Turbo Duo...What went wrong?

[SignOfZeta]

Shaq Fu.
Pit Fighter
Home Improvement
Waynes World?
Bebe's Kids

I didn't say as bad, I said as crude. I meant technically crude. Like, obviously of a specific hardware generation. Shaq Fu might be a piece of shit, but its clearly a 16-bit game. While the sprites are puny, they have quite a bit of animation. Home Improvement is a much better game (than Shaq Fu) and even better looking (than Shaq Fu) and more "16-bit-ish".

You are using hindsight and time-travel shenanigans to diss games.  I wonder if you were like this when the stuff was current.
I think you simply lack the ability to play old games in their proper context. 

I admit you are much more of a connoisseur. You can find the sliver lining in old games that I can't, but for the most part I actually did play these games in the correct historical context. I'm turning 39 this year for fuck's sake. I remember when there was a successful arcade every few blocks in this country and half the machines had b/w or vector monitors in them. I'm not trying to brag or anything, but in all seriousness kids born in the early 70s were in a unique situation to see, for the most part, what is so far the entire life cycle of video games and personal computers. The only shit that predates my experience is stuff that was so rare or so un-fun that it can't really be said to have been part of the cultural landscape.

Of course I didn't play every single thing in existence during that time period, so perhaps I am being unfair to Energy since I didn't play it for the first time until a few years ago....but I don't think I am. The thing really seems kind of sucky.

You probably hate Atari 2600 Asteroids because it flickers and you can play something better on your iPhone, right?

Honestly I've always thought the 2600 was a piece of shit. I spent my time in arcades and the 2600 had very few good arcade conversions. Between %90 of the games being zero fun beyond the first 5 minutes and the fucking HORRIBLE joystick (I was a weak and sickly child...or perhaps just lazy) I always hated that system. I did like the Coleco a lot though, and I had the 2600 module for it so I actually did amass quite a huge collection of $1 2600 games from Kmart during the crash years...I just like Coleco games a lot more.

[kazekirifx]

Arkhan and Zeta, Somehow I agree with both of your opinions so much, though I'm not sure how that's possible.

Incidentally, I was born in 1980, so I am right between the generations the two of you grew up in. It was a great time to be born since I was just old enough to start playing video games when the NES was the thing. I vaguely remember playing 2600 at a friend's house, but never actually got one until just a few years ago. The 2600 is amusing to me, and I'm really not sure why people who grew up with it complained about the ports. It wasn't until the PS2 days that home technology really started to be fully on-par with the arcades. I find Pac-Man on 2600 to be quite playable. Who cares if the playfield is the wrong size, the pellets the wrong shape, Pac-Man isn't round, and the difficulty is all screwed up? It's still fun and playable. I also enjoyed E.T. after watching the old "how to play" video someone put up on youtube. It's far from the worst game ever in my opinion.

[NightWolve]

I also enjoyed E.T. after watching the old "how to play" video someone put up on youtube. It's far from the worst game ever in my opinion.

Wait, no, you're kidding, right? I have a pseudo 2600 system ("Gemini," some sort of Atari 2600 knock-off) boxed away in my attic somewhere and I happen to have that piece of shit game, too! I don't even remember how it got into the collection (and I sure hope to God my dad didn't pay no $50 bucks for that shit, it was likely purchased for a couple bucks after the crash at some K-Mart perhaps), but hands down, that really is one of the WORST games EVER made!! IT IS! Almost all the games are garbage, except for a very few. The few I recall enjoying are River Raid, Megamania, (two shooters) Frogger, Pitfall 2 by Activision (ALMOST forgot that one!) and, eh, I can't think of anything else...which is either due to my bad memory or how much I think most of the games for that system sucked. ;)

[BigusSchmuck]

After reading through this thread, I suddenly don't feel old anymore. I'm glad this thread isn't going to a apple 2 vs commodore 64 argument, otherwise I think I would go insane.

[CrackTiger]

"Diagonal Scrolling" is Nintendo's Blast Processing.  It was PR-speak for something the base NES could do anyway.

What did Johnny Turbo call Lords of Thunder on that PBS show? A "DVH shooter"?

Nintendo did do more bs phantom tech advertising than Sega. Their handy chart debunking the Genesis said that the SNES could run Sonic the same as the Genesis version, except that it could also scale up Sonic's sprite till you could make out every
individual whisker.

