There's a lot that's wrong with the C64, but despite its problems it was a big success because: - It hit the sweet spot of price vs. performance at the perfect

There's a lot that's wrong with the C64, but despite its problems it was a big success because: - It hit the sweet spot of price vs. performance at the perfect time, just as the video game market began to crash. - Unlike most other cheap computer manufacturers, Commodore took a completely hands-off approach to software, which allowed a rich software ecosystem to spring up very quickly. Among the computer geeks in my neighborhood at the time, 1982/83 was all about the Colecovision game console, and 1983/84 was all about the C64.