Dreamcast & Psx Emulator

[saehn]

But the interesting thing, I think, is that it's easier to be more forgiving with older renders. The closer the engine gets to looking completely real, the more you realize certain things are missing.

Ah, the Uncanny Valley:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncanny_Valley

Personally, I prefer 3D for first person shooters and flight simulators. 3D or 2D for fighters. For everything else, there's 2D. Priceless.

 

[rokdcasbah]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncanny_Valley

yeah, it's at least a similar phenomenon. although i'd rather reserve the uncanny valley for things having to do with making humans or things that are anthropomorphic. i think that there's a more general issue of balance...if you're going to go overboard on screen resolution and texture detail, and leave other aspects the same, you can expect things to start looking a little weird. eyes don't "refresh" in the extremely clean way that an animation created frame by frame does. neither does a camera...so motion blur becomes required at some point. also, i think that the more pixels you have in an image, the more apparent it becomes that the lighting calculations for each ones are based on a video adapter's possible outputs, which in the end is somewhat arbitrary.

gears of war actually has a sort of motion blur, and it looks better than the fake one that some ps2 games have, but they only use it when you hit a certain button, so it's more of a special effect than a subtly varying feature of the engine.

cool link: http://www.rhythm.com/~ivan/mb.html

i saw a little twilight princess as well, and thoroughly enjoyed the light bloom stuff.

another cool link: http://www.daionet.gr.jp/~masa/rthdribl/

polygon engines, imo, are just sort of primitive, having evolved out of a sort of blitter-based mentality and designed to support existing (2D) hardware rather than the other way around. they require a lot of "extras" in order to approach the flexibility and realism of a raytracer. of course, they perform well in real-time, and raytracers mostly don't. when you only have 20-30ms to do a render, something's gotta go.

edit: links, typos

 

[Destructo2000]

I think 3d is way overrated. It's cool for FPS games (obviously) and some other games, but unless everything is 100% perfect in every way, I always notice things wrong wheras in 2d, you don't. I guess it's because in 2d, it almost can't be wrong. Most older games that are 2d are better anyway.

 

[Claym99]

I think 3d is way overrated. It's cool for FPS games (obviously) and some other games, but unless everything is 100% perfect in every way, I always notice things wrong wheras in 2d, you don't. I guess it's because in 2d, it almost can't be wrong. Most older games that are 2d are better anyway.

What about games like Zelda where you have puzzles? 3D quite literally adds another dimension to this. If not for 3D people would probably not give a crap about Zelda. People would only play games like Final Fantasy because of a good story line.

 

[Ravnos]

With enough brute force, anything is possible. I just think that is is a matter of extreme overclocking and really unlocking the 2nd core. If you can offload video to the 2nd core, then maybe you can get some simple Saturn Games to work. However, the Saturn is very unlikely because if I remember correctly, it has somewhere around 8 processors.

Well, when you can figure out how to overclock a GP2X to 3GHz, then we'll see about Dreamcast and Saturn emulation. In the meantime, neither one is happening.

 

[Alex.]

I think 3d is way overrated. It's cool for FPS games (obviously) and some other games, but unless everything is 100% perfect in every way, I always notice things wrong wheras in 2d, you don't. I guess it's because in 2d, it almost can't be wrong. Most older games that are 2d are better anyway.

What about games like Zelda where you have puzzles? 3D quite literally adds another dimension to this. If not for 3D people would probably not give a crap about Zelda. People would only play games like Final Fantasy because of a good story line.

I was under the impression that the NES, SNES, and Gameboy Zeldas were all major hits that established quite a solid fanbase. 3D is overrated. It's overused as well. There should still be room for 2D games on today's modern consoles, from beat-'em-ups to space shooters to platformers and to RPGs. The fact that 3D became the only acceptable norm makes me sick and quite sad, because it's a constant reminder of how the fun part of the video game industry turned into a money churning piece of shit. Homebrew is the future

- Alex

 

[saehn]

I was under the impression that the NES, SNES, and Gameboy Zeldas were all major hits that established quite a solid fanbase. 3D is overrated. It's overused as well. There should still be room for 2D games on today's modern consoles, from beat-'em-ups to space shooters to platformers and to RPGs. The fact that 3D became the only acceptable norm makes me sick and quite sad, because it's a constant reminder of how the fun part of the video game industry turned into a money churning piece of shit. Homebrew is the future

Claym99 is 16, so he's part of the generation that grew up playing that 3D drek. I blame Sony for pushing the 3D graphics of the PS1.

