New Amiga vs. SNES/Mega Drive Port Comparisons

[DanScott]

Originally Posted by touko

Akiko seems to be a simple "C2P" chip, i don't see it as an advantage here,because the MD already has a chunky display .

The Mcd has a dedicated chip to do sprites/bgs zooming,and a second 68k @12,5mhz (14mhz for the first revisions),technicaly it perform better than CD32 in some (most) way(s), and less in others as an A1200 can do .

True... I coded a Mega-CD game (BC Racers) but can't for the life of me remember any of the details....

[DamienD]

Originally Posted by Hewitson

Yep, as someone who played the arcade version first, I can honestly say that the Amiga version was a massive disappointment. I mean I knew it wouldn't be great, but I thought it'd be a lot better than it was.

Totally agree

[roondar]

SF2 for the Amiga was a big dissapointment. They could've done a much better job from a technical perspective.

But there's more to it than just that. Part of the dissapointment was the one-button-controller nonsense. The Amiga supported three button (yes, I did say 3) controllers from day one. It's right there in the HRM.

Yet Commodore decided in their infinite... Wisdom!? That one button sticks would also be acceptable. This was a massive mistake IMHO. Worse than most at any rate. And it pretty much destroyed fighting games on the system.

[DanScott]

Originally Posted by roondar

Yet Commodore decided in their infinite... Wisdom!? That one button sticks would also be acceptable. This was a massive mistake IMHO. Worse than most at any rate. And it pretty much destroyed fighting games on the system.

That's hardly fair to commodore, as (nearly) all joysticks were produced by third party vendors, based on (or the same as) designs from the ZX Spectrum / C64 days

[roondar]

Originally Posted by DanScott

That's hardly fair to commodore, as (nearly) all joysticks were produced by third party vendors.

They could've specified a minimum for use and/or standard configuration to use with the system. Other systems did this too and the third party vendors obliged.

So while it may be a bit harsh, it's not overly so - Commodore were in charge here. They could've supplied their own three button stick as standard. They could've used a non-standard connector that required a three button controller. They could've begged/pleaded/paid software creators to use more buttons. They could've made their own software require multiple buttons, etc.

Let's just say I disagree with laissez-faire approach used here by Commodore.

[DanScott]

This was 1984 FFS

[roondar]

Sorry, I disagree - the hardware documentation says these multi-button controllers are possible (and supported) and has done so since version 1 of that document. It was really shortsighted to not standardise them.

It also was already becoming commonplace: by 1984 several systems already featured two or more buttons for their controllers. This was nothing new.

[Leo42]

Yet Commodore decided in their infinite... Wisdom!? That one button sticks would also be acceptable. This was a massive mistake IMHO. Worse than most at any rate. And it pretty much destroyed fighting games on the system.

Not only fighting games: it destroyed gameplay in lots of genre: shoot them ups (you had to use the space bar or do a 360 on the joystick: remember Battle Squadron?), platform games where you had to move up/down and/or maintained button to perform actions, etc...

With more buttons lots of games would have been so much better.

Talking about SF2: apart from the sound, MD ports are really impressive.

[Solo Kazuki]

Originally Posted by roondar

SF2 for the Amiga was a big dissapointment. They could've done a much better job from a technical perspective.

But there's more to it than just that. Part of the dissapointment was the one-button-controller nonsense. The Amiga supported three button (yes, I did say 3) controllers from day one. It's right there in the HRM.

Yet Commodore decided in their infinite... Wisdom!? That one button sticks would also be acceptable. This was a massive mistake IMHO. Worse than most at any rate. And it pretty much destroyed fighting games on the system.

I'm completely agreed with You, Commodore should force at least 2 button support, CD32 joypad should be added for every A1200 set, but... Street Fighter II supports 2 button joypads. Just chose it when You select fighter. Even special moves are splitted between punch and kick (in opposite e.g. MK).

[Solo Kazuki]

Originally Posted by Leo42

Not only fighting games: it destroyed gameplay in lots of genre: shoot them ups (you had to use the space bar or do a 360 on the joystick: remember Battle Squadron?), platform games where you had to move up/down and/or maintained button to perform actions, etc...

With more buttons lots of games would have been so much better.

It's based on developers choice. Remember that some games have support for more buttons than one! See this list and throw out WHDLoad ones. Not too much, but for sure some.

And for sure lots of games would have been better and some would be more playable with two or more button support. Good that WHDLoad Team try to fix this mistakes.

[gimbal]

Originally Posted by roondar

SF2 for the Amiga was a big dissapointment. They could've done a much better job from a technical perspective.

Definitely, I remember playing a demo of Super Street Fighter 2 on my Amiga that moved a whole lot faster. But the sprites were smaller I think.

