Full screen Amiga games

[chromium]

I am using a PAL Amiga 500. A very early one as it has Kickstart 1.2 roms.

Most games I play don't fill the screen and have a large blank area at the bottom of the screen as seen below.





Some games have the crack intro looking ok:





But the actual game still has the blank space:





I thought maybe it's a PAL v NTSC thing, but this is a PAL Amiga 500 and I'm pretty sure those games would be PAL versions too.

I can't adjust the 1084S enough either to make it full screen.

Any ideas?

[TCD]

A lot of Amiga games only use 320x200 as the resolution. There's nothing wrong with your Amiga and it is really intended that way.

[Higgy]

I think just a lot of us forgot what it was actually like back in the day.

Playing an Amiga on a 16:9 LCD can mean a lot of black screen!! ;0)

[chromium]

Originally Posted by TCD

A lot of Amiga games only use 320x200 as the resolution. There's nothing wrong with your Amiga and it is really intended that way.

That's a shame, but I can't even adjust the 1084S to make it fill the screen as I can't move it low enough vertically. I wonder if they will look better on my Sony PVM.
I'll check it out. Thanks

Originally Posted by Higgy

I think just a lot of us forgot what it was actually like back in the day.

Playing an Amiga on a 16:9 LCD can mean a lot of black screen!! ;0)

I'm using a 14" CRT

I do remember this being an issue when I was a kid. I thought maybe now, with the power of the Internet, I might be able to find a solution

[Coagulus]

some games had a 50/60hz toggle in the cracktro which stretched 320x200 to fill the screen. Or you could run in 60hz beforehand using some software. The A1200 startup menu had an option to boot in NTSC which did the trick too.

[Hewitson]

It is indeed a PAL/NTSC issue. Remember on the PAL consoles how you got those borders on the top and the bottom of the screen? That's the same thing happening here, except the Amiga just gives you one huge border at the bottom.

Upgrading to an ECS Agnus will allow you to install a 50/60hz switch and then you can run NTSC games full screen and full speed.

[Amiga1992]

Originally Posted by Higgy

Playing an Amiga on a 16:9 LCD can mean a lot of black screen!! ;0)

On a modern screen you can mess with the aspect settings to reduce that border and make a nice screen ratio for you to use!

Originally Posted by Hewitson

Upgrading to an ECS Agnus will allow you to install a 50/60hz switch and then you can run NTSC games full screen and full speed.

A lot of these games will perform wrong if ran in NTSC, some times actually slowing down (Lemmings 1), other times bringing in graphic corruption (Yo! Joe).

Some games are made like that because they couldn't push to do what they wanted with more lines. Switching to NTSC brings problems.

[TCD]

Originally Posted by Hewitson

It is indeed a PAL/NTSC issue.

No, it is not. At least it's by far not as simple as that. Switching to NTSC will 'fix' some games, but like Akira said there are a lot of other issues that will arise if you do. There are lots of PAL games that only use 320x200.

[chromium]

Originally Posted by Hewitson

It is indeed a PAL/NTSC issue. Remember on the PAL consoles how you got those borders on the top and the bottom of the screen? That's the same thing happening here, except the Amiga just gives you one huge border at the bottom.

Upgrading to an ECS Agnus will allow you to install a 50/60hz switch and then you can run NTSC games full screen and full speed.

So these are PAL games but only using 200 lines?

I have a few spare Amiga 500s here, I think at least one has the ECS Agnus in it, how do I tell for sure? I think it's rev 6A board.

Originally Posted by Akira

On a modern screen you can mess with the aspect settings to reduce that border and make a nice screen ratio for you to use!


A lot of these games will perform wrong if ran in NTSC, some times actually slowing down (Lemmings 1), other times bringing in graphic corruption (Yo! Joe).

Some games are made like that because they couldn't push to do what they wanted with more lines. Switching to NTSC brings problems.

So there's no real way to fix this? My 1084S has all the size and positioning adjustments, but even when I bring it as low as it can go vertically there is still a big space at the bottom.

