Atari v Commodore

[peteym5]

There seems to be a lot of argument comparing what the Atari 8-bit and Commodore 64 can do with static pictures. I for one never get all the excited over displaying a picture on a computer screen. I like stuff more useful and interactive like word processors, spreadsheets, and games. The Atari having more CPU clock speed does allows it to handle more complicated game animation than the Commodore 64.

[potatohead]

That's where I'm at too. I've always liked the Atari for it's attributes as a SYSTEM, not any one technical attribute. Frankly, I like the Color Computer and Apple ][ (even the older, ugly ones graphically) for the same reasons.

 

I have always thought of those computers as being powerful computers, largely because they feature some attribute that builds on computing. The Atari has a great OS, SIO and later models featured good expansion options. Apple had the slots and could be built up to be a serious 8 bit workstation. I know that's funny, but just look at what people continue to do with the Apple ][. The Color Computer has a killer CPU, very simple system design, and ended up with OS/9 - FLEX, which is a fairly serious OS. The III had great graphics too.

 

The C64 is a great gaming computer, IMHO. It saw it's share of nice productivity applications, and punches well above it's weight graphically in some areas. Those things, for some people make it the best computer. All good. However, those things do not make it the "BEST" computer all around.

 

This then boils down to what we like. The time for selling these has passed, leaving just interested people and fun experiences today. Static pictures are the least interesting things to me today. Here's the bizzare twist for me: It's actually easy to setup the C64 to do great retro pixel art. In a way, that's dull. I know it can be done, and be done well. When somebody on the Apple, Atari, or CoCo does the same thing, it's kick ass, and something of interest! Where the magic is for me is seeing a machines boundary extended some. That requires we build on all that has been learned and then some new discovery, or excellent code effort. That's the retro story right there. It's cool, and it's not all been told.

 

I can sum that up with breaking expectations. There is a ton of C64 pixel art, because it's easy to do. There isn't so much of that on the Atari, because it's not so easy to do. On Atari, we've got to code the pictures to a higher degree than on C64.

 

Healthy competition as in, "I'll show those Atari guys a thing or two!" is a great thing. Game on and be happy we even are here to hash on this stuff! When somebody takes any of these machines and says, "Hey, look at this!" and I see something unexpected, that's where it is all at today. I like Atari best because the texture of the machine best fits this, and because it has great computing features.

Edited July 3, 2009 by potatohead

[+wood_jl]

The Atari is interesting because it brought so much to the table upon introduction, with its graphics and sound. Also, for its place in the continuum from 2600 to Amiga. The fact that it is as good as it is, with no competitor to copy at the time - is quite respectable. In my opinion, there was no real achilles heel to the system. It may not be absolutely 100% best at absolutely everything, but it is good-to-excellent at everything, maintains superiority in a few ways, and it came years before the Commodore 64.

 

The Commodore 64 is interesting because of what new stuff it brought to the table. Judging from this thread, that would be more colors on the screen at a time, more (and more colorful) sprites, and more sophisticated sound.

 

I don't see how either could be "better." The Atari is faster, faster I/O, more colorful palette, better scrolling, and more reliable. Commodore had it to copy when the 64 came out, and you bet they did. What's amazing is that they did NOT best the Atari in all the ways. What is expected is that it SHOULD best the Atari in at least SOME ways, and it does. It's not remarkable for doing so - given when it debuted, but it is still and interesting and capable machine.

 

Both play great games. On games where the palette can be used to reduce dithering, I think the Atari games look better. Some games where that's not an advantage look better on Commodore. However, the Commodore has a tendency to mask down the screen to a smaller square on the screen with large borders. Lots of games do this. I don't really mind.

 

I'll always prefer the Atari overall, but the Commodore is interesting. They're both more fun now that actuall floppy drives are not required. I'm especially happy I can play Commodore 64 games without the dreadful 1541, thanks to "1541 Ultimate." With the addition of this device, I am absolutely satisfied with the 64; I just hope it doesn't blow a SID or CIA or something.

 

Regardless of the arguements, some versions of some games are better on one than the other. Who cares why. I want to play them. Also want exclusives for each.

 

 

I will say it:

 

"The Commodore does some things better."

and

"The Atari does some things better."

 

Is that what this thread is all about - just getting one or 2 people to say those things?

 

Or is it to get me to declare my Atari "does nothing good" and "is absolutely inferior" and "sucks" and throw it away in protest? Sorry to disappoint.

