/vr/ - Retro Games

Consoles are different from computers, even if they use the same processor. The 6502 on the NES is actually a "capped" version of a 6502 (Ricoh 2A03), with less instructions and different mappings.

>>5772043
The instruction set is exactly the same except decimal mode doesn't work.

>>5772035
To make room for all the censorship it would seem.
https://www.wired.com/1993/04/nintendo-2/

>>5772049
Thus, it's a reduced instruction set. You can look up the NES programming manual on romhacking.net and see that it specifies pretty clearly some instructions as DISABLED. There were even macros invented to emulate instructions of the complete set.

Only the CLD/DEC instruction is disabled on the 2A01. You can execute it but it's just like a NOP instruction--one clock cycle and nothing else happens. Otherwise the instruction set is the standard 6502 one.

*2A03 I mean

https://forums.nesdev.com/viewtopic.php?f=9&t=9813

Here. The only difference is the lack of decimal mode, the "illegal" 6502 opcodes work as well because it uses an NMOS core but only about four games use them.

Only the CLD/SED instruction is disabled on the 2A03. You can execute it but it's just like a NOP instruction--one clock cycle and nothing else happens. Otherwise the instruction set is the standard 6502 one. I guess they figured decimal mode really wasn't needed for games.

IIRC the C64 Maniac Mansion has a fuckton more overhead than the NES, including a disk fastloader and anti-hacking measures which weren't necessary on a console.

Can't everyone just agree that Spike is best girl?

The original used the SCUMM engine, it was probably more bloated than straight 6502 asm.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6m1BiRyzbw

>>5772136
You mean Razor?

>>5772183
Well damn it. It's been a long day. I'm tired.

>>5772094
At least one dev was mad about the lack of decimal back then.
https://tcrf.net/Pachi_Com_(NES)

>>5772056
>mutually consenting adults

>>5772147
NES MM was written that way as well, they didn't use straight asm.

Most computer games of the time tended to be coded less efficiently than console games because they weren't as strapped for space. Disk storage was dirt-cheap compared to ROM cartridges and there was more more memory space.

>>5772035
>2k of RAM

Didn't NES games come with RAM on the cartridge board?

>>5773038
http://bootgod.dyndns.org:7777/profile.php?id=13

Maniac Mansion had RAM for the save game. Some of this could have also been used for extra workspace, but IDK.

The Famicom Maniac Mansion had no cartridge RAM, it just used the onboard 2k RAM. No idea about the NES MM.

Which is the best Maniac Mansion

>>5773350
The NES when all is considered, even with the censored content it looks nicer, has more music, and zero load time against the computer ones.

>>5773350
The Amiga version is the best version. Best graphics and best sound. Runs well under ScummVM.

>>5773350

https://anonfile.com/Y8P1171dnf/Maniac_Mansion_Amiga_zip
https://www.scummvm.org/downloads/#stable

>>5773489
>https://anonfile.com/Y8P1171dnf/Maniac_Mansion_Amiga_zip
thanks anon

>>5772136

>>5772136
>>5774531
>>5774642

>>5772035
What's the one where I can kill the hamster?

>>5774936
Literally soulless.

>>5772049
They took it out in favor of a built in sound chip.

>>5775001
The only thing they did was cut a single trace to disable decimal mode as they didn't want to pay Commodore royalties. Ricoh had a license to manufacture 6502s, but it applied only to Japan and not any other market.

>>5775047
The 2A03 had built in sound hardware, something had to be cut to fit in the sound hardware and that something was the decimal mode.

>>5775052
The logic for the decimal mode wasn't removed though, it's still on the chip die. They merely disabled it for legal reasons.

>>5772035
>They're both 6502 machines so the code should have been around the same size
you are 100% computer illiterate. just because it uses a similar cpu doesn't mean for a damned second that they should be "around the same size". what is this retard logic?
>>5772094
the NES had no need for decimal mode.
>>5775047
complete fucking horseshit. nintendo went with a custom design for its 6502 package, you incompetent faggot. paying royalites to MOS would still happened anyway.

>>5775106
>the NES had no need for decimal mode.

>>5772186

>>5775106
>complete fucking horseshit. nintendo went with a custom design for its 6502 package, you incompetent faggot. paying royalites to MOS would still happened anyway.
Reread the post carefully. Ricoh was licensed as a 6502 second source however the license was for the Japanese market only, not other markets so disabling decimal mode by cutting a single trace allowed them to sell the chips internationally.

