Iron Soldier vs. Metalhead

[Rick Dangerous]

Battle of the early 90's Mechs!!

 

So I got Metalhead recently for my 32x and found it to be quite fun, fast, easy to control, and just generally playable. I thought the graphics were particularly good and had the appearance of texture mapping (though I don't think that was the case as Darxide was the only texture mapped 32x game.)

 

My first experience with IS was not nearly as pleasant. I found it to be slow, blocky, and confusing. I realize that it's get better the more time you put into it, and the explosions are cool and a few of the other effects.

 

How do people think these tow stack up against one another 20 years later? Right now I find Metalhead to be more FUN, but i'm open to arguments that IS is a better deeper game. Would love to hear people's opinions on this.

 

IS:

Metalhead:

[Lost Dragon]

Going purely off memory (and it's been some years since i played either):

Iron Solider simply NAILED the feeling of being in an all-powerful Mech for myself, Tanks were like ants beneath my feet, helicopters, mere gnats to be swatted aside.weapons simply felt right, whole thing just felt wonderous (Iron Solider 3 which i recently fired up again on PS1, looked nicer, but played far too hard).Graphics i loved also, sure Metal Head looked 'nicer' in still shots, but it did'nt 'lessen' Jaguar I.S for me.

Few years after i quit Jag scene, i picked up a MD+32X, Metal Head was 1 of the 1st titles i bought for it...to quote Robocop, Dick, i'm very dissapointed....

Texture-mapping looked superb and i know Mech games are all about being in a lumbering beast, but game seemed to play at a sloth like pace, never felt anything like way Iron Solider held together.

I'd take the Jag mech game any day, Metal head was all fur coat and no knickers for myself.

[Rick Dangerous]

 

game seemed to play at a sloth like pace, never felt anything like way Iron Solider held together.

 

 

This part I don't get, because for me it's the opposite. IS you are crawling around at a snails pace and MH you can boogie, there is even a "run" button so to speak..

[Lost Dragon]

:-) Like i say it's been years since i played either.Just to clarify a tad, i'm talking more along lines that i never felt a sense of...'urgency' in Metal Head that i did in Iron Soldier (not so much refering to frame rates of each).Just seemed to lack any real punch to missions etc.

 

I guess i went in woith somewhat unfair expectations, as i'd seen C+VG score it higher than Iron Solider, Mean Machines etc rave about it, so was expecting it to blow Iron Solider clean away, it did'nt, nor did it hold my attention anywhere near as long as I.S.

[MAYAman]

IS is the much better game, I just played Metal Head about 3 months ago and IS is def just the more "realistic" mech game by far.

 

Do any homebrew devs or songbird or someone have the talent to even create a game that looks like Iron Soldier? Or is this just to much of an undertaking?

Edited September 19, 2014 by MAYAman

[ZylonBane]

Judging by the YouTube videos, Metal Head is a mech game in name only. It looks and plays more like a Wolfenstein 3D clone where the walls are textured to look like buildings and your enemies are low-poly models instead of sprites.

[Lost Dragon]

Do later levels on Metal Head 'open-up' or are you restrictred to being funnelled through corridors of tower blocks? (as i said been years since i played it, did'nt rate it, at all, so spent little time on it).At least in I.S i could stomp where i wanted, knock down punny buildings in my way kinda like a Mecha-Hulk. Did Metal Head offer same level of destructable scenary (if any?).If not, thing reviewers at time were somewhat blinded by the texture-mapping.

 

Recal C+VG moaning I.S only had a text briefing screen, which came across as really petty nit-picking...

[+save2600]

 

Do any homebrew devs or songbird or someone have the talent to even create a game that looks like Iron Soldier? Or is this just to much of an undertaking?

Coming not so soon for Jaguar CD: Iron Soldier 4...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

...the puzzle game.

[Chilly Willy]

Battle of the early 90's Mechs!!

 

So I got Metalhead recently for my 32x and found it to be quite fun, fast, easy to control, and just generally playable. I thought the graphics were particularly good and had the appearance of texture mapping (though I don't think that was the case as Darxide was the only texture mapped 32x game.)

Metalhead IS texture mapped, it's just 2.5D raycast texture mapping instead of 3D polygonal texture mapping.

 

I rather like Metalhead. It's fairly simple, but most of the first gen 32X titles are as well. If only we'd have gotten some 2nd gen 32X titles...

 

I've never played Iron Soldier, so I can't compare them. I'll try to play it some time and see how I like it.

[Willard]

I should try and find my copy of metal head, have it around here somewhere but didn't really like it. From what I recall the popup was so bad you come to rely on the map which also has limited range - so you could be walking between two rows of buildings then a building pops up right in front of you and its' a dead end. That and the levels are maze-like and simplistic like a bad FPS with mechs. And the graphics are extremely crude. At least, that's my vague recollection of the time I spent with the game.

