Target Renegade

[Fiery Phoenix]

Always thought the C64 version was ok (never played the others)

Gave both the Amstrad and ZX a bash, both have crappy scrolling (not a shock) and the CPC is a hell of a lot more blocky.

However I was unaware until this thread that they both have a 2 player mode, so bonus points there. Plus from re-playing the 64 version, the flying kick was good enough to knock down the bikers but was not successful with the other fighters (maybe just me) but was more successful on the other versions.

Both ZX and CPC had the classic Renegade backward kick which I can't remember seeing on the 64 version and a knee move on the ZX in my game which I didn't see on my 64 play.

I do like the look of the C64 still, although it is probably because it is the version I played originally and I am aware of. However, saying that I do like the look of the Amiga screenshot.

I would always much rather see an Amiga game that is not an arcade conversion which is available to play on MAME and is an improvement on an 8 bit version (like Raid Over Moscow)

So I am looking forward to this.

Would be great if someone did a Project Firestart Amiga version!

[dlfrsilver]

Originally Posted by x-vision

No, sorry but it is not about a personale taste. He specifically state why it is technically superior

I read the article (and i own Target Renegade on spectrum, i have a +2 amstrad model). But it's nowhere as good as on Amstrad CPC. The speccy has always been piss poor of the 3 main 8 bit machines....

[reno]

Originally Posted by manossg

Although I consider the CPC version far superior, I cannot but feel amazed at what the Speccy managed to achieve, considering its capabilities.

Have you noticed how this is the favourite sentence of Spectrum Youtubers ?
"great conversion bla bla bla given the good old Speccy's limitations". Literally every OGDuffy video has that for example.

It's roughly equivalent to : "okay he ran this marathon in 45 hours, but consider he only has one leg !" or "okay this is not the greatest painting ever, but consider the author is blind !" : praise for courage and points for participation, but not exactly a glowing endorsement of the result
Poor Spectrum ...

[Tigerskunk]

Originally Posted by reno

Have you noticed how this is the favourite sentence of Spectrum Youtubers ?
"great conversion bla bla bla given the good old Speccy's limitations". Literally every OGDuffy video has that for example.

It's roughly equivalent to : "okay he ran this marathon in 45 hours, but consider he only has one leg !" or "okay this is not the greatest painting ever, but consider the author is blind !" : praise for courage and points for participation, but not exactly a glowing endorsement of the result
Poor Spectrum ...

On the contrary CPC people always sound like "All these paintings look like shit because these artists had only a 10 inch wide brush. But look at this amazing painting where the artist could for ONCE use a proper brush, and see, it looks much better than what all the other artists have done."

[reno]

Originally Posted by x-vision

Why do you use images compressed, full of artifacts and with very different zoom and just a couple of weak enemies to compare both versions? do you think you can cheat to dismiss the poor amstrad resolution? spoiler: NO.

"But it's cheating" says it all about which one you think looks best.
Seriously... "compression artefacts" and maybe a 20% size difference are preventing you from seeing the not at all subtle differences between left & right, really? Anyway, feel free to provide your own side by side comparison if you really want to...

Do you want to play this game with the original Renegade too ?



Or Double Dragon ?



Or Gryzor ?



Dragon Ninja ?



Operation Wolf maybe ?



Or do you really like high res ? Sure, the CPC (on the right hand side here) does that better too (Iron Lord in 320x200 vs 256x192). It even has a native 640x200 mode (no tricks required), but that's monochrome so not as useful.

Originally Posted by x-vision

No, sorry but it is not about a personale taste. He specifically state why it is technically superior

No, he specifically doesn't say that in this interview.
He states "Spectrum is definitely my favourite" (=personal opinion), and then where you might expect him to explain why, it never comes : in fact at no point does he compare one port to the others.