 

Who cares which is "better" since that is such a subjective term. Use which one you like. If you think the Commodore will better accomodate the GREAT, EARTH-SHAKING, FANTASTIC game you are producing, go ahead and DO IT and quit trying to pretend you're asking questions about the Atari when you clearly have made your mind up and are actually here to argue about it.

 

Please be sure to drop back and let us know when it is done. Some of us have BOTH systems, and will be quick to judge, as you are.

[Jetboot Jack]

An interesting issue you raise there...

 

The 800 was the son of Stella and the Daddy of Amiga....

 

Each built upon the design and architecture of the former, each an evolution of a consistent design - and an excellent one at that, one need only look at the way they all handled their sprite system to see the family resemblance.

 

The C64 had no precursor nor did it foster any offspring - the VIC-20 has little in common with the C64 architecturally, certainly not enough to see them as related on a hardware level. And Commodore followed the C64 with the Amiga...

 

sTeVE

[atariksi]

Besides some C64 people's claim that they can have 16 colors anywhere, it's still restricted since having ability to have 16 colors anywhere would require a 160*200*16 = 16K buffer.

"Anywhere" = Any three colors out of 16 in any of 40 uniformly horizontally spread regions in one scanline + one background color for whole line + one border color

 

How many uniformly horizontally spread regions in one scanline, and with how many colors in them can you make on Atari ?

 

And yes there is a hires character mode "extended background" where charset is 64 chars, and background color is choosen with bits 6 and 7 of char code.

And guess what ? Whas it used in games ?

Maybe, I can not remember any... And I remember thousends....

Guess why ?

Because it sucks!

 

You switched your point. First you stated can Atari put up 16 color image at 160*200 with sprites flying around and now you are claiming 3 out 16 colors + BAK over 40 regions every scanline. The latter would require a software driven mode and disallow for sprites on C64. There are many software driven modes on Atari as well. And in that mode, you use up most of CPU time, distort part of the picture on left side, no time for sampled audio, etc. And certainly not something you can do while on a coffee break as it requires a kernel running across the entire screen. How many can Atari do in your specified regions is an unfair question. How many colors per scanline is a better question and I already posted code showing Atari can show more colors/scanline than C64. You prefer the 40 regions method and some prefer other methods. And even in this CPU driven mode, it's not 16 colors ANYWHERE. ANYWHERE literally would mean 16 colors can be selected in every 1*1 which is nonexistent on C64. Atari has a 80*200 where each pixel can be any of the 16 colors.

[atariksi]

There seems to be a lot of argument comparing what the Atari 8-bit and Commodore 64 can do with static pictures. I for one never get all the excited over displaying a picture on a computer screen. I like stuff more useful and interactive like word processors, spreadsheets, and games. The Atari having more CPU clock speed does allows it to handle more complicated game animation than the Commodore 64.

 

Originally, the point he was making was for moving picture not static ones. I would say Atari's palette helps make software driven modes much better than C64s for static imagery.

[peteym5]

No one can argue Atari had a better I/O interface and operating system. Nice user friendly front end DOS. I did say I wish Commodore concentrate more resources developing the 64 and not worry about other models that were not compatible. They could have developed a better disk drive, I/O speed, and operating system. Commodore had most of the OS encoded in ROM and couldn't be updated where Atari only kept common routines mostly to initiate start up so DOS can be loaded from disk and got updated several times. Several DOSes were made by different companies much more flexible and a better way to go in my opinion. Not sure if there were any bugs in the Commodore OS, if there were you got stuck with them.

 

I maintain the Atari 8-bit was more like the PC with a disk loaded DOS and the original people wanted to maintain backward compatibility. Strange coincidence that the formal head of Commodore who made all the different incompatible computer models took over Atari and made the incompatible ST. However what didn't help either company & Apple was lack of early interest in making a better 6502 before 1983. Only WDC made one, but the companies were already dedicating themselves to using 68000 processors at the time. What would have happen if WDC, MOS, & Rockwell got a 16bit 6502 out earlier at a good price?

Edited July 3, 2009 by peteym5

[atariksi]

Well, sometimes I feel like that...

Fighting a futile battle

 

Yeah, but you have to be as crazy as Don Quixote to really care whether you can convince a handful of people that one obsolete 8-bit is better than another.

