PC Engine on par technically with SNES / Genesis ?

[Joe Redifer]

Sewer Shark is an ugly mess, if I'm going to watch video and press a button every few seconds I want something cool to look at, not the same length of grainy sewer over and over.  The Sega CD version of Road Avenger is the BEST fmv game ever made, btw.  Nothing is cooler than that intro song, it gets me so pumped to get revenge.

Agreed on all counts.  Road Avenger makes me play it again and again because it is so "crazy insane".  Driving through hotels and whatnot plus you destroy several helicoptors before the game ends.  I bought the Saturn version which has MUCH weaker audio throughout the game and is also missing the song.  I did create a Quicktime video just for fun that uses the Saturn opening video but with the Sega CD audio for the opening song.  I also created a DVD for a friend that had a "subtitle" option for the opening lyrics.

[CrackTiger]

Sounds pretty good. Is it heavy on kanji? I can handle hiragana and katakana, but i only know about 1% kanji For this reason, i was thinking about trying to play through Tenjai Makyou Zero on SFC instead of Manji or Kabuki, since Zero is pretty devoid of kanji.

TMII and Kabuki Den are the most Gaijin friendly TM RPG's, language-wise as well as in other aspects.

Both games have large easy to read text with english names(listed at the top of the screen) for pretty much every item written in katakana in the menu screen.

Ziria and Zero use small hiragana for most things and Zero in particular, models it's menues after SNES Final Fantasy's and has the highest number(like 30 to 1) of non-essential items that make it very hard for people without any Japanese language skills.

TMII & Kabuki Den are easier to figure out on your own and are reasonably straight forward. Ziria has some tricky spots that could get you stuck forever without a walkthrough.

Zero is ridiculously non-straight forward. It can be really confusing and overwhelming for real gaijins, compared to TMII and Kabuki Den.

[grahf]

thanks for the heads up.

[Seldane]

Keranu: Why do you think The Legend of Xanadu is graphically impressive? Sure, there are some pretty pictures in it, but in-game - it's an NES game. Looks almost exactly like DQ1-4.

[SignOfZeta]

TMII and Kabuki Den are the most Gaijin friendly TM RPG's, language-wise as well as in other aspects.

Both games have large easy to read text with english names(listed at the top of the screen) for pretty much every item written in katakana in the menu screen.

Are we talking about the same games? I have TMII for PCE, and GC, and I have to say its the most Japanese-heavy Japanese RPG I've ever seen.

For a TM game, maybe its not bad, but it's vastly more dificult to play for people with very little Japanese knowlege than, say, Final Fantasy.

[TurboXray]

but in-game - it's an NES game. Looks almost exactly like DQ1-4.

 I can't beleive you think that. Sure the chars might be small but in no way does that game look like DQ1-4. Yeah, 3 color sprites from a 64 washed out palette of the nes - that exactly what Xanadu looks like

 But you're right, it's not awesome Unless Kenaru was refering to Legend of Xanadu II?

[Keranu]

Keranu: Why do you think The Legend of Xanadu is graphically impressive? Sure, there are some pretty pictures in it, but in-game - it's an NES game. Looks almost exactly like DQ1-4.

Seldane I must ask, have you ever played a NES game ? NES games generally use 10-20 colors on screen while I am sure the LoX games are in the 40-70 range and you can easily tell the difference when it comes to games like that. Sorry to pick on you here, but lets do a small comparison :

Nice looking overhead NES game (and I even used one of your example, Dragon Warrior IV):

/dw4ly5.png

Overhead screen of the first Legend of Xanadu:



I kind of find it funny how I was able to take a screenshot in Dragon Warrior IV that turned out so similar to the layout of the LoX screenshot . Anyways, that Dragon Warrior IV screenshot is using 17 colors while the LoX screenshot is using an impressive 85, cleary a huge difference and the difference can easily be seen. Even the nicest looking overhead on Genesis wouldn't be able to look quite as sharp as that LoX screen since it uses 21 more colors than the Genesis can use, but that's a different story.

Here is a comparison of the side scrolling screens using Mario 3, a very nice looking NES game, compared to another LoX screen:



Once again, huge difference but then again these two games have completely different styles. 12 colors for the Mario 3 screenshot and 64 for the LoX one.

