Atari v Commodore

[Barnacle boy]

PMSL @ Powerdrift. Partway through the lap it's as if the road just merges into the sky.

That's because half the time you're racing on raised sections of track, which is a feature true to the arcade original. Admittedly the way the roadside pillars are cut off at road-level leaves plenty to be desired. :/

Edited March 30, 2009 by Barnacle boy

[atariksi]

...

Right well if people want to compare the piles of rubbish games coded in 1983 using 25-50% of the machines (both cases) capability then fair enough. I am showing code that is pushing the C64 much more than examples given, in response to A8 coding/games that are taking years 3 decades after launch. Fair's fair and compare like for like unless you don't want a fair comparison

...

Even many of those atari games developed during 1980s using 25%-50% capability are better than C64 games at around same time.

 

>So I am just evening the scores with games like A8 Bomb Jack and Space Harrier being mentioned by showing you what is being done NOW on the C64 this decade by people taking their time and using 95% of the machine to showcase it's abilities not 3 before

 

Are these numbers like 95% arbitrary or from a random number generator? Games use whatever they need to get the game done not showing what a computer can do.

 

>Of course it IS an Atari forum so it doesn't really matter, but me personally I own every 8bit console or computer ever sold in PAL format and I have no bias at all. And how much commercial coding happened on either machine doesn't matter anyway it's the demo coders and homebrew games people pushing BOTH machines to their limit today that is important. IF Space Harrier was launched in 1985 for A8 it would have been as shit as any other game because it was about money not love for the machine, getting paid for doing the bare minimum to fulfill the contract and buy food and gas!

 

It is an Atari forum but I don't think it's preventing anyone from expressing the truth about C64.

 

>So do you want to talk about which machine is best by posting cutting edge coding on BOTH machines or shall I just leave this as a lost cause on a machine specific forum?

 

The the guts of the issue here is post cutting edge code for what feature? Most C64 sided people just keep stressing/repeating the same feature of having 8+ sprites on a scanline (X-axis) using 32 colors from a palette of 16 colors. There are a ton of other features in a computer and there's more than one dimension in the universe not just X-axis.

[atariksi]

Don't know about other topics you mentioned, but the audio resolution stuff is a misconception some have that C64 audio is always superior because they have seen some existing software that indicates that.

 

Approximately POKEY usage is at 40% from my point of view. Seeing RMT as the most comfortable Tracker, it misses also ~80% of full Tracker/Midi features. I guess everyone would kick a Tracker to the moon even on the AMIGA or PC, if it needs to create 64 instruments for one pattern, to have all necessary variations for a melody... not to mention about the "blocked" features...

 

And I wonder, how a game on the A8 would look like, when using GTIA modes in the background and multiplexed PM with GPRIOR 0 was used....

At least the Atari could show more than 100 colours per scanline then.... just an imagination...

 

Variations you mean notes? Most of the music notes are just computed via some formula rather than digitized per note basis. I think Sonix let you use samples of instruments at slightly less than 9Khz so you can easily play at other frequencies since they were integer multiples. That's what I was trying to point out before was the problem with software mixing where you had different frequencies playing that were prime numbers or numbers where fractional samples would have to be calculated via interpolation (which screws up the quality).

 

Games haven't even used GTIA modes by themselves what to speak of with multiplexing of PM/G w/Player 5 color and OR effects. GPRIOR 0 OR effects do not work in GTIA modes-- Graphics 9/11.

[TMR]

Even many of those atari games developed during 1980s using 25%-50% capability are better than C64 games at around same time.

 

That's a subjective matter of opinion - personally, the games are one of the reasons i got a C64 after a year of owning my 800XL to be honest, there was almost nothing i found to be anywhere near as playable as the games i was seeing on a friend's machine, i think Mercenary and Elektraglide were the two exceptions and the majority of titles either existed on both (usually with a better soundtrack, One Man And His Droid, The Last V8 or Thrust as a couple of random examples) or were only on the C64.

 

Another factor was not being able to find a bloody assembler i could A) afford and B) use on a tape-based machine! =-)

 

Most C64 sided people just keep stressing/repeating the same feature of having 8+ sprites on a scanline (X-axis) using 32 colors from a palette of 16 colors.

 

There's a reason for that, the majority of games are 2D so it's a huge plus for the C64 for those titles.

[TMR]

Variations you mean notes? Most of the music notes are just computed via some formula rather than digitized per note basis.

 

i believe emkay is talking about the way that in order to do complex sounds with RMT people are currently having to throw lots of differently tweaked sounds at patterns in order to get a range of notes... but i could be wrong?

 

Games haven't even used GTIA modes by themselves what to speak of with multiplexing of PM/G w/Player 5 color and OR effects. GPRIOR 0 OR effects do not work in GTIA modes-- Graphics 9/11.

