To celebrate August being C64 Month, we’re writing about a different Commodore 64 game every day! Start from the beginning here!
So I said before that this year’s blog posts about C64 Month wouldn’t include any licensed games, and Oink is kind of a license, but it’s also quite an original game and this is my site anyway and you’re not my real dad anyway.
I was a huge fan of Oink back in the day. It was a fortnightly British comic that was basically Viz for kids, and I adored its random scatological humour. The game pit you with the task of assembling a comic book (so that was a big draw to me too) for Uncle Pigg the editor by completing three minigames starring some of Oink’s recurring characters.
There was Pete’s Pimple, a simple Breakout clone with the action rotated 90 degrees, an occasionally buggy horizontally scrolling shmup starring Rubbish Man, and some kind of maze exploration game that was ostensibly about Tom Thug but uh there were robots and I think they just had some code lying about and just slapped it into the game at the last minute.
Anyway, the minigames weren’t individually all that great but they added up to a decent package, and the jokes were pretty spot on to match the extra low-brow humour, and now I want to go read a bunch of Oink comics again, so it’s a win-win really!
To celebrate August being C64 Month, we’re writing about a different Commodore 64 game every day! Start from the beginning here!
I feel like I’ve written a lot about Nebulus recently for Issue 9 of Reset 64, your favourite Commodore 64 magazine, but well I couldn’t resist the chance to talk about it again here for this blog series. Plus it was either this or Ninja Scooter Simulator, so here we are. In fact, the piece I wrote for Reset 64 didn’t make it into the magazine, so I’m going to run it here:
Myself and some of my other game developer pals wrote some thoughts about what they would do if they had to remake Nebulus – I hope you like it!
John Phillip’s innovative platformer won rave reviews when it was first released for the Commodore 64 back in 1988, and it still holds up amazingly well today. The objective was simple – climb a smartly-presented rotating tower, avoid strange creatures and solve puzzles to get to the top. Each of the game’s eight challenging stages offered plenty to discover and enjoy, and there was even a cool fish ‘em up bonus game between levels.
We asked several experienced game developers how they would bring Nebulus back, and here’s what they had to say!
Michael Carr-Robb-John (Archon, Dungeon Master 2, Shadow of Mordor)
“If I was asked to remake Nebulus on the current gen platforms, I would probably keep the traditional platformer mechanics but I would like to see it go bigger. This would mean levels with wider and taller towers, multiple towers on the same level (i.e. you can transition halfway up to another tower and then back again), more than one way through the level and puzzles that weren’t simply avoid monster or kill monster,
I would want other interactions with monsters, for example luring them to trigger switches, using poisons to make them attack other monsters or being able to mind control them. Visually I would probably make everything 3D even though we are playing in 2D and finally I would get rid of the fish catching phase of the game.”
Cameron Davis (Viva Pinata Party Animals, TY The Tasmanian Tiger 2, Game Room)
“One of the most interesting aspects of Nebulus to me is that it’s basically a maze puzzle game, with a key visual twist. Pogo can spit out these floating white balls to zap nearby enemies but it’s not exactly a shooter, after all.
With that in mind I would expand out the maze element by making the normally cylindrical buildings completely weird. I imagine huge, intertwining, almost Escher-like constructions floating in the depths of space that Pogo would have to navigate the surface of in order to reach a central point.
Imagine the trippier levels from Super Mario Galaxy with secret doorways, conveyor belts, platforms, and massive three dimensional shapes that are like convoluted space pretzels and you’re on the right path. I also think gravity can play an interesting part in how Pogo controls, with gravity getting lighter (and Pogo’s jumps getting higher / longer) the further away from the central point of the level he is.
The buildings can even change shape over time or through user interaction, for example a Moebius strip can have sections of it detach and re-attach in other locations, allowing access to new areas. I can see all sorts of weird and brain-bending environments being designed to keep players guessing.
And after you reach the target area of each level, you initiate the self-destruct sequence and then have to race back to your ship before the whole thing explodes! Perhaps after that you get a cute mini-game where Pogo pilots his ship through space towards the next level, firing at random creatures he finds along the way.
I think this would be a lot of fun, and a good way to update the formula for a new audience while keeping the original’s spirit of charm and exploration.”
