What The Jag Community REALLY Needs

[Sayton]

I'll tell you what the Jag Community needs...

 

All these protos/betas buddy!

 

Have you seen Conan? Looks awesome! Mortal Kombat 3? Heck yeah!

 

Man, I've tried MORE than once to contact Midway about the MK3 proto. I've even specifically asked for Ed Boon himself! Heck, one of my messages was even sent to the MK Team in hopes that someone there knew anything about it! I've even contacted many other ex-developers asking if they had any information regarding protos or they themselves might still have some. No answer...from any of them! SHEESH!!!

 

ARGH! There's still alot of goodness out there just waiting to be discovered...and I hope we can find them all! Will we? I don't know...but how cool will it be when yet another proto is discovered and we can all go "Oooo" and "Ahhh"!

 

It's very exciting to see a new proto/beta and whatnot surface. I'm sure many of you will agree with me on this!

 

Here's hoping we can relish in the findings of yet another proto/beta here soon!

[Christos]

Well I agree that if the betas are jaguar exclusives it would be nice to have. But if we are talking about games that we saw on other systems, well there is no point really. I don't care so much about a glorious would have been past but for a nice future with good new games, demos (I actually prefer demos to games most of the time) or whatever. In my view the jaguar community needs creativity and creativity from its users not just the developers.

[carmel_andrews]

What about an Unreal or Quake III type Game...that would be nice

 

Or if someone could make more CD/DVD type drives for the Jag....How about a Tomb Raider type game but with another character (seeming as though SCI/Eidos don't see the jaguar as a viable platform)

Edited September 8, 2009 by carmel_andrews

[The_Laird]

What about an Unreal or Quake III type Game...that would be nice

 

Or if someone could make more CD/DVD type drives for the Jag....How about a Tomb Raider type game but with another character (seeming as though SCI/Eidos don't see the jaguar as a viable platform)

 

Of course both Tomb Raider and Quake were started for the Jaguar.

 

I think most people really would be surprised how many games were actually in the production/proto stage for the Jaguar, I wrote the extensive guide on JS2

 

There are around 20-30 games that were actually finished but never released (many sadly lost) some we do know where they are but the producers were unwilling to give them up

[+sgrddy]

What about an Unreal or Quake III type Game...that would be nice

 

Or if someone could make more CD/DVD type drives for the Jag....How about a Tomb Raider type game but with another character (seeming as though SCI/Eidos don't see the jaguar as a viable platform)

 

More optical drives would be awesome. Could the Jag really do Quake though?

[The_Laird]

Well John Carmack obviously thought so or he wouldn't have started programming it

[T2KFREEKER]

What about an Unreal or Quake III type Game...that would be nice

 

Or if someone could make more CD/DVD type drives for the Jag....How about a Tomb Raider type game but with another character (seeming as though SCI/Eidos don't see the jaguar as a viable platform)

 

More optical drives would be awesome. Could the Jag really do Quake though?

Yes, the Jaguar is a much more powerful system than most people know. Carmack would have been able to work abound certain restriction that most developers would have been hindered by. Why? Because Carmack has been doing it for years with the PC. He even worked his magic getting DOOM where it was on the Jaguar. I remember an interview where he was saying that is=f Atari would have just given id 1 more MEG than they had, DOOM might have been one of the best console versions ever in the fact they could have fit all of the enemies, a few more levels and the music on the cart. Carmack loved the Jaguar and thought it was a fun little system to program for. He was looking forward to proving that the Jaguar could handle Quake and that the system was better performancewise than the press was giving it credit for.

 

As for Mortal Kombat 3, with the fact that Warner Brothers has bought Midway, I am pretty sure that the game is lost forever. If the guys that had been working at Midway forever and a day didn't know where it was, the new guys aren't going to know either. Sadly, there is probably a Hard Drive in storage somewhere in that building that has it stored there as well as some flash carts with Alphas on them. There has to be because I have seen the Flash Carts in action at the E3. Bummer dude!

[dreamcastrip]

... Carmack loved the Jaguar and thought it was a fun little system to program for...

