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That's true; also, at the time, 3d was the rage. I think the prevailing attitude was that 2d was on the way out. I think it would be interesting however if good developers had tried to do 2d on the N64. I have a feeling it would have been a fairly capable 2d machine in the right hands.Quote:
Originally Posted by Team Andromeda
I think if anybody could've made a great looking 2D game it would've been Treasure, but maybe they just weren't concerned about graphics in Mischief Makers. I think it mostly has to do with the N64 simply being designed to cater to 3D games and there's nothing wrong with that, it's what it does. It's what people at the time wanted.
No, only the 3D version was.Quote:
Originally Posted by The Jackal
Robotech CD looks terrible even for 95 game. I know Capcom was about to get involved but they pulled out for some reason. I wonder how much Gametek spend on the license to get this game.
I'm not sure but judging how protective and asinine Harmony Gold has been about the Robotech license over the years, probably a lot. The game did drive them to bankruptcy but that was mostly due to the fact that they underestimated how expensive the game would be to make.
I was going to say some of the things GameTek were planning for Crystal Dreams seem pretty similar to the open-ended space sim game, Elite. Interestingly enough it turns out they actually developed Elite II.
Robotech: Crystal Dreams -- That game was pretty hyped for a long time, and was highly anticipated by a lot of people both for the license and for the incredibly ambitious design. Then it got delayed over and over, until it was finally cancelled, sadly... but I'd think most N64 fans who were around at the time would have heard of it. Well, North American ones would have anyway, probably not people elsewhere.
Hardware-wise that is absolutely false, and games like Yoshi's Story show that the system is quite good at 2d when games were made in 2d on it. The reason why they made the controller three pronged was so that it'd be equally good as a 2d or 3d controller, probably expecting that the 2d side would be used more than it ended up being...Quote:
Originally Posted by Team Andromeda
In terms of actual results of course you're right that the system didn't end up having many 2d games, but that has nothing to do with the hardware's capabilities. We've said this over and over, why is it so hard to understand?
Don't forget that the game was a 1997 release, early in the system's life. For 1997 games it looks fine. Graphics got better later on of course, and Treasure's other two N64 games both reflect that.Quote:
Originally Posted by Obviously
The console was sold as a 3D console that's even with the N64 logo was made 3D to reflect that and has confirmed by NCL VP of engineering Jim Merrick at the time the official tool set of the N64 didn't even support 2D . So it's quite clear the N64 was always meant to be a 3D console.Quote:
Hardware-wise that is absolutely false, and games like Yoshi's Story show that the system is quite good at 2d when games were made in 2d on it
Guardian Heroes was early inthe Saturn life so was Astal and they totally and utterly outclassed N64 2D by miles, same goes for Gunners Heaven on the PS and as time went on , 2D just got better and better on these consolesQuote:
Don't forget that the game was a 1997 release, early in the system's life
I don't think Yoshi's Island is even a very good example of what the system is capable of, though at least enough to say that it DID (not could) do better 2D graphics than anything on the SNES, Genesis, and (arguably) Jaguar. (I'd say YI is more graphically impressive than Ray Man)Quote:
Originally Posted by A Black Falcon
I wonder if Nintendo actually programmed that game using the standard "fast 3D" microcode. (I know Nintendo had a few games using custom microcode, but mostly late gen ones iirc -not sure if any games ever used the more PSX-like "turbo 3D" code SGI offered -that would obviously have been far better for 2D games than the "fast 3D" one)
Yoshi's Story as an actual game is a separate issue. (and aside from gameplay, the sound design -both music and sfx/speech- really ruin it IMO -Yoshi's Island was very enjoyable on the sound end IMO . . . Story is just obnoxious -especially looking at it today, though I don't remember it being quite that annoying back in the late 90s)
Yes, so the system was no good for 2D from the consumer perspective (ie what software was available), and thus those with interests in the minor 2D niche market of the time would need to look elsewhere. ;)Quote:
In terms of actual results of course you're right that the system didn't end up having many 2d games, but that has nothing to do with the hardware's capabilities. We've said this over and over, why is it so hard to understand?
Well, obviously . . . 2D was limited on the PSX (and Saturn and PC) for the same reason, especially later in the generation. And much of the 2D games the PSX and Saturn DID get were done by Japanese companies, and we all know that Nintendo lost most of their JP 3rd party support (and JP market share) with the N64. ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by sketch
The N64 seemed especially tailor made for 3d from the get go (more so than the Saturn, and maybe even the PSX). The choice of an SGI chip for graphics and the introduction of the flagship Mario 64 seemed to scream "3D ONLY" when the N64 came out. I doubt it was designed at all with 2D in mind, but wonder what good developers could have squeezed out of it had the prevailing wisdom on 2D games been different.Quote:
Originally Posted by kool kitty89
As you pointed out, Japanese third party developers were the only ones making those types of games, and they left the N64 like rats leaving a sinking ship. All the arguments about N64's 2D capabilities are purely theoretical; using example of the small library of 2D games is pointless as obviously there was never any real effort put into 2D on this machine for the reasons stated previously.
Going for the S-Ranks in Mischief Makers is pretty fun. The only problem is that rheumatoid arthritis and blisters start to set in fairly quickly with the crappy N64 controller.
N64 had two graphics modes: "Turbo 3D" and "Fast 3D". Developers, your choice is 3D or 3D. No 2D. Seems a pretty significant indicator that they never had 2D in mind when designing the hardware.Quote:
Originally Posted by A Black Falcon
I don't think Yoshi's Story is as good graphically as even the middling 2D efforts on Playstation and Saturn.
No NCL lost Square hardly the powerhouse of 2D gaming at the best of times. They still had plenty of Japanese support, but it was clear from NCL own direction and tool set they were all for the 3D route and so 3D parties followed suite so rather than make a 2D Castlevania Konami made a 3D one, rather than make a 2D Bomberman Hudson made a 3D one and so it went on .It also can not be overlooked that the High Price of Carts and NCL launching so late gave a huge advantage for the Saturn and PS to become the home of Arcade ports for smaller parties in Japan and that's an advantage they keptQuote:
And much of the 2D games the PSX and Saturn DID get were done by Japanese companies, and we all know that Nintendo lost most of their JP 3rd party support (and JP market share) with the N64.
Also has confirmed by Seta their Arcade 64 board (ALECK64) had boasted 2D graphics to help it compete with the likes of ST-V and System 12 and even then it was outclassed by the ST-V
Isn't the fact that the N64 had a very lacking amount of texture memory the main reason it was hard to execute a well looking 2D game without a lot of stretched out textures?
My main issue with the N64 is just that , not that the textures are stretched , but that they are blurred beyond recognition at times :/
Or as the fancy peeps call it; Trilinear MipMap Interpolation.
That was a problem for more or less every N64 game bar Mario 64 . The N64 for what ever reason didn't do texture maps graphics well and suffered big time from washed out colours and blurry textures.Quote:
Originally Posted by Robotwo
The memory expansion pak was made for a reason.Quote:
Originally Posted by Team Andromeda
A standard N64 has very minimal amount of graphical memory , so it can only store very low-res textures , and the graphics chipset has built in Trilinear mipmap interpolation.
So when they needed to make any bigger object or sprite , it was a small texture stretched over a bigger surface that was "Smoothened out" so the pixels wouldn't show.
Yes for the N64 DD drive lol . Looking over that, even when you used the expansion pak lots of games still suffered the same old problems like of poor textures and washed out colours in Zelda MM, Excitbike, DonkeyKong Ect . When it came to textures and crisp clean display the SGI chipet was lacking to the Saturn and PSQuote:
Originally Posted by Robotwo