Gamecube hardware

[Sonic]

I was thinking abut the Gamecube today. I was thinking about all the games I've seen on it and what games push the hardware the most. When it comes down to it, I know the specs, I know the performance figures, but I don't know the perks of the GCN hardware. What's good about it, what developers like, what the Flipper can do with the TEV unit. I'd like to know these things. I'd also like a discussion on it, as I'm sure many of the Nintnedo fans in this forum are more knowledgable on this subject than I am. So here's my questions.

1. The Gekko CPU, is it easy to work with? Does it have good real-world performance that can easily be tapped into without having to hassle?

2. The Flipper GPU. The TEV unit still remains a mystery to me. Is it really something comparable to the pixel shader in the Xbox? If so, what are its advantages and disadvantages over the Xbox pixel shaders?

3. What games do you think have taken the most advantage of the hardware?

 

[Paul]

IMO gamecube is the father of the best looking game this gen so far.

 

[PC-Engine]

IMO gamecube is the father of the best looking game this gen so far.

...and which game might that be?

 

[rabidrabbit]

I'd guess Metroid Prime.
It does look currently better than anything on any console (IMO)

 

[Bohdy]

Well, everyone knows that the Gekko is powerful beyond compare (;-)), and from what I have heard, the TEV is closer to PS2.0 than Ps1.4 in its design and implementation.

I have never heard concretely how powerful the fixed T&L is but I do know that it loses less speed with the addition of local lights than other T&L units because they are offloaded on to the Gekko.

The rest is just hearsay I guess. Maybe some ppl know more, but no-one seems to be interested in Gamecube hardware these days.

For some good examples of Gekko power check WindWaker (a big demo for it) and the upcoming RS3 seems to be using it to its peak with light scattering and physics simulation for the entire water mesh and every raindrop.

 

[ChryZ]

I would like to add:

Gameplay(++), Fun(++), Graphics(+++):
Rogue Squadron II: Rogue Leader
Rogue Squadron III: Rebel Strike
F-Zero

Gameplay(+++), Fun(+++), Graphics(++):
Ikaruga
Pikmin
Super Monkey Ball 1+2
Viewtiful Joe
Mario Sunshine

 

[cybamerc]

Sonic:

Your first question can only be answered by Cube devs or to some degree Mac devs and there aren't a whole lot either on this board

As for the second one ERP has already said as much as you can reasonable expect one who signed an NDA to do.

As for the third one... well, the obvious answer would be RS2/RS3. Noone has really done shaders like Factor 5 on the Cube. Luigi's Mansion does some cool stuff as well - especially for a launch title. Metroid Prime, while perhaps not using the latest and greatest techniques, manages to combine it all into one extremely polished package. Zelda... animation is superb. Of upcoming games there's RE4 which looks really nice and Killer 7 which I just have to mention because eventhough we know little about it it just has the coolest visual style of any game and some quite nifty cel-shading.

 

[Goldni]

In the latest IGN interview Julian E. said he (Factor 5) could replicate and or do anything on the Cube that the XB can do. From what I've seen I believe him. The GCN devs who take thier time like Sega can pull off some amazing visuals.

 

[Phil]

In the latest IGN interview Julian E. said he (Factor 5) could replicate and or do anything on the Cube that the XB can do.

Not to say that isn't true, but replicating can mean a lot of things. In the end, I'm pretty certain PS2 could replicate anything Xbox can do aswell - question though is, how fast (at what performance hit)?

 

[zurich]

In the latest IGN interview Julian E. said he (Factor 5) could replicate and or do anything on the Cube that the XB can do.

Not to say that isn't true, but replicating can mean a lot of things. In the end, I'm pretty certain PS2 could replicate anything Xbox can do aswell - question though is, how fast (at what performance hit)?

Nod, no matter what anyone says, the 64 megs of ram in the XB is its trump card (over the GC).

edited for clarification.

 

[Rodéric]

Nod, no matter what anyone says, the 64 megs of ram in the XB is its trump card.

That and the HDD if it can be used to stream data (instead of using the CDROM drive).

 

[Ozymandis]

I'd guess Metroid Prime.
It does look currently better than anything on any console (IMO)

Artistically maybe. As far as sheer graphical prowess, I'd strongly disagree. The smooth 60 frames per second is appreciated, though

 

[Qroach]

Oh god, I thougt sonic posted a very valid question, and some people here are going to turn it into a thread from two years ago.

