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Atari Jaguar vs Sega Saturn hardware power


babrasch

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The issue of Next Generation magazine where Sam Tramiel stated that the Jaguar is just as powerful as the Saturn got me thinking. Was he just saying that to maintain the marketing strategy of the Jaguar's power, or did he know something that most people don't know? Also, he did state that the PSX was a small amount more powerful than the Jaguar, so that did go against their marketing. So, looking past the obvious advantages of the Sega Saturn's cd technology, are their specs really as closely matched as Tramiel said? If it's true, that also brings up the Saturn's comparability to the PSX, and the Jaguar's comparibility to the 3DO- and to a lesser extent- the 32X. Where would they fit into this as well?

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The Jaguar was a very powerful console for the year it got released, late 1993. Compared with other consoles released that year, it was pretty even with 3DO, and Jaguar ends up looking like a beast againts the AMIGA CD32 and FM TOWNS Marty. It kicks the crap out of those last two 32 bit systems so bad, that it validates the whole Jag 64 bitness :-D .

 

Tramiel was full of crap in that interview. Of course the Saturn and Playstation beat the Jag, they came out in 1995, 2 years later in the Jaguars market (they came out in late 1994 in Japan). They better were more advanced. But the Jag wasnt too shaby. The NEC PCFX came out around the same time as the Saturn and PS1, and the Jaguar blows it away.

 

Also, in 1995 the Funtech Super ACan was released, another system the Jaguar kicks the crap out of, even if it released later. The Apple/Bandai Pippin released on 1995 too, and at 3d its not much better than the Jaguar, and at 2d, the Jaguar beats it.

 

Oh, forgot about the 32X, released in 1994, a year after the Jaguar. Jaguar beats it on every way. More at 2d than at 3d i guess.

 

 

So, of the consoles released around the same time or a year after the Jag, we have that the Jaggy :

-Kicks the crap out of:

AMIGA CD32

FM TOWNS Marty

Funtech Super ACan

NEC PCFX

 

-Is pretty even with:

Sega 32X

Apple Pippin

3DO

 

-Gets beat by:

Sega Saturn

Sony Playstation

 

 

 

Yes guys, i am bored and had nothing better to do :P .

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Time to draw a line under this.

Yes Tramiel made those claims in Edge here in UK if my memory serves and Darryl Still (Atari UK Marketing) made a similar blunder in the letters page of Computer And Video Games.
Darryl was kind enough to clear up just how that happened when i put the question to him months ago, if your interested full interview can be found here:
Atari made a lot of false claims about the Jaguar..The Press made a lot of false claims about the Jaguar....
It happened with systems before, during and long after and i'm sure it keep happening in future generations.
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@travistouchdown:Been long, long time since i read the comments, but seem to recal Sega 'defending' the 2X SH-2's in Saturn by saying it's coders had been working on Parallel Processing in the arcade for a number of years.

 

Got a feeling it was Tom K.who might have offered that defence, but don't quote me...

 

 

 

I do remember Panzer Dragoon developers talking to Maximum Magazine that Saturn hardware was'nt an obstacle to them, as they'd worked on said Parallel CPU based coin-op hardware, so maybe Tom (if indeed it was he?) was using that as a reference point? i dunno....

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Got a feeling it was Tom K.who might have offered that defence, but don't quote me...

 

 

 

I do remember Panzer Dragoon developers talking to Maximum Magazine that Saturn hardware was'nt an obstacle to them, as they'd worked on said Parallel CPU based coin-op hardware, so maybe Tom (if indeed it was he?) was using that as a reference point? i dunno....

If he did say that, it wasn't wholehearted. Tom was not exactly a friend of the Saturn hardware design. He actually recommended going with the chipset that eventually found its way into the N64. I think he was well aware that the internal teams being able to handle it was not enough if 3rd parties would struggle.

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Got a feeling it was Tom K.who might have offered that defence, but don't quote me...