 

i've got half a puzzle game that uses APAC knocking about the place, perhaps i should finish it...

[FastRobPlus]

That's a subjective matter of opinion - personally, the games are one of the reasons i got a C64 after a year of owning my 800XL to be honest, there was almost nothing i found to be anywhere near as playable as the games i was seeing on a friend's machine, i think Mercenary and Elektraglide were the two exceptions and the majority of titles either existed on both (usually with a better soundtrack, One Man And His Droid, The Last V8 or Thrust as a couple of random examples) or were only on the C64.

 

Totally understand this point, but in the US, folks adpoted the 16-bit systems earlier, so the entire timetable of games is shifted about 1-2 years left, with 81-85 being the biggest Atari 8-bit software years rather than 84-87 for the C64.

 

So it isn't just that the C64 came out a few years later. There is also a huge delta between the adoption timeline in the US vs the UK.

 

The upshot of all this: It would not have made sense to make Omnitrend's Universe for the C64, and it would not have made sense to make Elite for the Atari even though both machinces could run both games.

[emkay]

i believe emkay is talking about the way that in order to do complex sounds with RMT people are currently having to throw lots of differently tweaked sounds at patterns in order to get a range of notes... but i could be wrong?

 

 

Have a look at the screenshot... particular "Channel 1". You have clearly the notes , the samples and the FX , independent from each other.

So you simply can play a sample at the dedicated note and the external processor makes the music FX.... like tone portamento, note portamento, arpeggio... all with one used sample.

Particular wih RMT, you always have to add the FX into the instruments.

 

You'd have to create instrument 7 6 times for this pattern and instrument 4 8 times just for having some tracker like sound fx.

Then you have to add different instruments for timing correction when using special filter sounds. So possibly you have to create instrument 4 with 15 different settings. When the melody gets even more complex, you really can assume to create 64 different settings for one instrument at one pattern.

 

It's as easy as written: Just someone create a fully working tracker for POKEY and you will have clear Pokey music.

Using POKEY for creating "samples" via the built in features and change the values by the used tracker commands.

Edited March 30, 2009 by emkay

[atariksi]

Even many of those atari games developed during 1980s using 25%-50% capability are better than C64 games at around same time.

 

That's a subjective matter of opinion - personally, the games are one of the reasons i got a C64 after a year of owning my 800XL to be honest, there was almost nothing i found to be anywhere near as playable as the games i was seeing on a friend's machine, i think Mercenary and Elektraglide were the two exceptions and the majority of titles either existed on both (usually with a better soundtrack, One Man And His Droid, The Last V8 or Thrust as a couple of random examples) or were only on the C64.

 

Another factor was not being able to find a bloody assembler i could A) afford and B) use on a tape-based machine! =-)

 

Most C64 sided people just keep stressing/repeating the same feature of having 8+ sprites on a scanline (X-axis) using 32 colors from a palette of 16 colors.

 

There's a reason for that, the majority of games are 2D so it's a huge plus for the C64 for those titles.

 

I am giving a reasonable answer based on the games I had as compared to the same games on C64 (without getting into hardware technicalities): Super Break Out, Frogger, Pac-man, Donkey Kong, Centipede, Defender and some others. Didn't have a big collection initially since even Defender cost me $50 from Sears.

 

Well, you can stress the same feature but it does not prove a machine superior unless you systematically go through each feature and show software that takes advantage of that feature better than the other machine. And it's not 2D-- it's X-axis. Y-axis is also part of 2D and Atari excels when you start to optimize in that dimension.

[atariksi]

...

Games haven't even used GTIA modes by themselves what to speak of with multiplexing of PM/G w/Player 5 color and OR effects. GPRIOR 0 OR effects do not work in GTIA modes-- Graphics 9/11.

 

i've got half a puzzle game that uses APAC knocking about the place, perhaps i should finish it...

 

I was talking about 60Hz/50Hz modes using GTIA Graphics 9,10,11 which require no tricks and are as easy to do as Graphics 8 or Graphics 15. These were definitely doable in early 80s but companies did not use them for either compatibility reasons with CTIA or perhaps because they were porting from other platforms like Apple or C64.

 

I wasn't talking about enhancements to the modes such as ANTIC Mode K (as mentioned earlier) or Player 5 color effects. Of course there are the 30Hz variations but that's not as good as 50/60Hz enhancements.

[Gorf]

i'd say the C64 was the more powerful overall

 

Considering the machine was a whole year after the Atari 8bits.....

 

...

And still more powerful even after being a 2+ years before.

 

 

Don't get me wrong the C64 is a great machine but I feel the lack of display lists, it's not as flexible. It's

definitely a powerful machine though.

 

The display lists of the A8 are a lot easier to deal with for fancy screens.

Sure you can pull some of this off with trickery on the C64 but the Atari

will always do it better as it is in hardware.