>>5775109
> licensed
> somehow not paying royaties
> just cutting a trace got them out of their contract
fucking hell. you people are dumb cunts.

>>5775090
https://tcrf.net/Pachi_Com_(NES)
>Why did they take out the 6502's decimal mode [from the NES architecture]? It's a decimal computer... Did they mess up the mask cutting or something?
They removed it.

>>5775112
Strangely enough it did since disabling decimal mode technically made the chip a workalike and not a clone.

The NES CPU has been decapped and there are shots of the die available online and the logic for the decimal mode is definitely still present.

The C64 doesn't have hardware sprite multiplexing, in fact the multiplexer routine in MM uses almost all available raster time. Could that have contributed?

The two Bit Corp games Duck Maze and Othello attempt to use decimal mode and fuck up when a digit exceeds ten. Bit Corp was a Taiwanese developer so it may be that they tested the games on a Famiclone which had working decimal mode.

>>5775114
>>5775112
>>5775106
>>5775001

>>5772082
This was all answered in the link here.

>>5775114
>>5775112
>>5775106
>>5775001

>>5772082
This was all answered in the link here. They did not have CAD tools in the early 80s and chip design was done by hand with enormous schematic diagrams laid out on several tables. It was extremely tedious and time consuming to add or subtract features to a chip, so simply cutting one trace was easier than trying to redo the 6502 to remove the decimal mode logic.

>>5772035
>different hardware is different

wow this insane who could have forseen t his

>>5775125
Is there a way to restore it.

>>5775125
Is there a way to restore it?

As someone else said, it may well be that stuff like the disk fastloader and anti-hacking checksums on the C64 added extra bloat the NES didn't have.

>>5772035
I don't know why the OP would ask this specifically technical question here. Wouldn't AtariAge or Lemon64 be a better place for it? /vr/ knows fuck-all about programming or hardware, only arguing over the new AVGN video.

>>5775112
The N64 similarly has MPEG video decoding acceleration support in its CPU. Nintendo never mentioned this to avoid paying royalties.

>>5772035
I don't know why the OP would ask this specifically technical question here. Wouldn't AtariAge or Lemon64 be a better place for it? /vr/ knows fuck-all about programming or hardware, only arguing over the new AVGN video or posting memes.

https://www.pagetable.com/?p=603

This has a lot of technical details for the C64 Maniac Mansion.

>>5772035
>they're 2 different games, completely different source, completely different graphics, etc...
>CPU architecture affects program size even if both programs are functionally identical
>graphics, music, and other assets are going to be in entirely different formats that match the target hardware

And then you have the basic fact that if 2 different people are told to program the same thing, their implementations are going to be fundamentally different.

>>5775185
^This.

>>5772035
you think that's bad? compare a Tekken arcade rom to a Tekken ps1 rom. Ayyycarumba

>>5775185
>>5775221
If you actually read the thread, you'll see OP got his answer and then some. Why are you trying to convince someone to take non-shitposting elsewhere?

>Ron Gilbert began the project by coding in 6502 assembly language, but quickly decided a game of this size and complexity was too big for it. A scripting engine similar to C was needed; unlike arcade-style games, Maniac Mansion could get away with it because it wouldn't need much speed.

>>5774936
The Deluxe version is another thing that exists. No idea how faithful the gameplay is to the original. The sprites looks slightly changed, and the color pallet is clearly huge.

https://www.myabandonware.com/game/maniac-mansion-deluxe-dbw

>>5775205
Sounds awfully complex. I'd have to wonder just how much they modified and simplified the game engine to fit in the NES's (more limited) memory space since it can only access 32k of ROM at once.

>>5772035
>nes scumm
Can i play zakk mccracken on nes?

>>5775514
There is no part of you that should be happy about playing a mouse game with a controller.

>>5775205
According to this, the game did not include support for the 1351 mouse because there just wasn't enough memory for it.

>>5775127
Maybe at this time only. Later it was some kind of challenge who could display the most sprites on an C64. And not just the usual suspects of the demo scene.

Especially later tricks that displayed graphics inside the previously barren border area, which was only possible via the usage of sprites... many, many sprites, certainly more then the 8 hardware sprites. A very good example of this would be Creatures II, but after all this was one of the later or almost last games on the system.

>>5775558
The NES would not be able to pull off that giant-ass bird thing because the sprites are too small.

Should the original MM get a remaster?

>>5775567
C64 doesn't have the NES's color palette and the graphics are blockier, but it does look more organic. NES graphics are too flat and have poor contrast.

