Chapter 1.7

Commodore 64 (1982)

History

There are few vintage home computers as beloved and recognizable as the Commodore 64 (C-64), the best-selling personal computer of all time according to The Guinness Book of World Records.¹ Debuting in 1982, the C-64 soon dominated the low-end computer market, enjoying robust support from third-party software and hardware developers into the 1990s. Although the C-64 was no programmer’s dream, its low cost and functionality made it a fantastic bargain for consumers. Even at its introductory price of $595, it was still cheaper than the equivalent Apple IIe ($1400) or Atari 1200XL ($599). Furthermore, the C-64’s availability at major retail outlets such as Kmart and Sears gave it broad exposure to its target demographic—working-class families who liked the idea of an affordable computer that could also play the latest games and (hopefully) help the kids somehow with their homework. Although the C-64 was finally discontinued in 1994, it still enjoys among the most active and devoted fan communities of all vintage home computers, with dozens of websites catering to the needs of C-64 collectors, retrogamers, and nostalgic fans.

The C-64 is by far Commodore’s most famous machine, but it wasn’t their first. Indeed, the Commodore PET, introduced in 1977, was part of the original trinity of machines released that year (along with the Apple II and the TRS-80). The PET featured an all-in-one design that included a built-in monitor, keyboard, and cassette drive (called the Datassette). The sturdy, sheet-metal housing made it a popular choice for schools, where it competed squarely with Apple, whose founders had approached Commodore earlier with their prototype. Commodore’s infamously cost-conscious founder, Jack Tramiel, however, declined Jobs’ offer, then challenged his own engineers to create a cheaper machine along the same lines. The result was the PET.

The PET line was followed by the VIC-20 in 1981. The direct ancestor of the C-64, the VIC-20 was a smashing success, selling millions of units and establishing Commodore’s reputation for cheap but versatile home computers. Several ads for the system starred Star Trek’s Captain Kirk (William Shatner), who beamed in to ask consumers why they’d buy a “videogame system” when they could have a computer for the same price. Obviously, Shatner wasn’t talking about the Atari VCS, which was at least a hundred bucks cheaper, but the Atari 400, the “kid friendly” home computer that would compete directly with the VIC at the major retailers. Despite Atari’s own desire to distance its home computer line from its videogame consoles (see Chapter 1.4), Commodore was all too happy to exploit the ambiguity.

However, despite the VIC’s enormous success, Commodore was just getting started. Work soon began on the “VIC-40,” the machine that would become the C-64. It was designed by several of the same engineers who’d worked on the VIC-20, and even used the same case from when the now-famous beige “breadbox” version was introduced. Although the early models closely resembled their predecessor, the C-64 differed where it mattered, with 64K of RAM (as opposed to the VIC’s 5K), a MOS 6510 processor, and the ability to display up to 40 columns and 25 lines of text in 16 on-screen colors (though it was capable of higher resolution, almost all of the games for the C-64 ran at 320 × 200 resolution). The C-64’s designers carefully studied and borrowed ideas freely from rival machines, which included Mattel’s Intellivision, the Atari 800, and the Texas Instruments 99/4A. “We tried to get a feel for what these companies could do in the future by extrapolating from their current technology,” Charles Winterble said in a March 1985 article for IEEE Spectrum magazine. “That made it clear what the graphics capabilities of our machine had to be.”

While no one disputes the brilliance of its designers, the C-64 owes much of its success to company founder Tramiel, a Holocaust survivor. Tramiel founded the company back in 1954 to make typewriters, then adding machines. After a trip to Japan, however, he switched to electronic calculators, eventually rising to the top of that market before Texas Instruments took over with cheaper devices. Tramiel would learn from the experience, though, recognizing how “vertical integration,” or owning the companies that make the various components of a single product, can keep costs low and competitors at bay.