 

Some of the features of retro computers are not obsolete. Recently mentioned about knowing exact cycle counts of software accurately is something unique to older simpler machines. Modern PCs just make things faster and faster overall but knowing exact cycle counts is beyond human caluclations given various processor speeds, power management, cpu throttling, different memory speeds, API-based hardware calls rather than direct, etc.

 

Even joystick interface is superior on retro machines like Atari, Amiga, C64 and you can time devices using software running cycle-exact stuff. Much harder to do in general for modern PCs. For specific PCs, you can do it using custom hardware.

[popmilo]

Some of the features of retro computers are not obsolete. Recently mentioned about knowing exact cycle counts of software accurately is something unique to older simpler machines. Modern PCs just make things faster and faster overall but knowing exact cycle counts is beyond human caluclations given various processor speeds, power management, cpu throttling, different memory speeds, API-based hardware calls rather than direct, etc.

 

Even joystick interface is superior on retro machines like Atari, Amiga, C64 and you can time devices using software running cycle-exact stuff. Much harder to do in general for modern PCs. For specific PCs, you can do it using custom hardware.

Yeah, my brother still uses C64 to flash microcontrollers!

[atariksi]

...

The Commodore 64 is interesting because of what new stuff it brought to the table. Judging from this thread, that would be more colors on the screen at a time, ...

 

They haven't established they get more colors on screen at a time. And if you go by GTIA modes, Atari easily does more colors on screen at a time. For 160*200, it's easier on C64 but necessarily more.

 

There are some other Atari advantages like better timers, bootability (as someone just mentioned), hardware collision detection (60-bits), etc.

[carmel_andrews]

Intersting point jetboot, however, the commodore geeks will say that the c64 does sort of have lineage with the pet series (though the two platforms are not electronically or software compatible)...apart from some of the i/o devices

 

Fact is, if we were to take away all these hardware tricks/advances graphics coding techniques from the A8 and c64, (i.e Fli/Ifli etc and HIP/TIP/Cin/Apac/Gtia bug) each advantage that one machine has is cancelled out by the advantage of the rival system

 

I.e pokey may have more sound channels but has less capability then SID...i.e no ADSR etc

 

GTIA may output more colours (256 as opposed to 128) but the c64 has built in 300/200 mode without moddying an existing gfx mode

 

Atari diskdrives may be faster then their c64 equivalents, but these turboloaders you get on a c64 are in software what you can only do in hardware on an A8

[atariksi]

...

The Commodore 64 is interesting because of what new stuff it brought to the table. Judging from this thread, that would be more colors on the screen at a time, ...

 

They haven't established they get more colors on screen at a time. And if you go by GTIA modes, Atari easily does more colors on screen at a time. For 160*200, it's easier on C64 but necessarily more.

 

There are some other Atari advantages like better timers, bootability (as someone just mentioned), hardware collision detection (60-bits), etc.

Should be "but not necessarily more". Forgot the "not".

[popmilo]

You switched your point. First you stated can Atari put up 16 color image at 160*200 with sprites flying around and now you are claiming 3 out 16 colors + BAK over 40 regions every scanline.

Those were two unrelated questions...

Here they come again in detail:

 

1. Can you produce 160x200 image in 16 colors, it doesn't have to be "every pixel in any of 16 colors"... Let it just use 16 colors for whole screen...

But it should be a "real ingame like" image...

Something like this...

(Its just amiga screenshot converted to simple 160x200 multicolor bitmap... There are only two moving objects - player and robot on the right. So there are no tricks.. just those 3+bak colors for each char... It could be nicer with retushing and using sprites for moving stuff, but even this is good enough for my point.)

 

 

So it can have "regions" - be it c64 sized character blocks or Atari player overlay...

 

It has three shades of brown, three shades of grey, three shades of blue, touch of yellow, white,red....

And all in same line...

 

Here is Amiga original for processing if you wish...

 

 

If someone successfully achieves this step, I'll ask for additional request "Now make 8+ at least 24x21 pixels 3 colored objects fly freelly around screen"

 

The latter would require a software driven mode and disallow for sprites on C64. There are many software driven modes on Atari as well. And in that mode, you use up most of CPU time, distort part of the picture on left side, no time for sampled audio, etc. And certainly not something you can do while on a coffee break as it requires a kernel running across the entire screen.

I wasnt talking about FLI. Sorry for not being clear with question.

You think there can not be sprites over FLI ?

6 sprites is the current record with no more than the *normal* FLI-bug (3 chars on the left side of screen...)

