Games that push the Jag

[Tyrant]

Having just gone out and bought Kasumi Ninja and Checkered Flag, and been somewhat unimpressed by their quality (but I did get the headband, and it only cost me 11 pounds for both hehe), I was wondering, just how many games use the Jaguar to full potential? Obviously Tempest2k makes great use of it, but I cant think of any other game that I have that really makes good use of the hardware.

 

What games would you guys say really make the best use of the machine, and show off with the quality of graphics / speed? Obviously gameplay is very important too, but I suspect a big part of the Jag's downfall was that most of the games look only slightly better than on 16bit machines. Kasumi Ninja could easily be mistaken for Mortal Kombat, and Checkered Flag looks only mildly better than No Second Prize on the ST (well ok, quite a bit better, but not as good as it could have been im sure).

[The Helper]

The only game that really comes close to pushing the Jag is Battlesphere. A lot of games look like they push the Jag because there frame rates drop horribly but its just poor programming.

 

I really like Battlemorph for the Jag CD - it has great gameplay and great graphics for its time - I don't know how much it pushes the Jag though.

 

Many Jaguar developers decided to use the 68000 Genesis like processor for a bunch of quick ports which is really sad because it land mines the Jaguar library with these games that are no better than a genesis version.

[Albert]

I haven't had a chance to spend a lot of time with my Jaguar collection yet, but it does seem that the power of the underlying Jaguar hardware was only tapped by a few games. Certainly BattleSphere is probably the most advanced Jaguar game, but it was also in development for a long time. Given the stories I've read about how difficult it is to fully exploit the Jaguar hardware, I'm not really surprised that we saw a lot of straight ports from other systems (like the Genesis) that didn't make use of the Jaguar's superior hardware.

 

Tempest 2000 is a fast-paced game and is pretty impressive visually (and audibly), or at least it was at the time, but I doubt it comes even close to what the Jaguar is capable of.

 

..Al

[Tyrant]

Its a real shame then that BS is so expensive. Have you thought about adding a programing section to Jag part of the site? There is a load of info out there about Jag programing, but its really hard to track down, it would make a nice adition to put together a well organised collection of docs, maybe even try to get some people who've had expierence writing comercial games to write some stuff. Im not really going too off topic here since Im sure with a lot of docs and support people could write new really high spec games, and unfortunatly there arnt any good sources of info that I've yet found.

[Albert]

quote:

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Originally posted by Tyrant:

Have you thought about adding a programing section to Jag part of the site? There is a load of info out there about Jag programing, but its really hard to track down, it would make a nice adition to put together a well organised collection of docs, maybe even try to get some people who've had expierence writing comercial games to write some stuff.

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Absolutely, a Jaguar programming section is going to happen here. In fact, I'd like to get programming sections done for all the systems we currently have sections for, plus systems we add in the future (like the Lynx). I just haven't taken the time yet to track down all the Jaguar programming info, and there is quite a bit of information floating around out there. After I move this upcoming week I'll start working on a programming section, I'm glad you asked about it! I'll gladly enlist any help in tracking such information down.

 

..Al

[Tyrant]

quote:

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Originally posted by Albert:

I'll gladly enlist any help in tracking such information down.

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Consider me drafted then hehe, I allready have quite a few links saved, I'll have another dig arround when I wake up and stick a bunch of links in an email for you.

 

Oh, and just a thought, but have you considered putting a short summery page on each machine's... when you enter a section. Its obviously your site, but if it was mine, I'd put up a little short page giving a quick summery of the machine, its specs, history, etc. rather than just jumping into the rarity guide, I'd put a little preface intro in there.

 

[ 11-04-2001: Message edited by: Tyrant ]

[The Helper]

Here is all my research into this subject

http://dmoz.org/Games/Video_Games/Console_...oper_Resources/

 

There is a lot more out there I am sure but this is a good start.

[Gunstar]

Even ScataLOGIC, the new name of the development&publishing team formerly known as 4play, the makers of Battlesphere, say that if they had rewritten the graphic "engine" code for Battlesphere and had more time to optimise, they could have doubled the polygons per second in Battlesphere. I think with this optimization it could have even been fully texture mapped. Anyhow, the general concensus from many discussions that I have seen is that even a game like BS, which is one of the few that uses a lot of th Jag's power, is only using about 60% (give or take 10-15%) of the Jag's 3D power. A lot of it's power is hard to tap, because of some system bugs that have to be worked around. Although, there is far better documentation on the Jaguar and it's bugs now, than even the pros had when designing games for Atari. It is time some worthy programmer(s) took it upon themselves to spend their extra time making the "system pusher" now that most bugs and fixes or ways around them are documented. Anyone feel like giving up a couple years of their spare time too get started? I'm an artist, and although I've never used any of the tools/programs used to make graphics/textures on the Jag, if I was donated the proper programs to help in development, I would be honored to be an artist on the project (I'm good, traditionally speaking). I could learn whatever is needed to learn in developmental art programs. Any takers (on the challenge of developing a game-not necessarily including me in the project)?