He talks about making a 48K vs 128K Spectrum version, then that he decided to only use 4 colours for CPC sprites and so "the graphics suffered in comparison to the original (CPC) Renegade", NOT in comparison to the Spectrum version (which could only DREAM of even just 4 colour sprites... because they're monochrome and the background still manages to colour-clash )

Originally Posted by x-vision

I don't wanna enter the same old childish discussion about which 8bit platform was better, because I could write a lot of reasons on why the spectrum was the best.

Yeah sure and the Atari STF is the best 16-bit platform too, it has MIDI ports after all.

Originally Posted by x-vision

So I invite you now to know the latest development for spectrum, like the "Velesoft" mode, which allows to use 102 colors and 256x384 resolution on a regular 128K spectrum AT 0 CPU COST, so it can be used for games (not just static screens for demos), just using the 128 second (shadow) screen. No extra hardware required at all.

This is quite cool and I appreciate how they're pushing the limits of the ZX Spectrum. It reminds me of this insane 8088 CGA PC demo [ Show youtube player ].
But the difference between you and me is that I would never try to use that to justify that CGA is better than VGA

[manossg]

Originally Posted by Steril707

On the contrary CPC people always sound like "All these paintings look like shit because these artists had only a 10 inch wide brush. But look at this amazing painting where the artist could for ONCE use a proper brush, and see, it looks much better than what all the other artists have done."

lol, I think the most accurate/frequent way to describe the CPC experience back in the day was "it looks great, until it starts to move" (and I am a CPC guy). :S Thankfully, this started to change, although long after the end of the Amstrad's commercial life.

[saimon69]

Originally Posted by x-vision

What modern way do you mean, like this?

[ Show youtube player ]

No, else is no more AY music,i think more remade on this style:
[ Show youtube player ]

[x-vision]

Originally Posted by dlfrsilver

I read the article (and i own Target Renegade on spectrum, i have a +2 amstrad model). But it's nowhere as good as on Amstrad CPC. The speccy has always been piss poor of the 3 main 8 bit machines....

Originally Posted by reno

"But it's cheating" says it all about which one you think looks best.
Seriously... "compression artefacts" and maybe a 20% size difference are preventing you from seeing the not at all subtle differences between left & right, really? Anyway, feel free to provide your own side by side comparison if you really want to...





No, he specifically doesn't say that in this interview.
He states "Spectrum is definitely my favourite" (=personal opinion), and then where you might expect him to explain why, it never comes : in fact at no point does he compare one port to the others.

He talks about making a 48K vs 128K Spectrum version, then that he decided to only use 4 colours for CPC sprites and so "the graphics suffered in comparison to the original (CPC) Renegade", NOT in comparison to the Spectrum version (which could only DREAM of even just 4 colour sprites... because they're monochrome and the background still manages to colour-clash )



Yeah sure and the Atari STF is the best 16-bit platform too, it has MIDI ports after all.



This is quite cool and I appreciate how they're pushing the limits of the ZX Spectrum. It reminds me of this insane 8088 CGA PC demo [ Show youtube player ].
But the difference between you and me is that I would never try to use that to justify that CGA is better than VGA

You
[ Show youtube player ]

All that suffering, all that pain, why living with such horror in your hearts?

This is not an old videogame: there is just one life. Why living it in endless envy and bile?

I said I won't discuss this anymore, cause is not the thread for that. I could show TONS of games which would put Amstrad to real shame, showing more colors (yeah, more than 4 for each sprite), more resolution, more sound channels (with its superior AY+beeper), and of course moving a lot smoother (as usual) than a poor cpc. But I won't do it cause I don't wanna disrespect the thread and the OP, I already passed the mental age of 11, and there are lots of videos in youtube for that, so I won't answer to all those excuses and bullshit.

Whatever the reasons you keep explaining and spreading, or whatever the long you make your posts, they can't never change the fact that Spectrum had the best games catalogue, by far. Simply because it was the most successful platform in Europe. Period. And it achieved that because Sir Clive Sinclair thought "computing for the masses, not the classes" and that was precisely what people needed at that time, kind of what Amiga did later but in the high end sector.

Deal with it and keep going with your lives.

