Well here's a game I didn't expect to see today, as developer Søren Trautner Madsen and team have released Awesome SlamSibs Infinite, an awesome new fighting game for the Commodore 64. Described by its creator as a nostalgic love letter to Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, the title blends iconic characters, classic games, and vintage music into a chaotic multiplayer brawler. Developed as a passion project rather than commercial, the game challenges players to pick a fighter, grab a joystick, and battle either a friend or a computer opponent. Squeezing a full-blown fighting game into the C64’s restrictive 64 kilobytes of memory proved to be a massive technical hurdle, requiring creative workarounds for sprites, animations, and stage effects.
What makes the project even more remarkable is its traditional, hands-on development process. Madsen crafted every single line of code, sprite, and animation entirely by hand the old-fashioned way, steering clear of modern AI tools until minor bug-hunting at the very end. While Madsen admits this handcrafted approach is a ridiculously inefficient way to build a game today, he notes that overcoming those limitations is exactly where the charm and fun of the machine lie. The developer didn't fly solo, however; he credited Jesper Rune Larsen for assisting with the menu system and extra code, and Jarkko Salminen for designing the menu graphics, alongside a dedicated community that contributed pixels and music. For Madsen, the ultimate goal is to keep traditions alive, recommending that players sit side-by-side with a friend to enjoy the game exactly how retro brawlers were meant to be played.
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Wow, I watched the video and I have to say those menu/attract mode graphics are some of the best I've ever seen on the C64. They look spectacular and also really well drawn! I assume the game pulls off those gradients by alternating different colors at different speeds? The game itself looks fun as well even though I've never really been into Super Smash Bros.
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