Samurai Shodown (SNES vs. Sega Mega Drive/Sega Genesis vs. Sega Mega CD)

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08-31-2012, 11:09 PM
Barone

^Lame video.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Stef

One of the funny thing is the MD version of SS is that the flags guy is not done of sprites but directly rendered in the background plan in software.
I believe they had to do that to avoid sprite flickering when you play tam tam vs tam tam for instance as sprites are really larges !
For sure this is a good port, just for this reason... and also this is something that it is impossible to do on SNES, big sprites with good animation + software sprite rendering is definitely too heavy for the weak VDP bandwish and CPU power of the SNES, it is probably one of the reason of the smaller sprites in this version.

They also squeezed the Genesis palette... The fight screenshots usually don't have less than 45 unique colors (Sega CD version has around 35) and the character select screen has more than 64 colors at times (depending on the fighters that you're selecting, of course).
09-01-2012, 07:06 AM
Stef

Indeed, they modify the palette on the player selection screen but i didn't know they do that also in game as it's a lot more difficult (i guess they do it only for the background).
I though the SegaCD version was basically the same with better music and extra intros... that's a shame the sega cd version display less colors !

Edit: Holy shit ! Just realized the flag guy is missing from the Sega CD version ! The Sega Genesis version is definitely better (music aside).
09-01-2012, 01:59 PM
Saturn Fan

Quote:

Originally Posted by OverDrone

All things considered, the MD wasn't really suited to arcade fighting games of the time - it seemed that in most cases an accurate conversion was just out of the machines reach.

The Sega Saturn would see to that though.

The Street Fighter, MK series, and of coarse, SS1 disagree with you. The console was plenty capable of putting out good ports of fighters, provided the programmers were decent and they had good sized carts to work with. Throw in the great six-button controller and its even better.

Anyway, the Genesis version of Samurai Shodown is pretty impressive. A lot of the original animation, voices, gameplay, and overall content were retained. Music is nicely represented as well. Its just a very well-rounded package.

Way better than the crappy SNES port with its itsy-bitsy sprites and hollow sounding music which, sadly, i bought over the Genesis version back in the day. How wrong i was! :|

Quote:

Originally Posted by Stef

Indeed, they modify the palette on the player selection screen but i didn't know they do that also in game as it's a lot more difficult (i guess they do it only for the background).
I though the SegaCD version was basically the same with better music and extra intros... that's a shame the sega cd version display less colors !

Edit: Holy shit ! Just realized the flag guy is missing from the Sega CD version ! The Sega Genesis version is definitely better (music aside).

The Sega CD has larger, more detailed sprites and retains more of the original animation. Sadly what should be a superior port and flex of the CD's muscle, falls flat duo to subpar programming. Theres absolutely no reason the flag guy should be missing, nor should the voices. Not with the CD's tech.

Throw in the bad loadtimes on top of that, and i'd rather play the Genesis version instead i'm sorry to say. The Sega CD version is a respectable port but falls unforgivably short.
09-01-2012, 02:03 PM
Barone

Quote:

Originally Posted by Saturn Fan

The Street Fighter, MK series, and of coarse, SS1 disagree with you. The console was plenty capable of putting out good ports of fighters provided the programmers were decent and they had good sized carts to work with.

Exactly.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Saturn Fan

Throw in the bad loadtimes on top of that, and i'd rather play the Genesis version instead i'm sorry to say. The Sega CD version is a respectable port but falls unforgivably short.

This.
09-01-2012, 02:15 PM
sheath

It is fair to note that the Sega CD's RAM might have been part of the limitation with the judge being missing. Having most to all of the NEO GEO original's animation and sprite size is kind of a big deal in comparison to the other adaptations. Now Earthquake missing is just silly. Also, the load times are the same as the 3DO version, just before the levels rather than after the match is supposed to start.
09-01-2012, 02:22 PM
Barone

I think it's more about flickering and sloppy programming like Stef said.
Eternal Champions on the Sega CD has many more frames of animation per character using the same RAM.
09-01-2012, 02:29 PM
sheath

Quote:

Originally Posted by Barone

I think it's more about flickering and sloppy programming like Stef said.
Eternal Champions on the Sega CD has many more frames of animation per character using the same RAM.

Did you ever figure out whether Samurai Shodown CD used the Genesis or the Sega CD CPU or both? If I remember Chilly right, the Sub CPU can only fill the four banks of 128KB of RAM with the other two being filled solely for access by the Genesis CPU or DMA to the VDP. I think he implied it wasn't well documented that the Genesis CPU could halt the Sub CPU and gain access to all 768KB at once. I know I haven't seen that in any of the RE documents.

So in this case "bad" programming might be chalked up to inexperience with the platform(s) or bad documentation.
09-01-2012, 02:40 PM
Barone

Sega CD's Samurai Shodown is running on the Genesis CPU.
FunCom was a shitty company.
09-01-2012, 04:08 PM
Saturn Fan

Quote:

Originally Posted by Barone

Sega CD's Samurai Shodown is running on the Genesis CPU.
FunCom was a shitty company.

Yup. Sub-par programming. Otherwise we could have had another stellar home port that outshined both the Genesis & SNES, and showed the hardware's potential(like Final Fight CD).

Too late now. *sigh*
09-01-2012, 04:46 PM
Olls

Quote:

Originally Posted by Saturn Fan

The Street Fighter, MK series, and of coarse, SS1 disagree with you.

That really just depends on your definition of "accurate". All these games are obsolete now that arcade-perfect ports are widely available.
09-01-2012, 04:49 PM
Barone

Arcade perfect MK ports? Where?
09-01-2012, 05:26 PM
Azathoth

Quote:

Originally Posted by Barone

Sega CD's Samurai Shodown is running on the Genesis CPU.
FunCom was a shitty company.

This may have been mention already; Funcom did zero optimizations on this port just like they did FFS. The sprites and everything are the exact same size as the AES/MVS version.
09-01-2012, 05:44 PM
Olls

Quote:

Originally Posted by Barone

Arcade perfect MK ports? Where?

MAME, or your next-gen console of choice.
09-01-2012, 05:52 PM
Barone

Quote:

Originally Posted by Olls

MAME, or your next-gen console of choice.

Those are nowhere near arcade perfect ports.
09-01-2012, 06:39 PM
Olls

Still miles ahead of their 16-bit outings.

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