 

The Sprites vs the player missles I would give a slight edge to the missiles

in most departments but the C64 sprites win the multicolor mode award.

 

It's like I have said, when you consider that the C64 was after the A8's,

it should have been a MUCH better unit than the old A8's but really it's not.

 

The POKEY vs SID argument is a tough one.

 

Over all I like the GTIA/ANTIC over the VIC chip.

 

I own both.

 

I also owned a VIC-20. Clearly the VIC-20 was a nice little machine

but hardly an A8.

[atariksi]

i'd say the C64 was the more powerful overall

 

Considering the machine was a whole year after the Atari 8bits.....

 

...

And still more powerful even after being a 2+ years before.

 

 

Don't get me wrong the C64 is a great machine but I feel the lack of display lists, it's not as flexible. It's

definitely a powerful machine though.

 

The display lists of the A8 are a lot easier to deal with for fancy screens.

Sure you can pull some of this off with trickery on the C64 but the Atari

will always do it better as it is in hardware.

 

The Sprites vs the player missles I would give a slight edge to the missiles

in most departments but the C64 sprites win the multicolor mode award.

 

It's like I have said, when you consider that the C64 was after the A8's,

it should have been a MUCH better unit than the old A8's but really it's not.

...

 

It's worse than Atari looked at it objectively from hardware perspective. I mean look at it practically-- if you had to choose a 1.79Ghz Pentium w/256 colors, 4-channel audio, BYTE wide joystick port, etc. vs. 1.0Ghz Pentium w/16 colors, 3 channel audio, NIBBLE wide joystick port, etc. Programmable modes are always better than built-in modes. Atari doesn't have any graphics modes built-in; you need to write a DL to create a mode and some DLs are prewritten for you in the OS. I don't think C64 has more multicolor sprite coverage than Atari if you use sprites for other things besides small objects; you have 8*248..32*248 pixel coverage for one sprite.

 

>The POKEY vs SID argument is a tough one.

 

For digitized samples, POKEY definitely wins with higher frequency playback and more DAC channels.

 

>Over all I like the GTIA/ANTIC over the VIC chip.

 

You get more combinations of graphics modes with hardware support on Atari vs. C64. There are other hardware features besides audio and graphics modes like i/o port speed, i/o port width, CPU speed, bootable peripherals, colors/shades, etc.

[oky2000]

Even many of those atari games developed during 1980s using 25%-50% capability are better than C64 games at around same time.

 

That's a subjective matter of opinion - personally, the games are one of the reasons i got a C64 after a year of owning my 800XL to be honest, there was almost nothing i found to be anywhere near as playable as the games i was seeing on a friend's machine, i think Mercenary and Elektraglide were the two exceptions and the majority of titles either existed on both (usually with a better soundtrack, One Man And His Droid, The Last V8 or Thrust as a couple of random examples) or were only on the C64.

 

Another factor was not being able to find a bloody assembler i could A) afford and B) use on a tape-based machine! =-)

 

Most C64 sided people just keep stressing/repeating the same feature of having 8+ sprites on a scanline (X-axis) using 32 colors from a palette of 16 colors.

 

There's a reason for that, the majority of games are 2D so it's a huge plus for the C64 for those titles.

 

I am giving a reasonable answer based on the games I had as compared to the same games on C64 (without getting into hardware technicalities): Super Break Out, Frogger, Pac-man, Donkey Kong, Centipede, Defender and some others. Didn't have a big collection initially since even Defender cost me $50 from Sears.

 

Well, you can stress the same feature but it does not prove a machine superior unless you systematically go through each feature and show software that takes advantage of that feature better than the other machine. And it's not 2D-- it's X-axis. Y-axis is also part of 2D and Atari excels when you start to optimize in that dimension.

 

So your whole argument for which machine is better is based on technically simple games written on limited cartridge memory? LOL well I have a suprise, we went way beyond that level of simplicity on the C64 about a quarter of a century ago

 

Well even if we talk about commercial games the Atari A8 wouldn't have a hope in hell of doing the following arcade conversion anywhere near as good as the C64 really for

was programmed in a couple of months by a few people at Ocean, and it's a bit delusional if you think that is because of lack of effort it can't be done on the A8, the C64 was a better compromise, no the only compromise the C64 made was a fixed 4bit palette look up table that's it, Sprites, scrolling, SID, CPU instruction set is all better on the C64 FACT. PM graphics are just a little better than VCS, and the Pokey has kinda nice style to it but it neither has the frequency range, sophisticated operators or special effects built into the SID. Pokey tunes all kinda sound the same, listen to Panther on the A8 and then on the C64, it is my 'atari fanboy test' track

 

The ONLY thing the A8 is better at is total available color palette, shame you can't even get the same 16 colours on screen AT THE SAME TIME as the C64 palette in 160x200 OR with the same amount of multiplexed 24x21 pixeled sprites per 24 scanlines without using ANY extra CPU/Graphics chip cycles. 16 shades of the same colour are a bit useless for most games. The C64 is officially 8 sprites per scanline, it is in the 1983 Programmer's Reference Guide which actually tells you this, it is not TOTAL of 8 just like A8 is not just a total of 4 Missile and 1 Player graphic also by the way.

