have more vivid colors better resolution and gfx than any other competitor
and about the sound, you could say that it is tied with the c64

it happens the C64 have by far better games and a much larger catalog of games

I desperately wanted an Atari computer and I think if the support was as monumental as what the C64 received then I would have be overjoyed with the machine. Like every 8bit though there was give and take so far as which had the best hardware and in that case I would argue Atari computers were better at most of what the C64 could do. However looking now at the best from both it's evident the C64 edges out the Atari regardless. Certain games just wouldn't look as good as they do if they were on Atari if looking at the arcade style of things for example. Sam's Journey shows this I think

Colours are also another thing that gets mentioned a lot in the same way Amstrad owners claim the same thing and while I'm in total agreeance in one sense, the C64 has what many might refer to as realistic tones. More muted to some but also less garish for others. The C64 generally has a more realistic look to it's games in terms of how the tones better resemble the actual colours we see in life and while that's maybe not as vivid or pretty, it's closer and therefore better I'm willing to bet for most people. There's certainly a nice jump in 3d performance on Atari though enough that it trounces C64? not really

Awesome machine though and certainly better in a couple of ways but not to the point that it could replicate C64's best I would say. Similarly a game written for what Atari does best would likely be a bit bland on the C64 as the Atari's palette is indeed very striking too

[sokolovic]

Originally Posted by dreadnought

Many of these trailblazing games (eg Pirates! or Maniac Mansion) have originated on C64, so saying that it lacked in this department is simply a no-no.

This sum it up.
I'll add SimCity to that list

Didn't had a C64 back then but I find surprising to thinks it didn't had innovating games.

[BarryB]

I still have 2 x C64 and loads of disk drives and disks, just found the C64 better because it had software on disk which did make loading less painfull than tape hence I used my C64 more than my spectrum when I was a kid, no R Tape Loading errors with a disk

[CCCP alert]

Originally Posted by stx2199

the Atari 8 bits is the best 8 bits computer from the era, even better than the C64 and the MSX
The atari 8 bits have more vivid colors better resolution and gfx than any other competitor
and about the sound, you could say that it is tied with the c64

it happens the C64 have by far better games and a much larger catalogue of games

A common myth, without a version of colour RAM you get 2/256 colours per scanline in 320 pixel mode and just 4 in 160 vs 16 per row of chars with no CPU overhead on VIC II. POKEY is no match for 1981 6581 (you can have up to 3 different combined waveforms in 16 bit resolution on each channel and up to 2 'sample' channels using the click bug, and professional filtering and ADSR so no technical argument to beat that sort of spec). Atari sprites are 8 pixels wide, you only get 5 max vs 24 and 8 per scanline on 64. Atari can't put a hi'res char next to a multicolor char, can't do Coleco/MSX style hi res colourful screens like C64 bitmap mode, you can't do sub pixel scroll hi res scrolling of multicolor chunky modes, you can't make sprites go between a split char background/foreground like Amiga's dual playfield.

The only advantage the Atari had was more colours in palette (first 128 for CTIA 400/800 then later 256 but useless if you only have 2 per scanline for game engines) and a faster CPU (which you need for software sprites anyway).

Don't confuse spastic developments on C64 with hardware potential. Law of the West, Enforcer- Full Metal Blaster or Nobby the Aardvark on any other micro computer of that generation is not possible in that quality without going to Amiga 1000 levels of tech. Like it or lump it the C64 was the best compromise and it is the best sound chip for any 8bit system.....unless you are deaf/a fanboy.

And if you want to throw all of the hardware into display of a static image using sprite multiplexing and 8kb hi res bitmap mode you get pretty much Atari ST quality and for photographic style images the C64 palette on a real TV not shitty vice emu palette bullshit is what photoshop would come up with converting a 24bit photograph scan to 16 colours. It's the same way I made 32 colour per scanline 640x512 OCS custom screen mode for a graphic adventure game engine.

If you don't know you don't know

The fanboys can continue now, the facts have been put out there by experts on both sides many times, nobody's mind will be changed and maybe as an owner's experience the Atari 800 was nicer but technically incorrect comments about better hardware overall, compromises included, can easily be dismissed. That doesn't mean more than half the 10000 64 games aren't spastic colour ram devoid rubbish that don't have galway/hubbard/whittaker amazing soundtracks but hey there are only 5 NES games worth a crap out of 750 made so still plenty to keep you busy.

to put the record straight, Rescue on Fractulus is the most amazing 8bit game of all time for me and I almost bought an 800XL just for that one game in 1985 even though I had a C64 for 2 years. The Amstrad and Spectrum ports are same/worse than the acceptable C64 port, 'better' owners experience though is a subjective dead end argument, you like what you like. But from a hardware point of view the C64 was cheap enough and the right compromises were made.

So let's just actually try to get on as a 'retro community' for once and enjoy this awesome fusion of cutting edge AI visuals and lovely electronica style chiptune audio.

[ Show youtube player ]

[kremiso]

the machine i grew up with
such a wide games library, maybe in another life i'll reach to play everything

i like how the games have been genre ordered in Tosec, really there is a lot more than just platform

Cinemaware included

[pandy71]

Originally Posted by chb

In reality games and images look often quite a bit more colorful on the C64. Examples can be seen here:
https://c64gfx.com/release/102354
https://c64gfx.com/release/101406
https://c64gfx.com/release/220164
https://c64gfx.com/release/124002

Colorful? C64 problem is that all those images are looking exactly same, color limitation severely impacting C64 graphic quality.

C64 is simply unable to deliver something even close to examples provided here: https://github.com/ilmenit/RastaConverter

Originally Posted by chb

*Cough* that's a bit of a stretch, really. Pokey can just do simple 1-bit square waves; it has 4 voices compared to the SID's 3 voices, but if you want usable frequency control, you lose half of them. The SID has 12-bit waveforms, ADSR envelope generators with 8-bit volume control, a state variable analog filter that gives you high/low/bandpass with variable filter frequency and resonance (albeit variance between chips is quite high for the older 6581 SID, restricting the filter's usefulness), some extra goodies like hardsync and ring modulation. It's pretty close to a typical analog synth of that time like the Minimoog.

All true but those threads about POKEY abuse are quite impressive:

https://forums.atariage.com/topic/24...for-8-bit-pcm/

https://forums.atariage.com/topic/27...ujiconvert-01/

[sokolovic]

I didn't notice that there wasn't red or blue in the C64 palette. What a curious choice, but I guess there is probably a reason.

[roondar]

Originally Posted by sokolovic

I didn't notice that there wasn't red or blue in the C64 palette. What a curious choice, but I guess there is probably a reason.

The C64 has both red and blue in it's palette. Now the red is admittedly not it's best colour, because both light red and red are not that saturated. But the blue is quite unmistakably blue.

Here's the C64 blue-on-blue startup screen for instance:
https://www.c64-wiki.com/wiki/BASIC

[Retro-Nerd]

The C64 has just normal saturated colors. But the most pics oder clips on the web uses the old and very inaccurate Pepto palette. He updated his old palette to Colodore, and it's just fine. I can hear this stupid "The C64 has just pastel colors" nonsense anymore. Furthermore the C64 doesn't have fixed colors, so they can look very different (dependig on the used TV/monitor). And the early board revisions output much more saturated colors anyway. I don't know why they decreased the default saturation for the C64c and later models.


https://www.colodore.com/