Some think LoX2 graphics are even more impressive, but I won't bother throwing in those screenshots for comparison. Also, I have a soft spot for the graphics in the first LoX .

[Seldane]

Okay sure, there are more colors, but design-wise, it looks like an NES game. A Super CD-ROM game from 1994!

Here are some nice overhead Mega Drive games. I find all of these much nicer-looking than LoX: (in fact, LoX doesn't even compare to them)

/md1ow6.png /md2ci3.png /md3sz6.png /md4ae2.png

Hmm, looking at these screenshots, I haven't seen ANY overhead PCE game that looks better than these games. LoX2 and Ys IV are in the same league, but they aren't really better-looking (and they are SCD games!)

[Keranu]

Seldane, you're just crazy - that's all I have to say . I'm sure I am far from being the only one to think that Legend of Xanadu looks nothing close to a NES game .

Nice looking Genesis games, but keep in mind the PCE could handle those with no problems.

[Seldane]

Nice looking Genesis games, but keep in mind the PCE could handle those with no problems.

Maybe. But why didn't they make any?

[Keranu]

They made plenty, but maybe they just didn't fit the tastes of a certain person located in Sweden (or should I say Esteria instead?) .

[Seldane]

Show me. One is enough.  

[grahf]

One could argue that design-wise, all those genesis games you posted look like NES titles also.

[GUTS]

Those Genesis games look way better than any overhead Duo game, easily.  Beyond Oasis alone is way beyond what the PC Engine was capable of, hell Gotzendeiner is one of the most graphically impressive PC Engine games and it chugs when there are more than a few sprites on screen and they're not even close to as big as the ones in Beyond Oasis.

[Joe Redifer]

Keranu where are you getting the extra color from in your screen shots?  I counted only 16 colors for the NES DQ game (the maximum it could put on the screen out of a total palette of 52) and 84 for the PCE Xanadu game.  Granted 1 color isn't a big deal I am just curious what method you are using to count the colors.  Maybe your method is counting the transparency channel of the PNG format as a color?  By the way the Super Mario 3 shot you posted only has 8 colors, not 12.

Anyway I will admit that most PCE and Turbo overhead games seemed to have more of a "tiled" or "patterned" look than the Genesis and SNES overhead games.  Doesn't mean they aren't fun.

[Keranu]

Show me. One is enough.  

No matter what I show you, you might just say it's not good enough for your tastes. It's hard to please everyone's opinions, but the general opinions for the graphics of games like Sapphire is that it looks outstanding. It's kind of like a Matrix situation; I can't show you what you are looking for, you'll have to find what it is you are looking for ;) .

Those Genesis games look way better than any overhead Duo game, easily. Beyond Oasis alone is way beyond what the PC Engine was capable of, hell Gotzendeiner is one of the most graphically impressive PC Engine games and it chugs when there are more than a few sprites on screen and they're not even close to as big as the ones in Beyond Oasis.

I believe it's fair enough to say that anything the Genesis can do, the PCE can do, except something like sound since their soundchips are so different. Especially when it comes to colors because the Genesis and PCE palette are very similar from what I know and the PCE doesn't suffer the severe color limitations. 32 colors for background and 32 colors for sprites, ouch.

Keranu where are you getting the extra color from in your screen shots? I counted only 16 colors for the NES DQ game (the maximum it could put on the screen out of a total palette of 52) and 84 for the PCE Xanadu game. Granted 1 color isn't a big deal I am just curious what method you are using to count the colors. Maybe your method is counting the transparency channel of the PNG format as a color? By the way the Super Mario 3 shot you posted only has 8 colors, not 12.

Got the color counts from pasting the image into Tile Studio and using the color count tool. It's probably including the invisible colors too, so that's more than likely where the one extra color is coming from.

[OldRover]

Put the developers of those Genesis games on the PCE hardware and you'd see the same game appearance on the PCE. Why? Because back then, it was all about developer skill, not hardware capabilities. As we've already seen, each of the systems of that generation had their advantages and disadvantages, and that was what this thread was really all about...hardware ability, not the ability of the game developers. Bad or slow algorithms, sloppy code, and a lack of dedication will always affect the product, and the PCE had more of these developers than any of the consoles of that time.