Ads for FFIII said that new blast processing/style techniques made it display all 256 colors at once in every screen or something. Ads for Killer Instinct said that even more advanced programming technology allowed it to display 512 colors per screen.

[SignOfZeta]

The reason ET is so hated is because there was no How to Play video back then. The game. As it shipped, is inscrutable. It cost fifty fucking dollars (when gas was $0.70 a gallon) and nobody had any fun with it whatsoever.

Regarding Pacman: You had to be there. You have to understand that people played a LOT in the arcade. Video games were a predominantly arcade thing in the early 80s. Pacman especially was huge. There were books published showing you how to play it. There was even a record where a guy speaks the exact pattern you need to repeat I order to kill the game. "Left, right, up, right...". Pacman 2600 doesn't even have the right fucking maze. People were pissed because they thought it could be better, and it really could have been. IIRC there is even a homebrew port of 2600 that is much more accurate. (That might have been a dream I had though). It's quite likely that kids who's parents never let them go to the arcade, kids who only knew Pacman from the shitty cartoon and the lunch boxes and puffy stickers, those kids probably thought the 2600 ver was fine.

To use a more clear example of why 2600 sucks, play Donkey Kong on 2600, Coleco, and arcade and get back with me. Was Donkey Kong Jr on 2600? I'm assuming it was, and I'd guess that was pretty terrible as well.

Also, good arcade ports weren't unknown pre-PS2. They don't have to be good, they just have to be decent. The NES has several, Donkey Kong 3 NES is very good. Flicky on Genesis, SFII on all 16-bit systems. Anything CPS2 on Saturn was good (and sometimes even PS). Obviously everything on Neo Geo is perfect.

[Arkhan Asylum]

It exists.

and yes, the Atari 2600 version of Pac Man was a goddamn mess.   It's not like Defender where its like "ok, this isn't as good as the arcade but it's still pretty good."

It's more like

"Why is the maze like this?  What the hell kind of sound effects are these?  Why does the game never get any harder?  etc".

Defender took some liberties due to 2600 vs arcade cabinet.... Pac Man... took some liberties too.   I think it was the guy programming it being a lazy SOB.  He could have easily made the maze the right way.  Those sound effects could have been fixed.  There is 0 excuse for any of it.  The startup noise sounds like a phone having a stroke, and the pickup noise sounds like someone farting.    The death noise is ok at least.

Those idiotic noises were used as generic TV sound effects for "Kid playing game you can't see", for awhile too.

It's not like they didn't have the means to do better.  It isn't like it was a first year game and no one knew how to program the 2600.  Slot Racer was already out.  Hell, it's maze was closer to Pac Man's maze than Pac Man.  That ain't right.   The homebrew hack isn't exploiting some crazy trick that noone knew about either.  It's just someone who isn't a jackass.  I bet the hack took longer than 6 weeks (development length of Atari 2600 pacman). 

It could have been way better.  They should have let Activision have a crack at it.   The other arcade ---> 2600 ports weren't too bad.    Even Donkey Kong is playable and pretty similar to the original.  Asteroids was pretty perfect too.  Gorf wasn't too shabby, and neither was Space Invaders.  Berzerk was awesome.  Venture even!  but, Pac Man, no.  They screwed up on that one.  You can tell it was rushed.

I know people that said they had fun with ET when it came out.  They said "it wasn't bad but once you beat it, it lost most of it's fun".  I like the game.  I thought it was ok when I played it in the 90s for the first time, and I thought it was fine after the internet decided it's the worst game ever.

[NecroPhile]

To me, the first system to do real transparencies, where you could just throw down a layer and change its opacity at will, numerically, with a hardware function, where slowdown would not fuck up the effect because it wasn't based on an interlacing trick, was the SNES.

In other words: "The first system to do transparencies in the exact same manner as a SNES was the SNES."  It's hard to argue with that.

The way the PCE does transparencies is the same way its done on Genesis, Neo Geo, and other 16 bit arcade hardware. The object is there, it isn't there, it is there, it isn't there, really fast like that, so that it appears half there. In other words, it flickers.

Much of the time that is true, but go back and re-read those threads and you'll find many examples of non-flicker based transparency in PCE games.  The techniques used admittedly have limits and are not 100% analogous to the SNES's transparency capabilities, but they are transparencies; dismissing them entirely with blanket statements like "the PCE can't do transparency" is as inaccurate as saying "the PCE can't do parallax"; it can do both, albeit not in the same manner as the SNES or in a way that it could replicate any SNES transparency pixel for pixel.

