Impossible Mission – Commodore 64 game remake in JavaScript | Hacker News Reader

Impossible Mission – Commodore 64 game remake in JavaScript

impossible-mission.krissz.hu

93 pointsingve34 comments

Good grief, how much I played this (on PC), and never got anywhere: been too young to figure out the actual objective, these days I revisit my childhood games with grownup eyes to start to actually appreciate them.

And seems like fellow Hungarian developer, gratula! :)

Same here. So many games I had no idea what to do. Raid on Bungeling Bay, Bolo, Impossible Mission, Conan the Barbarian, Spy vs Spy.

Mac Bolo was one of my first networking games and it was incredibly awesome

Raid on Bungeling Bay was one of the few C64 games I actually passed!

I still have no idea how to play this game, never stopped me having fun. Found out eventually you have to collect puzzle pieces and assemble them?

Click on then icon on the upper right corner, there's an extensive manual. Just found it myself too!

On the subject of this game, a truly classic precursor to the platform world we know now, it was recently remade for the Oric-1/Atmos machines. The Oric-1/Atmos were classic 8-bit systems which had a life of only 2 or 3 years during the height of 8-bit computing in the 80's, competing against the majors (C64/Amstrad/Spectrum/etc.) and not doing so well, alas. They were but a glitch in the 8-bit matrix.

It has been pretty neat to see the revival of the machines in the last two decades - and the scene that is producing new titles for the machines are pretty neat folks: computing purely for the love of it, producing titles of such brilliance that one could only have wished it happened 30 years earlier.

So I always like to mention it when the opportunity presents itself - if you want to play Impossible Mission, ported as a labor of love by very brilliant coders to an obscure/completely different platform than Javascript/web entirely, you'll need Oriculator:

https://code.google.com/p/oriculator/

.. and the Impossible Mission .TAP file:

http://im.defence-force.org/

"Stay awhile! Stay FOREVER!!!! Hahahaha ..."

(More great Oric titles, along the lines of the 80's classics like IM and more, available here:

http://www.oric.org/index.php?page=software&fille=top150game...

If you love Impossible Mission, check out SPACE 1999, SKOOL DAZE, DON'T PRESS THE LETTER Q, and more!)

The Atmos is the second machine I learned how to code on.

Wow - this is really taking the Oric far. Looks like I found one project to take a close look at while on vacations.

Many thanks for sharing this here!

"Another visitor! Stay a while...stay forever!!"

That was probably the first time I heard synthesized speech on a home computer game and I'm pretty sure I would occasionally fire it up just to play that part and impress other kids stuck with Tandys and such.

Very cool! I actually work with the original programmer at my day job. I'll have to forward this to him.

Would love to hear his feedback! The history of Epyx fascinates me.

I emailed him the link and a link to this submission.

His response was, "Lordy, people really do have too much time on their hands. Thanks, though. Consider me amused."

This has always been one of my favorite childhood games. I would love to hear what he has to say about the development of this title.

He doesn't seem to be much for story-telling about the old days, but several months ago I did find this interview he had done previously:

http://www.mayhem64.co.uk/interview/caswell.htm

I loved the atmosphere in this game. I played this in the eighties on a Commodore 64, in the height of the Cold War.

The C64 busted open my horizons somewhere around age 11, when a relative bought me one because my parents couldn't/wouldn't. This relative "knew a guy" with a bunch of (what I soon learned were pirated/cracked) games he was able to give me. Impossible Mission was one of them. I don't remember if I finished it, but I damn sure had fun trying. It was one of those I was initially unimpressed by but came back to later. From what I've seen so far, they did a terrific job on this port.

There's something so isolating and foreboding about the whole experience. The sound effects really add to that.

This is, for me, the game that defines the C64.

Doesn't get beyond:

  LOADING RESOURCES
       (8/50)

... in Safari. I guess, the mission is actually impossible here.

No sound and a couple of other things seem off in Firefox on Linux.

Chrome Canary on Windows works fine.

Is there any kind of tool for analysing JavaScript and reporting compatibility issues?

Works for me on Arch Linux + Firefox 38. In one room I could not search one specific object though.

Seems to work for me on Conkeror (basically Firefox) on OS X Yosemite.

No, no, no, no. That is exactly how a C64 tape cassette worked. Loading, loading, loading.

I remember getting further than ever before in Midnight Resistance (which sounded less rapey to me at the time), and then waiting for the next level, loading, loading, loading...

ROFL! Loading ... please wait ...

OK, I'll accept that explanation :)

Wow, this looks like a pixel perfect clone. Well done!

Wow! Wow! Wow! I loved this game so much - I even mentioned it two weeks ago here - lol :) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9720584

"UNSUPPORTED BROWSER" with Chrome Version 37.0.2062.120 Built on Ubuntu 12.04, running on LinuxMint 13 (281580)

I get that with version 41.0.2272.76 (64-bit).

Edit: It actually loads now with 43.0.2357.130. I guess the difference is significant.

If you like such games, a friend of mine writes new 8-bit style games playable on his website: http://www.yodasvideoarcade.com/

Wow. That really takes me back. Excellent work!!

Man I forgot how hard that game was.

nice!

is there a game engine where you can create games like this? Love the retro games.

Honestly, with a bit of research and a few practice games you could probably create your own engine for this. Its pretty simple as games go. Plus its far more fun to make your own engine to :D

Start with enchant.js

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