Anthony Stiller (Abyssonaut, Sopwiths & Pterrordons)
“Cute player sprite. Beautiful, rotating tower. Trial-and-error platforming.
Sounds perfect for a Virtual Reality experience. Not first person (I’m not a monster, though it would be brill for the submarine bonus scenes), but imagine hovering above the water like an elemental, the tower in full view. You can grab and rotate the tower itself slowly back and forth. I mean, that gorgeous rotation effect is what everyone remembers from Nebulus, right?
So there’s the tower, dappled light reflecting from the ocean surface, turning gloriously under your disembodied virtual hands. Your little tower toppler, Pogo, is guided by simply tapping the next platform to go to. A squeeze of the controller spits a gob of goo.
Turning the tower around reveal enemies, pathways along the outside of the tower, and potential hazards and pitfalls. Those infuriating disappearing platforms rattle a little. Enemies flinch at your touch, buying a little extra time to get Pogo higher up the tower.
And when that tower falls! Why not let the player smash the tower themselves with their mighty virtual fists? This sounds almost as satisfying as destroying a Dreadnought in Uridium.
Uridium? Hey, now that would be a VR experience and a half.”
Rob Caporetto (Armorello, Pocket Dogfights)
“A modernised version of Nebulus? That was quite an interesting conundrum to ponder. When I sit down and ponder where I’d go with it. As much as a straight evolution of the formula sounds appealing – the fact of the matter, I feel like I’d want to take it in more of a puzzle-based direction.
You still would be tasked with getting Pogo up to the top of each tower, though the pace would be slowed down, giving it a bit more of a planned tone. This would also extend to the time-limit, allowing it to be relaxed, giving more breathing room, along with less of a punishment for when you inevitably mess up your ascent.
Along with that, I’d also work to make the levels more involved, requiring do you more than just ascent to complete the stages. To start with, the tunnels which allow Pogo to quickly move to the opposite site would be altered to require you to unlock them, through finding keys or accessing switches.
Along with that, I’d mix things up by differing platform types – whilst your standard one continues to function as it does in the original game, I’d want to make sure there would be different terrains, that you’d need to find the right items for (ala Chip’s Challenge). This would also offer opportunities to trap the player with more than just the disappearing platforms offered in the original game.
In taking it in this direction, I feel that Nebulus would be a game which would reward patience and careful movement a lot more than in the original game, where the tight time limits would result in more frustration than fun. At least in my books.”
And to top off all this Nebulus love, here’s a Nebulus comic 🙂
To celebrate August being C64 Month, we’re writing about a different Commodore 64 game every day! Start from the beginning here!
I have to admit I was mighty tempted to use this space to write about Mayhem In Monsterland or Mega Apocalypse, but one thing kept drawing me towards Morpheus: interconnected systems.
See, I love Morpheus because all the upgrades you can buy for your super-duper spaceship all work with each other in interesting ways. The Inertia Converter can power the Shield Generators which in turn keep the radar working which gives you a direction to head in, for example. Each one of those systems can work independently, but mixing them together and finding a combination that works for you is one of Morpheus’ hidden pleasures.
I’m also a big fan of games that kind of exist by themselves without player interaction, and the systems you visit in Morpheus are a great example of this. There’s little drones that fly around repairing the twinkly things (I don’t have the manual in front of me and frankly can’t be bothered to go look up the real name of these things, bear with me here) you’re meant to deactivate, and you don’t just buy upgrades and have them instantly added to your ship – they get commissioned and you have to wait for them to arrive. I really like that.
Not many people remember Morpheus, and even less of them remember it fondly, but I really really really like how this game is designed. There’s a lot going on under the hood, and it requires patience and determination to figure it all out, but that’s my kind of game.
To celebrate August being C64 Month, we’re writing about a different Commodore 64 game every day! Start from the beginning here!
OK I will admit it was a tough call choosing between this and Laser Squad, but Little Computer People wins out because it was there for me when I needed it.
A lot of people think being a game reviewer is a cool job. I know I certainly did when I was 13 and devouring every page of Zzap! 64 every month, reading the madcap adventures of Julian Rignall and his crew. And look, let’s be real here – having a job where you get lots of free games handed to you and you don’t have to be outside digging ditches or in a dead end job flipping burgers or whatever is an incredible opportunity and I did my level best to do it right because I knew how fortunate I was to do it.
