What is the 7800 really capable of?

[Zap!]

I'll make a demo when I finally finish with the 8 bit pacman demo

I'm still waiting 6 years later lol!

[DracIsBack]

 

Actually, the SMS has a 64 color palette compared to the 7800's 256 color palette; indeed though, the SMS puts more colors on screen at one time than either the NES or 7800.

 

Yeah - I remember reading different things about the SMS and to this day, wasn't sure which was right. When the SMS 1 came out, it was advertised as having 64. Around the time of the SMS II, it was advertised as having 256. To this day, the info varies on the internet. For example.

Edited July 18, 2014 by DracIsBack

[gamecat80]

@ Trebor:

 

Thanks for posting vids of what the 7800 is really capable of

 

 

Sega Master System resolution = 256x192(224)

 

The majority of 7800 games = 160x240

 

The 7800 also handles resolution = 320x240 - 'usually' with a very limited color palette.

However, with some 'tricks', it handles 320x240 like this:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JNU1iJzfPFA

 

Now you've seen a 7800 game running a (even) higher resolution mode that the SMS pulled off.

 

 

Damn impressive! That example shows the 7800 with true arcade-quality 8-bit graphics and sound.

 

 

Exactly. Here's an amazing homebrew done within only 144KB. A POKEY chip is included for sound. It contains impressive graphics including parallax scrolling in numerous level rounds without requiring any additional graphics hardware support:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x0zXvBwA1fE

Seeing a game like this under the 7800, one may conclude that it can 'hold its own' against the SMS.

 

And that example of Bentley Bear shows the 7800 is capable of graphics and sound at least on-par with the SMS!

 

 

It almost makes me sick to my stomach how Warner and Tramiel completely screwed the 7800 in so many ways...

[Trebor]

 

Yeah - I remember reading different things about the SMS and to this day, wasn't sure which was right. When the SMS 1 came out, it was advertised as having 64. Around the time of the SMS II, it was advertised as having 256. To this day, the info varies on the internet. For example.

One of the things that can drive you nuts with the internet...The amount of misinformation. This is in addition to Sega being great with 'over selling' at times...i.e. "Blast Processing"...which actually did exist, but was really just a fancy marketing term for DMA under the Genesis/MD.

 

Regardless, always best to test with real hardware for the actual results

[Lynxpro]

@ Trebor:

 

Thanks for posting vids of what the 7800 is really capable of

 

 

Damn impressive! That example shows the 7800 with true arcade-quality 8-bit graphics and sound.

 

 

And that example of Bentley Bear shows the 7800 is capable of graphics and sound at least on-par with the SMS!

 

 

It almost makes me sick to my stomach how Warner and Tramiel completely screwed the 7800 in so many ways...

 

Warner didn't screw the 7800 up; GCC designed it not to have a POKEY standard so they could sell Warner/Atari their own designed GUMBY with each cartridge!

 

It was Atari Corp - Tramiel - that chose not to release the 7800 with the High Score Cartridge, the 7800 Keyboard/the AtariLab 7800 cartridge and other A8 accessories, the ProLine Joystick Coupler, the LaserDisc player, etc. It was Tramiel who didn't get a licensing agreement hammered down with Atari Games. It was Tramiel who didn't get the AMY sound chip completed so it could've been used in 7800 cartridges, the ST, the 65XEM, or any other future computers or game systems. It was also Tramiel who failed to gain the Sega Genesis for North America too.

 

Now, had Warner kept Atari Inc together, we don't know how long the 7800 would've been around as the flagship game system. They were going to release the Amiga as a high end game system for Christmas 1985.

It would've ushered in 16-bit console gaming a good 3 years before Sega ultimately did so for us.

[Lost Dragon]

@Trebor:Re:Sega being great over-selling:Tell me about it, C+VG in an early news piece on the then upcoming Saturn claimed it'd have a 64 Bit GPU and there was a Japanese TV advert for Saturn advertising it as a 64 Bit System.Also prior to the release of the Dreamcast, Sega were telling the press all DC games would run at 60 FPS.

