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Most impressive 3D-Games for the Sega Saturn

  • Thread starter SpongebobSquaredance
  • Start date

Animagic

Banned
I kind of disagree with that assessment. I can't even name 10 great games (and even the handful everybody keeps quoting are debatable imo). The system has some interesting curiosities, but killer-apps those aren't.

Let's be honest, I love the Sega and the Dreamcast, but the Saturn was crap.
I prefer the Saturn to the Dreamcast, but I love low poly and that era of games in general.
I didn’t care for the Dreamcast style of games much
 

DaGwaphics

Member
The 64 was not gimped because of cartridges. It’s one of its defining technically superior aspects.

Ps1 could not compete visually with 64s finest, even if we did that cute thing of ignoring psx texture warp and no filtering.

Much more so than more storage, 64 needed a sound chip. If they just made that single change, it would have a domino effect from sound quality to freeing up cart space to improving cpu performance I.e. FPS.

You really going to make that argument when only a few games had 64mb carts, with most being forced into 16mb or smaller carts (based on expected demand and the costs), Most of the third parties that limited Nintendo releases or dropped them completely sited the expensive/tiny cartridge as the cause.
 

PhaseJump

Banned
The 64 was not gimped because of cartridges. It’s one of its defining technically superior aspects.

Ps1 could not compete visually with 64s finest, even if we did that cute thing of ignoring psx texture warp and no filtering.

Much more so than more storage, 64 needed a sound chip. If they just made that single change, it would have a domino effect from sound quality to freeing up cart space to improving cpu performance I.e. FPS.

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You really going to make that argument when only a few games had 64mb carts, with most being forced into 16mb or smaller carts (based on expected demand and the costs), Most of the third parties that limited Nintendo releases or dropped them completely sited the expensive/tiny cartridge as the cause.
Yes I am. Cartridges were, and still are a vastly superior medium than Discs. Of course, more space would be beneficial (and i'll get to that in a moment), but the benefits far outweighed the disadvantages. But to say that it was gimped because of carts is pretty ridiculous.

What I said about the sound chip is very true. Take Duke 64 for example, which had no music. Yes, space was the reason it had no music. However, that's only because it lacked a sound chip. With a sound chip, it could've had great sequenced audio. In fact, some PS1 games don't even use the CD for music and have sequenced audio as well. Most of the space in your average ps1 cd was duplicate data to increase the horrid load times.

With a sound chip, you could basically sequence anything that wasn't voicework. The audio compression on certain games, or the lack of audio in others was the real problem with the 64.
 
BTW has anyone messed with Saturn emulation via Raspberry pi 4? Thinking about getting one.

Yes I am. Cartridges were, and still are a vastly superior medium than Discs. Of course, more space would be beneficial (and i'll get to that in a moment), but the benefits far outweighed the disadvantages. But to say that it was gimped because of carts is pretty ridiculous.

What I said about the sound chip is very true. Take Duke 64 for example, which had no music. Yes, space was the reason it had no music. However, that's only because it lacked a sound chip. With a sound chip, it could've had great sequenced audio. In fact, some PS1 games don't even use the CD for music and have sequenced audio as well. Most of the space in your average ps1 cd was duplicate data to increase the horrid load times.

With a sound chip, you could basically sequence anything that wasn't voicework. The audio compression on certain games, or the lack of audio in others was the real problem with the 64.
After Rogue Squadron didn't Nintendo license factor 5's musyx tools for their dev kits? Or.laybe that was for gamecube? I forget.

The lack of a sound chip on the N64 was huge.

Saturn 3D was crap. Sluggish and no transparency effects. PS1 blew it away.



C'mon dude. At least add something to the conversation other than 5th grade schoolyard shit. This is a solid thread and if you want to time travel back 25 years I'd appreciate if you did it elsewhere.

Having said that, yes PS1 was the better 3D machine.
 
BTW has anyone messed with Saturn emulation via Raspberry pi 4? Thinking about getting one.


After Rogue Squadron didn't Nintendo license factor 5's musyx tools for their dev kits? Or.laybe that was for gamecube? I forget.

The lack of a sound chip on the N64 was huge.


C'mon dude. At least add something to the conversation other than 5th grade schoolyard shit. This is a solid thread and if you want to time travel back 25 years I'd appreciate if you did it elsewhere.

Having said that, yes PS1 was the better 3D machine.
Factor 5's amazing compression tools were hugely beneficial to Nintendo, but not every developer could or would use it, and it still was lossy in comparison to sequenced audio. But its quality was really good. And it still used precious cpu cycles.

I actually don't know what would have been needed for every developer to have access to that tech (buying Factor 5?) but having that available from the start could have made a big difference.
 
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@ Daniel Thomas MacInnes Daniel Thomas MacInnes I still think the N64 with a CD-ROM drive would have been a winner. The N64 was so gimped by the limited storage available in the cartridges that it's hard to know what was possible with that system. However, devs that took the time to squeeze it could get great results in comparison to PSX (RE2 comes to mind), and without the storage limits the sky would have been the limit. The cheaper manufacturing cost would have been the icing on the cake.

@ EverythingsOverrated EverythingsOverrated I think the 32X was Kalinske's baby, that was a disaster.
I am not so sure, we dont know the full story of how all games work I think there are games that required that feature, the N64 had a lot of problems with its bandwidth I am not convinced just changing to a CD will fix those problems without changing other stuff like amount of memory or improving BW
 
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Yes I am. Cartridges were, and still are a vastly superior medium than Discs. Of course, more space would be beneficial (and i'll get to that in a moment), but the benefits far outweighed the disadvantages. But to say that it was gimped because of carts is pretty ridiculous.

they are different technologies, one is better or the other is better depending what you plan to do....... problem is there was more demand for the befits of the CD, specially the price, nobody liked nintendo draconian politics as the producer of the cartridges from the nes and snes generation at the time and nobody liked to pay more for a cartridge of different sizes or special chips

it is true that proms/eproms offered a very quick access to data but its also true that devs learned clever ways to stream data or make scenes that didnt required as often access to the storage medium so the cd problems werent as bad
 

sunnysideup

Banned
I think n64 aged the worst. Horrible framrates, muddy textures, but most importantly absolute crap image quality. Not only does it only support composit, it uses 2 layers of antiflicker filters that smears the whole image. Even 2d games look like ass.

saturn holds up better than n64.


