Misguided criticism of the Atari 7800

[carmel_andrews]

Warners Atari didn't have the money to mass produce the 7800 on demand, as Warners themselves apparently were getting a lot of heat from their shareholders and basically initially decided to stop bank rolling Atari (even though Atari's revenues during the inital stages of the video game crash, totalled more then the entire income/revenues from warners other divisions (put together) and then some, and that's not including Atari's properties and assets, in addition shareholders hads basically given the warners managment an ultimatum of 'getting shot ' of Atari or else

 

We all know what happened there on in

 

The tramiel Atari simply had no interest in the 7800, suffice it to say, they where even threatening to 'somehow' incorporate the 7800 hardware into the A8 (atari 8bit), tramiel only went back to the 7800 when he and his cronies ballsed up or fu~@**** up on the Amiga deal, which is why the Warner's and tramiel versions of the 7800 are different, tramiel only wanted the 7800 hardware as a 'basic' games system that could'nt be upgraded, completely different to the Warners/GCC 7800 design

 

Essentially, the 7800 died before it come to market initially (in 1983/4)

[DracIsBack]

Warners Atari didn't have the money to mass produce the 7800 on demand

 

That's not correct. Yes, Warner was trying to sell the business unit, but Atari had a lot of plans in place for launching the 7800, including sponsoring the Olympics. You make it sound as though Atari couldn't pay the plant, which wasn't the case. They were sold right as they went out to market.

 

In fact, if you look at Atari's launch plans and production quality under Warner compared to under Tramiel, you can tell they were committed to a lot more money behind the product. Tramiel essentially killed or cheapened everything Warner had in the hopper.

 

The tramiel Atari simply had no interest in the 7800, suffice it to say, they where even threatening to 'somehow' incorporate the 7800 hardware into the A8 (atari 8bit)

 

That's the first I've ever heard of this. Are there any articles on this?

 

, tramiel only went back to the 7800 when he and his cronies ballsed up or fu~@**** up on the Amiga deal

 

One has nothing to do with the other. When the deal with AMIGA didn't happen, they made the ST. They released the 7800 (minus the keyboard, peripherals, colour labels, most game development, gumby sound chip, marketing budget) when Nintendo started selling a lot of NES's and when they worked through the contractual issues that GCC had with Atari.

 

Essentially, the 7800 died before it come to market initially (in 1983/4)

 

This is an interesting point in that you can look at it from a glass half-full or half-empty perspective.

 

From the half-empty perspective:

 

1. Atari lost control of a market they used to lead.

2. The 7800 was only a fraction of what it was intended to be as a platform and as a seller.

 

From the half-full perspective:

 

1. Tramiel spent very little on developing the 7800 and marketing it

2. The 7800 still sold a few million units with no money spent

3. And gave Jack a ton of profit for little effort

 

At the end of the day though, the 7800 could (and should) have been more than it was.

[EricBall]

I've moved the discussion about Wormy for the 7800 over to the Atari 7800 Programming forum.

[The Lurking Horror]

Donkey Kong Country's graphics were originally rendered on very powerful, for the time, CGI computers and downsampled to resolutions the SNES could handle.  They look good on a composite TV but do not scale very well to an RGB monitor.  They could easily be modeled on today's graphics hardware. 

 

Very true. My main point is that Nintendo spent the money, and invested the time and effort to figure out how to make graphics like than on the SNES.

 

Tramiel would have hired the cheapest developer, given a couple of months to develop and told them it had to be on a 48K cart.

853214[/snapback]

 

Talking about DKC, Gamespy did a Top10 overhyped games feature some years ago and DKC was one of them. Tycho from penny-arcade even responded to them in a strip saying it was one hell of a revolution and they were dead wrong but I'm of the same opinion of the GS guys.

 

DKC was only a sprite engine overlaped in a boring game. So what if the sprites were modelled in supercomputers if they were still mere sprites? Nintendo gained much marketshare that days overhyping its products (like Sony do now for the PS line. Emotion Engine my ass!)

 

I hope to see a homebrew 7800 game REALLY breaking grounds someday, like opcode's games did for the colecovision. That's the joy of making homebrews IMO.

[potatohead]

What if the Super Mario Brothers team was given a multimillion dollar budget and a year or two to bring SMB to the 7800. Does anyone think that the 7800 couldn't pull it off?

 

I think they could (Scrapyard Dog comes close), but I don't think the graphics would look as nice. The 7800 has a problem with odd colors (either dingy looking or obnoxious looking) and blurry 'muddy' looking graphics. The NES had crisp colors and graphics. Perhaps that's why they look better to the casual observer.

