Commodore 64 Shoot 'em up Catalogue

Posted for quick reference purposes, this is a chronological list of Commodore 64 shoot 'em ups that are being covered in my History of Shoot 'em ups.

Commentary on most of these shoot 'em ups is found in the above-linked history article. This list thus far contains 82 original infographics that can be mouse-wheeled through in order to get an idea of the C64 shoot 'em up catalogue with no non-C64 admixture. You can also right-click the images and open them in a new tab at full resolution (2k-5k px).

The C64 shoot 'em up catalogue is exceedingly impressive:

As a rule, it started off slowly with arcade ports (1982-84)
Picked up the pace in 1985-86 via C64-native shooters
Hit its stride in 1987
Held the fort in 1988-89 and still came up with surprises until 1992

The C64 shooter catalogue wiped the floor with rival Western 8-bit shooter catalogues in the mid-to-late 80s, made the 16 bit Atari ST and IBM PC shooter catalogues look like complete jokes in the mid-to-late 80s, and even challenged the Amiga shooter catalogue in the late 80s to early 90s.

From 1985 to at least 1990 the C64 was the Western computer-game machine for shoot 'em up connoisseurs to own. In terms of grueling gameplay and raw and gritty audio-visuals the C64 shooter was hands-down the best for almost a decade.

I am far from done with this list, so check back every now and again.

This document was last updated on the 15th of May, 2024.