>>5775567
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bIpXvt0wxo

I've also never seen a NES game with falling snow like that.

>>5775567
a lot of NES games use this trick where they fade out the background to display large enemies. look at the bosses from life force, for example. the boss is literally the background layer.

>>5775836
I'll always give points here for how C64 graphics are clean and not filled with flicker and scroll artifacts.

>>5772035
It's almost like they're two entirely different games on entirely different systems
>>5773350
Amiga

The Famicom Maniac Mansion is more of a straight port but doesn't scroll screens. It was written in a custom game engine and not SCUMM.

>>5775864
Are you sure? I remember seeing a TV feature on that port and they clearly mentioned SCUMM.

>>5775961
No they didn't use SCUMM since LucasArts didn't develop that port. The US Maniac Mansion of course did as it was developed in-house.

>>5775735
No, they'd definitely mess it up by using the 90s LucasArts style, like one of the terribly misguided fan remakes did. The original Maniac Mansion has a legitimately dark tone that doesn't work nearly as well when the game looks like a Saturday morning cartoon.

>>5776072
Fate of Atlantis didn't have that super-cartoony, exaggerated style because it was a more serious game.

>>5775469
Ron is such a sad, washed up old joke now and he's also sold out to SJWs hard.

>>5772056
This was a really good read, cheers for this.

>>5775469
>"Seven different playable characters each with different special abilities and several possible endings. We were in way over our heads and felt we'd created an impossible mess for ourselves. We contemplated at one point cutting the game down to three characters and 2-3 possible endings. Yet we persevered."

>>5772035
The NES's tilemapped graphics, 4x4 tile color attributes, and stronger support for hardware sprites made graphics take up way less space than they would on the C64

>>5776194
>The NES's tilemapped graphics
C64 also uses tile/char graphics.
>4x4 tile color attributes
Char mode on the C64 has two global colors set by a register and each tile gets an individual color set via the color RAM.
>and stronger support for hardware sprites
Not really. The NES's sprites are tiny and lack the "double size" feature on the C64. They can only cover 64 pixels of screen area while C64's sprites can cover 192 pixels. It does have hardware sprite flipping so you save some space on not needing sprite patterns for every direction the character faces, although in the particular case of Maniac Mansion, it's only needed for the characters to face left or right.

There isn't anything that makes C64 code intrinsically more memory-hungry than NES code (it's all 6502 code and 6502 instructions are all 1-3 bytes), but a computer game does tend to have more overhead than a console game. NES games probably also had to use a higher degree of code compression to fit in the limited memory space (tricks like not using an entire byte of memory when you had to store a value smaller than 128). SMB is hugely compressed and the code overall is pretty messy and held together with glue and Popsicle sticks. That kind of super compacted code is difficult to write and also modify/debug.

>>5775836
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Hxx5IDtUyU
https://youtu.be/_gDyVuRVfTc?t=129
animated falling snow has been done, but that one in your vid is unique, I haven't seen anything like that on any other game, in 3rd generation anyway. But considering that creatures 2 was released 1992 its not that impressive, for c64 yes, but for that year not really when 4th gen consoles were already out for while.

>>5772035
>Why is something a certain way?
>I "know" it shouldn't be because reasons i don't understand and am obviously wrong but will make the claim anyway
Yikes. Why are zoomers so cringey? If you'd spent a few minutes just looking at what you're trying to talk about a thread wouldn't have had to dies for this.

>>5772035
Gilbert actually spoke in a podcast regarding the NES MM and he was just as distraught because he thought what they achieved wasn't possible.

>>5777596
>for c64 yes, but for that year not really when 4th gen consoles were already out for while.
Who's using 4th gen consoles as a comparison? That's pretty silly.

>>5777596
Mega Man 4 is an MMC3 game so that's practically cheating, but Dragon Fighter is actually pretty impressive since it's MMC1 and also doesn't use a CHR RAM setup for animated backgrounds, the game simply has two different sets of tiles for snow and puts them them offset a few pixels every frame.

>>5777596
Mega Man 4 is an MMC3 game so that's practically cheating, but Dragon Fighter is actually pretty impressive since it's MMC1 and also doesn't use a CHR RAM setup for animated backgrounds, the game simply has two different sets of tiles for snow and puts them with their position offset a few pixels every frame.

