Kelvin

Looks pretty good. I hope we see these games in Europe instead of crap like that eating game.

Not Konami, but...

Monkey Island !

Yeah, the game looks good, and it's good to see developers approaching WiiWare with the right mindset (unlike that naff eating game), but I too would rather see Elite 4 !

Clockwork, from what I can gather, this is more of a resource management/unit-level combat game than a true rpg. As I recall, you play a king and you send adventurers out to explore dungeons and fight monsters so that they can bring treasure back so you can build up your town.

That's what I've heard, anyway.

Rossi, just thinking out loud.

I can imagine some sort of rotation of the Wiimote controlling the rotation of the blocks. Actually, that might make a proper 3D version possible, as you can then rotate the Wiimote/blocks in all dimensions.

Sorry. Blathering.

Yeah, looking forward to this one. And not to flog a dead horse, but they're really going to have to sort out some kind of extra storage with games of this type coming out.

The "Dark Lord" looks like some variant of the Iron Giant from previous Final Fantasy titles, and perhaps also a bit like the "Shadow Lord" from FFXI. I like that aspect of the series; it binds them together in ways more subtle and designery than a simple continuity of plot or character.

This one is more of a "true" Turrican title than either of the SNES games, by virtue of it also appearing on the Amiga (as Turrican 3). It's still a bit of a poor cousin to the first two C64/Amiga titles though.

Still a good game, though!

Yeah, won't be getting this one, but I've got too many games to play and finish as it is!

Prices varied. On cassette, budget titles were usually £2.99 (with some at £1.99, and some at 99p!) and full price games were about £9.99. Disk games were about £15 as I recall, and cartridges were about £25, but I never bought one, so I don't know for sure. Assuming those are 1990 prices, and taking into account inflation, that's roughly £4.90 in today's money for a budget game, and £16.37 for a full price title. So based on that, the C64 Virtual Console costs are pretty good!

And Werewolves of London was a great game. I didn't know it had come out on the Speccy too. I knew it on the Amstrad, and it was the only game worth going over to my mate's house to play on his 464!

This is more like it. I'd rather have this than that cretinous food game.

Oh, and I remember Chip's Challenge too!

Well, I did cover some of that (including the console trade-in offer) up in the fifth and sixth paragraphs, albeit in less detail regarding Tramiel and the Atari/Commodore relationship.

Well, I stand corrected! Although Guide Plus is a bit different to the Freeview guides we get here.

ToadtheMushroom, I wondered if that was the case. Pretty much everyone has, or soon will have, a digital TV guide here in Britain, and one doesn't often think of the British being ahead of the Japanese in terms of technology!

Yeah, close enough.
I don't think my memory of that 95% second opinion score is strictly accurate either!

Yes, it's the only time I've seen a 100% score too, and while over the top, is still indicative of how good Mayhem was.

A better slate than some of the stuff we've been promised!

Will, it was Commodore Format that gave Mayhem in Monsterland the full 100%, but at least they had the decency to have a second opinion from another of their reviewers, who said the 100% was invalid but still gave it 95%!

Mayhem is a great game, but as far as single screenshots go, Creatures II looks a bit better, so I chose that one. Both of them are well worth the 500pts though.

Yes, with the digital switchover in the UK, most people will have an online TV Guide anyway, so I'm not sure how well it would take off here.

Thanks everyone. It was a fun article to write!

Tides of Chaos, with 20, 000 games, most of them won't be worth 500pts, no, but the hope is that we'll see the best of the C64 on the VC, and those games are definitely worth the price.

Yes, I did think that as I was writing this actually. Commodore's approach to the C64 reminds me of the Wii in some ways. That sense of reaching to a new and different audience.

I know what you mean about the SSI games, but I'm pretty sure that most of them were available on the Apple II also. The C64 was a better purchase though.

The thing is, when you write these things, there's always stuff you missed. Maybe I'll go back and add in the stuff about the D&D games, but with all respect to yourself, I don't know how much of a killer app they really were.

Neuzd, it's my first hardware focus, but I've done a couple of articles before. Gald you liked this one. The C64 was surprisingly good at 3D, I'd add Mercenary to your list, and I'd love to see any of them on VC.

Tnk4god, those are all excellent games, but I'm not sure where they'd fit in this article, which is more to do with the machine itself. If I ever do a piece on classic C64 games, I'll definitely be adding some of those, as well as Wasteland.

Oh, I didn't spot Mr Heli, which is a great shoot-em-up with a lot of character.

Great game, but IK+ was better. The first three-player beat-em-up?

