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[Jeffahn]

After an exciting session of Half-Life DC, I have seen the error of my ways. The framerate may have been in the sub 15 fps area half the time (especially during that demanding tram sequence where one character model shows up on screen), but it is obvious to me that, had the system still be alive today, a game like Half-Life 2 would have been no problem.

A suprisingly new low for you; trashing the DC on the basis of an un-released, incomplete port. Should I dig out the shots of how GT looked for the first time, the shots that lent the game a couple of extra years of development?

Actually, using DC's insane modifier volume capabilities, they could likely have added a fully unified lighting model to the game ala Doom 3.

The DC's modifier volumes are basically the same in principal as the shadow engine effects evident with the X-Box360.

I've heard rumors that the DC's graphics chip was so far ahead of its time that DX9-style operations are actually quite possible.

Normal mapping is impossible on the PS2...oh wait, it is actually possible. Many things become possible hardware-wise once you take the initiative. API's help with rote game development but they are not intended or capable of pushing any aprticular hardware to it limits by themselves.

The libraries were simply dated. Had the DC survived, though, we could have experienced the true power of the machine.

The DC libraries were universally acknowledged as being excellent. They would certainly have been refined and advanced, leading to more sophisticated gameplay and graphics.

Imagine what the 128-bit power of the DC could have done for HL2. Remember the Strider battle in the city? Now imagine the DC version with 80 Striders on screen at one time (fully self-shadowed, of course).

Would love to see PS2 have a go at PS2. Imagine that. No load times due to enhanced texture management.

I still can't believe how crazy the Sony hype was. I mean, while it turns out that the 100 specator comment actually DID come true (Rumble Roses puts more around the arena with more detailed main character models)...

No it didn't. Those spectators lack the texture detail evident in the Tekken demo. The geometry also appears to be lacking in comparison, and it's pretty hard to make out anything anyway. In any event, your sarcasm doesn't address the effect that 100 spectator and similar comments on fueling hype, wild speculation and rampannt zealousy targetting Sega. The impression created by that comment was that ahundred or so characters wandering around a game would be the norm and easy for developers to implement, yet here we sit five years later with one dubious example from one of Japan's top developers. Is that the best you ahve to offer?

Not only would they not have been inferior, they would have been vastly SUPerior. Thanks to the DC's modifier volumes, they could have had self-shadowing on all...wait, the game already had self-shadowing. Ah, but you see, on DC, they could have taken it to a whole new level. They could have used 2048x2048 textures with 4 layers per surface on EVERY surface. You know the bottom of Yorda's foot? Yeah, that could be 4 2048x2048 textures...giving the game a new sense of textured realism. Oh, and the resolution? We're talking 1920x1080p here with 128x AA and 1.8 million x AF. Yeah, that's real power.

Hey, hang on a sec -didn't ICO run at 30fps? You should probaly disown it just to be safe. Yes, another Ps2 game I actually played and enjoyed (up to a point).

...

 

[dark10x]

A suprisingly new low for you; trashing the DC on the basis of an un-released, incomplete port. Should I dig out the shots of how GT looked for the first time, the shots that lent the game a couple of extra years of development?

Who's trashing? DC was incredible.

LOOK AT TEH PS2!!11 TOTALLY CRAP, AM I RITE LOL?!!?

ROFL

How about some more DC?

Here's a pic from F355-2!!

Compare that to this fake PS2 crap...

The DC's modifier volumes are basically the same in principal as the shadow engine effects evident with the X-Box360.

Except for X360 really can't compare to the DC...

They had Gears of War shown on DC behind closed doors at E3, but MS wouldn't let the press report on it 'cuz it was running at 60 fps while the 360 couldn't even pull off 30. LOL 360 sux!11

The DC libraries were universally acknowledged as being excellent. They would certainly have been refined and advanced, leading to more sophisticated gameplay and graphics.

Oh I know!!!

No it didn't. Those spectators lack the texture detail evident in the Tekken demo. The geometry also appears to be lacking in comparison, and it's pretty hard to make out anything anyway. In any event, your sarcasm doesn't address the effect that 100 spectator and similar comments on fueling hype, wild speculation and rampannt zealousy targetting Sega. The impression created by that comment was that ahundred or so characters wandering around a game would be the norm and easy for developers to implement, yet here we sit five years later with one dubious example from one of Japan's top developers. Is that the best you ahve to offer?

