Crazyace:
Things dont really look much better than the tomb raider games.
Are you sure about some of your comparisons?
Shenmue - Saturn
Tomb Raider 3 and Chronicles - PlayStation
For me, Sega Rally 2 was above all a superlative game - graphically it was
outclassed by the Ridge Racer launch title...
SEGA Rally Championship - Saturn
Ridge Racer - PlayStation
SEGA Rally’s real visual strength was evident in motion where its cars realistically leaned into turns and bounced on the undulations of the road. The game’s physics provided the cars with a convincing suspension system and a substantial feel of weightiness.
and Toshinden ( another launch title ) is graphically better than both VF1/VF1 remix and VF2 --
Virtua Fighter 2 - Saturn
Battle Arena Toshinden - PlayStation
And VF2 runs at 60 fps.
but there are technically better PS1 games in the same genre
Right, but I was using a game which was developed simultaneously for both systems to highlight ways in which their versions differed. I mention several other games to perhaps point to a general trend.
Guden Oden:
No, no, no, no. WO was pretty solid 25fps on PS, on Saturn there was a definite juddering to the screen updates.
It’s at times hard to pinpoint the difference in framerate because they allowed you to move faster, as far as sense of speed, in the Saturn port.
Oh, I'm surely converted to your side NOW! "Many others"!
There are more to list, but the titles aren’t too noteworthy to the enthusiast gamer, nor are the differences all that dramatic. If you were a sports gamer at that time and trying to decide between Saturn and PlayStation, you might’ve noticed the differences in a title like Madden NFL ‘97, for instance, where the PS version looked cleaner but the field/stadium scrolled more smoothly on Saturn. Or in 3D Baseball from Crystal Dynamics, where the Saturn version looked a little better all around. Same situation as Mechwarrior II.
Let's just forget the awkward, bumbling design of the hardware itself with its multitude of processors (six in total, as I recall, though I might easily have missed one or two! ),
It may have been ugly to program, but there were some games that made good on its promised potential.
I think you'll find a lot more games ran much better on PS than the other way around.
Definitely, regarding multiplatform 3D games; most developers admitted that market conditions made it not worthwhile to try to make effective use of the SEGA hardware.
there's not much in that machine's favor in comparison.
It depends on what you’re looking for. Saturn had more flexibility for really interesting custom approaches, and its sound chip was amazing (though crippled somewhat by memory):
"Saturn's sound hardware is phenomenal. It's way, way, better than the PlayStation's sound - you can basically plug in a synthesizer and play it through MIDI."
http://darkwatcher.psxfanatics.com/console/details/saturn.html
and have a task that suited itself to being divided up (not all are).
The real limit to how nicely it can be done is the designer’s ingenuity, like on any multiprocessor system. Some people want to claim only titles like VF2 were ideal cases, but there’s incredible variety among a list of impressive Saturn titles:
Assault Suit Leynos 2
Panzer Dragoon Saga
Burning Rangers
Dark Savior (pushed lots of geometry)
Dead or Alive
Digital Dance Mix Vol. 1: Namie Amuro
Dragon Force
Duke Nukem 3D
Elevator Action Returns
Grandia
Guardian Heroes
Last Bronx
NiGHTS Into Dreams
Panzer Dragoon II: Zwei
Quake
Princess Maker
Radiant Silvergun
Megaman 8
Sakura Wars 2
Samurai Spirits: Best Collection
Saturn Bomberman (extra-high res for 10 players)
Scorcher
SEGA Rally Championship
Shining Force III
Silhouette Mirage
Sonic R
Soukyugurentai: Otokuyo (amazing visuals)
Street Fighter Alpha 2
Vampire Savior
Virtua Cop 2
Virtua Fighter 2
Virtual On: Cyber Troopers
X-Men Vs. Street Fighter
I don’t know... I’d say the Saturn’s ‘parallel’ processing approach could lend itself well enough to whatever the designer managed to plan properly.
Uh, come again??? Custom titles' higher framerates COMPARED TO WHAT?
Compared to similar games on PS. Daytona CCE ran smoother than the Gran Turismos, for instance. Virtua Cop 2 presented a staggering 3D world with more scope than Namco’s PS lightgun shooters, and the Saturn never flinched on it.
Its custom titles, like NiGHTS for example, moved very fast and nicely though loaded with special effects - reflections in the mirrors and the deforming terrain of Soft Museum, the flowing liquid surfaces of Mystic Forest, the showers of particles, etc. Virtua ON got hectic but stayed fast and smooth. The Saturn’s best titles were always good at not getting bogged down when running lots of flourishes.
I actually thought Panzer Dragoon 2 beat the pants off Nights in both graphics and gameplay departments, Nights was a confused, uninspired Mario64 knee-jerk response that used way too much purple in it graphics design. PD was simple to say the least in its gameplay, but it executed what little it had with lethal precision. Awesome shooting game for its time! Nights was just tired and boring IMO.
Panzer Zwei was very tightly executed. Very cinematic, too.
NiGHTS was and still is wholly original on just about every level. The freedom of flight, fluid and responsive controls that brought with it the first-released analog pad of the gen, and intuitive movement/actions - like closing the space around an enemy in a flying paraloop, capturing them within - that still kept you focused on the main task of maintaining your momentum and flight path unbroken. To pull off its 360 degrees of flight freedom in 3D, the levels challenged you to catch the springboards, bumpers, fountains, cannons, etc. to accelerate your path along 2D ‘runs’ around its 3D world. The game’s music was also pieced together in realtime, based off the temperaments (from how you’ve treated/interacted with them) of the artificial life forms (A-Life algorithms) living and breeding in the levels. I don’t see how something innovative like that can be “uninspiredâ€, or least of all, “tiredâ€. Or how the need to express an original vision, like that of NiGHTS, could at the same time be some “knee-jerk responseâ€.
You say the game is “confusedâ€, but I think it’s actually one of the few games that presents a fully unified vision from all its elements. It’s all about the freedom and gracefulness of flying, like in our dreams - hence the momentum-based gameplay that was all about maintaining your flight path, the system for ‘linking’ that rewarded your ability to ably direct your flight through hoop trails, the completely intuitive controls that required just one button, the themes, the graphics and music, and the little magical touches (such as the melodic chime that rings at a slightly higher note with each link you string together).
The concept is almost like swimming through the air (as if it were water) at high speeds.
If you agree, then I don’t understand why you said:
“The PS is just plain superior at 3D and that's a *fact*.â€
For some, the texture warping could be a pretty big deal breaker on a lot of PS 3D, regardless of what else the graphics are accomplishing. Some might really appreciate better graphic definition and favor Saturn’s higher-res mode games. The Saturn could offer more performance if your design or desired effect went outside the PS’s fixed pipeline and needed flexible power... the multitude of processors in SEGA’s console provided interesting options for that - notice that the custom water effects of Saturn’s Tomb Raider weren’t in the PS games, or the amazing water from Panzer Dragoon Zwei for that matter, particles, etc.
It can’t be overlooked that 2D was still a fairly big thing back in the 32-bit era, especially in the Japanese market. There are literally dozens of stunning 2D works shared by both systems where the Saturn is better... noticeably.
Anyway, here’s a little gallery of appreciation:
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