 

Tempest

 

yes, what you say is true, in the graphic resolution used for most, if not all, games. But what if the higher resolution the 7800 was capable of was used instead?

536225[/snapback]

 

I know this is an old thread, but I had to toss something in here.

 

The NES featured interlaced TV output and the 7800 didn't. That's what makes the difference between the two systems in terms of overall display crispness. The reality is the 7800 is a 160xwhatever machine and the NES was higher than that, interlaced. The result being square pixels and a totally different look.

 

That's not to say compelling games could not be written because I think they can. I happen to like the solid pixel look, but only on quality equipment. When done right, with good color selection, creative shapes, etc... it looks stable and solid. NES games jitter all over the place. (Blech.)

 

These differences mean things like text will look better on the NES because the greater resolution possible means a more square pixel in the horizontal direction. However, games that embrace that look will be competetive in their own way. One comparison would be Pitfall II for the 8-bit computers and the NES.

 

It looked awful on the NES, but great on the 8-bitters. Adding the extra color / sprite capability of the 7800 would result in a very good looking game with lots of action. Graphically it would look different than the NES, but in a good way. Pitfall, with some extras, such as weapons and powerups would really shine on the 7800, IMHO as an example.

Edited July 11, 2005 by potatohead

[EricBall]

The NES featured interlaced TV output and the 7800 didn't.  That's what makes the difference between the two systems in terms of overall display crispness.  The reality is the 7800 is a 160xwhatever machine and the NES was higher than that, interlaced.  The result being square pixels and a totally different look.

889543[/snapback]

Sorry, no.

 

Interlaced means displaying different images for the even and odd fields. Unfortunately, neither the 7800 nor the NES don't generate the correct vertical sync to produce interlacing. (Since they don't generate the half line at the end of the screen.) Thus the 7800 and the NES have identical vertical resolution: 262 lines per NTSC frame, of which 200-240 are typically active. (OTOH the 2600 can generate a true interlaced image because vertical sync is under software control.)

 

There are differences between the 7800 and NES horizontal resolution. The NES has active pixels per line and a pixel clock of 5.369MHz (1.5 * colorbust). The 7800 has two possible horizontal resolutions: 160 active pixels per line at 3.58MHz (colorburst) and the less commonly used 320 modes (7.159MHz = 2 * colorburst).

 

Aspect ratio is another matter entirely. The NES NTSC pixel aspect ratio is about 10:9, while the 7800 NTSC pixel aspect ratio is 5:3 (160) or 5:6 (320). The closest to square pixels is a PAL 7800 in 320 mode, where the pixels are very, very close to square.

 

Since this comes up every so often, I've done a comparision at http://atari7800.xwiki.com/xwiki/bin/view/Main/NES

[supercat]

Interlaced means displaying different images for the even and odd fields.  Unfortunately, neither the 7800 nor the NES don't generate the correct vertical sync to produce interlacing.  (Since they don't generate the half line at the end of the screen.)  Thus the 7800 and the NES have identical vertical resolution: 262 lines per NTSC frame, of which 200-240 are typically active.  (OTOH the 2600 can generate a true interlaced image because vertical sync is under software control.)

889732[/snapback]

 

While the NES does not do interlacing, it does interleave the chroma phase on consecutive lines and fields. This yields a considerable improvement in color quality at the expense of getting occasional motion artifacts (visible when approaching the flagpole at the end of a level in SMB).

[ziggystar]

What it really comes down to is programming, and the programmer in general. If they are willing to spend the time nearly any game can be better on one platform or the other. Hardware limitations are hardware limitations, every system has them. Super Mario Bros and the NES were designed with each other in mind. Trying to do Super Mario Bros on a system that was designed for Galaga, Pacman and Asteroids will be a harder challenge, but not impossible. Some games can be better on the 7800 then on the Nes, some games can be better on the NES then on the 7800.

[potatohead]

I should have said horizontal interlacing, which is what I was referring to. The poster above that pointed out the color phase hit the nail on the head.

 

Vertical interlaced displays, on the other hand, are not as attractive for games. Flicker is always an issue. Besides that, motion then introduces tearing of images, unless limited to 30Hz, or other graphical tricks are used. (With those tricks seemingly expensive on older machines --but I could be wrong.)

 

These things gave the NES a distinct look that really set it apart from other machines of the time. Honestly, development issues aside, I think many people prefer that look and the increased horizontal resolution that comes with it better than they do the solid pixel approach. Didn't the C64 do the same thing for it's 320 mode graphics display?

 

Anyway, I'm an Atari fan more than I'm a NES fan. (Though I had plenty of fun with my old NES!!)