In 1976 he purchased MOS Technologies, a prominent chip manufacturer. This acquisition gave Commodore a decisive edge in the home computer business, since they now had an in-house chip-fabrication capability that allowed them to design and debug circuitry rapidly and with great precision. They could also avoid the markup suffered by their competition, who had to rely on other companies for their chips. Tramiel also guessed correctly that the cost of memory (DRAM) would drop substantially by the time the C-64 was ready for production, and insisted that it ship with 64K standard. Tramiel also knew how to work the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) circuit, wooing journalists and software publishers to support the platform.

Perhaps Tramiel’s key contribution, however, was insisting that the C-64 be made as cheaply as possible. Wherever possible, he ordered his engineers to cut corners, especially when dealing with issues that would never be encountered by the majority of owners. The cost-cutting was especially evident to anyone trying to program using the built-in BASIC, which lacks commands for directly controlling the graphic and sound chips. According to Robert Yannes, one of the C-64’s designers, “That was an obvious part of the Commodore philosophy: you don’t waste money on things that make the product more expensive and that the majority of buyers aren’t going to use.”² Unlike Steve Wozniak, who built the Apple II with programmers firmly in mind, Tramiel barely gave them a second thought. The upshot was that even after the C-64 had become the dominant platform, many game designers did their work on an Apple II, leaving the cumbersome task of adapting their code for the C-64 to other programmers.

A key factor in the C-64’s success was their availability alongside Atari’s computers in retail outlets like Kmart and Sears. Tramiel tended to put the needs of major retailers first, even when it meant screwing over “mom and pop” Commodore dealers. As Brian Bagnall recounts in his book Commodore: A Company on the Edge (2010), Tramiel had a habit of dropping prices suddenly without warning his specialty dealers, forcing them to sell off their inventories at a grievous loss. Still, the terrific exposure offered by these big retailers gave Commodore a huge advantage over many of its rivals like Apple, whose hardware and software were only available at computer stores. The strategy also reveals Tramiel’s determination to truly make a computer for the masses—you didn’t need to go to a special store and talk to a certified dealer to buy a C-64 or software to run it.

Although the C-64 was equipped with a cartridge slot, most early adopters loaded and saved data from cassette. Although cassettes remained popular in Europe and other countries, by the mid-1980s most C-64 owners in North America had adopted the 1541 floppy disk drive. Notoriously slow, loud, and unreliable, the 1541 was nevertheless much faster than loading programs from cassette tapes. In any case, many users also purchased accelerators like Epyx’s Fast Load Cartridge, which sped up the loading of some software by many factors. Again, Commodore competed aggressively in the price war, offering the 1541 for $400. Thus, a would-be home computer owner could purchase a computer with a disk drive from Commodore for half the price of an Apple IIe without a drive. For millions of consumers, the choice was obvious.

Indeed, Commodore’s ferocious campaign to keep costs low may have played a role in the Great Videogame Crash, especially after the company introduced a $100 rebate to anyone willing to trade in their old computer or console for the purchase of a C-64.³ A later price drop to $200 drove their rival Texas Instruments (TI-99/4A) clean out of the market segment, providing sweet revenge for Tramiel. Ironically, Texas Instruments had failed to leverage their own chip facilities to drive down costs as they did during the calculator wars, instead buying off-the-shelf parts at great expense. It was an inexplicable mistake that Tramiel was all too happy to exploit.

In any case, even if your primary interest was gaming, it was hard to argue that the C-64 wasn’t a better value than a dedicated game console such as the Atari 2600 or Mattel Intellivision.

Naturally, software and hardware developers were eager to support the platform. The website Lemon 64 (www.lemon64.com), which caters to the C-64 emulation crowd, offers over 4000 games for download. Compare that to the Virtual Apple II site, whose fairly comprehensive selection of Apple II games is limited to around 1500 disk images. It’s really no wonder that the C-64 remained the dominant home computing platform for so long, even after rival machines (including Commodore’s own Amiga systems) far surpassed its audiovisual and processing capabilities.

