FGEN beta! From www.ksd/gp32/합니다/dev

[Rigor Mortis]

Hmmm... Wow, i didn't know the built-in chips actually increased the SNES CPU speed.. that 21 Mhz of the Super FX2 is a darn impressive increase :blink:

 

[Twimfy]

Y'know this is the first time I have ever really looked at the SNES in any detail, and I have to say it's an impressive piece of hardware, just when I was younger it completely failed to capture my imagination, I guess it depends on the user rather than the specs and software.

Anyhoo I have to say they did a better job than Sega, although I love my 32X and mega CD, why couldn't have they just used more advanced cartridges? The virtua racing and Virtua fighter MD cartridges produced far better results than the 32X ever did(apart from starwars maybe).

 

[Rigor Mortis]

Anyhoo I have to say they did a better job than Sega, although I love my 32X and mega CD, why couldn't have they just used more advanced cartridges? The virtua racing and Virtua fighter MD cartridges produced far better results than the 32X ever did(apart from starwars maybe).

If you are asking "Why didn't Sega put upgrade chips in their carts?" the answer is that they couldn't. In fact, that is why the failure known as the 32x was created - because Genesis carts could not contain coprocessers like SNES carts could.

(By failure I mean that it was not commercially succesful, not that it was inferior hardware)

 

[Twimfy]

They did put ugrades in their cartridges, Virtua figthter and racer both contained what they called the VR FX chip, which pumped polygons out of the megadrive. That's what I meant when I was talking about those two games doing a better job than the 32X.

 

[Chip]

The reason Sega and it's developers were probably a little hesitant about putting coprocessors in more games is very simple: Money. All those fancy graphics chips they put in the SNES carts were plenty expensive. They only used them because it was the only way to keep the system competitive.

Think about it, even back then, a 1mbit ROM chip didn't cost more than a couple dollars. Add another dollar for the cart casing and one more for packaging, and you can mass-produce a game for under $5 each. But something like the SuperFX chip probably cost $5-$10 just for the chip. If you design a game that uses one, you've automatically doubled or trippled your mfg. cost!

Sega was able to avoid this to some extent. Although it's graphics engine wasn't capable of quite as much as Nintendo's, what it could do, it did FAST. That's one of the reasons Sega pushed the Sonic franchise so much. They knew the SNES couldn't get a game to scroll that quickly, and they wanted to show that the genesis was the "faster" system.

When Sega finally broke down and admitted to themselves that some sort of upgrade was necessary, they built the 32x. The Idea was great on paper. Instead of putting coprocessors and extra ram in each cart (which eats up your profit margin), make an add-on that people buy ONCE and can be used with many carts. I'm not sure why it failed so miserably.

 

[Tobriand]

It failed so miserably for one or 2 reasons. Mostly because they introduced it atthe end of an era - just before the 32-bit systems came out. Including their Saturn. So people bought the 32x thinking there were a few games coming out, but then Sega released the Sega-CD - after only ever releasing about 2 games for 32x, and then the Saturn after only a couple of games for that.

It wasn't that those particular bits failed miserably, it was just that Sega themselves didn't keep them alive. At all. Which was why the Saturn went down so fast - not enough people were willing to fork out the $500 it was when it first hit the shelves for something that might only ever get 2 games made for it. Its a real shame the company didn't just hold back on the Saturn for a bit longer, not bother with the Sega-CD, and spend a bit more time on polygonal 32x games.

Even more because it would have left it more time to improve their 32bit system a bit more. Whilst its got nicer sound than the PSX, it still seems to be limited by traditional SEGA problems qith transparency in lots of things. And Pixellyness. In ways that the PSX virtually never saw. Or the N64. If they'd spent a bit longer on developing that and not rushed to get there first at the expense of their other systems, they'd prolly have done better with the dreamcast, since people would still have trusted them to release a lot for it, and they';d have successfully shifted more of the things.

And more dreamcasts sold means they might be able to be in the next next gen race that's starting to happen now (although not very far underway yet, methinks).

 

[crazeeplaya]

I always thought the SNES was a more powerful console too. If that is the case, with SNES emulation progressing well, maybe we would get a descent speed Megadrive emulator.

btw There is more than one being worked on at the moment. The other one (can't remember who it's by) is supossed to be running better than fGEN

 

[NssOne]

And more dreamcasts sold means they might be able to be in the next next gen race that's starting to happen now (although not very far underway yet, methinks).