But.
What people don’t see are the hours spent hunched over a keyboard, re-writing the same review a million times because it’s not quite right (Game Review System hadn’t been invented yet). The hunger that goes with not being paid for weeks on end because someone stuffed up the freelance cheque again and buying food that week just isn’t an option (Ah, GameSpot sending my cheque to Austria once, good times). The nagging feeling that, while people are out there saving lives or making a difference in the world, a life spent reviewing video games just doesn’t matter that much.
More than anything though, it was the isolation that comes with living in a one room apartment and keeping odd hours and never seeing my friends because I was always either too broke or too busy to spend time with them.
Enter Little Computer People.
David Crane’s fantastic artificial life simulation came years before digital pets became a thing, and the idea that this was a game you could play with no clear objective besides companionship was a novel one. I just absolutely adored my little computer person. I would leave my machine on running LCP while I wrote game reviews on my PC, and it was just nice to have someone else in my apartment doing their own thing. I would dutifully fill his water cooler and send him new records to enjoy every morning. We’d watch TV together and I would look forward to him writing his letters in the evening. When I got too hungry to write I would play a few rounds of Poker with my LCP and it was nice.
Yes, it was silly and simple and these days probably won’t hold your attention for long at all, but he was my friend and he got me through some crappy times. For that reason I’ll always love Little Computer People.
To celebrate August being C64 Month, we’re writing about a different Commodore 64 game every day! Start from the beginning here!
1988 was the year for horizontally-scrolling shmups. After R-Type dominated the arcades and showed the rest of the world how it was meant to be done, everyone started making similar games for home systems. Katakis was the best one.
Featuring huge player sprites, huge explosions and even more huge boss characters, Katakis took the R-Type formula – one that was designed around expensive arcade hardware that could throw sprites and colour around the screen like it was no big deal – and not only squeezed it into the humble C64 but made it even bigger.
R-Type’s sometimes serene pace made way for Katakis’ turbo-charged freneticism, and the uneven difficulty of Irem’s classic was made linear, though some would say it started off way too hard and just kept going. Still, when you’re playing a game on your home computer you don’t have to worry about finding a constant supply of coins to keep playing, so it worked out OK.
Most of us C64 aficionados already know the story about what happened to Katakis – just like The Great Giana Sisters, the game was pulled off the shelves for being too similar to its source of inspiration – but thanks to pirates we can all still play it today. And this is something I think you would enjoy doing today!
Man, that shark boss though. That thing was freaky.
To celebrate August being C64 Month, we’re writing about a different Commodore 64 game every day! Start from the beginning here!
OK this might be a very short blog post because Jack The Ripper is a game I was not very good at. In fact, I don’t think I ever even left the room you start in, but it was either this or James Pond 2: Robocod and well that’s really not a game that had the C64 in mind when it was being made so here we are.
(I apologise, this video is the Spectrum version, but you get the idea)
So. Jack The Ripper is a text adventure game that sets you with the task of solving the infamous murders that took place in Nineteenth-century London. A formidable enough task, made all the tougher because you’ve unwittingly been made a suspect and if you’re not careful you’re going to have all of the local constabulary seeking your arrest.
As I said, I was not very good at it, but I really enjoyed trying to find my way around the world. The text was written in a captivating way, mixing paranoia, horror and suspense around a believable representation of the city. The C64 version added some gruesome pictures of murdered corpses which thirteen year old me just loved to bits.
I had a quick go of these recently and got a bit further than I did when I first played it like 20 years ago, and I think it holds up quite nicely – so give it a go!
To celebrate August being C64 Month, we’re writing about a different Commodore 64 game every day! Start from the beginning here!
International Soccer is often dismissed as simplistic and unrealistic, compared to some classic football games like Microprose Soccer, but I can’t help but love this one to bits. It was the first C64 game I owned as it came with my trusty C64C as a cartridge, and you’ll always remember your first.
The game is presented side-on, and it’s not so much a realistic football game as it is an arcadey take on having a kick around with mates in the park. There’s no off-side stuff to worry about and the physics are about as realistic as Everton’s chances of winning the Premier League, but that just makes it more fun really, especially in two-player mode.