[x-vision]

Originally Posted by saimon69

No, else is no more AY music,i think more remade on this style:
[ Show youtube player ]

Ok, but technically I don't see any difference between that music and older ones. The latest development in that dept. is simulating SID effects and sampled sounds at almost no cpu cost, like here:

[ Show youtube player ]

[manossg]

It is a well known fact in the CPC community that we suffer from Spectrum envy and we secretly pray to Alan Sugar and wish that all our games looked like the speccy versions, Target Renegade included.

[CFou!]

for me better conversion or original games on CPC are:
Chase HQ
Gryzor/Contra
Target Renegade
Arkaniod II
Dragon Ninja
Cauldron II
barbarian (Palace)
Rick Dangerous
AMC
After the War
Savage
Ghost N Goblin
Bomb Jack

I loved CPC but never try Spectrum so i can not compare gameplay.
however I prefer the more colorful GFX on CPC

[acidbottle]

Its quite funny that the old arguments from the school yard are resurfacing on fully grown adults some 35 years later haha!

Nostalgia is based on what you grew up with and was aware of. Very few people had multiple computers back then and quite honestly, most of the time you went with what a friend owned or what a parent bought you from the store!

There is no way the spectrum can touch many arcade conversions on the CPC when compared to visuals. All the above is quite true, especially gryzor and renegade. Also crazy cars 2 looked great on CPC. However, games are not all about gfx, as everyone should well know by now. There were many and numerous games that didnt even make it to CPC, my all time favourites are zzoom, scuba dive and where time stood still being examples of this.

Just enjoy what you enjoy and let other enjoy what they enjoyed! Invade-a-load blew my mind when I saw it on a mates C64 though!

[roondar]

@havie, I say take whatever GFX as a base you like. Looking forward to the game

Any Amiga specific features you're looking into?
Like two button support or some nice samples lifted from the Arcade prequel?

[Havie]

Can I say that I am enjoying the debate immensely and although I was Speccy all the way, getting a CPC is on my list of retromachines. I have a C64 and enjoy playing on it and some games are brilliant (Salamander anyone - less said about the Speccy/CPC versions the better).

Anyway, back on track.

Update 4

Went car booting yesterday and spent most of the day playing with my booty! Spent time thinking about how to sort the y values of the bobs so they overlap correctly and after some helpful comments in the Blitz section had a go at a simple sort. Sort (hahaha) of works but obviously I have something muddled as sometimes list is sorted properly and other times, numbers repeat. Have posted for help and will also muse on it overnight.

Have also added a shadow to your player which grounds the jumps better and hopefully won't add to much to the CPU usage. If it does then I may have to go back to the graphics and fiddle around with the colours so the shadows are in 2 colours and I blit them to just one bitplane (something I have never done but seems simple enough).

I also drew an attack dummy that I plan for you to be able to practice your moves on. I am also using this to sort out my z-ordering routine.

With regards to Amiga specific features: music obviously, Swainy designed an additional level over the ZX version, decent sound effects and as sprites are completely useless for a game with z-ordering (I know you could do lots of clever image swapping but I think this would get complicated quickly) then there may be potential for some subtle and not so subtle parallax. The aforementioned pillar on level 1 (sprites can be any height without speed hit).

New screenshot to wet your appetite: (please note that as I am using WinUAE, the screenshots are in widescreen - looks great at 4:3).

[lmimmfn]

I think it would be good to have pillar sprites in the foreground for parallax. I also think changing the ground via copper could add a nice gradient(if done subtlety). Looks very nice

[x-vision]

Originally Posted by Havie

Can I say that I am enjoying the debate immensely and although I was Speccy all the way, getting a CPC is on my list of retromachines. I have a C64 and enjoy playing on it and some games are brilliant (Salamander anyone - less said about the Speccy/CPC versions the better).

Anyway, back on track.

