Posted By
commodore69
on 2014-09-27
14:30:12
|  What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
I love games like FIRE ANT, TOM THUMB, TREASURE ISLAND, KIKSTART and TUTTI FRUTTI. What I hate are games that are so hard, you play them over and over again, getting nowhere. You get pissed off with how hard they are and give up. The worst two I know are SPOOKY CASTLE and SCOOBY DOO. These are too hard to a point you soon get sick of them. What are the hardest games you know?
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Posted By
Luca
on 2014-09-27
18:22:04
 | Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
Turbo Esprit.
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Posted By
Csabo
on 2014-09-27
18:56:16
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
Oh come on, don't be like that. If you ignore the non-existent Spooky Castle, it's a legitimate and IMHO interesting topic.
There's quite a few games that have a very steep learning curve. Fingers Malone was the first one that came to mind for me  It's not that bad of a game, but the controls are sooo frustrating, I often rage-quit after a few tries.
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Posted By
retroscener
on 2014-09-27
19:43:24
 | Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
lol OK I'll play along. Just plz no more crazy stories 
Ghosts 'n Goblins & Green Beret. Not only are they near enough impossible, they're bloody awful games too.
Fingers Malone requires way much too pixel perfection for the elevators. I personally also found Gunlaw just too tough overall that I always died on the first level, but that's probably just me.
I agree with Scooby Doo, the ghoul respawns are ridiculously unfair.
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Posted By
commodore69
on 2014-09-27
19:55:29
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
SPOOKY CASTLE by ATLANTIS SOFTWARE: it does exist so hard it's beyond joke!
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Posted By
retroscener
on 2014-09-27
20:03:35
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
I'm not denying the game exists.
[Show][Hide]
Just not on our system 
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Posted By
commodore69
on 2014-09-27
20:06:08
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
WHY IS IT I'M HOLDING THE TAPE HERE I PURCHASED FROM ATLANTIS SOFTWARE IN 1988 THEN, HEY?
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Posted By
Csabo
on 2014-09-27
20:40:54
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
You may have a copy, but it's not a C16/Plus4 game.
Back on-topic: so that's two votes for Fingers Malone
Ghosts 'n Goblins and Green Beret: I'd put these into a different category. They are such bad conversions overall, that I don't even feel like playing with them. I think it's more frustrating when a game looks good (and probably IS good), but it's too hard to play.
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Posted By
retroscener
on 2014-09-27
21:11:47
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
@commodore69
There's a simple quick way to settle this.
Photos of the tape/cover plus video evidence of the game in action on our system or it never existed.
@Csabo
Mmmmm well good, bad or just downright terrible, I reckon they all count.
OK, as far as decent enough games go then, Rockman is also ridiculously tough. I would love to have a Youtube longplay of that one.
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Posted By
Hans
on 2014-09-28
03:44:33
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
Spiky Harold - Kikstart - Adventures In Time.
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Posted By
MIK
on 2014-09-28
07:24:19
 | Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
Fingers Malone is awesome. I gave it a 9 out of 10.
The controls are fine and work perfectly just like any other game in the genre. As I said before, it's just a different take on Pacman. Yeah it's hard for me too, but that's the attraction. It's a game you should pick at once in a while hoping to see a bit more each time or get a better score, much in the same way you would with Pacmania. A bit of luck and a bit of skill goes a long way and it works in both titles in much the same amount.
Fingers Malone is a Mastertronic classic that no collection should be without. Anyone that doesn't see it like that should go to the Commodore Dungeon in Hell and made to play C16/Plus4 Mayhem forever. 
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Posted By
Csabo
on 2014-09-28
16:19:15
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
Gotta strongly disagree with both Kikstart and Adventures In Time.
Kikstart is actually a really good example of how to do learning curves and level design just right. The game itself is near perfect, can't think of a single thing that would need fixing or improvement. You can easily finish the first level with little practice (if not on first try!), and it only gets easier from then on. (That's the key to any game: let the first few levels give you instant gratification and suck you in, then progressively get harder. Then hand over your credit card to buy gems. Oh wait, that's another platform ) In terms of level design, "all the tricks" are not given away too quickly, you will be encountering new obstacles even on later levels.