It's usually difficult to navigate in a 3D virtual environment (exceptions would be shooters and flight sims). Physical navigation depends on all kinds of peripheral cues that just aren't representable in virtual environments (at least not until we have the holodeck ). With 2D viewpoints, you have a clearer view of what's going on around you. The other problem with 3D is that it's usually rife with graphical errors. I shouldn't be able to see inside models, or environments. I shouldn't see seams or crack in models. Even "A-list" 3D games have these problems.

 

[rokdcasbah]

it depends on the engine. if it's done well (auto lock-on, intelligent camera, and such), a 3D game with tight controls can be more intuitive to control than a 2D game with messy controls.

anyone played kingdom hearts 2? i love the shmup sections in that, and i'm generally not a huge fan of shooters (but then, i love viewpoint for neo geo as well, and a lot of people don't...). the nice thing is that, at any given time, you can only move up/down or left/right...you are basically on a fixed track and can only rotate 90 degrees at a time, and only in the horizontal direction.

nights into dreams is the same way...looks 3D but plays 2D...i love stuff like that.
there's a lot of gray area between sprites + scrolling vs. full-on scene rendering. what about star fox, paper mario, etc etc. is doom a 3D game? what about wolfenstein 3D? don't answer that.

for the record, I love all games equally just give me an intelligent camera mechanism for 3D and I won't complain.

 

[lubidog]

It must be beyond discussion-2D done well is brilliant. 3D done well is brilliant!

I am so smart.

 

[saehn]

there's a lot of gray area between sprites + scrolling vs. full-on scene rendering. what about star fox, paper mario, etc etc. is doom a 3D game? what about wolfenstein 3D? don't answer that.

I've heard them referred to as being "2.5D".

 

[rokdcasbah]

2.5D makes me think of isometric bitmap games with flat backgrounds like mario rpg or ff7.

nothing wrong with that!!

edit: if i was more eloquent, i would have said in my last post that graphics and control/gameplay, while usually related, don't have to be. not all 3D games play like flight sims.

i agree that it can be frustrating when you have the full 6dof and nothing is automatic. what i consider to be "full-3D" means 3 translations (x,y,z) and three rotations (xy, yz, xz). for realistic controls each needs a vector (sign + magnitude). so you need 12 analog input mechanisms. that's madness. usually 3D games eliminate or automate the camera pitch (up-down rotation), so that eliminates 2 controls. implement gravity and include a jump button, and you're down to 8. which is what you get with two analog sticks. problem solved! but wait...who in their right mind wants to spend 99% of their time controlling movement and the remaining 1% having fun?

people who play flight sims

so there's plenty of games out there that "look" 3D but don't make you do all that crap work just trying to move around. my point was that there's no reason to write off the hundreds of thousands of games that can be called "3D", assuming that you even have a set criteria for what "3D" means.

 

[Destructo2000]

I think 3d is way overrated. It's cool for FPS games (obviously) and some other games, but unless everything is 100% perfect in every way, I always notice things wrong wheras in 2d, you don't. I guess it's because in 2d, it almost can't be wrong. Most older games that are 2d are better anyway.

What about games like Zelda where you have puzzles? 3D quite literally adds another dimension to this. If not for 3D people would probably not give a crap about Zelda. People would only play games like Final Fantasy because of a good story line.

I was under the impression that the NES, SNES, and Gameboy Zeldas were all major hits that established quite a solid fanbase. 3D is overrated. It's overused as well. There should still be room for 2D games on today's modern consoles, from beat-'em-ups to space shooters to platformers and to RPGs. The fact that 3D became the only acceptable norm makes me sick and quite sad, because it's a constant reminder of how the fun part of the video game industry turned into a money churning piece of shit. Homebrew is the future

- Alex

I'd have to agree with Alex. The only reason that the new Zelda, or other games, did so well is because they were already established and popular by the time their 3D counterparts arrived. Now sure, their are some really good 3d games, but there are even more 2d ones. That's why I liked the dreamcast so much since they still made 2d games. They didn't make as many as I would've liked, but they were still there. I've been playing the NES and the Genesis since before I was 2 years old (yes, before) and I guess that's why I like 2d games more. Or maybe it's just because they're better.

 

[rokdcasbah]

yeah but when they do 2D games on modern consoles they say, "hey, we've got all this space left on the cd, what are we going to put here?" and invariably they fill it with anime cutscenes and bad j-pop.

