# Graphics now and then...



## kyser_soze (Jul 2, 2009)

The thread about Syntax era, and digging around for loads of old screen shots, got me to thinking about graphics, especially 3D, between then and now.

Now don't get me wrong, I think the 3D available today is outstanding - motion captured characters etc, depth of play areas, realistic texture mapping and all that stuff...

However...

There's a part of me that thinks that videogames had more of an identity as a genuinely separate entertainment medium when they were stripped down to the bare bones. I'm thinking of games like Sentinel, Zarch/Virus, Elite etc. Like the CGi in _Tron_, it makes me think that the early stuff was trying to do the same thing as Kraftwerk and modernist architecture - honesty in materials, in the case of architecture, and trying to make electronic music that _sounded_ like electronic music, instead of trying to make it sound like guitars/violins whatever.

I think videogame graphics have gone the same way - in trying to make realistic representations of reality, videogames have lost a certain aesthetic, and with it a certain approach to game design (perhaps). 

Like I said, I'm not dissing modern graphics - stuff like Crysis, Assasin's Creed etc are actually genuinely beautiful IMO; but when I compare them to something like Ico, they seem to not lack something but seem more separated from a certain aesthetic feel.

It's one of the reasons I love _Tron_ so much - maybe it's my age or something, but it actually created what I imagined computers to look like as it were. A similar, but updated thing happens in the intros to Matric Rev and Reloaded - when they do the whole fractal creation thing.

I'm starting to ramble now so I'll shut up, but what do others thinK? Am I simply being nostaligic, or is there a genuine aesthetic argument to be made here?


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

No, you're absolutely right.  There's a very active debate about photorealism vs. hyperrealism vs. surrealism in games today.  The best graphical examples, IMO, avoid photorealism like the plague.

Look at something like Darwinia, incidentally, for how the Zarch/Virus aesthetic lives on.


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## perplexis (Jul 2, 2009)

I completely agree. I think the aesthetics have changed for the worse- there's nothing quite so exciting about realistic depictions of the world(s). The tendency to try to be more and more realistic graphically doesn't do anything for me, yeah I can marvel at the rendering for a bit, but I also kind of want to feel like I'm playing a game and not controlling a film. Maybe it's an age thing, ask any 10 year old now what they think of Elite and I suspect you'd get some pretty unimpressed responses.


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## isitme (Jul 2, 2009)

Nintendo are good at this, as are Squaresoft. they still use the graphics power available but have a very computer gamey look

must admit i'm a big fan of the 1990s anime style graphics more than photorealism


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## DotCommunist (Jul 2, 2009)

TBH it all went downhill after hex based wargaming


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## kyser_soze (Jul 2, 2009)

I'd be more depressed if i got the same replies out of 18 yr olds TBH, and depressingly I suspect I would!

I think Mirror's Edge is a good example of a game that has a good aesthetic that straddles the two extremes...


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## isitme (Jul 2, 2009)

but then games like unreal tournament or fallout are photorealistic depictions of fantasy worlds, which is also awesome


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## teuchter (Jul 2, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> The thread about Syntax era, and digging around for loads of old screen shots, got me to thinking about graphics, especially 3D, between then and now.
> 
> Now don't get me wrong, I think the 3D available today is outstanding - motion captured characters etc, depth of play areas, realistic texture mapping and all that stuff...
> 
> ...



Thread needs pics


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

The problem with photorealism is that it is still in shit, uncanny valley territory.  It looks good today only because we are looking at something new.  In five years we'll realise how bad it is.  Remember how amazingly realistic Virtua Fighter was when it came out?  Those not used to computer games already realise how shit the photorealism is, incidentally.  They look at the supposedly realistic GTAIV figures and think, "cartoons".

But a beautiful piece of art (Okami, Super Mario Galaxy, Team Fortress II) stays a beautiful piece of art, no matter how old it gets.


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## Crispy (Jul 2, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> I'd be more depressed if i got the same replies out of 18 yr olds TBH, and depressingly I suspect I would!
> 
> I think Mirror's Edge is a good example of a game that has a good aesthetic that straddles the two extremes...



Have you seen the timetrial downloadable levels?


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## kained&able (Jul 2, 2009)

i th9ink theres a place for both.

i loved the sprite based awesomeness of duke nukem 3d and a few of the shooters of that ilk but playing quake 3(i think) was an amazing expereince as you could immerse yourself in the game even more so with the recent crysis games.

The photo realism is need to make things seem real and therefore moe emersive to the user.

Simple/addictive games benfit hugekly from cartoony garphics as do games that are a bit more wacky or zany or whatever. Monkey ball with realitic graphics for example would be shite, same with the likes of rayman or whatever.

Realitsic graphics should only be used in games that try to scare you, or shooters/stealth games. Everything else i'm more then happy to have looking starnge and wonderfully coloured or whatever. Oh command and conquer type games benefit from ralisticish graphics as well, makes me care more about losing soliders and things.


dave


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## kyser_soze (Jul 2, 2009)

Elite




Tron




Mercenary








Starglider 1&2

BTW, I'm not deliberately ignoring 2D stuff...

Crispy - those levels look awesome...really lovely abstract art...for me there's a hint of the kind of 'floating landscape' style that Roger Dean used to produce for his Yes album covers...


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

Good artwork in games of the last five years or so:

Darwinia





Rez





Team Fortress 2





Audiosurf





fl0w


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

And a couple more to boot:

Okami





Devil May Cry 4


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## mwgdrwg (Jul 2, 2009)

More recent cool graphics:

Geometry Wars 2






Rez


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

Psst -- Rez was in the above list too.  Still, it's so good, it deserves to be shown twice.


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

And let us not forget the most beautiful game -- in EVERY sense of the word -- ever written.  Most beautiful by a looooong way.

Shadow of the Colossus


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## mwgdrwg (Jul 2, 2009)

kabbes said:


> Psst -- Rez was in the above list too.  Still, it's so good, it deserves to be shown twice.



Lots of gaming sites are banned here, so I can't see some pics. Still, it does deserve to be there twice!


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

mwgdrwg said:


> Lots of gaming sites are banned here, so I can't see some pics. Still, it does deserve to be there twice!


Aha   I'll go back and edit to include the names.


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## laptop (Jul 2, 2009)




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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

laptop said:


>


In all seriousness, there is a lot to be said for the idea that the pictures conjured in your head by a text adventure beat the hell out of any graphics yet seen.


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## FridgeMagnet (Jul 2, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> There's a part of me that thinks that videogames had more of an identity as a genuinely separate entertainment medium when they were stripped down to the bare bones. I'm thinking of games like Sentinel, Zarch/Virus, Elite etc. Like the CGi in _Tron_, it makes me think that the early stuff was trying to do the same thing as Kraftwerk and modernist architecture - honesty in materials, in the case of architecture, and trying to make electronic music that _sounded_ like electronic music, instead of trying to make it sound like guitars/violins whatever.
> 
> I think videogame graphics have gone the same way - in trying to make realistic representations of reality, videogames have lost a certain aesthetic, and with it a certain approach to game design (perhaps).



nah, you're being nostalgic

There have always been some games which made attempts to look realistic and some which were abstract. In the main, these early games that you say were "stripped down" _had_ to be stripped down because of the technology. You think Elite was deliberately wireframe and wouldn't have looked like Eve if it had been possible?

The proportion of games using stylised graphics for the sake of it - not just for performance reasons - is I'm sure pretty much the same. Remember that most of the games out there weren't stylised minimalist masterpieces either, they just _looked shit_.


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

All the same, fridgey, it's true that there was a very deliberate and much discussed aesthetic in art and music that was gradually being developed as a consequence of being forced to strip down the images and sound.  An entire artistic shorthand had been developed, understood by gamer and developer alike.  An entire iconography, even. 

