Hard Driving just plain impossible.....

[Crazy Climber]

 

 

 

I like Block-Out way more than they did!

Glad you like Blockout....man I hated that game

It just made me angry

[TailChao]

I feel that there is a huge misunderstanding about what Suzy can/cannot do, I hope these clarify things for some and identify how much work it actually is to render something like Hard Drivin' or Steel Talons, because the Lynx really isn't suited for such work:

 

 

 

 

 

Rubbish! STUN Runner uses the scaling chip to achieve its speed and so does Steel Talons for its smoothness. According to the Lynx designers the machine can scale any object which includes sprites (something the lame SNES could not do)

The only object the Lynx can display is a sprite like object. For our sake, I would hope it can scale and distort them. The SNES's rendering system functions completely differently, and cannot be compared to the lynx's rendering system.

 

2D scaling, as seen in STUN Runner (which is fast and great), is not the same thing as 3D polygons, as seen in Hard Drivin' and Steel Talons (which are slow and relatively lame).

You're correct in that STUN Runner, which was a true polygon game in the arcade, is wicked fast because they chose to simulate polygons in the Lynx port using 2D sprite scaling, at which the Lynx is very proficient. Hard Drivin' and Steel Talons chose to implement polygons instead in their Lynx ports.

 

However, all the games use the scaling engine on the Lynx. The CPU has to do more computations in 3D vs. 2D, thus the true polygon games are signficantly slower on the Lynx.

 

Precisely, STUN Runner actually worked because everything was just prerendered and scaled/distorted based on depth and position, it looked and played well.

If you look at the way Hard Drivin' and Steel Talons display everything, it's a mess (I still can't figure out why they decided to waste so much CPU time by scaling sprites to create EACH LINE of EACH LETTER on a sign.) This is a huge load of work for both the 6502 and Suzy, and it's no surprise why both are nearly unplayable.

Edited January 18, 2007 by TailChao

[Isgoed]

Very interesting TailChao, thanks!

[The_Laird]

Both Steel Talons and Hard Drivin' are highly playable and among some of the best games on the Lynx. This also seems a common opinion elsewhere too.

[TailChao]

Very interesting TailChao, thanks!

No problem, I'm glad someone was interested.

 

Both Steel Talons and Hard Drivin' are highly playable and among some of the best games on the Lynx. This also seems a common opinion elsewhere too.

An opinion is an opinion, but hey, no sense fighting with each other on the internet about it.

[Flojomojo]

Both Steel Talons and Hard Drivin' are highly playable and among some of the best games on the Lynx. This also seems a common opinion elsewhere too.

Hard Drivin' is playable only if you're willing to put up with single-digit framerates. The illusion of speed is ruined when everything is chopped up. I felt burned when I paid $40 for Hard Drivin' in the early 1990s, and I doubt time has been kind to it. Steel Talons was cool enough for what it was, but the Lynx controls weren't quite up to making it very playable.

 

Why are you such a booster/apologist for these lame ports? Unlike some multiplatform games (RoadBlasters, Xenophobe, and Rampart come to mind), the Lynx versions are vastly inferior to the Sega Genesis versions. The reader reviews of Hard Drivin' are not kind, nor were the critics when they first launched. Might want to find a source to back up your believe that yours was "common opinion elsewhere." Maybe you're thinking of Steel Talons only?

 

AtariAge's reviews of Hard Drivin': 50%, 6%, 60%, 30% <--- hardly stellar praise. 30% seems about right.

AtariAge's reviews of Steel Talons: 95%, 75%, 80% (Robert is very generous, I would give it a 75% for being a cool polygon game at the time.)

[The_Laird]

Did the Genesis even get a port of Steel Talons?

 

Hard Drivin' scored 89% in C+VG, 96% in Warning (Lynx fanzine), 90% Gamezone magazine, 4/5 Bad Influence and 4 Stars in ACE.

[Flojomojo]

Did the Genesis even get a port of Steel Talons?

 

Hard Drivin' scored 89% in C+VG, 96% in Warning (Lynx fanzine), 90% Gamezone magazine, 4/5 Bad Influence and 4 Stars in ACE.

Yep, there was a Genesis version as well as a SNES version. You can buy a copy for a penny on Ebay and pay 5 bucks to ship it.

 

In my opinion, those reviews were written by .... well, let's just call them "people who don't know much about good games." In any case, I don't care for it, and you think it's nice, so I guess we'll have to agree to disagree.

[Video]

Thanks for all the Info TailChao, I never knew any of that stuff (well, the scaling and skewing, but not the poly stuff) I always thought the Lynx had hardware for polys. No wonder the few poly games on there were so slow. Still, Steel Talons was cool on the Lynx (one of my more played games) and Hard Driving was choppy on EVERY platform I played it on ( probably due to it being a software emulation on every system it was on I believe)

 

I'll have to go look for a copy of this game now, on Ebay, and for Steel Talons for something else, cool that it's on the Genny and SNES.