 

Solid pixels with some good color depth, well applied, combine to produce a rock solid display. It's that classic Atari look. When things are properly synced to the TV, motion is smooth with objects sharp throughout. Making this stuff look good takes time and attention to detail however, along with very good use of color to round out the whole package.

 

I prefer a display like this, as to many people. A 7800 with S-video would look really nice, and would be able to use it's 320 mode to appear more NES like, IMHO.

 

Sadly, many 7800 titles ignored the more subtle aspects and look harsh and not well balanced color wise with the result being a very diminished experience.

 

The NES, while not as flexible as the 7800, in terms of its overall display capability, did make generating quality displays fairly easy by way of comparison.

 

Interestingly, I noted the same issues long ago, between the Atari and the C64. The limited choices offered on the C64, did not appeal technically, but forced a specific look that was both attractive and easy to achieve. Developers had no choice really. The same is true of the NES. Consider the Coleco Vision for another good example of this. All CV games, look like CV games because the hardware makes the tough choices for you, where a 2600/7800/8bitter game can display a range of visuals that may not always appear Atarish at first glance. In this, all NES games look like NES games, because again the tough choices were made in hardware.

 

All in all, the two techniques would wash in the marketplace, IMHO. NES can't help but produce a decent game display, easy to program. Atari tougher to program, but capable of a lot of variety not present in the NES package. Where getting titles out the door on the NES would be easier, cultivating variety and support for the Atari would have allowed them to play the variety and diversity trump card.

 

Some clever marketing, at the time, would have made the choice a viable option, thus capturing a significant share of the market. Had this been done, people would still be playing on 7800's in greater numbers just as we see them using NES systems today.

 

Atari did exactly the wrong thing back then. They discouraged third party development, because of the 2600 mess, and denied themselves the only solid weapon they had against the NES. Though both systems enforced licensed content, the holistic Nintendo approach proved to be superior in this regard.

 

Having said that. I still want to see a 7800 on a chip, or some other means to get more of them out there so we will get a more inclusive homebrew community on the machine and play the games we know it could have been capable of bringing to the table.

 

Peace

[shadow460]

For what it's worth, the 7800 roughly compares to the NES, right?

 

The backward compatibility issue alone is why I purchased a 7800 (with 7800 games) recently instead of an NES. I've been grabbing bunches of 2600 games for it.

 

I know this is a 7800 thread, but was its competition really all that? I've seen effects on the 2600 that I think the NES had no hope of producing.

And the need to blow out the NES games periodically...gah!

 

Give me Atari or give me death!

[potatohead]

For what it's worth, the 7800 roughly compares to the NES, right?

 

I think so. I also think it's real potential has yet to be seen. --Just like the 2600 through today.

 

(Who would have thought tile graphics would be somehow possible?)

 

The backward compatibility issue alone is why I purchased a 7800 (with 7800 games) recently instead of an NES.  I've been grabbing bunches of 2600 games for it.

 

Picked mine up for the same reasons. Damn glad I have it now. Been thinking hard about doing the S-video mod, but don't want to kill it. (They are hard to find now, I gather.)

 

I know this is a 7800 thread, but was its competition really all that?  I've seen effects on the 2600 that I think the NES had no hope of producing.

And the need to blow out the NES games periodically...gah!

 

Honestly, the NES was a very good system. It was designed with a specific look and feel in mind. That look and feel was popular with people and Nintendo had the muscle to generate games. (They are all very similar in overall feel and appearance however.)

 

Like I wrote above, the Atari machines are distinctive in their ability to produce interesting visuals, but they are harder to develop for too.

 

All in all, that makes for a well balanced competition back then. Where the 7800 failed was in Atari's decision to seriously lock it down, thus discouraging third party game development. That really hurt the machine overall.

Give me Atari or give me death!

 

I like 'em too, but that's a bit far

 

The good news is the budding 7800 developer community. We may yet see some exciting stuff! Even this small community outnumbers the NES developers, I think.

[shadow460]

Well, the system isn't that rare yet. I had my choice of three or four different lots when I made the winning bid on mine.

 

A browse through ebay will get you several auctions with 7800's.

 

Games are a different story. I've been using ProSystem EMU to play different 7800 games. I have all the roms from AtariAge, and found the Activision ones since I purchased the Activision carts.

 

Ballblazer and Choplifter are my favorites so far, not counting any 2600 games.

 

As for mods, I've taken the soldering iron and cement to my video card (V5 5500) many times now, so I'm pretty comfortable with most mods to out of production hardware.

 

I want to remove the timing circuit to be able to run my Supercharger.

Eventually I want to add composite video and stereo sound.

 

The NES rocked. Graphics alone don't make good games. I agree with you that some games are just NES games, no matter how you tweak them, and some are simply 7800 games.