There was a lot of mass-produced dross too, of course, no argument there.


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## Crispy (Jul 2, 2009)

ooh, spooky and evocative!
no, just a bit crap. sorry kz


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## Kid_Eternity (Jul 2, 2009)

I think I'm somewhere near FM's pov on this but can't help feel we're fucking lucky Tetris was made when it was made. Can you imagine how stupid it'd be if created now?


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

One problem is that static screenshots don't do any great graphics justice.  Computer games are a moving art.  It's the animation that captures you as much as anything else.  Nobody is going to tell me that the original Prince of Persia on the Amiga/ST wasn't beautiful.

Also:


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## FridgeMagnet (Jul 2, 2009)

kabbes said:


> All the same, fridgey, it's true that there was a very deliberate and much discussed aesthetic in art and music that was gradually being developed as a consequence of being forced to strip down the images and sound.  An entire artistic shorthand had been developed, understood by gamer and developer alike.  An entire iconography, even.
> 
> There was a lot of mass-produced dross too, of course, no argument there.



Yuh, but I dispute that there's any overall difference in the proportion of people fully exploring and using the medium artistically, and that there's any real difference in the games either. The genre of gorgeous photorealistic games didn't exist much in the early days - you could say Myst was one I suppose - but apart from that there are still plenty of games which know they're games, with "honesty" and all that. They just have a lot more options these days, including the photoreal (or attempted photoreal; the characters always spoil it, yes).


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

FridgeMagnet said:


> Yuh, but I dispute that there's any overall difference in the proportion of people fully exploring and using the medium artistically, and that there's any real difference in the games either. The genre of gorgeous photorealistic games didn't exist much in the early days - you could say Myst was one I suppose - but apart from that there are still plenty of games which know they're games, with "honesty" and all that. They just have a lot more options these days, including the photoreal (or attempted photoreal; the characters always spoil it, yes).


Actually, I think that there are *more* people consciously exploring the boundaries of interactive art these days.  The recent explosion in indie houses has guaranteed that.

That doesn't mean that we haven't lost an entire austere aesthetic genre though.


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## FridgeMagnet (Jul 2, 2009)

Kid_Eternity said:


> I think I'm somewhere near FM's pov on this but can't help feel we're fucking lucky Tetris was made when it was made. Can you imagine how stupid it'd be if created now?



Actually I think we value abstract puzzle type games a _lot more_ nowadays, because of mobile devices. People are still making abstract games with simple but cunning principles.


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

Apropos of nothing: when you start to look for images of stuff, you realise just how bad most screenshot captures are.  I mean, look at this attempt to sell the merits of a game:






Why would you even bother?


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## FridgeMagnet (Jul 2, 2009)

kabbes said:


> Actually, I think that there are *more* people consciously exploring the boundaries of interactive art these days.  The recent explosion in indie houses has guaranteed that.
> 
> That doesn't mean that we haven't lost an entire austere aesthetic genre though.



There are definitely more people in total; I don't know whether the proportion of all designers is greater though. There are plenty of potboilers about still and lots of people involved in making them.

Genres move on, but I don't think we've lost anything. I can't see which qualities of the games of the 80s that people liked can't be found nowadays.


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

As kyser described initially:




			
				kyser said:
			
		

> the early stuff was trying to do the same thing as Kraftwerk and modernist architecture - honesty in materials, in the case of architecture, and trying to make electronic music that sounded like electronic music, instead of trying to make it sound like guitars/violins whatever.


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## FridgeMagnet (Jul 2, 2009)

I don't think that's any less true now at all.


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

FridgeMagnet said:


> I don't think that's any less true now at all.


But the way that it was done back then is different to the way it is done now.  Not better, but different.


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## kyser_soze (Jul 2, 2009)

TBH I'm just happily gazing at those Mirror's Edge screen shots...such a beautiful palette...might see if there's a 1920x1100 version of those for wallpaper...

Having said all that, there are moments in modern gaming that genuinely make you go 'woah!'...for example, the first time you arrive at Damascus in Assasin's Creed, the camera pulls back and you get that filmic moment...


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## FridgeMagnet (Jul 2, 2009)

kabbes said:


> But the way that it was done back then is different to the way it is done now.  Not better, but different.



Well yeah. (Mostly - some people do deliberately use 8-bit style graphics and sound.) But I would claim that there isn't any less "honesty in materials".


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

Prince of Persia: Sands of Time also springs to mind for the quality of its set piece moments.

Even The Getaway, actually, as poor a game as it generally was, springs to mind as being impressive for those kind of moments.


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## EastEnder (Jul 2, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


>


The greatest revolution in home computer graphics was Elite, imho. Prior to that it'd all been 2D platformers or crappy racing games with really awful pretend 3D perspective. Elite shattered the mould, it was a true revolution. After that, all further innovations were merely incremental evolution. Braben & Bell are up there with Crick & Watson, Armstrong & Aldrin, Torvill & Dean...


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

Elite wasn't the first to do wireframe 3D.  Not by a long shot.


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

For example, Battlezone came out in 1980.  I think that was genuinely the first.  By contrast, Elite didn't come out for another four years, in 1984.


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## kyser_soze (Jul 2, 2009)

True, but it was done on a widely available platform, and it was attached to a brilliantly written game.

I mean for sure, the original Star Wars arcade machine, Battlezone etc had done vectors before, and there was the Vectrex console but Elite was different...


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## EastEnder (Jul 2, 2009)

kabbes said:


> Elite wasn't the first to do wireframe 3D.  Not by a long shot.


True, but to me it's still the one I regard as revolutionary. It was the first experience I ever had of unlimited degrees of freedom 3D - you could fly around a 3D environment, you weren't constrained to a 2D plane in a pseudo-3D world. It made 3D seem "real" for the first time, at least to me.


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

I'm not convinced that Elite was the first wireframe on a home computer either.  I'm sure that I remember a Spectrum rip-off of Battlezone, for example.

Solid 3D was being done too, as it happens.  3D Monster Maze was Doom on a Spectrum in 1982!  Well, almost...

No dispute that Elite showed the potential of 3D in the way that no other game had done though.  And no other game would do, either, for at least another 5 years.


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## elbows (Jul 2, 2009)

In my spare time I like to mess around with realtime 3D graphics, and I like the retro look a lot, which is just as well as its all Im capable of. I'll post examples one day if Im ever happy enough with anything Ive made.


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## kyser_soze (Jul 2, 2009)

kabbes said:


> I'm not convinced that Elite was the first wireframe on a home computer either.  I'm sure that I remember a Spectrum rip-off of Battlezone, for example.
> 
> Solid 3D was being done too, as it happens.  3D Monster Maze was Doom on a Spectrum in 1982!  Well, almost...
> 
> No dispute that Elite showed the potential of 3D in the way that no other game had done though.  And no other game would do, either, for at least another 5 years.



That's not solid 3D - 3DMM was basically the same effect as games like Space Harrier etc, which don't use real solids, but a single image that expands as it gets closer. Gives the appearence of 3D, but it's not 'proper' 3D, like wot vectors, voxels and polys draw...


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

No, but it introduced the gameplay style given by 3D corridors.  The technical trick used to produce it is less important than the gameplay it produces.  Bloody impressive back in 1982 too.


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## Kid_Eternity (Jul 2, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> TBH I'm just happily gazing at those Mirror's Edge screen shots...such a beautiful palette...might see if there's a 1920x1100 version of those for wallpaper...



It's the only game I've been tempted to buy purely because of the way it looks...


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

When I played the demo, I was actually rather disappointed with Mirrors Edge.  A beautiful game to look at and a sublime feel to the free running, but the gameplay seemed iffy.


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## kyser_soze (Jul 2, 2009)

It doesn't 'flow' the way it needs too IMV - altho from what I read about them, the levels Crispy referred to were all pure free running, no combat stuff...