 

Mind you they are all just as bad, prior to N64 release Nintendo were claiming you would'nt see any misting or fogging let alone pop-up in 3D games on the N64, shuch was the power of the hardware....

[mos6507]

The other thing often mentioned has to do with cart capacities. During the late 80s, CPUs were still slow but chips were getting cheaper and higher capacity. But the 7800 catalog was filled with a lot of leftover Warner launch titles from 1984 and the new ones were lower capacity carts compared to Nintendo and Sega. That's why there was a lack of scrollers in the 7800 catalog--they needed a lot of cart memory.

[Trebor]

That's why there was a lack of scrollers in the 7800 catalog--they needed a lot of cart memory.

 

Bentley Bear's Crystal Quest containing a whopping 48 total rounds, including parallax scrolling in many of them, is the same size as Alien Brigade and Crossbow.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x0zXvBwA1fE

 

A slightly smaller comparable scrolling game could be made fitting the same size of: Ace of Aces, Barnyard Blaster, Basketbrawl, Commando, Crack'ed, Dark Chambers, Fatal Run, Fight Night, Ikari Warriors, Impossible Mission, Jinks, Mat Mania Challenge, Mean 18 Ultimate Golf, Meltdown, Midnight Mutants, Motor Psycho, Ninja Golf, Planet Smashers, Scrapyard Dog, Summer Games, Touchdown Football, Winter Games, Xenophobe.

 

Well over 1/3 of the 7800 retail library contains cartridge sizes able to handle a scrolling platform game with ease.

[mos6507]

Today's homebrewers can do more than they could back then because the tools are better, understanding of the hardware is better, there's better knowledge-sharing, and more time and effort is put into each game. So I would not have expected a game like Bentley Bear to have appeared in 1986, and if it did, it would have required more memory. The one business decision the Tramiels could have made to make 7800 games better was to push for larger carts, but as you know, the Tramiels were cheap.

[Lynxpro]

 

Bentley Bear's Crystal Quest containing a whopping 48 total rounds, including parallax scrolling in many of them, is the same size as Alien Brigade and Crossbow.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x0zXvBwA1fE

 

A slightly smaller comparable scrolling game could be made fitting the same size of: Ace of Aces, Barnyard Blaster, Basketbrawl, Commando, Crack'ed, Dark Chambers, Fatal Run, Fight Night, Ikari Warriors, Impossible Mission, Jinks, Mat Mania Challenge, Mean 18 Ultimate Golf, Meltdown, Midnight Mutants, Motor Psycho, Ninja Golf, Planet Smashers, Scrapyard Dog, Summer Games, Touchdown Football, Winter Games, Xenophobe.

 

Well over 1/3 of the 7800 retail library contains cartridge sizes able to handle a scrolling platform game with ease.

 

 

Mat Mania Challenge is an abomination. It's the Club Drive of 7800 games. It plays nothing like the arcade originals [Mat Mania & Mania Challenge], it looks nothing like the originals, it doesn't sound at all like the originals. The graphics are so bad it resembles a game for the Spectrum. The sound is worse than any 2600 game I've played. Just completely terrible. And if it's a 128K game, then someone should check the source code because it must have top secret stealth fighter plans buried inside the ROM or something.

 

I feel personally insulted by the finished product since I used to write Atari Corp so much about porting both titles to the 7800 since I loved playing Mania Challenge in the arcades so much.

[Trebor]

Today's homebrewers can do more than they could back then because the tools are better, understanding of the hardware is better, there's better knowledge-sharing, and more time and effort is put into each game. So I would not have expected a game like Bentley Bear to have appeared in 1986, and if it did, it would have required more memory. The one business decision the Tramiels could have made to make 7800 games better was to push for larger carts, but as you know, the Tramiels were cheap.

Agree for the most part. However, we did receive Scrapyard Dog and with a little fine tuning and a couple of fixes, it could have been a great scrolling platform game.

 

Nevertheless, my response was to the statement: "That's why there was a lack of scrollers in the 7800 catalog--they needed a lot of cart memory", in conjunction with the "During the late 80's" (1986 would be mid 80's)

 

Size of cart 'a' factor...sure; the reason - the "why" as to the lack of scrolling platform games...Respectfully, disagree...Just see the aforementioned Scrapyard Dog and the (relatively) large number of games (Over 1/3 of the library) the same size or larger.

