The bestselling computer made home gaming accessible for millions as it launched the industry toward the mainstream with classic titles such as Dropzone and The Sentinel
or a period between the winter of 1983 and the summer of 1986, my life was completely dominated by the Commodore 64. The seminal home computer, launched 40 years ago this month, featured an 8-bit microprocessor, a huge 64k of memory and a set of graphics and sound chips that were designed by the engineers at Commodore’s MOS Technology subsidiary to power state-of-the-art arcade games. That didn’t happen.
At that time, programmers were still getting to grips with the machine. Offering twice the memory of most rivals, its hardware could also handle seamless scrolling allowing natural movement around larger game maps, and eight multicolour sprites on screen simultaneously.
I loved the fluidity of C64 games – the genres we now know really well were still blurred and malleable. The Sentinel was a puzzle game, but also sort of sci-fi horror; Spindizzy was an exploration game, but also a puzzler; Gribbly’s Day Out was a platformer but also an arcade adventure. These games built surreal, yet geometrically naturalistic worlds in an early sort of 3D, the sharp pixel visuals cleverly suggesting reflective surfaces and flowing water.
“If you just always have the same thing for him, he’s going to get bored really quickly, so you make his mind work, you give him options ... We try to very subtly put those all through the game, so it’s not really apparent, but it retains the interest for a long time.”
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