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Double Dragon: What would you fix?


DracIsBack

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Double Dragon is one of those games that, if I had the time and the know-how (or time to get the know-how), I would redo on the 7800. I LOVED this game in the arcade. I played it to death on many consoles and the PC back in the day.

 

On the 7800, this is one title that has always torn me. As a DD conversion, it's a complete disappointment to me. On the other hand, I still found it fun and play it on occasion, warts and all.

 

It was pretty cool to see the game on the 7800 back in the day but I was very disappointed in what came out in the end.

 

My gripes:

 

1. If ever a game had mixed graphics, IMO, it's this one.

 

I hate how the sprites look. No effort went into designing them at all. Jimmy looks like the bad guys. The Abobos are reused wrestlers from Title Match Wrestling. Just kludgy looking. Even the weapons look goofy.

 

Second, many of the backgrounds are subpar. The first level (and first impression) stands out as the weakest for me. I also hate most of the second level and am not fond of the fourth level. On the other hand, I actually think the third and fifth levels are done fairly well. It's also most two different guys worked on designing the different levels and this sucks. In particular, I *REALLY* hate the color choices in the first level. It's like - come on ... the 7800 has 256 colors and can put a bunch on screen at once. Did those awful combos have to be chosen in spots?

 

Third, in some levels, the scrolling is really sluggish and I don't think it needs to be. There are side scrollers on the 7800 that move more smoothly than this. Heck - some levels scroll better than others in this game.

 

 

2. Better music. Obviously, this one could use a POKEY. I don't think the music is bad for a 7800 game, but a POKEY would really help with the DD theme (ala Commando).

 

3. Finish the gameplay. This thing smacks of a short dev cycle to cut corners. Where are the moves (ala shoulder throws)? Where are the blocks and spears that come out of the wall? Why can't I throw a barrel if I want? Ugh. Why do the levels suddenly cut in and out in spots? Where is the elevator to take me down to the next level?

 

 

Just a few thoughts. While I've ready reviews saying that "Double Dragon pushed Maria", I really don't think it did. There are significantly better looking 7800 games (ie. Alien Brigade), better sounding 7800 games (ie. Commando) and this one smacks of "let's hire a cheap dev house to get it done FAST".

 

What would you do to improve Double Dragon?

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Edited by DracIsBack
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I agree with the music. I think the music could sound better with a pokey sound chip and have the level music sound closer to the arcade game as a result.

 

I would like to have the weapons in the arcade game to be added in the game. The weapons missing includes boxes, drums, rocks and dynamite.

 

The graphics need to be improve. There is bad animation on the weapons. The knife graphics suck. The knife looks like Cucumber.

 

The enemies look as bad as Dracisback mentioned.

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I suppose the artwork could use some improvement but knowing a little how the 7800 displays graphics, I think that's possibly the best anyone can do with DD. Sure it's possible to have more colors for characters but I'm not sure of that's practical. I suppose one can program the game to use a modified Genesis controller to have a third usable button.

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I suppose the artwork could use some improvement but knowing a little how the 7800 displays graphics, I think that's possibly the best anyone can do with DD. S

 

I think a lot of the issue is in the art direction of the game. Taking away how the graphics are put in the screen, the colors chosen are awful, in spots. (IMO). The perspective of the artwork is screwy in spots too. Many things look quickly rushed to design.

 

I really don't think that's the best anyone can do because there are better examples of graphics on the 7800 today. I mean seriously - ALIEN BRIGADE walks all over DD in a visual sense. Commando is a better conversion. Scrapyard Dog has better designed sprites and characters. Heck Electrocop was shaping up nicely too. Ditto for Chuck Norris: Missing In Action.

 

 

Imagineering didn't really dole out exceptional 7800 titles, IMO. A few were fun (DD and Ikari Warriors), many were outright crappy.

 

 

This wasn't BLUE SKY software. This wasn't Sculptured Software.

