How many games were done in Graphics 8 (Antic F)?

[xxl]

Apple II and BBC Micro games are all software rendered and the apple is at about 1/2 the speed of the Atari

 

Quick note, but I crunched the numbers on this, and the Apple II doesn't really run that much slower since video and refresh cycles are interleaved. For NTSC, the Apple II executes 65 * 262 = 17030 cycles per frame, while an Atari 800 running a 320x192 ANTIC mode F screen executes 19310 cycles per frame, only 13% faster. Even with display DMA turned off, the Atari is only 61% faster.

 

 

nie można tak porównywać. sprawdź ile cykli procesora zajmuje na apple2:

- obliczenie liczby losowej

- sprawdzenie joysticka

- wygenerowanie dźwięku

- narysowanie sprita/znaku/odcinka

na apple2 zajmuje to wielokrotnie więcej czasu i tak wolniejszego procesora (w pewnych operacjach nawet 10x wolniej niż na atari). w rzeczywistości apple2 jet sporo wolniejszy od atari8.

[Bryan]

Quick note, but I crunched the numbers on this, and the Apple II doesn't really run that much slower since video and refresh cycles are interleaved. For NTSC, the Apple II executes 65 * 262 = 17030 cycles per frame, while an Atari 800 running a 320x192 ANTIC mode F screen executes 19310 cycles per frame, only 13% faster. Even with display DMA turned off, the Atari is only 61% faster.

 

But, the Apple's hardware is very simple and things that require very little CPU time on the Atari (like scrolling and sound) are very CPU intensive on the Apple. The big drawback to the Atari (IMHO) is the lack of color in high-res modes (the 320x modes seem to be bolted-on to the 160x architecture).

[+Stephen]

But, the Apple's hardware is very simple and things that require very little CPU time on the Atari (like scrolling and sound) are very CPU intensive on the Apple. The big drawback to the Atari (IMHO) is the lack of color in high-res modes (the 320x modes seem to be bolted-on to the 160x architecture).

That's a pretty apt description, as everything happens internally at 160px resolution.

[Tyrop]

I did not know a lot of these newer games existed. Were games like Artefakt Przodkow intended to be played on real hardware with artifacting? It almost seems that Artefakt Przodkow

was meant for an emulator or monitor with chroma-luma connectors so that there would be no artifacting.

[sloopy]

I did not know a lot of these newer games existed. Were games like Artefakt Przodkow intended to be played on real hardware with artifacting? It almost seems that Artefakt Przodkow

was meant for an emulator or monitor with chroma-luma connectors so that there would be no artifacting.

 

or possibly in PAL, which doesnt do NTSC artifacting...

 

 

sloopy.

[kool kitty89]

...and the forthcoming Manic Miner port by Tezz:

 

That's a very nice use of color in hi-res mode!

Wow, I didn't know the 320 width 8x8 character mode could use indexed color like that... though I do seem to remember some mention of using all 5 of the (non sprite) color registers to allow for 5 colors on-screen (plus sprites) without added tricks like reloading color registers mid-screen. Not as broad as the C64's 8x8 character mode with enough CRAM to allow each character in the charset to have its own index, but you do have more colors to chose from on the A8 at least.

 

I know the bitmap mode is limited to 2 colors only, but it would make sense that the character mode could make use of more colors as many contemporaries did. (and the Speccy did, but that wasn't using characters but bitmap with attribute plane) They put 5 color registers in there for some reason, it wouldn't make sense to have more than 4 otherwise. (plus sprites) I wonder if there's added flexibility for the 160 wide modes too. (ie characters using more than just one set of 4 colors, but more combinations within the 5 color registers)

 

 

 

Apple II and BBC Micro games are all software rendered and the apple is at about 1/2 the speed of the Atari

 

Quick note, but I crunched the numbers on this, and the Apple II doesn't really run that much slower since video and refresh cycles are interleaved. For NTSC, the Apple II executes 65 * 262 = 17030 cycles per frame, while an Atari 800 running a 320x192 ANTIC mode F screen executes 19310 cycles per frame, only 13% faster. Even with display DMA turned off, the Atari is only 61% faster.