Yeah, that's the best I have to offer. PS2 is pretty crap, though, so surely you can understand. Thankfully, DC actually blows away those promises. Did you ever see the unreleased 128 trillion spectator DC demo? WOW! Modifier volumes EVERYWHERE!

Hey, hang on a sec -didn't ICO run at 30fps? You should probaly disown it just to be safe. Yes, another Ps2 game I actually played and enjoyed (up to a point).

Yeah, it was only a shitty 30 fps. That's why I burned (literally) the game as a sacrifice to the DC.

 

[Mr Gump]

Who's trashing? DC was incredible.

LOOK AT TEH PS2!!11 TOTALLY CRAP, AM I RITE LOL?!!?

ROFL

How about some more DC?

Here's a pic from F355-2!!

Compare that to this fake PS2 crap...

Except for X360 really can't compare to the DC...

They had Gears of War shown on DC behind closed doors at E3, but MS wouldn't let the press report on it 'cuz it was running at 60 fps while the 360 couldn't even pull off 30. LOL 360 sux!11



Oh I know!!!



Yeah, that's the best I have to offer. PS2 is pretty crap, though, so surely you can understand. Thankfully, DC actually blows away those promises. Did you ever see the unreleased 128 trillion spectator DC demo? WOW! Modifier volumes EVERYWHERE!



Yeah, it was only a shitty 30 fps. That's why I burned (literally) the game as a sacrifice to the DC.

I like you better like this.

Stay this way :lol

You have potential.

 

[dark10x]

I like you better like this.

Stay this way :lol

You have potential.

This is my true nature!

 

[DCX]

A god amongst mere mortals...we are not worthy...

DCX

 

[nitewulf]

This is my true nature!

now you're catching on kid! i didn't know you had it in you!! :lol :lol :lol
honestly i dont know why you bother most of the time.

 

[U.2.K. Tha Greate$t]

The dreamcast is powerful enough to keep up with the ps2 graphics, we just didnt enough time to really see it, but from my eyes it did. I think anyone with some common sense can see it. People talking bs because the dreamcast aint in the picture anymore, thats all. But as a hardcore sega fan, i know whats up.

 

[nitewulf]

The dreamcast is powerful enough to keep up with the ps2 graphics, we just didnt enough time to really see it, but from my eyes it did. I think anyone with some common sense can see it. People talking bs because the dreamcast aint in the picture anymore, thats all. But as a hardcore sega fan, i know whats up.

 

[Lazy8s]

dark10x:

I don't think you can, as evident by this thread.

Some people are aware of more specific differences in rendering. There are a number of IQ compromises that can be made to save memory. One which has gone over best that's currently being done is the use of a lower resolution backbuffer -- the game still outputs at 640x480 and uses high color, yet there's a less noticeable trade-off still going on.

Saturn looks awful on an HD set BTW

One nice thing about an HDTV with Saturn is that it should generally give better resolution coverage for Saturn's 704x480 games like Decathlete and Virtua Fighter 2.

Not sure where "novel" hardware comes from either. What's so novel about Sega hardware? (outside of their past arcade boards).

PowerVR is the only 100% fillrate effective renderer on the market and the lowest in bandwidth expense, helping to give it such a performance per cost. The Dreamcast, despite being the first of this generation's consoles, supported a standard of proscan in just about every piece of software (including utility and demo discs). It supported native VGA and also launched with a built-in modem. It released only about two and a half years after the N64 and was a budget priced console as well.

The Saturn had a nice higher resolution mode, built-in memory, and internal clock.

MidgarBlowedUp:

Path of Neo does things on PS2 previously thought impossible. Normal Mapping, for example, was shown to be entirely feasible on Sony's aging machine via a cool spotlight hitting a brick wall demo.

I'd known the claim about what they're expecting to release, but is this effect actually of the quality of a dot product method?

Too bad the DC can't handle ICO though.
That game even had individually rendered leaves on the tress and they reflected light.
I don't know the technical terms but it looked pretty.

