It wasn't a Commandore 64, it was a COMMODORE 64! - Page 2

FrustratedPoet · August 13, 2003, 05:29

Yes, Bruce Lee was awesome too.

Ah, so many memories...

Flandrien · August 13, 2003, 06:49

Indeed so many memories.

Remember poke 53281 ?

Remember <-L ?
(The turbo loader that loaded games in a fraction of the time it would normally take, and allowed you to save heaps of games on a single tape ?)

Remember searching for the right poke statements to get unlimited lives in a game ?

Harovan · August 13, 2003, 09:10

When I was a child, computers were the size of a room at least, or even a whole etage. Of course I wanted one, but my mom said we don't have enough space in our 3 room apartment.

Later in the 80s, as mid-twen, I had an Atari 800XL, which had cost me a fortune, because I lived in East Germany and didn't have any relatives in the west and so I had to buy it second hand for a horrendous price. It helped much, though. I learned a lot of programming with it. I had disassembled the whole operating system (~16k) and the basic interpreter (8k) and made my own patches. At one point, I was able to put machine code subroutines in basic strings without using an assembler.

As slow and crappy as it was, but I loved that little machine. It broke in the early 90s, although it was only the power supply, but nobody would fix a hopelessly outdated game computer for a reasonable price. This incident was the reason to buy my 1st PC, a 286/16 with a whopping MB RAM (as opposed to 64k) and 40 MB HDD (as opposed to iirc ~300k per disk). I kept the Atari though, in the hope I could fix it some day, but I couldn't. Finally, I threw it away on my last move, in January 2001, with tears in my eyes.

I played a lot of games. My all time favorite was the Jump and Run game "Pitfall".

Arrian · August 13, 2003, 10:29

BRUCE LEE!!! I'd totally forgotten about that one!

Pitfall was a great one too, but I don't think I had that on my commodore.

-Arrian

MrFun · August 13, 2003, 10:30

Double Dragon on Atari 2600

Arrian · August 13, 2003, 10:31

I'd forgotten about Double Dragon too!

-Arrian

MrFun · August 13, 2003, 10:32

Quote:

Originally posted by Arrian

I'd forgotten about Double Dragon too!

-Arrian

Wasn't it fun to walk around as this blob of pixels with legs, beating other people up with a stick?

Proteus_MST · August 13, 2003, 10:52

I´ve never heard anyone calling it Commandore here in Germany.

But it always had the nickname "Brotkasten" (Bread-Bin) because of his shape

I also began with the Atari 200

got my C-64 with maybe 10 years
and then migrated to the Amiga 500
and much later to my first PC (486 DX2-66)

Does anyone remember those Sport Games like Decathlon,
where you wasted one Joystick after the ofter, because you had to rapidly move the Stick from right to left just to gain Speed in the Running Events?

Harovan · August 13, 2003, 11:00

I played Decathlon on the Atari. It was a good game, although I every time almost caught a tendosynovitis doing the final 1500m with the joystick. That was worse than masturbating.

Other good games I remember (for now) were Bruce Lee (of course), Zorro, International Karate, The Last Frontier (not sure about the name), Mercenary (although with a primitive vector graphic) and a board game named Archon, similar to Chess, but with phantasy pieces.

Adagio · August 13, 2003, 11:38

Quote:

Originally posted by Proteus_MST
Does anyone remember those Sport Games like Decathlon,
where you wasted one Joystick after the ofter, because you had to rapidly move the Stick from right to left just to gain Speed in the Running Events?

I don't know that game, but I sure have spent a lot of my time playing Winter Games, Summer Games, etc...

Needless to say: We changed Joysticks several times during the "C64 ages"

Bereta_Eder · August 13, 2003, 11:43

Quote:

Originally posted by Proteus_MST
Does anyone remember those Sport Games like Decathlon,
where you wasted one Joystick after the ofter, because you had to rapidly move the Stick from right to left just to gain Speed in the Running Events?

yep

also Bruce Lee and Pool of Radiance: keep chaning 8 floppy disks!

C64 and its floppy disks was a major improvement over my Dragon 32 and its tape recoder. Then Amiga 500 (bliss) then the 386.

