Amiga vs. PC games comparison vid, whee :p

[Ironclaw]

Originally Posted by Duke

Good video, I might actually prefer the PC version of Stunt Car Racer if the colors weren't so retarted, it's much smoother.

So is the Amiga version, if it's a faster one. With the right settings in WinUAE it runs even smoother than the PC version .

[paranoid]

I think the CGA games are an unfair comparison.. That's more like an 8-bit machine and was released in '82 to boot. However, if that's the only conversion around, that's all there is, but a note should probably be made about that.

I'm curious, too, about the speed of, say, Stunt Car Racer. You can get WinUAE to approximate a 7 mhz A500, but what kind of processor was DOSBox getting close to? (Maybe it's nothing, but I'm wondering if it's close to apples and apples or apples and oranges..)

(I know the video wasn't some perfect scientific thing, but just a couple things I'm a little curious of..)

[laffer]

DosBox was using 3000 cycles for Stunt Car Racer. Don't know what kind of processor that amounts to.

I thought there were many PCs using CGA around 1987? Perhaps I'm very wrong (I probably am ). The CGA games were not released anywhere near 1982 in any case, those are the only PC versions available as far as I know.

[NLS]

Was CGA out in 1982 already?

[Retro-Nerd]

Originally Posted by NLS

Was CGA out in 1982 already?

Yep, it was released in 1981 (probably).

[Unknown_K]

The CGA games in the video looks like you played them on a VGA system (funky purple colors and teal).

Most CGA games had a Tandy mode and that made them look (and sound) much better.

Check this out:

http://www.oldskool.org/shrines/pcjr_tandy

Pictures of the differences at the bottom

The Amiga had better sound untill the Gravis Ultrasound (midi in general) came out, once the Soundblaster 16's came out even sound affects were better on the PC.

VGA pretty much owns AGA.

[laffer]

Originally Posted by Unknown_K

The CGA games in the video looks like you played them on a VGA system (funky purple colors and teal).

Most CGA games had a Tandy mode and that made them look (and sound) much better.

Yeah, that's true. Ah well, let's hope people don't think of that while watching

The Amiga had better sound untill the Gravis Ultrasound (midi in general) came out, once the Soundblaster 16's came out even sound affects were better on the PC.

Yeah but the SB16 was released years after the Amiga.

[keropi]

my speculation is that a SB-PRO is better or at least equal to Paula... th SB-pro is stereo, 8bit, 22050hz capable and it has a YM-3812 FM synthesizer...

go and read this INTERESTING article in PC sound history LINK
se sure to hear the "Magic Mushroom" samples, original and through the PC speaker...
you will to the superior PC speaker sound! (alone in the dark 1, also used this techique to play the game sfx through the speaker, it just rox)

[AMIGAZ]

Originally Posted by laffer

Yeah, that's true. Ah well, let's hope people don't think of that while watching



Yeah but the SB16 was released years after the Amiga.

like 7 years later?

Tool bad they never upgraded the Paual circuits to something like 16bit and more channels

[Fred the Fop]

UnknownK hit it on the mark.
The establishment of VGA as the preferred graphics platform is when the PC blew the Amiga (and what was left of the Atari ST) market into dust. This was about 1992 I believe.
The video is misleading to those not in the know.

[laffer]

I only agreed about the CGA displayed using a VGA card.

I don't understand how you think comparing Amiga games (a machine from 1987) to VGA games that were released years later than that.

[keropi]

... I don't see anyone in front of the PC speaker power!!!

as for my opinion on the hardware matter... a VGA is a great piece of hardware and is/was capable of producing amazing gfx and was not limited to layers/sprites moving , like the amiga and console gfx chips of the time. It's chunky pixel-moving orientation was superior. the only problem is that programmers did not do their jobs correctly, because it was more difficult to program that to rely on custom chips... they could make easily an amiga game for example without worrying much about programming routines, where on the pc they should make routines for everything... it was only after 1993-94 that the PC gain ground and programmers started coding correctly...

[Unknown_K]

For the most part the last Amigas sold were not even that different from the first ones (AGA being just a little tweek of OCS/ECS). The original Amiga games from 1987 sucked, it took a while to figure out how to program the graphics to make use of the Amigas power (and generally you needed 1MB of RAM for most of the good ones something most A1000 owners never had). A standard IBM XT would not even have 640K RAM don't forget, My Tandy 1000HX came stock with 256k of RAM, which I upgraded to 640K.

VGA cannot do CGA colors well , which is why I have a nice CGA monitor for my Tandy. People showing CGA games on VGA are just making a system look bad on purpose.

[laffer]

I tried using Tandy and CGA mode in Dosbox and the only game it made a difference in was Marble Madness. Perhaps the other two are supposed to use the colors in the video?

I'm thinking of correcting the video and reuploading it but no matter what I do, Barbarian and Winter games still display in those purplish colors.

[Unknown_K]

I will hit the underdogs later and snag barbarian and see how it looks on a tandy.

Here is a screenshot from the site:

http://www.the-underdogs.info/game.php?name=Barbarian

[laffer]

Thanks! Could you also check Winter Games while you're at it?

[keropi]

@Unknown_K:

please clarify something for the cga... it had a digital output and a composite, right? the digital gave 4 colors max, wherease the composite could give 16? never had a cga/ega, my 1st pc was an IBM 386sx/20 with a 256kb onboard vga....

[laffer]

Originally Posted by Unknown_K

I will hit the underdogs later and snag barbarian and see how it looks on a tandy.

Here is a screenshot from the site:

http://www.the-underdogs.info/game.php?name=Barbarian

Did you check this yet? The screenshot looks pretty similar to what it looks like in my video.. and Winter Games is pink as well, even in Tandy mode (at least for me, in Dosbox). The only game that seems to be very inaccurate in my video is Marble Madness. If that is the only game, I don't think I'll bother to redo the video, I'll just write in the description that Marble Madness has a better palette in Tandy mode.

[Unknown_K]

Originally Posted by laffer

Did you check this yet? The screenshot looks pretty similar to what it looks like in my video.. and Winter Games is pink as well, even in Tandy mode (at least for me, in Dosbox). The only game that seems to be very inaccurate in my video is Marble Madness. If that is the only game, I don't think I'll bother to redo the video, I'll just write in the description that Marble Madness has a better palette in Tandy mode.

I downloaded the files and made a floppy, but my Tandy is burried behind a Mac video capture setup that I need to move. Maybe later today.

[Unknown_K]

Originally Posted by keropi

@Unknown_K:

please clarify something for the cga... it had a digital output and a composite, right? the digital gave 4 colors max, wherease the composite could give 16? never had a cga/ega, my 1st pc was an IBM 386sx/20 with a 256kb onboard vga....

Not sure about the composite in normal PC CGA video cards since I have a Tandy. The Tandy does 16 true colors while I think the normal CGA does 4 and dithers the rest. My issue with the video is that the colors used on the CGA games look like the wrong colors (emulated using a VGA video card).