 

There are some games on the A8 I love don't get me wrong but to say it is a better machine than the C64 based on things that don't even come close to fully utilising the C64 is a bit silly really like Pac Man or Moon Patrol etc and even then Zaxxon and Super Zaxxon cartridge (the inferior version on C64 the tape versios were even better) still look heaps better than the 4 colour mess on A8, but if that's the only way people can justify a stupid argument then be my guest. Also Atarisoft did really shit conversions for the C64 anyway (on puprose derrr) which is why Oceans Donkey Kong C64 is so much better than Atari's effort on C64 (which is still better than the stretched blocky graphics of A8, ditto C64 Defender and PacMan are just ok but there are clones which are better and arcade perfect anyway for most games) Galaxian is an example of an A8 early 80s game that is really better on A8 but then we have an absolutely awesome conversion of Skramble and Time Pilot instead. But like I said these are caveman programs written by amateurs anyway s why bother.

 

I was hoping to see more game like Space Harrier A8 myself than seeing silly posts comparing ancient simplistic games, oh well never mind I'll leave this post alone then and know not to bother next time

 

If anybody thinks the C64 is only good for mildly breathed over VCS games like Donkey Kong then you're a bit of an idiot if those are the only type of games that are compared too whilst conveniently ignoring all the incredibly advanced games that the A8 could never do due to lack of VIC-II/SID features!

 

Turbocharge, Enforcer, Buggy Boy, Last Ninja, Ghosts & Goblins, Mayhem in Monsterland...these games are NOT possible on an A8 until anyone bothers to show me some linked videos to BETTER games technically I am sticking to that.

 

Never mind those games the A8 doesn't even have a version of Skramble as good as

or anything like it written in 1983 I shall assume from the lack of EVIDENCE to the contrary that the A8 is actually inferior in every way to the C64 except a useless 256 colour pallette....yeah great 4 out of 256 colors in 160x200 is soooo much better than 4/16 colors per 8x8 pixel block ANYWHERE on the screen isn't guys LOL

 

The facts are

 

Pokey is INFERIOR to SID 1 extra channel with waveforms that all sound the same the C64 is 3 with 5 waveform types/3 special effects plus filters PLUS sample channel)

PM is INFERIOR to Sprites (You can cover the entire screen with Sprites with very little effort, some coders uses sprites for parallax scrolling)

both have H/W scrolling but Uridium is FASTER AND SMOOTHER than any A8 scrolling game I have seen EVER.

DL vs Raster, it's the same thing, the C64 has scanline accurate timers so it is identical

CPU is faster on A8 but 6510 has better instruction set/ optimised version of 6502 A8 uses.

Max resolution is the same on both for games (320x200x2 colours or 160x200x4 colour) EXCEPT we have 4 colours per 4x8 pixel block too and you have 16 luminance on XL/XE only in 160x200....I know which one ALL games coders use.

Colour Palette easy win for A8..shame it makes no difference for anything except copper type vertical shading effects under the crappy PM graphics. Wow I can choose my 4 colours from 256 @ 160x200...I'm sure they will be radically different to the perfectly chosen range of 16 colours available on VIC-II huh?

 

ONLY Palette is larger on A8, but like I said who cares when @ 160x200 you can only have four colours anyway big deal

 

PS C64 had an arcade perfect version of Defender on tape (which loaded in about 2-3 minutes) for £6 so who cares how crap Atari programmed the C64 version for £30, no wonder they went bust and C= made billions under Jack Tramiel!

 

I keep hearing all this 'theoretical' rubbish and yet no one can post a single game that looks faster and better with better sound than the four main ones I mentioned (Turbocharge, Enforcer, Buggy Boy, Last Ninja, Ghosts & Goblins, Mayhem in Monsterland) I smell a lot of Atari BULLCRAP in this thread

[Rybags]

Faster scrolling?

 

Come on... you can move data around as much as you want but are limited to 50 or 60 FPS. The Atari can scroll much faster anyway since you can point the screen anywhere you want, on a per mode line basis.

 

Better instruction set? Bullshit. The 6510 is functionally identical to the 6502 and anyone beyond novice programming level should know that.

The "on-chip I/O port" is merely a poor-man's PIA type extension to the 6502 and the only advantage it gives is the ability to switch the normal memory-mapped I/O block out and replace it with ROM or RAM.

[Bryan]

Better instruction set? Bullshit. The 6510 is functionally identical to the 6502 and anyone beyond novice programming level should know that.