Please forgive the selective quoting but it touches on something about John Carmack's stated appreciation of Jaguar that's always intrigued me.

 

I'm familiar with Carmack's statement/s praising Jaguar and have since seen him words occasionally quoted by Jaguar sceners, including a highly esteemed current coder, to support claims of Jaguar's true potential when placed in the hands of sufficiently talented devs who know of and also implement the various techniques required to make Jaguar fly.

 

What I've never been able to truly fathom about what Carmack said all those years ago is what he was actually getting at beyond the immediately apparent or indeed if he said those words to perhaps gain additional media attention for both himself and his company. Whilst he may well have been merely voicing his opinion that Jaguar, despite its general media portrayal and mainstream public perception to the contrary, was in fact a more than capable system than was then commonly accepted. I've no issue at all in accepting he in any way intended to suggest anything more than what his words stated when taken literally. For the sake of continued debate though, here's an alternative and more analytical take ...

 

I can't help but wonder if he was actually expressing a sincere personal admiration for Atari's decision to take to market what was for the time such an unconventional, for the want of a better term, video game console with its proprietary multiple-processor architecture design model. As far as I'm aware and feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, such an alternative and novel design then represented a whole new approach in the world of mass marketed video game systems, for better or for worse (Saturn & PS3, anyone?!?), and was therefore unprecedented. I realise Carmack has also expressed how he considered Atari could/should have improved elements of Jaguar's internal design but I don't necessarily interpret those observations as a direct criticism. More of a personal regret of his maybe that such a left-field system was unnecessarily hamstrung by what he saw as a few easily remedied issues.

 

One possible impression is of Carmack putting on public record that he actively enjoyed the experience and personal challenge represented in learning to effectively exploit the Jaguar hardware. Looked at another way, perhaps he reveled in the opportunity and associated challenge of producing a game, and maybe several more if Jaguar had been commercially successful, which showcased his talent in order to gain industry/peer and fan recognition especially at a time when so many people perceived Jaguar as not being particularly special in part as a consequence of the numerous "lazy" 68K-only Amiga-esque titles then been released by lesser talented individuals.

[kskunk]

As far as I'm aware and feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, such an alternative and novel design then represented a whole new approach in the world of mass marketed video game systems, for better or for worse (Saturn & PS3, anyone?!?), and was therefore unprecedented.

I think Carmack liked the Jaguar because he had the programming chops to exploit it. Carmack was in the ideal position to exploit the Jaguar -- for a decade he had been exploiting PC hardware to make cutting-edge video games.

 

In 1993, PC hardware was quirky and weird, full of really nasty bandwidth constraints, and not designed to make life easy for game programmers. It made up for all this with lots of raw processing power -- if you could just figure out how to tap it.

 

Sound familiar? That's the Jaguar.

 

Speaking from the perspective of a hardware guy: You can get more power, or less cost, or an earlier ship date -- if you're willing to sacrifice ease of development. The Jaguar got all three in spades -- at a heavy toll on developers.

 

The Jaguar is definitely novel and innovative, and definitely alternative and quirky. But I don't think it represented the first of a series of new designs. Raw power over programmability is just a trade off some consoles make. The 2600 made it, the PS2 made it, and the Saturn made it.

 

Whenever you see parallel processing without cache coherence (ala Jaguar, or Nuon, or PS3), it's definitely a raw power over programmability moment.

 

- KS

[carmel_andrews]

.....some new games possibly, and sometime this century

 

....a little cartridge box to allow connection of el cheapo sata based cd/dvd drives and HD's (with cartridge through port)

 

...A hardware extension cartridge (a'la sega 32x alike)

 

For some kind doctor to come up with a cure for the 'jaguar disease' that seems to have aflicted/manifested itself on the community/market

Edited September 12, 2009 by carmel_andrews

[The_Laird]

I think next weekend will prove that the only disease present in the Jag community is alcohol poisoning

[+sgrddy]

.....some new games possibly, and sometime this century

 

....a little cartridge box to allow connection of el cheapo sata based cd/dvd drives and HD's (with cartridge through port)

 

...A hardware extension cartridge (a'la sega 32x alike)

 

 

Those would all be super. One of us will have to learn electrical engineering - or just contract it to someone.

