Could the 7800 handle Road Rash as well as the SMS?

[Giles N]

1 hour ago, Zoyous said:

What makes the Master System version of Road Rash so striking is its incredible pseudo-3D track. It practically looks like a polygonal environment, with a surprising amount of scenery and active NPCs tracking solidly and accurately in pseudo-3D space.

Yes, thanks for putting it that way.

Thats why @Defender_2600, I posted the little excerpt on hardware-comparisons above, which said the 7800 actually could have good potentials for pseudo 3D.

As the section also mentioned the pros and cons, or scope-of-utility of the 7800 palette, I thought the section fitted in here, even though it didn’t go very deep.

 

I think we would only get to know if the 7800 could do/or could have done - something like Road Rash - if games had been kept in steady production for it throughout 92 and 93 at least, - perhaps with many, many more devs competing on it.

 

As of now, the 2 only options are homebrewers getting into coding pseudo 3D or the planned Ataris’ 7800 release or releases to suddenly go in the direction of a new pseudo 3D game (pretty unlikely in my guesstimate).

 

So, what Atari should do, is to give Digital Eclipse ‘orders’ to open every 7800 ROM, and roughly systematize the program contents which should be made either public or available at request from homebrewers.

(if there legal things connected to stuff like this, I’m not the one to ask - it could anyway be bypassed by opening ROMs, and have them analyzed and the conceptual coding techniques re-published as ‘anonymous’ examples of ways to code this or that).

If they plan using the 2600 and 7800 as core-retro gaming platforms, gathering good developer teams for making new titles for them, could be worth it. (if Atari only does what every other company does, nothing else, just with their IP, they have less opportunity to stand out as company).

 
- - -

 

Now, as to the question at its most literal level: can the 7800 pull off an equally good Road Rash game as the SMS-version: I believe only trying to make something like that ‘HighWay Bash’ would show.

 
But endless speculations can at least be fun…

 

Motor Psycho had a winding and hilly Road, a fair amount of other bikes, roadside objects and road-trash (stuff to avoid) on-screen.

 

Wonder what Motor Psycho would’ve been like, if it had lots of memory on cart, pokey chip and gotten 2-3 more month worth of production-polishing…?

Edited January 10 by Giles N

[+Defender_2600]

58 minutes ago, Giles N said:

Thats why @Defender_2600, I posted the little excerpt on hardware-comparisons above, which said the 7800 actually could have good potentials for pseudo 3D.

As the section also mentioned the pros and cons, or scope-of-utility of the 7800 palette, I thought the section fitted in here, even though it didn’t go very deep.

 

I can't argue right now but that article is completely wrong regarding the comparison of palettes. The 7800 can use 25 colors per zone/scan line and many more colors are available for sprites than the NES and SMS.

[JagChris]

Quote

They didn't have the money, and the Tramiel's had no clue how to manage and market video games.  The 7800 had no install base either.  With a tiny customer base, and no corporate support, what developer/publisher was going to spend their time/money on Atari games?  Not when the NES was raging, even with N's high licensee costs.

1. The money. -In the 80s they weren't doing so bad in my understanding.

 

2. No clue how to manage and Market; you're dead on there. Even with games like Castlevania, Mario World out and it was clear what style of games were the future, they nearly completely ignored it. Smart people being ignorant.

 

3. No install base- better games would have have helped with that. Motivated devs would have helped with better games. They had developers. Otherwise the retail library would have been zero. An offer to do the usual contract for the work then for 6 months or a year the devs get the full or half proceeds minus publishing.They would have to take a hit for survival. Also grab some of the 8bit titles., authors. Winston Douglas Wood. Pay Epyx to revive the Apshai series. Grab the author of that 8bit adventure game that supposedly inspired Diablo...

 

1942. They needed to update that. They need to update that now for the VCS.

 

This is all hindsight fantasy football of course but it's what I'd try if I had the Infinity Gauntlet.

