Ziggurat's Cosmi C64 collection has a new name and a tapestry remake mode

Ziggurat Interactive has released a new trailer for its upcoming Commodore 64 compilation, updating the name to Cosmi: Forbidden Forest & Beyond. The publisher originally announced the project in March 2025 under a slightly different title. The re-reveal highlights the bundle's 10 included games and its completely redrawn medieval remake mode.

The collection focuses on titles originally published by Cosmi in the 1980s. Many of these are the work of developer Paul Norman. Norman was known for pushing the Commodore hardware with ambitious mechanics, digitized speech, and large sprites. You get 10 games in total. The lineup includes Forbidden Forest, Beyond the Forbidden Forest, Aztec Challenge, Caverns of Khafka, Seal, Delta Man, Chomp!, Spite & Malice, Navcom 6: The Persian Gulf Defense, and Chernobyl: Nuclear Power Plant Simulation.

Aztec Challenge is notoriously difficult. It forces players to run a gauntlet of spears and obstacles with very little room for error. Caverns of Khafka offers a more traditional platforming experience. Playing a 1980s nuclear disaster simulator on a modern console is certainly a choice. I am curious to see how that one holds up today. The main draw here is clearly the Forbidden Forest games.

The tapestry treatment

Ziggurat built a completely separate visual and audio style for the original Forbidden Forest. They call it a Bardcore-inspired remake. The new graphics replace the chunky C64 pixels with art that looks like a medieval tapestry in motion. Everything from the giant spiders to the archer protagonist has been redrawn to match the aesthetic.

You can swap between the original 1983 graphics and the new tapestry look in real time while playing. The audio gets a similar treatment. The original synthetic SID chip tunes have been swapped out for period-appropriate acoustic instruments.

Modern conveniences

Empty Clip Studios is powering the collection with its Arsenal Engine. That means the standard suite of modern retro conveniences is intact. Players get full save state support and a rewind function. These tools are practically mandatory for 8-bit computer games, which were often brutally unforgiving by design. Getting impaled in Aztec Challenge is slightly less frustrating when you can just rewind three seconds and jump earlier.

The package also includes a digital gallery of original box art, development artifacts, and vintage advertisements. There is even a digital comic book viewer.

Andy Lanning and Ant Williams of Ideas & Inks created new comic stories to expand the lore of these early games. Reading a comic about a Commodore 64 game in 2026 is a strange prospect, but it adds some welcome context to games that originally shipped with very little narrative text.

The collection is coming to PC via Steam and GOG, along with PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox, and Nintendo Switch. Ziggurat hasn't provided a specific release date yet, just a general coming soon window.

C64 games don't get compilation releases nearly as often as console titles from the same era. Compiling 10 of them with a custom engine and brand new art is a massive undertaking for a relatively niche slice of computer history. We will see if the tapestry mode is enough to draw in people who never touched a Commodore keyboard.