While saturn had lower quality clunky 3d compared to the other two. It supports rgb out of the box. And the pixels are clean and sharp. But impotantly like psx most great games are not full 360 degree 3d. A game like grandia looks fucking beatiful. Where as turok 2 looks like dogshit.
 
they are different technologies, one is better or the other is better depending what you plan to do....... problem is there was more demand for the befits of the CD, specially the price, nobody liked nintendo draconian politics as the producer of the cartridges from the nes and snes generation at the time and nobody liked to pay more for a cartridge of different sizes or special chips

it is true that proms/eproms offered a very quick access to data but its also true that devs learned clever ways to stream data or make scenes that didnt required as often access to the storage medium so the cd problems werent as bad
Cds could store fmvs and more audio, that's about it. In terms of game design it's a clear win for carts. Cd streaming can never match 64s loading and it only worked well if you had doors/small areas with something blocking visibility so it could load without being jarring.

Cost was an issue for sure.
 

DaGwaphics

Member
Yes I am. Cartridges were, and still are a vastly superior medium than Discs. Of course, more space would be beneficial (and i'll get to that in a moment), but the benefits far outweighed the disadvantages. But to say that it was gimped because of carts is pretty ridiculous.

What I said about the sound chip is very true. Take Duke 64 for example, which had no music. Yes, space was the reason it had no music. However, that's only because it lacked a sound chip. With a sound chip, it could've had great sequenced audio. In fact, some PS1 games don't even use the CD for music and have sequenced audio as well. Most of the space in your average ps1 cd was duplicate data to increase the horrid load times.

With a sound chip, you could basically sequence anything that wasn't voicework. The audio compression on certain games, or the lack of audio in others was the real problem with the 64.

I guess the better wording would have been that the N64 library was gimped by the cartridges, since they lost so much 3rd party support because of that issue. Definitely the access speed was a pro, while the high game prices and lack of 3rd party support were major cons.
 

DaGwaphics

Member
I am not so sure, we dont know the full story of how all games work I think there are games that required that feature, the N64 had a lot of problems with its bandwidth I am not convinced just changing to a CD will fix those problems without changing other stuff like amount of memory or improving BW

I know that the graphics unit was limited by the bandwidth on the N64, but didn't the system still have more total bandwidth than either Saturn or PSX? I am thinking that N64 was 500mbps and Saturn was 400mbps or thereabouts all told (Saturn used 3 or 4 different memory pools right?). But that could be all off, I don't really remember.
 
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S

SpongebobSquaredance

Unconfirmed Member
Maybe if they used the format of 64DD as the main one or at least released the add-on earlier on in the system's life it could've helped.
 
Cds could store fmvs and more audio, that's about it. In terms of game design it's a clear win for carts. Cd streaming can never match 64s loading and it only worked well if you had doors/small areas with something blocking visibility so it could load without being jarring.
the visibility problem is combination of factors more to do with the limitation in rendering, just because you have a cartridge it doesnt mean you dont have visibility problems both systems(n64 and PSX) have games with huge draw distances, also games with lot of fog and also games where most scenarios are mostly small rooms or arenas, also the game design is combination of factors not just one spec, the bandwidth problems and texture cache have their own set of problems in game design, you cannot compare cd vs rom cartridged game design in isolation because both consoles have different specs, then there are the games take for example how tomb raider maps are composed in tiles it is clear they dont have a problem just for being on CD

also take into account that games where far more complex and bigger now, rom speed wasnt as instantaneous as it was for the games on nes and snes, now you have to move some things around
 
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Daniel Thomas MacInnes

GAF's Resident Saturn Omnibus
Sega Saturn 3D Showcase, Part 2

We continue our look at "impressive three-dee videogames" for Sega Saturn with part two of our ongoing series. I'll pack in as many as I can until I reach the limit of 50 images. Once again, I'll state for the record that "impressive" does not mean "better than Sony or Nintendo." Good graphics are not the same as "most advanced graphics," and I think that should be obvious when discussing vintage games from 25 years ago. If you're really that hung up on looks, go buy a Playstation 5 and play Spider-Man.

The goal is to push back against the longstanding meme of Saturn as the "can't doo three dee" machine, which is patently untrue. While its hardware design is famously complex for its time, skilled and dedicated programmers were more than up to the challenge of presenting excellent visuals and dazzling worlds that could equal the best of Gen-5. Enjoy!


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Worldwide Soccer: International Victory Goal: Arcade sports title that features pre-rendered athletes and a smoothly rendered stadium. Appears to run at 60fps and looks superb.


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Tempest 2000: What? It's in "Golden Age of Videogames" 3D. This still counts. And it's The Yak's masterpiece, straight from the Atari Jaguar. Everyone should have this one.


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Panzer Dragoon: This sumptuous fantasy shoot-em-up deserved to sell millions. Its VDP2 effects are still untouchable to this day. And the movie! And the music! And everything!


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Virtua Fighter 2: 480/60 high-resolution visuals, motion-captured animation, immensely deep gameplay, stunning music. The gold standard for 3D fighters & Saturn's finest hour.


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Virtua Cop: Immersive 3D worlds, brilliant art & color design, location-sensitive shooting that inspired Goldeneye, a near-perfect translation of a $30,000 arcade.


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Sega Rally Championship: The definitive rally racer boasts 30fps visuals, sumptuous color & detailed textures across a variety of landscapes. Even the most fervent Saturn critics love this game.


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Nights Into Dreams/Christmas Nights: Highly original fusion of 2D/3D game design and several genres. Christmas Nights is the greatest demo disc ever made, full stop.


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Magic Carpet: Highly ambitious and original fusion of Doom and Populous, boasting complex morphing worlds, highly challenging enemies & frenetic action. JP edition offers analog control.


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Impact Racing: FunCom's combat racer plays like an updated Spy Hunter and boasts a frenetic, smooth-as-silk graphics engine that would make N64 fans jealous. A true underrated gem.


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Choro Q Park: Takara racer better known as Penny Racers. It's cute and charming in all the right places and its 3D racing is always endearing.


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Sega Ages Vol. 1: Afterburner, Outrun, Space Harrier, all arcade perfect and sometimes better (60fps mode in Outrun). This is why you hunt down that elusive and expensive Saturn Mission Stick.


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Shutokou Battle Drift King 97: Excellent installment of Genki's Tokyo Highway Battle series. Smooth 30fps and long draw distances. Identical to its PSX cousin, minus all the ugly zig-zags.


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V.R. Virtua Racing: Yes, it looks good but not quite as polished as the arcade original, but I'm including it for its wonderful track designs & killer music tracks created by Atari/Tengen.