On a peripherally related note, what are the 'transparencies' (for lack of a better term - it's more like looking through a net) in the hidden passages in Legend of Xanadu.  It looks like there's black/nothing alternating every-other-pixel on top of the characters.

[Arkhan Asylum]

Atari 2600 has the best transparencies.  I mean, look at those ghosts in pacman!  They're see thru!

[NecroPhile]

I was one of those poor fuckers that didn't know any better about 2600 Pac Man.  I lived in a small town and had only seen the real deal a couple of times, so I didn't know how it was supposed to be.

[Arkhan Asylum]

I was one of those poor fuckers that didn't know any better about 2600 Pac Man.  I lived in a small town and had only seen the real deal a couple of times, so I didn't know how it was supposed to be.

I guess everyone in my family liked it, but knew it sucked compared to the arcade machine 2 blocks away.    Though, I bet that if it weren't Pac Man, and wasn't hyped up as being the arcade to home conversion of such a sweet game, I bet it wouldn't have been as anger-inducing for people.

Kangaroo, Jungle Hunt, and Frogger were what they mostly played.

And Asteroids and Berzerk.


as a game, it really isn't awful.  It plays fine.  It just sounds really stupid, and is barely like the arcade one.

There were better clones in 1982.  I guess Pakacuda for C64 was pretty awesome at the time.   I've played it (the same cracked disk they used!).  It's pretty fun.  same release year as Pac Man on Atari 2600.

I think what pisses me off the most is that the fruit is just a fucking rectangle.  C'mon, they could've made it look like a cherry or something.

I don't even give it an A for effort, because I think the whole thing was rushed to quickly cash in on Pac Man.   

[NightWolve]

After reading through this thread, I suddenly don't feel old anymore. I'm glad this thread isn't going to a apple 2 vs commodore 64 argument, otherwise I think I would go insane.

Quiet you! ;) Honestly, I don't think I've ever even discussed Atari 2600 publicly before this thread... Seriously, I had forgotten all about it, but then when E.T. was mentioned, it brought back memories, of the whole system in general and a sort of "trauma" (if you will) with that particular game... I remember I was excited, enjoyed the movie and wow, now I get to play the game! How cool is that?? Yay! So I put the the cart in, turn the system on, start playing and my instant reaction within seconds, "HUH? WHAT?? WTF IS THIS GARBAGE??? WHAT WERE THEY THINKING?" When a game makes a first impression on ya like that, oh you remember it, alright!! And it looks like "the Internet" remembers it too, judging by this E.T. Wiki article I never knew existed prior to this thread.

E.T. is a couple of blocks of one color or so, you push the button and OK, his head moves up and down just the like movie (wow, awesome!), then you move around, you fall in a pit and sometimes, you can even get him to levitate out of it (again wow, just like the movie!), but most of the time you can't... You walk around some, you might get chased by some baddie, but you're slow, so best way to evade is to fall into a pit, then you have to try to levitate back out...if you can. Repeat! No thanks! The article does say, "the game can be enjoyable after the player has learned to navigate the pits" one of the few positive comments by Classic Gaming in support of one of videogame history's most costly debacles... I don't think learning to levitate properly would've changed my opinion or history's opinion, and so I don't think it should lose its razzie award because a minority somehow "managed" to find enjoyment with it... ;)

I thought it was fine after the internet decided it's the worst game ever.

Well, that pesky Internet full of a bunch of cranks does make some good arguments... Aside from being a horrible game, significantly contributing to Atari's failure, millions in losses, the 1983 crash, it appears it DID do something good, though: "the large number of unsold E.T. games along with an increase in competition prompted retailers to demand official return programs from video game manufacturers."

Can we at least agree that it has a "significant place" in videogame history ?? ;)

[CrackTiger]

To me, the first system to do real transparencies, where you could just throw down a layer and change its opacity at will, numerically, with a hardware function, where slowdown would not fuck up the effect because it wasn't based on an interlacing trick, was the SNES.

