Amiga, Commodore and creativity

[Jack Of Owls]

Been playing the C64 emulator Vice_x64 core for Retroarch today with a decent shader, Man, I never realized how terrible and dull the graphics were and how washed-out the color palettes look. In 1988, to a goofy teenager like myself at the time it practically seemed photorealistic, but now... wow. But the gameplay of the best C64 games must have willed out because there were some great games released for it.

 

[octavius]

The washed out colours was why I disliked the C64 myself. The Speccy had a nice and colourful palette, so why couldn't the C64?

 

[Luzur]

 

[Luzur]

You may have seen the Kickstarter campaign for Canari Games' stunning cinematic platformer Lunark.

The good news is, Canari has given us their blessing to convert the game to the C64 and Spectrum Next if the original game is successfully funded!

If you can, why not pop along and make a donation to help nudge the PC/Mac/switch version over the finish line?

Note: C64 & Spectrum Next versions are separate projects - the Kickstarter campaign is for the PC/Mac/Switch version only.

 

[Jack Of Owls]

The washed out colours was why I disliked the C64 myself. The Speccy had a nice and colourful palette, so why couldn't the C64?

That's how I felt about the original Nintendo game console vs. the Sega Master System. Nintendo had a dull color palette (but still far better than the C64's) while the SMS had a very colorful one, bringing the real rainbow to Rainbow Islands. It also offered the definitive versions of Impossible Mission and Ultima (IV) for console, I understand.

 

[Luzur]

Well i believe C64 was most famous for its music, and not the graphics, i think Amstrad CPC had the best ones back then. Amiga was the Commodore computer to grab that title later.

 

[Jack Of Owls]

Yeah, the music was fantastic on the C64. Sound effects, eh, not so much, unless they somehow used its music capabilities, like that amazing sound you hear when you first enter cyberspace in Neuromancer, which I suspect is taken from its music synthesizer chip rather than whatever handled sound FX (which typically sound as bad as the graphics looked). Fun Fact: the famous UK band Depeche Mode actually used a modified SID chip in one of their music synthesizes.

 

[Jarpie]

C64 graphics didn't look so faded out on CRTs, they look now worse than they actually looked like because of the modern displays, shaders/filters can make some difference, but IMO not that much.

Also, speccy = SHIT!

 

[FeelTheRads]

Also, speccy = SHIT!

NO U

 

[Jack Of Owls]

One of my absolute fondest memories in gaming was the very first time I played the first few minutes of this game on my new C64, and as I left the cafe and was walking (very very slowly due to the crude, clunky character animations of the era) down the streets of Chiba Japan this suddenly came on the soundtrack. I think I even started swaying and bobbing my head to the beat like an autistic kid when I heard it as I slowly ambled along. Oh, such glorious rose-colored moments from my callow youth..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=36ayNm-C9VU

 

[Jack Of Owls]

C64 graphics didn't look so faded out on CRTs, they look now worse than they actually looked like because of the modern displays, shaders/filters can make some difference, but IMO not that much.

Yes, especially if your color TV wasn't properly adjusted and supersaturated with Tint, Color and Contrast turned too high, which was about 90% of home color televisions at the time, in an age long before auto-color adjustment. You could watch an old B&W movie in color if you were clueless enough. Boris Karloff's Frankenstein monster looked oh so cool in oversaturated green tint. I use the CRT-Easymode shader for all my 8-bit/16-bit retrogaming needs. Most of those shaders are shit.

 

[A horse of course]

You may have seen the Kickstarter campaign for Canari Games' stunning cinematic platformer Lunark.

The good news is, Canari has given us their blessing to convert the game to the C64 and Spectrum Next if the original game is successfully funded!

If you can, why not pop along and make a donation to help nudge the PC/Mac/switch version over the finish line?

Note: C64 & Spectrum Next versions are separate projects - the Kickstarter campaign is for the PC/Mac/Switch version only.

How is this retro in the slightest?

 

[Jack Of Owls]

Looks retro to me, cousin. Um, Flashback, Another World, etc.

 

[A horse of course]

Looks retro to me, cousin. Um, Flashback, Another World, et.

Referencing old games does not makes something retro. Is Mighty No. 9 retro too?

 

[Jack Of Owls]

We're talking about the looks/aesthetic here, because obviously nothing can be truly retro that's made in the modern era.

Mighty No. 9? Never heard of it.

 

[Luzur]

You may have seen the Kickstarter campaign for Canari Games' stunning cinematic platformer Lunark.

The good news is, Canari has given us their blessing to convert the game to the C64 and Spectrum Next if the original game is successfully funded!

If you can, why not pop along and make a donation to help nudge the PC/Mac/switch version over the finish line?

Note: C64 & Spectrum Next versions are separate projects - the Kickstarter campaign is for the PC/Mac/Switch version only.

How is this retro in the slightest?

Legendary C64 publishing house Thalamus have announced that they will be porting Lunark to the C64 and Spectrum Next, if the Nintendo Switch and PC/Mac versions are successfully backed on Kickstarter.