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## kyser_soze (Jul 2, 2009)

kabbes said:


> No, but it introduced the gameplay style given by 3D corridors.  The technical trick used to produce it is less important than the gameplay it produces.  Bloody impressive back in 1982 too.



Some geek boy on a mainframe did that before 3DMM tho...


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## kabbes (Jul 2, 2009)

Gosh yes.  But we were specifically talking about home computers, remember?


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## FabricLiveBaby! (Jul 2, 2009)

Ikaruga was an amazing game.  Had real oldskool style to it, but the graphics in themselves were amazing.  It was an awsome game, and insanley difficult.

More games should be like this.


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## Kid_Eternity (Jul 2, 2009)

Insanely difficult is some understatement, that was the hardest fucking game I've ever played!


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## Monkeygrinder's Organ (Jul 2, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> It doesn't 'flow' the way it needs too IMV - altho from what I read about them, the levels Crispy referred to were all pure free running, no combat stuff...



I'd agree with that. There's a good game in there somewhere when it gets going but there's far too many stopping bits (crawling around in air ducts ffs), rubbish combat and falling off buildings to really get into it IMO. In parts it's like an annoying platformer from years ago - die, repeat until you get it, move onto the next bit, die a few more times...


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## Pingu (Jul 2, 2009)

some of the graphics in guild wars are really nice


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## yield (Jul 2, 2009)

kabbes said:


> And let us not forget the most beautiful game -- in EVERY sense of the word -- ever written.  Most beautiful by a looooong way.
> 
> Shadow of the Colossus



I can't wait for Team Ico's The Last Guardian. Hoping for a visual feast.


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## FridgeMagnet (Jul 2, 2009)

I didn't like Ikaruga much as an actual game, I have to say.


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## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 2, 2009)

kabbes said:


> One problem is that static screenshots don't do any great graphics justice.  Computer games are a moving art.  It's the animation that captures you as much as anything else.  Nobody is going to tell me that the original Prince of Persia on the Amiga/ST wasn't beautiful.



Turrican 2 on the Amiga as well.  It's hard to find a screenshot which really captures the beauty of it, you have to see it in motion.  The attention to detail was awesome.


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## fen_boy (Jul 2, 2009)

I completed Ikaruga on normal difficulty setting. It took me fucking ages.


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## Kid_Eternity (Jul 2, 2009)

FridgeMagnet said:


> I didn't like Ikaruga much as an actual game, I have to say.



I have no idea how good it was because I couldn't get into it as it was so hard. I do love vertical scrolling shooters though. Another game I love the look and design of yet can't for the life of me play well is the F Zero on the Gamecube, fucking mental speeds!


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## FridgeMagnet (Jul 2, 2009)

If you can't play something because it's too hard, it's not a good game.

I bought it mostly because (a) it was on offer and (b) I'd seen lots of people saying "this game is just so classic, it's like the classic vertical scroller, the graphics are so good" etc. The graphics are nice for a vertical scroller but really, you don't ever see them that often because everything moves so fast. I didn't think that it was _ridiculously_ difficult, just harder than I could be arsed to persist with; VSSes always depend on knowing exactly where to position yourself and move based on the wave you're entering, down to the millisecond and pixel, and... I don't care. It's just not a challenge I find worth persisting with.


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## Kid_Eternity (Jul 2, 2009)

FridgeMagnet said:


> If you can't play something because it's too hard, it's not a good game.



That's false logic, it's value is equal to 'something sells well it must be high quality'. I might just not be that great a gamer, it may be a gaming style I'm not used to, apparently Japanese games eat that type of thing up...


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## FridgeMagnet (Jul 2, 2009)

don't give me that relativist bullshit you hippie


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## agricola (Jul 2, 2009)

While _Elite_ was great, Frontier was far better than it, both graphically and in terms of the game experience.  

If Braben would ever get off his arse and do _Elite 4_ with modern graphics, no bugs (a la FFE) and with a big a sandbox experience as Frontier was it would probably be groundbreaking, albeit it would probably sell (at best) only 10% as well as some mindless MMORPG or FPS rubbish would.  

In fact, as a society we probably get the games we deserve nowadays - by the numbers, lead-me-by-the-hand, cliched shite.  Just look at how many people play the Battlefield series or CoD against how many frequented OFP or ArmA, for instance.


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## EastEnder (Jul 2, 2009)

Kid_Eternity said:


> That's false logic, it's value is equal to 'something sells well it must be high quality'. I might just not be that great a gamer, it may be a gaming style I'm not used to, apparently Japanese games eat that type of thing up...


Actually, I tend to agree with FM. I'm prepared to put in a fair amount of effort, but eventually if I'm still finding a game so impenetrable then I'm afraid it's the game's fault, not mine. Any halfwit can make a stupidly difficult game, it takes real skill to make a game that's both very challenging and captive & engaging. It's like art appreciation, I don't mind being challenged and forced to think deeply about the virtues of a complex painting, but ultimately, if after fair consideration & contemplation, I still think it's a bit shit, then the truth is, it's a bit shit....


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## Kid_Eternity (Jul 2, 2009)

EastEnder said:


> Actually, I tend to agree with FM. I'm prepared to put in a fair amount of effort, but eventually if I'm still finding a game so impenetrable then I'm afraid it's the game's fault, not mine. Any halfwit can make a stupidly difficult game, it takes real skill to make a game that's both very challenging and captive & engaging. It's like art appreciation, I don't mind being challenged and forced to think deeply about the virtues of a complex painting, but ultimately, if after fair consideration & contemplation, I still think it's a bit shit, then the truth is, it's a bit shit....



That's fine as an opinion for you, in your opinion it's a shit game for that reason but FM was talking objectively. Like I said different people, cultures etc value gameplay in different ways. You cannot simply say that if you don't like a game it's a shit game. If you don't agree check out your average argument about casual gamers and hardcore gamers...


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## Crispy (Jul 2, 2009)

agricola said:


> If Braben would ever get off his arse and do _Elite 4_ with modern graphics, no bugs (a la FFE) and with a big a sandbox experience as Frontier was it would probably be groundbreaking, albeit it would probably sell (at best) only 10% as well as some mindless MMORPG or FPS rubbish would.



Have you seen Infinity?

Space trading, combat, exploration whatever MMO, with a full galaxy of stars and planets on one server.

Been in development a long time. The engine is almost entirely a one-man effort, but it's all procedural just like Elite. All the static content is being made by volunteers.

Seamless space to planet flight. Bear in mind this is 3 years old

Space combat, with newtonian physics, in real time.


It looks really impressive. The developer has a blog here: http://www.gamedev.net/community/forums/mod/journal/journal.asp?jn=263350


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## FabricLiveBaby! (Jul 3, 2009)

There was another superb game in this depearment, can't remeber the name though.  Also on the Gamecube.

General premise was that a little girl is kidnapped by spectres into a castle, and you (also a girl) have to go and rescue her,  find her, and bet the spectres away with a stick before they can grab the little girl and take her back.  There's also a load of puzzles you complete whilst in the castle.

Anyone remeber what this was called?  I was trying to think of it all last night did a wiki search and everything and still can't find out.


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## kyser_soze (Jul 3, 2009)

Ahh,, scrolling shooters...anyone remember Xenon in the arcade? Can't find any decent grabs of it, bt it looked lovely for the time...


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## FabricLiveBaby! (Jul 3, 2009)

Kid_Eternity said:


> That's fine as an opinion for you, in your opinion it's a shit game for that reason but FM was talking objectively. Like I said different people, cultures etc value gameplay in different ways. You cannot simply say that if you don't like a game it's a shit game. If you don't agree check out your average argument about casual gamers and hardcore gamers...



See,   I guite like that kind of gaming style.

I completed ikaruga relativley quickly on normal mode (a couple of weeks I think), and it took alot of concentration and was pretty much a whole "don't talk to me! I'm concentrating" thing.