Oerdin · August 13, 2003, 11:52

The C64 was way ahead of it's time and I loved growing up playing on it. Sure, it didn't have a hard drive but it had full color video outs, a built in sound card, and a tape back up when your average PC was monocrome, couldn't make any sound other then the odd beep, and was the size of a medium suitcase.

What's more all the cool games came out on C64 first and then on PC only afterwards (around 1990 this changed and more games came out on PC). I loved playing Spy Hunter, Blue Max, Santa Pavara, all the Atari golden oldies, the AD&D gold box games (I remember thinking it was so cool that I could build a character and play him in 3 different games), Zork, and a bunch of other ones.

Oerdin · August 13, 2003, 12:01

I also had an Atari 2600 game council and the cool thing is I could use the joystick from the Atari on the C64.

There was also a cartrage bay (Two of them) on the C64 where the programing language was compatable with the Atari's but Commandore made their cartrages a different size so you had to buy the same game twice if you wanted to play it both on the C64 and on the Atari.

As I recall eventually someone came out with an adapter so you could plug Atari 2600 games into your C64.

Proteus_MST · August 13, 2003, 12:05

Quote:

Originally posted by paiktis22

yep

also Bruce Lee and Pool of Radiance: keep chaning 8 floppy disks!

C64 and its floppy disks was a major improvement over my Dragon 32 and its tape recoder. Then Amiga 500 (bliss) then the 386.

Ah yes, my C-64 at first also had a tape recorder.
We always traded games in School, each cassette had Turbotape at the Beginning (Program to compress Files) and then you could load the Games via using <- L (an arrow pointing eft, a key which modern PCs don´t possess and an L) and of course by using the Rewind and Fast Forward Kerys on the Recorder.
I remember the dynamic Linepattern (red and black Lines) that appeared while Loading via Turbotape, with the pattern being chaotic if you were in the midsts of Loading and consisting of horizontal lines moving downwards, if Turbotape had found the Beginning of a new File.
It was a very sad event, when I one time used a Cassette for Musicrecordings and forgot that I already had used it to record Games like Agent USA and the like.

Later of course I used a C 1541 Floppy.

As for Pool of Radiance:
Yep, it was a great game, despite always having to change Discs if you came to another Part of the City.
For some strange Reason I still remember the Codes, you got on the Isle with these many Sceletons movin around.
Lux, Samosud, Shestni

Later with the Amiga 500 I bought my first Harddisk.
200 MB for a Price of 2400 DM (which is 1200 Euro at the momentary Exchange Rate (not considering thingslike Inflation)
Despite only being 200 MB I never managed to completely fill the Harddisk

Oerdin · August 13, 2003, 12:08

Quote:

Originally posted by Proteus_MST

Lux, Samosud, Shestni

That's so funny. I also remember finding those outside the main gate of Sokul Keep which is on the island in New Phlan Harbor.

13 years later and I still remember the secret code words.

Bereta_Eder · August 13, 2003, 12:15

"As for Pool of Radiance:
Yep, it was a great game, despite always having to change Discs if you came to another Part of the City.
For some strange Reason I still remember the Codes, you got on the Isle with these many Sceletons movin around.
Lux, Samosud Shestni"

Yeah

You know I was lucky to find them so fast since the skeletons would not recognize them if you hadn't found the piece of parchment before hand

For the time, I was amazied as to how huge it was... I thought that Civilized Phlan and the Slums were all there was to it. Then I loaded up the next area (Cadorna's square or The Market area I don't remember) and I was in disbelief to see there was so much more game left. Not to mention when I actually got outside the city...

Bereta_Eder · August 13, 2003, 12:18

Oh yea, the first copy I got was pirated. Then I got theoriginal one (and saw the maps

)

Oerdin · August 13, 2003, 12:21

The game was HUGE! I mean 8x300kb who would ever use that much code.

I remember having such a hard time killing the nest of trolls in the slums. Your characters were to low in level to go on to the library or Cadorna Square and also to weak to beat the trolls. I finally just hired two mercenaries and let them do most of the fighting for me. After the battle I killed them and gained two +1 swords.

Bereta_Eder · August 13, 2003, 12:24

Yeah the trolls were difficult!

