The Best Commodore 64 Arcade Ports Ever! 

The c64 had great ports of Frogger, Tapper, Donkey Kong, Centipede, Digdug,Popeye,Donkey Kong jr. , Ghouls and Ghosts, Gyruss,Qbert,Paperboy. Crystal Castles and many others. This was the best 8th grade graduation gift my Parents bought me. They have both passed , but every time I fire my c64 up , I think of the both of them immediately. Happy Mother's day Mom. Thanks for all the memories your wonderful gift provided me in my teenage years. You saved me alot of quarters.

Buggy boy was brilliant conversation 👍

Great list and 100% agree with the list. My favourite is Ikari Warriors. The biggest surprise is Power Drift looking at the Arcade version. Chris Butler did a great job.

The whole time watching this I was thinking "he better have Bubble Bobble and Ghost N Goblins in here." One port I thought was near perfect and missing from this list was Tapper.

That's a nice list of good arcade conversions on the old C64, thanks. Another arcade conversion I enjoy a lot is R-Type, it's not arcade perfect, but a very nice conversion with excellent music.

I would have added ghouls&ghosts to the list, that game was an amazing port from a very advanced game and the music, in particular the intro and the level 4, is the the best ever made for c64 imho.

Great list but you had to add Green beret, Mikie, Yie ar kung fu and arguably Kung fu master. I like your videos so keep up the good work my good man!

Buggy Boy was incredible on the C64, fantastic conversion. But for me the greatest is Bubble Bobble, spent more time playing that than any other game in the late eighties. And the music, the music...........

Great list OSG. So many timeless classics. I remember spending many an afternoon playing Buggy Boy.

Great list. The transitions between them is also pretty sweet.

Bubble Bobble is my favourite game of all time. The c64 version feels the best in my opinion

Excellent collection that you’ve got here. There’s a few that are new to me that I’ll be adding to my list for purchase. Thank you.

Brill video OSG.....Lots to like there. I would have had Gauntlet and Gren Beret in there as I had a hoot with them all those years ago but 20 solid games there that are hard to argue with

I had no idea most of these existed! Maybe time to update the library

Good video mate I grew up with C64 and commodore Amiga so these videos bring back lots of childhood memories.👍Ghost n Goblins,Wonder boy,Shinobi and Ikari Warriors were my favourite games.👍

My favourite arcade port, from back in the day, was Mr Heli. My biggest disappointment was Strider. Great video 😎👍

Great to see the arcade versions to compare. Great vid

Great video! Salamander was outstanding at the time. Spent hours on that game. Love the side-by-side comparison to the original arcade versions. Your production values are getting better with every video 🙂

Great list. Nice presentation.

Just found you. Fantastic memories. Subscribed!

Enjoyed this mate! How did Simpsons arcade get ported to c64 and not Amiga😳 Think you could’ve shoehorned Kung Fu Master in there somewhere, love that game

Frogger Arcade and Donkey Kong Arcade (2016). Thanks for your great videos!

Was happy to see Gyruss on there, but surprised Satan's Hollow didn't make the cut.

Awesome video mate! Although I don't own a C64 anymore, I would really love get into playing these games again (through emulation). As a child I loved Buggy Boy, Ghost and Goblin's and Bubble Bobble. I had no idea that the C64 had these many awesome arcade ports. This is definitely a video I will be returning to. :D I don't know if you know this. But these kind of videos are incredibly handy for people wanting to get back to a platform. :D

Great video, definitely a few I need to check out!

Love watching your vids. Growing up with an Amstrad and C64, seeing these lists brings back some great memories. Keep them coming :-)

Great list OSG! I might get lynched for this but I always liked the C64 port of Ghouls n Ghosts. It was the amazing Geoff Follin music that sold it for me!

Great Video esp as there are some new Retro 64 people out there

Also, the side by side with the Arcades is Brilliant!!!

Great video OSG, thanks mate!

Brilliant list, although I must agree with some of the commentators here that R-Type should have been included. Also Wonderboy and Pac-Land were very decent conversions.

Great list. Though personally I would of found space for R-type. Iron man Stewarts off road was a great conversion and I remember operation wolf being a pretty good conversion too, although time may have clouded my judgment on that one.

Played a lot of Alcon (Slap-Fight) on C64 growing up, and it helped introduce me to the world of arcade shmups. Also had the original version of Ghosts and Goblins, and although the game itself isn’t as good as the arcade with all the missing content, I still think the music was one of the best compositions on the C64. Also, Mr. Do is a great game, but as a kid I had a knock-off called Mr. Dig, and I’ve gotta say that they did a great job copying the gameplay, but in terms of graphics and music and I prefer it to the original. Sometimes the best ports we got on the C64 weren’t the official ones.

Terra Cresta and Slapfight were also good conversions I thought. Anyway good video bud.

