28 September 2009, 18:56 | #1 |
Registered User
Join Date: Apr 2009
Location: United States
Age: 37
Posts: 99
|
Why are platform games on the Amiga really mediocre?
I hate to be negative when it comes to the good ol' Amiga, but I honestly believe that despite the Amiga being a huge technical achievement when it comes to graphics and audio, it didn't seem to translate the game play mechanics well when it comes to side-scrolling platform games. Now I know the Amiga wasn't designed to primarily be a gaming machine, but it certainly ended up getting that reputation anyway, so we'll just have to stick with it.
It seems to me that despite having good titles like Turrican and Leander, there were a bunch of crap ones like Shadow of the Beast, Zool, Superfrog, Rick Dangerous, Kid Chaos, and others related to them. It's either due to level design, game difficulty, wonky controls, or either the game just simply not interesting you at all. So am I the only person here who's alone in their opinion? |
28 September 2009, 19:05 | #2 | |
Going nowhere
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: United Kingdom
Age: 50
Posts: 8,997
|
Quote:
Beast - suspect gameplay, but technically as proficient as anything the Genesis and SNES could do at the time, in fact the conversions to the other consoles showed just how Amiga specific it was. Zool - gameplay wasn't so bad, programming let it down Superfrog - Seriously? Rick Dangerous - wasn't a platformer in the traditional sense Kid Chaos - was ok for what it was There were lots of good platformers, Ruff n Tumble, Fire n Ice, Tearaway Thomas, Switchblade 2, Beast 3, Arabian Nights, Soccer Kid, Assassin, Brian the Lion, Chuck Rock, Chuck Rock 2.... and on and on, in fact, direct your browser to this link: http://hol.abime.net/hol_search.php?N_ref_category=16 Thing is, Amiga was more able at doing every game type of the time, Genesis and SNES either were not capable or there was no market for other game types (i.e. flight simulators or general 3D vector graphics were poor on Genesis and had to have additional hardware in the case of the SNES). Amiga was a "jack of all trades", thats where its strength lied. |
|
28 September 2009, 19:32 | #3 |
Registered User
Join Date: Mar 2009
Location: UK
Posts: 457
|
No, you're not alone, the Amiga had a lot of crappy games, the ratio of good games/all games must be one of the smallest on any system...(i verified that, i tried ALL the amiga games on lemonAmiga (with the whdload/adf versions on Winuae), did the same for the Genesis (good genesis) , msx (tosec) and Mame, the ratio of good games/all games for the genesis/mame/msx is far greater than on the Amiga.
But there were great games on the Amiga, thank God the Amiga had GODS... and Turrican II. PS: Rick dangerous 1 and 2 are a great games. |
28 September 2009, 19:42 | #4 |
Missile Command Champion
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: Germany
Age: 52
Posts: 12,446
|
It's easily beaten by the NES where you find thousands of crappy games. I couldn't list all the good Amiga games. Sure there are shitty Amiga games too, but each game system has them.
|
28 September 2009, 19:44 | #5 |
Into the Wonderful
Join Date: Mar 2002
Location: England
Age: 49
Posts: 2,335
|
Gotta agree with Switchblade about Superfrog. A game that proves you can indeed 'polish a turd'.
|
28 September 2009, 19:46 | #6 |
Going nowhere
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: United Kingdom
Age: 50
Posts: 8,997
|
You also have to consider that developing for the Amiga was cheaper than the consoles, that has an impact on polishing a title or just making do. No licensing requirements for a start.
