Thalamus Lunark announcement - C64 and Spectrum Next?

Legendary C64 publishing house Thalamus have announced that they will be porting Lunark to the C64 and Spectrum Next, if the Nintendo Switch and PC/Mac versions are successfully backed on Kickstarter.

C64 GOTY Winner Announcement!

2018 was such a great year for C64, and I'm sure it'll keep getting better in 2019. Recently we published a fab list of game releases both physical and download games, and the list is crammed full of awesome games. In the article I published my list of nominees for Game of the Year, and last week I announced the winner live on Twitch.

L'abbaye Des Morts - Eagerly awaited C64 port will be released January 2019!

Some time back we announced the release of L'Abbaye des Morts; a great retro platformer in a ZX Spectrum style that was originally developed by Locomalito who is no stranger to developing fantastic games such as Maldita Castilla and Hydorah. Well you'll be pleased to know that same game which got a fabulous preview by hayesmaker64 of the C64 port from Antonio Savona and Double Sided Games, will officially be released for the Commodore 64 as from this month January 2019!

The year of the C64 - A 2018 Roundup and GOTY Nominees!

As another super year for the C64 draws to a close, I take another look at the release highlights of the year, starting with all the games which had Physical versions ship this year, then followed by all the digital download releases, including the ones which will ship next year, but which got digital releases this year. I’ll also nominate my favourites for the Indie Retro News GOTY 2018 (Game of the Year). I’ll reveal the winner on my Twitch stream on New Years Eve so stay tuned!

High Noon - Early C64 Western with extras from Hokuto Force

Back in 2015 when I joined Indie Retro News, there weren't so many brand new C64 games being released, so we used to fill our blog with news from the various cracking groups. I particularly liked Hokuto Force's releases because they focused on re-releases of those lesser known titles that most of us probably missed the first time around. Hokuto Force never stopped, but recently our C64 news has focused more on all the new and recent releases which are coming so fast, I feel like we've kind of deserted the "sceners", who pretty much kept the C64 alive for many years single handed with a constant stream of games and demos. So I thought I'd check out Hokuto Force's latest release (in collaboration with Mad Hackers Inc.): A new version of Ocean's 1984 Western shooter: High Noon. So let's take a look and see how it plays.

L'Abbaye des Morts 64 - Exclusive first review

L’Abbaye des Morts (The Abbey of the Dead) 64, is the latest game from Antonio Savona and Double Sided Games. It’s actually a port of a ZX spectrum inspired mini game, written by Locamolito and released as freeware for Windows in 2010, It’s been ported to Linux, Mac OSX, Nintendo Wii / 3DS, SEGA Megadrive and in 2014 received a cassette version for ZX Spectrum. It’s also got a Dreamcast and now a C64 version on the way.

The game was recently finished for C64, with a limited run of cartridge and floppy disk versions announced for pre-order from Double Sided Games. And a cassette version will be available later from Psytonik. So far we’ve only seen work in progress screenshots and videos from the game… but Double Sided Games were kind enough to send me a fully working version of the game to review and to play on my Twitch stream. So let’s start with the review!

Scuttlebutt - Behind Enema Lines: New game from Karl Hörnell for C64

Veteran Game developer and Cartoonist Karl Hörnell has ported his free to download ZX Spectrum game: Scuttlebutt, to the C64. Karl created a number of games for Interceptor Software while still at school. These included Clean Up Time, Velocipede, Fruity, Ronald Rubberduck and Toad Force. These were all pretty much entirely solo projects. As working for a UK company whilst in Sweden kept him isolated from the rest of the in house development team, and no internet or email to share knowledge. Even so, his games are well regarded, even to this day.

RGCDs Conga Combat for C64 + 27 more minigames released today - Huge 4KB compo update

UPDATE: Please note this article was originally written to cover just one game as 28 games were labelled as Coming soon on Reset's itch.io page and in the comments they said it would be 1-2 weeks for them, whilst this game had already been released.  It was only after I published this draft that those pesky Aussies decided to drop all 28 right away to beat the crackers.

Bub and Bob return home to the C64 - Puzzle Bobble announced!

Earlier tonight Neil tantalized you with in development screenshots of a C64 port of Bitmap Brothers' seminal Amiga blaster: The Chaos Engine.  Well it turns out this was just a warm up for what could be the news of the year as far as I'm concerned.  Time to forget the modern consoles' turgid E3 2018 and their endless reboots / remasters / sequels... and turn your attention to the latest announcement for the 36 year old Commodore 64.   We could also be seeing a port of Puzzle Bobble!   It's only 22 or 23 years late (The Arcade original from Taito released in 1994).

Guy In A Vest - C64 work in progress with a Q&A is not to be missed!

Antonio Savona has published some awesome looking gameplay for his latest work in progress: Guy in a Vest.  Guy is in no way affiliated to any well known Austrian action heroes turned USA Governors in any way! I caught up with Antonio today, to do some digging on his brand new game...  Here's what I was able to find out:

El Loco Challenge - Lotus inspired WIP C64 Racer gets a game menu theme update!

It wasn't long ago in one of HayesMaker big C64 weekly write ups that he mentioned a very cool looking new Lotus style racer called 'El Loco Challenge' in which is currently in development and the developer JammerC64 is hoping to release as much as possible in time for the Forum64/Protovision game competition. Well fast forward to this lovely sunny day and there's been a new update which shows the game menu as being finished!

Set your alarm clocks and have your wallet by your bed - The Zzap! 64 Annual Kickstarter is launching Friday at 8am GMT [UPDATE]

If you were hoping for a Friday lie in, cancel that, and if you go to work early then tell your boss you might be a bit late tomorrow, as you'll need to be up at 8 am for the launch of the Zzap!64 Annual 2019 Kickstarter project from Fusion Retro Books.  You'll also need to be fully alert to pick carefully from the various perks which will be on offer.  Exact details of the perks remain a tight lipped secret, although we do know it will feature a brand new C64 game called Sizzler from Achim Volkers and Trevor Storey.  Here's Roger Kean (founder of Crash Magazine and Editor at Zzap) on the inspiration behind the annual:

C64 Weekly Roundup - Exiting new projects, more amazing sound tricks and more!

Welcome to roundup #8.  This week has seen more amazing project announcements, also FM-YAM a new sound device built into a C64 cartridge, and Hokuto Force have worked their magic on a few forgotten gems.  I will also shamelessly plug my own channel, as I am making a brand new C64 SEUCK game for The New Dimension's 2018 SEUCK compo, in collaboration with my viewers, live on TwitchTV.

C64 Roundup is back - The Mini is here, all the new games and new projects

Hello folks, and welcome to Indie Retro News' C64 Roundup Weekly.  I've been on holiday in Japan, so I'll try to cover everything you might have missed while I've been away over the last couple of weeks.  Firstly, Japan was amazing. I mixed a sight seeing tour de force of all the Tokyo shrines, temples, landmarks etc, with visits to the Taito, Sega and Namco Arcades.  Also the amazing (but overpriced) retro game shops of Akihabara, Tokyo and Den-Den Town, Osaka.  The Cherry Blossoms were in full bloom and I got some high scores on Gradius and RType... at least for a full 10 minutes before some old dude decided to complete Gradius after I got off it!  Photos on my Instagram, link below.

Unless you've been living on the Moon, you'll know the big news is the arrival of Retro Games LTD TheC64 Mini. There have also been a ton of new games in development announcements and a couple of corking new releases.