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Edited by DracIsBack
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I am a bit suprised that no one mentioned the 7800 version of Double Dragon needed more memory. Double Dragon needed to be a least 144k to have more weapons on each level of the game.

 

I think some of the weapons of the 7800 version of Double Dragon is missing due to space. I think it is possible that the programmers didn't the space to add some weapons or objects to use in the game. The tramiel family wasn't big on spending money on memory for 7800 games.

 

I remembered the other versions of the game has less weapons missing like the sms version being 256k game. The nes had most or all the weapons of the Arcade version. That is despite the fact the nes version of Double Dragon being different the arcade version.

Edited by 8th lutz
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May I ask where did you get those screenshots?

 

Double Dragon: Took 'em with a video capture device. For years, I've been toying around with really beefing up my 7800 site and have never had time. i have hundreds on my hard drive. I take them from a real 7800 as I hate the look of screen shots on emulator. They don't show as nice, IMO.

 

Electrocop: Was posted here a while back by Jetboot Jack, who was kind enough to post them after getting them from artist Amy Henning.

Edited by DracIsBack
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I see. I'm not a big fan of using JPG for video games screenshots because the format tends to add extra colors that don't exist in the original screen the shot came from and it's really difficult to rip sprite graphics because the "blurring" effect in JPGs.

 

Anyway, I got to ask you do know how the 7800 displays it's graphics?

 

From working on the B*nQ, I know character is limited to four colors. Since one of the colors is used as a mask, the three remaining colors can be used to color the character. Depending on what one is trying to make, this could be not a problem or a serious one. In the case of B*nQ, the four color limitation wasn't a problem until I was asked to design a certain character. This character could be done with four colors but the result was ugly. I sent in that design to Kenfused and he didn't like it. I told him that I need one extra color to make it look better. So he reprogrammed that character into 12 color mode. The result was that I had to edit some of the sprites to take advantage of the extra colors.

 

Another thing I learned about the 7800 displays it's sprites is that there's a height limitation on how tall any sprite can be. The width can be anything but the most the height can be is 16 pixel high. The characters you see in Double Dragon aren't one sprite at all but rather two sprites layers put together to give an illusion of one character. Abobo might be three sprites.

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I see. I'm not a big fan of using JPG for video games screenshots because the format tends to add extra colors that don't exist in the original screen the shot came from and it's really difficult to rip sprite graphics because the "blurring" effect in JPGs.

 

Anyway, I got to ask you do know how the 7800 displays it's graphics?

 

From working on the B*nQ, I know character is limited to four colors. Since one of the colors is used as a mask, the three remaining colors can be used to color the character. Depending on what one is trying to make, this could be not a problem or a serious one. In the case of B*nQ, the four color limitation wasn't a problem until I was asked to design a certain character. This character could be done with four colors but the result was ugly. I sent in that design to Kenfused and he didn't like it. I told him that I need one extra color to make it look better. So he reprogrammed that character into 12 color mode. The result was that I had to edit some of the sprites to take advantage of the extra colors.

 

Another thing I learned about the 7800 displays it's sprites is that there's a height limitation on how tall any sprite can be. The width can be anything but the most the height can be is 16 pixel high. The characters you see in Double Dragon aren't one sprite at all but rather two sprites layers put together to give an illusion of one character. Abobo might be three sprites.

Actually the sprites can be any height, but they will be usually in 8 pixel or 16 pixel chunks due to the way holey dma works. My engine in b*nQ made them 16 since the accommodates most of the sprites. A special case is made for the snake in that I tie two of "my" 16 pixel high sprites together. Width is also a function of the code but they will be some multiple of 4 pixels in the 160 wide modes.

Edited by kenfused
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I see. From what I can understand how the 7800 does it's graphics, it's seems to be similar to how the 5200 does it's graphics. Only with less colors and in a slightly larger screen width. Most 5200 games graphic wise, can be ported to the 7800. I did a mockup shot of what Gremlins might look like on the 7800.