[Joe Redifer]

What are some good examples of PCE/Turbo overhead games that do NOT feature a tiled or patterned look like Xanadu does?  The screenshots don't have to be good enough for me or Seldane or anyone else.  I am just curious.

[Keranu]

Anearth Fantasy Stories (Seldane you might want to check this one out for graphics, it looks amazing. It's hard to find screenshots for it though), Fray in Magical Adventure, and Ys IV could qualify for what you are looking for, I guess. It's hard to find overhead games back from then in general that didn't really repeat tiles.

[CrackTiger]

Okay sure, there are more colors, but design-wise, it looks like an NES game. A Super CD-ROM game from 1994!

Here are some nice overhead Mega Drive games. I find all of these much nicer-looking than LoX: (in fact, LoX doesn't even compare to them)

Hmm, looking at these screenshots, I haven't seen ANY overhead PCE game that looks better than these games. LoX2 and Ys IV are in the same league, but they aren't really better-looking (and they are SCD games!)

I still find the original Phantasy Star better looking than the Genesis versions.

Gameplay-wise, I find overhead games in general, especially 3/4 perspective ones, as well as 3D games aren't as good as sidescrolling/2D gameplay.

As for good graphics in an overhead game, -the PC Engine didn't get as many overhead games. It's like comparing Genesis sports games to PC Engine sports games.

If you just want to go by nice looking graphics in general, then even any fanboy has to admit that at the very least, the PC Engine has games with as-good-as anything on Genesis graphics.

And the games in those pics aren't the best examples of Genesis graphics, especially PSIV's overhead. The Genesis has way better looking games art/detail & technical/graphics(cleaned up)-wise. And so does the PC Engine(Magical Chase alone trumps them all).

I could've put up some decent Anearth Fantasy Stories pics, but my Magic Engine key doesn't work anymore and there's more than 5 minutes of people standing around talking at the beginning.

[Keranu]

I took a bunch a good pics of Anearth Fantasy Stories once (which included the battle system, which you can never find pics of online ) and emailed them to a friend, but I don't have them saved anymore . I can't even remember what the battle system was like in that game, I just remember it looked waaaay cool.

[Digi.k]

I hope some people don't mind me borrowing some of their screenies for this...

ok so we like to look at nice pics then  I guess when you come to looking at the pc engine and dismissing it as underpowered you sure don't look hard enough ^__^ 

haha someone post some genesis screenies of Afterburner and compare it.
/afterburner.jpg

games from IREM run in one of the pc engine's higher resolutions.
/ninjaspirit.jpg

I sure like to find a genesis/megadrive shooter that looks as nice and colourful as this:
/parodius.jpg

or this.
/twinbee.jpg

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Need I mention the colour of these pc engine's screenies compared to the Genesis/megadrive's...

and as I've said from somewhere else before .. not bad considering the pc engine's cpu isn't much faster than the NES's.. but in terms of graphics its far from the NES..

[RuninRuder]

Beyond Oasis is the type of crap that seems graphically impressive in screenshots only to reveal itself as graphically limited in action.  Yeah, the ogre guy looks really cool when you see him in screens.  Then you play the game and realize you have to fight him and two other guys seven hundred freakin' times during a repetitive, mediocre five-hour adventure that forces you to tread through a lot of dull, drab, similar-looking environments.  Look at a few screens and you've seen all there is to see.  Wow, what a remarkable technological achievement.  

Xanadu 2 was the opposite for me in that it looked pretty good in screens, but breathtaking in action.  I think its environments contain a lot more beauty and variety than BO's.

[Keranu]

and as I've said from somewhere else before .. not bad considering the pc engine's cpu isn't much faster than the NES's.. but in terms of graphics its far from the NES..

I hope you don't mind if I correct this, but PCE CPU is a helluva lot faster than NES' and it's close to the speed of the Genesis. In fact, programmers (I am not one, so bare with me) will tell you that the PCE CPU is technically faster than Genesis CPU because it uses less clock cycles or whatever, check out nod's posts in the earlier pages of this thread. Yay for PCE .