Of course, another hurdle for C-64 game developers was the rampant piracy on the system. Unlike cartridge-based systems, the floppy disks preferred by C-64 owners could be easily copied and distributed among friends, at computer clubs, and eventually over online bulletin board systems. Naturally, publishers introduced a variety of schemes to thwart the illegal practice, but none proved effective against the armies of “cracking” groups. While many if not most C-64 owners purchased all of their software legally, it was all too common for gamers to have dozens of boxes full of hand-labeled floppy disks packed with pirated software. In many cases, the cracking group would place an audiovisual “cracktro” or “demo” that would load before the game. Since this demo had to fit into the often-tiny space left on the floppy disk after the game data was installed, the demo code had to be exceptionally compact, a feat that required considerable talent. This practice was the roots of the modern “demoscene” subculture, in which some of the world’s most tech-savvy coders, artists, and musicians compete to make the most impressive audiovisual displays using the smallest possible amounts of computer resources.

Although the C-64 supported a wide variety of business and productivity software, such as Broderbund’s The Print Shop (1984) desktop publishing package and Microsoft’s Multiplan (1983) spreadsheet program, the games brought most users to the system. With such a huge library of commercial and public domain games available, C-64 owners had access to every conceivable genre. Even when games originated on other systems, the C-64 ports often had enhanced graphics and sound.

The C-64’s games library is immense and reveals the extent to which, given enough time, programmers can optimize their code to take full advantage of a system’s latent capabilities. This is clearly seen when comparing C-64 games from the early 1980s like Wizard, The Blade of Blackpoole, and Choplifter! with those from the early 1990s like Chuck Rock and Creatures 2: Torture Trouble. Perhaps the most visually stunning of all C-64 games, however, is 1993’s Mayhem in Monsterland, designed by brothers Steve and John Rowlands, which could almost pass for a Super NES or Sega Genesis game. This feat was made possible by exploiting a bug in the C-64’s graphic chip, a technique pioneered by the demo programmers mentioned above. Undoubtedly, all game platforms have similarly unknown capabilities that could take even the best programmers years, if not decades, to find and exploit. The longevity of a platform like the C-64 gave it a chance to realize feats like this within its commercial lifetime.

Some of the most popular games for the C-64 were published by Trip Hawkins’ Electronic Arts company, which was founded just a few months before the release of the C-64. In 1983, they ported Bill Budge’s Pinball Construction Set, Free Fall Associates’ Archon: The Light and the Dark, Danielle Berry’s MULE, and Eric Hammond’s Julius Erving and Larry Bird Go One on One, quickly bringing the fledging platform to parity with the competing Apple II and Atari 8-bit computers. All of these games became smash hits on the C-64, and demonstrate the wide variety of game types that soon became available. Epyx was another prominent C-64 games publisher, with hit titles ranging from the popular Olympics-themed Games series to Dennis Caswell’s Impossible Mission (1984) puzzle platform game, which featured the now-iconic digitized voice sample: “Another visitor! Stay awhile; stay forever!”

The Commodore 64’s popularity among mainstream gamers began to decline after the release of the Nintendo Entertainment System in late 1985. Although the C-64 had several technical advantages over it, the NES’s full screen hardware scrolling was difficult to match on the C-64, and the NES’s processor was nearly twice as fast. These facts didn’t stop talented developers from trying to bring Super Mario Bros.-style gameplay to the C-64, of course. In 1987, a German company named Rainbow Arts published Great Giana Sisters, a remarkable clone of Super Mario Bros. programmed by Armin Gessert (with graphics by Manfred Trenz and music by Chris Hulsbeck). Nintendo’s response was swift, and the game was promptly removed from the shelves, making boxed copies into very desirable collectibles.