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Daytona USA Circuit Edition: The original Daytona plays better (giant middle finger to all the haters), but this JP update offers improved visuals, 30fps speed, five courses, split-screen and link-up multiplayer, and that drum fill that totally rips off Zeppelin.


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Virtua Fighter Remix: Sega should have packed this game with the Saturn instead of the glitchy original. An excellent early showcase for Saturn's mastery of 3D fighters.


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Fighters Megamix: Attention, Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft: Sega Saturn has Fighters Megamix. You don't. You lose. Also, Sega? Make another one!


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Mass Destruction: Boundless, glorious chaos. Instant death & mayhem everywhere, run over soldiers with a tank, burn buildings with fire. 60fps speed shames its PSX cousin.


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Sonic R: Another candidate for best 3D graphics on Saturn, but you already know that from those YouTube making-of videos. Amiga demoscene hackers rule!


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Decathlete: Glorious 480/60 arcade sports classic that delivers all the button-mashing excitement you could ever want. Gotta love the high-poly character models.


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Fighting Vipers: Trashy 1980s glam-metal fighter that's fast, loose, full of excitement. Gauroud shading & dynamic lighting f/x are a real standout. Also, Pepsiman!


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Last Bronx: AM3's take on Virtua Fighter adds weapons & it's brutalist good fun. The underground garage and subway stages look stunning, as do the 480/60 visuals.


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Dead or Alive: Tecmo masterpiece that does VF2 one better: 480/60 high-res, motion capture animation, polygon transparencies, crisp and clean art design. Fan-freaking-tastic.


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Baroque: A horror videogame classic, haunting and surreal and genuinely unnerving. Art design is magnificent, full of moody lighting and creepy monsters. Play in the dark with headphones and no distractions!


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Savaki: Realistic fighting game that offers 60fps, realtime light sourcing, Gauroud shading, solid animation and rock solid graphics. And it was coded by one individual! He could make Saturn sing--why couldn't you? Maybe you just weren't very good at your job.


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All Japan Pro Wrestling Featuring Virtua: Smarter than your average button-mashing wrestling videogame. Looks brilliant & plays like a dream. You will absolutely love this one.


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World Series Baseball 98: The greatest baseball videogame that ever was made or ever will be made. It's that good. You should be playing right now. I'll get the hot dogs ready.


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Saturn Bomberman Fight: Supremely fun and addictive multiplayer party mayhem. It's probably the last truly great Bomberman game & looks jolly damned good.


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Zero Divide: The Final Conflict: Robots w/breakable armor, superb character animation, stages with walls that never glitch out, and all at a crisp 60fps. Really, truly great.


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Goiken Muyou: Anarchy in the Nippon: Here's another 3D fighter with 480/60 hi-res graphics, smooth animation & infinite gameplay depth. Kudos for the excellent character design, slightly renegade and satiric.


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Burning Rangers: Sonic Team's anime firefighting classic overloads so many effects it threatens to burn your Saturn to ashes. Which may have been the point all along.


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Winter Heat: This sequel to Decathlete has better & more involving events & particularly brags stronger graphics & visual design from top to bottom. Supremely playable and fantastic fun, one of Saturn's absolute best.
 
I know that the graphics unit was limited by the bandwidth on the N64, but didn't the system still have more total bandwidth than either Saturn or PSX? I am thinking that N64 was 500mbps and Saturn was 400mbps or thereabouts all told (Saturn used 3 or 4 different memory pools right?). But that could be all off, I don't really remember.

there is a lot of stuff about n64 but if you are interested I recommend reading this from beyond3d


*the link is very interesting and give lot of hints about n64 problems but it wasnt the thread I intended, cannot find the link sorry :( but there are very interesting conversations in beyond3d forum about n64m, saturn and psx
 
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Goro Majima

Kitty Genovese Member
I generally agree that the games don’t look great and they’re just okay via an emulator. I also had a PlayStation and N64 instead so I don’t really have any nostalgia for these games.

I do remember seeing all the ads in magazines so I’d love to own an original one just for the hell of it. However the prices for the console and the software are far, far beyond “here’s a thing that I’ll just play for a couple hours” money.

Whereas I would totally spend $100+ for a good official SEGA mini console re-release thing. But if Raspberry Pi 4s can’t even do it all that well yet then we probably have a long wait for something like that. It’s just that between the Genesis Mini and decades of “Ultimate Genesis Collection” compilations - I’m super ready for the rest of Sega’s library to get some attention.
 
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nkarafo

Member
could N64 handle Sega’s Model 2 arcade games like VF2, Dead or Alive, Virtua Cop 1/2, Virtual On? Hell. No. Not a chance.
What do you mean handle them? As arcade perfect ports? No console at the time could do that. But handle them in the same way the Saturn did, with frame rate/resolution/graphical sacrifices? Sure, why not?
 

AMSCD

Member
I don't know what it is. Can't quite put my finger on it. But I love the look of Saturn games. It gives me nostalgia in a different way than N64 and PS1 games, which is odd because no one I knew (myself included) owned a Saturn. I only ever saw images in video game magazines. Perhaps that gave it some kind of mystique.
 

nkarafo

Member
What I said about the sound chip is very true. Take Duke 64 for example, which had no music. Yes, space was the reason it had no music. However, that's only because it lacked a sound chip. With a sound chip, it could've had great sequenced audio. In fact, some PS1 games don't even use the CD for music and have sequenced audio as well. Most of the space in your average ps1 cd was duplicate data to increase the horrid load times.

With a sound chip, you could basically sequence anything that wasn't voicework. The audio compression on certain games, or the lack of audio in others was the real problem with the 64.
There are 300+ N64 games released in the West. Duke Nukem 3D is the only game i'm aware of that didn't have music. Every other game had. So no, it wasn't because of the "lack of a sound chip" or the "cart size". It was something else which we don't know, only the developers know. Personally i believe it was an overall lazy port that got rushed.

People really like to judge the console based on very few samples of software. For some reason, the N64 is the one that gets this treatment much more so than the others.

The "N64 fog" is another one. Apparently, the fog in Turok 1 must be some kind of hardware feature the N64 can't avoid. Despite a ton of other games having unlimited draw distances and despite other consoles also having plenty of games that have short draw distances. I mean, there was no FPS game at the time with fully 3D graphics and long outdoor areas that didn't have some sort of pop-up/fog. On any platform, including the mighty PC (PC version of Turok also had the same fog). But it was specifically Turok on the N64 that made people believe it's a N64 thing. Only because Turok was a popular game for the system.

