Back in black

THEC64 Mini is back, and it's black

According to the C64-Wiki, THEC64 Mini debuted at the end of September in 2017, and, as I recall, units shipped early 2018. Whilst imperfect (more on that later), it has done very well, selling in the hundreds of thousands since, and remains Retro Games Ltd's (RGL) most popular product, still available in some places for as little as £50 in the UK. Though, TheSpectrum (also from RGL) is hot on its heels since it was launched in November 2024.

Just over 8 years after its launch, and THEC64 Mini is back in a beautiful matte black finish, complete with a microswitched joystick. Unlike the regular unit, with THEC64 and the Mini sharing many games (with an outlier being THEVIC20), the new unit, due to launch October 2025 (I'm really hoping that people don't start calling it THEC64 Blackie or something, I'm going to refer to it as the BE (Black Edition) henceforth) contains some of the best games ever to grace the C64 platform. Headline acts are from Protovision, with the unreal Sam's Journey and A Pig Quest stand out titles, along with Covert BitOps dystopian cyberpunk classic Hessian.

As far as I can gather, only 25 games are included, but all of them are absolute "bangers", as some young 'uns might say these days! In no particular order of greatness, the entertainment software included is as follows:

1. Yeti Mountain
2. Spinning Image
3. Steel Ranger
4. A Pig Quest
5. Hessian
6. Joe Gunn: Gold Edition
7. Hunter's Moon Remastered
8. It's Magic 2
9. Runn 'N' Gunn
10. Guns 'N' Ghosts
11. Metal Warrior Ultra
12. Millie & Molly
13. Rocky Memphis: The Legend of Atlantis
14. Good Kniight
15. Planet Golf
16. Nixy and the Seeds of Doom
17. P0 Snake
18. Grid Pix
19. Caren and the Tangled Tentacles
20. Ooze: The Escape
21. Sam's Journey
22. Shadow Switcher
23. Pains 'N' Aches
24. Knight 'N' Grail
25. Galencia

As for the imperfections of the original THEC64 Mini, most notable of these was the poor joystick build quality: the stem could snap too easily. In order to get the most out of the platform, there is some learning involved, and some manual work, for instance, remembering file flags or manually creating Commodore Joystick Map files with a text editor (on your modern PC or Mac) per game or per game folder. Perhaps the firmware has been updated so that this is no longer an issue, bringing the platform in line with the user experience on TheSpectrum and THEA500 Mini? Maybe then there is a new and improved UI. And maybe the launch of THEC64 Mini BE tells of a reboot for the platform, with the future being a THEC64c in a slimline casing? All will be revealed I'm sure. I'm wondering too if this Mini variant will support VIC-20 software? The temptation to do this with previous firmware upgrades was likely due to a lack of a keyboard, especially as THEC64 was nearly twice the price of the Mini at launch.

As a side note, it seems that RGL has resisted and probably not even thought about making THEC16 or THEPlus4 (gotta get that productivity software, right?), or maybe this is a hint that this will be a thing too? I'm letting my imagination go wild here. Anyway, I now have to wonder, do I want THEC64 Mini BE in my life? A positive might be an improved user experience, and I'll definitely be supporting indie C64 developers (note that all of the titles are post-commercial games). The joystick might also be a joy to use as well. But I'm waiting just like everyone else, and curiosity will get the better of me. As they say, a fool and his money are easily parted.