 

[A horse of course]

I saw that. "de-make" ports of modern games have been made before. Again, there's nothing retro about that aside from the technical aspect. I'd have thought that by 2019 people wouldn't be so easily fooled by these tumblr "retro-indie" bait games (always low effort, always awful art and sprite work, always brimming with buzzwords in their pitch).

 

[Luzur]

the old crew

 

[Jacob]

Referencing old games does not makes something retro. Is Mighty No. 9 retro too?

Seriously, do you have your own definition of "retro?" Imitating past stuff is literally the definition of retro.

 

[Melcar]

So retro.

 

[Jack Of Owls]

Just wanted to give you a little update on the C64 emulation thing and my assertion earlier in this topic that it looks like ass. Apparently most of these C64 emus have PAL selected by default. If you change it to NTSC and select the "Sony CXA" palette, it completely opens up and becomes noticeably more colorful and less drab, and looks like what I remember my actual C64 looking like on my ancient CRT TV way back when. Still, I wish someone would update that VICE x64 3.0 core for RetroArch because there's no way to save the above mentioned settings once you change them in the VICE core GUI (F10). With those incredible CRT shaders that can be applied to virtually any libretto core, I'm convinced RetroArch is the way to go for almost all 8 & 16-bit (and a lot of 32-bit too) emulation. But VICE x64 for RetroArch almost sucks. No one wants to have to change to NTSC & the external Sony CXA palette every time you launch a game, and the disk swapping feature is absolute tedium, with you needing to write "flipfiles" for each and every multi-disk game you play in the C64's massive disk image library. Correct these problems in the next VICE x64 libretto core (and auto-config joystick issues also present in VICE 3.0 for RA) and you have the prefect emulator for the Commodore 64.

 

[Jack Of Owls]

Just wanted to give you a little update on the C64 emulation thing and my assertion earlier in this topic that it looks like ass. Apparently most of these C64 emus have PAL selected by default. If you change it to NTSC and select the "Sony CXA" palette, it completely opens up and becomes noticeably more colorful and less drab, and looks like what I remember my actual C64 looking like on my ancient CRT TV way back when. Still, I wish someone would update that VICE x64 3.0 core for RetroArch because there's no way to save the above mentioned settings once you change them in the VICE core GUI (F10). With those incredible CRT shaders that can be applied to virtually any libretto core, I'm convinced RetroArch is the way to go for almost all 8 & 16-bit (and a lot of 32-bit too) emulation. But VICE x64 for RetroArch almost sucks. No one wants to have to change to NTSC & the external Sony CXA palette every time you launch a game, and the disk swapping feature is absolute tedium, with you needing to write "flipfiles" for each and every multi-disk game you play in the C64's massive disk image library. Correct these problems in the next VICE x64 libretto core (and auto-config joystick issues also present in VICE 3.0 for RA) and you have the prefect emulator for the Commodore 64.

ETA: Well, I gotz some good news and some bad news for Retroarch fans running the VICE x64 C64 core and want a more colorful palette - First the good news: I just discovered that there is an option for changing to the NTSC standard with the Sony palette enabled within Retroarch which means the setting can be saved. Now the bad news: 90% of the games I tested in NTSC and with the Sony palette run with SEVERE graphical errors and massive and erratic slow downs. Conclusion: Fuck the VICE x64 3.0 libretto core in its current form.

 

[Luzur]

 

[Luzur]

 

[Jack Of Owls]

Been tinkering with playing new C64 games lately, like Sam's Journey and Steel Ranger. Really nice stuff. And while there's a lot of remakes and remasters of old 8-bit games like Hunter's Moon and Yoomp! 64, I didn't realize the scene was still so alive and vibrant. I mean, the Commodore 64 is ancient computer museum shit, son! It shouldn't be as popular as it is, but I'm happy it is. No computer or video gaming console gave me as much joy as my old C64 in the late 80s/early 90s. Even my Amiga 500 felt like a step down from the C64 for me, though that's borderline crazy thinking. Hey, I adore my 64.

In other C64 news, I have also been continuing to tinker with my C64 and C128 lbretro cores for Retroarch. Discovered that the Sony NTSC palette can be used with PAL which makes it look less like ass and more like tits. Using custom viewports in Retroarch I got my big fucking screen (but cheap) Vizio TV filled with C64 real estate in CRT shader heaven and Ultima 5 looks glorious, better than the PC ports (though not that remake in the Dungeon Siege engine). Now that I've mastered disk swap flipfiles I might just attempt that massive collection of floppy dsk imagery known as Newcomer.. or not. Been playing a bit of Ultima 5 for the C64 and it never looked or sounded better. The PC version, even with all the enhancement patches don't do justice to the C64 port, imo. However, I discovered that the Vice x128 libretro core can't be used with command lines so no C128 emulation for Ultima 5 with all its nice music that the IBM U5 mods stole from.