Games in monochrome

[evildragon]

I have no real reason for doing this other than that I am bored. But I'm having my old monochrome IBM PC-XT computer showing screenshots from the 16-bit era of games. After I took these, I was surprised, these old monochrome screens can sure look pretty damn detailed!

Super Mario World: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v3...ps614be89b.jpg

Sonic and Knuckles: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v3...ps5c6a9347.jpg

Super Mario 64: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v3...ps88ad8598.jpg

This computer has enough VRAM to do at most 64 shades of grey on it's monochrome screen, so I thought these were interesting.

The CRT is between black and white and amber colored, so I thought these screenshots looked pretty damn cool in person.

[Soulis]

Yeah, its funny how CRT monitors are superior in every way, even when they are monochrome.

[vintagegamecrazy]

That's pretty nice to see. I love old PCs and wish I could find a decently priced monochrome monitor around here.

[Sky Llama]

I had an old Amber Zenith CRT the happily took composite in. I've never seen games look so crisp and clear as they did on that screen. I've got a video of it somewhere on youtube, but it was filmed a few years ago and I sounded like an idiot so I'm not searching for the link.

[evildragon]

Yep, those monochrome CRT's with the RCA jacks are very clear. Especially when you feed it luma from S-Video.

[kool kitty89]

This computer has enough VRAM to do at most 64 shades of grey on it's monochrome screen, so I thought these were interesting.

It's not VRAM, but a video DAC resolution limit. VGA and MCGA only do 18-bit RGB, so 64 levels of R/G/B/Cy/Ma/Y and therefore 64 levels of grayscale.
A 24-bit XGA/SVGA card with the same amount of RAM would be capable of 256 shades of gray, and technically, you could choose specific 18-bit color entries that convert to grays not in those 64 levels in 18-bit RGB. (the RGB to monochrome mixing circuit blends R, G, and B at different intensity levels) So you probably could get 256 shades of gray in 18-bit RGB too, on a monochrome monitor. (not identical shades to 8-bit grayscale though)

Yeah, its funny how CRT monitors are superior in every way, even when they are monochrome.

In this case, we're talking a VGA class monitor too, so much greater clarity (effective resolution) than TVs, 15 kHz arcade monitors, or PVM monitors.

[evildragon]

I actually knew about the DAC limit, because this CRT only gets to see 6-bits.. For some reason VRAM came out, when I meant to say it was a RAMDAC issue..

It's definitely mixed in a weighted grayscale too, however it's only using the G-pin out of the DAC, red and blue are unconnected, so it's going to have a max of 64 shades anyway no matter what you try. The computer just loads a special monochrome palette that red and blue grays can show on the green pin also.

[Moirai]

I believe i have a green monochrome Hewlett-packard laying around somewhere.... but i dont have a computer that can use it. It would be nice to have an old DOS machine with a Hercules video card or something.

[Drakon]

Here's the opposite:

[Moirai]

Always looking for an excuse to show of your mods aren't you, Drakon?

[evildragon]

I see no mod.

[Moirai]

I see no mod.

Or hacks, whatever. For the record, he did modify a game boy cart to use an eprom. so there were mods involved.

[Drakon]

Actually you could run it on a flash cart.

[TmEE]

(he made a monochrome game into color one)