Lucasfilm Games PAL vs NTSC

[Heaven/TQA]

i was just playing in NTSC mode Rescue on fractalus and was suprised by its speed as i was playing for more than 20 years the PAL one. are the lucasfilm games localised and patched for NTSC/PAL or are they NTSC only?

[Ross PK]

They must have been in PAL as well because I've played their games over here in Britain on my A8.

[Pengwin]

I have the cartridge version of Rescue on Fractalus, but it doesn't mention whether it's PAL or NTSC. I used to have the tape version back in the 80's and I don't recall anything about PAL on that either.

[Rybags]

It's been a while since I've played it, but doesn't that game (and Koronis Rift) run it's engine like a modern FPS, ie - it does movement calculations in realtime, then just keeps re-rendering the environment at whatever rate the machine happens to be capable of?

[Tickled_Pink]

There were different versions, even for PAL. The cassette version of Rescue on Fractalus was faster than either the disk or ROM (I think) versions. The ROM version was basically the disk version. The first one I had was the tape and it started off at a slightly faster speed and got harder quicker (also didn't have the intro) ... you could only select up to level 16 when you first load it. On disk and ROM, you can select up to level 32.

[Heaven/TQA]

just grab f.e. @ atarimania the us XE cart... and run it in atari800win in pal or ntsc. the msx is played faster on ntsc... but i am not sure if that is the "correct" version of the soundtrack f.e. as pal guys do only know "the slow version"... and the ntsc version plays faster without any gfx glitches which is a sign for ntsc as well.

 

lucasfilm were possessed by details so i am still wonder if they made pal adaptations.

 

what do the US boys here think?

[Rybags]

Is there any reference to the PAL register in the game code? (new install here, much stuff still missing)

[www.atarimania.com]

lucasfilm were possessed by details so i am still wonder if they made pal adaptations.

Lucasfilm Games only developed the game and sold the rights to Epyx after Atari blew it. You'd need to know if the team still had the rights for a release outside North America. Just my two cents...

 

--

Atari Frog

http://www.atarimania.com

[emkay]

Funny paradoxon:

On the 60Hz ATARI, that has lower cpu cycles per frame available, the game is faster.

On the 50Hz ATARI, that has more cycles per frame available, the game is slower.

Well, seems the frames are calculated at (VBI Speed)/x

If the 60Hz machine was fully used for frame calculations, the 50Hz machine has (around) ~20% CPU time available.

 

The 50/60Hz difference explains oftenly, why some games in 50Hz are unplayable, some are boring, and some are too easy. It's almost timing based on 60Hz.

[Heaven/TQA]

emkay. this was a suprise for me, too...

[ijor]

are the lucasfilm games localised and patched for NTSC/PAL or are they NTSC only?

 

They are localised. The original releases are NTSC versions, and the Uk releases are PAL. I don't know exactly if and how all aspects were adapted. But the music clearly was. The music sounds right if the system and version matches, and sounds incorrectly if it doesn't.

 

My guess (and not much more than a guess) is that the "PAL adaptation" was done later at the Uk, and not by Lucasfilm.