Edited January 20, 2007 by Video

[agradeneu]

I feel that there is a huge misunderstanding about what Suzy can/cannot do, I hope these clarify things for some and identify how much work it actually is to render something like Hard Drivin' or Steel Talons, because the Lynx really isn't suited for such work:

 

 

 

 

 

Rubbish! STUN Runner uses the scaling chip to achieve its speed and so does Steel Talons for its smoothness. According to the Lynx designers the machine can scale any object which includes sprites (something the lame SNES could not do)

The only object the Lynx can display is a sprite like object. For our sake, I would hope it can scale and distort them. The SNES's rendering system functions completely differently, and cannot be compared to the lynx's rendering system.

 

2D scaling, as seen in STUN Runner (which is fast and great), is not the same thing as 3D polygons, as seen in Hard Drivin' and Steel Talons (which are slow and relatively lame).

You're correct in that STUN Runner, which was a true polygon game in the arcade, is wicked fast because they chose to simulate polygons in the Lynx port using 2D sprite scaling, at which the Lynx is very proficient. Hard Drivin' and Steel Talons chose to implement polygons instead in their Lynx ports.

 

However, all the games use the scaling engine on the Lynx. The CPU has to do more computations in 3D vs. 2D, thus the true polygon games are signficantly slower on the Lynx.

 

Precisely, STUN Runner actually worked because everything was just prerendered and scaled/distorted based on depth and position, it looked and played well.

If you look at the way Hard Drivin' and Steel Talons display everything, it's a mess (I still can't figure out why they decided to waste so much CPU time by scaling sprites to create EACH LINE of EACH LETTER on a sign.) This is a huge load of work for both the 6502 and Suzy, and it's no surprise why both are nearly unplayable.

 

 

The best read I had in a month. Thanks for that! BTW Website update?

[TailChao]

Thanks for all the Info TailChao, I never knew any of that stuff (well, the scaling and skewing, but not the poly stuff) I always thought the Lynx had hardware for polys. No wonder the few poly games on there were so slow. Still, Steel Talons was cool on the Lynx (one of my more played games) and Hard Driving was choppy on EVERY platform I played it on ( probably due to it being a software emulation on every system it was on I believe)

 

I'll have to go look for a copy of this game now, on Ebay, and for Steel Talons for something else, cool that it's on the Genny and SNES.

Yeah, it's a weird rumor, and I have absolutely no idea how it became so widely spread. Maybe because Sage's "Lynx Reloaded" rendered so nicely, who knows. (By the by, if any of you haven't seen that demo, I suggest you go find it promptly). If you're interested in how Hard Drivin' and Steel Talons actually display things, try running them in Handebug (Debug Handy) and using the sprite step feature, really wacky stuff.

 

The best read I had in a month. Thanks for that! BTW Website update?

 

Again, no problem. Just remember, if any of you are curious about how anything I've done works (aside from stuff I can't talk about like emulation prevention), just ask. I'm glad to see that people are interested in the actual way Lynx software works.

Website & Updates? Wait about an hour

[zeropolis79]

What the heck were these people at Atari smoking when they made this game?

You need to look at it with a little perspective The fact that the Lynx has a version at all is pretty amazing. When Hard Drivin' hit the arcades, it had an insane amount of processing power inside of it, outclassing the poor little Lynx by several magnitudes. While the port certainly isn't perfect, it is pretty good, and with a little practice you can get around the tracks well.

 

I remember being hugely disappointed with the Saturn version, which was especially disappointing as the Saturn had so many killer versions of my favorite arcade games. Though its been a while, I'd have to dig it out to actually remember what I didn't like

 

Until Midway Arcade Treasures 2, the Genesis definitely had the best version of Hard Drivin' Though the Xbox version of MAT2 was destroyed by awful controls, I play it on my GC all the time. I love Hard Drivin' and Race Drivin' they're in my 'top game' list

 

For those who critise the Lynx version, take a look at the Commodore 64 version!

 

I like a good game of Hard Drivin myself.. I use MAME for the game though. Would love to get the Midway Arcade Treasures packs for my Gamecube but they seem to be hard to find..

[Gregory DG]

The current Lynx Game Rankings over at TAT has Steel Talons at #45 with a 76% score and Hard Drivin at #91 with a 44% score.

 

I guess ST is better because there's actually something to do. Just driving around the stunt track got kinda boring once the polygons and force feedback novelty wore off (of the arcade.)

[zeropolis79]

Compared 2 the C64 version, the Spectrum version was good