 

Don't you know about the 6510's instructions like:

 

SWH - Solve World Hunger

 

and

 

EMP - Enlarge My Penis?

 

 

Here's an example:

 

LDX #$FF   ;Ultimate manliness!
loop:
INC $10	 ;Penis size +1
EMP $10	 ;Look out ladies!
CPX $10	 ;Not there yet?
BNE loop

SWH		  ;solve world hunger in 6 cycles.

[_The Doctor__]

lol what a load, and it took a team of you make a list... the skramble game he listed... I just played it on the c 128 in c64 mode... it was crap game play. switching to 128 it was even crappier why I don't know is there an issue with it? So I was forced to dig out the c64 itself. I can't believe I dug the machines out of the garage for this tripe. I want the 2 1/2 hours of my life back now.... My test is this I had an 800 and an 800xl.... Jeff my neighbor had a vic20 and a c64 his neighbor had a 1200Xl.... guess where the whole gang all ways ended up to play? You guessed it 8 to ten kids always on the Atari system and 1 or 2 on the c64 and soon none on the 64 and all on the Atari.

Jeff always had the latest c64 stuff and way more money and lavished it on his systems. We simply got the modest things we could afford or sometimes type in. It sums it all up right there. Dollar for dollar game for game, playability and fun was always on the Atari's side. In fact that being said I am reminded of why I put this thing out in the garage in the first place..... one c64 and one c128 going to the thrift store. My wife thanks you for helping me to finally clear this mess out of the third bay.

 

I went trolling commodore sites to find this crappy software and I found many c64 fans use this exact quote... and I couldn't say it better...

Crummy scrolling (that makes the ZX Spectrum look good), and, in short, a tedious waste of time.

straight from the commodore fanbase

 

 

Even many of those atari games developed during 1980s using 25%-50% capability are better than C64 games at around same time.

 

That's a subjective matter of opinion - personally, the games are one of the reasons i got a C64 after a year of owning my 800XL to be honest, there was almost nothing i found to be anywhere near as playable as the games i was seeing on a friend's machine, i think Mercenary and Elektraglide were the two exceptions and the majority of titles either existed on both (usually with a better soundtrack, One Man And His Droid, The Last V8 or Thrust as a couple of random examples) or were only on the C64.

 

Another factor was not being able to find a bloody assembler i could A) afford and B) use on a tape-based machine! =-)

 

Most C64 sided people just keep stressing/repeating the same feature of having 8+ sprites on a scanline (X-axis) using 32 colors from a palette of 16 colors.

 

There's a reason for that, the majority of games are 2D so it's a huge plus for the C64 for those titles.

 

I am giving a reasonable answer based on the games I had as compared to the same games on C64 (without getting into hardware technicalities): Super Break Out, Frogger, Pac-man, Donkey Kong, Centipede, Defender and some others. Didn't have a big collection initially since even Defender cost me $50 from Sears.

 

Well, you can stress the same feature but it does not prove a machine superior unless you systematically go through each feature and show software that takes advantage of that feature better than the other machine. And it's not 2D-- it's X-axis. Y-axis is also part of 2D and Atari excels when you start to optimize in that dimension.

 

So your whole argument for which machine is better is based on technically simple games written on limited cartridge memory? LOL well I have a suprise, we went way beyond that level of simplicity on the C64 about a quarter of a century ago

 

Well even if we talk about commercial games the Atari A8 wouldn't have a hope in hell of doing the following arcade conversion anywhere near as good as the C64 really for

was programmed in a couple of months by a few people at Ocean, and it's a bit delusional if you think that is because of lack of effort it can't be done on the A8, the C64 was a better compromise, no the only compromise the C64 made was a fixed 4bit palette look up table that's it, Sprites, scrolling, SID, CPU instruction set is all better on the C64 FACT. PM graphics are just a little better than VCS, and the Pokey has kinda nice style to it but it neither has the frequency range, sophisticated operators or special effects built into the SID. Pokey tunes all kinda sound the same, listen to Panther on the A8 and then on the C64, it is my 'atari fanboy test' track

 

The ONLY thing the A8 is better at is total available color palette, shame you can't even get the same 16 colours on screen AT THE SAME TIME as the C64 palette in 160x200 OR with the same amount of multiplexed 24x21 pixeled sprites per 24 scanlines without using ANY extra CPU/Graphics chip cycles. 16 shades of the same colour are a bit useless for most games. The C64 is officially 8 sprites per scanline, it is in the 1983 Programmer's Reference Guide which actually tells you this, it is not TOTAL of 8 just like A8 is not just a total of 4 Missile and 1 Player graphic also by the way.