Nice showcase of some top C64 ports! I bet you could've done a top 30 easy! I'm hoping for Amiga best Arcade Ports Ever! Great vid m8 :)

First arcade i ever played was Pacman, an now i feel old lol. Great list as always buddy and 1 or 2 of them i have never played so will be fixing that haha. So until next time take it wasy and roll on the next one 👍 Ps, Salamander was a pure class game.

Impressive ports!

Hey Bro super nice video. My very first computer was a c64 in 1993 and I still have in place. Also my very first game is still my fav and also it is in your list. Its WizzardOfWor. I played it with my cousine when ever we were allowed to play. I loved to sound and very polished coop experience of that game. I still have the cartridge version, and if my cousine comes to visit me once in a year, we play M.U.L.E. and WizzardOfWor! Thx for the great content

Atarisoft's Mario Bros, Ninja Spirit and Rod-Land would probably be my top 3, great vid as always!

Is there something funky with the Wizard of Wor clip now too? Player and enemies seem to clip the walls? But great vid, agree on all these. Didn’t know a G’n’G arcade version was out tho! Thanks 👍

good stuff! have a great day! 👍👍

Pure Classic C64 games on this great list🤩

Great list! now I have to spin the c64 on again tonight😁👍🏻

Rampart is cool! I remember it from my Amiga times.

Some notable mentions, although possibly not up to quite the same standard are the Storm/Sales Curve conversions of Rodland, Saint Dragon and Silk Worm.

I didn't know any home version of the Simpsons Arcade existed.

One game that I didn't have back in the day, and only recently played on the C64 is Smash TV. The game is awesome, and in my opinion much better than the arcade (mainly because of it's fairness in play... though I do love the arcade as well). However, to play the game you have to use the two joystick method. Playing it on the C64 with the one joystick is good, but not spectacular. As soon as you implement the two joysticks you will experience a game on the C64 like no other....Give it a go (I use keys for both joysticks in WinVice.... WASD for one joystick and the arrow keys for the other).

I absolutely loved my C64! So much so, that I sold and bought them 3 or 4 times, the last one being the new style casing. I too didn't realise how many amazing arcade ports there were. In the right hands the C64 could pull off almost any port to a reasonable degree. I agree with another viewer who stated that these types of videos encourage people to get back into retro gaming but I do believe the main reason people love retro games is the originality and diversity of games and genres at the time. Think about 'Thing on a Spring', 'Boundet', 'sheep in Space '..brilliant games which were different from anything else..today, its about 75% FPS. Admittedly some amazing FPS' have been made but only since the Switch came out has there been a glut of original Indie games which hark back to the good old days which have been very popular. Retro means different things to different people but there is no doubt that "old" games are here to stay. Thank you for channels like yours which keep them alive 🙏

Great list, but I think Ms. Pac Man should be on the list. It is an incredible and very accurate port of the Arcade version.

Thank you for the amazing list! The only two things I'm not 100% sure: turbo outrun should be higher, maybe even top5 (an incredibile, amazing masterpiece!), and I'm not sure about Shinobi (it was ok, but I remember even back then I was not impressed... I'd rather see something else instead, like the great Ghouls'n'Ghosts, or Dragonninja - but this is maybe more my personal preference)

Finally you released this video!!!!

Interestingly Chris Butler wrote Power Drift and the original versions of Commando and Ghosts n Goblins. The guy is a genius. But has sadly refused to do interviews :-( He also did Space Harrier, 720 Degrees, Thunderblade, Turbo Charge and Arnie.

You know what OSG, i didn't know Simpsons arcade was on C64. I didn't see any reviews back in the day.

A good list but always debatable. If you consider the most faithful I think Is great, of you consider the most fun ports (whether they are faithful or not) there are gems like rtype and midnight resistance

Never played the arcade original - but I really liked Midnight Resistance on the 64er.

I was hoping to see Mario Bros (Atarisoft) , Q Bert, Mr. Do and Spy Hunter....

You should check out Road Runner on the C64. It's an amazing conversion.

The c64 was home to some fantastic arcade conversions. You really didn't need to go to the arcades with some of these.

What about bionic granny? Nah just joking. Great video

'Waggling king' is a pretty dubious honour!

It's weird to see the sprites horizontally misaligned in the C64 Wizard of Wor. This was never an issue on my NTSC C64 growing up, where a friend and I poured countless hours into this game. It was definitely one of the best 2-player experiences among the games I had, along with Bubble Bobble.

Wow i didnt know buggy boy was in the arcades. I love that game

Didn't realise Buggy Boy was an arcade game. Was one of my favourite C64 titles back in the day.

C64 was great in mid to late 80s as the arcade games weren't to advanced.i had lots on your list and loved them all,Hyper sports,bubble bobble ,gyrus to name a few Thought operation wolf may of been on the list along with silkworm So many happy memories of a time long gone when life was much simpler.