You really seem to be stretching to disqualify the Genesis' hardware transparency effects, with your specific detailed description of SNES transparency as your definition as "real transparencies". As you've been told and shown way too many examples of, there are lots of transparency effects in PCE games "where slowdown would not fuck up the effect because it wasn't based on an interlacing trick". Since you have SNES-superiority tunnel vision, you'll ignore it again, but for the rest of us who want to see an accessible example, go play Lords of Thunder until 8:26 in this video. Pause all you want, you'll never see an uncolored or single-colored section of that moving transparency layer, because there is absolutely no flicker, interlacing, etc (fake!) tricks being used. As I've pointed out in the past as well, some of these 60fps PCE transparencies do things that SNES hardware transparencies cannot. The PCE can't do every effect the SNES can do the exact same way either, but it can and did do all kinds of non-flicker transparency effects. Same with the Genesis.

You do understand as well that in order to get the SNES to do a transparency effect it's not as simple as flipping a switch, right? There is actual programming involved, just as with PCE transparency effects. You also must realize that the PCE doesn't require you to tape a colored sheet across your TV screen like Space Invaders the arcade does... the programming makes the PCE hardware do it all. Just like all the parallax that it does too. The color capabilities and speedy internal workings of PCE hardware actually make it all the more versatile at doing all kinds of non-flicker transparencies. There are also all kinds of limitations to SNES transparency effects too, the biggest being that it can only do a single transparent tile layer.

The way the PCE does transparencies is the same way its done on Genesis, Neo Geo, and other 16 bit arcade hardware. The object is there, it isn't there, it is there, it isn't there, really fast like that, so that it appears half there. In other words, it flickers.

Again, you are alone in your ignorance of the reality that the rest of the world is sharing. This is how the SNES does many transparency effects, like the Yoga Flame... and those other consoles can use this method as well... but the Genesis and PCE have many games that use non-flicker transparency effects. Repeatedly saying otherwise doesn't change the fact. You may dislike flicker transparencies, but you still have to put up with them in SNES games.

When things are transparent in real life they aren't %50 opaque because the thing is only there %50 of the time and absent the other %50 of the time. They are %50 transparent because only %50 of the light actually travels though them. On PCE you can't really change how transparent an object is except by changing the rate of the flicker, and that really falls apart at certain levels. Ie: you can't have something with %5 opacity since that would mean having the object only appear in %5 of the frames which...really wouldn't work for shit...although it is done quite frequently, usually when a character dies and is meant to disappear. Of course you can also make things seem transparent via very careful pallet choices and dithering effects, but those aren't variable at all.

The transparency effect in Blood Gear which I mentioned in our last "Zeta Witch Hunt", does degrees of transparency, not just 50/50... but takes it further to include special lighting effects which reveal added detail. So there is the staggered non-flicker transparency effect happening, which on SNES would only tint the layer behind it... but on top of that Blood Gear also brings out detail that was hidden in the shadows, the way that fully 3D lighting effects would reveal objects further behind the outer objects.

Even from a technical perspective, the TG16 is pretty much half way between the NES era and the SNES era. Technically, historically, chronologically, aesthetically. Have you ever played a SNES game as crude as Keith Courage or Energy? I haven't. I know, you like Keith Courage and Energy, thats fine, but seriously....JUST LOOK AT THOSE GAMES. Are they more like NES or more like SNES? Honestly. No bullshit. If you saw Blue Blink for the first time today would you assume it was for Neo Geo or CPS2 because of how insanely great the 16-bit visuals are?

Again, common sense should prevent the need for these basic concepts to be spelled out. A poor game, aesthetically or otherwise, is no measure of a console's potential. The very best, most impressive games, are simply the best examples we have. You undermine your credibility all the more when you pick out PCE games you feel are unimpressive as proof of the PCE's weakness. You also reveal your limited knowledge of the SNES/SFC library with these kinds of claims. But, if you actually believe in this kind of logic, here's your proof that the SNES is only an NES-quality 8-bit console-

[Arkhan Asylum]

I'd like to point out that the SFC LOH looks worse than the 16-color MSX one.

[CrackTiger]

I'd like to point out that the SFC LOH looks worse than the 16-color MSX one.

But at least the SFC version doesn't have FAKE(!) scrolling.

[SamIAm]

All those PCE transparencies seem like they're trying to inspire the idea of a transparency, and that's all.

The SNES processes transparencies by actually averaging the color values of overlapping pixels, and this technique is the basis of all modern transparency processing since. My impression is that it's also very easy to enable this when making an SNES game, as well. It's not a hack, it's setting a screen mode.