Despite the obvious similarities to Super Mario Bros., Great Giana Sisters has plenty of innovations, including a variety of hilarious power-ups (punk rock girl!), a wonderful soundtrack, and far freakier-looking monsters, with new, less obvious entries in the series continuing to be released today, even on Nintendo platforms.

Although many of its hit games originated on other platforms, several important and influential games debuted on the C-64. These include Will Wright’s SimCity (1989), which can trace its development back to Wright’s 1984 action-strategy game, Raid on Bungeling Bay. When Wright was designing this game, he had so much fun making maps for it that he felt that concept alone might make for a fun game. SimCity on the C-64 lacks many of the features of other versions, but C-64 fans still take pride that such a hit franchise began on their favorite platform and theirs was the only version to come bundled with the construction set. Other notable games originating on the C-64 include Lucasfilm Games’ Maniac Mansion (1987), SSI’s Pool of Radiance (1988), System 3’s The Last Ninja (1987), Rainbow Arts’ Turrican (1990), and Sid Meier’s Pirates! (1987). Habitat, released by Lucasfilm Games on Quantum Link in 1986, was one of the first online role-playing games. However, most of the hit games for the C-64 were ports of games developed on other systems or from the arcade. These include such hits as Firebird’s Elite (1985), an early sandbox space combat and trading game; Broderbund’s Lode Runner (1983), a platform game with a level editor; and Origin’s Ultima IV: Quest of the Avatar (1985), Richard “Lord British” Garriott’s RPG masterpiece. Naturally, for countless gamers, the C-64 adaptations of these games are what most people played in the 1980s and remember today.

Since the C-64 used the same joystick ports as the Atari 2600, finding gaming hardware was seldom an issue. Many gamers chose a standard Atari-style joystick with the familiar square bottom and fire button in the corner, but others opted for a specialty controller. Some of the more popular options included the 500XJ joystick from Epyx, which offered a molded grip for more ergonomic gameplay, Suncom’s Slik Stik and TAC-2, and Spectravideo’s Quickshot II Turbo.

Although much is often made of the C-64’s relative graphical capabilities, others point out that SID, the system’s powerful sound chip, was even more impressive for its time. Indeed, the C-64 was where “chiptune” maestros like Rob Hubbard, Jeroen Tel, Martin Galway, David Whittaker, Ben Daglish, and so many others got their start. Rob Hubbard’s music in the otherwise-forgettable shooter game Sanxion, released in 1986 by Thalamus, caused the game to be praised for its distinctive loading music. At a time when most computer games contained no music or, at best, a melodic sequence of beeps and bloops, Hubbard’s tunes demonstrated the potential of the C-64 as a truly musical instrument. The work of Hubbard and many of his contemporary SID composers has been remixed and updated for modern audiences, though the original tunes are available on any number of fans’ websites. Just like any other musical instrument, the SID chip can sound slightly different depending upon the system model from which it is used and the version.⁴

Another benefit of the SID was that quality speech synthesis was a possibility without external add-ons (although both those and speech input devices were readily available), found in many popular games such as the aforementioned Impossible Mission, Kennedy Approach (Microprose, 1985) air traffic control simulator, Beach-Head II: The Dictator Strikes Back (Access, 1985) multi-screen action game, Jump Jet (Anirog Software, 1985) flight simulator, Ghostbusters (Activision, 1984) movie translation, and Transformers: Battle to Save the Earth (Activision, 1986) platformer, which filled the entire side of a game disk with a fully narrated introductory story. SAM (Software Automatic Mouth), a speech synthesis program from Don’t Ask Computer Software, put the SID chip to good use, and let kids have their C-64 utter as many profanities as they wished.

Commodore produced its last C-64 in April 1994, when the company filed for bankruptcy. By that point, of course, DOS-based computers were the industry standard in the US, though the C-64 had continued to sell overseas, especially in Eastern Europe. Indeed, European companies were still releasing major commercial games for the C-64 as late as 1993, including the aforementioned Mayhem in Monsterland from Apex Computer Productions, and Lemmings from Psygnosis, and are at the forefront of the homebrew scene today.

