Crappy C64 screen resolution

[donnie]

Originally Posted by lmimmfn

There is no "best 8bit system", each has advantages/disadvantages and different compromises whether tech or price.

I do think its fun having discussion on the various c64 gfx modes/examples etc. and discussing capabilities of various machines.

C64 design team clearly made the best compromises, its the most balanced system.


It can scroll, it can show a ton of sprites, it has fantastic sound chip,it has a simple but versatile colour palette.

[donnie]

zx spectrum has great new games for it.

castlevania spectral interlude

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Delta's Shadow / Power Blade 3

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nothing

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dizzy viii

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[AestheticDebris]

Originally Posted by donnie

C64 design team clearly made the best compromises, its the most balanced system.


It can scroll, it can show a ton of sprites, it has fantastic sound chip,it has a simple but versatile colour palette.

It's a bunch of compromises that work in specific circumstances (and very heavily biased towards certain types of games) but it's by no means "the best". The Spectrum had a bunch of limitations, for sure, but games generally threw around more sprites whilst still being playable. Double Dragon, for example, isn't exactly held up as a pinnacle of the machine but it's much less compromised than the C64 version: both in terms of graphics and the number of enemies on screen. And, as often mentioned, 3D titles like racing games, isometric game and even full Freescape-esque 3D tended to perform better without needing hardcore coding skills. And neither of them compared to the Amstrad for text adventures, with it's 80 columns text display and cheap, fast, disk drive.

Which particular set of compromises is "best" is very dependent on what you wanted to do and each did some things better than others.

[Cris1997XX]

The Amstrad GX4000 is one of the best 8-bit computers/consoles from that era, maybe the sound chip is its only real weakness. I just wish it had a more active homebrew scene, it's got a lot of potential with games of this quality [ Show youtube player ]

[AestheticDebris]

Originally Posted by Cris1997XX

The Amstrad GX4000 is one of the best 8-bit computers/consoles from that era, maybe the sound chip is its only real weakness. I just wish it had a more active homebrew scene, it's got a lot of potential with games of this quality [ Show youtube player ]

It's come a long way since I had to beat the drum for it even amongst Amstrad fans who felt it wasn't worth emulating. There is still a reluctance to embrace it from some of the old guard, but there is an increasing amount of homebrew developers starting to see the potential in what was once derided as a total failure.

[donnie]

amstrad gx4000 came out in 1990.

[donnie]

Originally Posted by AestheticDebris

It's a bunch of compromises that work in specific circumstances (and very heavily biased towards certain types of games) but it's by no means "the best". The Spectrum had a bunch of limitations, for sure, but games generally threw around more sprites whilst still being playable. Double Dragon, for example, isn't exactly held up as a pinnacle of the machine but it's much less compromised than the C64 version: both in terms of graphics and the number of enemies on screen. And, as often mentioned, 3D titles like racing games, isometric game and even full Freescape-esque 3D tended to perform better without needing hardcore coding skills. And neither of them compared to the Amstrad for text adventures, with it's 80 columns text display and cheap, fast, disk drive.

Which particular set of compromises is "best" is very dependent on what you wanted to do and each did some things better than others.

I would be very surprised if an 48k spectrum has any upside to a standard c64.



It cannot scroll, often even the sprites are jerky, has color clash, has terrible soundchip.

[lmimmfn]

Originally Posted by donnie

amstrad gx4000 came out in 1990.

It's still 8 bit, you said C64 was the best 8bit. PC engine says Hi

Again, I hope we are older and can analyse 8bits rather than schoolyard arguing "the X is the best 8bit ever".

There is no need for that, I had a CPC but I love the soeccy, C64, MSX etc.(would absolutely love an Enterprise).

[lmimmfn]

Originally Posted by donnie

I would be very surprised if an 48k spectrum has any upside to a standard c64.



It cannot scroll, often even the sprites are jerky, has color clash, has terrible soundchip.

Stop this man, the 48k Spectrum was the cheapest multicapable computer at the time, comparing £100 tech vs £300 tech, yes that's fair.

[donnie]

Originally Posted by lmimmfn

It's still 8 bit, you said C64 was the best 8bit. PC engine says Hi

Again, I hope we are older and can analyse 8bits rather than schoolyard arguing "the X is the best 8bit ever".

There is no need for that, I had a CPC but I love the soeccy, C64, MSX etc.(would absolutely love an Enterprise).

It came out after the mega drive and a couple of months before snes in japan. And it was discontinued the year after.



Yeah.

[lmimmfn]

Originally Posted by donnie

It came out after the mega drive and a couple of months before snes in japan. And it was discontinued the year after.



Yeah.

So now release date is important but price of 48k spectrum isn't? I don't understand your arguments.

The PC engine was released in 87.

[AestheticDebris]

Originally Posted by donnie

I would be very surprised if an 48k spectrum has any upside to a standard c64.

It cannot scroll, often even the sprites are jerky, has color clash, has terrible soundchip.

Your bias is showing. Honestly, go away and compare the games. Double Dragon C64 tops out at two enemies on screen, whereas the Speccy version pushes three or four easily (and larger ones at that). And it's a pattern repeated by many games, RoboCop, Batman The Movie, Untouchables all have less enemies on screen. It's very much the downside of hardware sprites, once you hit the hardware limits it becomes difficult to work around it unlike a system that is simply drawing to a bitmap, where really you're capped by how much you prepared to compromise between on screen action and overall frame rate.

Originally Posted by donnie

It came out after the mega drive and a couple of months before snes in japan. And it was discontinued the year after.

It was absolutely too late and a complete flop in the market. But that doesn't mean it is not interesting hardware, nor that it isn't one of the more powerful 8-bit machines ever released.

[saimo]

General warning #1: the discussion focus shifted from screen resolution to the good (?) old machine X is better than machine Y.

General warning #2: don't mistake what games do with what machines can do. Does the Amiga suck because the Tiertex ports suck? Using games as examples is OK when they use the hardware adequately or, even better, when they push the hardware limits, but games that don't are not a testimony of hardware weakness. Judging hardware requires first of all a proper technical evaluation; then games can be used as supportive examples.

Back to the OP: the C64 resolution is just fine, as it's 320x200 in the 3 hires modes, which allow to display all the 16 colors each in its own way; that compares quite well (to put it mildly) with machines of the same class and definitely doesn't deserve the "crappy" adjective. The games that use hires graphics are a minority, but, so what?

Observation: among others, the C64's Sam's Journey and the Amstrad CPC's Pinball Dreams have been (rightfully) presented in this thread as good examples and nobody challenged that... and they both use widepixels; also, a post where donnie says that resolution doesn't really matter lists some multicolor games, but, among them, is also QUOD INIT EXIT IIo, which, instead, is entirely hires; this tells a lot regarding the general sensitivity to resolution and colors