ICU64: Real-time Hacking of a C64 Emulator

[mahchymk93]

Yay for matrixy heavy metal music while hacking a cataball.

[gjc82071]

Do you know how to adjust the CPU speed in Frodo? It's running at like 3-4,000%, which makes playing games rather impossible. I can't even find any documentation for Frodo. With VICE you can Alt+w for max speed, or set it in preferences. I don't see anything like that with Frodo.

[mathfigure]

@gjc82071

From main menu: Tools > Preferences > Standard > Limit Speed

Alternative, press * on numpad to toggle the wrap speed.

[gjc82071]

@mathfigure Ahhh haaa, that did the job! Much thx friend! :-)

[rogerjowett]

139,307? vuzela

[baso88]

poor program :( you are changing its memory...

[SafasoTV]

sweet dude or person?

[jesuszafra]

When will be finished this cool program? This style of "hacking"... I think it's the way to go for modern debugging system of a emulator. It will be great to change the monitor option in all c64 emulators by this amazing tool... Great work!

[mathfigure]

@jesuszafra

I'm trying to finish (before the new year) the version 0.2 which is still experimental.

(the first 'complete' version 1.0 seems that will take some years)

There are lots of "logical things" that could be visualized as "geometrical things" and then manipulated in a much more physical and easy way. The computers are unique tools for visualizations; otherwise they are just boring machines.

Thanks.

[b33p3rz]

I'm confused sir, as I am a noob. Please answer this question. This is a Commodore 64 Emulator program correct?

[mathfigure]

@b33p3rz

'Frodo' is an old Commodore 64 (C64) emulator. 'Frodo Redpill' is a modified version of Frodo which exposes the virtual C64. 'ICU64' monitors Frodo Redpill and visualizes the operation of the virtual C64.

[TheCyberbedouin]

can you walk on water?

[mathfigure]

@TheCyberbedouin hahaha! Only if it is frozen : (

[TheCyberbedouin]

@mathfigure

you are the best...hahaha

you trick me.

good joke man!

[pyrotas]

This is the most awesome hack I've seen in some 2-3 years...

[batlin]

This really is a very creative, slick and powerful interface. Amazing work! :)

[EETech]

Incredible!  Thanks.

[MatheusMK3]

Man, you gave me ideas!

Also, great job.

[earthwalker007]

mathfigure, you are a genius......  Thank you

[MrSatanica]

I have positively and absolutely no idea what this whole video was about, but I liked it anyway.

[GreatNorthWeb]

@mathfigure how old are you? i am 39, web developer, and a c64 collector. your video has done more to enhance my understanding of the c64 memory map than i ever thought possible. i never really grasped the underlying architec. of the 64, which is why i am relegated to building apps on top of the web layer, instead of building the low-level stuff that makes the web work. if i had access to a visualization tool such as yours 20 years ago, my entire career may have taken a different direction

[mathfigure]

@GreatNorthWeb Knowledge needs understanding and understanding needs imagination. To share your knowledge you must describe your imagination.

Speech & texts are not enough for most people. Graphs & diagrams are not enough for many, too. Dynamic+interactive+realtime (+operational) visualizations are not just descriptions: they touch reality. With this video (+program), my understanding for the C64 is shared in this way. (BTW: I'm 34 years old and unemployed, so I'm not sure about a career!)

[xoen6]

upd: godDAMN, this is truly impressive. like vivi/section of living organism.

[xoen6]

Fav 'n thx.

[TookMe20min2findThis]

This is very neat! Who coded the ICU?

And the killer question.... Why?! Nostalgia perhaps? I must admit this is a nice project to get to know how memory access and sprite works, but I always wonder where you guys get the energy to work on such an old 8 bits system.

Don't get me wrong, I loved the C64 (it was part of my life growing up), but given the developer expertise, I'd personnaly spend my time working on something more recent... In any case, well done!

[mathfigure]

@TookMe20min2findThis - Well, thank you, as I am the developer of ICU64. And here are some reasons why I started this project:

- it was possible, but never done before (innovation)

- to illustrate the operation of the software & hardware (education)

- to take the full control of a computer (hacking)

- to find new kinds of applications (evolution)

- to honor the C64/C128 who changed my life (nostalgia)

- to inspire others for other systems (hope)

[TookMe20min2findThis]

@mathfigure

Yassou mathfigure!

