Commodore 64 Games System

Commodore 64GS
Manufacturer Commodore International
Type Home video game console
Generation Third generation (8-Bit era)
Release date December 1990 (1990-12)[1]
Media Cartridge
Successor Commodore CDTV

The Commodore 64 Games System (often abbreviated C64GS) is the cartridge-based home video game console version of the popular Commodore 64 home computer. It was released in December, 1990 by Commodore into a booming console market dominated by Nintendo and Sega. It was only released in Europe and was a considerable commercial failure.

The C64GS came bundled with a cartridge with four games: Fiendish Freddy's Big Top O'Fun, International Soccer, Flimbo's Quest and Klax.

The C64GS was not Commodore's first gaming system based on the C64 hardware. However, unlike the 1982 MAX Machine (a game-oriented computer based on a very cut-down version of the same hardware family), the C64GS is internally very similar to the complete C64, with which it is compatible.

Available software

Support from games companies was limited, as many were unconvinced that the C64GS would be a success in the console market. Ocean Software was the most supportive, offering a wide range of titles, some C64GS cartridge-based only, offering features in games that would have been impossible on cassette-based games, others straight ports of games for the original C64. Domark and System 3 also released a number of titles for the system, and conversions of some Codemasters and MicroProse games also appeared. Denton Designs also released some games, among them Bounces, which was released in 1985.

The software bundled with the C64GS, a four-game cartridge containing Fiendish Freddy's Big Top O'Fun, International Soccer, Flimbo's Quest and Klax, were likely the most well-known on the system. These games, with the exception of International Soccer, were previously ordinary tape-based games, but their structure and control systems (no keyboard needed) made them well-suited to the new console. International Soccer was previously released in 1983 on cartridge for the original C64 computer.

Ocean produced a number of games for the C64GS, among them a remake of Double Dragon (which seemed to be more linked to the NES version than the original C64 cassette version), Navy SEALS, Robocop 2, Robocop 3, Chase HQ 2: Special Criminal Investigation, Pang, Battle Command, Toki, Shadow of the Beast and Lemmings. They also produced Batman The Movie for the console, but this was a direct conversion of the cassette game, evidenced by the screens prompting the player to "press PLAY" that briefly appeared between levels. Some of the earliest Ocean cartridges had a manufacturing flaw, where the connector was placed too far back in the cartridge case. The end result was that the cartridge could not be used with the standard C64 computer. Members of Ocean staff had to manually drill holes in the side of the cartridges to make them fit.

System 3 released Last Ninja Remix and Myth: History in the Making, although both were also available on cassette. Domark also offered two titles, Badlands and Cyberball, which were available on cartridge only.

Through publisher The Disc Company a number of Codemasters and MicroProse titles were also reworked and released as compilations for the C64GS. Fun Play featured three Codemasters titles: Fast Food, Professional Skateboard Simulator and Professional Tennis Simulator. Power Play featured three MicroProse titles: Rick Dangerous, Stunt Car Racer and MicroProse Soccer, although Rick Dangerous was produced by Core Design, not MicroProse themselves. Stunt Car Racer and MicroProse Soccer needed to be heavily modified to enable them to run on the C64GS.

Commodore never produced or published a single title for the C64GS beyond the bundled four-game cartridge. International Soccer was the only widely available game for the C64GS but had actually been written for the C64.

Hardware-based problems

The C64GS has been plagued with problems from the outset. Firstly, despite the wealth of software already available on cartridge for C64, the lack of a keyboard means that most cannot be used with the console. This means that people had often bought secondhand C64 software on cartridge only to find that the games are not compatible. The standard C64 version of Terminator 2: Judgment Day was designed for the console, but was included on a cartridge that required the user to press a key to access the game, rendering it unplayable.

To partially counter the lack of a keyboard, the basic control system for the C64GS was a joystick supplied by Cheetah called the Annihilator. This joystick, while using the standard Atari 9-pin plug, offers two independent buttons, with the second button located on the base of the joystick. This 9-pin plug was standard of many systems of the era, and the joysticks are fundamentally compatible with the ZX Spectrum's Kempston Interface and the Sega Master System. The Cheetah Annihilator joystick was poorly built, had a short life, and was not widely available, making replacements difficult to come by.

Primary reasons for failure

Prior to the console's release, Commodore had generated a great deal of marketing hype to generate interest in an already crowded market. Zzap! 64 and Your Commodore, Commodore 64 magazines of the era, reported that Commodore had promised "up to 100 titles before December",[2] even though December was two months from the time of writing. In reality 28 games were produced for the console during its shelf life - most of which were compilations of older titles, and a majority of which were from Ocean. Of those 28 titles, only 9 were cartridge-exclusive titles, the remainder being ports of older cassette-based games.

While most of the titles that Ocean announced did appear for the GS (with the notable exception of Operation Thunderbolt), a number of promises from other publishers failed to materialize. Although Thalamus, The Sales Curve, Mirrorsoft and Hewson had expressed an interest, nothing ever materialized from these firms. Similar problems plagued rival company Amstrad when they released their GX4000 console the same year.

There were other reasons attributed to the failure of the C64GS, the major ones being the following:

Commodore eventually shipped the four-game cartridge and Cheetah Annihilator joysticks in a "Playful Intelligence" bundle with standard Commodore 64C computer. Several years later Commodore's next attempt at a games console, the Amiga CD32, encountered many of the same problems although overall it was a lot more successful than the C64GS.

Technical specifications

The specifications of the C64GS are a subset of those of the regular C64; the main differences being the leaving out of the user port, serial interface, and cassette port. Since the system board is a regular C64C board these ports are actually present, but simply not exposed at the rear.

Internal hardware

The ROM contains two important differences from a standard C64 ROM. The first is that switching on the machine without a cartridge present results in a character-based animation asking the user to insert a cartridge. The second is an additional set of windowing commands, designed to compensate for the lack of a keyboard. However, there is no known software that uses it.

I/O and power supply

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Retro Treasures: Commodore 64 GS". retro-treasures.blogspot.se. 2013-06-07. Retrieved 2013-06-16.
  2. ↑ "Munchy Box". Your Commodore. UK: Alphaville Bublications Ltd. October 1990.
  3. ↑ The Hardware Book
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