Kid Eternity is right when he talks ab out style.  It requires alot of concentration but onces you get used to the feel of it, you can complete it fairly quickly.

Kind of similar to Frogger but on a much more difficult level iyswim.


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## kabbes (Jul 3, 2009)

FabricLiveBaby! said:


> There was another superb game in this depearment, can't remeber the name though.  Also on the Gamecube.
> 
> General premise was that a little girl is kidnapped by spectres into a castle, and you (also a girl) have to go and rescue her,  find her, and bet the spectres away with a stick before they can grab the little girl and take her back.  There's also a load of puzzles you complete whilst in the castle.
> 
> Anyone remeber what this was called?  I was trying to think of it all last night did a wiki search and everything and still can't find out.


That sounds very much like Ico on the Playstation 2.


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## FabricLiveBaby! (Jul 3, 2009)

kabbes said:


> That sounds very much like Ico on the Playstation 2.



That's the one!  My boyfreind  at the time had a gamecube and ps2. Confusion.

Yes Ico had some lovely smooth graphics.


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## Crispy (Jul 3, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> Ahh,, scrolling shooters...anyone remember Xenon in the arcade? Can't find any decent grabs of it, bt it looked lovely for the time...



Get Tyrian
Forgiving, graphically lovely mid-nineties vertical shooter for pc. Still great


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## kabbes (Jul 3, 2009)

FabricLiveBaby! said:


> That's the one!  My boyfreind  at the time had a gamecube and ps2. Confusion.
> 
> Yes Ico had some lovely smooth graphics.


Yeah, I think kyser might have mentioned it in the OP actually.  It was made by the team who went on to make Shadow of the Colossus and whose new project has been mentioned just up there ^^^.

A sensational piece of work, but its ghost mechanic ultimately proved a bit too irritating for me.


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## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 3, 2009)

Kid_Eternity said:


> I have no idea how good it was because I couldn't get into it as it was so hard. I do love vertical scrolling shooters though. Another game I love the look and design of yet can't for the life of me play well is the F Zero on the Gamecube, fucking mental speeds!



Only played the original SNES version but that was fucking awesome.


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## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 3, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> Ahh,, scrolling shooters...anyone remember Xenon in the arcade? Can't find any decent grabs of it, bt it looked lovely for the time...



Is that different from the Bitmap Brothers game?

My favourite scrolling shooter was SWIV on the Amiga - yet again, immense attention to detail, like one of the bosses which was a huge ship which took off from the ground, leaving crop circles in the corn it had been nestling on.


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## skyscraper101 (Jul 3, 2009)

So t_hat's _what happened to those blokes from that Dire Straits video.



kabbes said:


> Team Fortress 2


----------



## internetstalker (Jul 3, 2009)

I remember when I brought my Amiga.

My and my mates crowded round my TV watching the intro to shadow of the beast 2, going 'WOW!!' thinking it was the most realistic thing ever

Now I stoke up GTA IV and it's practically like playing a movie!


----------



## internetstalker (Jul 3, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> Ahh,, scrolling shooters...anyone remember Xenon in the arcade? Can't find any decent grabs of it, bt it looked lovely for the time...



AYe

it was like R type with better graphics

I think that game killed my love of shoot em ups a bit


----------



## Kid_Eternity (Jul 3, 2009)

upsidedownwalrus said:


> Is that different from the Bitmap Brothers game?
> 
> My favourite scrolling shooter was SWIV on the Amiga - yet again, immense attention to detail, like one of the bosses which was a huge ship which took off from the ground, leaving crop circles in the corn it had been nestling on.



Yeah I loved SWIV! Great fun.


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 3, 2009)

I will say this to my death, but I think that computer game designers back then were basically hippies.  You couldn't make that much money from it because it was quite niche.  Computer games were for 10 year olds with ADD or for spotty adolescents who couldn't get a girlfriend.

Now they're mass market entertainment and completely socially acceptable.

It's big money.  It's not surprising that there are fewer of the wacky little quirks that there used to be.


----------



## Kid_Eternity (Jul 3, 2009)

I think there's something too that, the spirit of the bedroom coders is long gone...


----------



## Crispy (Jul 3, 2009)

Kid_Eternity said:


> I think there's something too that, the spirit of the bedroom coders is long gone...


But being reborn with the resurgence of indie gaming and low cost platfroms like wii, ds and iphone.


----------



## Kid_Eternity (Jul 3, 2009)

Crispy said:


> But being reborn with the resurgence of indie gaming and low cost platfroms like wii, ds and iphone.



True although I'm not sure the culture (I'm thinking of that Lama guy) is quite the same.


----------



## EastEnder (Jul 3, 2009)

upsidedownwalrus said:


> Computer games were for 10 year olds with ADD or for spotty adolescents who couldn't get a girlfriend.


I was option B.

I lost interest in computer games when they entered the mainstream, all became a bit passé.


----------



## Crispy (Jul 3, 2009)

Kid_Eternity said:


> True although I'm not sure the culture (I'm thinking of that Lama guy) is quite the same.


Jeff Minter? He's a proper odd one


----------



## Kid_Eternity (Jul 3, 2009)

Crispy said:


> Jeff Minter? He's a proper odd one



That's the guy, a real dude and icon even of that period. Can't see people like him coming along again.


----------



## Dandred (Jul 3, 2009)

internetstalker said:


> I remember when I brought my Amiga.
> 
> My and my mates crowded round my TV watching the intro to shadow of the beast 2, going 'WOW!!' thinking it was the most realistic thing ever



How far did you get on that game? 

I would love to try it again, I remember me and my mates couldn't get past the first 3 or 4 screens


----------



## kabbes (Jul 3, 2009)

Jeff Minter and Llamasoft are still producing games.  Space Giraffe was their last.  Critically mixed reception, which caused him to throw his toys properly out of the pram.


----------



## loud 1 (Jul 4, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> Ahh,, scrolling shooters...anyone remember Xenon in the arcade? Can't find any decent grabs of it, bt it looked lovely for the time...



mega game


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 6, 2009)

Kid_Eternity said:


> True although I'm not sure the culture (I'm thinking of that Lama guy) is quite the same.



The Amiga used to say 'Guru Meditation' when it crashed  

How likely are Microsoft to put something like that into Windows?


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 6, 2009)

Crispy said:


> Jeff Minter? He's a proper odd one



He looks quite sane to me 









Wouldn't get through the doors of Sony or wherever...


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 6, 2009)

EastEnder said:


> I was option B.
> 
> I lost interest in computer games when they entered the mainstream, all became a bit passé.


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 6, 2009)

Dandred said:


> How far did you get on that game?
> 
> I would love to try it again, I remember me and my mates couldn't get past the first 3 or 4 screens



It was an absolute cunt of a game, was SOTB 2.  Even with the cheat (which I can still remember - you walk up to the left and say 'ten pints' to the first guy you talk to for infinite lives/energy) it was still impossible.

But there's a walkthrough on Youtube, so obviously we were all missing something when we used to play it.


----------



## tendo (Jul 6, 2009)

internetstalker said:


> I remember when I brought my Amiga.
> 
> My and my mates crowded round my TV watching the intro to shadow of the beast 2, going 'WOW!!' thinking it was the most realistic thing ever
> 
> Now I stoke up GTA IV and it's practically like playing a movie!



Shadow of the Beast was what sold the Amiga to me, it had parallax scrolling, which seemed to mean it could scroll the foreground and background at different speeds, which gave the games a depth that they'd never had before. I remember looking at it and thinking games could never get any better.


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

tendo said:


> Shadow of the Beast was what sold the Amiga to me, it had parallax scrolling, which seemed to mean it could scroll the foreground and background at different speeds, which gave the games a depth that they'd never had before. I remember looking at it and thinking games could never get any better.