 

How many can Atari do in your specified regions is an unfair question.

Why is that unfair question ?

How can a question be unfair ?

Should commodore guys say:"To ask us how big is C64 pallette is an unfair question." ?

 

And I didn't say "in my specified regions"

2. Question:

Let me quote myself: "How many uniformly horizontally spread regions in one scanline, and with how many colors in them can you make on Atari ?"

Let me answer with an example...

"In Antic mode E atari can display one region 160 pixels wide with any pixel in one of 4 colors."

 

Now tell me what Atari mode (using any method - dli,gprior,kernel...) combination of chars, bitmap, players, missiles, gprior produces more colors than that ?

 

I know ANTIC mode 4 and 5 can have that 5th color with character number >127 ....

So it would be:

"In Antic mode 4 or 5 Atari can display 40 regions 4 pixels wide and with every region in one of two combinations:

1. any pixel in one of 4 of these four colors: Background, PF0, PF1 and PF2

2. any pixel in one of 4 of these four colors: Background, PF0, PF1 and PF3"

 

How many colors per scanline is a better question and I already posted code showing Atari can show more colors/scanline than C64. You prefer the 40 regions method and some prefer other methods. And even in this CPU driven mode, it's not 16 colors ANYWHERE. ANYWHERE literally would mean 16 colors can be selected in every 1*1 which is nonexistent on C64. Atari has a 80*200 where each pixel can be any of the 16 colors.

Why is that better question?

IMHO it doesn't improve game programming if you have limits wher you can put that bigger number of colors....

I understand when you can put player on part of background or on player to improve its color...

Improving player sprite with some method is great stuff, and clever one. Player in scrolling games can be always in same place on screen, its size is limited...

But to make it usable systematicly over whole screen is another question...

 

Look, on C64 If I use 3 different colors in 4 pixels - in worse case I cover 75% of that region with "Any pixel any color" and only problem is that 25% and I still have background color to use...

If you love those 23 colors so much (and you do ) tell me how much of a scanline can you cover in percents without problems and in what resolution ?

And how big is a region in one scanline that you have to struggle with...

 

Have you seen that all the graphic modes after the 8-16 bit era are linear chunky modes ?

There is a reason, they are linear.

I know Atari has linear modes and its great, but either the resolution is low for arcade game, or the number of colors is not impressive.

 

I'm just looking for best option for jump and run arcade game... I'm not making a demo, a static image... I want to make a guy jump around and shoot at stuff!

[emkay]

 

So it can have "regions" - be it c64 sized character blocks or Atari player overlay...

 

It has three shades of brown, three shades of grey, three shades of blue, touch of yellow, white,red....

And all in same line...

 

 

You must be colour blind or else

 

The whole picture has 14 colours

There are 2 shades of blue, brown, and red

3 shades of grey, one black colour, one white colour, one green colour, one yellow colour.

 

There are neither 3 brown colours, nor three shades of blue.

 

But, in on case you are right, the colours are easier to set for such picture on the C64.

[emkay]

But, in on case you are right, the colours are easier to set for such picture on the C64.

 

Yeah, we really have too much other problems. Looking at the only inter PC-Atari graphics tool Graph2fnt. It even is not possible to create a simple screen in hires with coloured PM graphics.

 

But here is a raw sample of different techniques.

 

You see 10 chars used. One can be rolled in a different speed for creating a parallax effect. Based on the squared resolution in hires, you can use a trick like using every 2nd line for setting the pixel.

By that, one could easily set fixed DLIs to enhance the simple one coloured hires mode.

You can play with a lot of brightness effects to add another parallax effect.

Well, the real benefit does not work, because you could add attack waves like in the "Ripper" demo... but since hires is used, you don't need to use more than standard 8 bit width on the PMs ...

Overlay simply works with the used brightness. And so on...

Edited July 3, 2009 by emkay

[popmilo]

You must be colour blind or else

 

The whole picture has 14 colours

There are 2 shades of blue, brown, and red

3 shades of grey, one black colour, one white colour, one green colour, one yellow colour.

 

There are neither 3 brown colours, nor three shades of blue.

 

But, in on case you are right, the colours are easier to set for such picture on the C64.

Ok. Don't hang litterally to such descriptions...

I guess you get the point but here is more precise detail:

Because of C64 pallette limitations:

"RED" regions use Brown, Red, Light Red, Yellow and White.