Good parade, some games are missing... What about Pacland, Metrocross, Green Beret, Combat School? I think there are better coversion than Power Drift or Turbo Outrun... Even if these are very good games, but coin op is impossible to convert...

Here's one up for debate: Was Radar Rat Race better than Rally X? Sure, the c64 version was based on the vic 20 version so it was entirely character based and had no sprites, unlike rally x with it's smooth scrolling and animated turning. But it was so much easier to play, and the addition of the 'three blind mice' single voice soundtrack gave it a real frantic feel, especially when it time was running out and it seemed to speed up on its own, while the red rats relentlessly closed in

What let the C64 version of Buggy Boy down was the size of the car sprite, it was too small. Compare that to the excellent Spectrum version, where they managed to get a near perfect car sprite, and speed was good for the Spectrum. What let the Spectrum version down was the lack of coloured flags, and gates - this was part of the arcade machine's gameplay, you had to collect flags in a colour order to get a bonus, so when they're just black it took that feature away, and you just collected black flags.

Agree about Rainbow Islands. Technically a good arcade game, great conversion, but I never really enjoyed it.

Did you have many cartridge games on your C64? Did you think the graphics were generally better? I had I think Navy Seals, and Terminator 2. They definitely felt a bit more polished than the cassette stuff, I am assuming simply by the speed of loading?

Solar Fox was also a very close-to-arcade conversion.

"Time Pilot" (Space Pilot) was also very good on the C64.

I played at least 12 of those on my C64 back in the day

I prefer the original C64 ghosts and goblins music to the remake music.

uugh, those scanlines ...

I always thought that Operation Wolf and Midnight Resistance were very good arcade ports on the C64,

I remember playing Track and Field

Smashed, snapped and broken C64 joysticks! 🕹. I'm not sure if I'm the only person who kept all his busted up joysticks in a black bin bag full of them. Joysticks graveyard!! Lol!! Hoping to use the parts to try fix other broken joysticks!!

Strange, how they got Shinobi right, and the sequel Shadow Dancer wrong.

Ahh a man of taste although i would swap Bubble Bobble & rainbow islands around. If you were lucky enough to own the Big Beige B'stard in the 80s you really were spoilt for choice.

@Old Style Gaming Sorry man, but you were missing out some serious titles. What about Operation Wolf (technical masterpiece), Double Dragon 2 (still the best beat'em up on the C64), Green Beret (even better than the arcade, I really missed that one in your video!), Combat School, Smash TV, Midnight Resistance. Instead of those you have games like "Wizard of Wor", "Mr. Do", "Gyruss" and titles that were never commercially released like "Donkey Kong Junior", "Commando Arcade", "Ghosts'n'Goblins". Ok, it is your video and your opinion. It is alway hard to make choices. But thanks for the compilation anyways.

I had suprisingly many of these.

Gauntlet was pretty good on the C64, alongside The Deeper Dungeons expansion and sequel. Only 2 player but it did the job.

Honorable mention - kung-fu master

Commando Arcade - Personally, I think they made a mistake by trying to mix sound effects with the arcade music. The arcade music on its own isn't bad, but when you keep taking away one voice to do the sound effects, it ends up sounding rather poor. I wish they had offered a choice of the Rob Hubbard music, the arcade music or sound effects alone. It was a nice idea to try and have both the arcade music and sound effects, but I don't know anyone who actually prefers that option.

Lots of those games look like good versions, but the fat pixels, wrong aspect ratio and often wrong movement speeds mean that they are not good arcade ports for me. Some of them could have been made pixel perfect with some effort, but I guess commercial reasons probably got in the way. I'm from a BBC micro background and we have some great ports of the earlier games, but rarely got anything of the later games!

Rodland was fabulous too

I was sold on Guruss ;)

I also like the NES version of Bionic Commando better than the arcade as well

There was nothing more annoying than picking up the torch in Ghosts & Goblins all of a sudden

When I got the c64, I have the white one, looking abit like the amiga, I had wizard of war on cartridge.

Rod-Land, doesn't have in-game music, colorful backgrounds or half of levels (and, to be fair, not a single port had it) but other than that, it was an excellent port.

I was UK and I never heard of Donkey Kong Jnr on the C64. Is this a new game done by enthusiasts ? I see 2014 in the title but never heard of it. will google it

How could kong fu master not be on here it's the closest game iv played from the arcades!

Did you forget Slap Fight?

Everybody keeps forgetting Pooyan.

PLEASE, ALL RETROGAMERS: Stop using scanline emulation when capturing!

I broke so many joysticks playing Track and Field!

"My best mate was a waggling king" - uh-huh. ;-)

@Old Style Gaming, on top of you mind without thinking, which is the best C64 game?

Shinobi is awesome