Does the Beebe interleave like that as well or is it sharing bus tine with the display generator? (iirc the CoCo uses interleaving in a somewhat similar manner)

 

Doesn't the FREDDIE chip reduce some of that overhead?

 

 

 

 

 

 

But, the Apple's hardware is very simple and things that require very little CPU time on the Atari (like scrolling and sound) are very CPU intensive on the Apple. The big drawback to the Atari (IMHO) is the lack of color in high-res modes (the 320x modes seem to be bolted-on to the 160x architecture).

That's a pretty apt description, as everything happens internally at 160px resolution.

Hmm, I didn't know that... interesting. So the 320 pixel mode treats it as 160 pairs of pixels? And it wouldn't be limited to 160 in any case as you can push the display beyond the normal 160x192 restriction. (though on a normal TV/monitor you wouldn't be able to go beyond ~172x224 max without going off the sides of the screen into overscan -with custom calibration you could push it a good bit further though, probably 192x240 -not sure on the specifics of the limits on vertical resolution though... and that would depend on what vblank was used for and how much time was needed minimum)

 

But as for no color in the high res mode... I though you could normally have any 2 colors for the 320x192 bitmap mode and it seem like there's a lot more options for the character mode.

 

However the point is rather moot due to NTSC artifacting and the fact that Atari didn't use Y/C monitor output as standard even for the higher-end models. The limit to composite hut the high res modes in general and made 40 column text less useful or at least less pleasant to use. (hell, they could even have had a colorburst disabled mode or switch to allow normal composite or even RF to have pretty sharp grayscale video -through composite, a luma only signal should be about the same as RGB/component/s-video other than cheap notch filters or poorer comb filters possibly screwing things up and only RF noise would be an added problem on TVs -and that would depend on fine tuning and the modulator used- and B/W sets wouldn't even have possible issues with color filtering) I wonder how much notch filters have to do with the artifacting compared to sets with good comb filters. (I know notch filters lead to severe bleeding of color and luma degradation -the true extent of that would be seen by turning color all the way down)

 

Those problems do pretty much make the 160 wide mode ideal though as with a 3.58 MHz dot clock you have the luma at the same frequency as the color clock and thus minimize degradation of luma as well as issues with notch filters cutting the signal off at 3.58 MHz. (with no filtering you'd get dot crawl... but that's a lot better than the smearing issues tied to notch filters in most cases... good comb filters address both issues to a good degree, but that's still limited and results depends on the video encoder quality as well) But the 320 wide mode is twice the color carrier for NTSC and that's also the case on several others. (CoCo, C64, and Apple, not sure about some of the EU machines like the Speccy)

 

PAL lessens a lot of those problems are greatly reduced by the higher color resolution.

 

There's more middle ground for that too though, with dot clocks between 3.58 and 7.16 MHz, like the 5.37 MHz clock used by the TMS9918/28 (and NES, SMS, SNES, TG-16 low res, Genesis low-res, etc) and that gives a nice 256 pixels across on most sets, or slightly less (240 is safer for text and also corresponds nicely to the 6x8 text characters used by the 9918 for 40 column text). So for any machine where generating a clock rate close to that was practical, it would be a desirable feature for sure. For things like the Apple II and CoCo where the normal (or maximum) resolution already had a large boarder, that would particularly make sense to use a lower dot clock. (a 10.74 MHz master clock generator would me most convenient to allow 5.37 MHz specifically and mesh with the NTSC color clock... though with the CoCo it used a 14.3 MHz clock and the closest would be 4.77 MHz giving ~224 pixels across with some degree of safety and allowing 32 column text if 7x8 characters were used, or maybe you could multiply the CPU clock by 6 to get it... but I'm not sure how flexible the VDG was with its timings; with the Apple II they could have taken the CPU clock and multiplied by 6 and get a ~292 wide screen and thus a much smaller boarder with the 280 pixel wide display, though that could have screwed up the artifact colors -in the Apple II's case it was more blurring than anything else so it probably wouldn't be as much of an issue compared to the way some CGA games utilize composite artifacting)