 

[JagChris]

I meant Eastern Front 1942

[zzip]

13 hours ago, Defender_2600 said:

 

I see, you're into trolling. Everyone got to know you well and saw your problem with the 7800. We had a long list of your posts with your rubbish 7800. If you have better things to do, we won't miss you.

I'm trolling?   Haha   I tried to answer your questions in good faith.   I can see now you don't do anything in good faith.

[zzip]

7 hours ago, JagChris said:

1. The money. -In the 80s they weren't doing so bad in my understanding.

They did have some good years,  but Jack was notoriously cheap, and had this persistent idea that all you had to do was undercut the competition on price and you would win,  so they just dumped their inventory on the market for cheap.   The 7800 was released as is with its 1984 launch titles (many which were ports of 1982 arcade titles),  so it was horribly dated by the time it came out so wasn't going to compete with Nintendo.   Add to that they rereleased the 2600,  and created the XEGS.   So they suddenly had to supply three current consoles with new game cartridges,  which is insane!   Not spending enough on the gaming side and spreading themselves too thin.    But it's all the logical outcome of Jack's business philosophy.

 

7 hours ago, JagChris said:

2. No clue how to manage and Market; you're dead on there. Even with games like Castlevania, Mario World out and it was clear what style of games were the future, they nearly completely ignored it. Smart people being ignorant.

It took them a few years to hire people with game marketing experience,  and you do see an improvement in how they did things by the time the Lynx came out.  Keep in mind that the Tramiels had no intention of becoming a videogame company when they bought Atari.   Consoles were dead. everybody "knew" that!   There's an interview with Leonard Tramiel where he admits that they were far too busy with the ST at first to worry about a "little company named Nintendo"...

[Geoff Oltmans]

9 hours ago, JagChris said:

1. The money. -In the 80s they weren't doing so bad in my understanding.

 

 

 

My understanding is that when Tramiel took over Atari, Warner's Atari was losing money hand over fist and the first thing he did when he came in was to clean house to the bone leaving about 10% of the staff.... on top of being notoriously cheap. Should note though that Tramiel never had anything to do with Atari Games (the arcade division), only the home division.

[+Defender_2600]

On 1/10/2024 at 3:18 PM, zzip said:

I'm trolling?   Haha   I tried to answer your questions in good faith.   I can see now you don't do anything in good faith.

 

No, I'm the one laughing. You have zero knowledge of the hardware of third generation consoles, you do not know how the graphics modes work, you are not able to distinguish 40 colors from 10 colors on the screen, you are not able to distinguish a resolution of 80x112 from a resolution of 160x224, you know nothing about pixel PAR, you don't know how to use 7800 emulators, you don't have a real 7800... you literally don't understand what you see on the screen. In other words, you don't have the knowledge and skills needed to do a serious comparison between two consoles and have a valid opinion, you don't know what you're talking about.

 

You are not an active member of the 7800 community, you are completely disinterested in the efforts of the 7800 homebrew scene, and you do not respect our best programmers, demanding to know more than them in ridiculous comparisons. You intervene in the 7800 forum only to continue with your sick propaganda: "the 7800 is not capable of doing this or that". You are a victim of your childhood trauma "Atari killed the 5200 and released the 7800". This is all pathetic and everyone has seen it.

 

For the people who missed all this:

 

 

[Greg2600]

5 hours ago, Geoff Oltmans said:

My understanding is that when Tramiel took over Atari, Warner's Atari was losing money hand over fist and the first thing he did when he came in was to clean house to the bone leaving about 10% of the staff.... on top of being notoriously cheap. Should note though that Tramiel never had anything to do with Atari Games (the arcade division), only the home division.

Correct, and that's why the irony was that the former Atari Games arcade unit (disguised as Tengen) were probably outselling Atari Corp on competing consoles!  Tramiel Corp also lost licensing to Atari's arcade properties, which they would now have to pay for, if they wished to port.  Chose not to. 