[Tyrant]

Well I will definatly want to be writing code for the Jag eventually, however I need a good few months of study at least before I even get close to being ready to code small things. I would also like to get a real alpine board to work on (Could one develop on a flash cart? obvously it wouldnt have interactive debuging, but it could work, right?)

 

I think tho the best idea is to try and talk a pro developer (one of the Batlesphere ppl maybe?) to write a shortish text on the subject, as well as getting hold of the official atari docs, which I think I saw a little while ago.

[Albert]

quote:

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Originally posted by Tyrant:

[QB]Oh, and just a thought, but have you considered putting a short summery page on each machine's... when you enter a section. Its obviously your site, but if it was mine, I'd put up a little short page giving a quick summery of the machine, its specs, history, etc. rather than just jumping into the rarity guide, I'd put a little preface intro in there.

---

 

This is actually exactly how we had the site setup initially. You'd click on one of the systems (2600, 5200, 7800) and you'd be brougth to a page like this. We decided that while people wouldn't mind seeing this once or twice, it gets tedious after a while when what you're really after is the rarity guide. So we moved these "history" pages for each system to their own separate page, and then linked that page in the navigation bar to the left.

 

Besides being more convenient for users, another consideration was the amount of bandwidth we were using. Having that page come up *every single time* when someone just wanted to get to the rarity guide was a waste of bandwidth. Of course, we ended up replacing that page with a rarity Search page instead, but that had to be done to give people more flexibility in searching through all the titles we have online.

 

..Al

[Albert]

Just wanted to thank you guys for your enthusiasm for setting up a Jaguar Development section. It would be nice to host some information here on AtariAge, but I'm sure a good deal of the it will be offsite, judging by the DMOZ links I looked at. It's nice to see that there's lots of cool Jaguar programming information out there!

 

..Al

[Songbird]

quote:

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Originally posted by The Helper:

The only game that really comes close to pushing the Jag is Battlesphere.

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There are a number of games that push the Jaguar. Obviously, I can't really speak to which ones were coded "the best" and sometimes it's not apples to apples comparisons, because it all depends on what the game is trying to do. Does a polygon game "push the Jag" better than a really intense 2D game with large and/or many sprites?

 

Here are some of the best "push the Jag" games for 3D/polygons:

 

BattleMorph

BattleSphere

Iron Soldier 1 and (especially) 2

Fight For Life

Skyhammer

Missile Command 3D

 

Some other games that also push the Jag, but more with sprites and/or 2D:

 

Protector

Super Burnout

Atari Karts

NBA Jam

 

Pick up some of these games, and you won't likely be disappointed.

[Tyrant]

Thanks for the info. I'll go pick up some of them. With hindsight, what d'you think the effect on sales would have been if Atari hadnt included a 68000 in the Jag? There would have been less games initially, but developers would have been forced to use the hardware properly and make games that were visually impressive and make a real impact in gamers minds.

 

Discuss.

[Songbird]

quote:

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Originally posted by Glenn Saunders:

2D games don't really push the hardware the way 3D games do. There few Jag games that are hampered by 2D slowdown whereas Battlesphere is probably the only 3D game in the entire catalog that _doesn't_ have a jerky framerate (by today's standards).

---

 

It all depends on what your definition of "pushing" is, I guess. There's no doubt that smooth, visually pleasing 3D is more difficult to develop on the Jag than smooth, visually pleasing 2D, but that doesn't necessarily guarantee that the more complex 3D code has more going on simultaneously than the 2D code, which is one way to define complexity.

 

Certainly, I would never try to compare any of the 16-bit ports (Raiden, FP Soccer, Flashback, and so on) to a game like BattleSphere or Iron Soldier 2 in terms of pushing the Jag, but OTOH I do know for a fact that the Protector code does use the 68K, DSP, and GPU in tandem, and pushes the Jag a LOT harder than most (if not all) of the 16-bit ports.

 

The most impressive 3D games on the Jag, in terms of speed, textures, size of playable area, etc., would have to be:

 

Iron Soldier 2 (wins my vote for best-looking 3D Jag game)

BattleSphere (can also network up to 16 consoles -- very impressive!)

BattleMorph (nice large areas to explore, some textures, but also some obvious sprites mixed in)

[Atari-Jess]

i really have to agree with songbird on that, i mean i dont have any of the games (or any jag games (yet hint hint)) but from countless screen shots, reviews, specs and the like, i really thing songbird has it to the three he mentioned.

[Gunstar]

quote:

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Originally posted by Glenn Saunders:

I just think the hardware potential of a console is of little importance if no games express that potential.