Or how the N64 must have slow frame rates. I can at least understand that since the games that suffer from this are some of it's more popular ones. But again it's not a universal thing. Again, it's only because of the popularity of the games that had these issues.

Both the PS1 and Saturn have their fair share of foggy games. Or rather Pop-up because fog was harder to render so you had objects appear in front of you instead. Both the PS1/Saturn had a ton of games with slow frame rates. I believe the Saturn had a bigger ratio of games with bad frame rates compared to the N64. It's just that the games that suffer from these issues aren't as popular and people don't know them as well.
 
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Feh. It was still a dick move on Sony's part to try and swipe royalties from Nintendo.

Sony trying to act like Nintendo couldn't be trusted in good faith to resume with the deal when Nintendo offered to continue with basically something they had no issue with (Nintendo getting game software royalties, Sony everything else) is rich.
Sure, but you don't allow SONY to book a show have all the press-ready only for its big event, only to drop them the same day. NCL should have had at least the common to tell SONY to cancel its event
Also If SONY were looking for almost complete control over a CD Add-On can you imagine what they'll be looking for over a highly expensive super console to make up for selling it at a huge loss
So even if you believe Tom's lies, it would have been little in it for SEGA
 
There are 300+ N64 games released in the West. Duke Nukem 3D is the only game i'm aware of that didn't have music. Every other game had. So no, it wasn't because of the "lack of a sound chip" or the "cart size". It was something else which we don't know, only the developers know. Personally i believe it was an overall lazy port that got rushed.

People really like to judge the console based on very few samples of software. For some reason, the N64 is the one that gets this treatment much more so than the others.

The "N64 fog" is another one. Apparently, the fog in Turok 1 must be some kind of hardware feature the N64 can't avoid. Despite a ton of other games having unlimited draw distances and despite other consoles also having plenty of games that have short draw distances. I mean, there was no FPS game at the time with fully 3D graphics and long outdoor areas that didn't have some sort of pop-up/fog. On any platform, including the mighty PC (PC version of Turok also had the same fog). But it was specifically Turok on the N64 that made people believe it's a N64 thing. Only because Turok was a popular game for the system.

Or how the N64 must have slow frame rates. I can at least understand that since the games that suffer from this are some of it's more popular ones. But again it's not a universal thing. Again, it's only because of the popularity of the games that had these issues.

Both the PS1 and Saturn have their fair share of foggy games. Or rather Pop-up because fog was harder to render so you had objects appear in front of you instead. Both the PS1/Saturn had a ton of games with slow frame rates. I believe the Saturn had a bigger ratio of games with bad frame rates compared to the N64. It's just that the games that suffer from these issues aren't as popular and people don't know them as well.
The no music thing was just an example of the detriment of no sound chip. Obviously I didn’t mean that was common. However, having a larger cart or a sound chip would have solved that. The port wasn’t too lazy because they remade the game completely in 3D, but sure it could’ve used more dev time.

Perhaps with better compression the music could’ve been there.

You’re preaching to the quire with the rest of your post. P polybius80 streaming still wasn’t as effective on PS, nor did ps ever have draw distance like banjo tooie. And always there were at least initial load screens on ps even when streaming was feasible.

64’s bandwidth limitation was a bottleneck for its own design, not in comparison to Saturn or Ps, both of which had less bandwidth. And I’ve read ERP of boss games posts before and posted on b3d for years.
 
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nkarafo

Member
having a larger cart or a sound chip would have solved that.
Well, they couldn't do anything about the sound chip but the cart size was their choice. They decided to be cheap and use a 8MB cart in late 97 where 12MB ones were pretty common and i think even 16MB ones existed. I mean, it's Duke Nukem, not some obscure indie title, they could do better than that.

But even then, i don't think the cart size was the issue at all. Midi/chip music takes very little space even on the N64. You have a game like Banjo-Kazooie with more than 250 music tracks (because a lot of the tracks have different variations) and the USF music game rip library is still less than 1MB. Goldeneye's music is 600KB.

here's the interesting part though, most of the size is taken by the midi library, not the songs themselves. Each song is like a quarter of a Kilobyle. That's around 200-300 bytes. That's less than a txt file with only a line in it. They are just instructions of what notes to play. Most of N64 soundtracks are like that, with very few exceptions. And yet, Duke Nukem 3D on the N64 does already have a library in the cart which takes up about 300KB. But only a single song, the title theme, which takes less than 1KB. So that proves the size was not an issue since they already have the library inside (which takes most of the space anyway), thus every other song would take less than 1KB each.

So they saved what, 5-10KB? That's literally nothing, even for a 8MB cart.

There's really no excuse for the lack of music when the rest of 299 games do have music or ambiance. It's not even a matter of a "small percentage of N64 games". It's literally only 1 game that lacks music, unless there are a couple obscure ones i don't know of. So yeah, there's no way to know why they didn't include it, unless a developer gives an explanation.
 
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streaming still wasn’t as effective on PS,

disagree, there are good amount of games where is implemented very well, even at the begining of the generation there were games like tomb raider with huge scenarios that required no loading screen during a level

nor did ps ever have draw distance like banjo tooie.

games like spyro and crash bandicoot have huge draw distances too, a good LOD system allows a game to have big draw distance, that is not a special feature of the system that is how you make your game, there is a reason why most n64 dont have as big draw distances as banjo tooie and that is they are not made in the same way and not implement an LOD system for that

And always there were at least initial load screens on ps even when streaming was feasible.

is that a big problem really? having a rom chip has its own set of problems too, each has it drawbacks, CD is considered better because it had the benefits that most people in the industry wanted and if dev managed to work around its limitation that was even better, there is a reason why cartridges stopped being used in consoles until the tech improved

64’s bandwidth limitation was a bottleneck for its own design, not in comparison to Saturn or Ps, both of which had less bandwidth.

budget is not unlimited there are compromises like the texture cache BW(in different parts of the system), latency... each system has its own set of problems and advantages too
 
I think n64 aged the worst. Horrible framrates, muddy textures, but most importantly absolute crap image quality. Not only does it only support composit, it uses 2 layers of antiflicker filters that smears the whole image. Even 2d games look like ass.

saturn holds up better than n64.


