Commodore 64/Amiga converts -- Who else?

[Manhattan Sports Club]

I've become quite enamored lately with C64 and Amiga emulation. I never had any in their heyday, but am finding alot of the games to be pretty good just with a different look and feel to them. I think games like Turrican can compete well enough with Contra for instance, and even the more simple ones like Monty on the Run have their own charm. What attracts me is not just the brilliant music and graphics for their time but also getting to know some good classic 2D games that were not japanese. This is where the west had its own place in classic gaming, something people raised as console gamers tend to forget.

So who else has gotten into these platforms and what are some of your favorite games?

[bb_hood]

Monty on the Run is awesome, you should check out Lazy Jones, its one of the best C64 games and it has awesome music.
I also really like WizBall and Wizard (might be called Super Wizard).

[o.pwuaioc]

Brand new convert here, too. I was convinced that the C64 was the best route after realizing that arcade game after arcade game just looked much better on the C64. A complete DK on an 8-bit system? C64. It makes me want to sell my console versions of these games and just stick with the C64. Unfortunately, another computer for me at the current time is just unfeasible. Emulation it has to be....for now.

[Mayhem]

If you want the best of everything in general, then the C64 is probably the way to go if you want one home computer. US and European game types, short and big, single load and multiload, all genres covered. With some great graphics (in a different way to the NES due to the hardware architecture) and the best sound of any 8-bit machine.

[Manhattan Sports Club]

If you want the best of everything in general, then the C64 is probably the way to go if you want one home computer. US and European game types, short and big, single load and multiload, all genres covered. With some great graphics (in a different way to the NES due to the hardware architecture) and the best sound of any 8-bit machine.

I realized your name/avatar is a reference to Mayhem in Monsterland, a neat little game at that.
The euros seemed to be more fond of the C64/Amiga than the US was, but still a great machine.

[Mayhem]

Probably because consoles didn't take off in a massive way in Europe until the Megadrive (Genesis) and SNES era... people had NES and Master System, but they were often seen as the expensive upstarts on the block, much more costly to buy game wise, and very hard to pirate in comparison.

[treismac]

Yeah, man. I have much love for the C64. Its library ran the gamut from wonderful arcade ports to unique originals. From the former I enjoyed Paperboy, Commando, 1942, Kung Fu Master, Donkey Kong (don't recall right off if it was the Atari or Ocean port), Mario Bros. Ms. Pac-Man, Yie Ar Kung Fu ,Gauntlet, and many, many more. Amongst originals games that I fondly recall are International Karate, Beach Head II, Buggy Boy, Jump Man Jr., Mail Order Monsters (don't imagine this has passed the test of time, though), Impossible Mission, H.E.R.O.*, Way of the Exploding Fist, and Spy Vs. Spy all come to mind as games that well rewarded my patience for waiting through the loading time.

Sadly, my father threw away my Commodore 64 years ago.

I've become quite enamored lately with C64 and Amiga emulation.

What emulator do you use for the C64?

[tom]

Wrong forum, please move to Classic Computer Gaming

[Gamevet]

I realized your name/avatar is a reference to Mayhem in Monsterland, a neat little game at that.
The euros seemed to be more fond of the C64/Amiga than the US was, but still a great machine.

You'd be right about the Amiga in the US, as most computer gamers had moved on to PC, but don't sell the US short on our love for the C-64. I've been rockin my C-64 since 1985 and had several friends that also had the computer as their source for videogames. There was no videogame crash in North America; we just started playing computer games in the early 80s' and quit playing consoles. The NES was not an overnight success in the US and really didn't take off until mid 1988. Even Toys R' US was pushing advertising for the C-64 during the holiday season for 1987. I didn't buy the NES until early 1989, when C-64 software started to fade here and the NES was the hot item here.

Welcome to the C-64 club guys. It's one of the greatest gaming systems ever!


Check out this video. This guy from Europe is introducing modern age gaming kids to the C-64.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0FLlxq5LSlo

[Graham Mitchell]

I actually really like the Amiga. I've got an Amiga-CD 32 in the closet (currently with a broken disc drive ) But it has some really awesome games for it. The Amiga CD-32 version of Microcosm is really the only one worth playing, even though it's basically unbeatale without cheating. Deep Core and D/Generation are also really, really fucking cool, and outperform just about every sega CD game.

My favorites in the Amiga library are the Psygnosis games, however. No console ports of any of them do them justice. Shadow of the Beast II is jaw-dropping, even today. People wonder why the first SotB was so widely ported when they all blow, but it's because the Amiga version is so amazing.