Yes, the Dreamcast can and did perform that effect. The "reflected" light is an overbright texture from the image reapplied to the screen.

I don't know what each was doing but are you sure we are talking about the same game?
The GH version of SH2 was Restless Dreams for the Xbox. Not to be confused with the original SH2 for PS2.

The lighting precision in that regard was the same for both PS2 versions.

And I have the game here at the house, the crowd is fully 3D.

Here is a model from the game... pretty far beyond the DC I'd say

On the subject of 3D crowds, DC had a nice one in Virtua Tennis.

 

[U.2.K. Tha Greate$t]

Maybe so, but VT sucks, because the game is too hard.

 

[dark10x]

Maybe so, but VT sucks, because the game is too hard.

Dude, DUDE. That's it, you're outta the Sega fan club. You do NOT diss Virtua Tennis.

 

[carbonbased]

*snip*
Remember the Killzone 2 "PS3" footage? Do you really know what that was running on? That rendered in realtime on the DC's Yamaha soundchip. The only feature of the PVR used was the modifier volumes. 60 fps on the DC's soundchip. Yeah, that's DC powa.

:lol :lol Finally you realize how futile it is logically arguing with "them".

 

[iced lightning]

Dreamcast rulez

viva la swirlvision

 

[MidgarBlowedUp]

I'd known the claim about what they're expecting to release, but is this effect actually of the quality of a dot product method?

Deferred Shading on PS2

Benefits of Deferred on the PS2
Allows per-pixel shading on PS2!
Extensive per-pixel programmability
floating point (including divide, sqrt, random, etc)
integer
data swizzling
lookup tables
data load/store (pixel local or between pixels)
looping
branching
Unlimited shader length
Flexible shader memory use (shader program, constants, etc)
Enables high-end effects like normal mapping & per-pixel lighting.

PS2 is quite capable of rasterizing per-pixel attributes to buffers
Lighting and shading performed at full floating point precision!

........

PS2: Bunny Demo
Object space normal maps, gloss maps
Directional lights with specular highlights
Two hemisphere area lighting
HDR accumulation, tone mapping

I could not tell you a dot product method from a zit on my a$$ but the above stuff sounds pretty cool for the old crappy "1999 Non Hardware Pixel Shader PS2"

Link: http://www.gdconf.com/archives/2004/pritchard_matt.ppt

 

[Warm Machine]

The common method of doing lighting now is by using a spherical harmonics gradient as a faux HDRI source. The method gives a faux global illumination look but is less calculation and memory dependant that a traditional point light solution. The PS1 was capable of such a feat as was the DC but both machines were outta there by the time the technique became available. Like most graphic effects like those in ICO they were added after the DC died and as such the DC never got to enjoy their benefits.

The myth of the PS2 being this amazing lighting is just that. All it is is new graphics tricks that were not known to developers before.

 

[MidgarBlowedUp]

The myth of the PS2 being this amazing lighting is just that. All it is is new graphics tricks that were not known to developers before.

That makes a little sense because ICO was going to be released on PS1 and was then ported to PS2.

 

[Lazy8s]

MidgarBlowedUp:

I could not tell you a dot product method from a zit on my a$$ but the above stuff sounds pretty cool for the old crappy "1999 Non Hardware Pixel Shader PS2"

Depending on the render cost, it seems like promising development tools.

When the PS2 launched in 2000, shader effects had already been around. The first consumer hardware with dot product bump mapping came in 1998 with the introduction of the Dreamcast, before the DOT3 method even became standard.

That makes a little sense because ICO was going to be released on PS1 and was then ported to PS2.

Doesn't mean the technique was well known by the development community at that point, and it's very possible the effect was something they began working with after they moved to PS2.

On DC:

 

[MidgarBlowedUp]

[note]Eternal Arcadia >>>>>>>>>>>>>> Xenosaga...just for the record.

Holy crap!!!
PS1 ~ Dreamcast ??? (j/k) but still....

