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Post by Ex on Sept 17, 2020 22:04:39 GMT -5
Don't listen to that, Shining the Holy Ark is great. Most folks do tend to enjoy StHA. Sarge for example is also a fan. Maybe EasyHard would love it too, or maybe he'd find it to be a humdrum experience that grows ever more tedious as well. I certainly encourage him to find out for himself. And seriously, the Saturn is a ridiculously over-engineered piece of tech. Eight processors total! Yeah. The biggest problem was SEGA not thinking ahead and providing strong development tools right out the gate. SEGA simply provided specifications and documentation for every component of the hardware, as was standard practice. SEGA and Nintendo expected devs to use assembly for the bulk of their programming, in tandem with referencing the provided documentation and SDKs. With only rudimentary support for C via Saturn and N64. Sony came in and changed that forever with the PS1. Sony specifically designed friendly tools so that devs could get TONs of hardware performance out of just plain C language, without needing to dip into assembly, except in specific instances for speed enhancement. Sony cared a lot about making the PS1 user friendly to develop for, and in doing so cost SEGA ground versus the Saturn's lack of easy development. (This is worth noting not for you Sarge but for our guest readers.) PS:
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Post by Sarge on Sept 17, 2020 22:23:27 GMT -5
And really, the hardware in the PSX was just well designed. Unlike the PS2 and PS3, it was a simple architecture that was very capable.
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Post by Xeogred on Sept 18, 2020 14:05:32 GMT -5
Re: Treasure.
I want to play more of these:
- Gunstar Heroes
- McDonald's Treasure Land Adventure - Dynamite Headdy - Sin and Punishment
Mischief Makers - I liked this one back in the day but haven't replayed it since the 90's.
Radiant Silvergun - I give up on trying to get into this one. I've tried like five times. I think my issue is that it gives you all the tools at your disposal immediately, unlike the traditional slow progression shmup styled power up systems. I don't know. I don't love how it looks either. Great music though.
Alien Soldier - I recall beating this on the Sonic Sega Genesis Ultimate Collection and thought it was forgettable I think?
Ikaruga - I love it.
However, looking over their list the crowned champion is very obvious to me and I hope you've got nothing bad to say about this one @opwuaioc ...
An absolute masterpiece. Up there with Mushihimesama and Thunder Force IV for my top favorite shmups. I couldn't even beat it back in the day because it's freaking insane. But I finally conquered it last year during a Club Retro theme for White Whales. Finally mastering that SOB was exhilarating. And by "master"... mean, finishing Normal at least hehe. Logged 9 hours to finally finish Normal.
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Post by Ex on Sept 18, 2020 14:37:04 GMT -5
Off the top of my head, there are only two Treasure games that I absolutely loved. Alien Soldier is one, the other is this masterpiece: Best action game on Wii. Sad so many sleep on it.
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Post by paulofthewest on Sept 18, 2020 15:08:48 GMT -5
When I played Street Fighter Alpha 3 I can see the improvement on the Saturn IIRC the Saturn handles 2D a lot better than the PlayStation, but the PlayStation handles 3D a lot better than the Saturn. It's almost like SEGA was working on a super 2D system initially, like the next iteration of the Genesis, but then begrudgingly added 3D tech to the Saturn halfway through. However the PlayStation was meant for 3D since its inception. Well that's how it's always come across to me. I've not done super technical research on the Saturn personally. Although I recall something about the Saturn using quads instead of triangles for its polygons, which caused issues for programmers. But anyway, yeah 2D fighters and shmups on the Saturn are going to be superior to their 2D PS1 versions. Well the system had 2 graphics chips (one for 2D the other for 3D, if I'm reading that right.) So, yes they basically wanted an ultimate 2D 32-bit arcade box, but then appended 3D. So, we got a mess. I really wish they jsut stuck with 2D...
And really, the hardware in the PSX was just well designed. Unlike the PS2 and PS3, it was a simple architecture that was very capable. While I can't comment on the PS2, having personally programmed for the PS3, it is was stupid. We had a PowerPC whose job is move data to the streaming units so Sony could boast a large FLOP rating. Then slap on an underpowered memory system with > thousands of clock cycle latency on a memory access. Ya, good luck with that.
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Post by toei on Sept 18, 2020 15:43:09 GMT -5
You know, the only Treasure game I've finished is Light Crusader, and that's a complete outlier in their gameography (I typed that word wondering if I was making it up, but apparently it's a real word!). I might go through Gunstar Heroes one day. I don't like bosses that much, so that probably disqualifies Alien Soldier, which would otherwise have been of interest. And maybe I'll try Radian Silvergun, since "having all the tools at your disposal from the start" sounds great. Gradually building your weapons up is cool too, but I'm not a huge fan of losing it all just cause you get hit once, as is the standard in shmups.
