[swaaye]

Originally Posted by Exophase

Regardless of what Rand Linden claimed I don't have a lot of faith that Dreamcast can emulate N64 that well. Maybe around the level PSP does at best, but even PSP has a couple advantages here. You can see how poorly the Daedalus port runs in onQ's video, this isn't any kind of real accomplishment..

Yeah, even Xbox is iffy with a lot of N64 games.

[Simon F]

Originally Posted by Exophase

Can you be more specific? .

I meant this part of your comment:

But I agree that PS2 probably had more room to grow as developers figured out how to best utilize its many resources and DC games wouldn't have improved

<shrug>

[Exophase]

Originally Posted by Simon F

I meant this part of your comment:

<shrug>

You clipped that quote in a bad place :P

To your comment, no, I wasn't making the assumption that DC games realized the full capabilities of the machine. Just that PS2 had more of a learning curve so it stood to reason that it'd take longer to see games utilize it as well.

[function]

Originally Posted by Simon F

Aren't you making the (flawed?) assumption that all the features of DC had been utilised?

Other than the aniso filtering (used once), SSAA (used once), dot3 bump mapping (used once, on a coin, in a Shenmue 2 menu), what else was rarely utilised? I remember this post from a few years back:

Originally Posted by Simon F

Which is again, strange, because CLX2 could do shadows from two lights sources - one using the full featured** modifier volume and the second using a "cut down" one which only allowed the shading to be modified.


**Fully featured meant that each triangle could choose one of two totally independent texture/shading parameter sets on a pixel-by-pixel basis.

What do you mean by a "texture/shading parameter set"? Does it mean texture layers, blend modes, light source, fogging etc?

Could you have had an effect where, say, within a volume representing a pocket torch you could have turned on a spot light source, a bump map, a specular map and activated particles representing dust in the air?

[Lazy8s]

Among those more "premium" features which were underutilized, the CLX2 also had two, generally applicable internal (fast) color buffers that could've been exploited to far greater effect for creative multi texture effects.

I figure Dreamcast's CLX2 was further ahead of any comparable graphics part near its launch in 1998 than any other modern graphics launch, with the exception of maybe MBX versus its respective competition of 2004.

[swaaye]

More DC hardware discussion here:
http://forum.beyond3d.com/showthread...dreamcast+neon

including SimonF on underutilized features.

[Simon F]

Originally Posted by swaaye

including SimonF on underutilized features.

Excellent. That saves me having to remember.

[fearsomepirate]

My friends' kids play some game where they fly RC planes and drive RC cars around a room to beat various challenges, and it's really pretty. I saw some kind of bump-mapping (EMBM?) in it, too.

[kagemaru]

Originally Posted by fearsomepirate

My friends' kids play some game where they fly RC planes and drive RC cars around a room to beat various challenges, and it's really pretty. I saw some kind of bump-mapping (EMBM?) in it, too.

My guess is Toy Commander?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UOz6lc5IUoA

Had a decent following IIRC, never got into it myself though.

[Simon F]

Originally Posted by kagemaru

My guess is Toy Commander?

It was a great game - you are basically enacting a child's imagination battling the 'evil toy bear'. Weapon upgrades were amusing - misiles started out as pencils, then biros and finally, IIRC, highlighters.

Techwise, it also featured shadow volumes (very useful when doing bombing runs).

[Angelcurio]

I really think that a generational leap can't only be measured from a graphics point of view. The Dreamcast did a lot of things that would become common place later, like the inclusion of a modem for online play, being able to browse the web (i don't remember if a special CD was needed for this), a memory card with a screen (ofter underused, etc. And as others have said in the graphics department, there was even a program to emulate PSX games called Bleemcast, even though i don't remember if it actually saw the light of the day.

[kagemaru]

Originally Posted by Simon F

It was a great game - you are basically enacting a child's imagination battling the evil bear. Weapon upgrades were amusing - misiles started out as pencils, then biros and finally, IIRC, highlighters.

Techwise, it also featured shadow volumes (very useful when doing bombing runs).

Yeah I had a lot of fun with the demo, have no idea why I never picked the game up.

Maybe I'll track a copy down, I still have my DC since that's the only system I'll never trade it.

Originally Posted by Angelcurio

I really think that a generational leap can't only be measured from a graphics point of view. The Dreamcast did a lot of things that would become common place later, like the inclusion of a modem for online play, being able to browse the web (i don't remember if a special CD was needed for this), a memory card with a screen (ofter underused, etc. And as others have said in the graphics department, there was even a program to emulate PSX games called Bleemcast, even though i don't remember if it actually saw the light of the day.

Yeah you needed a browser disc to browse the net on the dreamcast, a couple browser upgrades were also included with the ODM demo discs. The browser for the Saturn worked the same way.

Also Bleemcast did release, though not as originally intended. They planned to release one package that supported ~200 PS1 games, but it got scaled down to only a handful of disc releases that each supported a single game. I had it for MGS and Tekken 3 (at least I believe it was Tekken 3).

[fearsomepirate]

Yep, that's the game. Looked to be in the same spirit as Chibi Robo, Katamari Damacy, and that sort of thing.

Comparing GT2 Bleemcast vs Sega GT really shows off how much better PD was at nailing the colors in their in-game assets. The Sega GT games looked really cartoony by comparison (heck, Burnout 3 looks more realistic than Sega GT 2001). The Forza team has finally caught up, though.

[Nano]

Technically it destroyed those platforms.

Had some headroom too, especially as programmers lean new techniques. Shame it was cancelled so early...