Effects like checkerboard dithering look terrible in comparison. This comes up a lot when talking about the Saturn and Playstation - the Saturn can't process transparency quickly if the two pixels being averaged are being drawn by different GPUs, with some exceptions. In many games, they went with a substitute. Castlevania SOTN looks like ass on the Saturn almost solely for this reason, and it's not even something that Saturn fans spend effort on disputing.

Lords of Thunder does the same thing Sonic games did for water - changing the entire palette partway down the screen. Is it effective? Sure. Is it good for anything other than water? Not really.

[spenoza]

All those PCE transparencies seem like they're trying to inspire the idea of a transparency, and that's all.

The SNES processes transparencies by actually averaging the color values of overlapping pixels, and this technique is the basis of all modern transparency processing since. My impression is that it's also very easy to enable this when making an SNES game, as well. It's not a hack, it's setting a screen mode.

Effects like checkerboard dithering look terrible in comparison. This comes up a lot when talking about the Saturn and Playstation - the Saturn can't process transparency quickly if the two pixels being averaged are being drawn by different GPUs, with some exceptions. In many games, they went with a substitute. Castlevania SOTN looks like ass on the Saturn almost solely for this reason, and it's not even something that Saturn fans spend effort on disputing.

Lords of Thunder does the same thing Sonic games did for water - changing the entire palette partway down the screen. Is it effective? Sure. Is it good for anything other than water? Not really.

Does it really matter if a transparency effect is calculated on the fly or pre-arranged with smart palette use? It is true that on-the-fly transparency is a lot more flexible in how and where it can be used, but that doesn't mean that prearranged substitutes can't be just as good in their set context.

[SamIAm]

That palette-change trick works fine where it works, but it is extremely limited in its application. It's like putting on tinted glasses. True transparency (as I don't hesitate to call it) allows you to actually make an object transparent. That means transparent clouds, fireballs, ghosts, dripping honey or whatever. The difference in design potential is massive.

[spenoza]

That palette-change trick works fine where it works, but it is extremely limited in its application. It's like putting on tinted glasses. True transparency (as I don't hesitate to call it) allows you to actually make an object transparent. That means transparent clouds, fireballs, ghosts, dripping honey or whatever. The difference in design potential is massive.

I think "on-the-fly" or "real-time transparency" is more appropriate than "true transparency". But even the SNES was highly limited in how it could use real-time transparencies, due to the transparent layer being a tile-based background layer rather than sprites or either (same with Mode 7 effects). There are lots of weird moments in SNES games where objects either remain without any change when a transparent layer passes by or which disappear behind the transparent layer instead of changing color and remaining otherwise visible. Those were mostly problems early in the life cycle of the system, but it still demonstrated that the real-time transparency effect was limited and finicky, and had to be futzed with in order to be relatively seamless. Heck, even the Sega Saturn had some issues with its transparency implementation, and it was quite a beast all the way around (I understand this problem was actually a bug and not part of how things were supposed to work).

So I will agree that, generally speaking, some kind of real-time implementation is going to be ultimately more flexible, but it wasn't really until the Playstation that said implementations were truly trouble-free.

[BigusSchmuck]

With all this talk about transparencies and flickering I'm surprised no one has gotten a seizure yet. lol At any rate, who cares about special effects just so as you enjoy the games you play right? Besides, games like Mega Man 3 for the NES you can use the slow down glitches to your advantage, at least I did back in the day...

[SamIAm]

So I will agree that, generally speaking, some kind of real-time implementation is going to be ultimately more flexible, but it wasn't really until the Playstation that said implementations were truly trouble-free.

I basically have no disagreement there.

As a big Saturn fan, I've spent a lot of time looking into what the problem was with the system not being able to do transparencies sometimes. Basically, it comes down to the fact that true/real-time transparency effects involve two graphics having their color values averaged, and if the two graphics involved are being drawn by the Saturn's two different GPUs (or VDPs, as they're known), it's inefficient for them to communicate the necessary information.

If all you want is the Saturn's VDP2 to draw a transparent background layer of clouds over another background layer of mountains, then that's no problem at all. NiGHTS shows an interesting case of sprites being transparent over other sprites and polygons, but not backgrounds, because VDP1 was only doing the effect with its own graphics. If you want an effect like this one, though, you've got to allow the system a lot more processing time to pull it off because it involves VDP1 sprites and VDP2 backgrounds. Surprisingly, this feature is also not hard to enable, it's just hard to budget time for.

