Retro Arena: 32-bit era consoles

[Neon Ignition]

Presumably a lot of the N64's issues came down to the cartridges. Tomb Raider was impressive but a large part of that rested on how early into 3D gaming the game landed, it was amazing on release but within a year or two the series was already showing itself to be a fairly ugly dinosaur next to titles like Mario 64 and Banjo. One of the N64's issues was that its low popularity compared to the PS1 meant we relied heavily on Nintendo and Rare to push the hardware so it's a specific line of examples we're reliant on to show the systems capabilities. The PS1's best looking games often came from third parties working in a much more competitive space forcing them to bleed more from the hardware but even then there's a lot of smoke and mirrors to achieve an overall look where closer eyes on framerates, textures and modelling show how rudimentary they are next to some of what N64 had. But I guess it comes back to how much devs got out the hardware and how the N64 wasn't 32-bit

[Leon Retro]

To use machine code. Like Dave Perry (not the animal lol) said to programme on the Saturn was to learn the machine, to on the PS was the read a book on C . It wasn't just SEGA's In-House studios that used the Saturn, some of the smallest team did wonders on the system.

That's what I mean -- you have to be a genius coder like David Perry. He's a mastermind when it comes to coding and being clever at designing games.

I read an interview with the coder of Saturn Doom, who stated that he got the game looking and running brilliantly, but ID refused to let him use both processors, so the port ended up being not as impressive. I think someone at ID didn't want the coder to show off his skills and how good the Saturn tech could be.

So developers who loved to take an old school approach to coding and learning hardware, would have enjoyed the challenge the Saturn offered. The results could obviously be stunning. A few Saturn games really show up the idea "the Saturn can't do decent 3D" as being nonsense.

I got mine N64 with Mario 64 and Pilotwings N64 on its USA launch, it costs me a fortune and then I shelled out another £40 quid for a RGB mod and the display was still washed out and blurred

I think the exchange rate was great back then, so my modded USA N64 with 3 games was maybe £250??? I know it seemed quite cheap back then.

When it comes to 'blur-o-vision and washed out graphics', I only really saw that in all the bad games. I think top developers managed to overcome those issues -- especially RARE who had access to Nintendo's secret microcode. What were Nintendo thinking keeping it to themselves???

T

Only Mario 64, Yoshi Island 64 didn't seem to suffer. I still loved the N64, for me, its biggest issues was a lack of traditional shooters, the poor output of Nintendo (in terms of games made each year) and the lack of the sound chip, It was a dream system for any FPS fan and so I loved it

I couldn't have lived with only an N64 -- I needed the Namco games, and all the arcade and shoot 'em up titles. But as much as I didn't own loads of N64 games, simply because most really were garbage, I did spend a crazy amount of time with the games I did enjoy. It was a machine that didn't give me loads of games to get excited about, but it certainly made gaming more exciting with a few games that really were something special.

I was playing Wave Race a few days ago. It's still a joy to play through again and again. For some reason, the low frame-rate doesn't bother me at all. The game just feels really satisfying to play.

[dataDave]

Presumably a lot of the N64's issues came down to the cartridges. Tomb Raider was impressive but a large part of that rested on how early into 3D gaming the game landed, it was amazing on release but within a year or two the series was already showing itself to be a fairly ugly dinosaur next to titles like Mario 64 and Banjo. One of the N64's issues was that its low popularity compared to the PS1 meant we relied heavily on Nintendo and Rare to push the hardware so it's a specific line of examples we're reliant on to show the systems capabilities. The PS1's best looking games often came from third parties working in a much more competitive space forcing them to bleed more from the hardware but even then there's a lot of smoke and mirrors to achieve an overall look where closer eyes on framerates, textures and modelling show how rudimentary they are next to some of what N64 had. But I guess it comes back to how much devs got out the hardware and how the N64 wasn't 32-bit

Exactly. Technically MGS is a pixellated/dithered mess - but the developers worked around that and came out with something beautiful.

Besides massive pixellation you also had those wonky warping vertices which could give you motion sickness.

[dataDave]

Also, any game running on iD Tech 1 isn't actually 3D - so should work fine on the Saturn.

[Team Andromeda]

It was, but Perfect Dark wasn't the only game from that era to suffer from poor frame rates. Besides fighting games nearly all of them did. You could probably count the number of 60FPS 3D games across all platforms on one hand.

With the N64 you could, most could barely hit 30 fps, but quite a number of 3D Sports games run at 60 fps on the Saturn, same for the PS and then you had the huge number of titles that run 30 fps at higher res too

I'm trying to find the very best example of 3D on the PlayStation in order to compare it to year-1 GoldenEye on the N64.

When you're being selective that can be the case. But I was always quite impressed with the 3D in Soul Edge over a year into the PS

[Leon Retro]

But I guess it comes back to how much devs got out the hardware and how the N64 wasn't 32-bit

It took Namco 6 months to port Ridge Racer -- and people thought it was an incredibly good port. So the hardware was easy to work with -- and devs managed to push it from year to year up until 2000. Because the industry -- all over the world -- was very much focused on the PlayStation, all sorts of developers managed to find ways to push the hardware and impress people.