There's still a certain beauty to games like Beast, Turrican, Lionheart, Gods.

The problem with Beast was that it was such, well, a Beast of a thing to actually play.


----------



## kyser_soze (Jul 7, 2009)

> it had parallax scrolling, which seemed to mean it could scroll the foreground and background at different speeds, which gave the games a depth that they'd never had before.



There were a gazillion games on the C64 which featured parallax scrolling, not least one of Sensible Software's first (possibly even first) release, the aptly named _Parallax_...other titles include _Sanxion_, _Delta_, _Wizball_...the list goes on...


----------



## tendo (Jul 7, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> There were a gazillion games on the C64 which featured parallax scrolling, not least one of Sensible Software's first (possibly even first) release, the aptly named _Parallax_...other titles include _Sanxion_, _Delta_, _Wizball_...the list goes on...



So what was it about Shadow of the Beast that was so special then? And don't even think about bursting my bubble that it wasn't!


----------



## kyser_soze (Jul 7, 2009)

I think it's main claim to fame was that it was the one of the first 'killer apps' on the 16-bit computers, particularly the Amiga. Along with Defender of the Crown, it's hi-res in-game graphics, cut scenes etc probably helped lift the A500 into what then passed as major sales...


----------



## tendo (Jul 7, 2009)

It had more pixels? That's it? *pop*

Robocod _was_ ace though.


----------



## kabbes (Jul 7, 2009)

Shadow of the Beast was (one of) the first to use raster rendering, if I remember right.  That's why it looked so amazing.


----------



## Crispy (Jul 7, 2009)

tendo said:


> It had more pixels? That's it? *pop*
> 
> Robocod _was_ ace though.



The demo version that was on all the coverdisks was the full game with a simple lock at the end of the first level. Enter the cheat code and you could access the whole game


----------



## tendo (Jul 7, 2009)

kabbes said:


> Shadow of the Beast was (one of) the first to use raster rendering, if I remember right.  That's why it looked so amazing.



Thanks kabbes, I knew it was special. 

Rasta rendering. Built from the love of His Imperial Majesty Haile Selassie I, King of Kings, Lord of Lords, Conquering Lion of the Tribe of Judah, and Elect of God.


----------



## Crispy (Jul 7, 2009)

What? 'raster rendering' is a rather meaningless term. Every home computer makes an image out of an array of pixels. That's Raster. The other one is Vector, which was for expensive CAD machines and some arcade games and the Vectrex home games machine.

Altered Beast just had great big art tiles, so it looked nice, that's all.


----------



## kabbes (Jul 7, 2009)

Crispy said:


> What? 'raster rendering' is a rather meaningless term. Every home computer makes an image out of an array of pixels. That's Raster. The other one is Vector, which was for expensive CAD machines and some arcade games and the Vectrex home games machine.
> 
> Altered Beast just had great big art tiles, so it looked nice, that's all.


Look, I have no idea what it means.  But the likes of Zero and ST Format and all of those kind of magazines were going mental about it at the time.  There were all kind of demos produced that used "rasters".  I'm sure that somebody must know what it means.  I just know that it was a big deal.  And SOTB was one of the first games with it.


----------



## kyser_soze (Jul 7, 2009)

> Altered Beast



*Ahem* Shadow of the...


----------



## kabbes (Jul 7, 2009)

Altered Beast was good too, mind.


----------



## kyser_soze (Jul 7, 2009)

kabbes said:


> Look, I have no idea what it means.  But the likes of Zero and ST Format and all of those kind of magazines were going mental about it at the time.  There were all kind of demos produced that used "rasters".  I'm sure that somebody must know what it means.  I just know that it was a big deal.  And SOTB was one of the first games with it.



As Zzap!64 were going crazy about 'raster lines' and 'raster interrupts' on expanded border C64 and any game that had quick scrolling (I remember the white lines at the bottom being a Bad Thing) a long time before that.


----------



## kabbes (Jul 7, 2009)

Yes, that does ring a bell.

I was about 12 at the time.  What did I know about graphic techniques?  I just knew that I WANTED IT.


----------



## Crispy (Jul 7, 2009)

There were all sorts of fancy tricks you could pull with C64 and Amiga gfx, so I suppose they gave them silly names. Bit like 'Blast Processing' on the megadrive


----------



## fen_boy (Jul 7, 2009)

. I remember that being a big thing.


----------



## kyser_soze (Jul 7, 2009)

Me too; I remember looking at DKC and thinking 'cor'


----------



## fractionMan (Jul 7, 2009)

Crispy said:


> What? 'raster rendering' is a rather meaningless term. Every home computer makes an image out of an array of pixels. That's Raster. The other one is Vector, which was for expensive CAD machines and some arcade games and the Vectrex home games machine.
> 
> Altered Beast just had great big art tiles, so it looked nice, that's all.



This ^^ 

Crispy beat me to it.

The thing I remember about it is that It had loads of paralax scrolling.


----------



## Yetman (Jul 7, 2009)

I was playing Altered Beast last night. It is pretty funny tbf. Good though.

Killer Instinct was the business. When you pulled off a 64 hit combo by simply thrashing about on the buttons then pretending to your friends that you meant it. Freakin A


----------



## Crispy (Jul 7, 2009)

Yetman said:


> I was playing Altered Beast last night. It is pretty funny tbf. Good though.
> 
> Killer Instinct was the business. When you pulled off a 64 hit combo by simply thrashing about on the buttons then pretending to your friends that you meant it. Freakin A


My schoolmate could complete KI, getting loads of combos all over the place, playing with his _toes_, wearing a
_blindfold_


----------



## kyser_soze (Jul 7, 2009)

One of my mates could get 128 hit combos using _just his nose_, cos he was Metallica's _One_ dude...


----------



## fogbat (Jul 7, 2009)

kabbes said:


> Jeff Minter and Llamasoft are still producing games.  Space Giraffe was their last.  Critically mixed reception, which caused him to throw his toys properly out of the pram.



From wikipedia: 



> veteran video game journalist Stuart Campbell described Space Giraffe as "one of the best games released this year at any price" but Campbell used the first letter of each paragraph to spell the phrase "MINTER IS A BIG TWATTY SPACKER TRUFAX".


----------



## Kid_Eternity (Jul 7, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> As Zzap!64 were going crazy about 'raster lines' and 'raster interrupts' on expanded border C64 and any game that had quick scrolling (I remember the white lines at the bottom being a Bad Thing) a long time before that.



Jesus we'll be talking about Mode 7 next, and the amazing power of the Super FX chip...


----------



## marksims68 (Jul 7, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> As Zzap!64 were going crazy about 'raster lines' and 'raster interrupts' on expanded border C64 and any game that had quick scrolling (I remember the white lines at the bottom being a Bad Thing) a long time before that.



Remember the Tutankhamun demo by 1001 crew.  Filled the whole screen that did!  At the time people thought it was impossible but then the code was hacked and analysed and people went "ah I see!" and the whole "sprites in the sideborders" thing was born.

Still impressive though, even today!


----------



## kyser_soze (Jul 7, 2009)

_Au naturellement_ marksims - that image prompted me to get a modem and join compunet and I spent the next 2 years downloading expanded bitmap/scrolly text/ripped hubbard/galway/crowther tunage demos


----------



## marksims68 (Jul 7, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> _Au naturellement_ marksims - that image prompted me to get a modem and join compunet and I spent the next 2 years downloading expanded bitmap/scrolly text/ripped hubbard/galway/crowther tunage demos



Thats funny so did I mate.............Great fun wasn't it?


----------



## kyser_soze (Jul 7, 2009)

I blame Rignall personally.


----------



## Yetman (Jul 7, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> I blame Rignall personally.



I blame his mullet.