 

Games such as Winter Games, Summer Games, Commando, Dark Chambers, Double Dragon, Mean 18 Golf, Banyard Blaster, Ikari Warriors, Jinks, were "late 80's" titles the same size as Scrapyard Dog...Crossbow was late 80's and even larger than them.

 

Regardless, I'm with you on bad decisions being in the hands of the Tramiels (and others). The 7800 was so badly short-changed, it borders on the ridiculous, if not surpassing it.

[gamecat80]

Warner didn't screw the 7800 up; GCC designed it not to have a POKEY standard so they could sell Warner/Atari their own designed GUMBY with each cartridge!

 

It was Atari Corp - Tramiel - that chose not to release the 7800 with the High Score Cartridge, the 7800 Keyboard/the AtariLab 7800 cartridge and other A8 accessories, the ProLine Joystick Coupler, the LaserDisc player, etc. It was Tramiel who didn't get a licensing agreement hammered down with Atari Games. It was Tramiel who didn't get the AMY sound chip completed so it could've been used in 7800 cartridges, the ST, the 65XEM, or any other future computers or game systems. It was also Tramiel who failed to gain the Sega Genesis for North America too.

 

 

Yes, but didn't Warner get Atari in deep financial debt before Tramiel "saved" it? Seems to me Warner is just as much at fault as Tramiel for shortchanging the 7800. There will always be "what ifs" regarding old consoles. The Atari 7800 really had the potential to be an 8-bit gaming powerhouse of it's time if everything worked out like it should have.

[+Defender_2600]

 

Actually, the SMS has a 64 color palette compared to the 7800's 256 color palette; indeed though, the SMS puts more colors on screen at one time than either the NES or 7800.

 

Compared to 7800, the SMS puts more colors on screen at one time for the background (SMS 31 colors from 2 palettes vs 7800 25 colors) but for the sprites the SMS has only one 15 color palette while the 7800 can use any palette available.

 

For example, with 7800 160B mode 24 colors on screen are available for the sprites (12 colors from 2 palettes + transparent / background) and a single sprite can have 12 colors or 24 colors with two overlapped sprites.

 

As a side note, I also noticed that in some SMS games the sprites do not have transparency (see SMS Space Harrier).

 

 

"...the SMS has a far, far more limited palette than the 7800 (or even 2600), it's only 6-bit RGB, probably a good bit worse than even the default 56 colors/shades on the NES. (the 7800 has 256 colos, or 16 hues with 16 luminance levels each like GTIA, double the luminance levels of TIA/CTIA)...

 

...the SMS uses 2 4-bit palettes from 6-bit RGB (64 colors) each with 15 colors (both applicable to the BG, only 1 usable for sprites) plus a solid BG color for a possible maximum of 31 colors on-screen (in both cases you'd have common cases of less than that due to practical limits of separate palettes, probably more so with the NES). Then there's the limits on how those colors are aplied to the tilemap and sprites: for the SMS you could have a fixed 15 color palette for sprites and the ability to select between the 2 palettes for each 8x8 BG tile...

 

...In any case, you'd be a hell of a lot closer than the SMS's 6-bit RGB... sure it can do 16 colors for any pixel on-screen without any tricks, but there's very few shades of any color... and even if you combined all useful yellowish/orange-ish/brownish shades, you'd probably only manage 6 or 7 colors and even then they'd look a bit off. (games that look best on the SMS tend to be stylized heavily for RGB colors)..."

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/121299-nes-vs-7800/?p=2174853

 

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/221754-differences-between-atari-2600-and-atari-7800-sprite-colors/?p=2925976

[+Defender_2600]

Thinking about 7800 sprites in 160B mode, I have made this Double Dragon sprite as an example...

 

 

 

 

 

[Trebor]

Awesome work (As always), Marco. Probably the thing that drives me more nuts than just using TIA sound in a game like Double Dragon (Kung-Fu Master too) is the lousy (small) player sprites that were utilized. Your 160B graphics mode mock-up is fantastic. Even having something along the lines of the Amiga would have been nice, or at least they could have been 'on par' with the SMS and NES sprites - which MARIA is more than capable of handling.

