Finally i have the proof behind those Jaguar CD screenshots.....

[sd32]

Interesting. We have Atari Owl who actually knows the Jaguar pretty well, having coded a very impressive engine for Atari Owl Project, and Chilly Willy, who has worked on a system somewhat close in performance to the Jaguar, the Sega 32X. Both have mentioned that with the right compromises, a recognizable port of Tomb Raider could be done for the Jaguar.

 

Coming from these 2 guys, who actually know what they are talking about. i think the argument holds some water, then.

 

I think we have to leave out Alone in the Dark as a game that the Jag wouldnt be able to handle, Bill. I just dont see why not. Maybe Atari Owl could give us his opinion in the regard of the Jag having trouble doing a decent port of it. As i already mentioned, the Fujitsu FM TOWNS has an OK port of it, and the Jaguar is way more powerful than that system. Hell, with a big enough cart, you wouldn even need the Jag CD system.

[Bill Loguidice]

Interesting. We have Atari Owl who actually knows the Jaguar pretty well, having coded a very impressive engine for Atari Owl Project, and Chilly Willy, who has worked on a system somewhat close in performance to the Jaguar, the Sega 32X. Both have mentioned that with the right compromises, a recognizable port of Tomb Raider could be done for the Jaguar.

 

Coming from these 2 guys, who actually know what they are talking about. i think the argument holds some water, then.

 

I think we have to leave out Alone in the Dark as a game that the Jag wouldnt be able to handle, Bill. I just dont see why not. Maybe Atari Owl could give us his opinion in the regard of the Jag having trouble doing a decent port of it. As i already mentioned, the Fujitsu FM TOWNS has an OK port of it, and the Jaguar is way more powerful than that system. Hell, with a big enough cart, you wouldn even need the Jag CD system.

 

My only concern with Alone in the Dark is if using the Jag CD would somehow compromise the game. Make no mistake, I suspect the Jaguar could pull off Alone in the Dark since again, we know the 3DO could do a decent version of it with little issue (keeping in mind it's far from an ideal version; I would assume that the Jaguar version wouldn't quite be as good as the 3DO version since the 3DO hardware is better suited to such technology). As was discussed ad naseum, though, whatever your opinion of Tomb Raider, it is a significant technological 3D leap, being both real-time and much faster paced versus a mostly pre-rendered game like an Alone in the Dark (and the one actual example we have on the Jaguar CD, Highlander).

 

Again, while I respect the opinions of actual programmers with obvious talent, it's still just words until we see something in action that's a little more than what we get with a tech demo. The Atari Owl thing is impressive, but it's simply not Tomb Raider in any way, shape, or form. I think myself and others would just like a little more in terms of evidence. It's certainly not out of the realm of possibility, it just seems unlikely given what we've talked about for six pages of comments now.

[+CyranoJ]

Let's wait for Vladr to comment on this before we get a definitive answer from the experts!

[Bill Loguidice]

Let's wait for Vladr to comment on this before we get a definitive answer from the experts!

 

Just as long as it's not just written claims and is instead actual evidence in even a brief game demo, I'm all for it.

Edited January 23, 2015 by Bill Loguidice

[+remowilliams]

Just as long as it's not just written claims and is instead actual evidence in even a brief game demo, I'm all for it.

 

Ah, you might not want to wait then unless you're looking for 'FPS benchmarks' presented as Performance Facts, run on a Jag emulator run on a PC that is seventy gazillion times more powerful than the Jaguar itself actually is.

[Atari_Owl]

 

Were you LTTP with TR2? At the time, the only real criticism I remember was that it wasn't like the original in certain ways. Plenty of games back then had a little slowdown and certain graphical issues, but we often accepted it despite coming from the 50/60Hz slickness of the prior consoles, simply because it was a vastly different experience playing all these amazing textured polygon games. Just seems an odd one to pick out of all the games I remember from back then.

 

To be fair, maybe i was a little late, i had certainly seen Mario 64 by the time.

 

I suppose it was a little later still that i began to look seriously at it and became rather horrified by it.

 

 

Regarding Alone in the Dark

 

2MB is plenty to work with. The vast majority of my 3D engine for example fits in very little space, the data structures are small.

 

One could load in a chunk of compressed backgrounds/rooms, decompress to a scratch area, models need not take up much space. There's no reason why AITD couldn't be done with remarkably little loading.. like oh say ANY of the CD based consoles of the time.