 

As for the cleaning of house, I mean, how many of those people were actually game designers?  GCC had been paid by Warners to do the 7800 and that first crop of games. 

7 hours ago, zzip said:

They did have some good years,  but Jack was notoriously cheap, and had this persistent idea that all you had to do was undercut the competition on price and you would win,  so they just dumped their inventory on the market for cheap.   The 7800 was released as is with its 1984 launch titles (many which were ports of 1982 arcade titles),  so it was horribly dated by the time it came out so wasn't going to compete with Nintendo.   Add to that they rereleased the 2600,  and created the XEGS.   So they suddenly had to supply three current consoles with new game cartridges,  which is insane!   Not spending enough on the gaming side and spreading themselves too thin.    But it's all the logical outcome of Jack's business philosophy.

 

It took them a few years to hire people with game marketing experience,  and you do see an improvement in how they did things by the time the Lynx came out.  Keep in mind that the Tramiels had no intention of becoming a videogame company when they bought Atari.   Consoles were dead. everybody "knew" that!   There's an interview with Leonard Tramiel where he admits that they were far too busy with the ST at first to worry about a "little company named Nintendo"...

In fairness, when they bought in, the market was big on computers and computer gaming, less so on consoles.  However, it HAS been disputed by several esteemed researchers here on AA that the Tramiels did in fact plan on having a console lineup.  The problem was that Warner Bros ppl had already axed the 5200, and shelved/delayed the 7800 roll out.  So Tramiel's who again bought Atari for the computer line, I believe were somewhat shocked at the wreckage the console division was in.  They couldn't sell the 7800 without resolving the GCC matter, and that took time.  They weren't poor, but when you're trying to expand computer offerings that would focus on home and business, that takes capital.  Consoles take just as much if not more to get the products made, marketed and sold, to say nothing about the games.  Even when the Lynx came around, that was a product ready to go, Epyx had already spent the money to design it, and create a number of games. 

[+Defender_2600]

27 minutes ago, Greg2600 said:

As for the cleaning of house, I mean, how many of those people were actually game designers?  GCC had been paid by Warners to do the 7800 and that first crop of games. 

 

 

GCC Credits List V.7 9/1/2023

 

Compiled by Doug Macrae, Michael Feinstein and Steve Golson

 

https://intotheverticalblank.com/gcc-credits/

 

[Giles N]

18 hours ago, Defender_2600 said:

 

I can't argue right now but that article is completely wrong regarding the comparison of palettes. The 7800 can use 25 colors per zone/scan line and many more colors are available for sprites than the NES and SMS.

Ok, - I’m sorry if I found a shallow source.

 

Do you think the article is onto something when it comes to the 7800s abilities to handle pseudo-3D graphics (better than the SMS)

 

- - -

 

When it comes to porting games, my general feeling is that it often ends up being a question not about absolute equivalence in quality on every area, but - if properly produced - each system gives a port its distinctive ways of showing off what its good at.

 

- - -

 

I really doubt the 7800 could have a Hang-On port closely matching arcade.

The Arcades’ sprite scaling and number of things to happen on-screen at the same time, at that speed, and made to run smooth with super-respinsive gameplay, would call for nothing short of a miracle of a porting-production.

 

A solid port of Road Rash… sure could believe that… perhaps not as good as the SMS on some points, but better in other areas…

 

 

[+Defender_2600]

51 minutes ago, Giles N said:

 

I really doubt the 7800 could have a Hang-On port closely matching arcade.

The Arcades’ sprite scaling and number of things to happen on-screen at the same time, at that speed, and made to run smooth with super-respinsive gameplay, would call for nothing short of a miracle of a porting-production.

 

As I already said, on 7800 it is not necessary to use sprite scaling but simply use a sequence of sprites of different sizes. As for speed, if the 2600 can do this....

 

 

[+Muddyfunster]

1 hour ago, Giles N said:

Ok, - I’m sorry if I found a shallow source.