While saturn had lower quality clunky 3d compared to the other two. It supports rgb out of the box. And the pixels are clean and sharp. But impotantly like psx most great games are not full 360 degree 3d. A game like grandia looks fucking beatiful. Where as turok 2 looks like dogshit.
I quite agree. It was a step backwards from Screen Res and framerates which so many N64 games suffered from and the N64 was even a step backwards from the Snes in terms of sound.
 

nkarafo

Member
there is a reason why most n64 dont have as big draw distances as banjo tooie and that is they are not made in the same way and not implement an LOD system for that
Most platform games on the N64 have as much of a draw distance as banjo-Tooie.

Also this is Space Station silicon Valley on the N64:

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That's the same scene on the PS1 version:

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Not saying this game is a representative or anything, i'm saying that it was easier to do big levels like that on the N64, even on lesser known titles like this, because of the way the N64 can build worlds with less polys. The PS1 scene below is probably using the same amount of polys as the N64 above. But they get wasted because the PS1 needs more to render each surface, otherwise you get a lot of warping.

Early, foggy N64 games were the exception, not the rule.

Also, Crash Bandicoot is not a good example because these games are not free-roaming 3D. It's far easier to achive impressive graphics when they are on-rails.
 
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pramod

Banned
Objectively speaking, I would have to say the most impressive are the few games that utilized high-res mode, ie Virtua Fighter 2, Decathlete, and Dead or Alive.
 
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cireza

Banned
Some more nice 3D games on the Saturn











And of course, with the Saturn one also got some nice VDP2 effects


Scorcher is very impressive. Game was made by the same European team who made Sub Terrania and Red Zone on MegaDrive, both games pushed the hardware. All these games have excellent soundtracks by Jesper Kyd. For Scorcher, he opted to use the FM synth of the Saturn rather than push Redbook audio (there is only one track in Redbook I think).
 
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Scorcher is very impressive. Game was made by the same European team who made Sub Terrania and Red Zone on MegaDrive, both games pushed the hardware. All these games have excellent soundtracks by Jesper Kyd. For Scorcher, he opted to use the FM synth of the Saturn rather than push Redbook audio (there is only one track in Redbook I think).
Yeah, Lemon and Zyrix were quality teams such a shame what happened to the whole group. I really loved the music in Scorcher it really used the sound chip well; Speaking of which I was always impressed with the music in House Of the Dead on the Saturn. So many think its CD DA when in the game it's all coming off the sound chip
 
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Not saying this game is a representative or anything, i'm saying that it was easier to do big levels like that on the N64, even on lesser known titles like this, because of the way the N64 can build worlds with less polys. The PS1 scene below is probably using the same amount of polys as the N64 above. But they get wasted because the PS1 needs more to render each surface, otherwise you get a lot of warping.

Early, foggy N64 games were the exception, not the rule.

Also, Crash Bandicoot is not a good example because these games are not free-roaming 3D. It's far easier to achive impressive graphics when they are on-rails.

PS1 also has games with long draw distances apart from crash bandicoot games(wich includes the team racing) or spyro games

terracon(free roaming game) for example


or hogs of war(again free roaming when is your turn)



also megaman legends 2(another free roaming) has long draw distances and quick load




and also there are games in both systems where ps1 have better draw distance and in some cases even more polygons















the draw distance is something devs implement it depends the game, what they want to achieve and the developer if they are very talented is more easy that is why you will find different results in different games, you mention an interesting point about using more polygons to minimize warping(and the painters technique too) wich is true but its also true that the z buffer has a huge cost in n64 so is not as simpe to draw polygons as in ps1and far away models may not require as much polygons so the warping is not a problem everywhere
 
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cireza

Banned
PS1 also has games with long draw distances apart from crash bandicoot games(wich includes the team racing) or spyro games

terracon(free roaming game) for example


or hogs of war(again free roaming when is your turn)



also megaman legends 2(another free roaming) has long draw distances and quick load




and also there are games in both systems where ps1 have better draw distance and in some cases even more polygons















the draw distance is something devs implement it depends the game, what they want to achieve and the developer if they are very talented is more easy that is why you will find different results in different games, you mention an interesting point about using more polygons to minimize warping(and the painters technique too) wich is true but its also true that the z buffer has a huge cost in n64 so is not as simpe to draw polygons as in ps1and far away models may not require as much polygons so the warping is not a problem everywhere

Comparing PS1 to N64 in a Saturn topic...
 
Well, they couldn't do anything about the sound chip but the cart size was their choice. They decided to be cheap and use a 8MB cart in late 97 where 12MB ones were pretty common and i think even 16MB ones existed. I mean, it's Duke Nukem, not some obscure indie title, they could do better than that.

But even then, i don't think the cart size was the issue at all. Midi/chip music takes very little space even on the N64. You have a game like Banjo-Kazooie with more than 250 music tracks (because a lot of the tracks have different variations) and the USF music game rip library is still less than 1MB. Goldeneye's music is 600KB.

here's the interesting part though, most of the size is taken by the midi library, not the songs themselves. Each song is like a quarter of a Kilobyle. That's around 200-300 bytes. That's less than a txt file with only a line in it. They are just instructions of what notes to play. Most of N64 soundtracks are like that, with very few exceptions. And yet, Duke Nukem 3D on the N64 does already have a library in the cart which takes up about 300KB. But only a single song, the title theme, which takes less than 1KB. So that proves the size was not an issue since they already have the library inside (which takes most of the space anyway), thus every other song would take less than 1KB each.

So they saved what, 5-10KB? That's literally nothing, even for a 8MB cart.

There's really no excuse for the lack of music when the rest of 299 games do have music or ambiance. It's not even a matter of a "small percentage of N64 games". It's literally only 1 game that lacks music, unless there are a couple obscure ones i don't know of. So yeah, there's no way to know why they didn't include it, unless a developer gives an explanation.
I admit you have me questioning why now. Perhaps it is like you said, and they just ran out of time. It is interesting though, that all the quake and doom ports lack the original music as well. Not sure why, but perhaps it's related. Either way, I agree with you that they could have done more ; whether that's in the form of a 12mb cart or just more time.
 
PS1 also has games with long draw distances apart from crash bandicoot games(wich includes the team racing) or spyro games

terracon(free roaming game) for example


or hogs of war(again free roaming when is your turn)



also megaman legends 2(another free roaming) has long draw distances and quick load




and also there are games in both systems where ps1 have better draw distance and in some cases even more polygons















the draw distance is something devs implement it depends the game, what they want to achieve and the developer if they are very talented is more easy that is why you will find different results in different games, you mention an interesting point about using more polygons to minimize warping(and the painters technique too) wich is true but its also true that the z buffer has a huge cost in n64 so is not as simpe to draw polygons as in ps1and far away models may not require as much polygons so the warping is not a problem everywhere

Gonna quickly respond to this so we can stop mucking up the thread with 64 and PS.

