Why were old games programmed in assembly when higher level languages existed? -

i noticed if not nes / atari, etc games coded in assembly, @ time, c, cobol, , fortran existed think make easier code right? why did choose assembly on these available higher level languages?

those games had 8-bit cpu chips , microscopic memories, like, 2kb. answer take on half ram.

compiled code out of question. on 8-bit cpu's "large" memories, "64k" (whee!) compiled code difficult use; not routinely seen until 16-bit microprocessors appeared.

also, potentially useful language c , had not yet taken on world. there few if c compilers 8-bit micros @ time.

but c wouldn't have helped much. games had horribly cheap hacks in them pretty required timing-specific instruction loops ... e.g., sprite's y-coordinate might depend on when (in video scan) control register written. (shudder...)

now there was nice interpreted-bytecode language around time or perhaps little bit later: ucsd pascal running on ucsd p-system. although i'm not big pascal fan, way ahead of else processors. wouldn't fit on game or run fast enough game play, though.