Norbert's Emulators

The Centipede Emulator for the Commodore 64

This is an emulator of Atari's classic arcade game "Centipede" from 1981 running on the Commodore 64.

The program can be downloaded as a C64 "prg" file here: centipede.prg

You can use this file with a C64 emulator or put it on a floppy disk and play it on the real machine.

In the following you will first see some screenshots of the running game and then find a description of the emulator.

Norbert Kehrer's C64 Centipede Emulator Norbert Kehrer's C64 Centipede Emulator
Norbert Kehrer's C64 Centipede Emulator Norbert Kehrer's C64 Centipede Emulator
Norbert Kehrer's C64 Centipede Emulator Norbert Kehrer's C64 Centipede Emulator

Here is also a video of the emulator in action:

In 1981 Atari launched the aracade machine "Centipede". The game was developed by Lyle Rains, who also created "Asteroids", and Dona Bailey, the only woman in Atari's coin-op division back then. Centipede was one of the most commercially successful games at that time.

The arcade machine is based on a 6502 CPU and Atari's POKEY sound chip. The game was later ported to many different hardware platforms up to today's smartphone era.

Since the nineties, arcade emulators like MAME can emulate the classics like Centipede on modern computers. This program is a Centipede emulator for the Commodore 64. The "emulation" of the arcade machine's CPU is done directly by the 6510 processor of the C64, which just runs the original game program on the C64. The video and sound hardware of the arcade machine is simulated on the C64 by specific routines in Assembly language. In this way, the original game play is (more or less) exactly reproduced, with some major trade-offs, though, which had to be made due to the lower resolution and sprite and color capabilities of the C64.

The Centipede emulator is started by loading and running "centipede.prg" on the C64. Then a start screen appears, where you can select your language, number of lives, and other configuration parameters with the keys "1" to "6". This selection corresponds to the DIP switch selection which the original arcade machine offered to the operators. By pressing the fire button you start the emulation. Centipede is switched to free-play mode here, i.e. it is not necessary to "insert coins". A game can be started with the fire button.

Now have fun with the classic Centipede on your classic Commodore 64 computer!

Norbert