>>5775845
the dragon in mega man 2 was done this way

>>5777683
by 1992 snes and genesis was out

>>5777648
>Yikes. Why are zoomers so cringey?
Physically painful to read this post

Maniac Mansion is MMC1, this means the core game engine is 16k and occupies the $C000-$FFFF range. The $8000-$BFFF range is the "data" bank the game switches as needed. When your characters walk into a room, it first switches in the level data, then the graphics data, copies it to CHR RAM (since this is a CHR RAM game similar to LOZ), and finally switches in the audio bank, which contains the sound data and which is in use during actual play.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9EU0Ml28keg

Also like on the C64, it has two different raster interrupts for the top "text" bar and the bottom "command" bar." The NES doesn't have an IRQ timer like the C64 does, unless you use MMC3 (which this game doesn't) so it has to rely on the sprite 0 trick. Sprite 0 is simply a solid black square so it's invisible. The game switches the sprite 0 location as it's going down the screen so the PPU renders it a second time at the bottom of the playfield, allowing a second IRQ.

On the C64, the game engine uses a multiplexer to create the characters, which are made of three stacked sprites. The NES multiplexes in hardware so this step is unnecessary.

So the main ace the NES has up its sleeve is being able to switch the data banks instantaneously. On the C64, the all the level/sound/graphics data for the current room is in memory, which takes a lot of space (when you go into a room, the data for that room is all loaded from disk in one chunk). On the NES, only whatever is currently needed is switched in and then immediately switched back out.

Then factor in the disk routines and anti-hacking measures which add more bloat.

>>5777665
I suppose given that that they had to shoehorn (and I mean shoehorn) everything into 64k, let alone attempt it on a system with less than 45k memory space.

>>5777897
In the video though, it's still playing the music when you're switching rooms. Clearly it's doing some other trick here.

>>5777806
That's a clear sign of autism cringelord

>>5775567
if there was an NES port of this game, the bird would have been a background layer that moves around while the pipes (and critters on the floor) would be sprites. Alternatively, the bird would be reduced to a 64X64 sprite, as those would be the maximum number of sprites you can display without flickering. Multiplexing and sprite scaling can go a long way.

For comparison, the Thunderbird in Zelda II is pretty...small.

>>5775558
Creatures 2 as a whole would be hard for the NES to pull off because it's very heavily dependent on the C64's sprite capabilities. Even the score counter at the bottom uses sprites and bigger sprites than what the NES has. The falling snow might also be tricky due to the way the attribute system on the NES works.

>>5778436
Cope, dilate, have sex, etc

>>5772043
>Consoles are different from computers
Stop, just stop.

Not contributing, just posting some cool pics

>>5779070

>>5779073

>>5779075

>>5779080

>>5778703
>All the cringey little zoomer npc memes
You're taking cringe to new depths kiddo

>>5779083

>>5779095
>this autism
oof

>>5779098
I wonder if Jaleco porting MM to the Famicom was another case of the Japanese adoring American computer games.

>>5779685
LucasArts wanted to make a Nintendo game, and they already had MM.

>>5779098
>Rozzer

>>5779098
are these the advisers in the japanese version of sim city?

>>5779254
>more zoomer noise
kek

>>5779698
They eventually made their own version instead of translating Jaleco's version. Were they by chance dissatisfied with Jaleco's version? How does the Jaleco one compare, tech wise, to the LucasFilm version? It seems far simpler in design, did they have to make any concessions besides the infamously long password system?

I always found weird that this game had a TV show.

>>5779685
I never knew about this thing, looks like they changed all the writing to weird scribbles to save memory

>>5772035
You have much slower drive access on the c64. Loading times would have been minutes if part of the game was missing.

>>5773350
PC windows remake

>>5784453
The game has a fastloader built in, so load times aren't too annoying.

>>5784357
I know you're shitposting, but the Famicom MM is entirely in Hiragana and it is fucking bizarre.

>>5784460
Even fastloaders aren't that fast.

>>5784459
The sprites are weirdly smooth and melted. Amiga still looks better in the end.

>>5782909
>I always found weird that this game had a TV show.
Did anyone watch that? I don't mean anyone reading this, I mean anyone anywhere.

>Atlantis enlisted comedian and former Second City Television writer/performer (((Eugene Levy))) to creatively spearhead the development the series. Originally pitched as a more overtly horror/science fiction-themed comedy in the vein of The Addams Family or The Munsters, (((Levy))) ultimately rejected this approach, recruiting a number of The Second City alumni and re-working Maniac Mansion from the ground up into the more lighthearted and slightly surreal series it eventually became.
could've been good, then the jews got to it

>>5784463
>>5784460
I thought Zak McKracken had worse load times than MM.