Comparing bits, bytes, # colours, resolutions, bops, boops, dots, # sprites, RAM, ROM, Cart Size etc can give you an "on paper" winner but the real story is often far more complicated and convoluted with these consoles. 

[Giles N]

12 minutes ago, Muddyfunster said:

the real story is often far more complicated and convoluted with these consoles. 

Thats what I’ve been trying to get at… even though as a non-coder it’s my own guesstimate.

 

 

- - -

Very few or non completed homebrews with 3D or pseudo 3D completed and released.

 

Atari should get Digital Eclipse to open/hack the ROMs of all the 7800 games, and make the coding techniques for different types of problems accessible to homebrewers. They will profit (little or much) by having a living and vital homebrew community for the 2600 and 7800 continually going.

 

 

Edited January 11 by Giles N

[+Defender_2600]

17 minutes ago, Muddyfunster said:

Comparing bits, bytes, # colours, resolutions, bops, boops, dots, # sprites, RAM, ROM, Cart Size etc can give you an "on paper" winner but the real story is often far more complicated and convoluted with these consoles. 

 

And without forgetting all this:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memory_management_controller_(Nintendo)

 

[Goochman]

Im a pretty simple guy so when I looked at the Road Rash video I thought to myself it looks like Pole Position but with a Motorcycle.  Looking at the 7800 PP2 and it being a first generation title I feel like with a bit more polish you could build off PP2 and turn it into a motorcycle game.  Am I missing something big in Road Rash thats not native to PP besides changing scenario colors/backgrounds?

[Giles N]

1 hour ago, Goochman said:

Im a pretty simple guy so when I looked at the Road Rash video I thought to myself it looks like Pole Position but with a Motorcycle.  Looking at the 7800 PP2 and it being a first generation title I feel like with a bit more polish you could build off PP2 and turn it into a motorcycle game.  Am I missing something big in Road Rash thats not native to PP besides changing scenario colors/backgrounds?

Pole Position 2 doesn’t have a road/way that goes uphill/downhill.

But thats done in Motor Psycho.

 

Road Rash have roads also that cross from left/right over your forward-into-the-horizon road.

 

Road Rash have quite a lot of roadside elements, while both PP2 and Motor Psycho keep the selection to only sign-posts.

 

Motor Psycho does have quite s lot of road signs, but only lined up neatly along the road.
 

The ckosest comparison to Road Rash on the 7800 is Motor Psycho.

If you’d added hitting other opponents instead of jumping, and had more types of road-side objects, you’d be quite close, at least closer. 

 

 

[Zoyous]

  

12 hours ago, Goochman said:

Im a pretty simple guy so when I looked at the Road Rash video I thought to myself it looks like Pole Position but with a Motorcycle.  Looking at the 7800 PP2 and it being a first generation title I feel like with a bit more polish you could build off PP2 and turn it into a motorcycle game.  Am I missing something big in Road Rash thats not native to PP besides changing scenario colors/backgrounds?

Adding on to Giles's notes above:

• Another main component of Road Rash is an economy and upgrade system that works in the context of a series of races. You collect winnings from placing in the races and you can use the money to buy better bikes.
• There is a combat system in which you can punch, kick, or use weapons such as chains and lead pipes. You can also steal an opponent's weapon with correct timing by attacking as they're trying to hit you with it.
• There is a password system to save career progress.
• During the races, you have to navigate around traffic that is going in the same direction, as well as oncoming traffic, and crossing traffic moving on the cross streets.
• Police will pursue you and you have to outrun them and/or physically pummel them. If they catch you, you'll be arrested and be out of the race.
• Crashes result in the rider falling off of the motorcycle, and often sliding forward some distance until momentum runs out. Then the player must run back towards the motorcycle to get back on it and continue riding. Thus, the track has to be able to be shown moving forward or backward.
• If the crest of a hill is steep enough and you're moving fast enough, it's possible to catch air and pull off some long jumps.
• There is a sort of striping that extends on the landscape on either side of the track. These appear to be textured tiles but they can appear to move in smaller pixel increments than the SMS's 8x8 background tiles, so I'm guessing it's using some kind of color palette cycling trick to create this illusion.
• Backgrounds have parallax strips showing the distant landscape and layers of clouds scrolling at different speeds on turns.
• There are cutscene images before and after the races - with portraits of rival "rashers" giving threats or advice prior to the race, and showing the "rashers" partying together in different track locations afterwards.