Speed is the biggest reason why so many Saturn games have fake transparencies.

The bug aspect that you may have heard about is that the Saturn does tend to glitch out when doing polygon-on-polygon transparencies. The only Saturn game to do this in a non-hack fashion is Dead or Alive, and it does it only for the explosion that happens when someone goes outside the ring. The effect is so fast that it doesn't matter if it glitches.

Finally, there are hacks and shortcuts. VDP2 can make a layer of transparency over ALL graphics on the screen very easily, which is actually a very often-used effect. Also well-known is a hack that lets you make a VDP1 sprite transparent over a VDP2 background very efficiently, but with one compromise: any sprite that gets in between those two will simply disappear. Guardian Heroes did this with one character's red cape. Eventually, this hack was even implemented into Sega's later dev kits.

There, all you ever wanted to know about Saturn transparencies.

[Arkhan Asylum]

did people piss and moan this much about transparency when SNES and shit were current?  I know I didn't give a fuck.

[spenoza]

The bug aspect that you may have heard about is that the Saturn does tend to glitch out when doing polygon-on-polygon transparencies.

See, I used to think this, too. Now I'm not so sure of it. In fact, I bought into the whole "the Saturn is a true 2D machine" and "the PSX only used flat polys". It turns out I was wrong (partially). The only classic 2D stuff the Saturn does involves backgrounds. Saturn sprites ARE flat polys, or very nearly are, as far as I can tell. It has no separate 2D engine or blitter outside of its texturing capabilities. 2D sprites are basically a function of the texturing engine. Now, the Saturn does 3D differently than many systems in that it uses quads, and quads are better suited to 2D implementations than triangles. I don't know the full scope of the system's handling of transparent textures, but if it can do transparent sprites, it can do transparent textures. It may be that it can't do transparent solid-color or garoud-shaded polys, but it shouldn't have any problems with textured ones.

[SamIAm]

My TV was too shit to make out most of those effects anyway.

[kazekirifx]

The average person trying to decide which system to buy in the early 90's didn't give a shit whether or not true transparency could be achieved or not. As Zeta (I think) also pointed out earlier, Did the Turbo have Mortal Kombat, NBA Jam, or Ninja Turtles? No, no, and no. That along with the price, and the fact that most people didn't know anyone else who had one, and hadn't even heard of it doomed it to hardcore obscurity.

Obviously, the reason I liked Pac Man and E.T. on 2600 is because the Internets had told me how bad they were beforehand, and I was fully prepared for the worst. Then, being able to actually force some enjoyment out of them I was pleasantly surprised. Learning how to actually play and succeed at "the worst game of all time" was indescribably satisfying... (And for the record, the "How to Play" video on Youtube I believe was actually made in the 80's.... though I don't know how it was distributed back then. (Probably two boxtops from E.T. serial plus $10.95 S&H  )) This is the same as the 'Waterworld effect' I experienced when I saw the movie Waterworld for the first time ever in about 2007 or 2008. Being prepared for an infamously bad movie made it pleasantly surprising to find some positive aspects in the experience.

I imagine people who got their first Turbo after 2000 or so probably also experienced the 'Waterworld effect' to some extent. They probably have a pretty good idea of what to expect from the system and certain games beforehand, thanks to Al Gore's Internets. But back in the day, it was so different. I wanted every game I bought for the Turbo to be the next Mario-killing blockbuster that would prove to all my friends how awesome the system was once and for all. Expectations that high tend to set one up for disappointment.

[SamIAm]

The bug aspect that you may have heard about is that the Saturn does tend to glitch out when doing polygon-on-polygon transparencies.

See, I used to think this, too. Now I'm not so sure of it. In fact, I bought into the whole "the Saturn is a true 2D machine" and "the PSX only used flat polys". It turns out I was wrong (partially). The only classic 2D stuff the Saturn does involves backgrounds. Saturn sprites ARE flat polys, or very nearly are, as far as I can tell. It has no separate 2D engine or blitter outside of its texturing capabilities. 2D sprites are basically a function of the texturing engine. Now, the Saturn does 3D differently than many systems in that it uses quads, and quads are better suited to 2D implementations than triangles. I don't know the full scope of the system's handling of transparent textures, but if it can do transparent sprites, it can do transparent textures. It may be that it can't do transparent solid-color or garoud-shaded polys, but it shouldn't have any problems with textured ones.