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Post by Sarge on Sept 18, 2020 15:48:25 GMT -5
While I can't comment on the PS2, having personally programmed for the PS3, it is was stupid. We had a PowerPC whose job is move data to the streaming units so Sony could boast a large FLOP rating. Then slap on an underpowered memory system with > thousands of clock cycle latency on a memory access. Ya, good luck with that. Yikes! Yeah, sounds terrible. Also, very cool that you've coded for the PS3!
toei: Light Crusader is one that grew on me, and might be the least "Treasure" game in their catalog. Surprisingly understated in a lot of ways - I think when I first played it, I was under the impression that it was a European-developed game. It gets weird later on, and it does contain some of their hallmarks, but it really sticks out from the rest of their library.
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Post by anayo on Sept 18, 2020 16:40:03 GMT -5
I was 5 years old and completely unplugged from the gaming media. My personal gaming was limited to Gameboy and NES. The most modern titles I had access to were on my Dad’s MS-DOS PC, which could play Doom and stuff like that. In 2020, Sega Saturn visuals don’t look very good. They didn’t even look so great a year or two later compared the competition. But when I first saw a Sega Saturn graphics I thought they looked incredibly modern, high-tech, and exciting. I really wanted one.
I remember every Sega Saturn in-store demo so vividly. The first time I was at a store with my Dad. They had a Sega Saturn with Bug. Bug looks like crap today, but in 1995 to a 5 year old kid it looked amazing. Later, at that same store, I definitely played Sega Rally Championship. It looked so sophisticated and inviting. I felt like I was in the future.
Later, in 1996 at another store, they had three TVs on pedestals arranged in circle showcasing the 3 most powerful gaming consoles at the time: the Sega Saturn with Panzer Dragoon 2, the N64 with Mario 64, and the Playstation with some title I can’t remember any more. I recall running away from a big encroaching boulder in the first stage of Panzer Dragoon 2.
I have no memories whatsoever of seeing Sega Saturn after that. I never seemed to see it in stores anymore. None of my playmates had one in their houses. When they announced the Sega Dreamcast in 1999 I was very puzzled. I thought, “Wait, didn’t they have a Sega Saturn? I thought that was still around.”
I don’t think I could conceptualize that far ahead. All I really understood was that 32-bit games were more advanced and desirable than 8 and 16 bit games. It would never have occurred to me, “Sega dethroned the NES’s stranglehold on the US game market, can they do it again?” because I didn’t know any of that background yet. These were just fun boxes I’d play in front of the TV or at other kids’ houses, I didn't have the perspective to see it as some capitalistic battle.
No I had no idea. Money wasn’t really a concept I understood at that age. Although I do remember the weird look my Dad got on his face when I told him I wanted a Sega Saturn for Christmas. He was probably thinking about the blow it would deliver to his bank account!
Yes! I first got one at Goodwill in 2004 or 2005 for $40. Now I have maybe 5 of them, a few of which are white or gray models from Japan.
One could argue the Playstation library has more diverse offerings and the N64 can outmuscle them both at 3D rendering. But the Saturn really appeals to me because of how unattainable it seemed. I wanted one as a kid and didn’t get one, the good games became collectors’ items shortly after its discontinuation, the really good games were stuck in Japan, the Saturn struggled at 3D graphics so when it pulled off visuals that would have been average by Playstation standards it seemed phenomenal, and Saturn emulation wasn’t even accessible to most people until the late 2000’s. Playstation and N64 were plentiful and easy to find growing up, but good Saturn stuff was rare as hen’s teeth. I think these factors made me want it more.
domestic:
Virtua Cop II NiGHTS into Dreams Dragon Force Shining Force III House of the Dead
import:
Elevator Action Returns Bulk Slash Metal Slug
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Post by Sarge on Sept 18, 2020 17:46:23 GMT -5
Oh, dang, forgot about Elevator Action Returns as well. Very, very cool game. Might even sort of work for this month's theme.
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Post by anayo on Sept 19, 2020 5:50:16 GMT -5
Oh, dang, forgot about Elevator Action Returns as well. Very, very cool game. Might even sort of work for this month's theme. That one also saw a rerelease one Taito Legends 2 for Xbox and Playstation 2.
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