 

For any machine where the high-res modes were still largely useful in grayscale, offering colorburst disabling would be highly advantageous regardless of anything else. (that would hold true for the ST and Amiga as well... and CGA did offer just that feature -albeit software toggled only)

Edited November 8, 2010 by kool kitty89

[Divya16]

Hmm, I didn't know that... interesting. So the 320 pixel mode treats it as 160 pairs of pixels? And it wouldn't be limited to 160 in any case as you can push the display beyond the normal 160x192 restriction. (though on a normal TV/monitor you wouldn't be able to go beyond ~172x224 max without going off the sides of the screen into overscan -with custom calibration you could push it a good bit further though, probably 192x240 -not sure on the specifics of the limits on vertical resolution though... and that would depend on what vblank was used for and how much time was needed minimum)

 

But as for no color in the high res mode... I though you could normally have any 2 colors for the 320x192 bitmap mode and it seem like there's a lot more options for the character mode.

 

However the point is rather moot due to NTSC artifacting and the fact that Atari didn't use Y/C monitor output as standard even for the higher-end models.

 

The original Atari 800 has the Y/C output and if I plug that into the SVideo->VGA converter and hook it up to an LCD, you get 320 pixels without artifacting. But artifacting looks fine as long as you just want different colors and not care exactly what those colors are (maybe like C64). Here's one of those 320 pixel games CreepShow from HSC:

[Rybags]

Does the Beebe interleave like that as well or is it sharing bus tine with the display generator? (iirc the CoCo uses interleaving in a somewhat similar manner)

 

Doesn't the FREDDIE chip reduce some of that overhead?

 

BBC has RAM that can be accessed at 4 MHz, so supposedly all video and refresh accesses are transparent giving the CPU no halt states.

 

Freddie makes no difference, Antic/6502 both run at ~ 1.79 MHz sharing the bus without interleave regardless of machine. Later DRAMs can supposedly tolerate more slack refresh times than the earlier ones, e.g. Commodore Plus4 gets away with only 5 Refresh slots per scanline vs Atari's 9.

But it wouldn't have been much point making an Antic version that does less Refresh cycles, you'd suddenly end up with a heap of software (esp demos) that didn't work properly.

 

Similarly, the later RAM chips Atari used could likely run in a 5 MHz system but producing an architecture with interleaved CPU/Antic access would = more broken software.

[The Usotsuki]

Hmm, I didn't know that... interesting. So the 320 pixel mode treats it as 160 pairs of pixels? And it wouldn't be limited to 160 in any case as you can push the display beyond the normal 160x192 restriction. (though on a normal TV/monitor you wouldn't be able to go beyond ~172x224 max without going off the sides of the screen into overscan -with custom calibration you could push it a good bit further though, probably 192x240 -not sure on the specifics of the limits on vertical resolution though... and that would depend on what vblank was used for and how much time was needed minimum)

 

But as for no color in the high res mode... I though you could normally have any 2 colors for the 320x192 bitmap mode and it seem like there's a lot more options for the character mode.

 

However the point is rather moot due to NTSC artifacting and the fact that Atari didn't use Y/C monitor output as standard even for the higher-end models.

 

The original Atari 800 has the Y/C output and if I plug that into the SVideo->VGA converter and hook it up to an LCD, you get 320 pixels without artifacting. But artifacting looks fine as long as you just want different colors and not care exactly what those colors are (maybe like C64). Here's one of those 320 pixel games CreepShow from HSC:

Looks like Pinball Construction Set.

[kool kitty89]

The original Atari 800 has the Y/C output and if I plug that into the SVideo->VGA converter and hook it up to an LCD, you get 320 pixels without artifacting. But artifacting looks fine as long as you just want different colors and not care exactly what those colors are (maybe like C64). Here's one of those 320 pixel games CreepShow from HSC:

Did the XL or XE line have the luma line connected too, or just the original 800?