Later Models

•  1984: Commodore released a C-64 in a briefcase-style case, the SX-64. Powered by AC rather than batteries, the SX-64 was an interpretation of the popular transportable CP/M computer designs from Osborne and Kaypro. It has the distinction of being the first full-color transportable computer, though its small 5-inch screen, heavy weight (23 pounds), and lack of focus on serious business software may have contributed to its lackluster sales (the sticker price was relatively competitive at $995). The SX-64 featured a built-in 1541 floppy drive and a sturdy handle, which doubled as an adjustable stand. The only standard C-64 feature missing from the SX-64 is the datasette port.

•  1985: Commodore released the Commodore 128 (C-128), which also failed to perform as commercially well as its predecessor. The C-128 featured 128K of RAM, a MOS 8502 processor clocked at 2MHz, and a Zilog Z80 clocked at 4MHz. It also boasted an updated operating system, Commodore BASIC V7.0, which addressed many of the deficiencies of the earlier C-64 version. While the system was almost entirely C-64 compatible, it did receive a new, higher-speed, higher-capacity disk drive called the 1571, which was also necessary for CP/M compatibility (CP/M was an optional and underpowered cartridge add-on on the original C-64). A sleeker and more professional-looking model, the C-128D, was released soon after and featured a built-in 1571 and external keyboard. These multiprocessor systems could be switched among three different operational modes—C-128, C-64, and CP/M. In short, it was three computers in one but, unfortunately for Commodore, most gamers were happy enough with the one.

In C-128 mode, the computer made up for most of its older brother’s technical shortcomings—it had the ability, for instance, to display 80 instead of 40 columns of text on a monitor thanks to 16KB of dedicated video RAM (64K of VRAM in the 128D). These enhancements, along with a new numeric keypad, made it far more useful for business and productivity applications. Unfortunately, few games were ever developed specifically for the C-128, although it was highly useful for running an enhanced version of GEOS, a Macintosh-like graphical operating system originally released in 1986 by Berkeley Softworks.

The CP/M mode suffered from occasional sluggishness, but made up for it with versatility; the 1571 could access a variety of otherwise incompatible read/write formats. Unfortunately, by the time the C-128 was released, the CP/M operating system was already on its way out, replaced by IBM PCs and compatibles running Microsoft’s DOS (see Chapter 1.6).

•  1986: Commodore released the C-64c, which was basically a C-64 system with more modern styling, matching the sleeker lines of the C-128. The C-64c was bundled with its own version of the GEOS operating system.

The Commodore Community

Considering the number of C-64s sold over the course of its 12-year production run, it’s not surprising that a large and vibrant user community developed around the platform. Commodore-focused user groups and bulletin board systems (BBSs) were common across North America and Europe. Quantum Link (Q-Link) was an online commercial service that ran from 1985 to 1994, catering to C-64 and C-128 users before shifting to the PC market and changing its name to America Online. Amazingly, several Commodore computer clubs formed in the 1980s are still active today. One example is the Fresno Commodore User Group (FCUG), which still meets monthly and even publishes a regular newsletter.

Attending a computer club or logging onto a BBS was a good way to get help and discover the large library of public domain and shareware software available for the platform. Many C-64 owners enjoyed writing their own games and software for the system, or typing them in from magazines. Collections of such programs were often compiled on a single floppy disk and distributed to members of a club or subscribers to a magazine. Commodore offered bundles of public domain software as well, which included many educational games for children.

After the introduction of the Commodore Amiga in 1985, some C-64 owners made the move to the new platform, but most eventually switched to PC DOS or Macintosh computers instead. Sadly, no single computer model would ever again enjoy the market share of the C-64 in its heyday. In hindsight, there was simply no way to replicate that special combination of power and price that the C-64 embodied. This was evident by the long list of failed competitors in its class, including Commodore’s own C-16 and Plus/4, or with enhanced variations like the C-128 or unreleased C-65 prototype, which promised to be the ultimate 8-bit computer. The problem for these wannabes, however, was that for millions of fans, they already owned the “ultimate” 8-bit computer and would accept no substitutes.