>>5784519
I don't live in US and had an original NES cartridge, I grew up always looking and wondering about that yellow sticker SEE THE TV VERSION and thinking it must be the coolest shit ever.

????

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLqA06yA79_IkUWxugT-RSkP6diKpo1Hib
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLqA06yA79_ImCjtEGd_IUzuZFVIPWhdT1
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLqA06yA79_InM5U9fg6-2Ks2ZVjmEyITi

>>5772185

If I had the game running through a horrendous filter like that, I also I wouldn't recognize the characters.

>>5784461
t. never played famicom games

>>5784519
I watched the show, I was super excited only to find out it was this barely-referenced sitcom, not far off from seventh heaven or whatever prime time sitcoms cable network channels had with the weird almost-soap-opera camera speed.

Joe Flaherty was funny but beyond that the show didn't have much substance. It was like freaks and geeks without the whole plotline 10 years too early.

Was a shame, Fucking loved the game and obsessed over it.

>>5784519
>>5785564
Same. Literally me.
>see the stupid "as seen on TV!" label
>have fantasies about a funny ass comedy based on the game, involving the mansion, the 5-7 character archetypes, hamsters in microwaves, talking tentacles etc etc
>parents finally get cable
>it's a very pedestrian sitcom with some passive references and identical names
god that was the dumbest shit ever

>>5785761
and I replied to the wrong post yay
>>5785724
>>5785525
>>5784519

>>5773489

I only played through the NES version as a kid. Downloaded and just did a playthrough with Dave, Michael, and Syd. Thanks for the good times, vr bros.

>>5784357
>game is entirely in japanese
>leave "secret lab" in english

I have a soft spot for the NES version since is the one I grew up with and the music, man, there are some sick tunes in there.

>>5775047
>I know nothing about the NES. Please fuck my face

Ok anon if you insist

>>5785884
well the game still takes place in america

>>5772035
They needed a lot of space for the drawing, sound, and disk routines that the nes hardware obviates, if I remember correctly

>>5787203
You may have an argument with the disk routines but I don't see how the graphics or sound code would necessarily be more complex than the NES.

>>5787227
C64 has to have a software sprite multiplexer, no? NES does this in hardware.

>>5787241
That was covered earlier. The characters are three stacked sprites each and the engine switches sprite pointers as the screen is being scanned. The NES doesn't require this additional step, but it does switch the sprite 0 position mid-frame so it can do two screen splits. There may also be some double buffer code for the screen scroll on the C64 but not sure.

I would assume the disk routines and anti-hacking checks took a fair bit of space. Did you know that the graphic for Sandy's tits is stored separately from the other sprite data? Reason is unknown but it may have been to prevent nude hacks.

>>5787259
>Did you know that the graphic for Sandy's tits is stored separately from the other sprite data? Reason is unknown but it may have been to prevent nude hacks.
Someone needs to ask Ron Gilbert about this sometime.

>>5787241
>googoogaagaa noises
kids. lol.

>>5787259
>>5787241
>look at me I was born in 1999 and I learned about retro hardware from AVGN/The 8-Bit Guy videos XD
kys

>>5787259
As someone else said, the NES can switch in the graphics/sound/level data on the fly, the C64 loads everything from disk at once which uses a lot of memory.

>>5787639
This also would've been possible on the C64. But usually these c64 cartridges were obscenely expensive and only a few hundred (somewhere between 300-400) games were available on cartridge beside the disk and tape versions. I only have a single game (Batman - The Game) and one freezer Cartridge (Final Cartridge III) for the system, since compared to the disk and tape releases these were just to expensive for me.

You can also see now with the homebrew scene what would've been possible on the C64 with exclusively cartridge based games (i.e. the Luftrausers or Canabalt C64 port). Like the Prince of Persia C64 Port that would be completely impossible via Disk, let alone Tape media. But I don't want to know how much such rather big carts would've costed back in the day.

>>5787639
Right. When you go into a different room in MM, it switches the level data into $8000-$BFFF, reads it, then switches in the graphics data, copies it into the CHR RAM, and finally switches in the sound data. It doesn't load all the data for the room all at once and keep it there until you go into the next room like on C64.

>>5787719
The carts would have been expensive, although devs might also have appreciated that they were much more pirate-proof than magnetic media.

>>5787719
>This also would've been possible on the C64.
Need I remind you that PoP was originally an Apple II game.