[d4rk3lf]

Originally Posted by DamienD

It is if you grew up in the Arcades

...and also if you had the SNES version at home around that time period

I've seen and played arcade at that time, not the SNES.
It is a bad port, just, not THAT bad port.

If you had Amiga, and didn't had a whole lot of money to spend on arcade, as a kid, it could compensate it a little bit.
It was slow, but it had it's own pace, and you had to practice in order to finish it. It had different levels of hardness. 2 players are also not that bad.

Maybe I think of it this, because at the time, I only had C64, and on my friends Amiga, SF looked pretty descent to me.
Of course, I was blown away with Mortal Kombat 2 (look and feel), but at that point of time, I'd happily play even SF 2 on the Amiga.

[touko]

True... I coded a Mega-CD game (BC Racers) but can't for the life of me remember any of the details....

Oh, i can tell you it was a good version

The MCD problem was the MD's DMA, for exemple even if the MCD's asic was powerful, it can't do the snes mode 7 @60fps because the lacks of DMA bandwidth,30fps is the max it can do .

[DanScott]

I seem to remember that the each of the 68000's could only have access to memory at any one time... or at least there was some kind of shared memory that had to be banked in to either of the processors... it's a long time ago though, and not a project that I was particularly happy to work on

[Sgt Jack V]

Honestly, I felt that when Accolade and The Code Monkeys were porting Turrican 2 to Genesis before it became Universal Soldier, they were doing an enhanced port. If you look in the background of the early levels, you'll see some nice background graphics. In Amiga Turrican 2, it's just a rainbow gradient. And let's not forget the extra rooms and 1-Ups they put in there!

In fact, I've thought of a whole hack that turns UniSol into an enhanced port of Turrican 2, with the levels exclusive to UniSol turned into secret levels. Too bad I can't hack outside of graphics...

[lordofchaos]

I think I've actually found a game that actually exceeds the Mega Drive in all departments, well kind of. Mostly.

[ Show youtube player ]

[gimbal]

Is it me or does the megadrive version have the literal jumping sound from Gods?

[rabidgerry]

I know this is a comparison thread but these arguments wreck me big time!

When I first got into Amiga I knew no different than my better looking in my opinion SF2 that was slow as hell compared to my mates with their SNES and MD consoles with terrible sounding music and cheopo looks graphically. I enjoyed the slow ass SF2and learned the 1 button utilization and completed with every character including the bosses. I learned to live with the slowness.

But for all the crying about how botched the SF2 port was, I was like "well I don't give a shit now that that port was rubbish because I know the Amiga can do better". And that was after I got a copy of Shadow Fighter on my plain jane old A500.

It had speed, it had characters, it had BLOOD, it had graphics and it was fantastic. This helped me sleep better at night knowing I could play something as good as my console friends.

As for Mortal Kombat. I never even knew the port existed on Amiga until my Amiga re-birth never mind wonder if the port was as good as the consoles. So my only experience was playing on my mates consoles back in the day, mostly on Megadrive. So upon getting MK for the Amiga and only ever having had console experience of the game I can safely say the Amiga felt a little more solid. But then I always felt something about the graphics on Amiga always was more solid over the consoles. Gameplay felt very similar to the megadrive but it for me was better because I didn't have no nasty 3 buttons to deal with and the MK Amiga control system is actually pretty good with just a single button! I can hear the anger and blood boiling as I type this about spreading such blasphemy. I used nothing but single button joysticks my whole Atari and Amiga life span and I was just adapted to it. The only trouble I had was when I went to a friends a played something with lots more buttons and I couldn't deal with it.

Anyways I really love the MK port on the Amiga and I'm kinda shocked it was around at the time the super slow SF2 was being played to death at my house thinking this is all the speed my machine can do with a beat em up. I would have loved to have had MK back in the day! But hey there you go!

[lmimmfn]

I loved MK on the Amiga back in the day, i never played the console port only the arcade. However MK2 is even better, i absolutely loved that game and played 100s of hours on it. Can never get the WHDload version working on my A1200 though, grrrr.

I only played/viewed the SF2 demo on Amiga Format or CU Amiga coverdisk and just thought WTF is this lol.

[manossg]

Originally Posted by rabidgerry

...but it for me was better because I didn't have no nasty 3 buttons to deal with and the MK Amiga control system is actually pretty good with just a single button! I can hear the anger and blood boiling as I type this about spreading such blasphemy. I used nothing but single button joysticks my whole Atari and Amiga life span and I was just adapted to it. The only trouble I had was when I went to a friends a played something with lots more buttons and I couldn't deal with it.

Amen to that!