"BLUE" regions use Blue, Light Blue, Cyan, White

"BROWN" regions use Brown, Light Brown, Light Red, Yellow, White

"GREY" regions use Dark Grey, Grey, Light Grey, White

And there is few green pixels on top right part where green sphere is. It looked like Light green to me, but now it looks like its Yellow...

They have same luminances so its not such a big difference in such a small region...

But that could be Dark Grey,Green,light green and white...

 

Now this is just "Import as KOALA image" -> "Save as png image" process.

If one would do it properly it could use Green and Purple for more color diversity...

 

I think you get the point

Thanks for understanding...

[popmilo]

But, in on case you are right, the colours are easier to set for such picture on the C64.

 

Yeah, we really have too much other problems. Looking at the only inter PC-Atari graphics tool Graph2fnt. It even is not possible to create a simple screen in hires with coloured PM graphics.

 

But here is a raw sample of different techniques.

 

You see 10 chars used. One can be rolled in a different speed for creating a parallax effect. Based on the squared resolution in hires, you can use a trick like using every 2nd line for setting the pixel.

By that, one could easily set fixed DLIs to enhance the simple one coloured hires mode.

You can play with a lot of brightness effects to add another parallax effect.

Well, the real benefit does not work, because you could add attack waves like in the "Ripper" demo... but since hires is used, you don't need to use more than standard 8 bit width on the PMs ...

Overlay simply works with the used brightness. And so on...

 

I know about hires artifacting if that is what you talk about and I understand parallax scrolling with using every 2nd line....

Havent given much thought to hires mode...

It seams like its not that colorfull

 

I'll sleep on it and try to understand it tomorrow, to tired now

[atariksi]

Intersting point jetboot, however, the commodore geeks will say that the c64 does sort of have lineage with the pet series (though the two platforms are not electronically or software compatible)...apart from some of the i/o devices

 

Fact is, if we were to take away all these hardware tricks/advances graphics coding techniques from the A8 and c64, (i.e Fli/Ifli etc and HIP/TIP/Cin/Apac/Gtia bug) each advantage that one machine has is cancelled out by the advantage of the rival system

 

I.e pokey may have more sound channels but has less capability then SID...i.e no ADSR etc

 

GTIA may output more colours (256 as opposed to 128) but the c64 has built in 300/200 mode without moddying an existing gfx mode

 

Atari diskdrives may be faster then their c64 equivalents, but these turboloaders you get on a c64 are in software what you can only do in hardware on an A8

 

POKEY has 4 channels but it also has 4 DACs (4-bits/dac) whereas C64 has one 4-bit DAC (looking at just hardware-- not software burdened versions).

 

I don't know what you mean by "without moddying an existing gfx mode" since GTIA modes are built-in modes (Graphics 9/10/11).

 

You can also have accelerated Atari disk drives in software if you use joystick interface to PC or PC to SIO cable with pc's parallel port, but Atari gets the advantage of being self-booting and not requiring uploading specific fastloaders for specific programs. More generic OS.

[emkay]

It seams like its not that colorfull

 

I'll sleep on it and try to understand it tomorrow, to tired now

 

The "not so colorful" picture has actually 16 colours. But this is not the point.

Seeing the hires parallax theoretically working while the ships can be moved at charset resolution, a real multiplexer for the PM graphics could be added.

[andym00]

The "not so colorful" picture has actually 16 colours. But this is not the point.

 

You must be colour blind or else..

The whole picture has 15 colours..

Edited July 3, 2009 by andym00

[atariksi]

You switched your point. First you stated can Atari put up 16 color image at 160*200 with sprites flying around and now you are claiming 3 out 16 colors + BAK over 40 regions every scanline.

Those were two unrelated questions...

Here they come again in detail:

 

1. Can you produce 160x200 image in 16 colors, it doesn't have to be "every pixel in any of 16 colors"... Let it just use 16 colors for whole screen...

But it should be a "real ingame like" image...

...

Yes, Atari can produce 160*200 images in 16 colors and still have sprites flying around.

 

>Something like this...

 

Don't change it to a specific image now; Atari uses different method of getting 16+ colors on a scanline than C64.

 

>Here is Amiga original for processing if you wish...

 

As I stated before, you can use a vector quantization algorithm and you can get pretty good images on Atari and use the best colors per scanline along with gprior mode 0.

