DEMO STYLE TEXT : C64 Assembly

With thanks to Shallan for his help in this We have all seen the fancy demos that have been created on the C64 over the years. Some of the most artistic and entrancing graphics and text swirling around the screen. In this tutorial I am going to take you through how to make a fancy […]

C64 Assembly : Multicolour Alphabet

We all would love to be jumping into coding some amazing games when beginning any new language. Before we do this however, we need to master some basics. Let’s get something displaying on the screen. We left our last lesson with the simple ‘Hello World’ example. Lets switch this up to printing the characters of […]

C64 Assembly : Hello World

I wanted to start out with something simple when beginning to look at Assembly. The traditional Hello World output seemed like the best choice for this. I’ve taken an example from the excellent ‘The Anatomy of The Commodore 64‘ and Old Skool Coder‘s Youtube channel for this one. Starting the Code Block The first thing […]

Setting up for C64 Assembly Coding

In this brief tutorial I want to look at how we can setup KickAssembly for the C64 and Visual Code in order to code, compile and run programs on the C64. Things you will need: 7-Zip Up to date Java installation which can be found at the Java Website A copy of Vice – the […]

WRITING CODE FOR THE C64: 4- BEGINNING BASIC #3

Thinking through Problem Solving as a Programmer Most of us have been exposed to the idea that computers can make decisions. This is true but before the computer can make a decision, the programmer must tell it how. One of the magic elements about computer science is that after you have written a program and […]

WRITING CODE FOR THE C64: 4- BEGINNING BASIC #2

One of the most important aspects to coding is understanding how to use the arithmetic operations available on the C64. It is capable of solving simple arithmetic and more complicate maths such as algebra and trigonometry, these functions are commonly used in game programming. Arithmetic Symbols There are four arithmetic symbols which you can use […]

WRITING CODE FOR THE C64: 4- Beginning BASIC #1

Most beginners to coding on the C64 won’t start with Machine Code or Assembly language coding. They will begin to explore their programming potential with BASIC. I included the previous chapters on Assembly language to help beginners understand what goes on behind the scenes when we craft a game or a program in an interpreted […]

WRITING CODE FOR THE C64: 3– ASSEMBLY LANGUAGE PT 2

In this section of my tutorial blog I’m going to look at how we can alter the bits instead of just moving them. The most important aspect of coding is about control. I want you to feel empowered and to be able to craft your own games and programs with all of this knowledge. Math […]

WRITING CODE FOR THE C64: 3– Assembly Language pt 1

Assembly Language is used as a convenient way for humans to work with the opcodes (discussed in Chapter 1) required for a microprocessor to function. This is a step up from having to work with the pure binary in machine code. Assembly language contains three character mnemonics which represent each opcode and a number base […]

WRITING CODE FOR THE C64: 2 – All About the Numbers

The above image shows the motherboard of the Commodore 64, contained within the motherboard are circuits. These circuits are designed to have two states : on and off. These states are represented with different electronic voltage levels. This is why we say that all data or information which flows through a computer is a stream […]