Street Fighter 2 OCS Version Discussions

[DanScott]

My estimate is that the background gfx, hardwares sprites & copper list needed for the background playfield will take approx 40k to 45k in total

The front playfield for the characters needs to be double buffered, and will take 36k

If we set aside a generous 100k for music and sound effects (this is one project where PreTracker might come in handy)

We have then OVER 300k of chip memory left, and of course 512k of extra (slow/chip/fast) memory too (code won't take up a huge amount of space). I'd say in total we will have around 700k to 750k available for character data

I've probably forgotten to include a few bits and bobs... but should be fine for memory

[DanScott]

Comparison now:

OCS Mock Up vs. SNES Screen Grab

[Galahad/FLT]

Originally Posted by DanScott

Comparison now:

OCS Mock Up vs. SNES Screen Grab

I think if the OCS version was remotely close to that and had the speed of Elfmania, the Amiga could have been dealt a pretty decent version.

[Havie]

Originally Posted by Galahad/FLT

I think if the OCS version was remotely close to that and had the speed of Elfmania, the Amiga could have been dealt a pretty decent version.

Wow - looks good and you could probably use the copper to bring the yellow back into the score section too!

[skan]

Originally Posted by Galahad/FLT

I think if the OCS version was remotely close to that and had the speed of Elfmania, the Amiga could have been dealt a pretty decent version.

Indeed!

Awesome work so far, kudos!

[DanScott]

Originally Posted by Havie

Wow - looks good and you could probably use the copper to bring the yellow back into the score section too!

If you want the characters to change colour too

There *might* be a way to use some hardware sprites up there for the scoreboard, but not sure yet, need to think about that.. might be possible though

[redblade]

looks amazing.

If you have a template of the background asm file and want to pass that work of to someone else I might be able to help with that.

[Havie]

Originally Posted by DanScott

If you want the characters to change colour too

There *might* be a way to use some hardware sprites up there for the scoreboard, but not sure yet, need to think about that.. might be possible though

Sorry - may be being thick here but wouldn't you just change the colour of the palette entyr for the few lines of the power bar and then back again? I ask as in my Space Invaders I do the overlay using a copper change on colour 2 but am fighting some strange effects!

[DanScott]

Originally Posted by redblade

looks amazing.

If you have a template of the background asm file and want to pass that work of to someone else I might be able to help with that.

I'll probably be writing an exporter, that takes everything, and spits out a data file for constructing the copper list etc.. so it will become a somewhat automated process

[DanScott]

Originally Posted by Havie

Sorry - may be being thick here but wouldn't you just change the colour of the palette entyr for the few lines of the power bar and then back again? I ask as in my Space Invaders I do the overlay using a copper change on colour 2 but am fighting some strange effects!

The score bar will be on the same playfield as the characters, and the characters can be drawn into that area too, so if the copper changes the colour to the more yellow/orangey shades (which it can do), the characters will also change colour on those scan lines too.... although, it "may" not actually look to bad if they are moving quite fast in that area. Definitely something to consider

[dreadnought]

Everything else is fine, but the fact that their clothes are the same colour. Is there no way around it?

[DanScott]

Originally Posted by dreadnought

Everything else is fine, but the fact that their clothes are the same colour. Is there no way around it?

Not if you want a game that plays like the snes version at 50fps

There are 7 colours available for ALL characters, and to be fair, I don't think the characters look too bad in that restricted palette.

[Tsak]

Originally Posted by dreadnought

Everything else is fine, but the fact that their clothes are the same colour. Is there no way around it?

Characters are part of the second playfield so they need to share the same 7 color palette. Having said that there *might* be a way to squeeze some extra color out of this. The characters palette was chosen with all of them in mind, however you only see two per fight, so it could be possible to use a different palette based on the 2 characters chosen.

The big problem with this is that characer assets need to keep using the same color slots, and each character will be using most (if not all) colors available, so it's not like you can take one color and change it to something completely different (f.e. a negative hue or different brighness). But still you could tweak and experiment for better results than just using the same generic palette in every fight.