 

>If someone successfully achieves this step, I'll ask for additional request "Now make 8+ at least 24x21 pixels 3 colored objects fly freelly around screen"

 

First you need to admit that your first request is doable by Atari then we can go to the next point.

 

The latter would require a software driven mode and disallow for sprites on C64. There are many software driven modes on Atari as well. And in that mode, you use up most of CPU time, distort part of the picture on left side, no time for sampled audio, etc. And certainly not something you can do while on a coffee break as it requires a kernel running across the entire screen.

 

>I wasnt talking about FLI. Sorry for not being clear with question.

 

You stated "one scanline" not 4*8.

 

>You think there can not be sprites over FLI ?

>6 sprites is the current record with no more than the *normal* FLI-bug (3 chars on the left side of screen...)

 

I have seen them use a sprite to hide the distorted region but not sprites flying around. Let's see example of 2 sprites flying around. I suppose you can do one by unrolling the fli loop and using up more memory.

 

How many can Atari do in your specified regions is an unfair question.

>Why is that unfair question ?

>How can a question be unfair ?

 

Sure it can be. You can't compare two different methods of coloring. Can I ask how many maximum colors can you get using CHUNKY mode on Amiga as compared to GTIA chunky mode? It's unfair because Amiga uses bitplanes not chunky. Similarly, C64 uses 4*8 color maps and Atari uses other techniques like GPRIOR mode 0.

 

>Should commodore guys say:"To ask us how big is C64 pallette is an unfair question." ?

 

If you can get 256 colors using some other means then Atari uses, it would be unfair question. Atari can get 16+ colors on a scanline but why does it have to be in 4*8 regions???

 

>And I didn't say "in my specified regions"

 

You implied your regions by context. We get 23 quite easily without color re-use in our region as the BASIC program posted showed.

 

>2. Question:

>Let me quote myself: "How many uniformly horizontally spread regions in one scanline, and with how many colors in them can you make on Atari ?"

 

If I wanted to deal in regions, I would give example I gave before of GPRIOR over 4X sprites or use GTIA mode with resolution enhancement-- that gives you 16 color choices every 2*1.

 

>Let me answer with an example...

>"In Antic mode E atari can display one region 160 pixels wide with any pixel in one of 4 colors."

 

You have to let Atari people answer who have done low-level graphics programming.

 

How many colors per scanline is a better question and I already posted code showing Atari can show more colors/scanline than C64. You prefer the 40 regions method and some prefer other methods. And even in this CPU driven mode, it's not 16 colors ANYWHERE. ANYWHERE literally would mean 16 colors can be selected in every 1*1 which is nonexistent on C64. Atari has a 80*200 where each pixel can be any of the 16 colors.

>Why is that better question?

 

Because imagery doesn't have to follow the 4*8 rule-- colors can occur anywhere. It's actually more wasteful in some cases to have uniform grid if colors are bunched up.

 

>If you love those 23 colors so much (and you do ) tell me how much of a scanline can you cover in percents without problems and in what resolution ?

>And how big is a region in one scanline that you have to struggle with...

 

23 is normal for GPRIOR mode 0 but with color re-use you can get more than than per scanline.

 

>I'm just looking for best option for jump and run arcade game... I'm not making a demo, a static image... I want to make a guy jump around and shoot at stuff!

 

Well, then you can stop asking about static imagery then.

[NRV]

Hey andym00! thanx for the previous answer. I know what we can do with the a8, I was asking just for curiosity, maybe there was an algorithm that could be interesting or useful in some special cases

 

Just to remember some of the "enlightenment" reached in some parts of this thread:

 

Good things from the c64: (from what I know)

- the Sid ("only" 3 voices, but nice and easy to setup sounds)

- the 8 "real hardware" sprites, colorful, with good resolution, can be multiplexed vertically and only need to change one address to move up/down and to be animated

- the 320 pixels X-resolution with lot of colors, nice for dithering

- the "let's scroll one 1 pixel" and "let's move the sprite 1 pixel" in a 320 pixels resolution

- the 256 chars per font

- the "colors per resolution per line" ratio is good

- good system design compromises, overall

 

+ when it counted: the price

+ lots of "modern" games and a bigger "scene"

 

Good things from the a8:

- the palette (128 colors most of the time, 16 hues with 8 shades)

- the GTIA modes (the "16 shades from one color" mode, that let you get 256 colors)

- the scrolling system (is easy to scroll in all directions.. also you can have different windows, scrolling in different directions)

