The history of Rastan - arcade documentary

[PatmanQC]

[ Show youtube player ]

[ZEUSDAZ]

ZX 128k version was brilliant, the hi-res of that system made that version look great, C64 was bugged and as for the cpc version,....VOMIT CITY!!!

Rastan 128k: [ Show youtube player ]

[alexh]

Interesting as always?

[TCD]

Just watched it and it is interesting (as always) to hear about the origins of the game and the sequels that didn't reach the west.

[Calabazam]

Best versions are the true to arcade Apple IIGS for 16 bits and the jewel of Sega Master System version for 8 bits.
Can't wait to actually play the Amiga version on Scorpion Engine even if it somehow looks like something else.
I am sad that even with Vampire and PiStorm and still can't play it perfectly on the Amiga with Mame (playable but awful sound).

[Retro-Nerd]

The arcade sequel Warrior Blade is pretty good. I like it a lot. It has German speech samples. Very weird, but the Japanese like this kind of stuff.


[ Show youtube player ]

[TEG]

Originally Posted by ZEUSDAZ

ZX 128k version was brilliant, the hi-res of that system made that version look great, C64 was bugged and as for the cpc version,....VOMIT CITY!!!

Rastan 128k: [ Show youtube player ]

Spectrum games had something on their own especially when you had to move a such big personage around the screen.

[PatmanQC]

Originally Posted by Calabazam

Best versions are the true to arcade Apple IIGS for 16 bits and the jewel of Sega Master System version for 8 bits.
Can't wait to actually play the Amiga version on Scorpion Engine even if it somehow looks like something else.
I am sad that even with Vampire and PiStorm and still can't play it perfectly on the Amiga with Mame (playable but awful sound).

Cannot believe how well the Apple version turned out

[CCCP alert]

Originally Posted by PatmanQC

Cannot believe how well the Apple version turned out

I'm not, based on the incredible II GS version of Sword of Sodan.

Very interesting video, watched it last night, never knew the C64 artist was a n00b on the job (which explains the borked MC1/MC2 global sprite pallet colours).

I thought this had a PC Engine port but no it didn't sadly. Imagine how awesome the Amiga version could have been if Reflections developed it. Scorpion engine version hopefully finished one day.

[CCCP alert]

Originally Posted by ZEUSDAZ

ZX 128k version was brilliant, the hi-res of that system made that version look great, C64 was bugged and as for the cpc version,....VOMIT CITY!!!

Rastan 128k: [ Show youtube player ]

No it wasn't, they don't use attribute ram on ZX to distinguish enemies/you/background moving on screen so it's useless to play because you can't even tell what's going on fast enough LOL. Perhaps they should have wasted less CPU cycles on parallax scroll and used it for attribute ram usage so you don't get lost in a hideous monochromatic mess, especially on the shitty sinclair/amstrad RF dot crawl o vison modulators of the speccy comps on a real CRT display back then 100% of speccy users played them on.

II GS is the only 'brilliant' version, rest are nothing like playing it in the arcade.

[NorthWay]

Originally Posted by PatmanQC

Cannot believe how well the Apple version turned out

I was about to say how that was crying out for a hostile port before my braincells got the correct alignement, but at least possibly a transcoded one if jotd can be lured into it :-)

[jotd]

I love that game, even if I suck at it but, seeing the assets, I fear that it would require AGA and even with that, it would be very demanding. The Scorpion ECS port looks brilliant already (but will it be completed?)

Something people have to understand about transcodes: if you have a dual playfield scrolling in the original and you want to get rid of it, you have to MERGE foreground and background tiles, which is a big problem with the original code.

That's why I'm defending the "crappy" Shinobi port for instance: it seems to preserve the arcade assets, dual playfield, and also sprites, only degraded in terms of colors & FPS to a point where it's crap. I could peek at the amiga & arcade code there's a possibility that they're closely related too.

On the other hand, I was discussing that point with Toni Galvez the other day, and he pointed out that Shadow Dancer turned out all right, that's because they probably recoded a lot of stuff from scratch.

[Megalomaniac]

I'll admit a bias with Spectrum Rastan, as it's one fo the first games I bought, but those graphics are more than clear enough, if you've spent much time with the system your eyes can easily train onto the main character and clearly see the enemies coming. I'd certainly rather play Rastan on the Spectrum than a certain similar Amiga game which does away with the complicated bits of Rastan (attacking from ropes, swinging ropes, fire pits, falling and sideways-attacking spikes, enemies on multiple levels that you need to jump or crouch in order to attack).

There are definitely effects in arcade Rastan that a pre-AGA Amiga would struggle to match, but you can definitely get close, as the Scorpion engine version is demonstrating so far. Needless to say, any contemporary conversion would have almost certainly been a lazy ST port (unless someone like Discovery Software had got the rights), so there'd still be merit in doing a new improved version a la Bomb Jack Beer Edition or Final Fight Enhanced.