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The article has been written exclusively for Commodore is Awesome/Vintage is The New Old by Eric “Majikeyric” Hilaire, tThe developer of ‘Bug Hunt’, one of the strongest entries on the 2016 RGCD 16K Game Cartridge Competition.

In September 2015, I was looking for a little game to port to the Commodore computers (not only to C64 but also Amiga and VIC20).

I’m not a really good at graphics this is why I wanted to make a convert from an already existing game. I searched through the titles of the Sega Megadrive, this is my favourite console and I had made some tools to rip graphics and data from Megadrive emulators saved states (GSX files).

The game had to be simple, nice looking and funny. Bug Hunt was perfect! Furthermore, the resources of the game (sprite sheet, background graphics…) were available without needing to rip them.

I learnt that Bug Hunt was originally a freeware PC game made by Lazy Brain Games and converted to the Megadrive by The AfroMonkeys (a Spanish developer team).

I gave up the idea to port Bug Hunt to the VIC20 because without real hardware sprites it was not doable.

Before going full assembly I made a prototype of the game in PureBasic on PC to adjust the game logic. When ready, I started the development of the Amiga OCS version in 68000, it was well advanced but I stopped it because real life took all my spare time at that moment.

In February 2016, I regained interest in Bug Hunt and started the C64 version! (my favourite and beloved computer). I converted the graphics with ConGo and did some artwork with my bad skill (with GrafX2) but I’m satisfied with the final result.

On the programming side, I cross-develop on PC using Ultra-edit, ACME and VICE and a bunch of command-line tools I created for data conversion. The port to the C64 was fast, the most challenging task for me was the sprite multiplexer. I had never managed so many sprites!

Mid-February the game was nearly finished, I realized then that I could entry the RGCD 16KB Cartridge Dev Compo ! (I never started Bug Hunt with that compo in mind).

I decided to contact Joachim Wijnhoven (Yogi Bear) to ask him to make the music and sound effects of the game. I didn’t know him but I really liked the tunes he composed. He kindly accepted!

With the help of Roland Hermans (NEO) for the sound effects and the play-routine (he added the SFX support to his player just for this game!), they delivered a great work! (and they are both very nice persons).

There is an Amiga version in progress! Don’t know if it will be finished one day but who knows.

I would prefer improving the gameplay of the C64 version according to the comments of C64 users.

I have been programming on the C64 for 25 years, I belonged to some demo/craking groups in the past but I have nearly released nothing.

After a long break, I’m back to the C64 and the only thing I want now is to make games for it.

But one thing makes me sad, I must be the only one french still coding on C64….

You can download the game here.

Author: Eric “Majikeyric” Hilaire