There was quite a lot of negativity. for various reasons, surrounding the Saturn and N64 amongst devs and publishers. I never saw any negativity directed at the PlayStation. It really was the perfect piece of hardware at the time and developers embraced it with a passion. It may not be everyone's favourite console from that era, but it was certainly the most popular and successful. I can easily appreciate why that was the case.

[Leon Retro]

Besides massive pixellation you also had those wonky warping vertices which could give you motion sickness.

Yeah, it's not like the PlayStation didn't have issues. But for a $299 console, it offered a lot. Developers absolutely loved the hardware and managed to push it further and further between 1994-2000.

When you think that PCs didn't really have 3D hardware at the time -- and still cost thousands of pounds -- the PS1 was a great piece of kit that enabled all sorts of 3D games running at decent frame-rates.

[Zaki]

I read an interview with the coder of Saturn Doom, who stated that he got the game looking and running brilliantly, but ID refused to let him use both processors, so the port ended up being not as impressive. I think someone at ID didn't want the coder to show off his skills and how good the Saturn tech could be.

41:28

http://theretrohour.com/the-retro-hour-episode-14-jim-bagley-legendary-games-coder/

John Carmack's fault apparently....oh dear.

[Leon Retro]

Also, any game running on iD Tech 1 isn't actually 3D - so should work fine on the Saturn.

Yeah, that is a good point actually. It's definitely not a game that should have troubled a 32-bit console. But with the Saturn, you really needed to use parallel processing, which most developers weren't accustomed to. The PS1 was far easier to understand and get to grips with.

Of course, if the Saturn had been a huge hit in the West, publishers would have made sure developers got the most out of the hardware.

The industry focus on the PS1, which was totally justified, meant that some of the best developers didn't get to push the Saturn hardware. So we ended up with small libraries of great 3D games for the Saturn & N64, whereas the PS1 got loads.

[Leon Retro]

41:28

http://theretrohour.com/the-retro-hour-episode-14-jim-bagley-legendary-games-coder/

John Carmack's fault apparently....oh dear.

I thought it was John Carmack, but I wasn't sure. Jim Bagley had Doom running really fast and fullscreen, so it would have been very impressive. He said they simply ported the PS1 version after Carmack refused to let him use the full hardware, which indicates that the Saturn version would have been better.

I really wish the Saturn had been more successful in the West and a true rival to the PlayStation. We would have seen lots of Western developers push the hardware in clever ways. It would have made things even more interesting.

[Neon Ignition]

I did like the way Sega's teams seemed to take the systems criticisms to task. Can't do shading? Have this. Can't do transparency effects? Have at you!

[Leon Retro]

I did like the way Sega's teams seemed to take the systems criticisms to task. Can't do shading? Have this. Can't do transparency effects? Have at you!

Well, they definitely pushed the hardware further and further as time went on -- and did certain things graphically that surprised people.

I think it was all about Sega's people also learning the hardware and developing libraries. You can see that with how Virtua Fighter evolved to Virtua Fighter Remix, then Virtua Fighter 2. It took Sega's best people a while to get to grips with the hardware. Sega Rally & Virtua Fighter 2 really were amazing to behold at the time.

But the early issues that led to a certain degree of negativity surrounding the machine, really prevented the Saturn from being a true rival to the PlayStation in the West. It just couldn't recover from Sega's early fumblings.

I really wish the Saturn & N64 had been more successful, as it would have led to more games for each. The Saturn was definitely lacking when it came to great 3D games -- and the N64 only ever got a tiny amount of truly special games. The PlayStation easily dominated that era of gaming.

[Team Andromeda]

I thought it was John Carmack, but I wasn't sure. Jim Bagley had Doom running really fast and fullscreen, so it would have been very impressive.

Jim said he had the best-looking version of Doom (console versions) running on the Saturn at 60 fps then id demanded he couldn't use the VDP 1 and VDP 2 for anything than to just draw the screen

[Team Andromeda]

Well, they definitely pushed the hardware further and further as time went on -- and did certain things graphically that surprised people.

SEGA didn't do anything fancy with transparent effects tbh, The Saturn could do 2D transparent effects no trouble through the VDP2, it was when the Transparent effect was needed to be warped around a polygon you had issues and so it was so in SEGA own games, that said Model 2 had no hardware support for transparent effects and the mesh effect had to be used quite a lot.

But the early issues that led to a certain degree of negativity surrounding the machine, really prevented the Saturn from being a true rival to the PlayStation in the West. It just couldn't recover from Sega's early fumblings.

One can get over shortcoming with early software (as seen with the PS2) the trouble with SEGA at the time was you had SEGA West all for and spending all its PR and development support on the 32X, while SEGA Japan was all for the Saturn. If SEGA had killed off the 32X, Things would have been much better, along with SOJ never letting SOA try and to develop the next-gen Sonic

. Sonic X was a complete mess from start to finish

[Team Andromeda]

Yeah, it's not like the PlayStation didn't have issues. But for a $299 console, it offered a lot. Developers absolutely loved the hardware and managed to push it further and further between 1994-2000.
.

The gfx in Vagrant Story and Metal Gear Solid were nothing short of incredible