 

There are some games on the A8 I love don't get me wrong but to say it is a better machine than the C64 based on things that don't even come close to fully utilising the C64 is a bit silly really like Pac Man or Moon Patrol etc and even then Zaxxon and Super Zaxxon cartridge (the inferior version on C64 the tape versios were even better) still look heaps better than the 4 colour mess on A8, but if that's the only way people can justify a stupid argument then be my guest. Also Atarisoft did really shit conversions for the C64 anyway (on puprose derrr) which is why Oceans Donkey Kong C64 is so much better than Atari's effort on C64 (which is still better than the stretched blocky graphics of A8, ditto C64 Defender and PacMan are just ok but there are clones which are better and arcade perfect anyway for most games) Galaxian is an example of an A8 early 80s game that is really better on A8 but then we have an absolutely awesome conversion of Skramble and Time Pilot instead. But like I said these are caveman programs written by amateurs anyway s why bother.

 

I was hoping to see more game like Space Harrier A8 myself than seeing silly posts comparing ancient simplistic games, oh well never mind I'll leave this post alone then and know not to bother next time

 

If anybody thinks the C64 is only good for mildly breathed over VCS games like Donkey Kong then you're a bit of an idiot if those are the only type of games that are compared too whilst conveniently ignoring all the incredibly advanced games that the A8 could never do due to lack of VIC-II/SID features!

 

Turbocharge, Enforcer, Buggy Boy, Last Ninja, Ghosts & Goblins, Mayhem in Monsterland...these games are NOT possible on an A8 until anyone bothers to show me some linked videos to BETTER games technically I am sticking to that.

 

Never mind those games the A8 doesn't even have a version of Skramble as good as

or anything like it written in 1983 I shall assume from the lack of EVIDENCE to the contrary that the A8 is actually inferior in every way to the C64 except a useless 256 colour pallette....yeah great 4 out of 256 colors in 160x200 is soooo much better than 4/16 colors per 8x8 pixel block ANYWHERE on the screen isn't guys LOL

 

The facts are

 

Pokey is INFERIOR to SID 1 extra channel with waveforms that all sound the same the C64 is 3 with 5 waveform types/3 special effects plus filters PLUS sample channel)

PM is INFERIOR to Sprites (You can cover the entire screen with Sprites with very little effort, some coders uses sprites for parallax scrolling)

both have H/W scrolling but Uridium is FASTER AND SMOOTHER than any A8 scrolling game I have seen EVER.

DL vs Raster, it's the same thing, the C64 has scanline accurate timers so it is identical

CPU is faster on A8 but 6510 has better instruction set/ optimised version of 6502 A8 uses.

Max resolution is the same on both for games (320x200x2 colours or 160x200x4 colour) EXCEPT we have 4 colours per 4x8 pixel block too and you have 16 luminance on XL/XE only in 160x200....I know which one ALL games coders use.

Colour Palette easy win for A8..shame it makes no difference for anything except copper type vertical shading effects under the crappy PM graphics. Wow I can choose my 4 colours from 256 @ 160x200...I'm sure they will be radically different to the perfectly chosen range of 16 colours available on VIC-II huh?

 

ONLY Palette is larger on A8, but like I said who cares when @ 160x200 you can only have four colours anyway big deal

 

PS C64 had an arcade perfect version of Defender on tape (which loaded in about 2-3 minutes) for £6 so who cares how crap Atari programmed the C64 version for £30, no wonder they went bust and C= made billions under Jack Tramiel!

 

I keep hearing all this 'theoretical' rubbish and yet no one can post a single game that looks faster and better with better sound than the four main ones I mentioned (Turbocharge, Enforcer, Buggy Boy, Last Ninja, Ghosts & Goblins, Mayhem in Monsterland) I smell a lot of Atari BULLCRAP in this thread

http://www.archive.org/details/C64Gamevide...hive18-Skramble

omfg I can't waste anymore time on this.... even with the fastload cart starting was a what I remembered got sandwich got drink. and the stupid load procedures.....

Edited March 31, 2009 by _The Doctor__

[xxl]

> DL vs Raster, it's the same thing, the C64 has scanline accurate timers so it is identical

 

?

show me code to display memory like Apple2 on c64.

 

atari code for ANTIC (no 6502 usage)

 

gr8 equ $f

blank equ $70

jvb equ $41

 

antic dta BLANK,BLANK,BLANK

:192 dta $40+gr8,a(apple_ekr+((#%*$400)+((#%$40)/8)*$80+(#/$40)*$28)

dta jvb,a(antic)

 

[Fröhn]

lol what a load, and it took a team of you make a list... the skramble game he listed... I just played it on the c 128 in c64 mode... it was crap game play. switching to 128 it was even crappier why I don't know is there an issue with it?

Why don't you play some of the good games instead? He gave you a few examples:

 

"Turbocharge, Enforcer, Buggy Boy, Last Ninja, Ghosts & Goblins, Mayhem in Monsterland...these games are NOT possible on an A8 until anyone bothers to show me some linked videos to BETTER games technically I am sticking to that."