 

I didn't really like Iron Soldier the first time I played it, but after giving it another chance a little while later I liked it enough to play through the whole game. IS has a lot of variety among the levels and missions, and the draw distance is never an issue. The speed of the game initially bothered me too, but I became more comfortable with it as I played more. The cities are a much smaller scale than your mech so even when you are moving slowly you are actually travelling through the city pretty fast - contrast this with metal head where you are much smaller than the buildings and you have to travel faster to get the same distance. Also since your speed holds constant in iron soldier you can look around while travelling forward, which is extremely useful when picking off enemies, but you aren't going fast enough that you have to worry about crashing into buildings unless you are being careless. Overall I think IS has a good balance.

 

Might have to dig out metal head and give it another try, but my recollection of it is that the game is so bad I don't think it'd help much.

Edited September 21, 2014 by Willard

[Rex Dart]

They both have their positives. Metal Head is quick and arcade-y, like Namco's tank games, or Robot Tank. Iron Soldier was far more in-depth, like somebody had shrunk Mech Warrior 2 down to fit the hardware (and 3+12 button gamepad).

 

All I know is that I'd play a game named "Iron Soldier vs. Metalhead"

[ZylonBane]

Metalhead IS texture mapped, it's just 2.5D raycast texture mapping instead of 3D polygonal texture mapping.

No, it's full polygonal texture mapping. If you look closely at the walls and floors you can see warping artifacts characteristic of software texture mapping algorithms of the time. And, the game allows you to switch to an overhead view, which would be impossible to render with a raycaster.

[guSTaw]

Krazy Ivan vs...Phase zero?

 

Edited September 21, 2014 by guSTaw

[Otto1980]

Metalhead IS texture mapped, it's just 2.5D raycast texture mapping instead of 3D polygonal texture mapping.

 

 

 

How you see that? looks for me linke standard texture technics for me

[JagChris]

Krazy Ivan vs...Phase zero?

 

 

Krazy Ivan comes off kind of goofy. Not just the acting. The play mechanics as well.

[Chilly Willy]

How you see that? looks for me linke standard texture technics for me

I don't see it - looks like standard Wolf style raycasting to me... maybe RotT rendering. I don't see anything that screams affine texture warping... perhaps you can suggest a screengrab that demonstrates affine warping.

[JagChris]

Looks like bitmaps to me.

 

[Chilly Willy]

Okay, I take it back. I played Metalhead and paid attention when I got close to buildings, especially at angles. It's using polygons - probably quads. In that case, I'm fairly impressed by the speed, but it would have probably been faster with less pop-up if they had used raycasting instead. The game certainly didn't need to be 3D polys.

[Otto1980]

Okay, I take it back. I played Metalhead and paid attention when I got close to buildings, especially at angles. It's using polygons - probably quads. In that case, I'm fairly impressed by the speed, but it would have probably been faster with less pop-up if they had used raycasting instead. The game certainly didn't need to be 3D polys.

 

i was also impressed but then came to my mind that most jaguar games have much more colorfull textures (AVP and Hoverstrike especially) and i think also on the color vatiations..

(compare bc racers vs atarikarts) and you see what i think about

 

however.. i think its much more effort to calculate a 3d texture with very limited colors (maybe 8bit or less, clut or so, like metalhead) instead of a well shaded (and maybe 16Bit Cry depth) color texture like hoverstrike CD for example

 

i think metalhead COULD look much better on jag

[ZylonBane]

It's using polygons - probably quads. In that case, I'm fairly impressed by the speed...

I'm not, considering the incredibly short draw distance they used.

[NeoGeoNinja]

Never seen Metal Head before. Looks alright.

 

Iron Soldier destroys it though. Esp. IS2...

Edited September 22, 2014 by NeoGeoNinja

[sd32]

Yeah Iron Soldier all the way to me. One of the first games were i felt like i was inside a virtual reality type world, and plus gave you the feeling of really being inside a huge mech. Was there any PC mech simulator back in 1994 as good and impressive as Iron Soldier?

Metal Head just felt generic to me, decent game though. I remember magazined BITD being really impressed with IS, and not very much with Metal Head.

[ZylonBane]

Was there any PC mech simulator back in 1994 as good and impressive as Iron Soldier?

"This is HQ to any available units. We have mechs down at nav gamma."

 

Yeah yeah, 1995, not 1994. Earthsiege was out in 1994 but never seemed as popular.

[Video]

I LOVE IS a lot. I got it was one of my first Jag games (of course, I got mine in 96 or so, instead of day one) I got the IS2 cart when it finally came out, and it was well worth it IMO, just, for the number of available games and high cost, I never could bring myself to get a jag cd.

 

As far as old mech games, what about Mech warrior? I was blown away by that for the genesis, and got it for the SNES and was sorely disappointed (it was a 2d top down game on snes where the genny was a 3D polygonal game) I was expecting an FX chip 3D game, eh, oh well. I still loved the genny game, and played it till the video rental place sold it (should have bought it myself, and would have, had I known how hard it would be to come by down the road, one of the few games I can recall (that I wanted) that never got down to the price of dirt)

 

Anyhow, IS, IS awesome. I still regularly play it. Never played Metalhead 9never even heard of it till this topic) but same thing there, never did get a 32X addon, though I may have to see about that someday, same with jag cd.

[+CyranoJ]

Abbreviating Iron Soldier probably just got you on a watch list