[Tigerskunk]

Originally Posted by Havie

Sorry - may be being thick here but wouldn't you just change the colour of the palette entyr for the few lines of the power bar and then back again? I ask as in my Space Invaders I do the overlay using a copper change on colour 2 but am fighting some strange effects!

The characters are able to jump into the screen area where the energy bars are.

Add/edit: Dan explained it already.. ( should press refresh page before posting)

[dreadnought]

Originally Posted by Tsak

The big problem with this is that characer assets need to keep using the same color slots, and each character will be using most (if not all) colors available, so it's not like you can take one color and change it to something completely different (f.e. a negative hue or different brighness). But still you could tweak and experiment for better results than just using the same generic palette in every fight.

I'm sure you guys did consider it, just mentioned this as a layman-gamer. So, I guess, you can't make Ryu's belt purple, and his clothes black? (I guess this about sums up my ideas about this coding sorcery).

When you're actually playing a game like SF, your eyes are mostly on the characters. So having them wear the same colour is a bit jarring, especially seeing as they're opponents. Alas, if that's the cost of 50 fps fluid gameplay, so be it

[Tsak]

Other than that great work overal @Dan

One suggestion if I may:
The back building could be part of the second playfield instead of being a sprite. That would free sprites to be used for the clouds (obviously different and tweaked from the SNES ones to be usable as sprites).

Questions in this case are:
a) Can you still horizontally parallax the back building then?
b) Would you consider to vertically parallax the building as well, i.e. when the characters jump?

[DanScott]

Originally Posted by Tsak

Other than that great work overal @Dan

One suggestion if I may:
The back building could be part of the second playfield instead of being a sprite. That would free sprites to be used for the clouds (obviously different and tweaked from the SNES ones to be usable as sprites).

Questions in this case are:
a) Can you still horizontally parallax the back building then?
b) Would you consider to vertically parallax the building as well, i.e. when the characters jump?

a) yes, you could... as long as there was some space either side, you could quite easily shift it left and right, however it would then also be needing colours from the back playfield.
As it is using sprites it can have it's own palette. I think that clouds could still also be added above the building, and be static / very slow moving

b) yes to this too, i did think about this, but the the SNES doesn't seem to do any vertical parallax, and not sure the coin op does either.. but for a different game that is "inspired" by SF2 (that's the overall plan) it could be done for sure with careful planning and consideration for an already complicated copperlist



Just to confirm, this has all just been put together layering gfx in Photoshop, and I haven't put any code down yet (but I do have a pretty good grasp on the OCS hardware, so what you see in the pics should easily be achievable)

[Adrian Browne]

Originally Posted by DanScott

a) yes, you could... as long as there was some space either side, you could quite easily shift it left and right, however it would then also be needing colours from the back playfield.
As it is using sprites it can have it's own palette. I think that clouds could still also be added above the building, and be static / very slow moving

b) yes to this too, i did think about this, but the the SNES doesn't seem to do any vertical parallax, and not sure the coin op does either.. but for a different game that is "inspired" by SF2 (that's the overall plan) it could be done for sure with careful planning and consideration for an already complicated copperlist



Just to confirm, this has all just been put together layering gfx in Photoshop, and I haven't put any code down yet (but I do have a pretty good grasp on the OCS hardware, so what you see in the pics should easily be achievable)

Fascinating. I honestly thought the a500 was incapable of producing a snes like conversion in the play-ability department. Good idea to make an original game as its probably more interesting to you as a project and for us too of course. Elfmania is the only beat em up game that springs to mind as being a somewhat otherworldly accomplishment from a technical point of view. God knows how they did what they did.

[touko]

b) yes to this too, i did think about this, but the the SNES doesn't seem to do any vertical parallax

The snes can move each tile by an offset, so technicaly, it can,you can see it in aladdin, the snake level use this feature .
[ Show youtube player ]

[DanScott]

Originally Posted by touko

The snes can move each tile by an offset, so technicaly, it can,you can see it in aladdin, the snake level use this feature .
[ Show youtube player ]

I know the SNE can do that Discussion here is about SF2, and it doesn't do vertical parallax on these SF2 backgrounds as far as I can tell (looked at quite a few now)