3. The keyboard and joysticks
The C64's keyboard on yours
Letters, digits and signs type as themselves: press " and the C64 gets SHIFT and 2, as its own keyboard has it. SHIFT is the C64's SHIFT, on its own too: with a letter it types the graphic on the front of that key (in the upper-case set), and with Alt (C=) it switches between the two character sets. Caps Lock is SHIFT LOCK: while it is on, the C64's left SHIFT is held down, as SHIFT LOCK holds it.
| Your key | The C64's |
|---|---|
| Enter | RETURN |
| Backspace | INST/DEL (delete) |
| Insert | SHIFT + INST/DEL (insert) |
| the arrow keys | the cursor keys (left and up are SHIFT with the cursor keys, as on the C64) |
| Home | CLR/HOME (with Shift: clear the screen) |
| Esc | RUN/STOP (with Shift: load and run, from the tape) |
| Page Up | RESTORE |
| Caps Lock | SHIFT LOCK |
| Ctrl (or Tab) | CTRL: with 1-8 the colours, with 9 and 0 reverse on and off |
| Alt (Option on a Mac) | C= (the Commodore key): with 1-8 the light colours, with a letter the graphic on the left of its key; with SHIFT it switches between the two character sets |
| F1-F8 | the function keys (F2, F4, F6, F8 are SHIFT with F1, F3, F5, F7) |
| \` | ← (the left arrow) |
| ^ | ↑ (the up arrow) |
| \\ | £ |
Keys as typed, or keys as placed
The way above, Keys: as typed, is right for BASIC and for writing: what is printed on your key is what you get. Some games read keys by where they sit on the C64's own keyboard, not by what they type. For those, press Keys: as typed under More and it becomes Keys: as placed: every key on your keyboard is then the C64 key in its place, whatever is printed on it, and SHIFT is simply SHIFT.
| Your key, in its place | The C64 key there |
|---|---|
the letters, the digits, , . / | the same |
| \` | ← |
- and = | + and - |
[ ] \ | @ * ↑ |
; and ' | : and ; |
| End | = |
| Insert | £ |
| Home, Backspace (or Delete) | CLR/HOME, INST/DEL |
| Esc, Tab, Alt | RUN/STOP, CTRL, C= |
| Page Up, Caps Lock | RESTORE, SHIFT LOCK |
Press it again to go back to Keys: as typed.
How the keys reach the C64
Every key is held down for at least two of the C64's keyboard scans, and quick taps come one after another, so even very fast typing arrives as you typed it. Keys you hold down are held on the C64 too, and several at once work.
The joysticks
A C64 has two joystick ports, and most games read port 2. NEURA/8 takes a joystick from whatever you have to hand, and all of them can be used at once:
| You have | It is the joystick |
|---|---|
| a number pad | 8, 2, 4 and 6 are up, down, left and right; 7, 9, 1 and 3 the diagonals; 0, 5 or Enter fire |
| the arrow keys | press Arrows: cursor keys under the screen and it becomes Arrows: joystick: the arrows are the stick and Space fires. Press it again to have the cursor keys back |
| a game controller | plug it in (or pair it) and press any button: its d-pad or its left stick (pushed past half way) moves, its four face buttons fire. The first controller is port 2, a second one port 1 |
| a phone or tablet | a stick and a FIRE button appear under the screen: put your thumb on the stick and slide it the way you want to go |
Joystick: port 2 under the screen moves the number pad, the arrows and the touch stick to port 1, for the games that read that one. A controller stays on its own port.
A real stick cannot be pushed up and down at once; a keyboard can. If you hold both, the C64 sees only down (and only right, for left and right together), so a game never sees what no joystick could send.
As on a real C64, a joystick in port 1 shares its wires with the keyboard: moving it while a program reads the keyboard can type a character or two. That is the C64's own wiring, not a fault. The keyboard's own wiring does the same in one more way: hold three keys that sit at three corners of a square in the C64's grid of keys and it reads the fourth as held too (a "ghost" key). Games were written knowing it, so NEURA/8 keeps it.