https://youtu.be/in_-aN1M-yw
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Keep in mind that the original Final Fight CD already runs mostly on the Mega Drive side of the hardware.
So, by the looks of it, what we have here is Final Fight CD minus the Sega CD enhancements (clear, concurrent voice samples, CDDA music tracks) and with a color hack on top.
How much they will further change the game is yet to be seen though.
The colours look a little worse than Final Fight Cd though or is it just my imagination?
Either way really looking forward t this have always wondered how good a Megadrive port could be.
if sound is the only improvement on the CD side, can we conclude they didn't release Final Fight on stock MD just because the rom would have been quite big and expensive? (IIRC that was the reason for axing one character in both Final Fight SNES ports)
It's more than just a color hack. It's remade from scratch and tries to be as close as possible to the arcade version, and has some details the CD version does not have. See this, for example.Quote:
Originally Posted by Barone
There's an "Ultimate" mode in the main menu, but we don't know what it's about.Quote:
Originally Posted by Barone
I disagree. Look at the player select screen, for example.Quote:
Originally Posted by Edek
I had only seen the first video; there are more changes now. OK, it's importing assets from the arcade. That's good.Quote:
Originally Posted by Stifu
Regarding the other comments, yeah, it's still WIP so we better wait and see what the final result looks like (probably better than the current snapshot).
I think the "MD" colors are better.
Redrawing is way better that the original MCD version. Period.
My only gripe is that pure red, and even blue to some extent, should be prioritized in this port during gameplay.
I know it is pretty difficult to downscale colours from CPS1 to Megadrive, but red popping out on Capcom games is as important as SEGA's blue skies.
Will keep track of this promising project!
It's still a WIP, the colors keep changing. Like, Jessica has a brown dress in that video, but a dark red one in this later tweet.Quote:
Originally Posted by dr apocalipsis
Also, for what it's worth, this tweet from today shows pure red used for blood.
This looks so cool. I hope it gets completed.
Looks like they are doing it from scratch rather than porting the SCD version. The ost sounds ok but could be better.
I hope the gameplay stays faithful to the arcade and they fix the weird stuff from the SCD version. Also intrigued in what "ultimate mode" has to offer.
Well it's using SGDK, wouldn't that suggest they are rewriting at least some of it using that sdk?
This is really interesting, and if the game is faithfully recreated with just SGDK, that's a really big deal.
I hope we get to learn more soon.
Looks fantastic, looking forward to trying it out.
For a game like Final Fight, I wish they would prioritize keeping bright/vivid colors even if it means making some stylistic changes from the arcade version. Trying to match the CPS color scheme is likely to end up looking dull and washed out, with yellows and reds replaced by shades of orange and brown. There's only so much you can do with four palettes.Quote:
Originally Posted by Stifu
This is why SoR2 is consistently cited as one of the best looking Sega Genesis games. There was no attempt to do realistic shading, instead the characters and environments have lots of bright colors like they came out of a comic book.
A new video that looks promising: https://twitter.com/MXRetroDev/statu...43663530397696
That looks just about perfectQuote:
Originally Posted by Stifu
WOW!!! This is an exciting project.
And this video indeed looks promising.Quote:
Originally Posted by Stifu
Use of colors seems improved compared to the opening sequence of stage 1 from the trailer.
Looking forward to more updates!
First level gameplay, enjoy guys!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxHJcM-GHQY
Interestingly, the original arcade game does not have shadows when characters are off the ground, but he added them in this port. So he's trying to improve on the game in subtle ways.
The visuals are solid, noticed some extra animation with the katana and how the blood moves. Gameplay seems pretty off however, kinda doubt he'll be able to match the Sega CD port.
I'm definitely going to give this a playthrough in the future. I'm not the biggest Final Fight fan, but I do love the Beat 'Em Up genre so I'll keep playing them as they come out, with updates.
Same here when it gets releasedQuote:
Originally Posted by Hairlesswookiee
Well it was just a test video they haven't finished it so right now we were seeing just a demo of the mega drive version showing it can be made for the mega drive so they have alot of time to make this version better then Sega CD and ArcadeQuote:
Originally Posted by Vludi
Dunno about that, he's not Hidecade and so far he seems more capable with the graphical stuff than replicating the gameplay. I imagine that the game is hard to program considering all the subtleties in enemy behavior, rank, rng, item drops and combat.