[Barnacle boy]

Don't forget

!

[_The Doctor__]

I did exactly what the guy told me to do.... he even posted a link to on youtube. I still don't see anything I feel is 'not possible' it all comes down to fun and playability. Seems like on the c64 it can look good but plays eh so so, or if it manages to play great it looks not so good. I guess I am just use to the gameplay offered by the xl, 130XE, amiga, falcon and any of the modern systems I now use. The commodore seems hesitant to me... sluggish.. Maybe if I get use to it I can train my brain to buffer what I see against what I am doing. I am using ntsc machines. But even the people I have talked to in poland and germany seem to say similar things so I am guessing it's not just an American issue

lol what a load, and it took a team of you make a list... the skramble game he listed... I just played it on the c 128 in c64 mode... it was crap game play. switching to 128 it was even crappier why I don't know is there an issue with it?

Why don't you play some of the good games instead? He gave you a few examples:

 

"Turbocharge, Enforcer, Buggy Boy, Last Ninja, Ghosts & Goblins, Mayhem in Monsterland...these games are NOT possible on an A8 until anyone bothers to show me some linked videos to BETTER games technically I am sticking to that."

 

[Fröhn]

I did exactly what the guy told me to do.... he even posted a link to on youtube. I still don't see anything I feel is 'not possible' it all comes down to fun and playability. Seems like on the c64 it can look good but plays eh so so, or if it manages to play great it looks not so good. I guess I am just use to the gameplay offered by the xl, 130XE, amiga, falcon and any of the modern systems I now use. The commodore seems hesitant to me... sluggish..

Sluggish? You are simply trying the wrong games.

 

IO

 

And yes, the A8 couldn't do that.

[emkay]

lol what a load, and it took a team of you make a list... the skramble game he listed... I just played it on the c 128 in c64 mode... it was crap game play. switching to 128 it was even crappier why I don't know is there an issue with it?

Why don't you play some of the good games instead? He gave you a few examples:

 

"Turbocharge, Enforcer, Buggy Boy, Last Ninja, Ghosts & Goblins, Mayhem in Monsterland...these games are NOT possible on an A8 until anyone bothers to show me some linked videos to BETTER games technically I am sticking to that."

 

 

You guys make me crazy....

OFCOURSE the A8 can do those games. Possibly not at 50Hz. But who cares?

The whole C64 community doesn't care about 3D is slow as hell, or the movement is ridiculously blocky on the C64.

 

According to your facts about "the A8 cannot do this or that", the C64 cannot do :

 

-Space Harrier

-Rescue on Fractalus

-Koronis Rift

-The Eidolon

-Stunt Car Racer

-Amaurote

-Test Drive

-Turbo Charge

-Power Drift

 

and so on....

[emkay]

Not even to mention Archon.

 

Most C64 guys even today haven't recoznized the rule of light balancing in the game, because the C64 has not enough colours to show it all correctly.

[_The Doctor__]

Finally something that responds more like what I am use to! Graphics are very Atari like too! A decent side scroller, I give it about an 81%. but the music in the game is different in the video you posted. It is not SID, and the smoothing in the video must be due to youtube codec, much like the other 8 bit posts we see.

I shouldn't have to work that hard or need an expert to direct me to a good responsive game, it kinda sums up the experience. I don't think I am keeping the c64 for a couple of games. But I will say this I find some of GEOS pretty interesting. I think if anyone wants to play along and truly compare they need to do what I am doing a real Atari 800XL/XE vs a Real c64. Looks like lemon64 has most of what we need to get the software. And then run em, then the truth of the audio and video as well as gameplay can be seen. And the lemon votes kinda back up my number it looks like they rated it an 80 percent as well. The lemon64 review also notes slow response of ship. I personally like the fact it is a little more challenging than the other 64 games right at the start. Having to start over to know where the bad guys are coming from because the ship can't cross the screen fast enough otherwise is a little daunting.

 

I did exactly what the guy told me to do.... he even posted a link to on youtube. I still don't see anything I feel is 'not possible' it all comes down to fun and playability. Seems like on the c64 it can look good but plays eh so so, or if it manages to play great it looks not so good. I guess I am just use to the gameplay offered by the xl, 130XE, amiga, falcon and any of the modern systems I now use. The commodore seems hesitant to me... sluggish..

Sluggish? You are simply trying the wrong games.

 

IO

 

And yes, the A8 couldn't do that.

 

Edited March 31, 2009 by _The Doctor__

[atariksi]

Even many of those atari games developed during 1980s using 25%-50% capability are better than C64 games at around same time.