 

It's ports like those games that unfortunately place the 7800 in the 'slightly better than the 2600' light in the minds of some people. From back in the day, games such as Ninja Golf and the Pit Fighter prototype show how larger (than the ones found in the aforementioned games) player sprites could have been utilized. Heck, even BasketBrawl has better looking player sprites.

 

Regardless, thanks again for the mock-up demonstrating what is possible. Perhaps someday Double Dragon may see an update - even if it's "just" graphically.

[Bakasama]

It's ports like those games that unfortunately place the 7800 in the 'slightly better than the 2600' light in the minds of some people.

 

 

From what I understand how the 7800 does it's graphics, it seems closer to "The 7800 can do what the 5200 does with more colors and spites and slightly less screen width in 160 mode."

[+Defender_2600]

Awesome work (As always), Marco. Probably the thing that drives me more nuts than just using TIA sound in a game like Double Dragon (Kung-Fu Master too) is the lousy (small) player sprites that were utilized. Your 160B graphics mode mock-up is fantastic. Even having something along the lines of the Amiga would have been nice, or at least they could have been 'on par' with the SMS and NES sprites - which MARIA is more than capable of handling.

 

It's ports like those games that unfortunately place the 7800 in the 'slightly better than the 2600' light in the minds of some people. From back in the day, games such as Ninja Golf and the Pit Fighter prototype show how larger (than the ones found in the aforementioned games) player sprites could have been utilized. Heck, even BasketBrawl has better looking player sprites.

 

Regardless, thanks again for the mock-up demonstrating what is possible. Perhaps someday Double Dragon may see an update - even if it's "just" graphically.

 

I'm glad that you like. Thank you.

 

It is interesting to note that Double Dragon II for Amstrad CPC has larger player sprites with pixels wide and 10 colors.

 

 

 

 

 

[Jinks]

Dd2 final boss fight = $25.00 in quarters.

Totally unfair..

[Trebor]

It is interesting to note that Double Dragon II for Amstrad CPC has larger player sprites with pixels wide and 10 colors.

 

Cool...thanks for sharing that Marco. Honestly, I've never really looked into non-US released computers much, outside of the Sharp X68000 (Which is spectacular, btw). Looking over some YouTube clips of the CPC Double Dragon and Double Dragon II, it creeps up a concern I have with finding a balance between looking good and playing well.

 

The CPC version(s), although containing larger sprite characters, plays slowly and is somewhat choppy ("II" is not that bad). Granted the original Arcade version has slowdown, when there's many characters/much action on the screen, but the entire game does not play slowly or choppy. Curious to know how large the 7800 characters could be in practice without experiencing tremendous/overall gameplay slowdown or choppiness.

 

One line of thought is the perception of this being where the 7800 can really shine, as if understood correctly, larger character sprites are not really one large sprite, but rather a couple of sprites stacked on top of each other. The beauty with the 7800/MARIA is being able to handle a large number of sprites on the screen without slowdown or flicker. So, the feeling is that the 7800 could handle these larger (multiple sprite) characters with little to no slowdown, but again just a theory in understanding.

 

As much as I absolutely love the mock-ups (I *really* do), the wonderment still lies with if they could be actually put into practice; however, that would mean the game being programmed/developed to know for sure...lol. Then again, as mentioned earlier, much depends on the ability and resources of the developer. One developer may be able to deliver a rock-solid port with your gorgeous sprites at respectable 'arcade(-like)' speeds, while another may have difficulty with code/timing being efficient enough to prevent overall and drastic slowdown or/and choppy gameplay.

 

Regardless, it's good to see/know the MARIA chip can accommodate the larger characters; hoping to see an actual implementation 'in-game' someday

[Trebor]

Dd2 final boss fight = $25.00 in quarters.

Totally unfair..

Yeah, it's a tough final boss fight, but at least the entire game was not a quarter gobbing fest, which became standard with these type of games (Side-scrolling beat'em-ups) in my experience, really starting with the '89 release of Final Fight.