 

The issue of Next Generation magazine where Sam Tramiel stated that the Jaguar is just as powerful as the Saturn

 

 

Both guys were doing what President's do. Posturing and defending their company and product

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The issue of Next Generation magazine where Sam Tramiel stated that the Jaguar is just as powerful as the Saturn got me thinking. Was he just saying that to maintain the marketing strategy of the Jaguar's power, or did he know something that most people don't know? Also, he did state that the PSX was a small amount more powerful than the Jaguar, so that did go against their marketing. So, looking past the obvious advantages of the Sega Saturn's cd technology, are their specs really as closely matched as Tramiel said? If it's true, that also brings up the Saturn's comparability to the PSX, and the Jaguar's comparibility to the 3DO- and to a lesser extent- the 32X. Where would they fit into this as well?

 

 

This theads already been done:

 

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/110830-atari-jaguar-vs-sega-saturn/

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Yep it was Tom, making reference to Sega's coin-op hardware as a 'defence' for chips used in Sega Saturn:

 

 

Yes, we do use several different processors in the Sega Saturn, and we

don't apologize for it (as a matter of fact we use 8 .Each processor

was chosen for specific technical reasons and are each integral parts of

our architecture for providing the best in-home video game experience

possible. Remember, we have been making the most advanced Arcade

machines for years. We knew that no single chip can provide that quality

of game play. It takes several different chips working in concert to

maximize different aspects of the game experience, including the visual,

auditory as well as gameplay itself.

 

http://www.sega-16.com/forum/archive/index.php/t-6380.html

Edited by Lost Dragon
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The Apple/Bandai Pippin released on 1995 too, and at 3d its not much better than the Jaguar, and at 2d, the Jaguar beats it.

 

The Pippin :_(

 

I reluctantly collect for it and for some reason I never considered how it measures up to other consoles. Nice to see it put into perspective though. Has some really interesting features such as 640x480 VGA out that look really nice on modern sets, wish it had a little more platform specific software to show it off.

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The Jaguar was a very powerful console for the year it got released, late 1993. Compared with other consoles released that year, it was pretty even with 3DO, and Jaguar ends up looking like a beast againts the AMIGA CD32 and FM TOWNS Marty. It kicks the crap out of those last two 32 bit systems so bad, that it validates the whole Jag 64 bitness :-D .

 

.....

 

 

So, of the consoles released around the same time or a year after the Jag, we have that the Jaggy :

-Kicks the crap out of:

AMIGA CD32

FM TOWNS Marty

Funtech Super ACan

NEC PCFX

 

....

I can tell you that "FM TOWNS Marty" has quite the library of perfectly playable in English and fun to play 2D games (quite a few SCUMM adventures), regarding the "NEC PCFX" it's a 2D beast especially wrt FMV stitching it's just that there's not much for the non Jap user, I am pretty sure that the Jag could kick them out of the blue but it just doesn't show so obviously in the 2D offering and the 3D is so primitive that I prefer usually to ignore it. For sure the Jag had a little more variety but a lot of arcade ports on the Marty are very fun to play (because they were nice games to begin with).

 

Regarding the CD32 and again just 2D there's a quite a lot but yeah it looks so previous gen (and way too colorful in many instances), Commodore dropped the ball not giving it an extra 2M of fast RAM (but it would likely have been too expensive) that helps so much in terms of perf it is unbelievable (it literally doubles perf for 3D games, at which point they are not half as bad, but in the proto 3D category obviously).

 

That is to say that due to a rather poor library the Jag cannot show off its prowess and that is the unfortunate part, I think Atari should have chose a different CPU (more unfamiliar) as the controller so that more developers would have bothered harnessing Tom and Jerry.

Edited by phoenixdownita
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That is to say that due to a rather poor library the Jag cannot show off its prowess and that is the unfortunate part, I think Atari should have chose a different CPU (more unfamiliar) as the controller so that more developers would have bothered harnessing Tom and Jerry.

 

Yeah, except those chips are broken, so be thankful for the 68000 or there wouldn't be much of anything.

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I can tell you that "FM TOWNS Marty" has quite the library of perfectly playable in English and fun to play 2D games (quite a few SCUMM adventures), regarding the "NEC PCFX" it's a 2D beast especially wrt FMV stitching it's just that there's not much for the non Jap user, I am pretty sure that the Jag could kick them out of the blue but it just doesn't show so obviously in the 2D offering and the 3D is so primitive that I prefer usually to ignore it. For sure the Jag had a little more variety but a lot of arcade ports on the Marty are very fun to play (because they were nice games to begin with).