 

Lets look at the PC requirements for AITD

16 MHz Processor, 640K RAM, 5 MB free hard drive space

Come on now.

 

 

Is the Jag as capable as a Saturn or PS1?

G-d No

 

Could the Jaguar do a recognisable TR?.... maybe.

Could it do MediEvil or Ridge Racer 4?...

 

Are there some games, unrepresented on the Jag, that it could have had a decent stab at? Sure.

Edited January 24, 2015 by Atari_Owl

[+save2600]

 

Are there some games, unrepresented on the Jag, that it could have had a decent stab at? Sure.

 

For sure!

 

BTW: How's that RPG coming along? We gonna see a release anytime soon - or at all?

 

Latest news, or am I looking in the wrong place?

 

http://atariowlproject.blogspot.com

[Lost Dragon]

Created seperate thread for this:

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/234265-quake-was-converted-to-playstation-just-never-published/

But felt it was worth bringing up here when people talk of how well Jaguar could have run Quake, often use saturn version etc for comparisons.Here's details on the sadly never released PS1 version.

Even though i've given up posting on forums, i wanted to share this...

[Lost Dragon]

Also there's THIS, even though we know the Swagman screens were mock-up's just as Tomb Raiders were, here's Swagman Coder Chris Long, talking of games origins:

''Swagman editor started life as a Megadrive Editor on the Amiga.This was then converted onto the PC and then enhanced, adding other features such as height, go-behind, slope and trigger object modes'.

Right, so far then:Creature Shock, Swagman, Tomb Raider, Thalion Games etc etc claims put to bed, proof of PS1 Quake uncovered, plus friend of mine asking Dave Perry about claims of EWJ 1+2 on Jaguar, oh, Minter Ultra Star Raiders myth cleared up.....

Really think some fresh, factual Lost Games threads should appear, lot of these Lost Jaguar game YouTube vids etc just don't hold any water.

[Austin]

I'm no programmer, but it doesn't take one to know that the Jaguar could have done Alone in the Dark. All you have to do is look at Highlander. It's the exact same concept: a handful of flat polygonal objects moving on top of flat 2D backgrounds, and that game pulled it off fine (now how great of a game it actually was is a different story all together).

[JAGUAR]

If back in 1992 Miyamoto and his team or Naka and his team were given Jag dev kits, they could have had amazing games coming out by 1995 especially if they were CD games. Every bit as good as stuff on PS1 or Saturn. For sure Jag was equal in 2d and not far behind at all in 3d. The Jag is like a Ferrari race car that no top professional driver ever got the chance to drive (the top top Japanese or European dev teams like Nintendo or Rare etc.) And thats it really. Even Sega with all its money, a lot more than Atari, had similar problems in convincing top game makers to put a real effort into making games for Saturn. And also the complicated internals deal, both Jag and Saturn shared..

 

Miyamoto could do Mario 64 on Jaguar CD, I guarantee it. It would just be less detailed is all, and not as smooth. Kind of like most Saturn 3d games compared to PlayStation.

 

Like for instance if you gave Miyamoto the finished Highlander Cd, he could have polished it up over some months and turned it from horrible to really great.

 

Jaguar and N64 are my favorite systems actually and they have a lot in common.

[Austin]

Every bit as good as stuff on PS1 or Saturn. For sure Jag was equal in 2d and not far behind at all in 3d.

 

Yeah... no.

[JAGUAR]

 

Yeah... no.

Jaguar can push sprites like nobodies business. How do you figure Jag is not as good as Saturn and PS in 2d? Look at Rayman Ubisoft were amazing and Rayman is equally good looking on the 3 systems. Tempest 2000 is 3d but uses sprites and is every bit as good on Jag as Saturn or ps1. Doom on Jaguar is every bit as good as PS1 and Saturn version and they could have made the same version as ps and Saturn (doom 1 and 2) for Jag CD if they wanted. Iron soldier 1 and 2 are very impressive in 3d. Long long draw distance and smooth looking. Huge polygons similar to N64. Battlesphere is super smooth 3d game with nice polygon action. Super burnout 2d graphics puts anything on neo geo to shame and that system is touted as best 2d system ever. cybermorph even is super impressive, 50 worlds and each one is a rather massive 3d polygon environment with tons of polygon enemies everywhere. Cybermorph is very underrated.. huge massive game that just most people aren't even good enough to beat the first level... The Jaguar CD came out in September 1995 and Atari died in January 1996. Obviously the Jag + Jag CD combo was not even close to coming to its full potential. Jag CD and 3do could have fought with PS1 and Saturn but nobody wanted to make games for those systems because there was no money to be made, Its all marketing. sony and sega had way more money and better marketing than Atari or 3do... its all about money. 3do for that matter is underrated too, lots of killer 2d and 3d games equally as impressive as stuff on ps1 or Saturn. road rash, nfs, gex for instance. Austin you are a sega fanboy more than Jag fanboy that's all, I see your yt vids.

