Why was Z never ported to the Amiga?

[TCD]

Originally Posted by sokolovic

They could have made a specific Amiga version, not a 1.1 conversion of the PC one, as Bullfrog did with Syndicate for instance.

Have you watched the job interview video that dreadnought linked to?

[CCCP alert]

Originally Posted by gimbal

According to the interview it sold like hotcakes anyway; there being a sequel is proof enough. Just not in the US. Can't really call that late to the party. Late to the party would be releasing an RTS game in the C&C Generals era, it was already fizzling out at that point.

I can only go by what people on the TV said at the time, it was horribly delayed and it never got as much attention as C&C or sales too, was the often reported story back in the 90s. I think it was more 'Z deserved to be equal with C&C" and not a me-too copy like Garrison vs Gauntlet on Amiga due to the delays in it being finished. Had it been out first it would have sold 3 million copies instead of C&C selling that amount being the argument. Didn't say it was a flop, just that it was perceived as a C&C clone because it came after when it really wasn't, didn't kill sales it just blunted them I guess but could find no figures for how many copies were sold. Either way hot cakes is not the impression TV journalists were touting at the time, maybe it did much better in the USA?


I'm sure something similar could have been done on A1200 as things like Dune II existed already but not an exact copy, there is probably too much stuff being calculated behind the scenes in the game engine, although you do need a 486 just to scroll the screen around on a PC and on an A1200 it's a piece of piss etc even in 640x400, probably more to do with all the little flying objects on screen being tracked and the 8mb being needed is an indication of how much data is in the game engine going on off screen/behind the scenes etc. I am no expert on the difference between the two platforms but I suspect 6mb is too much of a difference even if you account for the way DOS games had to be coded to cover 1000s of potential specifications of the user's PC it ends up being installed on.

Dune II is one of those few games I had on my A1200 and 486 PC at the time, my PC was 4mb then.

[malko]

Originally Posted by TCD

Thank you Interesting that they didn't switch to PC because the game wasn't running well on the Amiga, but because the Amiga 'was dead'.

And also that initially the PC full game was intended to be released on 1 floppy disk and that all fmv were added post-development only to fill the new CD support that came out at that time.

Originally Posted by TCD

Let the hunt begin

Fingers crossed

[Seiya]

for sure if there is public source code, BSzili or Arti will bring the game on Amiga. The more expert developers for DOS conversions.

[Megalomaniac]

I doubt that its the audiovisuals (aside from the FMV, which nobody would expect in a floppy-based Amiga version) that make Z's system requirements so much higher than Dune II or Warcraft 2. Even then, it recommends a Pentium 90 and 16Mb RAM, and requires 20Mb of hard drive space (presumably without installing any of the FMV, and based on VGA graphics, and more for SVGA). Even if Commodore had still be alive in mid-1996, I'm not sure a significant amount of Amigas of equivalent performance level would have existed in people's homes, especially as I doubt AAA would be a huge help over AGA. Likewise, had they designed the game around mass-market Amigas (even a hypothetical 6Mb 030 AAA based A1800), the result would have lacked the advanced features necessary for a game to compete on a 1996 PC or the Playstation.

[BigD]

Originally Posted by Megalomaniac

Even then, it recommends a Pentium 90 and 16Mb RAM, and requires 20Mb of hard drive space (presumably without installing any of the FMV, and based on VGA graphics, and more for SVGA). Even if Commodore had still be alive in mid-1996, I'm not sure a significant amount of Amigas of equivalent performance level would have existed in people's homes, especially as I doubt AAA would be a huge help over AGA. Likewise, had they designed the game around mass-market Amigas (even a hypothetical 6Mb 030 AAA based A1800), the result would have lacked the advanced features necessary for a game to compete on a 1996 PC or the Playstation.

Agreed, a CD-Rom equipped 030/50 AGA 8MB Fast Ram Amiga might not have been enough. A similar spec ran ADoom and Napalm in 1998 but this was 1996 and I think everyone would have needed A4000 040/25 with 16MB Fast Ram and possibly a Picasso IV our at least Picasso II level RTG board to take this on! To be honest AAA was a pipe dream given the resources C= gave to it! They stopped Amiga development entirely for 6 months during its peak period! Not a hope! If C= had survived then C='s own sales team would have probably recommended a PC to run Z if you'd asked them in 1996!

Does anyone else think it's weird C= relied on 3rd parties to push hardware with upgrades and the scuppered them with products like the A600 and A3000?

[malko]

Having the original game without the video would be great to start with (as it was initially developed - according to the interview).

[BigD]

Originally Posted by malko

Having the original game without the video would be great to start with (as it was initially developed - according to the interview).

That's like playing C&C without the FMV videos! Most of the atmosphere disappears! There's no excuse not to keep CD ISOs now that we can mount them if no physical drive is present. The idea is that back in the 90s people upgraded their computers to play new games. Most A500 users didn't get that memo or did and bought a PC!

[malko]

Originally Posted by BigD

That's like playing C&C without the FMV videos! Most of the atmosphere disappears! There's no excuse not to keep CD ISOs now that we can mount them if no physical drive is present. The idea is that back in the 90s people upgraded their computers to play new games. Most A500 users didn't get that memo or did and bought a PC!

In the interview it is stated that the Amiga version was finished as well as the PC version (at least how I understood it). Initially the PC version should have been sold on 1 PC floppy disk. But before the commercialisation, CD came out and it was decided then to add video to fill the spare space of the CD rom. Therefore if an Amiga version has to be found, it will be without any video. There will be nothing to keep from this side as it doesn't exist on the Amiga version. This is the reason I mentioned that if the original Amiga version could be found (without video - but I believe with cut scenes), it would be great . If then, in a second time, someone will try to adapt the Amiga version to play the fmvs from the PC CD version, why not...

[TCD]

Originally Posted by malko

In the interview it is stated that the Amiga version was finished as well as the PC version (at least how I understood it).

In the interview he mentions that they 'ported the game over' to PC, but it also sounds like that they did that quite early on in development as he mentions that (they thought at that time) the Amiga wouldn't have the necessary 'horse power' for the game. If a version for the Amiga still exists it is most likely an early prototype.

Edit: A bit later he mentions that they 'had to move the production on to the PC'. Doesn't sound like a finished version was ever created for the Amiga.

[malko]

Originally Posted by TCD

[...] If a version for the Amiga still exists it is most likely an early prototype.

Edit: A bit later he mentions that they 'had to move the production on to the PC'. Doesn't sound like a finished version was ever created for the Amiga.

I have not watched the full interview but speaking about the Amiga version of Z, he clearly states " [...] we can make no money on it... it was a real shame cause we had a working version on it. So then we switched to the PC [...] ".