Your examples of draw distance pale to 64's heavyweights ; there's lots of visible pop in and at least some fog in the very distance, with a lot of flat terrain. Very clearly lacking compared to Banjo tooie or other examples. The warping and pixelation just instantly remind me why I found it hard to play PS games back then.

Your Nascar example is because they didn't use custom microcode for the 64 port, so yes PS could have polygonal advantages in those scenarios. Funny, I didn't know about the Spiderman draw distance... however I will say it clearly has higher resolution due to the expansion pak. Have that game on 64, very fun btw. Like the comic strip cutscenes on that version as well.

There are even more severe downgrades of 64 to ps1 ports like Rayman 2, which just hacked away at everything, even level size, in addition to the usual lack of z buffering and filtering.

--

Anyways, I never said PS couldn't or didn't have advantages in certain ports, just when looking at both of their max potentials 64 is clearly a league ahead and I always found the implication that it wasn't a bit disingenuous.
 
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SirTerry-T

Member
Sure, but you don't allow SONY to book a show have all the press-ready only for its big event, only to drop them the same day. NCL should have had at least the common to tell SONY to cancel its event
Also If SONY were looking for almost complete control over a CD Add-On can you imagine what they'll be looking for over a highly expensive super console to make up for selling it at a huge loss
So even if you believe Tom's lies, it would have been little in it for SEGA
Could you really imagine Hiroshi Yamauchi "playing nice" where Sony were concerned? The bloke was a bloody beast in the boardroom. Once he realised he'd misjudged the Sony deal he wasn't going to cut them any slack.
 
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Could you really imagine Hiroshi Yamauchi "playing nice" where Sony were concerned? The bloke was a bloody beast in the boardroom. Once he realised he'd misjudged the Sony deal he wasn't going to cut them any slack.
No, but I would have expected better from Howard Lincoln

 
Returning to the main topic, I thought I would post some screenshots of "impressive 3D games" for Sega Saturn. This does not necessarily mean "3D graphics that are better than Sony & Nintendo" or "the absolute cutting edge," because that's just a waste of time. These are examples that I think show off the hardware and still impress me today.

Most of these photos were taken by me with an iPhone or iPad aimed at a Trinitron CRT or Bravia HDTV, and some were captured directly from Youtube videos. Let's see if you can recognize them all, and hopefully there will be one or two new discoveries for you. Each of these games comes highly recommended--obviously, you should buy a Saturn if you don't already own one. In fact, I think it should be your main console, but that's because I'm a crazy old person who's in early stages of Alzheimer's. Enjoy!


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Madden NFL 98: The best US football game for Sega Saturn and one that still plays very well.


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Wipeout XL: Released in Japan and PAL territories as Wipeout 2097. Fairly expensive & rare but looks fantastic. Analog control supported.


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Resident Evil: Survival horror classic that hasn't aged a day, and I say it's just as good as the PSX original.


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J.League Go Go Goal: Tecmo arcade soccer game runs at 60 fps and sharp resolution (possibly 480?) that looks breathtaking in action.


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World League Soccer 98: Saturn's best soccer game? Spectacular visuals & presentation. Just wait until you see the crowds in the stadium stomping.


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J.League Jikkyou Honoo no Striker: Konami arcade soccer game that reminds me of the 16-bit ISS classics. Super detailed & smooth 30 fps.


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Pebble Beach Golf Links: Ya know what? I love this game & don't care about the haters & the pixely trees. It's worth it for Stadler & the elevator music.


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Steep Slope Sliders: Snowboarding classic with legendary course designs & controls that perfectly anticipate Tony Hawk. Love it, love it, love it.


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Shining Force 3 Trilogy: Adventure epic that shows off Saturn to its fullest. Everything just looks glorious, polished, pristine.


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Sega Ages: Galaxy Force 2: Outstanding translation of legendary arcade classic, some of the best 3D sprite graphics you'll ever see. Kudus, Appaloosa!


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Grandia: I'm just going to leave this animated clip from Grandia here. Those VDP2 water effects have never been replicated anywhere before or since.


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Virtua Fighter Kids: Cutesy version of VF2 boasts 480/60 high-res visuals & impressive facial animations. Games like this was Saturn's bread and butter.


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Tomb Raider: To heck with the haters, I say TR on Saturn looks great, especially the high contrast lighting & amazing water effects.


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Jonah Lomu Rugby: Terrific rendition of rugby that's fast, furious & looks great. It has a strong SWOS groove and that's only a good thing.


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Mobile Suit Gundam Side Story Trilogy: Fantastic mech shooter, blazing speed & action, plays like Virtual On as a 3D shoot-em-up. Love it!


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Sonic Jam: Sonic World: Glorified tech demo that uses all the Saturn's hardware tricks, as well as paving the way for Sonic Adventure.


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NHL All-Star Hockey 98: Sequel to NHL Powerplay 96, they're both excellent hockey games for Gen-5. Nice mo-cap animation & player models.


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K-1 Fighting Illusion: Kickboxing sim with highly impressive 3D arenas plus lighting & shading effects. And it plays well. A really good showpiece.


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Gungriffon: Game Arts really outdid themselves with this killer mech shooter. Weighty, powerful, visually dazzling. Sequel is also worth playing.


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Virtual On: Mech arena fighter just blazes. Action is relentless, furiously tense & packed with wild explosions. How did AM3 pull this off?!


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NBA Action 98: The original 2K basketball game from Visual Concepts that still looks and plays great. Kobe's first videogame cover, too.


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Bulk Slash: Anime-styled mech shooter from the studio who gave us Gate of Thunder. A cult Saturn classic & great showpiece for the hardware.


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Thunder Force 5: What's to say? It's Technosoft's final masterpiece & one of Saturn's finest show-off games. Curb-stomps the PSX version.


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Dark Savior: Isometric Action-RPG from the creators of Landstalker. Highly impressive use of polygons & bitmaps to create immersive 3D worlds.


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Panzer Dragoon Saga: What else is there to say? It's Panzer Freaking Saga. That's all you really need to know.


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Panzer Dragoon Zwei: This might be the best technical 3D showpiece for Sega Saturn. The water stage alone remains unsurpassed, then or now.