Yeah, I'm with Valien; let's have Catan or Carcassonne or even bloomin' Scrabble instead of overblown mini-games.

90's, you mean the Metal Gear that was also released on C64?

Yes, I would be very surprised if we get C64 on Wii, but we don't get Turrican and Turrican II. As you say, Cobra Commander, they're among the best games on the system, so chances must be good!

That Guy... we may not get MSX in Europe, but we may still get Aleste as it was released on the Master System as Power Strike.

I wonder if only Japan will get the MSX? If Japan gets the MSX, and we get the C64, what will North America get? The Atari 2600?

I hope we get Fantasy Zone as it was a great game.

I'm hoping for the C64 versions myself. They don't look as pretty as this, but the gameplay is a bit more balanced and the music is much less cheesy!

Joxe, it's nothing at all like Contra really. It's far more of a platformer that just happens to have a main character with a gun, like a cross between Mario and Metroid.

I'm not hugely familiar with Super Turrican but other games in the series have had massive levels which have scrolled in all directions, not just left-to-right. There's lots of exploration, and multiple paths through the levels, and all that kind of fun stuff. So in a way, it is easier than stuff like Contra because you can avoid the enemies by going a different path, or you can try to gun your way through, and so on.

Also, the Turrican music is much, much better.

Yep, one thing that Turrican has always had over other games of its kind is the music. Those titles, from the C64 up, had fantastic tunes that I still find myself humming nowadays.

Jon, Turrican 3 for the Amiga is the same game as Mega Turrican for the Megadrive, so you'll want to check that out. I think the only differences are minor graphical and sound changes, mainly in the Amiga's favour.

And strenny, we call Turrican a shooter, but there's just as much in the way of platforming and exploration too. I'd always thought of the series as platform games, really.

Super Turrican is good, but now that the C64 is confirmed, I'm looking forward to the real thing!

E-dawg, the MS/GG Sonic games were quite different to the Megadrive versions, but just as good in their own way.

Starwolf_UK, the MS Sonic games still hold up today, and you'd be surprised a how fast they seem.

My biggest hope is probably for Phantasy Star, but there are so many great games for the system.

Oh I don't know, it's the way the current on-screen keyboard works for email and web browsing, so I can see why they might keep the same functionality.

(Can you use the right stick for the web keyboard now? I know you can move the pointer on the Wii Menu with the stick, but I've not tried the keyboard.)

Oh I don't know. Most of the old developers have been absorbed into larger publishers nowadays, so they could still release their older stuff.

zelda freak, yes you have been missing out.

Serpent, as have you. There are lots of brilliant C64 games, many of which have been mentioned already on this thread.

Adamant, The Great Escape was released on C64, but it was one of those titles that was a straight port of the Speccy version, so there's nothing unique about it unfortunately.

witchfinder, I'm in complete agreement.

And to my disgust, I'd forgotten about The Last Ninja so I'll hang my head in shame!

I just added some Points, and somewhere else expressed a wish that this game would be released. It's like destiny!

*River City Ransom*! Absolutely brilliant! It was on my wishlist, but I didn't even realise that it was on the horizon. Great stuff, and I'm going to download it right now!

And it's a two game week too. Things are looking up.

Atlantis1982, at least give the MS and C64 a try before you condemn them!

With any luck, with more systems emulated and thus more games to release (as well as WiiWare on top of that), we'll see the schedule pick up a bit.

More likely, we'll still see one game a week, but we can hope.

Rhys, I may give it a go!

I think both Gremlin and Ocean are owned by Infogrames nowadays, so you never know. I did email Codemasters a few months ago asking if they had any plans to support the Wii in terms of Virtual Console and Wiiware, but they didn't seem keen.

I'd take Impossible Mission from the EPYX list, but almost all (I must confess, I've not heard of Eliminator) of the games on the Hewson list are works of brilliance.

It should also be remembered that the library of games for the C64 was quite different between Europe and the US. I don't think European classics like the aforementioned Head Over Heels, Creatures and Paradroid ever made it Stateside in large numbers.

But now the Finns are being tricky!

Damo, I was the opposite to yourself. I only knew one person with a NES, and plenty with C64s, Speccies and Master Systems. So I see a potentially vast untapped reservoir of excellent gaming here, whereas I could name only a few NES games I'd chase down. Still, as you say, each to their own, and the more systems on VC, the better!

Yeah, I'm not holding my breath for Giana, but it would show a great sense of humour on Nintendo's part.

If this is true, then they'd have to have some kind of keyboard support in place for International Karate; how are we going to press "T" mid-battle?