 

Double Dragon ('87) and Double Dragon II ('88) was sort of the line in the sand for me concerning a game being fair to play mostly on a quarter/credit or two as oppose to impossible, requiring numerous 'credit-ups' throughout the game for this genre. Granted, Atari had that crap in spades heavily with Gauntlet (II), but that's a different genre. Despite that, love those games as well.

 

Released to the Arcades just a year prior ('86), before the side-scrolling fighter came along, a great fighting game is Yie Ar Kung-Fu. The (MSX to) ColecoVision port is actually pretty impressive and handled overall very well - considering the hardware/system limitations. The Famicom-NES port is disappointing though, being a near carbon copy of what you see on the MSX/ColecoVision and should have been better.

 

Looks like the CPC had a port of this as well (Hi, Marco ); although it appears to have slowdown/choppiness like Double Dragon. Most impressed with the C64 port, which looks and plays pretty well, albeit your player moves a tad too fast and the challenge is a bit easy.

 

Nevertheless, would love to see a 7800 port of this Arcade game:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6KWRveg_gJs

 

P.S. For those unfamiliar with the game, the player captured above is very good/excellent and recalls a number of the moves quite well. This game is challenging, despite the video making it appear 'easy'. It's a two button game and has a variety of moves you may decide to execute, but not overly complex to pull off. It's not like any of those 90's fighters with ridiculous combos and move-sets. Nonetheless, it certainly lays groundwork for them here though:

 

[Lynxpro]

How about we flip the discussion to "how weak the NES's native hardware is"? I just read that Tengen's Klax port to the NES required their own mapper chip [the RAMBO-1 aka Mapper 064] to run, which was slightly more powerful than Nintendo's own MMC3 mapper chip.

 

The 7800 didn't need no jive-turkey mapper chip to run Klax!

Edited August 15, 2014 by Lynxpro

[Bakasama]

That may be so but I think Klax really could have sounded better.

[Lynxpro]

That may be so but I think Klax really could have sounded better.

 

True, but a POKEY could've solved that. That's a little different than having to add a graphics co-processor to run a simple game like Klax. Without the mappers, the NES is clown shoes, plain and simple.

[The Usotsuki]

Just remember, the only way to know the limits of the possible is to step beyond them into the impossible.

[Trebor]

Without the mappers, the NES is clown shoes, plain and simple.

 

Don't know if that is an exaggeration or not , the truth is though, as has been stated on several occasions, ~90% of its library required additional hardware assistance beyond the base system's capabilities. Additionally, a good representation of what the base console can do is reflected in the "Black Box 30".

 

The following games...

 

...10-Yard Fight, Balloon Fight, Baseball, Clu Clu Land, Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr. (Math), Donkey Kong 3, Duck Hunt, Excitebike, Golf, Gumshoe, Gyromite, Hogan's Alley, Ice Climber, Kung Fu, Mach Rider, Mario Bros., Pinball, Popeye, Pro Wrestling, Slalom, Soccer, Stack-Up, Super Mario Bros., Tennis, Urban Champion, Volleyball, Wild Gunman, Wrecking Crew...

 

...are certainly nothing to sneeze at; however, they reach nowhere near the caliber of titles that are hailed and praised so highly for the system such as Super Mario Bros. 3, and especially Castlevania III; the amount of additional assistance for that game, particularly graphically, is tremendous.

 

For a more extensive list of all NES titles see here. When reviewing the list, note the "Mapper" column. Any title that does not state: "---- (0)" received additional hardware assistance above the base system's abilities. This page helps in appreciating how many different mapper configurations have been created to cover the variety of additional hardware assistance the NES received. It's really a shame to never know what the 7800 could accomplish if it had that kind of support and additional resources.

 

Noteworthy too, the XM module - a conglomerate of some possible 7800 cartridge based hardware - just barely scrapes the surface and is a miniscule fraction of the scope and depth of 'NES-like' cartridge based hardware. Regardless, the 7800 already does a very impressive job without the 'NES-kind' of extensive resources at its disposal, thanks not only to some of the original library games, but also to the outstanding homebrew developers.