{"id":3067,"date":"2024-12-06T14:12:51","date_gmt":"2024-12-06T13:12:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.jesperjuul.net\/ludologist\/?p=3067"},"modified":"2024-12-06T14:21:46","modified_gmt":"2024-12-06T13:21:46","slug":"the-history-of-the-commodore-64-in-twelve-objects-6-wizball-and-other-scrolling-games","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jesperjuul.net\/ludologist\/2024\/12\/06\/the-history-of-the-commodore-64-in-twelve-objects-6-wizball-and-other-scrolling-games\/","title":{"rendered":"The History of the Commodore 64 in Twelve Objects #6: Wizball and other Scrolling Games"},"content":{"rendered":"

On the occasion of my upcoming book Too Much Fun: The Five Lives of the Commodore 64 Computer<\/a>, I am writing\u00a0<\/em>The History of the Commodore 64 in Twelve Objects, posted weekly from November 1st<\/sup>, 2024:<\/em><\/p>\n

\"Wizball\"
\n(C64 Wiki)<\/p>\n

Object #6: Wizball and other Scrolling Games<\/h1>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

What even is<\/em> the 1987 game Wizball<\/i> (Sensible Software)? With glowing reviews and a spot on many \u201cbest C64 games ever\u201d-lists, in this game you are a wizard wrapped in a ball, at first hard to control, but gradually acquiring new skills and a cat companion. The world has lost its color, and your job is to collect colors, making the world whole and saturated.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Wizball<\/a><\/p>\n

Like many early C64 games, it is unclear what genre the game belongs to. This horizontally scrolling game is a bit like Defender<\/i> in its shooting, but more like an action-adventure platformer in the way you traverse the world and collect objects. Like other C64 games, it is famous for its music, this one by Martin Galway.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Commodore 64 came out in 1982, and the first smoothly scrolling games followed in 1983 (International Soccer<\/em>, Son of Blagger<\/em>, Neoclyps<\/em>, and Wanted: Monty Mole<\/em>). When did PCs have smoothly scrolling games then? This is usually said to be ID Software\u2019s 1990 <\/span>Commander Keen<\/i>. IBM appears to have made a conscious decision not to add game-related features, and hence THE PC WAS NEARLY A DECADE BEHIND. <\/span><\/p>\n

Along with the Atari 8-bit computers, the C64 could do what its main competitors (ZX Spectrum, Apple II, IBM PC, Amstrad) could not: The C64 video chip, the VIC-II, allowed for games that smoothly scrolled around a larger world. \u201cScrolling\u201d is not a genre today, but the scrolling facility allowed for the early C64 tradition of action-adventure games and action-adventure platformers (predating say Nintendo\u2019s games by many years).<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Wanted:<\/a><\/p>\n

The 1983 Wanted: Monty Mole<\/i> \u00a0<\/span>instructed players to REMEMBER IT\u2019S NOT JUST A PLATFORM GAME ITS AN ADVENTURE, emphasizing the newness of combining action with exploration. The C64 hardware thus enabled a whole subgenre of action-adventure games.<\/span><\/p>\n

When European developers later made games of open exploration, say Grand Theft Auto<\/em>, it was not surprising, as these were the kind of games they had grown up on.<\/span><\/p>\n

What scrolling games do you remember?<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>Coming December 13th<\/sup>: Object #7 \u2013 The SID Chip \u2013 Commodore 64 Music<\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On the occasion of my upcoming book Too Much Fun: The Five Lives of the Commodore 64 Computer, I am writing\u00a0The History of the Commodore 64 in Twelve Objects, posted weekly from November 1st, 2024: (C64 Wiki) Object #6: Wizball and other Scrolling Games What even is the 1987 game Wizball (Sensible Software)? With glowing … Continue reading “The History of the Commodore 64 in Twelve Objects #6: Wizball and other Scrolling Games”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[26,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3067","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-c64","category-games"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jesperjuul.net\/ludologist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3067","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jesperjuul.net\/ludologist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jesperjuul.net\/ludologist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jesperjuul.net\/ludologist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jesperjuul.net\/ludologist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3067"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/www.jesperjuul.net\/ludologist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3067\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3083,"href":"https:\/\/www.jesperjuul.net\/ludologist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3067\/revisions\/3083"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jesperjuul.net\/ludologist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3067"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jesperjuul.net\/ludologist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3067"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jesperjuul.net\/ludologist\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3067"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}