 

Does the Beebe interleave like that as well or is it sharing bus tine with the display generator? (iirc the CoCo uses interleaving in a somewhat similar manner)

 

Doesn't the FREDDIE chip reduce some of that overhead?

 

BBC has RAM that can be accessed at 4 MHz, so supposedly all video and refresh accesses are transparent giving the CPU no halt states.

 

Freddie makes no difference, Antic/6502 both run at ~ 1.79 MHz sharing the bus without interleave regardless of machine. Later DRAMs can supposedly tolerate more slack refresh times than the earlier ones, e.g. Commodore Plus4 gets away with only 5 Refresh slots per scanline vs Atari's 9.

But it wouldn't have been much point making an Antic version that does less Refresh cycles, you'd suddenly end up with a heap of software (esp demos) that didn't work properly.

 

Similarly, the later RAM chips Atari used could likely run in a 5 MHz system but producing an architecture with interleaved CPU/Antic access would = more broken software.

They could have had higher speed modes on top of backwards compatible modes... (same thing if they ever added a faster CPU)

[Divya16]

The original Atari 800 has the Y/C output and if I plug that into the SVideo->VGA converter and hook it up to an LCD, you get 320 pixels without artifacting. But artifacting looks fine as long as you just want different colors and not care exactly what those colors are (maybe like C64). Here's one of those 320 pixel games CreepShow from HSC:

Did the XL or XE line have the luma line connected too, or just the original 800?

I think it's dependent on the price of the machine. The 400 didn't have it because it was suppose to be a cheaper end machine. Ask Sloopy, he's been adding video mods to machines that don't have it.

[kool kitty89]

The original Atari 800 has the Y/C output and if I plug that into the SVideo->VGA converter and hook it up to an LCD, you get 320 pixels without artifacting. But artifacting looks fine as long as you just want different colors and not care exactly what those colors are (maybe like C64). Here's one of those 320 pixel games CreepShow from HSC:

Did the XL or XE line have the luma line connected too, or just the original 800?

I think it's dependent on the price of the machine. The 400 didn't have it because it was suppose to be a cheaper end machine. Ask Sloopy, he's been adding video mods to machines that don't have it.

The 400 didn't have a monitor port at all... neither did the 600XL, so that's obvious with RF only unmodded.

 

I was asking specifically about models including the monitor/AV port (5 pin DIN compatible with the Commodore pinout) like the 800, 1200XL, 800XL, 65XE, and 130XE. I'd gotten the impression that some models only included the composite video line and no luma signal. (composite video also doubles as chroma when using s-video just like with the C64 -though I think the C64C has an expanded AV port with dedicated chroma line but you need a different cable to use that)

[+MrFish]

The original Atari 800 has the Y/C output and if I plug that into the SVideo->VGA converter and hook it up to an LCD, you get 320 pixels without artifacting. But artifacting looks fine as long as you just want different colors and not care exactly what those colors are (maybe like C64). Here's one of those 320 pixel games CreepShow from HSC:

Did the XL or XE line have the luma line connected too, or just the original 800?

I think it's dependent on the price of the machine. The 400 didn't have it because it was suppose to be a cheaper end machine. Ask Sloopy, he's been adding video mods to machines that don't have it.

The 400 didn't have a monitor port at all... neither did the 600XL, so that's obvious with RF only unmodded.

 

I was asking specifically about models including the monitor/AV port (5 pin DIN compatible with the Commodore pinout) like the 800, 1200XL, 800XL, 65XE, and 130XE. I'd gotten the impression that some models only included the composite video line and no luma signal. (composite video also doubles as chroma when using s-video just like with the C64 -though I think the C64C has an expanded AV port with dedicated chroma line but you need a different cable to use that)

The XEs do, except for the XEGS (has a composite out plug).

[kool kitty89]

The 400 didn't have a monitor port at all... neither did the 600XL, so that's obvious with RF only unmodded.