 

Also Mortal Kombat 3 could have been done on Jaguar cd and been every bit as good as the playstation version.

 

Also tetrisphere was done on Jag and ported to N64... that's saying something. impressive game too.

 

Edited January 26, 2015 by JAGUAR

[Austin]

Your overuse of the statement, "every bit as good," makes me question whether you understand what that phrase actually means.

 

I'd also be hard-pressed to take someone's word as unbiased when their name is simply "JAGUAR" and they rock a Jaguar system as their avatar.

Edited January 26, 2015 by Austin

[+remowilliams]

not far behind at all in 3d

 

LOL

 

Miyamoto could do Mario 64 on Jaguar CD

 

LOOOOOOL

 

 

You can demake anything into worthless/unrecognizable crap if you want to go far enough. That fact is not an endorsement of the Jaguars power.

[Lost Dragon]

Whilst it's true that various high profile games were initally attempted (at least in turning concept into bare bones basic engines), on what was in reality some very early steps in 3D on consoles (thinking of Tomb Raider on MCD, Indy Jones And The Inferno Machine starting out of SNES with Super FX chip), developers are happy to say why games were moved onto far more powerful hardware, they simply could'nt get anything like the results they wanted from the technology at the time.

Yes, the Saturn was an amazing 2D machine, but even it needed a Ram cart for SNK's 2D Fighters did it not?.I'd already posted up quote from Probe regarding massive ball ache converting a 2D arcade game like Primal Rage onto CD based consoles at the time (3DO, Saturn+PS1).

Limited Ram alone on stand alone Jaguar/3DO caused enough headaches as was.Jaguar would of need extra hardware on the CD Add-on to compete with even 3DO in terms of Texture Mapping, likes of ATD, Imagitec etc all gone on record in this regard....

[Austin]

Yes, the Saturn was an amazing 2D machine, but even it needed a Ram cart for SNK's 2D Fighters did it not?.I'd already posted up quote from Probe regarding massive ball ache converting a 2D arcade game like Primal Rage onto CD based consoles at the time (3DO, Saturn+PS1)

 

 

Yeah, a bunch of later fighting games on the Saturn needed the RAM cart. Before that was a thing, some of the earlier SNK fighters used dedicated ROM carts.

[Lost Dragon]

Whilst a lot of the 3DO versions of games are better than the ports the PS1 and saturn recived and things i loved on PS1 (Soviet Strike, Disruptor, MGS, Blood Omen:Legacy Of Kain etc, as well as those i were'nt so keen on..Alien Trilogy) either were planned for or started out on..3DO, again there's more than enough developer quotes from the era to see it was outclassed in terms of 3D by the PS1/Saturn and a lot found it lacking in 2D compared to the SNES.

 

3DO+Jaguar were both machines with fair share of pro's and cons, simply replaced by newer, more powerful technology, just as every machine before and after them has been.

 

 

Actually WTF am i doing get involved in this?

 

I'm meant to be sticking to just bringing new interviews to light on here....

 

I'm out.

[Chilly Willy]

Yes, the Saturn was an amazing 2D machine, but even it needed a Ram cart for SNK's 2D Fighters did it not?.I'd already posted up quote from Probe regarding massive ball ache converting a 2D arcade game like Primal Rage onto CD based consoles at the time (3DO, Saturn+PS1).

 

Limited Ram alone on stand alone Jaguar/3DO caused enough headaches as was.Jaguar would of need extra hardware on the CD Add-on to compete with even 3DO in terms of Texture Mapping, likes of ATD, Imagitec etc all gone on record in this regard....

Those large 2D fighters would have worked fine on the Jag... if they made them as larger bank switched carts like the NeoGeo. They could have made huge bank switched carts for the Jaguar easily... and more expensive, of course. That was the primary issue with 2D fighters on the PS1 and Saturn - not enough ram for holding all the tiles. Some Saturn fighters off-loaded the extra tiles to a rom cart. Those would have done well on the Jaguar on a large cart. It's one area a cart has the edge over CDs.