 

That's a subjective matter of opinion - personally, the games are one of the reasons i got a C64 after a year of owning my 800XL to be honest, there was almost nothing i found to be anywhere near as playable as the games i was seeing on a friend's machine, i think Mercenary and Elektraglide were the two exceptions and the majority of titles either existed on both (usually with a better soundtrack, One Man And His Droid, The Last V8 or Thrust as a couple of random examples) or were only on the C64.

 

Another factor was not being able to find a bloody assembler i could A) afford and B) use on a tape-based machine! =-)

 

Most C64 sided people just keep stressing/repeating the same feature of having 8+ sprites on a scanline (X-axis) using 32 colors from a palette of 16 colors.

 

There's a reason for that, the majority of games are 2D so it's a huge plus for the C64 for those titles.

 

I am giving a reasonable answer based on the games I had as compared to the same games on C64 (without getting into hardware technicalities): Super Break Out, Frogger, Pac-man, Donkey Kong, Centipede, Defender and some others. Didn't have a big collection initially since even Defender cost me $50 from Sears.

 

Well, you can stress the same feature but it does not prove a machine superior unless you systematically go through each feature and show software that takes advantage of that feature better than the other machine. And it's not 2D-- it's X-axis. Y-axis is also part of 2D and Atari excels when you start to optimize in that dimension.

 

So your whole argument for which machine is better is based on technically simple games written on limited cartridge memory? LOL well I have a suprise, we went way beyond that level of simplicity on the C64 about a quarter of a century ago

 

...

 

No, I gave one answer where I stated my observations since YOU complained that you don't want to hear "technical" stuff and then you decided to be a hypocrite and start claiming technical things although not correct.

You are reading out of context. The argument was answer to games that were better even in the early years (w/o GTIA).

 

>Well even if we talk about commercial games the Atari A8 wouldn't have a hope in hell of doing the following arcade ...

 

I don't go by my limited experience. Oh, here's a game that's superior on C64-- so C64 is better. Oops, someone recently created/found a better version on Atari. Atari is better. No, they just upgraded the C64 version so C64 is better. Etc. Etc. I rather stick to a more rational approach than yours.

 

>...CPU instruction set is all better on the C64 FACT. PM graphics are just a little better than VCS, and the Pokey has kinda nice style to it but it neither has the frequency range, sophisticated operators or special effects built into the SID. Pokey tunes all kinda sound the same, listen to Panther on the A8 and then on the C64, it is my 'atari fanboy test' track

 

Again going by some limited sample to generalize over entire POKEY. You NEVER read this thread because you are raising the same points without refuting the replies that were made to your points in this thread. CPU instructions work along with ANTIC DL instructions at 1.79Mhz whereas your instruction set is just 6502. As I stated, POKEY can play 68Khz sampled audio on 4 DACs.

 

>The ONLY thing the A8 is better at is total available color palette, shame you can't even get the same 16 colours on screen AT THE SAME TIME as the C64 palette in 160x200 OR with the same amount of multiplexed 24x21 pixeled sprites ...

 

You are BIASED. I am more interested in the truth than your bias toward a machine. "ONLY" colors! I just stated a bunch of things that are superior on A8. You can get all 256 colors on-screen. You can get GPRIOR effects in 160*200 and also do sprite overlays. You are biased in comparing standard mode with a sprite-enhanced mode on the C64.

 

>16 shades of the same colour are a bit useless for most games. The C64 is officially 8 sprites per scanline, it is in the 1983 Programmer's Reference Guide which actually tells you this, it is not TOTAL of 8 just like A8 is not just a total of 4 Missile and 1 Player graphic also by the way.

 

You have a lot to learn if you are going to argue hardware. You have no idea how GTIA modes work. There are three of them and sprites work with them. You can also use GPRIOR in Graphics 10 which is paletted mode-- regardless of what you do to your C64, you won't get this mode. And 16 shades of one color are useful for photographs. Stop calling people names if you haven't even read the thread nor understood the argument. First go back and answer all the remarks in this thread regarding C64 inferiority before you call people names. Once you call people names instead of answering the point, you lose and are no longer interested in the truth...

 

I am so sorry you bought an inferior machine thinking it was superior to A8 but people make mistakes in life and you have to live with it. But you are making things worse for yourself by arguing against reality.

[atariksi]

> DL vs Raster, it's the same thing, the C64 has scanline accurate timers so it is identical

 

?

show me code to display memory like Apple2 on c64.

 

atari code for ANTIC (no 6502 usage)

 

gr8 equ $f

blank equ $70

jvb equ $41

 

antic dta BLANK,BLANK,BLANK

:192 dta $40+gr8,a(apple_ekr+((#%*$400)+((#%$40)/8)*$80+(#/$40)*$28)

dta jvb,a(antic)

 

 

For some odd reason, C64 people think it's better to just POKE a register and set a graphics mode rather than have a coprocessor let you set various graphics/text modes on a scanline basis and thus save CPU time and memory. They have less CPU time to begin with and they still prefer not having that option.