Adventures In Time: pretty good controls. The way player death is handled is also very good: you get a short period of invulnerability. (This is pretty standard nowadays, but there are few old games that have this.) This means there's no obstacle you cannot pass - at most, you just lose one life. There's tons of games where a "hard part" will just block you "forever", frustration time!
Spiky Harold - kinda agree. It's hard, especially timing the jumps. Though on the other hand, it is a slow paced game, the enemies also move slow. So it's not as bad as some others.
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Posted By
commodore69
on 2014-09-28
17:42:08
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
KIKSTART is fun to play, but SCOOBY DOO is a nightmare! As more and more ghosts appear, it becomes impossible to complete the level. You give up. I think playing TREASURE ISLAND or TOM THUMB is a lot more fun, but ROBIN TO THE RESCUE is fun too!
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Posted By
Lavina
on 2014-09-29
02:23:58
 | Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
one vote for Csabo's opinion about Kickstart.
Also, how about this?
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Posted By
MIK
on 2014-09-29
02:55:11
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
While it looks neat, sadly Atlantis copied Mastertronic and gave us Pink as our machine colour with the new style covers.
and it's, 16/PLUS 4
Check out Survivors and 3D Glooper.
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Posted By
Lavina
on 2014-09-29
03:04:09
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
Yeah they must have changed that practice for this release.
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Posted By
retroscener
on 2014-09-29
03:47:15
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
@Lavina
What sorcery is this?
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Posted By
Luca
on 2014-09-29
03:44:35
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
Hey now it's getting spooky for real!
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Posted By
retroscener
on 2014-09-29
04:11:25
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
A commercial C16/Plus4 game in 1990 is very spooky indeed (that would really be One To Two then wouldn't it?, or has Lavina been possessed by Commodore69?
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Posted By
MIK
on 2014-09-29
09:49:27
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
The last Commercial game I recall buying which was new in a shop, I think it was WHSMITHS, the game Taskforce and that was 1989. So 1990 was not far way. If I remember correct things had dried up for C16/Plus4 and it was Alternative Software Limited dominating what little shelf space there was left, games I already owned for the most part in original form any way so never bothered picking most of them up.
If memory servers, that year (1989) I picked up a Commodore 64C in the autumn and tones of good stuff was on budget label by then such as Ghosts'n Goblins, Ikari Warriors and more. I had it good any way and 8 bit gaming lived on while the rest of the world was rapidly changing over to 16bit and beyond.
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Posted By
Lavina
on 2014-09-29
09:07:25
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
of course it's edited, but not like the fotoforensics show.. Everything was there I just copy pasted some parts there and back. Forensics also show 'commodore' text as edited, however it was there and remained unchanged. All the numbers existed as well, I just copied it. No way of telling it like this.
http://www.retrogames.co.uk/enlarge.cgi?image=032158.jpg&ref=032158&name=032158
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Posted By
Doug
on 2014-10-07
11:41:24
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
Sorry some of you found FM too hard! You just need to apply the same methodology that I used to write it:
Step 1 - put in a long hard day at work (OK, it was Uni back then, but you get the gist).
Step 2 - get dragged down the pub by your mates an consume a silly amount of beer
Step 3 - stagger back to digs, switch on trust C= gear and hack away into the small hours ... job done!
Doug
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Posted By
Csabo
on 2014-10-07
12:23:22
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
Hey Doug,
Nice to see you around Funny, this issue came up before: forum/9526.
In Fingers Malone, a few other games are mentioned (in the level names): Nemesis, Fingers Revenge and Icicle Works. Nemesis was a C64 game (that you looked for and found, there's an old thread about it here). Icicle Works we all know and love. That leaves Fingers Revenge. Any ideas on what that was, or what was planned?
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Posted By
Doug
on 2014-10-07
17:56:04
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
Hey Csabo - good to be back this way. Sorry its been so long....