Oh hey, I missed this. I was responding to Arkhan last time.

I'm not qualified to go into great depth on the subject, but I remember it was the conclusion of a bunch of homebrew guys on the board where I hung out. I also have personally seen the glitch in Dead or Alive - some polygons simply disappear when the effect is happening. AFAIK, it's exclusively a problem with polygon-on-polygon transparencies, and not a problem at all with polygon-sprite and polygon-background transparencies at all.

Who knows for sure, though. Anyway, yeah, the Duo. It was too expensive.

[jeffhlewis]

and yes, the Atari 2600 version of Pac Man was a goddamn mess.   It's not like Defender where its like "ok, this isn't as good as the arcade but it's still pretty good."

If you guys haven't already, you should really read the book "Racing the Beam" - it's a history and in-depth study of the VCS/2600 platform. They use popular games like Combat, Pac-Man and Pitfall as case studies, including studying the assembly code used in the games and the creative thinking that had to be used to make the 2600 do anything beyond very basic Combat-type games.

I knew very little about the 2600 going into the book (I was born in 81 so I missed most of the Atari age) but I found the talks about the architecture really interesting - basically the 2600 hardware was specifically designed to run a series of VERY basic games like Pong, combat and a BASIC editor, and that was it. Atari had planned to have that hardware around for a year or two. The guys who designed it never dreamed of being able to do anything approaching games like Pitfall and others - those games were really the product of a lot of creative thinking by the programmers and the fact that the 2600 didn't have a screen buffer, so game logic had to be performed while the screen was being redrawn (hence the book title). Programmers had to be fully aware of the registers keeping track of the current scanline and how many CPU clock cycles they had to run code between scanlines. really interesting stuff.

The book also goes over the absolute corporate insanity that brought about Pac-Man - the suits basically gave the programmer like 5 weeks to create the game. It's kind of amazing he was able to do it at all.

Link to the book:
http://www.amazon.com/Racing-Beam-Computer-Platform-Studies/dp/026201257X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1334075025&sr=8-1

[geise]

As probably already stated by others:

Next to no advertisement (except small sections in game mags)

Anime and RPG's weren't mainstream yet

Next to no fighting games unless you imported

Shooting games were starting to die out in popularity

Next to no 3rd party support or Big Budget titles/Arcade hits

Already struggling for market share against Sega and Nintendo

Stores weren't promoting it and had it placed in small obscure parts of the store.

[Arkhan Asylum]

and yes, the Atari 2600 version of Pac Man was a goddamn mess.   It's not like Defender where its like "ok, this isn't as good as the arcade but it's still pretty good."

If you guys haven't already, you should really read the book "Racing the Beam" - it's a history and in-depth study of the VCS/2600 platform. They use popular games like Combat, Pac-Man and Pitfall as case studies, including studying the assembly code used in the games and the creative thinking that had to be used to make the 2600 do anything beyond very basic Combat-type games.

I knew very little about the 2600 going into the book (I was born in 81 so I missed most of the Atari age) but I found the talks about the architecture really interesting - basically the 2600 hardware was specifically designed to run a series of VERY basic games like Pong, combat and a BASIC editor, and that was it. Atari had planned to have that hardware around for a year or two. The guys who designed it never dreamed of being able to do anything approaching games like Pitfall and others - those games were really the product of a lot of creative thinking by the programmers and the fact that the 2600 didn't have a screen buffer, so game logic had to be performed while the screen was being redrawn (hence the book title). Programmers had to be fully aware of the registers keeping track of the current scanline and how many CPU clock cycles they had to run code between scanlines. really interesting stuff.

The book also goes over the absolute corporate insanity that brought about Pac-Man - the suits basically gave the programmer like 5 weeks to create the game. It's kind of amazing he was able to do it at all.

Link to the book:
http://www.amazon.com/Racing-Beam-Computer-Platform-Studies/dp/026201257X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1334075025&sr=8-1

yeah.  Activision had some good drugs back in the 80s.  It is the only way I can explain that shit.

[spenoza]

It is rather amusing to find out that the creator of E.T., considered one of the worst games ever, not just on the 2600, was also the creator of Yar's Revenge and Raiders of the Lost Ark, two of the better games on the 2600. The latter two games took a year or so to develop and for E.T. he was given 5 weeks, so that pretty much covers things, I think.