 

Regarding the CD32 and again just 2D there's a quite a lot but yeah it looks so previous gen (and way too colorful in many instances), Commodore dropped the ball not giving it an extra 2M of fast RAM (but it would likely have been too expensive) that helps so much in terms of perf it is unbelievable (it literally doubles perf for 3D games, at which point they are not half as bad, but in the proto 3D category obviously).

 

That is to say that due to a rather poor library the Jag cannot show off its prowess and that is the unfortunate part, I think Atari should have chose a different CPU (more unfamiliar) as the controller so that more developers would have bothered harnessing Tom and Jerry.

Yeah, i am talking only from a technical prowess point of view, when i say that the Jaguar is much better than the Marty, CD32 and PCFX.

 

You are correct, Marty has a lot of great 2d games, among them, some kick ass arcade ports like Raiden (better than the Jags), Splatterhouse, New Zeland Story, Tatsujin 2, etc. And some awesome point and click adventures. Actually, as a whole, i prefer its games catalog over the Jags.

 

CD32 also has a lot of cool games, not bad at all for a failed console.

 

PCFX library isnt that big or impressive. But its FMV capabilities were pretty awesome, it does beat the Jaguar at that.

Edited by sd32
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Yeah, except those chips are broken, so be thankful for the 68000 or there wouldn't be much of anything.

I don't know much about that, I quickly read a jag tech doc and on paper it looked very well done.

 

Care to elaborate on what's broken?

Just the gist, not the details unless that's were the broken part really emerges.

For example we all know Nintendo crippled the N64 by having the CPU access memory thru the RCP and only allowing 4K (2K really in some cases) of texture mem .... is it something along those lines? A glaring architectural bad choice that cripples the system?

Edited by phoenixdownita
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The Pippin :_(

 

I reluctantly collect for it and for some reason I never considered how it measures up to other consoles. Nice to see it put into perspective though. Has some really interesting features such as 640x480 VGA out that look really nice on modern sets, wish it had a little more platform specific software to show it off.

 

I am such a sucker for failed consoles like the Pippin, and their could have been stories, hehe.

 

Hey, at least it has Marathon and Marathon 2, that makes it pretty cool in my book.

 

I have always wondered how hard it would be to port some Mac games to the Pippin, like Wolfenstein 3d and Doom.

 

About how it compares with other consoles, it sure seems quiet weaker than the Saturn and PS1, and a bit better than 3DO and Jaguar (at least at 3d, Jag should beat it at 2d, right?). It had to do everything though the 66 mhz powerpc CPU, but at least it had about 6 MB of RAM, and was expandable. I wonder how better game engines could have gotten on it with time.

Edited by sd32
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I am such a sucker for failed consoles like the Pippin, and their could have been stories, hehe.

 

Hey, at least it has Marathon and Marathon 2, that makes it pretty cool in my book.

 

I have always wondered how hard it would be to port some Mac games to the Pippin, like Wolfenstein 3d and Doom.

 

About how it compares with other consoles, it sure seems quiet weaker than the Saturn and PS1, and a bit better than 3DO and Jaguar (at least at 3d, Jag should beat it at 2d, right?). It had to do everything though the 66 mhz powerpc CPU, but at least it had about 6 MB of RAM, and was expandable. I wonder how better game engines could have gotten on it with time.

 

One of the rarer models/revisions of the AtWorld Pippin can be hacked relatively easily and standard Mac games can be played on it. Unfortunately, the standard AtMark model doesn't have this ability. I'm not sure how easy it would be to actually convert Mac games to the Pippin. Maybe if someone had an official Dev kit it would be possible? I have no idea.

 

Interesting platform. Unfortunately, there's little reason to own one outside of Shockwave, Marathon and Tropic Island Pinball (the first two which are easily acquired on other platforms). The hardware is nice though and its 3D capabilities seemed to be a step above the 3DO from what I can tell, with everything running at 640X480 with crisp visuals and smooth framerates. It's a shame there weren't more worthwhile Pippin-specific games or at least a wider array of nice Mac ports (a port of the Mac Wolf 3D would have been awesome, for instance).

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