|
28 September 2009, 20:00 | #7 |
Zone Friend
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: Kent
Age: 51
Posts: 1,061
|
Platformers were mostly best on Console but the Amiga had one or two really nice ones - nothing really special but always a lovely atmosphere
I know i'm probably in a minority on these forums but although Super Frog was far from dire, it also wasn't anything you could boast at console owners Soccer Kid was classy i thought Lionheart was gorgeous and quite unique I by far preferred Amiga Mr Nutz although again that may have been down to atmosphere Ruff n Tumble was impressive despite some that say 30fps just isn't impressive Zool was particularly poor i'd say as there really wasn't anything in the way of depth for control or it's very basic gameplay.You could have fun playing it i guess but it was so very simple regarding these things Amiga games were their own thing and i wouldn't honestly change any of these games - they felt very Amiga.Although we never got a game to rival games like Super Mario Snes, Amiga still had plenty to boast about over console owners Putty Squad of course was real nice and no matter how hard i try to like the Snes version, it lacks the vibrancy of the Amiga game - um i mean demo as it's unlikey certain people are ever pull their finger out over this one I think it was when Amiga tried to mimick console style games that it had problems - Amiga worked best when it did it's own thing Last edited by Adropac2; 28 September 2009 at 20:11. |
28 September 2009, 20:07 | #8 |
Registered User
Join Date: Apr 2009
Location: United States
Age: 37
Posts: 99
|
Just to reiterate, I am only specifically talking about side-scrolling platformers. Adventure games, RPG games, and any simulation games don't count.
And I never said the Amiga is horrible at platform games; I just think that at times, Amiga platformers also seem to lack something that not everyone can explain. I honestly thought Superfrog was mediocre because there's not much about the game that stands out much as being amazing. And I believe that the World 1 music got really annoying to listen to after awhile. Lionheart, IMO, is actually an amazing game. Level design is awesome, as well as the platforming bits. But I really hate the fact that the hero can only attack with a short sword and his rather tiny legs. So even stuff like that can count as a relevant flaw of the game. It would be nice if we had Mega Man and Castlevania like clones for the Amiga. Maybe even Earthworm Jim for the Amiga would've been kickass. |
28 September 2009, 20:43 | #9 | |||
Registered User
Join Date: Jun 2008
Location: somewhere else
Posts: 515
|
You could as well mention shmups (with side scrolling or not), most Amiga arcade games may have looked good (not always) but they had no gameplay and worst of all many of them didn't even run at full frame rate (something that would have been unacceptable on consoles, except for some minor slowdowns in some games).
I remember games like Assassin (a bad strider rip-off) or Leander (and several others) where they couldn't display more than a couple of enemies on screen without going below the frame coz them wise guys were using too many bitplanes, overscan, etc., this of course shattered any hint of gameplay that could have been present there. I seems to recall that the james pond games were well crafted, tho. Quote:
Quote:
Quote:
|
|||
28 September 2009, 20:46 | #10 | |
Missile Command Champion
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: Germany
Age: 52
Posts: 12,446
|
Quote:
Last edited by Retro-Nerd; 28 September 2009 at 20:54. |
|
28 September 2009, 20:48 | #11 |
kachou ON!
Join Date: Apr 2009
Location: New Hampshire, US
Posts: 192
|
I think one of the issues with platformers on the Amiga is, and let's be honest here - Up should not be jump on a strict platformer.
Turrican was programmed with this in mind and made the jumps more tailored to an "Up = jump" standard... and did it beautifully. But Turrican is a run-n-gun more than a platformer and so doesn't count for this exercise. I haven't really played a straight up platformer yet that I enjoyed on the miggy although I've yet to try Superfrog. Games with platforms that are essentially other types of games though? Brilliant. Rodland, Bubble Bobble, Turrican in a way... all awesome on the miggy. But until I see a jump button for a platformer... no dice. |
28 September 2009, 20:51 | #12 |
Missile Command Champion
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: Germany
Age: 52
Posts: 12,446
|
A jump button doesn't mean automatically that it's a good game. Noticed this disscussion in a some US forums several times. Computer games are designed for joysticks and they work fine this way.
|
28 September 2009, 21:01 | #13 |
Registered User
Join Date: Jun 2008
Location: somewhere else
Posts: 515
|
Yeah, look at Bionic Commando there's no jump and it still sucks, look at Sonic it only needs 1 button and it still rocks
|
28 September 2009, 21:02 | #14 |
Missile Command Champion
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: Germany
Age: 52
Posts: 12,446
|
Well Sonic is only fast. The gameplay is pretty boring.
