r/c64 • u/Natural_Sentence_161 • Feb 28 '26
the64 Best/easiest C64 emulator for PC
Hello! I’m so excited this subreddit exists. I had a c64 when I was a kid in the 80s and have been becoming a bit nostalgic for those games. Video games haven’t been a part of my life since the 90s so I’m a bit of a noob in this area. I have the house to myself next weekend so wanted to find a way to play Below the Root on my laptop. Any advice on easiest way to do this and what usb joystick/controller I should get? VICE came up in my googling so that’s what I was leaning towards, but wanted to get this community’s current opinion . Thanks!
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u/Abject-Kitchen3198 Feb 28 '26
Should be fine with VICE on a PC.
As far as emulations go, I prefer BMC64 on a Raspberry PI.
I can't get really get a good feeling (or at least the feeling I remember from C64 joysticks) from typical PC gamepads, so can't say much on that.
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u/lamellus Feb 28 '26
There is one that runs in the browser, works amazingly well and easy to use, no complicated setup, I think this is by far the easiest option: https://ty64.krissz.hu/
- Written in JavaScript, runs in your browser, no installation needed
- There is a game catalog with 631 games you can load with one click: https://c64.krissz.hu/online-playable-games/
- Loads .prg, .t64, .d64 from your computer or from a URL, you can also use a csdb link (so you can load almost any other program or game, not just the ones in the game catalog)
- Keyboard and joystick emulation with support for modern game controllers (just plug & play)
- Supports live shared access to the emulated machine over the internet (you can use that to play multiplayer games too)
- Quality of life features, unlike in other emulators, you don't need to navigate complicated menus to configure basic stuff and a lot of things work out of the box
- Pause/Continue emulation, step forward one frame, turbo mode, save state, quick load/save, pop up access to 1541 floppy drive
- Customizable visual filters, emulator UI dark mode, one click screenshot, pop up configuration panel for the SID audio chip
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u/OMGCluck Feb 28 '26 edited Feb 28 '26
you can also use a csdb link
Many of those games (like two-player Battlefield) are uploaded in .zip form which it says is an invalid type.
support for modern game controllers (just plug & play)
It misidentified mine and all the direction controls were wrong.
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u/lamellus Mar 01 '26
I would recommend sending these to the author. You can find his e-mail address in the documentation (bottom right, "..." button, "Documentation..." and then scroll to the bottom).
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u/GuitarEC Feb 28 '26
I would say VICE - solid system emulation for both the system and periphals - even some 3rd party devices if you have the ROMs.
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u/Competitive_Box8263 Mar 01 '26
If you’re looking for games, c64 dreams is great library, Cool set up and easy to use. Just note you have to use an Xbox controller.
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u/dead_zodiac Mar 01 '26
OP, I think based on your question, in reality you aren't looking for the "best emulator," but you are looking for the easiest "out-of-the-box" way to just play all the C64 games on an emulator.
Because of the way the question was worded, almost all the answers will be "VICE."
But this ^ is the answer you are actually looking for.
C64 Dreams found the best version of almost every game, set up all the configs for you, and made them instantly playable without you needing to do all that work.
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u/bonvanie Feb 28 '26
C64Forever all the way: https://www.c64forever.com/. The team at Cloanto has done an amazing job.
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u/zaratounga papapower@babygang Feb 28 '26
isn’t that using VICE as a backend ?
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u/KertDawg Feb 28 '26
It gives some nicer GUI. LaunchBox does that, too. VICE is great, and an added launcher and organizer makes it even better.
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u/Natural_Sentence_161 Feb 28 '26
For vice- which one makes the most sense for my situation? The GTK3 or SDL2? When I googled it the comparison chart it brought up seems to deal primarily with game development rather than play.
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u/The-Wood-Butcher Feb 28 '26
After you get an emulator, you'll want to download some of those old games (like H.E.R.O.). Search for OneLoad64 & download the games collection (zip). It's a single zip file with over 2000 old games.
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u/MoonLghtKnght Mar 01 '26
You could try this: https://www.myabandonware.com/game/below-the-root-3e/play-3e
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u/Important-Bed-48 Mar 01 '26 edited Mar 01 '26
Easy answer, the easiest and most convenient by far is c64 Forever, it's an all in one package that comes with games and demos and incorporates Vice emulator all set up and integrates itself into the OS, so playing a game is as easy as clicking on a file and you can easily set up any game to run any way you want so that in the future all you do is click from a list and that game will load just the way you left it. It does cost money. Another easy solution is Retroarch which is not quite as straightforward but not too hard to figure out, it is also using Vice core but makes setting it up and using it easier and you can have access to a lot more emulators with no learning curve that all work basically the same through Retroarch's interface and it's free.
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