 

Anyway to Drac's question, if the Double Dragon characters just use four colors it's just very difficult to make look interesting. Simple objects like b*nQ's red and green balls work well with just four colors. I suppose if one had to make the Double Dragon characters look better, the only ways as far as I can tell is use 12 color mode or stack two sprite layers together to create the illusion of single character. I remember 12 color mode has some limitations that prevent that that from being the answer to a better Double Dragon.

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I see. From what I can understand how the 7800 does it's graphics, it's seems to be similar to how the 5200 does it's graphics. Only with less colors and in a slightly larger screen width. Most 5200 games graphic wise, can be ported to the 7800. I did a mockup shot of what Gremlins might look like on the 7800.

 

 

Anyway to Drac's question, if the Double Dragon characters just use four colors it's just very difficult to make look interesting. Simple objects like b*nQ's red and green balls work well with just four colors. I suppose if one had to make the Double Dragon characters look better, the only ways as far as I can tell is use 12 color mode or stack two sprite layers together to create the illusion of single character. I remember 12 color mode has some limitations that prevent that that from being the answer to a better Double Dragon.

7800 screen width can be up to 160/320 pixels wide like the non-overscanned 5200 modes but it needs two display list entries to do so (128 is the limit with one entry).

One slight advantage the 5200 has with multicolor character mode is the ability to swap out one of the colors when the hi-bit is set which is one thing that could make porting a little less easy. You could use 12 color mode to compensate but then you would probably have to use double wide character mode and multiply your character codes by 2. Not much of an issue for writing new stuff, but might be if trying to do a quick port. The limited RAM doesn't help in porting stuff either.

 

12 color mode doesn't have too many limitations other than causing Maria to steal more cycles and make it so you have less on a line. The main limitations in b*nQ (when you did some of the characters for me) was you really didn't get 12 colors since some of the colors in palettes were being shared with other 3 color objects and some colors were replicated among them. So you were limited to a 12 color object taking its 12 colors that are already in use for the background, or 12 colors of which a lot were already in use for the balls and other objects.

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Talking about sprites with the 7800 is confusing because it really doesn't have any. I like to think of it has long but short in height film strips with each frame only eight or sixteen pixels(or what ever height you want) and either 160 or 320 in width. But instead of one frame on the screen at a time you have a bunch (depending on what height you choose) stacked on top of each other until you fill the screen.

 

The original Atari developers used NeoChrome on the Atari ST to do the art. Here's an example they gave you with some Robotron characters on it. I started playing around with Super Pacman characters at the beginning.

 

Maybe a visual example of the way the graphics vs. colors are laid out may help artist in designing graphics as well as anybody who wanted to program a better graphics program tailored to the 7800.

 

Allan

7800_SUPER_PAC_MAN.png.zip

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Edited by Allan
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Talking about sprites with the 7800 is confusing because it really doesn't have any. I like to think of it has long but short in height film strips with each frame only eight or sixteen pixels(or what ever height you want) and either 160 or 320 in width. But instead of one frame on the screen at a time you have a bunch (depending on what height you choose) stacked on top of each other until you fill the screen.

 

The original Atari developers used NeoChrome on the Atari ST to do the art. Here's an example they gave you with some Robotron characters on it. I started playing around with Super Pacman characters at the beginning.

 

Maybe a visual example of the way the graphics vs. colors are laid out may help artist in designing graphics as well as anybody who wanted to program a better graphics program tailored to the 7800.

 

Allan

 

Thanks, I think that pic is going to useful for me. It does remind of some Street Fighter II and Crystal Castle graphics I've seen. Except the tiles looked like pieces to puzzle. I do got a question of background titles and larger characters (like Karateka fighters). I remember the background titles are make the same way as the player characters, so wouldn't the background part resemble puzzle pieces.