It’s a real laugh when you run down the field with the ball bouncing on your head all the way along, or watching the bewilderingly stupid AI steal the ball from you, run for a bit, and then just stop for no good reason. International Soccer is kind of broken but it’s a good kind of broken, like when you reach into a packet of chips and pull out a chip that’s kind of like…two chips? I really need to go back to analogy class.
Also, at the end of the match all the players line up and a pricess comes out with a trophy, so that’s nice.
To celebrate August being C64 Month, we’re writing about a different Commodore 64 game every day! Start from the beginning here!
While it was tempting to use this space to talk about the under-rated platform classic Hudson Hawk, I’m trying to avoid games that are licenses and instead concentrate on original works that, if not designed with the C64 in mind, at least had the humble 8-bit in mind during its creation. So let’s talk about Head Over Heels!
It’s a game about two lovable critters, one that is a giant head and one that is basically a big pair of feet, and their adventures as they try to escape the puzzle-filled isometric levels that they find themselves stuck in. They begin the game separated and must use their individual powers (Head can jump, Heels can run, for example) to find their way back together and then take on the mischievous aliens who are…I don’t know, I don’t think I read the manual that much. It’s basic adventure game stuff these days, but back then this was defining the genre and it did it with cute characters and a lot of charm. I am a sucker for charm.
I loved this game so much that I even – shock – bought an original copy. For someone who pirated games like mad back in the day this was a huge deal. I remember playing it for days on end and thinking I was totally awesome when I finally got the pair back together – only to discover that I had only completed the first of five levels. This game turned out to be a real head-scratcher!
To celebrate August being C64 Month, we’re writing about a different Commodore 64 game every day! Start from the beginning here!
You’re in jail! Worse than that, you’re in German jail! Worse than that, it’s 1942 and you’re in a German Prisoner Of War camp! Man, I hate it when that happens.
What I like the most about The Great Escape (not to be confused with the Steve McQueen movie) is that you don’t have to play it. Just let go of the joystick and you can watch your little main go about his daily routine and just hope some American soldiers storm your P.O.W. camp to set you free one day.
You might notice through this month of C64 games that I really like games that have a life of their own – games that kind of exist just fine by themselves without player interaction, and The Great Escape is that taken to a literal conclusion. It’s actually fun (and part of the gameplay, really) to just watch the daily routine play out, and look out for opportunities to wander off by yourself for a bit of a sticky-boo around the grounds.
Of course, taking the time to explore the big jail you live in results in great rewards – a hidden tunnel here, a quickly-pocketed torch there – but you must be careful to not draw the attention of the prison’s guards who make routine patrols around the complex. This is one of those games that requires you to make notes, so be warned people who hate, you know, doing things.
To celebrate August being C64 Month, we’re writing about a different Commodore 64 game every day! Start from the beginning here!
Nobody talks about Fernandez Must Die a lot, heck there isn’t even a Wikipedia page for it (well, there is but it’s in Italian), which is a shame because I think it’s rather good and certainly interesting enough to play for an hour or two. It’s like…what if Ikari Warriors had depth and exploration? See, I told you it’s interesting.
Your mission is to rid a generic dictator of his control of a generic south American republic, and of course the most economical and politically-expedient way of doing that is for you (and an optional buddy in two player mode) to just drive into town and shoot all the soldiers dead.
Each stage is a vertically scrolling (up and down, no expense spared here) environment with simple mazes to explore, vehicles to drive and secret rooms to find – most of which hold captives for you to rescue. Santa just loves people who rescue hostages! I love the little touches like how there’s planes that fly overhead, or how soldiers bodies turn into skeletons when you shoot them.
The aforementioned two player mode is a great laugh, as not only does it make the game easier to play but you can also both jump into a jeep and wreak havoc on the locals. One player steers while the other fires, and it’s a sure-fire way to get both of you killed really quickly because it’s the video game equivalent of juggling knives on a unicycle.
If you like the setting of games like Commando or Mercs but think they’re a bit simple then seriously you need to give Fernandez Must Die a try. Apologies to all the other Fernandezes out there!
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