- the 3 playfield width modes (32, 40 and 48 chars.. easy overscan)

- the display list and all the graphic modes that you can mix (some of then aren't that useful, but is nice to have the options available)

- the interruption system (NMI's and IRQ's) and WSYNC

- the DLI's (that let you change lots of things "vertically" speaking: colors, font, scrolling, player's position and size.. to overcome some of the limitations of the system)

- the POKEY for 4 voices and sound effects (the "Instrumentarium" song for example)

- using the sprites as overlays to add more color (but at the cost of some planning and head scratching)

- is nice to be able to "replicate" a sprite horizontally, but this is mostly for static screens, demos, puzzle games or very simple games (you lose too much cpu time)

- is nice to have the "collision detection" options for the sprites, but they don't get used that much

- the processor "speed" (if you want more speed you can disable the screen, or have a display mode with big pixels that don't use too much cycles, useful for 3d games and demos)

 

- the "chroma effect" in PAL, that lets you have a 256 solid color mode (the problem is that the colors are a little darker and you lose half the vertical resolution.. and it doesn't look good in NTSC)

- the just discovered "RIM" mode (Rybags interlaced mode ), that lets you "duplicate" the vertical resolution, but at "half" the frame rate

 

+ I suppose the peripherals and modern hardware advances, by I'm mostly a software guy..

+ Numen, DChessboard, Alternate Reality, BallBlazer, Eidolon, Encounter, RoF, Koronis Rift, Space Harrier and..

 

Bad things from the a8:

- "the colors per resolution per line" ratio is low

- the sprite system (the number, the width, and not multicolor in the real sense.. they are like software sprites when moving vertically and when doing animations, you need to copy memory in most cases)

 

I think that the sweet spot for c64 are the games that use a lot of colorful sprites, like shooters and platformers, and the arcade games from the 80's. Also the Sid in itself

 

For the a8 that should be something like the weak spot.. you can only do good ports of some of them, the others lose too much. The a8 "shines" mostly with 3d games (maybe also with isometric games) and with 2d games that have the "verticality" and the architecture of the machine in mind.

 

(for popmilo)

I think that nowadays you should design your game thinking on the limits of the machine, more than just make a port from another design. For example this screen could be a good compromise for an action platformer in the a8:

 

 

It's a normal Antic4 char screen, 5 colors per line, plus player3 and missile3 used to add a 2 more colors, as "underlays" (the pipes). There are always black and white colors to add detail, and two colors that can be used for the background. There is a DLI every 8 scan lines (in almost every char line) to add more color and change the P/M position. With this you still have the 3 other players and missiles, that could be used to add color for the (human) player and some enemies. You will need to use software sprites over some area of the charset, losing like 40 chars (according to the number, size and movement of the enemies), but you can also change fonts with the DLI's. Adding horizontal scrolling is easy, but the vertical scrolling could be tricky, because you need to update the P/M (easy if they are mostly squares) and the DLI's position (but it can be done).

 

another example of a colorful screen in the vertical axis (using just two color registers):

 

 

By the way popmilo, our "windmills" are some of the best in the world, you don't have any hope to win against them

 

regards

[Polybius]

Was there ever an Atari 8-bit version of Wizard of Wor? I knew there was a C64, and an Atari 2600 port of the Arcade game, but I not sure if there was an A8 port.

 

what other ports of this Game were there?

[Polybius]

I Think the Atari 8-bit would win over the C64.

 

Hey! If anyone is interested in selling a C64 or Atari 8-bit computer, im looking for one.

[+wood_jl]

The 800 was the son of Stella and the Daddy of Amiga....

 

Each built upon the design and architecture of the former, each an evolution of a consistent design - and an excellent one at that, one need only look at the way they all handled their sprite system to see the family resemblance.

 

The C64 had no precursor nor did it foster any offspring - the VIC-20 has little in common with the C64 architecturally, certainly not enough to see them as related on a hardware level. And Commodore followed the C64 with the Amiga...

 

I've alway felt kinda like the ST was a child of the Commodore 64. After all, Tramiel must have put some of the same guys on it, as some engineers left Commodore with him, and undoubtedly took technology with them. Commodore engineers who remained at Commodore must have had an easy time, having the Atari-esque Amiga technology handed to them.

 

Also, remember that when you're amongst Commodore fanboys, Jay Miner is God, but only in reference to the Amiga. Anything Miner did prior to that (i.e. not wearing the Commodore brand name) was crap.