Softice hacking environment backed by a hardware button: On the C64 there was an extension cartridge "module" called "Action Replay MK5" which would put the whole system into a REPL debug mode similar to gdb.
You could inspect any memory and disassembly and write plus patch any machine code while the system was paused. There also was a diff mechanism to see which memory changed (e.g. if you lost a life).
I think the similar one I had was the Super Snapshot cartridge, and it was quite magical. If a game could fit in RAM, you could dump the works to an executable file, and then the cartridge had a speed-loader that made the drive much faster as well. And a drop-in debugger, as you mentioned. It really changed the way I thought of interacting with software at the time.
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Softice hacking environment backed by a hardware button: On the C64 there was an extension cartridge "module" called "Action Replay MK5" which would put the whole system into a REPL debug mode similar to gdb.
You could inspect any memory and disassembly and write plus patch any machine code while the system was paused. There also was a diff mechanism to see which memory changed (e.g. if you lost a life).
I think the similar one I had was the Super Snapshot cartridge, and it was quite magical. If a game could fit in RAM, you could dump the works to an executable file, and then the cartridge had a speed-loader that made the drive much faster as well. And a drop-in debugger, as you mentioned. It really changed the way I thought of interacting with software at the time.