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Talking about sprites with the 7800 is confusing because it really doesn't have any. I like to think of it has long but short in height film strips with each frame only eight or sixteen pixels(or what ever height you want) and either 160 or 320 in width. But instead of one frame on the screen at a time you have a bunch (depending on what height you choose) stacked on top of each other until you fill the screen.

 

The original Atari developers used NeoChrome on the Atari ST to do the art. Here's an example they gave you with some Robotron characters on it. I started playing around with Super Pacman characters at the beginning.

 

Maybe a visual example of the way the graphics vs. colors are laid out may help artist in designing graphics as well as anybody who wanted to program a better graphics program tailored to the 7800.

 

Allan

 

Thanks, I think that pic is going to useful for me. It does remind of some Street Fighter II and Crystal Castle graphics I've seen. Except the tiles looked like pieces to puzzle. I do got a question of background titles and larger characters (like Karateka fighters). I remember the background titles are make the same way as the player characters, so wouldn't the background part resemble puzzle pieces.

Somebody correct me if I'm wrong but the background and the characters are the same. You just have to keep track of where the characters and background are in your program so that when you move a character over background graphics you can re-draw the back ground when the character moves somewhere else. It's sort of like moving Players vertically on the 8-bits/5200. If you don't erase the top or bottom row (depending on which way your moving) you will continously leave a line behind you like a smear. On the 7800 if you don't redraw the background though (I think) you will just leave the background color and erase your graphic background. Hopefully that made sense.

 

Allan

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On the 7800 you are just giving it a list of objects to display in any particular zone. each zone has a list of objects to display for that zone and they will be drawn on top of each other in the order they are displayed. A zone is typically 8 or 16 pixels high because of how holey dma works. So if you want a "sprite" to have a lower priority than background objects you have it first, then the background, the sprites you want in the foreground. Each zone is one entry in the display list list. Each entry in that zone is a display list entry. The only limit to what you can display is what Maria is capable of pumping out in a zone, and that you have time to manipulate the display list entries.

 

So lets say you are using 8 pixel high zones. If you are displaying a "sprite" that is 16 pixels high, it will have an entry in two or three zones (two only if it exactly aligns with a zone). In each entry you are able to tell it the offset in the sprite to stop pulling data. The top and bottom are then clipped appropriately by holey dma. I suppose a picture would be worth a 1000 words, but I have to head off to work at this moment. I keep meaning to create a minimal program to move an object around but have never gotten around to it.

 

 

--Ken

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  • 6 years later...

3. Finish the gameplay. This thing smacks of a short dev cycle to cut corners. Where are the moves (ala shoulder throws)? Where are the blocks and spears that come out of the wall? Why can't I throw a barrel if I want? Ugh. Why do the levels suddenly cut in and out in spots? Where is the elevator to take me down to the next level?

 

 

Honestly I'd be ok if every Double Dragon ever removed these cheap bits.

 

Let's take the god awful platforming of DD 1 & 2 out while we're at it!

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Better character graphics, audio that supports a POKEY or YM2151, HSC support… Yep, that would do it.

 

To add to that better game-play. If/Since that is all being tackled, might as well improve the background graphics as well...LOL.

 

Seriously, 7800 Double Dragon is one of those poorly ported games that gives some people the impression or belief, and the misrepresentation, that the 7800 is just a slightly better 2600 system. You take a look/play of this game and then something like Alien Brigade (1990), Ninja Golf (1990), Commando (1989), and it's hard to believe this was released for the same system late in 1989. This is one title that really would need to be remade completely.

 

IMHO, if this was ever tackled, the developer(s) would probably be better off just creating a port of the sequel, Double Dragon II instead.

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Groovybee did a mockup of the title screen of double dragon on the 7800. I forget it was in some in some special graphic mode that I never heard of..

And we have had lots on character mockups done before. Actually I think this thread should be linked to at least one other thread excatly like this. Heres a fun game try and find the threads I am yapping about.. or not.. but I bet trebor will..

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