[Digi.k]

and as I've said from somewhere else before .. not bad considering the pc engine's cpu isn't much faster than the NES's.. but in terms of graphics its far from the NES..

I hope you don't mind if I correct this, but PCE CPU is a helluva lot faster than NES' and it's close to the speed of the Genesis. In fact, programmers (I am not one, so bare with me) will tell you that the PCE CPU is technically faster than Genesis CPU because it uses less clock cycles or whatever, check out nod's posts in the earlier pages of this thread. Yay for PCE .

ok thats cool with me, thats another plus that the pc engine has over the genny.

I think im gonna post some more games tomorrow.

[GUTS]

Beyond Oasis absolutely smokes Xanadu, I'll take similar looking environments over ridiculous amounts of fetch quests and crappy tiled overhead view graphics anyday.  Now compared to say BLOOD GEAR it's not even a contest, BLOOD GEAR plays better than both of those games.

[TurboXray]

A note on PS IV - it looks much better on the real hardware than on any emulator. On emu it looks like a dithered mess, but on the Gens TV output it blends oh os nicely   I like the look of PS II over PS 4 - just slightly though, but that could change since I've haven't logged more than 6 hours on PS4.

I think Gotzendeiner look average at best - not impressive from what I've seen - it's play control is too sloppy for me.

Seldane, those pics are awesome examples of great Gen games. But we all know that any graphics the Gen can display(colors and res), the PCE can do as well - OK sans shadow/highlight since it display colors not available in the 512 palette - see Charles Macdonalds 1536+ color demo for MD.

I agree with Nod, Sega had strict requires for granting a license to any given game to be published, while Hudson was much more lenient. I remember reading a statement by Hudson saying they knew they couldn't complete with Sega and Nintendo so they focused and simple gameplay and fun (I wish I could remember the source).

Sega was one of the kings of the arcade business - I think this is the most determining factor to Sega's success in the 16bit era (3rd in Japan, but #1 and/or #2 in the US depending on who you ask).


LoX:II

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Gulliver Boy

/recent/42.png
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Anearth Fantasy
(looks a lot like Ys I & II artwork...)
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De Ja
(no reason really to post it, but ...)
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not bad considering the pc engine's CPU isn't much faster than the NES's.. but in terms of graphics its far from the NES..

The NES cpu is based on the original 6502, the PCE based on the w65s02 - there's a noticable difference alone right there - not to mention the PCE runs at 7.16mhz and the NES runs at 1.79mhz. Besides, the PCE's huc6280 CPU is even faster than the Gens 68k in a bit of the same operations - MIPS(millions instructions per second) wise it's faster than the NES, SNES, and a hair faster then the MD. It's all in how you use it Actually the 68000 isn't famous for it's speed, but it's architecture and cost - very popular in embedded systems with its orthogonal instruction set and wide address range. The 68k is useful for operations that aren't that crucial in 16 bit games, i.e 32bit add/sub, 32bit multiply/div, etc.

Agree with runinruder with BO. It looks awesome, but average at best game - couldn't get into it. The wasn't there a Zelda clone for Gen or was BO supposed to be it ?

I sure like to find a genesis/megadrive shooter that looks as nice and colorful as this:

Sorry, but the MD has some great shooters. Gaiares is graphically the most impressive use of 64colors IMO.

There are plenty of awesome graphics on the MD, Sega sure knew how to make use of those onscreen 61 colors.

BTW: I'm stuck in Anearth Fantasy - nobody answers the babies cries int he beginning

[Keranu]

Great post, Bonknuts; I pretty much agree with everything you said. I also wanted to point out that last pic you posted of Legend of Xanadu II with the random roman characters... were you trying to translate it or something? If so, lemme know! And keep me up with your other projects.

[RuninRuder]

I agree that even the mighty Xanadu 2 can't top Blood Gear.

