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Re: C64 - Happy 35th Birthday to the Commodore 64

Posted: August 23rd, 2017, 4:54 pm
by pacman000
If we go too far with this we'll wind up discussing politics/religion, since both have to do with ethics, morality, and implementing them in society. ;)

I do believe there should be abandonment standards in intellectual property laws; there are already abandonment standards for real and personal property. And U.S. copyright laws used to have abandonment standards. Copyrights had to be renewed after 28 years; owners had to register their works, and include a copyright notice; that's why Night of the Living Dead wound up in the public domain; the distributor accidentally left the copyright notice off. The current copyright laws were supposed to correct situations like that, but they've created another problem: orphaned works with no clear copyright holder, and no way to legally create new copies, barring a few fair-use situations.

In spite of the problems I think the old register/renew/mark laws struck a better balance between author's rights and public rights. I also think it's generally immoral to violate the laws of the land, barring extreme circumstances. The current copyright situation isn't extreme enough to warrant breaking the law to correct a wrong. :/

I always thought DVD recorders didn't catch on because there was more than one format, and because disks wouldn't always work in a different player, and because DVR's were easier/offered more features. (Pause/Rewind live TV.) And now DVDs can't record in HD. All the DVD recorders I saw were VCR/DVD combo units; they emphasized the ability to copy your home videos to the newer format. You could still use them to record TV, if you had a receiver for the DVD recorder.

Wasn't this a C64 thread?

Re: C64 - Happy 35th Birthday to the Commodore 64

Posted: August 23rd, 2017, 6:27 pm
by scotland
pacman000 wrote: Wasn't this a C64 thread?


By Jove, you're right again.

One of my favorite memories is playing Elite, but as the C64 Critic wrote in his review, after about 20 hours or so. The gameplay gets 'hamster wheelish'. I guess I just fondly remember those first 20 hours. 20 hours is still a lot lf fun.

One of the less fond memories was Star Trek The Kobayashi Alternative. That may have been the last text adventure I bought.

Re: C64 - Happy 35th Birthday to the Commodore 64

Posted: August 23rd, 2017, 7:47 pm
by VideoGameCritic
Would it be possible for somebody to release a mini "flashback" style Commodore 64 console pre-loaded with classic games? I think something like that would be a big hit, especially considering how hard its games are to obtain now.

Re: C64 - Happy 35th Birthday to the Commodore 64

Posted: August 23rd, 2017, 9:56 pm
by Stalvern
VideoGameCritic wrote:Would it be possible for somebody to release a mini "flashback" style Commodore 64 console pre-loaded with classic games? I think something like that would be a big hit, especially considering how hard its games are to obtain now.

That already exists, although it seems to have been discontinued.

Re: C64 - Happy 35th Birthday to the Commodore 64

Posted: August 24th, 2017, 7:27 am
by scotland
Stalvern is referencing the Epyx plug and play, a joystick loaded with about 20 Epyx games. Its pretty simple.

What would be nice would bea Flashback that has at least a partial keyboard and many more games.

Re: C64 - Happy 35th Birthday to the Commodore 64

Posted: August 24th, 2017, 7:42 am
by newmodelarmy
The problem with a C-64 flashback is that you would need a keyboard.

Re: C64 - Happy 35th Birthday to the Commodore 64

Posted: August 24th, 2017, 9:01 am
by scotland
The rival ZX Spectrum does have the ZX Spectrum Next with just such a keyboard. I am not following the Next news, but I believe it was a kickstarter project nearing completion.

Re: C64 - Happy 35th Birthday to the Commodore 64

Posted: August 25th, 2017, 11:14 am
by pacman000
http://www.c64forever.com/

Browsing through Lemon 64 today. Found this. It's a C64 emulator package which comes with 200 games.

What's C64 Forever?
C64 Forever is a new revolutionary C64 preservation, emulation and support package!

The one-click player interface features more than 200 pre-installed games and demoscene productions. In addition to the C64 it also emulates systems such as VIC 20, Plus/4 and C128.
Source: Lemon 64 http://www.lemon64.com/

Re: C64 - Happy 35th Birthday to the Commodore 64

Posted: August 25th, 2017, 7:35 pm
by Stalvern
newmodelarmy wrote:The problem with a C-64 flashback is that you would need a keyboard.

Not really. Most C64 games used joystick control.

Re: C64 - Happy 35th Birthday to the Commodore 64

Posted: August 25th, 2017, 8:23 pm
by newmodelarmy
Stalvern wrote:
newmodelarmy wrote:The problem with a C-64 flashback is that you would need a keyboard.

Not really. Most C64 games used joystick control.


You could not possible be more wrong with your statement. Most games had a keyboard overlay that allowed quick reference to the keyboard commands. True that many games were joystick only but just as many games (if not more) required the keyboard.