 

[halo9]

I agree, there's no reason why 2D games couldn't be made on modern systems, with up-to-date graphics, higher numbers of levels with more variation in style through the game. I'm quite a fan of the '2.5D' shooters that appeared in the last generation of consoles, Ikaruga, the Silpheed sequel on PS2 and many more on DC. The addictive, classic 2D arcade shooter gameplay is totally present, but with updated visual content.
I still have trouble getting into roaming 3D games. My Zelda Wind Waker is largely untouched. I do disagree that the continued success of the Zelda franchise is entirely down to it's history. Original 3D puzzle games like Pikmin can be very successful, they just seem to take an extra degree of effort to create, and these games are few and far between.

 

[saehn]

so there's plenty of games out there that "look" 3D but don't make you do all that crap work just trying to move around. my point was that there's no reason to write off the hundreds of thousands of games that can be called "3D", assuming that you even have a set criteria for what "3D" means.

Agreed, definitely. There certainly are exceptions. My objection is towards the badly done 3D games that started appearing about the time of the PS1. Just because you can do something in 3D doesn't mean that you should. One exception to the 3D flight/shooter guideline is the Grand Theft Auto series. That sucked (IMO) in 2D, but I loved it in 3D. Still, even it had the problems with seeing "inside" hollow characters and buildings.

I guess some us are just saying that we'd like to see more 2D games being produced again.

 

[Claym99]

I was under the impression that the NES, SNES, and Gameboy Zeldas were all major hits that established quite a solid fanbase. 3D is overrated. It's overused as well. There should still be room for 2D games on today's modern consoles, from beat-'em-ups to space shooters to platformers and to RPGs. The fact that 3D became the only acceptable norm makes me sick and quite sad, because it's a constant reminder of how the fun part of the video game industry turned into a money churning piece of shit. Homebrew is the future

Claym99 is 16, so he's part of the generation that grew up playing that 3D drek. I blame Sony for pushing the 3D graphics of the PS1.

It's usually difficult to navigate in a 3D virtual environment (exceptions would be shooters and flight sims). Physical navigation depends on all kinds of peripheral cues that just aren't representable in virtual environments (at least not until we have the holodeck ). With 2D viewpoints, you have a clearer view of what's going on around you. The other problem with 3D is that it's usually rife with graphical errors. I shouldn't be able to see inside models, or environments. I shouldn't see seams or crack in models. Even "A-list" 3D games have these problems.

Actually, I grew up playing NES and SNES...I can still remember the original Zelda map and where to get the second sword or where the great fairies are...

I have no problem with 2D but I don't have a hate fetish against 3D. If we didn't have it, a lot of games would be repetitive.

If I lived in a world where all I cared about was 3D...why would I have a GP2X?

 

[Destructo2000]

While we're still "on topic?" about dreamcast and psx emulation, does anybody know when beta 5 of psx4gp2x will be released? I hope it eventually utilizes both cores.

 

[crunchyballoons]

dreamcast hahahhahaahhahahahahahahahahahahahaaa..... ha...ha <_<

:lol:

 

[markiej]

Regarding biggest console generational leaps

I'd make a case for 'from NES to SNES'

totally off topic - but who cares because the actual topic is completely moot (w00t),

Between NES & SNES came Turbo Grafx & Megadrive. Ans SNES was not that much better than the Gennie, and worse in some areas (couldn't do the quick processing that made games like NHL, Gunstar, & Sonic Fly).

A case could be made that NES to Genesis was the hugest leap, but didn't master system and turbo grafx (pc engine) sneak in there?

 

[rokdcasbah]

Regarding biggest console generational leaps

I'd make a case for 'from NES to SNES'

totally off topic - but who cares because the actual topic is completely moot (w00t),

Between NES & SNES came Turbo Grafx & Megadrive. Ans SNES was not that much better than the Gennie, and worse in some areas (couldn't do the quick processing that made games like NHL, Gunstar, & Sonic Fly).

A case could be made that NES to Genesis was the hugest leap, but didn't master system and turbo grafx (pc engine) sneak in there?

there's no such thing as console generations. it's marketing & press bs that's become part of the general gamer vocabulary. where does it come from?

my theory is that sega created it with their "welcome to the next level" campaign. they had beaten nintendo to making a second home console, so they emphasized the fact that it was 16-bit and all that.

then once you have some made-up taxonomy, post it to wikipedia and pretend it's real