[Hewitson]

Originally Posted by TCD

No, it is not. At least it's by far not as simple as that. Switching to NTSC will 'fix' some games, but like Akira said there are a lot of other issues that will arise if you do. There are lots of PAL games that only use 320x200.

The majority of them use that resolution because they are designed to be compatible with NTSC computers. I bet you could count the number of "PAL" games which don't work correctly in NTSC on one hand.

[TCD]

Originally Posted by Hewitson

I bet you could count the number of "PAL" games which don't work correctly in NTSC on one hand.

Maybe instead of assuming things you should test some games instead... You'd be surprised I guess.

[StingRay]

Originally Posted by Hewitson

The majority of them use that resolution because they are designed to be compatible with NTSC computers. I bet you could count the number of "PAL" games which don't work correctly in NTSC on one hand.

You would need a lot of "one hands" then...

[Amiga1992]

Originally Posted by chromium

So there's no real way to fix this? My 1084S has all the size and positioning adjustments, but even when I bring it as low as it can go vertically there is still a big space at the bottom.

I feel you dude, you have no idea how this pissed me off back in teh day. I played with many stretched screens many times.
But yes, there's no "fix", this is the way it's intended to be. You'll find many games which have borders because they couldn't get to do what they wanted to do full screen.

[s2325]

I think only emulator can stretch games to full screen, with aspect ratio or without.

[Steve]

Originally Posted by chromium

So these are PAL games but only using 200 lines?

No one here has really explained why this is the case. Basically NTSC is 320x200 so fills the screen. PAL is 320x256 so has extra screen space for more sprites etc. Most developers however were either too lazy to write two versions of the game or more likely it was the extra expense in developing two seperate versions that put a lot of developers off. So most developers just wrote one version of a game for the lowest common denominator which was NTSC, but that would still run on PAL but wouldn't fill the screen. Its a shame most developers felt this way although with a bit of fiddling with the settings you can still fill the screen if you are using an emulator.

[Amiga1992]

Originally Posted by Steve

Most developers however were either too lazy to write two versions of the game or more likely it was the extra expense in developing two seperate versions that put a lot of developers off.

Making assumptions is always easy.
I don't have in-depth knowledge of the Amiga to give you a precise explanation, but as said before, this isn't as simple as that. It was explained before. Perhaps, if you want a more in-depth case study, someone can explain it to you.

Things change radically with the different number of lines, it's not just a matter of size or convenience.

And not wanting to make two versions is not being lazy, it's being realistic about budgets and time constrains!! Sometimes it would be plain impossible because of tech (again, as said before, some games just won't be able to run well on more tan 200 v-lines), and let's not forget that the US market was substantially smaller than the European market, but not small enough to ignore it completely, hence the best compromise doing that. It's a business decision that makes sense.

[britelite]

Originally Posted by Akira

And not wanting to make two versions is not being lazy, it's being realistic about budgets and time constrains!!

And if you were going to share the graphics with an ST-version (or PC-version later on), then you also had to keep the resolution at a 320x200 maximum.

[chromium]

Just as bad, if not worse on my PVM.





So the issue is a PAL signal only outputting 200 lines of picture and these games would look ok on an NTSC Amiga? I think it could be worth putting in a NTSC switch, because at least some games will fill the screen as it'll be outputting 200 lines in NTSC instead. If there are issues with some games I can just switch back. What do people think?
Is there a guide on doing this mod anywhere?

[Amiga1992]

Originally Posted by chromium

So the issue is a PAL signal only outputting 200 lines of picture and these games would look ok on an NTSC Amiga?

No, as said before, this is not necessarily the case. Some games, yes, others, no.
It isn't an "issue" to be "fixed".

[Retro-Nerd]

The Amiga has no fixed resolutions. The amount of viewable boarder differs from game to game. It's not comparable with the consoles PAL/NTSC 50/60Hz case, where you always get fullscreen in 60Hz. Well not on the Master System (too low resolution), but e.g. on MD or SNES, Saturn, PSX.