2D Potential of the N64

[Godot102]

We all know that the Nintendo 64 was far and away the most capable machine for 3D graphics in its generation,

I disagree. All the power was wasted on terrible textures, IMHO.

I'll take blurry textures over that weird pixelated warping thing that the Ps1 does with textures any day.

Unfortunately, the frame rate drops seem to be way more noticeable on n64 games,at least to me they do.

[harper]

I'll take blurry textures over that weird pixelated warping thing that the Ps1 does with textures any day.

Unfortunately, the frame rate drops seem to be way more noticeable on n64 games,at least to me they do.

I'm not bothered by any of that stuff honestly. Gotta take the bad with the good.

[ZeroAX]

Well I expect 2D games to be better looking on the PS1 just because of the amount of disk space. 650-700 MB compared to what? 50? Think of all the art assets the CDs could hold.

[Gooseberrysoda]

I thought that Clayfighter 63 1/3 did a nice job of being a 2D game.

[Flake]

Well I expect 2D games to be better looking on the PS1 just because of the amount of disk space. 650-700 MB compared to what? 50? Think of all the art assets the CDs could hold.

Space =/= capability. The N64 and Playstation did not have the visual memory needed for crunching sprites. The work around with the Playstation was to have two dimensional polygons with the "sprite" applied to it as a texture map. The PSX could have had blue ray sized discs but it still was hampered in 2D gaming by its 3D architecture.

I'm not sure but I'd bet the N64 had a similar issue.

[ZeroAX]

Well I expect 2D games to be better looking on the PS1 just because of the amount of disk space. 650-700 MB compared to what? 50? Think of all the art assets the CDs could hold.

Space =/= capability. The N64 and Playstation did not have the visual memory needed for crunching sprites. The work around with the Playstation was to have two dimensional polygons with the "sprite" applied to it as a texture map. The PSX could have had blue ray sized discs but it still was hampered in 2D gaming by its 3D architecture.

I'm not sure but I'd bet the N64 had a similar issue.

wooow....wooooooow. That was a stupid design choice. Is that why when I played the PS1 port of Megaman X3 (on the Megaman X collection) something seemed wrong compared to the snes version I had played on an emulator?

And ok you are making a great point, but for example Final Fantasy could have so many beautiful detailed backgrounds (let's not consider the space gobbeling FMVs for a minute) thanks to having so much space. That's more what I had in mind. Of course I may be wrong, I have no idea how much space those high quality images would take, but I am talking based on how the difference in image size (MB) corresponds to difference in image quality (and resolution).

[AppleQueso]

N64 did have the ram expansion pack...

don't think it was ever used for anything 2D though

[Flake]

wooow....wooooooow. That was a stupid design choice. Is that why when I played the PS1 port of Megaman X3 (on the Megaman X collection) something seemed wrong compared to the snes version I had played on an emulator?

And ok you are making a great point, but for example Final Fantasy could have so many beautiful detailed backgrounds (let's not consider the space gobbeling FMVs for a minute) thanks to having so much space. That's more what I had in mind...

No, it was a market driven design choice. Nowadays we are so used to game systems that can do anything the designers want, where the amount of time and money put into a project is the only real limiting factor on the end result.

Back in the day, machines had to be built to produce the type of games platform holders thought their consumers were after. Sony thought that 3D was the future and built a machine for that. It did not need a lot of visual ram because it was just showing the gamer a 'picture' of the polygons it drew and you, the gamer, are the one that makes that picture make sense.

Nintendo thought the same but banked on gamers hating load times more than they ended up actually hating them.

Sega wasn't sure what to think so they hedged their bet with the Saturn and put in a 3D and 2D processor. It created for the Saturn a great legacy but it crippled it at the market place and made development hard.

But when you look at those three systems, in most cases only the Saturn is doing true 2D, drawing sprites and compiling multiple sprites to generate scenery, characters, and effects. The N64 and PSX just used clever work arounds.

[Gunstar Green]

SHAKE SHAKE

I remember being excited for Mischief Makers when it was coming out. I wanted to see what glorious 2D could be done on Nintendo's newest, most powerful console. Honestly I was pretty disappointed.

Today I understand why of course, the N64 just wasn't made for those type of games in mind.

We all know that the Nintendo 64 was far and away the most capable machine for 3D graphics in its generation,

I disagree. All the power was wasted on terrible textures, IMHO.

I'll take blurry textures over that weird pixelated warping thing that the Ps1 does with textures any day.

They're both pretty awful. The 5th gen has aged terribly unless it's the one you grew up with and have nostalgic fondness for the early 3D look. Can't say that I do personally.

[Breetai]

They're both pretty awful. The 5th gen has aged terribly unless it's the one you grew up with and have nostalgic fondness for the early 3D look. Can't say that I do personally.

It didn't age terribly if you like 2D stuff and own a Saturn. The PS1, despite a lot of ignorance in this thread, has a lot of nice 2D games as well. It's not as capable as the Saturn, but developers did use some brilliant techniques to get some very nice 2D stuff on the system. Just look at the PS1 versions of Symphony of the Night or Street Fighter Alpha 3.