(Note: This is only if I understand what you said correctly. I don't understand how you don't know this by now, but if you don't here it is.)

SEGA dropped out of the console market due the cost of next-gen hardware parts and manufacturing. So SEGA went completely third party only developing games for Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo. And if I read that hartware.de correctly, SEGA is planning on developing games for the GP32, also.

 

[Twimfy]

There is still hope I think, you never know what might spring up next.

Does anyone have 32X specs in comparison to the PSX, again I've heard it rumoured that it is the more powerful machine (in specs only) I have one and I have yet to find a game which reaches the lowest PSX standard, but I can't help wondering what might have been.

 

[Mofokubik]

Here are the specs I found for 32X

Processor
Twin Hitachi (SH2) 32 bit RISC processors
- clock speed of 23 MHZ
- 40 MIPS

Co-Processors
Genesis 68000, Z80, Genesis 32X VDP Video processor
- 50,000 texture-mapped polygons/sec
- texture mapping
- hardware scaling and rotation

Video
32,768 simultaneous colours on screen
Genesis resolution
- Overlaying over existing Genesis/SegaCD video

Memory
12k (4 MBit) additional RAM to Genesis/SegaCD memory

Sound
Stereo PCM chip
- audio mixing with Genesis sound
- additional 2 channels (therefore 14 all together?)

Cartridge
- compatible with Genesis model 1 & 2, JVC X'eye
- can store save game/score information (as with many Genesis games)

I played 32x before and its amazing what it can make genesis do. I havent played a sega saturn before. Dreamcast is great, one of my favorite systems of all time. I dont think they skimped on the hardware at all, and the multiplatform games were much better on dreamcast, at least I think so.

 

[Chip]

It wasn't that those particular bits failed miserably, it was just that Sega themselves didn't keep them alive. At all. Which was why the Saturn went down so fast - not enough people were willing to fork out the $500 it was when it first hit the shelves for something that might only ever get 2 games made for it. Its a real shame the company didn't just hold back on the Saturn for a bit longer, not bother with the Sega-CD, and spend a bit more time on polygonal 32x games.

I have read more than one article attributing the rapid death of the Saturn to the near-imposibility of developing games for it. Supposedly the dev-kit that Sega supplied to game prod. companies was absolute crap, and the hardware was extremely difficult to code for. There were quite a few games that were abandoned almost immediately after they were started once the programmers saw how difficult it was.

Sega learned their lesson from the Saturn debacle, which is why the Dreamcast is so programmer-friendly.

As to the early death of the 32x, I think you're right. It was probably just bad timing. If they had developed it a year or 2 earlier, it might have gotten a foothold in the market that would have extended the life of the Genesis by several years.

 

[Twimfy]

Yeah EDGE magazine stated that it was a major screw up of marketing and Saturns difficult hardware that made it fail. Actually I've just noticed that it has a similar architechture to that of the 32X's twin hitachi risc proccessors (both of which are 2D). Fundamentally producing Textured 3D polys on the Saturn plucked up the same problems as what people are having now with the GP32.

Saturn is a great 2D machine but pathetic at 3D unless it's done properly, I'm stilled impressed everytime I play Sonic R on mine, but then I put die hard trilogy and things quickly get ugly.

One thing I think the 32X would have been great for would have been upgrading games, the fact that it could overlay onto the megadrive/sega CD display is an interesting idea and they could have modded games so easily with that.

 

[Tobriand]

I haven't played a 32x or a Sega-CD, but I do have a saturn, which for the most part I love. Especially Panzer Dragoon Saga.

It does very much suffer from pixellyness though. Its tollerable, but if you compare it to psx, its quite bad. Anyone with more knowledge on these things know if it had an FPU or not? Could just have been non-floating 3D or something, which would explain it.

 

[SephirothIce]

I would comment, but I am a hardcore SNES fan.

 

[Twimfy]

You did comment and you're still a hardcore SNES fan. :huh:

 

[Kop_007]

Have I been transported back to 1992? Snes vs Megadrive, will it ever end?

Snes was better by the way.

 

[Exile 3]

u jerk