|
28 September 2009, 21:06 | #15 |
HOL/FTP busy bee
Join Date: Sep 2006
Location: Germany
Age: 46
Posts: 31,608
|
It's a NES thing I guess. I remember when I first played on a MasterSystem (after I had played on C64 and also Amiga), the concept of 'Up' not being jump was quite strange Like Retro said these games were designed that way. Note that it doesn't say anything about the quality of the platformer itself It's just not a point that there wasn't a button for jump that make all platformers 'suck' on joystick based systems
|
28 September 2009, 21:15 | #16 |
Missile Command Champion
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: Germany
Age: 52
Posts: 12,446
|
I like jump buttons in Amiga games too, if they are optimized for gameplay. There are WHDLoad patches with jump button support, but some doesn't really work properly since the jump mechanics are still intact for a "stick up" control.
Turrican on the Sega Mega Drive is similar. The game has of course a jump button, but the coder used the jump mechanics from the Amiga version. It doesn't work. Last edited by Retro-Nerd; 28 September 2009 at 21:21. |
29 September 2009, 02:37 | #17 |
Registered User
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: Tasmania, Australia
Age: 39
Posts: 1,189
|
I liked the gameplay in Aladdin, and Marvin's Marvelous Adventure seems to have an endless amount of fun and varied levels. Lionheart has beautiful controls, I think. The designers of that game were true Amiga fanatics, and the gameplay is perfect with both joystick and 2-button control pad. Mr. Nutz was the same, it hit the hardware and made full use of the Amiga's strengths, with tight controls for joystick and pads. But with both of these games you just need to practice all the moves and get good at them to fully enjoy the gameplay. Flink was also another great platform game, which sadly only came out on the CD32 so isn't as accessible as most other Amiga games. It was made by the same guys who made Lionheart, and it's a beautiful game to play.
Halloween Nightmare will be a good Amiga platform game when it's finished. It will have several control options too (Joystick, 2-button pad, CD32 pad, Keyboard, Playstation pad, maybe USB controllers as well). |
29 September 2009, 03:21 | #18 | |
Going nowhere
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: United Kingdom
Age: 50
Posts: 8,997
|
Quote:
Not a weakness no, I'd rather the Amiga was able to do everything, rather than one key area the best. |
|
29 September 2009, 03:47 | #19 |
Workbitch 1.3
Join Date: Oct 2001
Location: Melbourne, Australia
Age: 46
Posts: 2,084
|
Console game developement budget and japanese attention to detail missing perhaps? If the amiga had been "big in Japan" I am sure we would have seen a lot more polished platformers rather than UK and Euro software houses rushing out stuff to get on the shelves and occasionally producing a diamond in the rough.
|
29 September 2009, 13:53 | #20 |
Registered User
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: Tasmania, Australia
Age: 39
Posts: 1,189
|
Ohh, I forgot to mention Yo! Joe! It's one of my favourite Amiga platform games, and definitely one of the best two-player games. There aren't many other Amiga 2-player scrolling platformers apart from 'Allo, 'Allo.
|
Currently Active Users Viewing This Thread: 1 (0 members and 1 guests) | |
Thread Tools | |
Similar Threads | ||||
Thread | Thread Starter | Forum | Replies | Last Post |
my (incomplete) list of Amiga PD platform games | s2325 | Retrogaming General Discussion | 260 | 17 October 2017 07:48 |
Best Amiga Platform Games | mancity | support.Games | 13 | 11 May 2012 20:34 |
Amiga games you want released on the DS or any other platform. | seuden | Amiga scene | 17 | 06 February 2008 07:49 |
mighty! amiga! platform games | Critter | Retrogaming General Discussion | 51 | 31 January 2004 17:21 |
Who are developing games for Amiga platform at the moment? | oldpx | Amiga scene | 65 | 06 October 2002 17:41 |
|
|