[Odonadon]

Piping in myself, there are a lot of PCE games that look worse than Genesis games color-wize.  So again, comparing games to games is futile, especially in a hardware discussion

When you ask most serious coders what really defines performance, you'll get MIPS as your answer.  No matter how many special backgrounds you can push, it all comes down to a MIPS facter at the end of the day.  Mind you that is today, and "back then" everyone defined power by "bits", but keeping Bonknuts's latest post in mind (the PCE boasts MIPS figures higher than SNES and Genny), I think it's fair to say that the PCE is more powerful  

OD

[TurboXray]

Keranu: Yeah, I was working the LoX:II translation. I put it on hold since the S-JIS text is compressed.  Dave(Shadoff) took a look at the compression scheme and noted that it wasn't the same as Ys IV or Emerald Dragon, though he did offer assistance for when I start working on it again. I'm working on Auleria currently and rapping up Spriggan Mark 2 - just waiting for the script from akamichi . Star Breaker is in the works as well - Motaw gave me the translated script from his old project.

 Runinruder: Do you have some pics of the game? It looks pretty cool, but I haven't gotten far. I was looking at the S-JIS text, seems to have a simple compression scheme.

Odonadon: Hehe, there's plenty of examples how the CPU was carelessly coded - i.e. slowdown. Then again same with SNES and MD. I actually learned some optimizing techniques from debugging game code. I have to be fair though, the 68000 has some advantages over huc6280 but there more of convience of coding or ease of use. The 68000 was very popular so more programmer were familiar with it too. The linear address is nice (no bank switching) as is the nice line of registers, but the huc6280 has zeropage (256 fast accessible slots in memory / pseudo regs) so I guess its a good trade off.

[CrackTiger]

Agree with runinruder with BO. It looks awesome, but average at best game - couldn't get into it. The wasn't there a Zelda clone for Gen or was BO susposed to be it?

Raguna Centy/Crusader of Centy is the best most Zelda-y game for Genesis/MD that I can think of.

I haven't actually gotten around to playing it yet, but from what I know/seen about it, it's pretty close to the Zelda's, where as the Thor/Oasis games are more unique and/or Final Fight-y.

Keranu- I think that Anearth's battle system was reasonably traditional, but I didn't get too far into it the one time I played it.

But the battles look like Tales Of Phantasia, with large animated characters running across the screen to attack enemies. And I don't remember if TOP had it, but Anearth uses 3D'y warping floors like Street Fighter II.

[Keranu]

What's that Zelda rip off for Genesis that's about the Bible? My friend was writing a walkthrough for that game or something, but I think stopped. Now that was a 16-bit game with NES graphics.

[PC Gaijin]

BTW: I'm stuck in Anearth Fantasy - nobody answers the babies cries int he beginning

It's been so long since I played Anearth, but I fired it up just to take a look at the graphics since Keranu mentioned it. Are you talking about right after the opening cutscene? Where the baby is left at the door of the church on a snowy night? Because a priest came out eventually and got the baby, then FF a few years to the baby as a young boy, and the game started. Maybe your copy is messed up?

Also, why are people using MIPS to compare performance between two different CPU architectures?

[Joe Redifer]

haha someone post some genesis screenies of Afterburner and compare it.

haha ok:







Now before you start doing handsprings while singing "Genesis sucks" be aware that these two games here really don't take much advantage of either system.  Both could do much, much better.

But we all know that any graphics the Gen can display(colors and res), the PCE can do as well

For still screens, definitely.  But what people seem to forget often on this board is that the Genesis could display an extra background whereas the Turbo had to use sprites to accomplish the same effects.  Because of this I think flicker was more prevalent in Turbo games that did this (***waits for someone to bring up Lords of Thunder***) and the Genesis didn't need to spend unnecessary sprites.  But if all you look at are colors and resolution, of course the Turbo can match and exceed the Genesis by quite a noticeable amount.

[Keranu]

Man, I always knew the PCE version of After Burner II looked nicer, but I wasn't aware of the Genesis version missing that much detail. But that goes without saying for a lot of early arcade ports for consoles.

[CrackTiger]

Man, I always knew the PCE version of After Burner II looked nicer, but I wasn't aware of the Genesis version missing that much detail. But that goes without saying for a lot of early arcade ports for consoles.

The PCE version is also smoother(maybe just the screen spinning), which stands out the most when firing up one after the other.

[Keranu]

Yeah I have compared them before and noticed the PCE version was smoother. I also like the music a lot more in the PCE one, but that's more of a personal preference.