I also got two mercenaries and used them as "troll fodder(!)" while my team kept firing whatever they had at them. Spells, Oil bombs, arrows, darts etc etc etc

Oil bombs were important! I remember I couldnt believe when I had beaten them for the 1st time (having 3 team members with 3 or 4 hit points), when one of them rose back up!!!! (and killed two of my pcs)

Adagio · August 13, 2003, 12:45

Quote:

Originally posted by Proteus_MST
I remember the dynamic Linepattern (red and black Lines) that appeared while Loading via Turbotape, with the pattern being chaotic if you were in the midsts of Loading and consisting of horizontal lines moving downwards, if Turbotape had found the Beginning of a new File.

Wasn't it all possible colors, and not just red and black? I remember more different colors when loading...

By the way, what was the point of those "load lines"? Where they just there to show the user, a game was loading, or did it have any purpose actually?

Japher · August 13, 2003, 12:49

coma-bore... like this thread

I liked Frogger too, and Pitfall

Adagio · August 13, 2003, 12:51

Quote:

Originally posted by Japher
I liked Frogger too

Who didn't?

Proteus_MST · August 13, 2003, 13:19

Quote:

Originally posted by paiktis22
Yeah the trolls were difficult!

I also got two mercenaries and used them as "troll fodder(!)" while my team kept firing whatever they had at them. Spells, Oil bombs, arrows, darts etc etc etc

I Liked Mercenaries,
they were good Supplies of good Armor and Weapons,
you just had to attack them after they were weakened after Battle and themn take the Weapons and Armor from their Corpses

Proteus_MST · August 13, 2003, 13:25

Quote:

Originally posted by ADG

Wasn't it all possible colors, and not just red and black? I remember more different colors when loading...

By the way, what was the point of those "load lines"? Where they just there to show the user, a game was loading, or did it have any purpose actually?

My memory tells me from Red and Black.

As for the Purpose:
I had the Imagination that those lines where somehow a function of the Data the Program read at the moment, so unorderly Patterns of Bytes would create chaotic Patterns of Lines, No Data would just generate a Black screen while ordered Patterns of Bytes would create more ordered Lines.
So I suppose, that these Loading Lines could have something to do with each File having a orderly Pattern of Bytes as a Header.

Odin · August 13, 2003, 16:25

I was too young for the C-64.

My first gammining machine was a NES in 1990, when I was 4, then a SNES when I was 6. My sister was addicted to Super Mario Bros. and Final Fantasy.

Bereta_Eder · August 13, 2003, 16:27

Quote:

Originally posted by Proteus_MST

I Liked Mercenaries,
they were good Supplies of good Armor and Weapons,
you just had to attack them after they were weakened after Battle and themn take the Weapons and Armor from their Corpses

I never did it. I didnt consider it "ethical"

I tried to keep them alive and even bothered to return them to the training hall before dismissing them

Arrian · August 13, 2003, 16:47

Holy ****! You guys remember an awful lot about PoR! I just vaguely remember having the game. I'm not sure I finished it. I definitely beat Dragons of Krynn, though.

Winter Games!

Remember that too. I liked the skiing (jumping/racing), but the figure skating part sucked.

-Arrian

Bereta_Eder · August 13, 2003, 16:50

Yeah I can honestly say that PoR has left a very lasting impression on me, and others as I see

It was I think the first full immersion to a real and very big for its time CRPG.

Stefu · August 13, 2003, 17:03

I had Winter Games. Summer Games, too. And California Games, though all the events didn't work in California Games. Don't remember much anything about the games, but I played them quite a bit.

What else did I have for C64 except for the Games series and Rick Dangerous? Mmm... Mission: Impossible, I believe. Also some space game that kicked veritable arse but the name of which I sadly don't remember.

There's this one game I had either on C64 or Amiga, but I don't remember the name, or much about it. It happened in some kind of a fantasy/fairytale world, the main playable character had a flute, and at least one enemy type was some kind of a blue bird. Also, I have a feeling the game was developed by Ubisoft or some French company (Or wait, is Ubisoft a French company?) Anyway, for nostalgy's sake, I'd at least like to remember the title.

Hueij · August 13, 2003, 17:56

Quote:

Also some space game that kicked veritable arse but the name of which I sadly don't remember.

Elite?

I lost quite a few hours playing that game.