1. Stop quoting anything Julian says. He hasn't released and XBox title, Only gamecube titles, and he had a hand in creating the gamecube hardware.

2. The gamecube hardware is fast, but structured in a way that it's easy to develop for. This isn't a bad thing, but it doesn't leave many ways to improve on performance or squeez a bunch of new rendering techniques out of it.

 

[zurich]

Nod, no matter what anyone says, the 64 megs of ram in the XB is its trump card.

That and the HDD if it can be used to stream data (instead of using the CDROM drive).

Well I didn't mention the HD since the vast majority of devs treat it as a big memory card :? AFAIK the level streaming bit was only seen in Halo.. most games still prefer to inflict cruel load screens on us

 

[Bohdy]

1. Stop quoting anything Julian says. He hasn't released and XBox title, Only gamecube titles, and he had a hand in creating the gamecube hardware.

2. The gamecube hardware is fast, but structured in a way that it's easy to develop for. This isn't a bad thing, but it doesn't leave many ways to improve on performance or squeez a bunch of new rendering techniques out of it.

1.) Factor 5 did relelase a DivX pack for the Xbox that did take advantage of the Pixel Shader capabilities to improve performance. Plus they only made the audio software for the Gamecube. And I daresay we should look at their output before questioning harrow-break's credibility

2.) Still arguably more flexible than the Xbox, especially with Dev's being forced to use .Net and not having access to assembly (AFAIK).

 

[zurich]

1.) Factor 5 did relelase a DivX pack for the Xbox that did take advantage of the Pixel Shader capabilities to improve performance. Plus they only made the audio software for the Gamecube. And I daresay we should look at their output before questioning harrow-break's credibility

2.) Still arguably more flexible than the Xbox, especially with Dev's being forced to use .Net and not having access to assembly (AFAIK).

1) F5 have a vested interest in GC hardware. This was argued to death some time ago, and IIRC, the evidence supporting this ended up being greater.. so not going to get into this again.

2) Er, what? Devs have been using assembly on the Xbox for some time.. infact, at the beginning that was all they had (for vertex/pixel ops). There was a video interview with Bungie some time ago (think it was on IGN insider, not sure) where Jason Jones basically leaped praise upon praise upon their 'assembly guy' for getting the shaders done fast, and thus allowing the game to ship for Xbox launch. Actually it may have been in 'Opening the Xbox' now that I think of it.

Me thinks you need to get your facts straight!

 

[Bohdy]

2) Er, what? Devs have been using assembly on the Xbox for some time.. infact, at the beginning that was all they had (for vertex/pixel ops). There was a video interview with Bungie some time ago (think it was on IGN insider, not sure) where Jason Jones basically leaped praise upon praise upon their 'assembly guy' for getting the shaders done fast, and thus allowing the game to ship for Xbox launch. Actually it may have been in 'Opening the Xbox' now that I think of it.

Well, they are a first party :? But I could very well be wrong, this is just what I have heard. I believe some PS2 dev's were complaining about not having low-level Xbox access. I heard the .Net thing from the mouth of a Dev himself though.

And harrow-break has a vested interest in Atari if anything

 

[Tagrineth]

They have SHADER ASSEMBLY, basically they have to hand-code any shader programmes they use, but that isn't low level hardware access as the same shader programmes should work on an ATi Radeon 8500 or better (mostly).

 

[Paul]

...and which game might that be?

Re: Remake.

Don't anyone give me that garbage "oh but it's pre-rendered" because it's all useless, it doesn't matter HOW they get the game to look amazing, the game just looking amazing is what counts. And IMO this game is the best looking so far.

 

[arhra]

They have SHADER ASSEMBLY, basically they have to hand-code any shader programmes they use, but that isn't low level hardware access as the same shader programmes should work on an ATi Radeon 8500 or better (mostly).

The xbox (/gf3) shaders are almost identical to an idealised dx8 shader, though, so the shader assembly will translate almost exactly to actual shader microcode (it's actually a superset, i believe, with the xbox sdk providing a few extra instructions to cover the additional functionality). It also provides the ability to load multiple vertex shader programs at once, and switch between them at will, without having to stall and flush the pipeline, and a few other. IIRC, it also allows you to define pixel shaders in the native hardware format, and access to the gpus native pushbuffer format.