[Joe Redifer]

The spinning screen is smooth on both, but the Genesis version rotates slowly (though still smoothly) when not in a barrel roll.  On still pictures the only real advantage the PCE has is the nice gradients at the horizon that are completely missing from the Genesis version.  The PCE has some nice (but slow) scaling of the Sega Enterprise and the refuel jets.  The landing strip isn't even in the Genesis version.

Both suck balls compared to the 32X version, anyway.

[CrackTiger]

Yeah I have compared them before and noticed the PCE version was smoother. I also like the music a lot more in the PCE one, but that's more of a personal preference.

Yeah, I like the music in both versions and am glad that they're so different. I almost bought the Saturn version a few minutes ago during a Saturn shopping spree(if only to here the "arcade" music).

If anyone's intersted in hearing the soundtracks, both are up on my site(and currently in my car stereo).  

[Keranu]

Sweet I haven't checked your site in awhile, I didn't know you had the soundtracks for both of those. Last time I checked you had the Aero Blasters soundtrack up, which was nice. Keep up the fantastic work on the site, dude!

[Joe Redifer]

I have the Saturn version as well as the 32X version (the sound is almost identical between the two).  I also have the Genesis version and the Master System version which has the melodies.  Does the PCE version have the melodies ?  I really hate how they removed the melodies from After Burner 2.

Oh, and just for fun, more colors simultaneously doesn't always equal spooge-fest graphics.  It is probably more important to have better colors to choose from in the first place.  Here are some pics of a couple of Genesis games that put more than 64 colors onscreen simultaneously:


71 colors


70 colors


75 colors


95 colors


105 colors


163 colors

[TurboXray]

Also, why are people using MIPS to compare performance between two different CPU architectures?

 Because games/systems in the 16bit era were not CPU intensive in the way it would be on a PC or MAC or even PS 2. Games in the 16bit era in general performed mostly of non complex instructions - alot of read/compare/add-sub/store. These can easily be converted to MIPS - average cycle of all instuctions divided by the number of cycles per second. It's not the end all, but it's a very good point of reference for speed between the two architectures since it applies more true to these games systems.

 But your right, they are two different architectures - each with there own strengths and weaknesses. Ofcourse anyway you look at it, the PCE and MD CPUs still faster than the NES and SNES.

For still screens, definitely. But what people seem to forget often on this board is that the Genesis could display an extra background whereas the Turbo had to use sprites to accomplish the same effects.

 Yeah, that's the PCE's achilles heel. That's why I love the SGX  
Another thing the Gen had was priority setting on the BG tiles. The PCE has to do a detection routine and use a sprite mask when the main sprite gets with in a few pixels of it - i.e. Ys I&II when Adol goes behind the BG parts - pillars, trees, etc.

Because of this I think flicker was more prevelant in Turbo games that did this (***waits for someone to bring up Lords of Thunder***) and the Genesis didn't need to spend unnecessary sprites. But if all you look at are colors and resolution, of course the Turbo can match and exceed the Genesis by quite a noticeable amount.

 Gen also ran standard in 340/320 x 224 mode which really helped it out. Both has the same sprite to scanline limit, but the Gen can have 8x8 sprite size. This seems like a dis-advantage, but it's not. The PCE can have 16 16x16(min) sprites and the Gen 20 8x8(min) sprites. On the PCe if you have a bullet the size of 4x4, it takes the whole 16x16 space. So on a shooter with 8x8 or smaller bullets, the Gen could have more smaller sprites on a scanline before flicker starts to happen. GOT and LOT are good examples of designing around limitation, instead of just running a scripted game without concern for limitations.

 There are some plus' on the PCE side video side - you can write to the video memory at any time, the video processor has it's own DMA independent of the CPU, the tile map can address a tile anywhere in video memory, sprites size up to 32x64, sprites have there own palette (256colors) that is seperate than the back ground palette entry(256), background tile map up to 128x64(1024x512 pixels), block transfer (DMA) instruction to and from video memory.


 Joe: Besides the vectorman pics, the others look good.

Because a priest came out eventually and got the baby, then FF a few years to the baby as a young boy, and the game started. Maybe your copy is messed up?