Update 4

Went car booting yesterday and spent most of the day playing with my booty! Spent time thinking about how to sort the y values of the bobs so they overlap correctly and after some helpful comments in the Blitz section had a go at a simple sort. Sort (hahaha) of works but obviously I have something muddled as sometimes list is sorted properly and other times, numbers repeat. Have posted for help and will also muse on it overnight.

Have also added a shadow to your player which grounds the jumps better and hopefully won't add to much to the CPU usage. If it does then I may have to go back to the graphics and fiddle around with the colours so the shadows are in 2 colours and I blit them to just one bitplane (something I have never done but seems simple enough).

I also drew an attack dummy that I plan for you to be able to practice your moves on. I am also using this to sort out my z-ordering routine.

With regards to Amiga specific features: music obviously, Swainy designed an additional level over the ZX version, decent sound effects and as sprites are completely useless for a game with z-ordering (I know you could do lots of clever image swapping but I think this would get complicated quickly) then there may be potential for some subtle and not so subtle parallax. The aforementioned pillar on level 1 (sprites can be any height without speed hit).

New screenshot to wet your appetite: (please note that as I am using WinUAE, the screenshots are in widescreen - looks great at 4:3).

Looking good.

There is a modded spectrum with an additional level, although the backgrounds are very boring. The more you look for backgrounds elsewhere, the better. It would be great adding some parallax, like pillars, trees/brushes at the park, etc...

About the discussion: I didn't wanna ruin your thread, so its a relief you don't mind :P , but I hope you know about the latest spectrum developments, cause there are really interesting games using the nirvana/bifrost engines or modding old games to improve some features .

[Immortal]

@Havie

Just to inspire you, in 2012 a Remake of Target Renegade was released for the PC:
Check it out and keep up the good work

[ Show youtube player ]

[10shu]

Originally Posted by Havie

Can I say that I am enjoying the debate immensely and although I was Speccy all the way, getting a CPC is on my list of retromachines. I have a C64 and enjoy playing on it and some games are brilliant (Salamander anyone - less said about the Speccy/CPC versions the better).

Anyway, back on track.

Update 4

Went car booting yesterday and spent most of the day playing with my booty! Spent time thinking about how to sort the y values of the bobs so they overlap correctly and after some helpful comments in the Blitz section had a go at a simple sort. Sort (hahaha) of works but obviously I have something muddled as sometimes list is sorted properly and other times, numbers repeat. Have posted for help and will also muse on it overnight.

Have also added a shadow to your player which grounds the jumps better and hopefully won't add to much to the CPU usage. If it does then I may have to go back to the graphics and fiddle around with the colours so the shadows are in 2 colours and I blit them to just one bitplane (something I have never done but seems simple enough).

I also drew an attack dummy that I plan for you to be able to practice your moves on. I am also using this to sort out my z-ordering routine.

With regards to Amiga specific features: music obviously, Swainy designed an additional level over the ZX version, decent sound effects and as sprites are completely useless for a game with z-ordering (I know you could do lots of clever image swapping but I think this would get complicated quickly) then there may be potential for some subtle and not so subtle parallax. The aforementioned pillar on level 1 (sprites can be any height without speed hit).

New screenshot to wet your appetite: (please note that as I am using WinUAE, the screenshots are in widescreen - looks great at 4:3).

Really cool... so what kind of Amiga would this run on? a500? or AGA?

[dreadnought]

Originally Posted by Havie

Can I say that I am enjoying the debate immensely

I wish something close to a "debate" was possible As it is, it's usually "the computer X I had as a kid is absolutely the best at everything. Any flaws, blame it on a port".


When in reality all these machines had their weak and strong points. Yes, that includes the mighty C64 too.

[Tigerskunk]

Originally Posted by dreadnought

I wish something close to a "debate" was possible As it is, it's usually "the computer X I had as a kid is absolutely the best at everything. Any flaws, blame it on a port".


When in reality all these machines had their weak and strong points. Yes, that includes the mighty C64 too.

It's interesting though, that those certain personality traits of the different machine's owners are still shining through after all these years.