----------



## Yetman (Jul 7, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> I blame Rignall personally.



I blame his mullet. It was almost like we overlooked his mullet ownership because he was so cool and popular. A bit like MJ and the first kid I suppose.


----------



## kabbes (Jul 7, 2009)

Do you blame his mullet?


----------



## Structaural (Jul 7, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> True, but it was done on a widely available platform, and it was attached to a brilliantly written game.
> 
> I mean for sure, the original Star Wars arcade machine, Battlezone etc had done vectors before, and there was the Vectrex console but Elite was different...



I'm pretty sure Elite was the first to use backface-culling and paralaxing too. 

Anyway, I'm in full agreement of your OP. I know a lot of it's nostalgia, but that's a big driving force. It would be good if you could turn a TomTom into Tron mode for instance. Anyone remember Automan?

I still yearn for a decent playable Tempest, if I had a big house and bit of money I'd buy an old console machine.


----------



## Structaural (Jul 7, 2009)

agricola said:


> While _Elite_ was great, Frontier was far better than it, both graphically and in terms of the game experience.
> 
> If Braben would ever get off his arse and do _Elite 4_ with modern graphics, no bugs (a la FFE) and with a big a sandbox experience as Frontier was it would probably be groundbreaking, albeit it would probably sell (at best) only 10% as well as some mindless MMORPG or FPS rubbish would.
> 
> In fact, as a society we probably get the games we deserve nowadays - by the numbers, lead-me-by-the-hand, cliched shite.  Just look at how many people play the Battlefield series or CoD against how many frequented OFP or ArmA, for instance.



Eve-onine was inspired by Elite, but you can't dogfight, though you can come close with a fast frigate.


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> I think it's main claim to fame was that it was the one of the first 'killer apps' on the 16-bit computers, particularly the Amiga. Along with Defender of the Crown, it's hi-res in-game graphics, cut scenes etc probably helped lift the A500 into what then passed as major sales...



I reckon it was the music on games like that just as much as the graphics.  While the early amiga graphics weren't a colossal step up from the Commodore 64, the music was on another planet.  Especially games like Onslaught which I think was one of the earliest (it was bundled free with my Amiga in 1990)


----------



## kyser_soze (Jul 7, 2009)

I'd have to remind myself of some Amiga tunage (and yes it did sound lovely), cos IIRC from my yoof I preferred the Sound of SID...


----------



## kabbes (Jul 7, 2009)

upsidedownwalrus said:


> I reckon it was the music on games like that just as much as the graphics.  While the early amiga graphics weren't a colossal step up from the Commodore 64, the music was on another planet.  Especially games like Onslaught which I think was one of the earliest (it was bundled free with my Amiga in 1990)


Funnily enough, I looked for a screenshot of Onslaught to post earlier in this thread as an example of great graphics back in the day.  However, I couldn't find one.  Only the splash screen seemed to be available.

Brilliant game, brilliant graphics, brilliant music.  And impossible.


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

fogbat said:


> From wikipedia:



Stuart Campbell was funny as fuck.  I used to absolutely love Amiga Power because the reviews were just so much less anal and self-serious, and so much more irreverent and funny than any other magazine I've encountered - indeed, I still have some somewhere at my parents' house in some boxes, and a few years ago I reread some of them and still found them hilarious


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> I'd have to remind myself of some Amiga tunage (and yes it did sound lovely), cos IIRC from my yoof I preferred the Sound of SID...



SID?


----------



## kyser_soze (Jul 7, 2009)

Sound Interface Device - the sound chip in the C64...


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

kabbes said:


> Funnily enough, I looked for a screenshot of Onslaught to post earlier in this thread as an example of great graphics back in the day.  However, I couldn't find one.  Only the splash screen seemed to be available.
> 
> Brilliant game, brilliant graphics, brilliant music.  And impossible.


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> Sound Interface Device - the sound chip in the C64...



Ah...

Check out the Onslaught link above.

Odd game, but amazing music.

I remember unpacking the Amiga, setting it up, putting that disk in (i'd never even had a home computer before) and me and my brother sitting there marvelling at it.

My dad then came in and started whinging and saying "What's this piped music zombie nonsense?".  I think he was secretly a little overwhelmed by it all.


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

I particularly liked the World 2 music - around 0:40:00


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

Lionheart - another one with lovely graphics and music


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

Ah, and 

Only played a playable demo, never got to play the full thing.


----------



## Kid_Eternity (Jul 7, 2009)

upsidedownwalrus said:


> Ah, and
> Only played a playable demo, never got to play the full thing.



I loved the look of the game but found it boring as hell to play tbh...


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

I loved the demo I played...


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

I've completely subverted another thread with Amiga posts about games with scrolling parallax and proto-trance, rather than sticking to the original premise of wiry 3D


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

is one of the first Amiga games I ever saw, at my mate's house.  Amazing intro, graphics and sound


----------



## kabbes (Jul 7, 2009)

Mr. ex-Dog, you are threatening to set a new world record for posts to poster ratio, eclipsing even a mighty Cunuck clusterbomb!

11 of the previous 15 posts are from you!


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

Sorry. I get like that when certain topics turn up - Amiga games.  Red Dwarf.  Nirvana.  Teaching in China.  Travelling in India.


----------



## machine cat (Jul 7, 2009)

Crispy said:


> The demo version that was on all the coverdisks was the full game with a simple lock at the end of the first level. Enter the cheat code and you could access the whole game



why did you not tell me this when i had my amiga?


----------



## Kid_Eternity (Jul 7, 2009)

kabbes said:


> Mr. ex-Dog, you are threatening to set a new world record for posts to poster ratio, eclipsing even a mighty Cunuck clusterbomb!
> 
> 11 of the previous 15 posts are from you!





Leave him alone he's a real dude.


----------



## Infidel Castro (Jul 7, 2009)

isitme said:


> Nintendo are good at this, as are Squaresoft. they still use the graphics power available but have a very computer gamey look
> 
> must admit i'm a big fan of the 1990s anime style graphics more than photorealism



Digging up an old post in the subject, but I agree entirely re Squaresoft among others.  I love the old Japansese RPGs and even the old 2D scrollers like Alex Kidd, Wonderboy in Monsterland, etc.  I like pixels to be pixels rather than gritty near-photo-rendered images.

I want my games to feel ELECTRONIC.


----------



## kyser_soze (Jul 7, 2009)

> I want my games to feel ELECTRONIC.



^^^
This is what I was getting at in my OP.


----------



## Infidel Castro (Jul 7, 2009)

kyser_soze said:


> ^^^
> This is what I was getting at in my OP.



I don't tend to engage too much on the old xbox or PS3 because I find that a lot of the games these days are just 1st person hack-n-slash or shoot-em-ups.  Balls to that.

The greatest game of all time is still Track and Field.


----------



## tendo (Jul 7, 2009)

I'll see your Track and Field and raise you a Stunt Car Racer.






But, I did knacker a couple of Quickshot joysticks playing Track and Field.


----------



## fen_boy (Jul 7, 2009)

*Julian approves of this thread*


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

tendo said:


> I'll see your Track and Field and raise you a Stunt Car Racer.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Best driving game ever, hands down.

Lotus 2 was good mind you.


----------



## machine cat (Jul 7, 2009)




----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

drcarnage said:


>





What is that?


----------



## machine cat (Jul 7, 2009)

remember all the great developers? Rainbow Arts, Ocean Software, Team 17 etc?


----------



## machine cat (Jul 7, 2009)

upsidedownwalrus said:


> What is that?



Loom. Made by Lucasarts in the early '90s and was one of the first games to use the Scumm engine.


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

drcarnage said:


> remember all the great developers? Rainbow Arts, Ocean Software, Team 17 etc?



Do you remember Team 17's Project X?  Absolutely stunning, it temporarily gave me hope that the Amiga could keep up with the Consoles, but it was dogged by being almost impossible.