Still hope they can match/improve the SCD port, the best possible outcome would be a slightly worse looking Sharp x68000 port.
It is the version that should have appeared at the time.
I'm glad it's coming tho now I don't have to buy a silly Sega CD which failed in my eyesQuote:
Originally Posted by masteries
Quote:
Originally Posted by Vludi
I think it's good to be realistic about our expectations, but I also think that, if you were to pick a 90's arcade game to convert to a 4th gen console, a CPS-1 game being ported to the Genesis/MD is about as ideal as it can get, and the game being Final Fight, one of the best known, well-documented arcade games of the 90's, with a goal of getting it running on hardware that is so damn close to the coin-op, is pretty much the best place to start. Not only that, the console already has a damn fine port available, so there's lots of material to draw from.
I'm pretty happy this port is being worked on, and I hope the devs are successful with this project. So far, it's looking, sounding, and moving great.
Edit: I noticed that I accidentally clicked the Mod Edit Post button, rather than the Reply with Quote button. My apologies. It wasn't my intention to make it appear as if I was editing your post.
There's no way such a high-quality port could have been made back then. It's just like the aMaru's Ghouls & Ghosts improvement hack, there's no way the game could have been that good back then, given the constraints of the time.Quote:
Originally Posted by masteries
Quote:
Originally Posted by Stifu
You guys are so observant. I would never have picked up on those details.Quote:
Originally Posted by Vludi
I agree. Final Fight was revolutionary when it came out. I remember when it was new in the arcades, everyone wanted to play it, the graphics were considered very realistic back then. I didn't see the SNES port until a couple years later, at the time I thought "wow this is just like the arcade" except 1 player. Without the benefit of seeing the games side by side it was hard to tell how much was missing. So if a port like Final Fight Ultimate had come out back in the day, people would have had their minds blown. Nobody would have cared that the colors are a little different or if enemy patterns aren't exactly the same.Quote:
Originally Posted by SEGA-Jorge
The one issue this is going to have, and it's true for every 4th gen console, is that there's no way to match the sprite capabilities of the CPS1. Arcade Final Fight can have ten enemies on the screen at once. What's the realistic limit here, maybe 4 or 5 in two player mode?
Right, also ROM sizes limited so much of what could be done back then. Final Fight arcade is over 50 mbit, in 1990 a game that size probably would have cost $150 or more.Quote:
Originally Posted by Stifu
I'm working on a beat 'em up for the Mega Drive, so that helps (nothing worth showing yet). Otherwise I would not have noticed. :)Quote:
Originally Posted by axel
Some old games may look simple at first but are actually difficult to recreate, I remember that in the making-of video of Windjammers 2, the developers stated that it took them quite a while to match the gameplay from the original Windjammers, they were surprised with the code and even had direct contact with the original developers in order to make a worthwhile sequel.Quote:
Originally Posted by SEGA-Jorge
Overall it's more convenient to make an "approximation" than a faithful port, in Final Fight's case even the Sega CD port has some rather weird stuff compared to the arcade, while the SNES version is almost a different game. Either way this new port will be an interesting homebrew addition, "ultimate mode" could be pretty cool if there are extra moves/mechanics, characters or stages.
By 1993 I think they could've developed a solid 16mbits MD port, maybe not as good looking this one but still solid.Quote:
Originally Posted by Stifu
That is so true about many SNES ports. They look good visually, but they play like different games. Having a fast 68k made a lot of things possible for the Genesis.Quote:
Originally Posted by Vludi
A 16mbit port should have looked pretty good considering the SNES port is only half that. 1993 seems a bit late for a cart release of Final Fight though. If Sega wanted to do it you'd think they'd go for it right away when it's new and fresh.
It's not just the 68k as King of dragons was a pretty good port compared to Final Fight, and there are unfaithful MD arcade ports too like Sunset Riders. Sometimes the developers were just more willing or capable to make more accurate ports regardless of hardware differences.
1993 was the same year SF2 SCE was released, so a cart release of Final Fight doesn't sound too bad imo, to me porting an old arcade game for the Sega CD was a weirder decision.