Efharisto for sharing your passion. These are great reasons!! Btw, I just finished reading the "Spectacular rise and fall of Commodore".. very interesting! I'm sure the former guys at Commodore would enjoy your work!

As for myself, I became a computer hardware engineer, thanks mostly to the C64. Your work brings me nostalgia...

Keep up the good work!

Andio sas

[smtc5b]

LOL what the....... I have every game in existence on my C-64 and I never EVER remember seeing this game LOL

[MikeRoweWaves]

Looks like fun! I might give this a shot.

[TheHevquip]

that cataball game looks like the most fun thing ever. wait...people on the internet still get sarcasm, right?

[ross817]

If only there was a similar memory scanner on cheat engine. Although you would have to scan through a heck of a lot more than 64k.

[Sabocalypse]

this is amazing I really loved it

[Lobsterkins]

This is really, really intuitive and well-done. One question: does the left window designate one pixel for every single address in the C64's RAM?

[mathfigure]

@Lobsterkins: Exactly. And since the 64KB of C64 are 65536 bytes, all these compose an image of 256x256 pixels. The ROM and the Memory Mapped I/O of C64 are visualized in the same window also, but they aren't shown in this video. Even more, it's possible to rearrange the pixels in any way (see the video /watch?v=1TdaoOluq0A).

[AlsatianCousin]

beautifully done :) Kudos!

[LASC121]

me hizo llorar... completamente hermoso

[libardoxp]

@LASC121 a mi tambien ....xD

[DKshad0w]

Now if we can only do this with the universe.

[DistorterMedia]

This is awsom! Respect!

[ksandom40]

Dispite how impressive that is. My favourite bit is the painting of the title screen about 2/3 in.

[kristopolous]

take out the music ...

[barcade134]

This is sick.... you're my hero!

[kervin152]

Very cool!

[mehmabbe]

Dumbest video i've seen, this is as impressive as hacking a NES.

Check razor1911, they can do something. Not like your patethic attempt of completing levels in a game no one have heard about that is nearly 30 years old.

[freedomtomyself]

This is The Art.

[0cton]

Can someone name All songs in this video?

[craftiestran]

They're all from the Matrix soundtrack.

[defjam126]

holy shit.

[wowthungsten]

"It was as if I could see the individual bits, like we're in a matrix, where everything is reduced to ones and zeros."

[spencersghost]

I don't really get this. I guess if I knew more about computers this would seem pretty cool.

[frvfilms]

wow, tech gets cooler every day.

[pyVlad]

I wonder how long it took to find that single value the game uses to know when the level's done...

[InfoPoet]

i would imagine no time at all if you know assembly

[Choominator]

@pyVlad You do that pretty quickly with a debugger, just compare memory snapshots before and after the level and you will reduce the pool to just a few bytes, continue to do that every level and you will eventually single out the location.

[kickstep]

reminds me of a very similar thing i did to analyze files and their structure. cool stuff

[lectrick]

use of a mathematica notebook to probe memory and render it is genius

[wartex8]

@lectrick agreed

[Xerticle]

That is so cool

[stubert311]

i'm waiting for the ps3 equivalent in 30 years

[UKLooney]

Brilliant, this would have been useful when we was hacking c64 games back in the 80's. I look forward to what we will be doing in 20 years time under the nwo.

[playaspec]

Totally sick! I wish I had this back in the day! I certainly hope you release the source so it can be adapted to other legacy systems.

[golemosworld15]

the band teeth mt. need to incorporate this in their visuals, would fit nicely.

[mrzack888]

i dont get it

[Nero51]

Because you are not intelligent enough to understand it, learn about basic programming and you will, not that difficult.

[jr88881]

fashnek, dude, there's nothing more relevant than Commodore 64.

[KalHog]

Amen.

[andrei25ni]

so cool :)

[fashnek]

Okay, but why couldn't they have done this with something a LITTLE more relevant, like the N64?

[AntiPr0ph3t]

I have no idea what this is all about but it looks impressive.

[dsannes]

Looking at it from a historical game design perspective...This is pure gold. Can you analyze any moving image to that level of detail? Have you ever used that stuff to create topology maps for 3D? I love the Idea of breaking stuff down like that and re-visualizing it into other stuff. Nice Creation

[mathfigure]

About your questions; if I understood well (since my English is not good), probably you have misunderstood what you see (correct me if I'm wrong). It is not about image analysis of the display. It's about decoding numbers from the memory (what any computer does all the time).