This is why I wasn't all that impressed with the DC for the most part.
I was impressed with SC and DOA2 and a few other games like Tomb Raider.
But most of the games just plain sucked IMO. Blue Stinger, JSRF, Crazy Taxi, Powerstone, and many other games just did nothing for me at all. I stuck with my Thread of Fate, Vagrant Story, and FF games. I also, still enjoyed a few nice Saturn games at the time.

Less than 5 months after I recieved a Dreamcast from my parents then system pretty much died and Sega announced "No more support". I felt like I got screwed out of my money.

Well, I better stop now. I'm dragging a dead horse around.

 

[Lazy8s]

dark10x:

DC:

 

[BuddyC]

[note]Eternal Arcadia >>>>>>>>>>>>>> Xenosaga...just for the record.

Holy crap!!!
PS1 ~ Dreamcast ??? (j/k) but still....

This is why I wasn't all that impressed with the DC for the most part.
I was impressed with SC and DOA2 and a few other games like Tomb Raider.
But most of the games just plain sucked IMO. Blue Stinger, JSRF, Crazy Taxi, Powerstone, and many other games just did nothing for me at all. I stuck with my Thread of Fate, Vagrant Story, and FF games. I also, still enjoyed a few nice Saturn games at the time.

Less than 5 months after I recieved a Dreamcast from my parents then system pretty much died and Sega announced "No more support". I felt like I got screwed out of my money.

Well, I better stop now. I'm dragging a dead horse around.

You seriously did not just compare Skies of Arcadia to Threads of Fate. Ignoring that the ToF screens are about half the resolution of the SoA shot, the texures alone..

I'm not going to play the screenshot game. But comparing the geometry, poly counts, textures, and such of SoA to ToF. Oh man.

 

[Lazy8s]

dark10x:

DC:

 

[BuddyC]

dark10x:

DC:

Okay, I give up. You're spamming the thread with piss-poor images from CVG because?

 

[Lazy8s]

If the DC is going to be evaluated -- and compared to the PS1, no less -- on the representation of the previously chosen random games' random screenshots, there might as well be a selection from those to consider.

dark10x:

DC:

dark10x:

DC:

Nice chopper dude.

dark10x:

DC:

 

[MidgarBlowedUp]

You seriously did not just compare Skies of Arcadia to Threads of Fate. Ignoring that the ToF screens are about half the resolution of the SoA shot, the texures alone..

I'm not going to play the screenshot game. But comparing the geometry, poly counts, textures, and such of SoA to ToF. Oh man.

Obviously I'm not comparing. I guess you didn't get the memo from my previous post with the letters "J" and "K" with a "/" in between them. That is slang for "Joking".

Obviously to do a comparison we would need to compare Soul Calibur to Tobal #2 and in that case Soul Calibur would easily win, and by a very large margin. My point was polygon fillrate. When I bought the Dreamcast I was expecting 'Next-Gen' but the only Next Gen game I recieved was Soul Calibur. Most games on PC had better graphics than what was on DC.
(ex. Half Life)

I wasn't trying to make any kind of technical point.
But do you think joey's mom could really tell the difference?

 

[Sjoerd]

Obviously I'm not comparing. I guess you didn't get the memo from my previous post with the letters "J" and "K" with a "/" in between them. That is slang for "Joking".

Obviously to do a comparison we would need to compare Soul Calibur to Tobal #2 and in that case Soul Calibur would easily win, and by a very large margin. My point was polygon fillrate. When I bought the Dreamcast I was expecting 'Next-Gen' but the only Next Gen game I recieved was Soul Calibur. Most games on PC had better graphics than what was on DC.
(ex. Half Life)

I wasn't trying to make any kind of technical point.
But do you think joey's mom could really tell the difference?

Aren't pc games always better looking than console games? I mean the fastest console of the current generation is the xbox and we all know that's some pretty slow pc hardware. Even at launch.

Next generation consoles are probably the first to impress from a technical standpoint.

 

[dark10x]

dark10x:

DC:

Dude, I agree that DC is totally the shit (especially those modifier volumes), but I hope you realize that a lot of those shots aren't even from the final game. ^____^

What a poser. You're out of the DC fanclub, Lazy. You haven't even played Code Veronica, have you? ROFL!!1111 LOL!!!!!!!!111oneone

Aren't pc games always better looking than console games? I mean the fastest console of the current generation is the xbox and we all know that's some pretty slow pc hardware. Even at launch.