[sh3-rg]

Uh-oh... looks like another one escaped.

[JAGUAR]

Whilst a lot of the 3DO versions of games are better than the ports the PS1 and saturn recived and things i loved on PS1 (Soviet Strike, Disruptor, MGS, Blood Omen:Legacy Of Kain etc, as well as those i were'nt so keen on..Alien Trilogy) either were planned for or started out on..3DO, again there's more than enough developer quotes from the era to see it was outclassed in terms of 3D by the PS1/Saturn and a lot found it lacking in 2D compared to the SNES.

 

3DO+Jaguar were both machines with fair share of pro's and cons, simply replaced by newer, more powerful technology, just as every machine before and after them has been.

 

 

Actually WTF am i doing get involved in this?

 

I'm meant to be sticking to just bringing new interviews to light on here....

 

I'm out.

 

90% of game developers in 1995 and 1996 were a bunch of money grubbing sellouts who were brown nosing the playstation and Saturn at any chance cus they were all foaming at the mouth at how much money they were going to make selling ps and Saturn games cus the hype about ps and Saturn in 1995 was crazy high (and they all knew a million each saturns and ps1s would be sold in no time)!

 

All devs gave up on Jaguar and 3do because not many systems sold, nothing to do with the performance of the machines, everything to do with the fact that 3do and Atari didn't have near enough money to market their systems like crazy like sony and sega did with ps1 and Saturn. marketing is all that matters. the fact of the matter is Jaguar 3do ps1 and Saturn are all very similar in power in both 2d and 3d... the n64 was a noticeable step up in 3d from these machines...

 

I will give a real world comparison. Im a good looking guy and also very nice, but im poor. I dated a girl who was hot and rich. she started judging me the 2nd date based on the fact I wasn't rich like her. Nothing to do with my looks or personality, but purely bullshit (how much money I have). Its the EXACT same thing with the systems... Jag and 3do were judged based on how COOL They were (not very cool, because you didn't see jag and 3do commercials, advertisements, every single day, in your face everywhere like Saturn and especially Playstation.) That's how the world works, money and bullshit runs the world. Truth and reality doesn't mean much really. our world revolves around marketing, bs, lies, etc. its because of the money thing.... So basically not enough people were brainwashed into drinking the jaguar and 3do kool aid cus Atari and 3do didn't have enough money to brainwash enough people. im telling you, the Jag with cd attachment was super capable of amazing stuff. Remember, Jag cd came out in September 95, Atari cancelled all games in January 96. that is FOUR MONTHS of life the Jag cd had, not near enough time to see what it could do. barely scratched first generation jag cd games...

[108 Stars]

Jag CD could do NOTHING, no matter if devs had 4 months or 4 years to spend on it. It's not like the Mega-CD, which considerably beefed up the Mega Drive's performance. The Jag CD basically just allowed using CDs as medium. Doesn't change a thing beside allowing bigger games in theory, and more likely FMV and CD music.

 

Also the point of the Jag being every bit as good as PS1 and Saturn if devs had been given enough time... damn, where do those guys keep coming from? Is there some hidden underground vault filled with delusional Jag fanatics who have been inhaling the fumes for the last two decades?

 

On the subject of Tomb Raider.

 

Whilst i've never played it (the first game), i have had the misfortune of playing Tomb Raider II on PS1. The first level of which has possibly the worst texturing i've ever seen.

 

Also people seem to be talking as if it has a high frame rate. I don't have my measures to hand (it is some time ago now), but i seem to remember it being consistently around 15-20fps, dropping as low as 12.5 at times.

i think i also measured the N64 zelda games but i dont remember whether i posted the results here or JSII.. does anyone recall?

Actually, your opinion on TR PS1 is a big reason for my disbelief in the Jag handling anything recognizable as TR. Back on JSII you told me that it runs between 15 and 20 fps; not quite unusual for the time, but Core Design were no hacks. They knew their stuff, and if they failed to get TR games running at better speeds on the PS1 with its clear advantage in 3D, I find it hard to believe that the game, with all its complex geometry, from characters to level architecture, all fully textured, would run on the Jaguar in a playable state.