Your observations are somewhat wrong, even in ports where we have the source code, it is very difficult to get a 1/1 result, until the end of the 2000s there was no perfect port of Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo, considering here also the difference in the power of Arcade hardware and Mega drive.Quote:
Originally Posted by Vludi
So I think starting from that point of view is wrong, it's very obvious that everyone involved is looking for the best and closest to the arcade, but first of all what really matters is an experience, interesting and fun. You may not remember, in the 90's Turtles In Time Arcade was ported to Snes, and many consider the Snes version to be a far superior and most often definitive experience.
The Hidecade comparison struck me as extremely rude and disrespectful.
It would be interesting comments/criticisms to help and not just shit.
Well the port has an "arcade mode" which uses arcade assets and similar enemy placement, so it's only natural to expect some accuracy, just like the Sega CD and Sharp ports. I'm not saying that it has to be 1:1, just saying that so far it falls short compared to the other ports. Again I know that it's difficult to replicate the arcade, which is why I see more potential in "ultimate mode" which isn't tied to the arcade's standards, and best of all, could offer a somewhat original experience.Quote:
Originally Posted by Chev Chelios
Because the gameplay and levels were completely overhauled to the point it's a different game from the arcade, not the case we're seeing here with "arcade mode" at least, which is just a regular port.Quote:
Originally Posted by Chev Chelios
Now you are just being overly defensive, just mentioned Hidecade as an example of someone being very concerned with matching the original gameplay, I can understand that other developers have different priorities. If Mauro needs playtesters I'm up for it, though there are enough brazilian FF veterans out there that can be of help.Quote:
Originally Posted by Chev Chelios
Is he looking for people who speak Portuguese to test? I could help with that.Quote:
Originally Posted by Vludi
I guess the best would be to reach out to him on Twitter.Quote:
Originally Posted by axel
By the way, new tweet: https://twitter.com/MXRetroDev/statu...92582572130306
Honestly, my fist impression is that I like the left (old) picture better. It's more dull, but the right one looks garish, and characters don't stand out as well from the background. In the new one, it seems like he's using character palettes for some of the background elements (with the car having Guy's colors), which strikes me as a bad idea. That said, the author says you have to see it in action to really appreciate it. I guess the changes he's making are in line with axel's opinion regarding color usages. Anyway, so far he has done a great job, so I trust the end result will be pretty nice.
That is what I said, yes... but I pictured it looking different than this. I think in a scene like this it makes sense to use more muted colors for the background, so the characters will pop against it. Like that skyline for example I would rather it be in gray than blue, because I want to focus on what's happening in the foreground.Quote:
Originally Posted by Stifu
Edit: I looked at that part of the stage (from the arcade version) in Photoshop and it's using 100 colors just for the background alone. That's going to be very tough to reduce and still look good. I guess it depends how accurate you want to stay to the original. You could for example set the stage at night, darken everything, that would make the far background much easier as you could get rid of all the blues and greens.
The number of colors isn't a good indicator of what actually needs to be done. There's a big difference between adapting a 100 color photograph and adapting a 100 color background of a game using <15 color tiles and meta sprites to different hardware that uses <15 color tiles and meta sprites.Quote:
Originally Posted by axel
Capcom's CPS games use the kind of vibrant shaded coloring that I like, which is also very 16-bit console friendly.
I updated my POC Final Fight recolors to proper Mega Drive colors, but photoshop screwed them up. So here the 4-palette version is PC Engine colors (not PCE spec).
I didn't finish polishing up the background and the drainage pipe and floor still need to have one be rolled into one of the matching palettes. Everything else is using one of the 4 palettes I designed around prioritizing the player sprites. Player sprites looking good and accurate makes or breaks ports for me and is why the SuperGrafx version of Daimakaimura is uncomfortable for me to play.
http://superpce.mywhc.ca/misc/ffmdc2.png
I have some orangey alternate drums that I might have swapped in. The "polishing" would involve going into elements like the sky/cityscape and adjusting the colors by hand to suit the new palette and redrawing bits here and there. The player life count font would use a better suited set of colors from the 4 palettes. A proper port might need tile reduction, but this was just and experiment to show what the Mega Drive can do with color.
The arcade version of the Player Select screen is 87 colors. My 4-palette 9-bit color version is 42 colors.
http://superpce.mywhc.ca/misc/ffmdcps2.png http://superpce.mywhc.ca/misc/ffcpsc.png
It wasn't difficult to do at all. After adapting arcade assets to 9-bit colors for a while it becomes clear what kind of shades need to be rolled into a darker or lighter color.