Digital Foundry Retro Discussion [2024]

[Cyan]

 

[Cyan]

a 13 years old kid is the first human being to ever beat Tetris. Til now only an AI had managed to achieve that.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

We've found our John Connor!

 

[Seanspeed]

Have you ever said to yourself, "You know what, this game does not have enough jaggies and pixel crawl!"? Well we've got a solution for you!

 

[Cyan]

Have you ever said to yourself, "You know what, this game does not have enough jaggies and pixel crawl!"? Well we've got a solution for you!

yup, that caught my attention. I don't see the point, except for saving some processing power, of using native resolution on a modern display. Also he could combine native and the improvements he is talking about, if that makes any difference even at 4K, but to each its own.

 

[Cyan]

 

[see colon]

It's strange to me that John says it's rare to see unfiltered textures in PS2 games. I see them fairly often. Lots of games have unfiltered textures for hair, fire, grates and the like. I remember them being very abundant in Resident Evil Dead Aim.

 

[davis.anthony]

To be fair to PS2, it actually did a pretty decent job of running MP2 all things considered.

And it is arguably more of an 'impossible port' than any of the Switch 'impossible ports'

 

[Shifty Geezer]

This thread is for discussion Digital Foundry Retro content only. For other retro discussion, please post here.

 

[Cyan]

wish I had played this back in the day. I never was into Star Wars but some of the Star Wars games are pretty good, though this seems to be a step above.

 

[Theeoo]

Hopefully they'll do a Dark Forces 2 remaster as well.

 

[Cyan]

Hopefully they'll do a Dark Forces 2 remaster as well.

does it use the same engine? The engine of the original was ahead of its time. Certain details like true structures one on top of the other with space between them and being able to look up and down is something that Doom players could only dream about.

Btw, the tick rate trick is nifty. If I get the game I am going to play it on my 165Hz monitor. Any PC should be able to run this game smoothly nowadays.

I didn't know that John was such a nerd, even when he talks about music. The Sound Blaster AWE 32 was my first ever soundcard -although my Soundblaster Live was the true evolution, allowing for huge soundfonts-.

More than a decade ago, I got the Roland SD-50, which could be considered an evolution of the Sound Canvas, but with General MIDI 2 support, atlhough it has a totally new set of instruments -more than 1000-, and it sound really good. I still have at home and it's working like the first day.

I miss MIDI 'cos of personalization, and I loved to extract MIDI files from the game files using certain DOS programs back in the day. But well, that's a different matter... and it was really practical in an era where memory was at a prime.

 

[Theeoo]

>> does it use the same engine?

Dark Forces uses the Jedi engine, which was used in Outlaws, and the sequel uses the Sith engine, so no.

 

[Karamazov]

 

[Karamazov]

I miss MIDI 'cos of personalization, and I loved to extract MIDI files from the game files using certain DOS programs back in the day. But well, that's a different matter... and it was really practical in an era where memory was at a prime.

i miss the times when i was playing midi musics with the yamaha S-YXG50 soft synthesizer midi player

 

[Cyan]

i miss the times when i was playing midi musics with the yamaha S-YXG50 soft synthesizer midi player

never had that synth when it was launched, But it's available nowadays in many sites and I have it since a few years ago, and it's an amazing synth 'cos it only uses 4MB of memory but you can get professional music from it, if you use the correct SysEx messages. Did it work directly with games like say Doom?

When I heard this, I was awestruck, how such a soft synth from Yamaha could sound so professional while packed in only 4MB.

Metallica's Master Of Puppets being played on it.

I worked in several soundfonts and the memory requirements could rapidly increase, but such great sound in 4MB....

And as a bonus....

 

[Cyan]

 

[Cyan]

John's friend, Andi, shows some of his GB games.

 

[Cyan]

the PS1 days.... That's when I had my first PC -in late 1995- and iirc the PS1 was launched that year.

 

[Nesh]

the PS1 days.... That's when I had my first PC -in late 1995- and iirc the PS1 was launched that year.

What I find outstanding is how well Wipeout aged. There is something about it's style, sound and motion that compose a more pleasing aesthetic compared to the modern wipeouts and similar games.

The environments have elements of believability and groundedness compared to the overdone futuristic sterile looks of the new games. There is an identity vs the generic futuristic designs of Wipeout Omega. The logo designs and weapon icons are much more pronounced as part of the game's identity. It has Designers Republic talking to you.

The sound effects, such us the boost, the weapon acquisition, the warning and starting voice , the collision effects, are very unique, stylized and much more fitting with the whole theme and composition. The music is varied and stylish, fully describing the theme compared to the generic, mainstream beats found in newer games.

The ships have a more realistic control and much more believable physics. The ships physics give the impression of wind and gravity were the pilot is fighting with forces of nature. Like how Gran Turismo would have been if anti gravity racing became a thing. The new Wipeout games don't convey that. The ships are just floating as if they are on ice and on a flat rail.

There is also a very interesting detail with the camera work. The camera doesn't stick behind the ship. The ship gets off center on different parts of the screen while the camera follows the track, farther adding to the experience and also creating an atmosphere of the observer of the whole game as a composition of sound, motion and visual effects