 

Watching footage of the SMS Road Rash, I counted up to about 8-9 other objects on the course at one time including scenery and other riders (not including the player). And at most three other active opponents. In Motor Psycho I usually saw about 6-8 other objects on screen at once (the most being when there are rows of cones on the road), also with up to three other active opponents.

 

I tried counting frame rates and it looks to me like SMS Road Rash runs around 8 frames per second while Motor Psycho is somewhere around 20 fps. (This was just based on Youtube footage so that could be throwing it off depending on how the video is encoded.)

 

Watching footage of Motor Psycho, I agree that this could be a good foundation to build upon for a Road Rash clone. The pseudo-3D road doesn't appear to move in quite as fine increments as the SMS Road Rash road. The SMS Road Rash road looks a bit more fluid and has more variations in sizes of hills and sharpness of curves. But that could just have been a stylistic decision to make the Motor Psycho road be more "extreme" (the tall hills certainly are) rather than any limitation of the 7800 hardware.

 

On 1/9/2024 at 9:28 PM, Greg2600 said:

In fairness, I think we should refer to Road Rash as a Game Gear title, because that's why it was made.  Had SEGA not been spending money to create or port IP's to the Game Gear, their 2nd most marketed system, and at times the most, with the Genesis, the SMS would have died on the vine in the early 90s same as the NES did.

I don't think that's accurate, and besides that I don't see the importance of the differentiation. The Game Gear architecture is based on the Master System (with an expanded color palette and stereo sound). The Sega Master System was the best-selling 8-bit console in Europe for many years with a commercial lifespan well into the 90s after it was discontinued in North America. The Game Gear and SMS versions were developed and released at the same time.
 

On 1/9/2024 at 9:28 PM, Greg2600 said:

Road Rash, while visually impressive for 8-bit, with vertically scrolling objects, a 3D effect, and horizontally scrolling landscapes, is not a "fun" game.  It's not choppy, but the game itself is slow, the enemies are rarely more than one or two on screen, and there's no engine sound!  Granted Motor Pyscho's sound is ear rattling, how do you have a bike game without an engine??  Just tires squealing.

Fun is subjective of course, but it sounds like maybe you haven't played it long enough to buy any of the faster bikes? Like many racing games, you start off with the slowest available vehicle and work your way up. As for the engine noise, with these systems' audio limitations it's either music or engine. Maybe they should have made it an option in the settings.

[zzip]

23 hours ago, Defender_2600 said:

 

You are not an active member of the 7800 community, you are completely disinterested in the efforts of the 7800 homebrew scene, and you do not respect our best programmers, demanding to know more than them in ridiculous comparisons. You intervene in the 7800 forum only to continue with your sick propaganda: "the 7800 is not capable of doing this or that". You are a victim of your childhood trauma "Atari killed the 5200 and released the 7800". This is all pathetic and everyone has seen it.

I do respect the homebrewers.   They do amazing things with the hardware but I also notice the things they can't do.   Not their fault,  hardware limitations.

 

I generally don't post in homebrew development threads, but I do post in Atari History/Gaming industry threads.   Yes I have opinions, why are you so threatened that I find the 7800 underwhelming that you have to resort to personal attacks?

 

 

[+Defender_2600]

39 minutes ago, zzip said:

I do respect the homebrewers.   They do amazing things with the hardware but I also notice the things they can't do.   Not their fault,  hardware limitations.

