The Def Guide to Zzap!64

Well, the DVDs we were promised have come through, packed full of inlay etc. scans that Shocktropper did himself.

They have to be renamed and fiddled with a bit, but it'll mean we should have a very large percentage of all C64 game high quality scans online.

GameBox64 has moved to its own domain and server. The scans have become easier to navigate, with you being able to sort them in various ways and other things have been tweaked as well.

With all of the above out of the way, I can now start adding more of those scans from Shocktropper's DVD.

The site has 83 games on it so far, with about 1000+ in the pipeline! x-)

You are just time genuises! This is just what retro gamers need! We can't get the originals, haven't got the machine anymore, rely on emu's, web searching (for hours on some titles!) downloading a D64 or T64 and praying it will work. But when it does then we think, the manual? the cover? Can I find any ads of the day to take me back? What about scans of the actual reviews from all those years ago, and on and on!

Then you find that ZZAP 64 has been scanned and from there you get to here! I hope you go from strength to strength, get more and bigger advertisers as retro grows and you all make a million! This is a fantastic project and I wish and hope the best for you! Even a fold out sheet of instructions for say "The Eidolon" is artistically and functionally as good as you get even today, where manuals are getting as bland as the games.

Once you've made the millions, can you please organise modern rewrites of classics like Koronis Rift and SEAL Team!!!

Thanks for the great feedback, we will continue , me scanning and Iain laying the stuff out for a few years yet

Yeap!! Thanks for the great feedback, makes it all worth while!

I dunno about making millions though I might have to look to a different area than Zzap to accomplish that!

But the ads do now pay for the web sites/space and hopefully as Gamebox gets more popular, it'll bring in enough ad revenue to allow me to get more space to host all the box scans etc. I have access to.

Interesting that you mention about the scans of the games being tied to the scans of the reviews and adverts, as I'm planning to link the first two and the latter one is something on my to do list (it's quite a long list by now!)

humorguy wrote: What about scans of the actual reviews from all those years ago, and on and on!

Well I was so motivated by your positive feedback that I've added this feature to gamebox64. There is now an extra column thats gives a direct link to the Zzap review, if one exists.

What one post could do, eh?

Cracking stuff that.

Well, the site is building up nicely now. There are 101 games/records with a total of 1609 scans (50% of them are small versions of the other 50%!)

The odd number means, either one scan is missing or there's one too many... some day I'll figure out which!

http://www.gamebox64.com

There's 116 games on GameBox64 now and I'm just uploading almost 100MB of inlays and manuals etc. related to Driller and Elite!

A really amazing work!
THIS is what was lacking regarding the good old C64 on the web.
Thank you for all of your work, (scanning and uploading) and thank you as well for ordering the scans whenever an update is made.

PS: How many more games do you have to be scanned? Just curious...

Thank you!!

I'm not too sure how many more games there are to be added (from the scans I've already got) but at a guess I'd say it's 500+. Once that is done, then there's the job of scanning all/any other games that are out there. So it should keep me busy for a long time!

I've been very busy adding games the past couple of days and...

http://www.gamebox64.com now has 150 games / editions in its database!

I just love you guys!



Any chance of Gateway to Apshai being counted among featured games?

Well Iain is welcome to use the scans I have on my site if they are good enough quality (and yes Gateway to Apshai is up there). I suspect they might not be enough dpi and/or pixel size.

If you have a list of games that were needed to be scanned for Gamebox64, where is it? If someone (like me) either has not got a scanner, or does not know how to do it (not me!) Is there a safe way for a gamer to send his game to you (with postage to get it back, so it does not cost you anything - you deserve not to have to pay to post it back!)? If there is a "yes" to one or both of the above questions then a) I will look at the list regularly and b) I will certainly be someone who will send his whole game to you to scan and return.

I have nothing but admiration, and therefore faith, and therefore trust in what you are doing for the retro community. I am looking for original C64 games all the time on ebay and elsewhere on the web. at boot sales, charity shops and even skips(!), so it is possible that either now, or one day, I might have a game you're looking for. Of course, if it's in the future, I may have a scanner by then!

Once again keep up the good work - don't work so hard you're killed until dead!