 

Choplifter is like this--I just can't feel it right when it's not on the Apple IIc.

[potatohead]

Choplifter is like this--I just can't feel it right when it's not on the Apple IIc.

 

Yes! Exactly. There was a feel to the Apple ][ Choplifter that just didn't translate across. That's what I was trying to get at about the 7800.

 

Maybe we will get some 'Atari' like games for the 7800 yet. It can do things in ways the nes cannot.

 

Interestingly Robotron is the same way. The Apple ][ version rocked.

[shadow460]

I have the feeling Ballblazer is gonna turn out to be a 7800 game like that. I can't wait til I get it in the mail with the actual system.

I played the rom on Pro EMU, and liked every minute of it.

 

Anyone ever try a port of Star Castle? That might be a decent game to work with.

 

Speaking of Choplifter, was that originally an Apple II game or was it ported to the old computer?

[potatohead]

I have the feeling Ballblazer is gonna turn out to be a 7800 game like that.  I can't wait til I get it in the mail with the actual system.

I played the rom on Pro EMU, and liked every minute of it.

 

Oh yeah, it was made for the hardware. Never played it on a 7800, but it sure was a great game on the 8bitters.

 

Anyone ever try a port of Star Castle?  That might be a decent game to work with.

 

...interesting. The 7800 can move a lot of things around. Totally fun game.

 

Speaking of Choplifter, was that originally an Apple II game or was it ported to the old computer?

 

Pretty sure it was Apple ][ first.

[shadow460]

I guess, then, I should learn to program so that a Star Castle port can be made...

 

(I stink at that game, but it is fun.)

 

I didn't think about it at first, but yeah, moving the rings and cannon plus keeping the buzzards going full speed would be a little hardware intense.

Then you have to add in the color--Star Castle used a monochrome display with colored overlays.

 

Could the 7800 do vector style graphics or would we need to try something else?

[ziggystar]

I've always wondered that myself. If the 7800 can do real vector graphics, I might have do a title myself.

[EricBall]

I guess, then, I should learn to program so that a Star Castle port can be made...

 

(I stink at that game, but it is fun.)

 

I didn't think about it at first, but yeah, moving the rings and cannon plus keeping the buzzards going full speed would be a little hardware intense.

Then you have to add in the color--Star Castle used a monochrome display with colored overlays.

 

Could the 7800 do vector style graphics or would we need to try something else?

893445[/snapback]

Not vector graphics per-se, but if the graphics can be broken down into sprites (small rectangular bitmaps) then the 7800 has a chance.

 

For Star Castle the biggest problem would be the rings, especially the way they grow when a full ring is eliminated. The rest of the objects could be created as pre-defined sprites. (Like I did for SpaceWar! 7800.)

[ziggystar]

What about using premade character maps for the rings? Having a set of predefined character maps on hand and swaping them in and out of memory.

 

Then blowing the holes out on the fly.?

[shadow460]

What about using premade character maps for the rings? Having a set of predefined character maps on hand and swaping them in and out of memory.

 

Then blowing the holes out on the fly.?

893731[/snapback]

 

When the red ring is eliminated, the rings literally "grow" outward, much like the aliens in Tempest "grow" as they near the rim.

Star Castle's rings continue to rotate as they grow, too.

Maybe one could add a flash in the cannon area when this happens, and then the new arrangement would be visible when the flash fades.

 

This could be an opportunity for some extra visuals.

 

I thought about how a sequel might run for Star Castle, and it might be easy to eliminate the growing rings (at the player's peril) and replace them.

I'd replace them with homing missiles from the cannon in that case. I would also increase the cannon's rate of fire.

Of course, the player's ships would be a little more powerful, with the addition of slow firing lasers (think Solar Storm with a fourth of the firing speed) added to the standard bullets, and a VCS Asteroids type of shield.

 

I just don't know much about programming. I could probably come up with a decent concept, but programming it is not something I know how to do.

[ZylonBane]

A decent Star Castle port would absolutely require a pixel-addressable bitmap in the central ring area. This is well within the 7800's capabilities. Just look at F-18 Hornet.

[Shawn]

I did go looking for source code / disasm for SMB but wasn't able to find much ...

886543[/snapback]

 

 

KEEP ON LOOKING GOD DAMN IT! ERIC YOUR THE MAN TO MAKE IT. SMB = 7800 GLORY!!

[EricBall]

KEEP ON LOOKING GOD DAMN IT! ERIC YOUR THE MAN TO MAKE IT. SMB = 7800 GLORY!! 

894845[/snapback]

Umm, no. I have quite enough stuff on my to-do list. (Like 32K SpaceWar! 7800.)