 Hehe, maybe I didn't wait long enough.

[Joe Redifer]

Joe: Besides the vectorman pics, the others look good.

Yeah, that's what I mean.  Vectorman looks like ass, yet it has 70 colors or more onscreen pretty much throughout the entire game.

[T2KFreeker]

Truthfully, I could care less which machine is more powerful than the other, I just like my Turbo machines more, again, personal preference, but it's the truth, it had better games for the most part, at least I thought so. Of all three, the SNES is my least favorite as it stunk of Corporate America, well here in the US at least, and corporate isn't always good, and usually never is!

[Keranu]

Yeah, that's what I mean.  Vectorman looks like ass, yet it has 70 colors or more onscreen pretty much throughout the entire game.

There are also plenty of games that us more than 64 colors that look great too. By the way, I though Vectorman looked kinda nice, though a bit dithery. The sequel looks nicer.

[Joe Redifer]

Vectorman 2 actually uses less than 61 colors at all times from what I've seen.  Probably because it is so dark.  I refuse to play any game that does not put at least 40 colors on the first screen I see after pressing START (or RUN).


(Kidding, by the way).

[CrackTiger]

Oh, and just for fun, more colors simultaneously doesn't always equal spooge-fest graphics. It is probably more important to have better colors to choose from in the first place. Here are some pics of a couple of Genesis games that put more than 64 colors onscreen simultaneously:

It really depends on the comparison.

Like say, if you gave the NES a 16 million color pallete. The games would still be limited by per sprite color restrictions, number of colors onscreen overall etc.

Finally, the Genesis is so far off from the PC Engine color display-wise, that even if you gave it a 16 million color pallete, the PC Engine would still have the potential for better screen shot graphics overall.

But if well reproduced beutiful art isn't what someone judges "good graphics" by, say someone like Dave Halverson from Gamefan/Play magazines...

-and instead your brain is mainly stimulated by moving slates(no matter how bland), or some kind of simple warping effect that you've been told once was hard(or impossible) to do(or in the current gen, feet that slant on hills)...

-then it doesn't really matter and taking an bland NES game and super-charging it with 50 layers of parallax and 15 independant scrolling bg's and scaling/rotating sprites and throwing in a 'special' sound(ing) chip... all with under 18 unique colors onscreen and some crude art...

-would impress them more than any Capcom or Neo Geo arcade game with any bg layers turned static.


And I'm not going to say matter-of-factly that well-reproduced art = good graphics(even though I can argue that everyone agrees so outside of systems wars scenarios, like say judging an arcade game standing on it's own).

Because there are a lot of people out there(especially on internet rant pages) who really have no taste(good or bad) in art and really do judge all game graphics by self-percieved technicalities or single particulars, like:

"all 16-bit games must use parallax or they look like NES!"

"all 32-bit games must be 3D and use (what I deem to be)true light sourcing or the they look like 32X( tehy sux)!"

"all '128-bit' games must use any kind of 'mapping' that I happen to think up of while playing a particular game, particularly if one or two other consoles don't render it in hardware(and therefore by my definition not at all), or it loos like PSX graffix!"


....now, back to the whole pallete thing.

The SNES is supposed to always have the bestest graphics, no matter what(!), 'cuz its got a bigger pallete and can display 256 onscreen. But when you look at so many of those OMG games that you remember looking so hot back in the day on an emulator (or S-Video) today... you can now see that a lot are kinda drab color-wise and often don't use too many colors in their fantastic bg's.

I used to beleive that the PC Engine had a crappy pallete like the Genesis and that SNES had to ALWAYS be better(!). But now I see how vibrant the colors are in most decent PCE games, even the lower color ones.


Finally, the Genesis doesn't seem to be bottle necked by the 64 colors onscreen thing so much as other 'per colors limits. I amateurly say this because there so many(all?) quality ports to Genesis, where the same game also appears on SNES or TG/PCE... and in both/all versions, there are less than 64 colors(thats a lot of colors!) onscreen in all versions... but the Genesis version still noticibly recycles colors and winds up showing slightly less shading than the other(s).