[Arkhan Asylum]

It's no great surprise that Yars Revenge and Raiders took a year, where ET took 5 weeks.

In order to develop for Atari 2600, you first have to basically create your own library to access the video hardware. Seeing as Yar's Revenge was an early title, I'm sure Warshaw had to sit and dick around to figure everything out.

Raiders was more advanced than this, again requiring dicking around.

You can see reuse of some stuff he learned in those two games when you look at ET. 

The programming isn't the actual problem with ET.   The problem is the game concept itself leaves a lot to be desired.  It's too ambitious.  Most of those adventurey games are hit/miss.   Raiders of the Lost Ark barely worked as it is. 

ET Should have just been an arcade-like game.   It should have been a few mini-games broken up into segments where you earn a piece of the phone.

Maybe have one that's like a mini pacman, grabbing reese pieces while avoiding the FBI/NASA people
Then one where you're like running from left to right, like moon patrol, avoiding the FBI/NASA while you run thru the woods
Then one where you are elliot steering the bike like Night Drivin' or some shit

bunch of crap like that, all ending with a space-ship flying "get ET's ship into space!" portion.

It would have worked better.   Atari 2600's strong point is basic arcade games.

[NightWolve]

like moon patrol

!!!! Moon Patrol! Hey, we used to pass that game around on 5.25" floppies back in my High School days and when Radioshack's Tandy 1000 PC's were still in style!!! I just thought of something, too, Moon Patrol was actually my first "hack!" Eheh! If you could figure out how to use a hex editor on the DOS platform and edit a binary executable to change "Game Over" into "You Suck!" -- which was my chosen goal at the time -- well, then by God, that earned you your hacker credentials! That was my baptism right there! I didn't know dick about programming, but I sure could do a thing or two with a hex editor!! I don't get it though, you're like ~10 years younger than me and frighteningly far more retro than I am... ;)

[Arkhan Asylum]

I'm defective.

I hopped generation gaps, and threw up gang signs while doing it.

[geise]

Arkhan rhymes with Retro "Can"

[Arkhan Asylum]

youre a retro can.

[Tatsujin]

What is a retro can?

[Arkhan Asylum]

its like a retro bottle, but a can.

[BigT]

and yes, the Atari 2600 version of Pac Man was a goddamn mess.   It's not like Defender where its like "ok, this isn't as good as the arcade but it's still pretty good."

If you guys haven't already, you should really read the book "Racing the Beam" - it's a history and in-depth study of the VCS/2600 platform. They use popular games like Combat, Pac-Man and Pitfall as case studies, including studying the assembly code used in the games and the creative thinking that had to be used to make the 2600 do anything beyond very basic Combat-type games.

I knew very little about the 2600 going into the book (I was born in 81 so I missed most of the Atari age) but I found the talks about the architecture really interesting - basically the 2600 hardware was specifically designed to run a series of VERY basic games like Pong, combat and a BASIC editor, and that was it. Atari had planned to have that hardware around for a year or two. The guys who designed it never dreamed of being able to do anything approaching games like Pitfall and others - those games were really the product of a lot of creative thinking by the programmers and the fact that the 2600 didn't have a screen buffer, so game logic had to be performed while the screen was being redrawn (hence the book title). Programmers had to be fully aware of the registers keeping track of the current scanline and how many CPU clock cycles they had to run code between scanlines. really interesting stuff.

The book also goes over the absolute corporate insanity that brought about Pac-Man - the suits basically gave the programmer like 5 weeks to create the game. It's kind of amazing he was able to do it at all.

Link to the book:
http://www.amazon.com/Racing-Beam-Computer-Platform-Studies/dp/026201257X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1334075025&sr=8-1

Thanks for the recommendation.  That sounds like a book right up my alley... sadly, my programming and hacking days are likely behind me as real life and a job in a totally unrelated field takes up 99% of my time, but I always enjoy reading about clever approaches to hardware limitations...  As I was born in '81, the next generation of systems was more familiar to me... I wonder if there are any books like this pertaining to the 8/16 bit generations...

[Tatsujin]

@Tatsujin: I'm adding that slowclap animated GIF to my PWN image collection. Thank you! ;) I guess my avatar would've worked for your purposes too, but eh, that one is kinda old.

[Tatsujin]

its like a retro bottle, but a can.

I never knew that there was a retro bottle as well, I only knew about the retro cup, cap, vase and dish.