With all the interest in retro gaming or neo-retro gaming, one might think Atari would just publish some titles for their various historical consoles. They might even end up creating some lasting IP if they work at it.

[matmook]

.....some new games possibly, and sometime this century

 

....a little cartridge box to allow connection of el cheapo sata based cd/dvd drives and HD's (with cartridge through port)

 

...A hardware extension cartridge (a'la sega 32x alike)

 

For some kind doctor to come up with a cure for the 'jaguar disease' that seems to have aflicted/manifested itself on the community/market

 

Don't forget that the Jag-CF is coming !

[carmel_andrews]

There are some tech heads here that know hardware hacky....but with certain issues and matters that i won't go into here, there doesn't seem to be the incentivisation or the motivation for those tech heads to take those ideas and run with it

 

Or am i looking at things the wrong way/barking up the wrong tree etc

[+sgrddy]

 

 

Don't forget that the Jag-CF is coming !

 

What's that?

 

 

There are some tech heads here that know hardware hacky....but with certain issues and matters that i won't go into here, there doesn't seem to be the incentivisation or the motivation for those tech heads to take those ideas and run with it

 

Or am i looking at things the wrong way/barking up the wrong tree etc

 

Money would be enough to motivate most people. I'll ante in.

[Christos]

 

 

Money would be enough to motivate most people. I'll ante in.

 

Not likely. This is a hobby. You do it because you like it and you get a sense of acoomplishment. It's great if you make some money out of it but they are just a bit of extra cash that you can use to get something a bit self indulging. If your driving force is money you'll get demotivated really fast and really hard.

[Lord Thag]

What this system needs (and what it always has needed) is diversity. It's got a ton of potential which was, unfortunately, never fully tapped by developers save in a few rare games. In many ways, it's like a less successful N64. There are about ten outstanding games, and everything else is either garbage, forgettable, or something you can just as easily play elsewhere.

 

What really needs to happen is for someone to do something like Pier Solar or whatever. We need RPGs, a couple of decent shmups, a turn based strategy game. Anything to diversify the library and renew interest.

 

Sad fact is, it probably is not going to happen. The jaggy is a complicated beast. Most homebrewers are gonna go with something more accessible like the genesis.

 

And, to be honest, the prices need to drop. I'm sorry, but ninety bucks a game is just too much to spend for a homebrew.

 

Unfortunately, this isn't likely to happen given the lack of popularity, difficulty in making carts, and general lack of interest.

 

It's a shame, as the jag is a nice unit, but due to the above reasons, it's my least favorite of the Atari consoles. I keep it around for AvP, Iron Soldier, tempest, and a couple of other games, but that's about it.

[+sgrddy]

 

 

Money would be enough to motivate most people. I'll ante in.

 

Not likely. This is a hobby. You do it because you like it and you get a sense of acoomplishment. It's great if you make some money out of it but they are just a bit of extra cash that you can use to get something a bit self indulging. If your driving force is money you'll get demotivated really fast and really hard.

 

I didn't mean the driving force for me to make it. I meant the driving force to get someone else to do it... As in Jag fans coming together and just paying for it.

 

 

 

...Unfortunately, this isn't likely to happen given the lack of popularity, difficulty in making carts, and general lack of interest.

 

It's a shame, as the jag is a nice unit, but due to the above reasons, it's my least favorite of the Atari consoles. I keep it around for AvP, Iron Soldier, tempest, and a couple of other games, but that's about it.

 

Making CDs is cheap. Making an interface for industry standard optical drives would totally make sense.

Edited September 13, 2009 by sgrddy

[GT Turbo]

What's that?

 

 

JagCF is an hardware addon allowing to use Compact Flash card instead of cartridges, additionnal ram, new DSP, new UART chip for networking, two USB connectors for PC and mouse keyboard.