As for the ZUI (Zoomable User Interface); ZUIs are not applicable only to maps (like Google Earth). And this is just an example (in 2D).

[oldbroken1]

no one hacks a gibson

[p0staldude000]

i dont know what im looking at

[sigmundur]

p0staldude, what you're looking at is the Matrix. After a blue pill.

[mathfigure]

When a gamer plays a game imagines that he is inside the world of the game (like Avatar).

When a hacker plays a game imagines how it works (like Matrix).

Here you see the hacker's view (after a red pill, not a blue pill).

[Maytrex50]

My hacking is nothing to this

[JigenD]

You'd probably hack better if you had a nice hex display of every bit of your system RAM.

[ErebusWolf]

that is exactly what he has there... and its color coded.

[esathegreat]

"This video contains content of Sony music Entertainment."

WTF!?

[gjc82071]

Holy shit, that is so cool. I gotta check these programs. I already have every single c64 rom available, so now, I could have some fun messing with them.

[rjsbaker]

This is fantastic.

[shadowwarrior0584]

Nice

[Zabriskie0]

"This video is not available in your country due to copyright restrictions" - What for a fucking service is youtube. Show some videos not. Youtube has applied a !!! Censor !!! on videos. And the band-wide is also to low in most cases.

[traxonja]

wow! very very cool :)

[hueseph]

Cool. I had a Vic 20. My how thing have changed. Thanks for using RATM for the background music. That midi crap will drive you crazy.

[tropic4]

sweet.

[bcdon1]

Amazing!!!

[Rojirosama]

awesome

[xroni]

very nice how it visualizes the depacker at the start

[johnlunney]

This is absolutely amazing :)

Thank you so much. I am now imagining something similar for other old computers like the ZX, and also for the Super Nintendo...

[vinny4punt0]

hey i only got 0's in my memory:O wh00t ?

[oleschri]

This ... is ... totally ... awesome!

[ugurozyilmazel]

oooooooooooooooooooooo mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm­mmmmyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy god! awesome! need mac port!

[w72atfreemaildothu]

fu(king awesome, man! i'm gonna tear apart some old demos with it...

[mathfigure]

With demos, you should also watch the 'Raster' for the VIC events. This is the 'canvas' for a demoscener. The tough about creating a c64 demo is that this canvas is temporal instead of spatial.

[spudw2k]

very cool software, but they ould've at least taken the orig music instead of the end credits of the matrix version.  still. 5 stars.

[bajan13k]

Innovative use of mathematica. I didn't know it could be interfaced like that (of course, I've never used it ;) ).

[drn74]

Great work man!

[nevyn]

The memory view was amazing. Well done!

[henrikb4]

This is incredible! Genius work 100%.

I just have a few questions:

* What kind of hacking does the Mathematica interface offer?

* Will it be available on other platforms than Windows.

[mathfigure]

- Mathematica has the most flexible programming language that ever made (as I know). It is best for prototyping and for testing any idea, right away. Here, Mathematica has full access to the emulator via a special version of the ICU64. I use this framework to test new features.

- I deal only with PC and Windows. But, I'm sure that we will see many programs alike in the future, for many machines (real or virtual).

[mikedailly]

Love the memory zooming, great idea.

[theQbelek]

very elegant execution

[terrapinbear]

I just haxorgasmed!

[ztnalrekim]

That's Matrix style right there man!

[joecassara]

Delicious, dude!

[AssemblerGuy]

Heh -- of you could show this stuff to the C-64 community back in the 8-bit hay-days, the game crackers would lick their chops, all the while commercial game publishers would sh!t their pants...! XD

[storerestore]

Awesome! It would be sweet if you implemented something like OSC or MIDI for outside control of the memory contents.

[KrionyX]

This is extremely impressive and will be quite useful.

DP/FOE/KRX

[aufsturz]

this is basically... INCREDIBLE!!

[0x51d]

Wow! Awesome!

[shmupstick]

Kicks some serious butt!!!

[waskoma]

freakin awesome, pretty please finish it, and make it vice (=most popular emulator by far) compatible

[johnwbyrd]

Absolutely beautiful. Well done.

[mathfigure]

ICU64 runs in conjunction to Frodo Redpill.

Both programs are not ready for the users, yet.

(Maybe in a couple of months)