 

This is obviously true, so I guess the Jaguar has never used it's full potential, hey, I already said that!

 

It's easy to claim that BS only uses 60% of the system's potential, but it's hard to prove it by showing an example of the system using 100%.

 

The developers that had this so called "5 years" experience are the ones who initially said this, they should know.

 

If it takes 5 years to write a game for the Jag that exploits 60% of the system's potential then it's utterly impractical to write a game that reaches 100%.

 

This is just not true. It took 5 years for the game to be released, but this in NO WAY implies that it was under development for five years, it had been finished for quite a while, AND they worked on it PART TIME, which means that they put the same amount of hours into it's development that any full time development house would have done in probably about a year and a half to two years.

 

That's why I'd rather benchmark the system against Battlesphere than some theoretical maximum.

 

This would be logical since you are right in having any other benck mark except maybe Battlemorph or Iron Soldier or Skyhammer.

 

2D games don't really push the hardware the way 3D games do. There few Jag games that are hampered by 2D slowdown whereas Battlesphere is probably the only 3D game in the entire catalog that _doesn't_ have a jerky framerate (by today's standards).

 

Battlemorph, Iron Soldier 1&2, Missle Command 3d, DOOM and several others all have very respectable frame rates. Rayman, SuperBurnout and Skiing&Snowboarding all run at 60fps!

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[mos6507]

>>

Battlemorph, Iron Soldier 1&2, Missle Command 3d, DOOM and several others all have very respectable frame rates. Rayman, SuperBurnout and Skiing&Snowboarding all run at 60fps!<<

 

In today's terms, any 3D game that runs below 30fps is not an acceptable framerate. I'm not sure any other Jag game besides BS matches BS.

 

2D framerates aren't much to be proud of anymore. Consoles are judged based on their 3D performance. 2D was pretty much "perfected" by the time the Saturn came out.

[mos6507]

I just think the hardware potential of a console is of little importance if no games express that potential.

 

It's easy to claim that BS only uses 60% of the system's potential, but it's hard to prove it by showing an example of the system using 100%.

 

If it takes 5 years to write a game for the Jag that exploits 60% of the system's potential then it's utterly impractical to write a game that reaches 100%.

 

That's why I'd rather benchmark the system against Battlesphere than some theoretical maximum.

 

2D games don't really push the hardware the way 3D games do. There few Jag games that are hampered by 2D slowdown whereas Battlesphere is probably the only 3D game in the entire catalog that _doesn't_ have a jerky framerate (by today's standards).

[someguy]

Games that "show case" the Jaguar's abilities:

 

Missile Command 3D does an excellent job of showing off the Jaggy's 3D abilities, and is a fun game to boot.

Iron Soldier 1 & 2, DOOM, AvP, Tempest, Defender, Atari Karts, Protector, CyberMorph/BattleMorph, Power Drive Rally are carts I recommend.

[Gunstar]

quote:

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Originally posted by Glenn Saunders:

>>

Battlemorph, Iron Soldier 1&2, Missle Command 3d, DOOM and several others all have very respectable frame rates. Rayman, SuperBurnout and Skiing&Snowboarding all run at 60fps!<<

 

In today's terms, any 3D game that runs below 30fps is not an acceptable framerate. I'm not sure any other Jag game besides BS matches BS.

 

2D framerates aren't much to be proud of anymore. Consoles are judged based on their 3D performance. 2D was pretty much "perfected" by the time the Saturn came out.

---

 

Well, if the Jaguar had been released recently, then I would agree with you; I'm not trying to compare any of the Jag's games to today's games. Back when the Jag came out the standard, even on the PC, was 15-20 frames per second which is as fast or faster than 8mm film, and was very respectable for the time. Some of those Jaguar games I believe get as high as 24-25 frames per second (e.g.,Iron Soldier 2) which is the same speed as 35mm theatre quality film. The smoother the framerate, the better, but 15-24 frames per second is fast enough to "fool" most people's visual perception of fluid motion and that is good enough for me when we are talking about an eight year old system. I also feel that the 2D IS relevent when discussing a console this old as 2d was still the most common form of game at the time. At best I compare the Jaguar to it's counter parts of the same era including the 3DO, Saturn and Playstation. It held it's own at the time when comparing the 2nd generation Jag&3do games to the 1st generation Saturn&Playstation games. If it had lasted longer and had the same kind of support from top developers, I think it could have held it's own through second generation PS and Saturn games. But that's something that is moot.

Another thing to keep in mind as to the question "if" the Jag could do better than Battlesphere, remember that technically this was a first generation title done by a brand new development team, part time, with practically NO budget and the first time working with the Jaguar, with poor to no development documentation. There is more available to us now, that they had back then, even when Atari was in business. So what do you think could have been done by an experienced, top development house if the funds and time were poured into Jaguar development even into 2nd and 3rd generation titles?