[T2KFreeker]

Going by certain theories that have been thrown around for a long time, I have such a hard tinme taking anything that any videogame magazine or corpoately sponsored videogam web site has to say. I am one of those people that looks at what limitations that a system may have and try to see the amazing things that it does, and this can get hard, especially when you are a fan of the underdog systems. Alot of the people I know talk so much shit about perfectly good systems like the Atari Jaguar, 32-X, and Saturn, I still don't see the point. Each of the systems mentioned has awesome games that take advantage of what the hardware can do, and each has been "Tricked" into doing siome amazing stff.
Example; Ever seen Rayman on the Jaguar? Blows both the Playstation and Saturn versions out of the water. The 32-X actually has some of the nicest games I've seen from that generation of gaming, right at the tail end of the death of 16 bit, it still was an awesome little piece of Hardware that was never really pushed, and I still think that it is sad.
As far as the Turbo Grafx/Duo/PCE, this system just has some of the most amazing games ever made. It may not have the most colors on screen, or all the junk that the SNES has, or "Blast Processing"  like the Genesis, but it does what it is supposed to do, and does it well. It plays games, and that was what it was supposed to do. NEC was able to revolutionize gaming as a whole so much with one system. I remember when everyone in the industry was laughing at them for using the CD Rom on their machine. Well, we know where that went. nThat right there is a huge factor to look at when looking at this system. Even though the first batch of games wasn't the best in the world, look at later releases like Shape Shifter, Y's, Shadow Of The Beast, and God help us, Beyond Shadowgate. These are amazing examples of games that were just awesome as hell. Splatterhouse on the PC Engine is still far better than either of the Genesis games, and then we have Bonk, great stuff. I don't know about you all, but I HATED Bonk on the SNES, it was horrid.

[CrackTiger]

Going by certain theories that have been thrown around for a long time, I have such a hard tinme taking anything that any videogame magazine or corpoately sponsored videogam web site has to say. I am one of those people that looks at what limitations that a system may have and try to see the amazing things that it does, and this can get hard, especially when you are a fan of the underdog systems. Alot of the people I know talk so much shit about perfectly good systems like the Atari Jaguar, 32-X, and Saturn, I still don't see the point. Each of the systems mentioned has awesome games that take advantage of what the hardware can do, and each has been "Tricked" into doing siome amazing stff.
Example; Ever seen Rayman on the Jaguar? Blows both the Playstation and Saturn versions out of the water. The 32-X actually has some of the nicest games I've seen from that generation of gaming, right at the tail end of the death of 16 bit, it still was an awesome little piece of Hardware that was never really pushed, and I still think that it is sad.
As far as the Turbo Grafx/Duo/PCE, this system just has some of the most amazing games ever made. It may not have the most colors on screen, or all the junk that the SNES has, or "Blast Processing"  like the Genesis, but it does what it is supposed to do, and does it well. It plays games, and that was what it was supposed to do. NEC was able to revolutionize gaming as a whole so much with one system. I remember when everyone in the industry was laughing at them for using the CD Rom on their machine. Well, we know where that went. nThat right there is a huge factor to look at when looking at this system. Even though the first batch of games wasn't the best in the world, look at later releases like Shape Shifter, Y's, Shadow Of The Beast, and God help us, Beyond Shadowgate. These are amazing examples of games that were just awesome as hell. Splatterhouse on the PC Engine is still far better than either of the Genesis games, and then we have Bonk, great stuff. I don't know about you all, but I HATED Bonk on the SNES, it was horrid.

I loved the 32X. It was my first and main Doom experience. It was worth it alone for that one game.

I also loved Virtua Racing and had wanted to play the game for less than $1 per credit ever since I first came across an arcade unit during a trip to a big city.

I got both games and the 32X at X-Mas/my birthday and I had fun with it for months after(I still don't know what happend to it, lost in a move?)

I also didn't like SNES Bonk and didn't give the SFC game a chance after helicoptering through a maze as a chicken for way too long.

I have the Saturn version as well as the 32X version (the sound is almost identical between the two). I also have the Genesis version and the Master System version which has the melodies. Does the PCE version have the melodies? I really hate how they removed the melodies from After Burner 2.

The PCE version definately has more than the Genesis version, but I don't know if there is still some missing from the arcade.