For comparison: Sure, Hard Drivin' is on the Lynx. But with its framerate that seems to refresh about once or twice every second, it doesn't mean that it is in any playable state really.

Edited January 26, 2015 by 108 Stars

[NeoGeoNinja]

You can demake anything into worthless/unrecognizable crap if you want to go far enough. That fact is not an endorsement of the Jaguars power.

 

The first game that always enters my mind was when EA 'brought' NFS Hot Pursuit to the Wii:

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nTK02EGhSc

 

Haaahahahahaha!

 

Doom on Jaguar is every bit as good as PS1 and Saturn version and they could have made the same version as ps and Saturn (doom 1 and 2) for Jag CD if they wanted.

 

No. It's really not re: PS1 version

 

Yes, the Saturn was an amazing 2D machine, but even it needed a Ram cart for SNK's 2D Fighters did it not?.I'd already posted up quote from Probe regarding massive ball ache converting a 2D arcade game like Primal Rage onto CD based consoles at the time (3DO, Saturn+PS1)

 

One of SNK's first titles for Saturn, Fatal Fury 3, didn't use a RAM/ROM cart and it really suffered as a result. Shame, as FF3 is a solid (underrated) title and would have been much better, had the cart method been utilised.

 

KOF 95 was SNK's ONLY title to utilise a ROM Cart. Can't remember which way round it is, but the cart holds animation for the backgrounds I believe, leaving the onboard RAM to cater for character animation etc. It was a great version, but STILL had to load characters between rounds in 3-vs-3 mode.

 

The latter KOF's (96 + 97) opted for the RAM cart route, alongside its other titles - SS3, SS4, RB1 & RBSpecial... but again, those KOFs still had to load characters (briefly) between rounds in 3-vs-3 mode. SNK would have been much better off using the 4MB cart Capcom were using > their choice of the 1MB cart (also used for Metal Slug, WWaku7 etc)

 

Capcom also offered alternative use of the 1MB cart for Marvel Super Heroes and Cyberbots too, but later opted for their own 4MB cart for future titles: VS series, SFZero3, Vampire Saviour etc

 

Note: SFZero 1 & SFZero 2 didn't use the RAM Cart at all and still look splendid on Saturn. It should also be noted, amidst the usual speculation, that SFZero 2 Dash on PS1 is ALMOST as good as the Saturn version (just some minor details not included) and SFZero is pretty much identical on both.

 

The Jag CD basically just allowed using CDs as medium. Doesn't change a thing beside allowing bigger games in theory, and more likely FMV and CD music

 

This is also my laymans interpretation of the Jaguar CD.

 

For example, the CD could have held expansion packs and extra missions for the likes of Syndicate or, if it had ever released on Jaguar, more levels for Lemmings. And so on.

 

It could do little in terms of bringing graphical advantages to the Jag sans the usual FMV fare...

Edited January 26, 2015 by NeoGeoNinja

[sh3-rg]

 

I dated a girl who was hot and rich. she started judging me the 2nd date based on the fact I wasn't rich like her. Nothing to do with my looks or personality, but purely bullshit (how much money I have). Its the EXACT same thing with the systems... Jag and 3do were judged based on how COOL They were (not very cool, because you didn't see jag and 3do commercials, advertisements, every single day, in your face everywhere like Saturn and especially Playstation.) That's how the world works, money and bullshit runs the world. Truth and reality doesn't mean much really. our world revolves around marketing, bs, lies, etc. its because of the money thing.... So basically not enough people were brainwashed into drinking the jaguar and 3do kool aid cus Atari and 3do didn't have enough money to brainwash enough people. im telling you, the Jag with cd attachment was super capable of amazing stuff. Remember, Jag cd came out in September 95, Atari cancelled all games in January 96. that is FOUR MONTHS of life the Jag cd had, not near enough time to see what it could do. barely scratched first generation jag cd games...

 

 

 

I have a hard time taking this account seriously... then again, this is Jagwaaaarr....

 

[sh3-rg]

Also the point of the Jag being every bit as good as PS1 and Saturn if devs had been given enough time... damn, where do those guys keep coming from? Is there some hidden underground vault filled with delusional Jag fanatics who have been inhaling the fumes for the last two decades?

 

The vault is where they end up, not where they originate.

 

 

They don't have to suffer at the hands of us infidels for long, the missionaries will already have been dispatched and a new life awaits far from this place here.

Edited January 26, 2015 by sh3-rg