I also really like Elvira II--the Jaws of Cerberus, though I had trouble playing it in emulation. The crack wasn't working properly. But the aspects of the game I got to see were really cool. It's a combination between Shadowgate and a first-person dungeon crawler like Might and Magic, with a super-creepy setting and awesome soundtrack. All the Horrorsoft Amiga games look awesome. I still haven't tried Waxworks. The PC version is available on goodoldgames.com, but the sound blows in that version.

Of all the 16-bit computers and consoles around, the Amiga had the best sound, even if it underperformed compared to the SNES or Genesis in terms of visuals at times. Still I think the majority of games originally made for the Amiga play best on the Amiga.

[Gamevet]

I actually really like the Amiga. I've got an Amiga-CD 32 in the closet (currently with a broken disc drive ) But it has some really awesome games for it. The Amiga CD-32 version of Microcosm is really the only one worth playing, even though it's basically unbeatale without cheating. Deep Core and D/Generation are also really, really fucking cool, and outperform just about every sega CD game.

My favorites in the Amiga library are the Psygnosis games, however. No console ports of any of them do them justice. Shadow of the Beast II is jaw-dropping, even today. People wonder why the first SotB was so widely ported when they all blow, but it's because the Amiga version is so amazing.

I also really like Elvira II--the Jaws of Cerberus, though I had trouble playing it in emulation. The crack wasn't working properly. But the aspects of the game I got to see were really cool. It's a combination between Shadowgate and a first-person dungeon crawler like Might and Magic, with a super-creepy setting and awesome soundtrack. All the Horrorsoft Amiga games look awesome. I still haven't tried Waxworks. The PC version is available on goodoldgames.com, but the sound blows in that version.

Of all the 16-bit computers and consoles around, the Amiga had the best sound, even if it underperformed compared to the SNES or Genesis in terms of visuals at times. Still I think the majority of games originally made for the Amiga play best on the Amiga.

I still have my Amiga 500. I was quite shocked when I had heard that it didn't sell more than 1.5-2 million units in North America. I had 3 different stores in Dallas, that were dedicated to Amiga and another store where I could rent Amiga titles. I saw it as the best computer available at the time, until games like Wing Commander came out for the PC.

[Manhattan Sports Club]

What emulator do you use for the C64?

I'm an Ubuntu user. I've tried running VICE both for Ubuntu and through WINE without success. So, I've been using CCS64 via WINE for the time being since its the only one that's worked for me so far.

For Amiga I use FS-UAE.

[o.pwuaioc]

Just curious, are you in Manhattan? If so, where are you finding C64 games?

[Mayhem]

Check out this video. This guy from Europe is introducing modern age gaming kids to the C-64.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0FLlxq5LSlo

ah, the innocence of youth.

That, by the way... is me presenting

(Seriously, it is me. I did two sets of filming for the BBC last May and June, and the finished piece was made available on the BBC News portal on August 1st)

[blue lander]

If you enjoy European 8 bit computer games, you have to check out the Sinclair Spectrum too. It has a lot of the same titles as the C64, but there's tons of great exclusive titles as well. Many people will probably be turned off by the inferior graphics and music, but it's still worth checking out. I play the Spectrum way more these days than the C64.

[theclaw]

I still have my Amiga 500. I was quite shocked when I had heard that it didn't sell more than 1.5-2 million units in North America. I had 3 different stores in Dallas, that were dedicated to Amiga and another store where I could rent Amiga titles. I saw it as the best computer available at the time, until games like Wing Commander came out for the PC.

I'm used to thinking of C64 as a blockbuster, yet Amiga as a commercial failure. Then again I'm sure many europeans can relate by not quite getting our mass NES popular culture.

[Gamevet]

I'm used to thinking of C64 as a blockbuster, yet Amiga as a commercial failure. Then again I'm sure many europeans can relate by not quite getting our mass NES popular culture.

It was a home computer pop culture here from late 82 to 87. Once the NES started becoming really popular in early 88, the 8-bit computers started fading fast.

I grew up in a small town of about 4,000. I had one friend with an Amiga 1000 in his house. I really didn't get to touch it though, because it was his father's. I would not see an Amiga again (Federated), until I moved to Phoenix for school in 1986 and later when I moved to Dallas in 1989. I never thought the Amiga was even a 1/4 as popular as the C-64 before it, but I thought it had sold at least 3 million in North America. I had PC friends that would tell me the Amiga was nothing more than pretty graphics and sound. I was lucky to live in large cities, where there was plenty of places to purchase software for it, even in 1990. I guess it just never became popular enough to reach the smaller urban areas.

ah, the innocence of youth.

That, by the way... is me presenting

(Seriously, it is me. I did two sets of filming for the BBC last May and June, and the finished piece was made available on the BBC News portal on August 1st)

It's a small world, isn't it?