Best DualPlayfield games 8*8

[Retro1234]

What are the best 7*8 games out there really im talking about graphics over gameplay, the fact that wonderdog and chuck rock 2 can be converted down from megadrive to 7*8 is really impressive on the artists part.

I really want to just recreate one of these, its just dualplayfield but see something like this running in just 7*8 will be good and would be interesting to look at the palette and dithering used.

[DanScott]

Originally Posted by Boo Boo

What are the best 7*8 games out there really im talking about graphics over gameplay, the fact that wonderdog and chuck rock 2 can be converted down from megadrive to 7*8 is really impressive on the artists part.

I really want to just recreate one of these, its just dualplayfield but see something like this running in just 7*8 will be good and would be interesting to look at the palette and dithering used.

If I remember correctly, the background playfield in Chuck 2 & Wonderdog were actually done in 6 colours + black, and this included all the sprites too, as they were drawn to the background playfield, and 1 colour was sacrificed to do the copperlist "sky" gradients.

Of course, the colour gradients give the impression of more colours, as does the use of 4 attached sprites for the main player character (+2 sprites for Chucks club, and the other 2 sprites for rain and snow effects on the respective levels).

Also at the bottom of the map in Chuck 2, I was able to bring up another playfield with switched priority, parallax scrolling, and it's own 7 colour palette. There's one level where this does not work 100%... one of the water levels I think just a bit of bad map design...

[DanScott]

For me personally, the best looking duel playfield game is Jim Power... but some of the foreground & sprite graphics sometimes look a bit low colour

[vulture]

Yup Jim Power and Lionheart imo

[Retro1234]

Jim power is good and LionHeart is an excellent game, really im just looking for a game without those extra sprites ideally a conversation arcade syle -just load in the copper effect and two maps, thanks for your suggestions.

[DanScott]

I don't think you will find much that only used 2 playfields, and no extra hardware sprites... I could be wrong though`

[Retro1234]

Theres not a huge number in use in wonderdog is there? otherwise ill have to multiplex sprites as well I guess.

[DanScott]

Originally Posted by Boo Boo

Theres not a huge number in use in wonderdog is there? otherwise ill have to multiplex sprites as well I guess.

Only the main player character and his "stars"... no multiplexing or aggressive re-use of sprites there

[Retro1234]

Still very good - and you had different artists for Wonderdog ang Chuck 2

[DanScott]

Same artist drew the original Megadrive artwork, and 2 different artists doing the conversion work (Richard Morton on Chuck 2, and Adi Mannion on Wonderdog).. I think the conversion work in Chuck 2 is a little better, as Wonderdog was a slightly more "rushed" project..

[JudasEZT]

Shadow of the beast games. I think the third one is specially good in be good looking, and also be a flexible game.. Is more subtle game design than both prequels. It has cool textues in backgrounds and intelligent use of palletes.

Wolfchild is very good too.

[Mrs Beanbag]

It is a difficult trick to pull off, especially with 8-way scrolling (which can make copper palette changes more difficult), but i was very impressed with the graphics in OCS Soccer Kid.

Jim Power is technically very impressive but i find it quite gaudy to look at. So i think the award still has to go to Lionheart.

[DanScott]

Originally Posted by Mrs Beanbag

It is a difficult trick to pull off, especially with 8-way scrolling (which can make copper palette changes more difficult)

This is what I originally thought when coding Chuck 2

But I created a lookup table with an entry for each horizontal scanline, with how many words of copper data there were up until (and including) that line.

I then blitted the copper data into the copperlist, wrote in the roaming bitplane pointers for the copper split scroll, and then blitted the remaining copper data after the bitplane ptr changes.

I couldn't have any dynamic moving copper stuff that way, but I am sure it could be done with some improvements

[Mrs Beanbag]

i have this problem double on some levels, since BOTH playfields can have vertical wrap-around...