In all seriousness, no. As each new console was introduced, it was doing things simply not found on or common on the PC. Even tho the PS2 sucks (LOL), it really brought high-poly models to the table and PCs didn't enter that territory for at least a couple years. Then, XBOX was the first to really put DX8 style effects to good use. Games like Halo, with extensive per-pixel lighting, just couldn't by matched on the PC in 2001. When PSX and Saturn were introduced, PC 3D was much slower and it took some time to catch up. When N64 was introduced, that really sparked the 3D card market...but it also took some time. New consoles usually spend a year or two ahead of the best PC games before the PC catches up.

 

[dark10x]

Oh, and LAZY OWNED!!!!!!

Lazy8s:

ME:

RAWRRRRRRRR

^^Easy for Dreamcast BTW.

Comparison PS2 shot...

Holy crap, PS2 is ghey.

 

[6.8]

dark :lol :lol

 

[Jeffahn]

Tobal #2

Regarding Tobal 2, technically it's not as visually impressive as people think it is. If you go back and play it you'll notice a short spurt of loading before the winner poses. That short spurt is the game loading a high-polygon model of the winner to replace the 2 low-poly models of the fighters. This fooled many people into saying things like the game looked as good as VF3 and I'm making this whole point as an example of how simple techniques that don't neccessarily tax the hardware any more than usual can be used to impress beyond their rair reach. It's still a remarkably good looking (and playing) game for PS1, but not quite the visual masterpiece many assumed at the time.

I still want to respond some of dark10's pre-psychotic-episode posts but I'll have to see if I have enough time.

...

 

[Matlock]

Dear god, this is like the The Battle of New Orleans of The Console War.

 

[Kleegamefan]

Maybe so, but VT sucks, because the game is too hard.

 

[lachesis]

Well, if DC lived upto this date... I'm pretty positive that it could have shown and pumped out better graphics that is near PS2 quality in select games. Better library, better tricks to cope the hardware limiatations with its more plentiful VRAM and all.

While PS2 is a powerful piece of hardware, but it also had chance to brew its potential for 6+ long years. DC didn't even had that. It's not fair to really compare, but I don't think the difference might be anything more than PS2 to Xbox difference.

A lot of us are also fooled by the art-direction too, not just technical advantage. For something like GT4's realistic lighting, it's not just a lighting source you have to employ but what kind of "temperature" to capture the realistic outdoor environment's atmosphere in many cases, etc. One of the reaosn that graphically inferior Genesis' Sonic 2, still looks really good compared to alot of SNES games were because of smart art-direction.

But, really. What's the point of arguing this over? DC is dead, unless you call those dating sims are the sign of its continous support. DC's been dead for how many years now? Very long. A lot of us, and our expectations has changed, but DC has remained the same. Of course, DC's offering would look pretty crude, but that doesn't mean DC couldn't do something of today's graphics.

Thus, we are comparing something that doesn't exist with what we have. Nothing more amusing than drunken conspiracy theory, really.

lachesis

 

[dark10x]

Thus, we are comparing something that doesn't exist with what we have. Nothing more amusing than drunken conspiracy theory, really.

Thankfully, we can all play DC2 in our imagination...

/me goes back to playing VF5 on DC2 in head

 

[MidgarBlowedUp]

Regarding Tobal 2, technically it's not as visually impressive as people think it is. If you go back and play it you'll notice a short spurt of loading before the winner poses.


...

Holy crap, your right!
Thanks for the heads up.

 

[dark10x]

Holy crap, your right!
Thanks for the heads up.

NOT WHEN USING EPSXE WITH AN ISO ON YOUR HDD!!!11 NYA NYA!!

 

[Lazy8s]

 

[SolidSnakex]

What the hell are you trying to prove with that?

 

[Lazy8s]

 

[Lazy8s]

 

[Lazy8s]

 

[Lazy8s]

 

[Lazy8s]

 

[BuddyC]

There was no reason for that. Take the number of games you posted caps of, subtract two, and that's how many days you'll be back in.