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Shining the Holy Ark: Best dungeon crawler of its era, a richly detailed & involving world you'll love to explore. Love the art design.


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Wipeout: Visuals are slightly below PSX original, but the controls & vehicle collision physics are better. Great sense of speed & motion, great fun.


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The House of the Dead: Crazy hard but crazy fun and you're grateful for the trip. Get over your whining over the Minecraft textures and enjoy the ride.


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Virtua Cop 2: Honestly, I have no idea how Sega AM2 pulled off this Saturn conversion. Those cats ran with Hitachi Assembly code in their bones.


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Radiant Silvergun: That's "Radiant Fucking Silvergun" to you, mister, and don't you ever forget it. That's the game's full name and it fits like a glove.


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Powerslave: Lobotomy Trilogy Part One. The greatest 3D adventure not named Zelda, Metroid or Goldeneye. "Can't Doo Three Dee?" Seriously?! Do this.


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Duke Nukem 3D: Lobotomy Trilogy Part Two. Fast & furious, tough as nails, gritty & smooth just where it needs to be. You can still play online matches.


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Quake: Lobotomy Trilogy Part Three. Sensational use of lighting, mood & dread. So much better than N64 version that it makes your teeth hurt.


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Worldwide Soccer 97/98: Premier soccer franchise on Saturn, boasting smooth 30fps speed & sublime animation. Still looks & plays like a dreamboat.


(...to be continued...I need to go to sleep...)
Nice ones, and I apologize if I was a bit harsh at points on the other reply. But, I simply cannot shift blame for Saturn's problems in America from Stolar to Kalinski, there's too much evidence showing where Kalinski was either doing well or hamstrung by SoJ, and where Stolar intently dampened Saturn's chances to make way for the Dreamcast.

I think n64 aged the worst. Horrible framrates, muddy textures, but most importantly absolute crap image quality. Not only does it only support composit, it uses 2 layers of antiflicker filters that smears the whole image. Even 2d games look like ass.

saturn holds up better than n64.


While saturn had lower quality clunky 3d compared to the other two. It supports rgb out of the box. And the pixels are clean and sharp. But impotantly like psx most great games are not full 360 degree 3d. A game like grandia looks fucking beatiful. Where as turok 2 looks like dogshit.

Hate to agree but I agree. It's basically PS1 > Saturn > N64 in terms of that generation. PS1 and Saturn had a lot of similarity in most genres and lots of great games of good variety but PS1 simply has more of them due to having more games on the platform. N64's standouts are very strong games, but there's literally only a handful of them and most are concentrated in a select few genres.

Also games that would've made you think it was the best in certain genres back in the day, like FPS with GoldenEye, IMHO don't hold together well anymore and other games on the other platforms are much better in hindsight (PowerSlave/Exhumed on Saturn, which was basically a Metroidvania FPS way ahead of its time. That type of FPS didn't seem to take off until Metroid Prime on Gamecube six years later).

That said...I think the Treasure games do 2D pretty well on N64. Bangai-O, Mischief Makers (great game) etc.

I guess the better wording would have been that the N64 library was gimped by the cartridges, since they lost so much 3rd party support because of that issue. Definitely the access speed was a pro, while the high game prices and lack of 3rd party support were major cons.

I think the Saturn offered the best of both worlds here, as it supported CDs and expansion cartridges by default. However I think where Sega screwed up was not making the 1MB RAM cartridge standard with all Saturn units. It would've encouraged devs to use it a lot more and that would've also meant more use of the eventual 4MB RAM cartridge too.

That could've been used potentially as a point of marketing comparison to show an area of strength over the PS1, which would always be disc-only and thus not have the benefits of a 1MB RAM cart as standard to aid in game performance. I don't recall how much the 1MB RAM cart costed new, but whatever the price was, surely at least 50% of that was markup for profit margin reasons.
 
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RAIDEN1

Member
Dreamcast had its work cut out from the get-go....Sega were on the ropes circa 1998 compared to where they were prior to the launch of the Genesis/Megadrive..
 
Dreamcast had its work cut out from the get-go....Sega were on the ropes circa 1998 compared to where they were prior to the launch of the Genesis/Megadrive..

And Sega removing themselves from any real market presence for most of 1998 and 1999 (until Dreamcast marketing and launch) in the West was a complete disastrous move in hindsight. That was 12 - 18 months of mindshare and relevancy practically wiped out, while Sony and Nintendo solidified their brands with massive growth (TR3, RE2, Parasite Eve, Fear Effect, RE3, FF VIII etc. with Sony, Pokemon's popularity explosion for Nintendo).

I will never understand their decision to do that, they didn't even consider doing a few ports of some of the Japan-exclusive JRPGs/adventure games etc. to keep Western fans satiated.
 

Daniel Thomas MacInnes

GAF's Resident Saturn Omnibus
And Sega removing themselves from any real market presence for most of 1998 and 1999 (until Dreamcast marketing and launch) in the West was a complete disastrous move in hindsight. That was 12 - 18 months of mindshare and relevancy practically wiped out, while Sony and Nintendo solidified their brands with massive growth (TR3, RE2, Parasite Eve, Fear Effect, RE3, FF VIII etc. with Sony, Pokemon's popularity explosion for Nintendo).

I will never understand their decision to do that, they didn't even consider doing a few ports of some of the Japan-exclusive JRPGs/adventure games etc. to keep Western fans satiated.


I would agree that not having a physical presence at retail from the first half of 1998 to September 1999 was rough for Sega, and it did contribute to a sense of "What happened to..." Mind you, most kids tuned out Sega after 1994 and never knew Saturn even existed, so it was a pretty long time away from the limelight. I think this was one of the key reasons why 1999 was such a successful year for Dreamcast. For most gamers at the time, it felt like a genuine comeback.

The reasons why Sega went away for 18 months? Money. They were losing money on Saturn hardware and software. They were taking losses on everything they sold and not selling enough software units to break even (most retail videogames have always lost money, but are balanced out by the one or two blockbuster hits). I don't think fanboys quite understand that this is a business. Sega doesn't exist to make you feel good about yourself. They exist to make a profit for themselves and their shareholders. That's all. The company's finances were fragile enough that having Saturn products on store shelves would have been harmful and caused even greater losses, something that was impossible while investing such enormous funds into the Dreamcast project.

Why didn't Sega release "Saturn Game X?" Because it would not have turned a profit, it would have lost money. Simple as that. Just because you or I may like Saturn Game X, doesn't mean the average consumer would, and by 1998 those consumers were almost entirely gone. Sega held only 4 percent of the videogame console market by the end of 1997. They were finished and absolutely nothing was going to turn that around. Sorry.