Fingers Revenge was a vague idea I had for a follow-on, but it never happened. I decided to concentrate on finishing my degree, and spend any time doing late night hacks on games (even if it did keep me in beer money!). When I graduated I decided to concentrate on more 'serious' work opportunities than those to be found writing 8-bit games. At the time it was clear that the whole 8-bit home-computer scene was on the decline, so I shifted focus to PCs (and picked up a juicy job at IBM). It was probably a mistake to completely shut down my 8-bit activities, but there you go. As for what Fingers Revenge would have been - who knows? I never really firmed up the idea.
Cheers,
Doug
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Posted By
retroscener
on 2014-10-08
04:08:08
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
Heyo Doug. Good to see you here. Just wanna say that there's nothing stopping you from finally making this sequel a reality for us C16/Plus4 fans, maybe look on it as a hobby side project as others still on the scene here do?, if only to get this sequel teaser finally off your consiensce. Would love to see more of the original programmers back on the scene
Surprisingly, there's been a few games which I found very challenging back in the day (Fingers Malone still definitely being one of them) yet now finding a doddle to beat now, so I'll have to load this up and give it another go. I owned Fingers Malone and Prospector Pete way back then. I never had a Plus/4 and so only played Icicle Works briefly at my mate's house, until PC emulation came along of course.
P.S. So what was the Nemesis line about?
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Posted By
Luca
on 2014-10-07
19:24:07
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
Mh, along time I hoped to see more stuff by Doug indeed, pity the C16 had 3 only overall... Anyway, happy to see you on these shores
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Posted By
Doug
on 2014-10-08
04:56:35
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
Hi Baz,
It was a project I undertook with an acquaintance of mine. (Background - I took a year off from Uni to concentrate on writing games [which was how Icicle Works came to be]. During this time I spotted the need for a fast tape loader for c64, so I wrote Burner. This saw a lot of success, but entailed frequent visits to the tape duplication companies to help convert titles. On one of these visits I met Kevin, who had just written a beach head clone and was having trouble use Burner. Turned out he lived not far from me, and soon we decided to co-operate on a game).
Nemesis (http://retrocollector.org/index.php?page=1&system=29&publisher=426&title=&release=4159&media=123456789&gallery=1) was only ever released in Germany I think. If you get your hands on a tape well done - its rare!
By-the-way, my fast loader exploits were not limited to tapes. I also did a disk fast loader, that had the honour of being used on the C64 disk version of Elite. Kudos or what?
Cheers,
Doug
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Posted By
MIK
on 2014-10-08
08:34:18
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
Hi Doug,
It must be fun when you catch people red handed for not liking something because they view it as hard. Just goes to show you never know who might be watching. Good timing! 
Hope life is treating you well, crazy where the years go!
Fingers Revenge, yeah nice in theory.
One for retirement age on those cold winter nights, that's if you don't move too the Sun. Dreaming and thinking out loud as you would at the age of 44... Maybe have extra screens leading off a center starting one which would then allow more escape routes around the mazes. At the same time you can always return back to those screens until everything has been collected throughout. It would make it feel more like rooms your exploring then. One for the Plus/4, 64K any way if ever you fancy it.
Saying that, there is more than plenty with the original to keep folks going for another 28 years!
Great to see you again any way!
All the best,
Lando (if you remember that old nick name in these parts)
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Posted By
Doug
on 2014-10-20
18:18:47
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
Hi Mike,
Sure I remember you! I just noticed that you're from Southampton. Small world. That's where I went to Uni. In fact Fingers Malone was born in my room at Chamberlain Hall. Blimey that was a long time ago...
Take it easy!
Doug
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Posted By
MIK
on 2014-10-21
12:05:22
| Re: What are the most ridiculously hard games for the COMMODORE PLUS 4?
Wow, Patrick Strassen who did the likes of GWNN and Powerball also lived in Southampton, Romsey. Some where Patrick was also in contact with Udo Gertz as he sent him some of his C16/Plus4 stuff such as the early version of GWNN when it was known as Challenger, see more on GWNN page... amazingly Udo still had his stuff!
Crazy small world indeed.
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