Collecting Commodore 64 Systems and Software

Because the C-64 was such a ubiquitous and durable platform, finding a unit in working or even mint condition is seldom difficult. Obviously, since so much software was released in disk form, a collector will also want to add a disk drive, most likely a Commodore 1571, which is more versatile and quiet than the 1541. Collectors who aren’t nostalgic for the old breadbox styling of the early C-64 may well prefer a C-64c.

The much rarer portable SX-64 is often hard to find in decent condition, but its relative portability makes it desirable to try. The C-128 is fairly easy to find, but the more versatile C-128D represents more of a challenge. The C-128 line is preferred by some C-64 enthusiasts for their more reliable and capable power supplies (which readily support memory expansion cartridges) and greater overall capabilities, but the trade-offs in extra bulk, complexity, and compatibility may not be worth it to most gamers.

Software is easy to find for the C-64, although prices range widely depending on the obscurity and desirability of the individual game. Because of its relative ubiquity, however, many games can be had for a song, with plenty of opportunities to purchase large collections of diverse titles for very reasonable prices on auction websites.

A stunning range of homebrew games continue to be produced on cassette, disk, and cartridge, as well as digital image for use in emulators. The most prolific publisher and distributor of such games today is RGCD, whose 2011 releases included endless runner C64anabalt and strategic battle game Not Even Human—Inhumane Edition, 2012 releases included action combo Greenrunner/Redrunner/Retroskoi+ and platformer UWOL: Quest For Money, and 2013 releases included platformer Sir Ababol/Nanako In Classic Japanese Monster Castle and Vectrex conversions Spike/MineStorm.

Like many of the other platforms from the 1980s, the C-64 has a variety of newly created multicarts, flash memory, and drive emulators available, as well as a host of other interesting add-ons and accessories. These devices include the 1541 Ultimate-II, which can emulate everything from utility cartridges to expansion memory to every type of software format, the EasyFlash 3, which can emulate a variety of cartridge formats, individual Computers’ Micromys V4, which connects PC mice to the C-64, and Protovision’s 4 Player Interface, which allows the use of four simultaneous joysticks for great multiplayer gaming.

Emulating the Commodore 64

C-64 emulation is mature and well implemented on a variety of platforms. Several online software repositories are readily accessible, and it’s easy to get support from the large community of enthusiasts that still exist for the platform. The most popular emulation software is VICE, which also works well for other Commodore 8-bit platforms, like the PET and VIC-20.

Cloanto’s C-64 Forever emulator is a 100 percent legal emulation package available for under $20. It features a well-designed and intuitive graphical user interface for loading and installing games, and includes over 200 demos, games, and applications. If you’re new to C-64 emulation, this is by far the best way to start.

Interestingly, the C-64 is the only classic computer to have its games featured on the Nintendo’s eShop, though the selection is not particularly robust. Fully featured emulators are also available on iOS and Android devices.

¹  Unfortunately, various factors have contributed to the official number being difficult for historians to determine. Sales have been reported by various sources as anywhere between 12 and 30 million. Even taking the lowest number, it’s still more than any other single computer.

²  See Tekla S. Perry and Paul Wallich, “Design Case History: The Commodore 64,” IEEE Spectrum, March 1985.

³  The most popular trade-in was the Timex Sinclair 1000, an underpowered budget computer, which by that time could be found for $50 or less!

⁴  The early 6581 and late model 6582 and 8580 revisions of the SID chips generate sound slightly differently from each other. Many enthusiasts prefer the nuances and improvements found in the 8580. Even chips in the same series, however, can produce subtle differences in sound output.