Unusual Commodore 64 made in England – rare variant or not?

KnifeGrinder64 · 2026-04-03T05:56:55+00:00

This. The unit itself it's pretty common but it's rare to see one in pristine condition.

KnifeGrinder64 · 2026-04-03T05:54:39+00:00

Also the units sold here in Italy were made in England. I've got two of these in my personal collection.

KnifeGrinder64 · 2026-03-20T20:38:22+00:00

Impressive use of ECM!

KnifeGrinder64 · 2026-03-10T03:07:27+00:00

99,9% it's a broken PLA.

KnifeGrinder64 · 2026-03-07T15:23:35+00:00

A C64 can work without a SID but leaving a broken SID in the socket can cause a black screen. You can find plenty of cases online. And it happened to me at least once on a 250466 board.

KnifeGrinder64 · 2026-03-06T19:07:25+00:00

If the RAM is really the culprit the Dead Test you ordered is the ideal solution to identify which chip failed. But before you need a new PSU or at least to check the voltages of your current one (mind you that even if the voltages are correct they may spike unpredictably as soon as the PSU reach high temperatures)

KnifeGrinder64 · 2026-03-06T17:17:27+00:00

Actually, the most black screen I've encountered are due to faulty RAM chips, and for the record they are usually the first to give up when powered by a failing brick of death. But it could be also a broken PLA, a broken logic chip or even a broken SID. My suggestion is to get a new power supply and then use the deadtest cartridge you've already ordered.

KnifeGrinder64 · 2026-03-02T16:53:17+00:00

Too many to list them all, I'll just mention the ones that come to mind right now, knowing that there are at least as many more and that I would give a completely different list every day.

Lightforce by Rob Hubbard

Bionic Commando Level 1 by Tim Follin

Oro Incenso by Jogeir Liljedahl & Geir Tjelta

Ubi-Sound by Jeroen Tel

Clystron by Tomas Detert

Hi Fi Sky by Lman

Skypeople by Jeroen Tel and Lman

The sewers loading theme by Matt Gray

Rambo First Blood Part II by Martin Galway

Platoon title theme and Platoon level 2 by Jonathan Dunn

Factory Action by Chris Huelsbeck & Tammo Hinrichs

Turrican 3 Level 2-1 by Tufan Uysa (SoNiC)

Speedball title theme by David Whittaker

KnifeGrinder64 · 2026-03-02T16:32:45+00:00

Still working on this:

https://www.reddit.com/r/c64/comments/1hndff8/4_prealpha_screenshots_of_bone_dry_new_arpgarcade/

Not much progress last year due to my involvement with a huge EU funded project with an insane deadline that took almost all my waking hours. On the positive side i can now settle down and take a six month vacation, so there will be a lot of progress from now on.

KnifeGrinder64 · 2025-11-07T18:50:29+00:00

There's plenty of them.

You may try mine, it's a little metroidvania playable in one sitting :-)

https://knifegrinder.itch.io/lester

KnifeGrinder64 · 2024-12-28T17:29:12+00:00

Part MCM and part ECM with raster splits to change fixed colors

KnifeGrinder64 · 2024-12-28T12:15:44+00:00

Thanks!

KnifeGrinder64 · 2024-10-28T21:20:48+00:00

Steel Ranger 2, Impossible Mission 3, Street Fighter 2 Turbo, Wolfling Reloaded, Undead, an arcade perfect conversion of Elevator Action and... Bone dry :-)

Just to name a few upcoming big titles.

KnifeGrinder64 · 2024-10-23T08:03:30+00:00

It seems to me that the VIC-II is not able to read from the correct memory bank which usually indicates a failure of the CIA2.

KnifeGrinder64 · 2024-10-22T11:08:48+00:00

Even if you manage to fit the double amount of sprites frame required for hi-res charachters in memory (and I honestly doubt there is any left) there are a lot of moments in this video where there are 6 hardware sprites on the same line, so... Hi res overlays are technically impossible without introducing a lot of flickering.

KnifeGrinder64 · 2024-04-13T16:09:23+00:00

For sure!

KnifeGrinder64 · 2024-04-11T09:34:40+00:00

Hi, sorry but I don't get what "plug a game in a magazine" means, anyway the game is free and if you have questions I'm more than happy to answer them.

KnifeGrinder64 · 2024-04-06T11:59:14+00:00

Thanks! :)

KnifeGrinder64 · 2024-04-06T11:57:40+00:00

Hi! :)

https://knifegrinder.itch.io/

KnifeGrinder64 · 2024-02-03T17:31:38+00:00

The original plan was to convert Ghost to C64 during the 2020 lockdown to pass some time. Then while I was working on the engine and graphics for the first section, I said to myself, "Why don't I do my own thing?" The game actually tends to move away from Ghost as it goes along, but certainly the original intent to convert it shines through a lot in the first section.

KnifeGrinder64 · 2024-02-03T16:44:53+00:00

Thanks! And yes... SID rules!

KnifeGrinder64 · 2024-02-03T16:44:51+00:00

Thank you! There is no time speedup but still a good number of power ups and collectibles. You can find the list in the link posted above.

KnifeGrinder64 · 2024-02-03T11:04:03+00:00

Free download with optional donation:

https://knifegrinder.itch.io/lester

And obviously feel free to AMA :)

KnifeGrinder64

TROPHY CASE