>>5787719
>But I don't want to know how much such rather big carts would've costed back in the day.
It can't have been more than NES games especially since they wouldn't have needed hardware for battery saves or a lockout chip all of which was added expense.

>>5787629
You're off by at least 5 years. Probably 10.

>>5787629
Since when does AVGN discuss hardware?

Aren't we forgetting the FDS existed and the original versions of Zelda were FDS games?

>>5788286
fds wasn't marketed outside of japan. so.. nobody gives a shit.

>>5788051
>Need I remind you that PoP was originally an Apple II game.
..that ended up being better as conversions to other platforms than the original apple 2 version. really makes you think.

>>5788731
>muh freedumbs
>muh sturz n streypz
>muh cheezburgz
stay morbidly free, chump

>>5772136
>not picking bernard
you literally miss out on the game

>>5773053
That was an interesting read

>>5774792
>Be a retard
>Use horribe filter
Good job.

>>5787276
Sounds like a good way to get maced

>>5788051
Did you take a look how the other ports looked like? Especially the 8-bit ones (most of the 16-bit ones were just fine, back in the day I played the game on my Amiga and later GameGear... the game gear version was crap btw.). For whatever reasons an official C64 port was in production twice (!) but never came to fruition. Back in the day I only saw some vague screenshots of the C64 version in magazines. Fuck, did this look ugly.

Judging from the developers blog about the making of the homebrew C64 port, this one was a very close conversion of the Apple Original.
http://popc64.blogspot.com/
He used a commented Apple ][ disassembly of the game as base for his conversion, since while he was trying to get it to work on the C64 the original sources were nowhere to be found (Jordan Mechner in the end found them). And the conversion is really close, since he didn't even try to optimize it. Like when drawing the tiles for the backgrounds and animations he didn't even used the typical route on the C64 of just using char graphics, but rather used bitmap mode like the original game. I don't know how well the original run, but if he had released the game on disk you probably would've needed to wait at every screen for the next one to load.
But I'm sure if he optimized his port and did thinks the typical C64 way instead of an 1:1 conversion of the original code it might be possible to play from disk.

Reading the blog again, the constraint of using a cartridge indeed was based in the way he drew the graphics (bitmap vs. character sets). The bitmap mode of the original needed just too much memory and was also too slow for floppy access. And using a cartridge was a fast shortcut for copying around the tileset graphics and level structure.

When released back in the day in that way this also would've been a rather huge and thus expensive cartridge game with its 512kb (I think this was even the maximum size for C64 cartridges).

>>5789335
>Like when drawing the tiles for the backgrounds and animations he didn't even used the typical route on the C64 of just using char graphics, but rather used bitmap mode like the original game
A couple of points here. Bitmap on the C64 is 8k just like the Apple II, although actually it's a bit more since you also have the color RAM and screen RAM (both 1000 bytes) to hold the color data while the Apple just has the bitmap buffer since its color is made of NTSC artifacts generated by the pixel alignment. A commercial release of PoP back in the day very likely would have used char mode.

As for disk access, the Apple II's disk drives are a _lot_ faster than the 1541. However, PoP also requires a 128k machine so most of the game can be fit into RAM which minimizes disk access.

And I'm also reminded some of Jumpman which rather unnecessarily runs in bitmap mode because Randy Glover simply copypasted his original Atari source code when converting it for the C64. The bitmap screen on the Atari 8-bit is only 2k or something but on the C64 it's 8k.

Bitmap mode is totally impractical for any dynamic games on the C64. It's only useful for stuff where you're mostly going to have a static background like The Law of the West or Way of the Exploding Fist.

>>5788064
I'd say it wasn't the cost per-se but rather how slim the profit margins are for computer games. I remember something like Raid on Bungeling Bay sold like 20K copies on the C64, but 800K on the Famicom.

>>5789518
>I remember something like Raid on Bungeling Bay sold like 20K copies on the C64
I'm not sure what the retail price of the game was but supposing around $50, that was about $1 million in total revenues. The NES version on paper would have been worth a lot more, but Nintendo took half the total profits for themselves.

>>5789335
>He used a commented Apple ][ disassembly of the game as base for his conversion
I'm pretty sure every port of PoP back in the day used Jordan's original code as the basis, although I suppose it was most useful on the NES which shares a CPU with the Apple II.

>>5789335
Oh, I see now. He didn't need the cartridge, he was just too lazy to bother converting the graphics code properly.