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

Oh- and Alien Breed.


----------



## machine cat (Jul 7, 2009)

I don't remember Project X, but defo Alien Breed! That was an awesome game!! There's a new one coming out soon too  

I passed the Team 17 office a few months back as it's not too far away from me. I may pop in sometime and see what it's like.


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)




----------



## machine cat (Jul 7, 2009)

Now i remember it!


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

I think it's about time someone mentioned IK+


----------



## machine cat (Jul 7, 2009)

i only ever played it on a mate's c64 a couple of times but it was awesome


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

Do you remember Heimdall?  Superb stuff.

And Monkey island, although that was really the start of the PC era, the Amiga struggled with MI2 at times...


----------



## kabbes (Jul 7, 2009)

Discussions on 8-bit classics always somehow end up becoming all about 16 bit instead


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

kabbes said:


> Discussions on 8-bit classics always somehow end up becoming all about 16 bit instead



And it's usually my fault


----------



## machine cat (Jul 7, 2009)

upsidedownwalrus said:


> Do you remember Heimdall?  Superb stuff.
> 
> And Monkey island, although that was really the start of the PC era, the Amiga struggled with MI2 at times...



never heard of Heimdall 

Monkey Island 2 is my favourite game of all time. You're right, the Amiga did struggle with it (hence the name for my radio show on TCTE - 12 disks ffs ). But both Monkey 1 & 2 are awesome. I still play them to this day, but with out the disks and loading times.


----------



## Infidel Castro (Jul 7, 2009)

Did Team 17 do Worms?

Anyone a fan of Cannon Fodder or Chaos Engine?  Two more class games there.


----------



## machine cat (Jul 7, 2009)

Infidel Castro said:


> Did Team 17 do Worms?
> 
> Anyone a fan of Cannon Fodder or Chaos Engine?  Two more class games there.



yes, yes and yes!


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

drcarnage said:


> never heard of Heimdall
> .



It was this game where you were a Viking Overlord or something, and your character strength was, quite originally, determined by playing three short arcade sequences.  The first one was where you're in a pub, very drunk, and using the mouse have to throw some axes at the locks of a girl who is tied up by them to a wooden board, to free her.  






The second one, still drunk, you have to catch a greased pig.  The third one is slightly more pedestrian and revolves around going along a boat knocking men off.  






But the better you do, the better stats your character have.  Then it's an epic isometric adventure - something like Head Over Heels crossed with AD&D.  And superb cartoony graphics.


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

Infidel Castro said:


> Did Team 17 do Worms?
> 
> Anyone a fan of Cannon Fodder or Chaos Engine?  Two more class games there.



Yup. I loved the feature of Chaos Engine where if you didn't have someone to play 2 player with, the computer controlled the other player for you


----------



## machine cat (Jul 7, 2009)

upsidedownwalrus said:


> It was this game where you were a Viking Overlord or something, and your character strength was, quite originally, determined by playing three short arcade sequences.  The first one was where you're in a pub, very drunk, and using the mouse have to throw some axes at the locks of a girl who is tied up by them to a wooden board, to free her.
> 
> 
> 
> ...




you know, I do remember that first screenshot from an Amiga magazine i re-read a million times when I was a kid, but I never played the game for some reason.


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

It was a great game.


----------



## machine cat (Jul 7, 2009)

upsidedownwalrus said:


> It was a great game.



is it available for dosbox? might download it


----------



## Crispy (Jul 7, 2009)

I totally remember that hair one too. Must have played it on a mates amiga


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

drcarnage said:


> is it available for dosbox? might download it



Must be - I'm sure there was a PC version


----------



## machine cat (Jul 7, 2009)

will have a search this sometime this week


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

Abandonia has the second game, which I never played here


----------



## machine cat (Jul 7, 2009)

sweet.

there's so many games i need to play (mainly ones you got a demo of in magazines but couldn't afford the whole thing) and replay, i might take a week off work to dedicate my time towards them.


----------



## sleaterkinney (Jul 7, 2009)

upsidedownwalrus said:


> Turrican 2 on the Amiga as well.  It's hard to find a screenshot which really captures the beauty of it, you have to see it in motion.  The attention to detail was awesome.



It was so imaginative wasn't it?, great game.


----------



## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 7, 2009)

sleaterkinney said:


> It was so imaginative wasn't it?, great game.



Yeah, I even remember my mate's mum who absolutely hated us playing computer games, pausing to remark that 'it's quite artistic actually'.


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## lindawalkrsin (Jul 8, 2009)

I think you're just being nostalgic. You yearn for the games of your youth, and the kids who grew up around SNES do the same, and so will future generations brought up on PS4/5/6/7.


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## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 8, 2009)

I do agree with that to an extent - and I remember cos the Amiga was my first computer thinking it was aces, but people who'd grown up with 8 bits first all constantly saying that 'the graphics and music are nice, but the playability isn't a patch on the C64/Speccy'.

However, I do think there's something in my assertion that games designers back then were a rather different breed and that it was generally more of a labour of love.


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## tendo (Jul 8, 2009)

What was that game on the Amiga that you got to use loads of different vehicles in? It was an adventure game and the main mode of transport was skiing, you could also hang glide at one point. Not very much to go on I know but I spent bloody ages playing that.

Knightlore was another game I spent a lot of time on. I remember it being brown rather than pink though.


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## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 8, 2009)

Midwinter!

I never played it, but wasn't there a colossal flaw in it, in that you were meant to spend months flying, driving, cycling, making new friends, and doing a really complex solution to the mission, and then some wag noticed that all you had to do was walk north 400 metres and blow up a power station and you had 'completed' the game?


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## tendo (Jul 8, 2009)

upsidedownwalrus said:


> Midwinter!
> 
> I never played it, but wasn't there a colossal flaw in it, in that you were meant to spend months flying, driving, cycling, making new friends, and doing a really complex solution to the mission, and then some wag noticed that all you had to do was walk north 400 metres and blow up a power station and you had 'completed' the game?



You fucking star! I was gonna say it was called winter something. Midwinter!

No idea about the flaw as I spent months playing the thing but never completed it.

I have a massive grin on my face. Like that >


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## machine cat (Jul 8, 2009)

lindawalkrsin said:


> I think you're just being nostalgic. You yearn for the games of your youth, and the kids who grew up around SNES do the same, and so will future generations brought up on PS4/5/6/7.



of course we 're being nostalgic to a certain degree, it's hard not to be when chatting about games of yesteryear. however, what i enjoyed about being a kid in the 90s was the progression of games and hardware. from the spec/c64 style graphics to 16-bit amiga games. the whole SNES/megadrive revolution in terms of consoles and mass home entertainment, the 32/CD/virtua boy fads that followed, and finally the ps1/online pc craze that brought games closer to what they are today

it still happens with games and consoles today, but you notice it less and doesn't seem as exciting.


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## kabbes (Jul 8, 2009)

This thread has _seriously_ lost track of its original terms of reference!


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## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 8, 2009)

tendo said:


> You fucking star! I was gonna say it was called winter something. Midwinter!
> 
> No idea about the flaw as I spent months playing the thing but never completed it.
> 
> I have a massive grin on my face. Like that >



I never actually played it.  I just have an encyclopaediaic memory for stupid irrelevant things which I'm interested in. 

There was a follow up called Hunter which was meant to be even huger and probably the progenitor of the big PC games of today.


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## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 8, 2009)

drcarnage said:


> of course we 're being nostalgic to a certain degree, it's hard not to be when chatting about games of yesteryear. however, what i enjoyed about being a kid in the 90s was the progression of games and hardware. from the spec/c64 style graphics to 16-bit amiga games. the whole SNES/megadrive revolution in terms of consoles and mass home entertainment, the 32/CD/virtua boy fads that followed, and finally the ps1/online pc craze that brought games closer to what they are today
> 
> it still happens with games and consoles today, but you notice it less and doesn't seem as exciting.