Honestly, US Saturn fans should feel grateful to have received the software titles that were released, especially Panzer Saga, which was very expensive to localize and produce. That was a pure labor of love on Sega's part.

Short, Short Version: blame the kids for not buying more Sega Saturn games.
 

Daniel Thomas MacInnes

GAF's Resident Saturn Omnibus
Gonna quickly respond to this so we can stop mucking up the thread with 64 and PS.

Your examples of draw distance pale to 64's heavyweights ; there's lots of visible pop in and at least some fog in the very distance, with a lot of flat terrain. Very clearly lacking compared to Banjo tooie or other examples. The warping and pixelation just instantly remind me why I found it hard to play PS games back then.

Your Nascar example is because they didn't use custom microcode for the 64 port, so yes PS could have polygonal advantages in those scenarios. Funny, I didn't know about the Spiderman draw distance... however I will say it clearly has higher resolution due to the expansion pak. Have that game on 64, very fun btw. Like the comic strip cutscenes on that version as well.

There are even more severe downgrades of 64 to ps1 ports like Rayman 2, which just hacked away at everything, even level size, in addition to the usual lack of z buffering and filtering.

--

Anyways, I never said PS couldn't or didn't have advantages in certain ports, just when looking at both of their max potentials 64 is clearly a league ahead and I always found the implication that it wasn't a bit disingenuous.


As a general rule, multiplatform games during Gen-5 are best on the original system. For example, Dead or Alive, Grandia or Thunder Force 5 on Saturn, Wipeout, Destruction Derby or Krazy Ivan on Playstation, Rayman 2 on Nintendo 64. These games are all good across the different consoles, but the home console always seems to have just a little pizazz and polish the others can't fully match. Each of the three main systems has its own strengths that stand out from its rivals, and that's what makes this era so endlessly fun. There's treasure everywhere!

As always, the lesson is not about which machine is "more powerful" (an absolutely useless phrase clueless kids toss around) but who are the more skilled and dedicated programmers. How well does a software team understand the hardware design and how best to exploit its features? How much time and money do they have? Aha--that's the critical element missing from the endless debates. These companies exist to make money, not to make fanboy gamers feel good about themselves. Software studios and publishers will dedicate resources to where they believe they will see the greatest returns. If a game on Console A sells 5x, 10x more than Console B, then don't be surprised when you discover that the Console B port was given a single coder and a shoestring budget.
 
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RAIDEN1

Member
I think David Rosen (the man who had founded Sega) always thought that Sega should be a software house rather than getting into the world of hardware...
 

nkarafo

Member
I admit you have me questioning why now. Perhaps it is like you said, and they just ran out of time. It is interesting though, that all the quake and doom ports lack the original music as well. Not sure why, but perhaps it's related. Either way, I agree with you that they could have done more ; whether that's in the form of a 12mb cart or just more time.
Quake used redbook audio instead of midi so N64 having a different soundtrack made sense. It's not easy (if possible) to convert a real soundtrack to midi. Quake on Saturn has the PC soundtrack btw, on the CD.

Original DOOM used midi which would be easy to have on the N64, then again even the PS1/SAT ports had a more atmospheric ambience. N64 having a darker, more sinister tone made sense to use that music instead of the quirky original soundtrack. So i think that was an artistic choice, not a technical one.
 
Quake used redbook audio instead of midi so N64 having a different soundtrack made sense. It's not easy (if possible) to convert a real soundtrack to midi. Quake on Saturn has the PC soundtrack btw, on the CD.

Original DOOM used midi which would be easy to have on the N64, then again even the PS1/SAT ports had a more atmospheric ambience. N64 having a darker, more sinister tone made sense to use that music instead of the quirky original soundtrack. So i think that was an artistic choice, not a technical one.
Agreed on doom, but it’s an interesting tidbit I thought.

Doom 64 is awesome, runs great on og hardware.
 
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As a general rule, multiplatform games during Gen-5 are best on the original system. For example, Dead or Alive, Grandia or Thunder Force 5 on Saturn, Wipeout, Destruction Derby or Krazy Ivan on Playstation, Rayman 2 on Nintendo 64. These games are all good across the different consoles, but the home console always seems to have just a little pizazz and polish the others can't fully match. Each of the three main systems has its own strengths that stand out from its rivals, and that's what makes this era so endlessly fun. There's treasure everywhere!

As always, the lesson is not about which machine is "more powerful" (an absolutely useless phrase clueless kids toss around) but who are the more skilled and dedicated programmers. How well does a software team understand the hardware design and how best to exploit its features? How much time and money do they have? Aha--that's the critical element missing from the endless debates. These companies exist to make money, not to make fanboy gamers feel good about themselves. Software studios and publishers will dedicate resources to where they believe they will see the greatest returns. If a game on Console A sells 5x, 10x more than Console B, then don't be surprised when you discover that the Console B port was given a single coder and a shoestring budget.
Sure, in the same way that ps2 has advantages over og Xbox and GameCube ; doesn’t mean the latter 2 aren’t more powerful.

Just like n64 vs. PlayStation. Funny, you never hear how ps2 and Xbox have “strengths and weaknesses”, only with 64 is that a thing.

So yeah, strengths and weaknesses ; but also, one machine has a generation newer feature set, carts and triple the Clockspeed. If I’m going to be called a fanboy for this your argument is disingenuous.

What I’m saying and what you said can simultaneously be true, you know! Budgets, lead platform and talent absolutely matter, of course.

Edit : also it’s kinda shocking to me how many people don’t mind texture warp and unfiltered surfaces.
 
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Just like the other consoles, especially the Saturn.
Uep, and the N64 had more 3D games, AND 2D games with these problems, than the other three. Strangely enough the Jaguar had the most consistent frame rates on average than each console that gen,. Keywords: Consistent on average, not good or high, consistent, lol.
 
Home consoles have always had variations in parity. And these are not always positive or negative either, sometimes a system will excel in one respect and lack in anothers. Often there are tricks that developers learn that get more out of the hardware. Ultimately it comes down to the games.

Interesting to consider the very first generation of 3D consoles all coming out at once and having different approaches to rendering pipelines, texture filtering, etc. It is something we don't have nowadays, when every game more or less looks identical, even if the architecture varies.

That's kind of special, tbh, to have such very different presentation styles.
 
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