 

Some pictures :

 

http://www.jagware.o...indpost&p=10862

 

 

GT

[Fadest]

We need RPGs, a couple of decent shmups, a turn based strategy game. Anything to diversify the library and renew interest.

RPG : AtariOwl's project seems to be a very ambitious RPG/adventure game. Starcat's Eerivale is an adventure game, but will also fit an empty hole.

shmups : Reboot's Project One has just been released, it seems that some other shooter are in current coding phase

turn based strategy game : not really what you are thinking of, but my goal with S.P.A.C.E is to offer a different kind of game, a boardgame inspired strategic game for up to 4 players. But like RPG, this is lot of time, and lot of work to balance the game.

[The_Laird]

What's that?

 

 

JagCF is an hardware addon allowing to use Compact Flash card instead of cartridges, additionnal ram, new DSP, new UART chip for networking, two USB connectors for PC and mouse keyboard.

 

Some pictures :

 

http://www.jagware.o...indpost&p=10862

 

 

GT

 

How long ago was this announced now? Were we not supposed to have this magical device about 3 years ago?

[Christos]

 

 

How long ago was this announced now? Were we not supposed to have this magical device about 3 years ago?

 

I don't know if you've ever done any h/w development (or any development for that matter) but it should be fairly obvious that when you make an original complicated work, such as a new chip, you'll get into problems. Especially when this is done on your spare time and you don't have company resources to allocate. In the end the jaguar community waited 7 years for a breakout clone. It can wait 3 for a complicated piece of h/w .

 

Glad to see you are looking as forward to it as I am .

Edited September 13, 2009 by Christos

[carmel_andrews]

what the jaguar community really needs...... A programming and hardware discussion repostiory (something along the lines of csdb for the commie 64) rather then handbags at 30 paces (gets pretty boring after a while)

 

After all, there is a game in all of us and also a hardware widget in some of us...perhaps such as repository would incentivise and motivate some people (including me and some others here) to thinking about the jaguar beyond just playing some good games

 

The more games programmers and tech people out there for the jaguar can only mean good things for the future of the market/community

 

One idea i did have (which might be beyond the scope and abilities of the jaguar community/market at the mo. and only because of certain matters/issues i won't get into here) was that the community/market nominate a prefered games programming langauage, somewhat alike the Batari basic (2600) or STOS +package extensions (i.e the graphic/game screen editing program, sprite editing thing and sound/music editing packages STOS came with)for the ST etc and make it into a jaguar games programming package, you could call it jagbas/basic or jaggame(s)bas/basic or whatever

 

It would be supplied on a cartridge (with all the stos alike package extensions) on the cartridge you'd have either a usb or ps2 connection for the keyboard (as the cursor would be controled by the jagpad) you would be able to save your data/program on one of those memory card things, i.e like the ones you use for a cammy phone or digi cam (as there would be a memory card connector/slot within the cartridge)

 

Just a thought (or at least my 2p's worth

Edited September 13, 2009 by carmel_andrews

[Atari_Owl]

We need RPGs, a couple of decent shmups, a turn based strategy game. Anything to diversify the library and renew interest.

RPG : AtariOwl's project seems to be a very ambitious RPG/adventure game. Starcat's Eerivale is an adventure game, but will also fit an empty hole.

shmups : Reboot's Project One has just been released, it seems that some other shooter are in current coding phase

turn based strategy game : not really what you are thinking of, but my goal with S.P.A.C.E is to offer a different kind of game, a boardgame inspired strategic game for up to 4 players. But like RPG, this is lot of time, and lot of work to balance the game.

 

Thank you for the mention Fadest.

Regarding the shoot 'em ups, i understand that although Sea Plane has been cancelled (is this right?) I hope that you mean that Project Apocalypse is STILL in development?

I also wish you well with S.P.A.C.E. We have perhaps, with Starcat... put ourselves into the most long-term and challenging of projects.

[The_Laird]

what the jaguar community really needs...... A programming and hardware discussion repostiory (something along the lines of csdb for the commie 64) rather then handbags at 30 paces (gets pretty boring after a while)

 

This exists already its called Jaguar Sector 2