 

I was asking specifically about models including the monitor/AV port (5 pin DIN compatible with the Commodore pinout) like the 800, 1200XL, 800XL, 65XE, and 130XE. I'd gotten the impression that some models only included the composite video line and no luma signal. (composite video also doubles as chroma when using s-video just like with the C64 -though I think the C64C has an expanded AV port with dedicated chroma line but you need a different cable to use that)

The XEs do, except for the XEGS (has a composite out plug).

I knew that about the XEGS... pretty obvious from the pictures of the back of the unit.

 

I must have gotten the wrong impression about many A8 models not having luminance output... did Atari sell chroma/luma cables and monitors? (it wouldn't make a lot of sense to support a feature and not make use of it, but I haven't seen much mention on Atari branded Y/C monitors and cables)

[emkay]

I must have gotten the wrong impression about many A8 models not having luminance output... did Atari sell chroma/luma cables and monitors? (it wouldn't make a lot of sense to support a feature and not make use of it, but I haven't seen much mention on Atari branded Y/C monitors and cables)

 

The 800 was designed by the chroma and luma generating, to fit to S-Video. The signals have been put together to have a FBAS and the successive TV-Modulator. Not having the luma on the dedicated PIN simply reminds of "someone has forgotten to solder the missing cable". Or it was just a "save some cent per machine" supposal. Dropping the FBAS Pin would have been the better decision to me.

[Justin42]

Possibly lots of the isometric games Head over Heels, Molecule Man, Knight Lore (2008), am sure there was a another game called Armarote but can't find this on any of the databases....

 

Plus Kult a decent shoot'em up!

 

 

Amaurote was an AMAZING game.. well, graphics demo.. never entirely "got" the game but played it a lot for the music and graphics...

[+therealbountybob]

Possibly lots of the isometric games Head over Heels, Molecule Man, Knight Lore (2008), am sure there was a another game called Armarote but can't find this on any of the databases....

 

Plus Kult a decent shoot'em up!

 

 

Amaurote was an AMAZING game.. well, graphics demo.. never entirely "got" the game but played it a lot for the music and graphics...

Would have helped if I could have spelt it correctly! Here it is on atarionline.pl well worth playing. Think you had to clear out a sector and defuse a bomb, will have to dig out my cassette with the inlay from the giant tape box some time

[Kaz atarionline.pl]

Tomcat:

 

http://atarionline.pl/v01/index.php?subaction=showfull&id=1272750803&archive=&start_from=60&ucat=1&ct=nowinki

 

 

[kool kitty89]

Hmm, the composite artifacts in the high-res mode aren't actually that bad compared to what I was expecting... albeit probably worse on old/cheap TVs using notch filters. (added RF noise as well and possibly some color skewing from the modulator, but the primary artifacts should be in composite video)

 

http://www.atariage.com/forums/blog/364/entry-7064-comparing-atari-xe-composite-video-lumachroma-and-vbxe-rgb/

 

In any case it seems to look good enough to be reasonably useful. (would have been cool for some wireframe based stuff... like had they done that for Star Wars like most of the European 8-bit ports of that rather than plain animated sprites/character graphics, though that would have performed better in 160x192 in any case)

[emkay]

Tomcat:

 

http://atarionline.p...at=1&ct=nowinki

 

 

 

Not only hires, probably the best sidescrolling shooter at all.

[+CharlieChaplin]

Well,

you can also add:

 

- Shanghai by P.Sabath (Gr.8 + PM for colours)

- Taipei XL (versions 1.0 and 1.1)

- Kaiser 2 by C.Strotmann (at least the pics)

 

Andreas Koch.

[Irgendwer]

Pool 1.5

[xxl]

Chopin 2010

 

http://atariarea.krap.pl/informacje/chopin-2010/1505

[José Pereira]

Tomcat:

 

http://atarionline.p...at=1&ct=nowinki

 

 

 

Not only hires, probably the best sidescrolling shooter at all.

 

 

Is this one using GR.0 or is it GR.8?

 

 

José Pereira.

[MaPa]

Is this one using GR.0 or is it GR.8?

 

 

José Pereira.

 

 

GR. 0