Yes, the jump ups were HUGE back then.  I reckon there's far far more difference between a Speccy and Amiga game (taking the best of each say) than between a PS1 and PS3 game.

I remember a bloke at school whose family were from Singapore.  He went there on holiday and bought a gameboy - he was the first person in the school to have one.  I recall just being blown away that here was a 'hand held game' where you could change the game and it wasn't just restricted to three pre-set positions or whatever like the old Donkey Kong games were.

Kids of today are spoilt, I'm tellin' yer!   All these bloody mobile phones which  you can play Doom on or whatever.

I'm sticking resolutely to my crappy 7 pound nokia til the last possible moment


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## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 8, 2009)

kabbes said:


> This thread has _seriously_ lost track of its original terms of reference!



If this thread was more high brow I'd probably have got a 24 hour ban for hijacking 

Going back to the 3d thing, what about games like Dungeon Master?  Revolutionary!  I doubt if stuff like Doom would have happened without DM/EOTB.


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## kabbes (Jul 8, 2009)

Dungeon Master, although graphically it was just an enhancement of 1983's 3D Monster Maze, really showed the way that 1st person perspective could and would work in the future.


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## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 8, 2009)

A game I always wanted to play but didn't was Crowther's Captive, which took the DM concept and riffed on it, so you were a guy locked in a prison cell at a computer console, controlling four droids, who you had to guide to rescue you.

Got really good reviews.


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## machine cat (Jul 8, 2009)

upsidedownwalrus said:


> If this thread was more high brow I'd probably have got a 24 hour ban for hijacking
> 
> Going back to the 3d thing, what about games like Dungeon Master?  Revolutionary!  I doubt if stuff like Doom would have happened without DM/*EOTB*.



Eye of the Beholder? Fantastic game!


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## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 8, 2009)

Yeah.  Fucking hard though 

They were both really really _scary_ - is there a modern day game as terrifying?

I actually jumped once when playing DM at a mate's house, and was ribbed mercilessly for it afterwards


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## machine cat (Jul 8, 2009)

i always had to play Eye of the Beholder with someone in the same room as me i found it that scary


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## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 8, 2009)

drcarnage said:


> i always had to play Eye of the Beholder with someone in the same room as me i found it that scary



That makes me feel a bit less of a big girl's blouse


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## kabbes (Jul 8, 2009)

The more that games have been able to explicitly show things graphically, the less I've become afraid by them.


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## ohmyliver (Jul 8, 2009)

upsidedownwalrus said:


> A game I always wanted to play but didn't was Crowther's Captive, which took the DM concept and riffed on it, so you were a guy locked in a prison cell at a computer console, controlling four droids, who you had to guide to rescue you.
> 
> Got really good reviews.



*eta* url snipped as it doesn't contain the game... 

I played on my trusty atari st, it was good, but it seemed to go on for ever, and ever, and then a little more ever.  (it has apparently 5957 missions).

I always was wow'd by Moleneaux's(sp?) games like powermonger. But more by the scope.


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## Moggy (Jul 8, 2009)

kabbes said:


>



Fuck. Yes.


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## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 8, 2009)

kabbes said:


> The more that games have been able to explicitly show things graphically, the less I've become afraid by them.



It's just like films really isn't it?  I find The Others infinitely more scary than any gorefest.


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## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 8, 2009)

ohmyliver said:


> I always was wow'd by Moleneaux's(sp?) games like powermonger. But more by the scope.



Do you remember Megalomania?  Great god game who found powermonger and populous a bit up their own arse.  It was really cartoony and had these great samples, like this camp scientist going "The design is ready" and stuff.

Superb stuff.


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## ohmyliver (Jul 8, 2009)

upsidedownwalrus said:


> Do you remember Megalomania?  Great god game who found powermonger and populous a bit up their own arse.  It was really cartoony and had these great samples, like this camp scientist going "The design is ready" and stuff.
> 
> Superb stuff.



only played the demo.... I liked powermonger better to be honest... lots of  nice graphic touches such as seasons, babies to villages being delivered by storks. You could also speed it up and watch villages and town populations grow and ebb, forests being chopped down, at superfast speeds etc


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## FridgeMagnet (Jul 8, 2009)

upsidedownwalrus said:


> A game I always wanted to play but didn't was Crowther's Captive, which took the DM concept and riffed on it, so you were a guy locked in a prison cell at a computer console, controlling four droids, who you had to guide to rescue you.
> 
> Got really good reviews.



I played it on the ST, and you can get it for DOSBOX now from some abandonware site or other. It is still good actually though effectively unfinishable.

This thread is so nothing to do with graphics any more. You sad old retro lot.


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## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 8, 2009)

FridgeMagnet said:


> This thread is so nothing to do with graphics any more. You sad old retro lot.





I'm going to stop posting on this thread, it's all my fault


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## machine cat (Jul 9, 2009)

upsidedownwalrus said:


> I'm going to stop posting on this thread, it's all my fault



Don't, it's one of the best threads on the site! Or at least start one dedicated to old skool games.


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## upsidedownwalrus (Jul 9, 2009)

drcarnage said:


> Don't, it's one of the best threads on the site! Or at least start one dedicated to old skool games.



I think it's run its course now anyway


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## Infidel Castro (Jul 12, 2009)

On the OP, I was chatting to my lady's nephew this morning who's just bought Virtua Tennis 09 for the PS3.  He said how realsitic it was so I started waxing lyrical about how I prefer my games to look like games and not realistic, and that this was because of how games used to look on 8-bit and all that.  He seemed to understand to be fair!  I think the handhelds give give him a sense of gaming as it used to be graphically for me when I was his age.  

Away from the OP, I still think that the original Populous is my favourite game ever, above Worms, Lemmings, FFVII and whatever else I have loved (LMA Manager on PS1 and PS2, Everybody's Golf, Breath of Fire series, Diablo...).  I ripped it for the Sega Master System emulator a while ago and I just can't believe how good it still is.  I used to play it at the age of 16/17 listening to _Dummy_ by Portishead.  The atmos was nailed on!


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## dweller (Jul 12, 2009)

a couple of modern indie PC games that have cool simple graphics but with an imaginative edge are

Gumboy Crazy adventure





And yet it moves





hamsterball is a cool looking marble madness style game





ballance released by atari was another nice looking marble game


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## The Groke (Jul 13, 2009)

Back to graphics:

I bought Trine yesterday and I reckon it is the best looking game I have played all year. Side-scrolling, indie production and absolutely beautiful.






Cracking game too - plays like Prince of Persia crossed with the old SNES game, The Lost Vikings.


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## Barking_Mad (Jul 27, 2009)

Exile - originally on the BBC, but ported over on to the C64 and Amiga. 



> The game contains other characters to interact with as well as a physics model with gravity, inertia, mass, explosions, shockwaves, water, earth, wind, and fire. Energy is required to power the weapons and jetpack system, and needs to be collected throughout the game. Finn cannot die: when he reaches a point near death he is automatically teleported to safe locations previously reached and designated by the player, and ultimately back to his orbiting spaceship: consequently in many cases it is still possible to complete the game.
> 
> A major feature to this game is the enormous and detailed world it offered for exploration. This is achieved by generating the majority of the caverns and tunnels from a compact but highly tuned pseudorandom process - recreating the same world from the same seed each time - augmented with a few custom-defined areas. This structure was explained in the plot as the crew of the Pericles having set up a base in a natural cave system, with Triax having his own base in caves deep below.
> 
> Exile's programming featured innovative routines like creature strategy code that knew about noises nearby, line-of-sight vision through the divaricate caves and tunnels, and enemy's memory of where the target was last seen, etc.



All originally in 32k 


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exile_(arcade_adventure)


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