 

I generally don't post in homebrew development threads, but I do post in Atari History/Gaming industry threads.   Yes I have opinions, why are you so threatened that I find the 7800 underwhelming that you have to resort to personal attacks?

 

 

 

You have zero knowledge of the hardware of third generation consoles, you do not know how the graphics modes work, you are not able to distinguish 40 colors from 10 colors on the screen, you are not able to distinguish a resolution of 80x112 from a resolution of 160x224, you know nothing about pixel PAR, you don't know how to use 7800 emulators, you don't have a real 7800... you literally don't understand what you see on the screen. In other words, you don't have the knowledge and skills needed to do a serious comparison between two consoles and have a valid opinion, you don't know what you're talking about.

 

You are not an active member of the 7800 community, you are completely disinterested in the efforts of the 7800 homebrew scene, and you do not respect our best programmers, demanding to know more than them in ridiculous comparisons. You intervene in the 7800 forum only to continue with your sick propaganda: "the 7800 is not capable of doing this or that". You are a victim of your childhood trauma "Atari killed the 5200 and released the 7800". This is all pathetic and everyone has seen it.

 

For the people who missed all this:

 

[zzip]

18 hours ago, Defender_2600 said:

You have zero knowledge of the hardware of third generation consoles, you do not know how the graphics modes work, you are not able to distinguish 40 colors from 10 colors on the screen, you are not able to distinguish a resolution of 80x112 from a resolution of 160x224, you know nothing about pixel PAR, you don't know how to use 7800 emulators, you don't have a real 7800... you literally don't understand what you see on the screen. In other words, you don't have the knowledge and skills needed to do a serious comparison between two consoles and have a valid opinion, you don't know what you're talking about.

 

You are not an active member of the 7800 community, you are completely disinterested in the efforts of the 7800 homebrew scene, and you do not respect our best programmers, demanding to know more than them in ridiculous comparisons. You intervene in the 7800 forum only to continue with your sick propaganda: "the 7800 is not capable of doing this or that". You are a victim of your childhood trauma "Atari killed the 5200 and released the 7800". This is all pathetic and everyone has seen it.

Wow, that's an almost verbatim repetition of your previous diatribe aimed at me.   

 

If you have such a warped obsession with me that you have to constantly dig up my old posts and cherry pick and twist what I said,  then maybe you should work through your own issues before accusing others of childhood trauma?   Just some friendly advice.

[+Defender_2600]

12 hours ago, zzip said:

Wow, that's an almost verbatim repetition of your previous diatribe aimed at me.   

 

If you have such a warped obsession with me that you have to constantly dig up my old posts and cherry pick and twist what I said,  then maybe you should work through your own issues before accusing others of childhood trauma?   Just some friendly advice.

 

Well, I'll tell you in a friendly way, your "Disinformation activity" regarding 7800 graphics has failed miserably. You can't delete what you wrote, your old and recent posts will be your shadow and your reputation has become a joke in the 7800 forum.

 

And despite you, it was a further opportunity to delve deeper and show the excellent graphic potential of the 7800, making people even more aware.

 

P.S. just as we have seen that you are not able to distinguish 40 colors from 10 colors on the screen, maybe next time if you continue to insist with your sterile propaganda, I will demonstrate how you are incapable of distinguishing a resolution of 80x112 from a resolution of 160x224. I just have to dig up an old ridiculous post of yours. 

 

[Cris1997XX]

Woah, what the hell is going on here? I thought Kirk Johnston was the only bad thing happening to Atari Age

[Giles N]

32 minutes ago, Cris1997XX said:

Woah, what the hell is going on here? I thought Kirk Johnston was the only bad thing happening to Atari Age

There is a debate whether - theoretically - the 7800 could have a version of Road Rash that’d be on par in quality as the Sega Master System version (one the technically best games for the system).

 

Seems its gotten a little heated, even though its mostly based on speculations concerning what could have been given this or that.

 

The 7800 have 3 pseudo 3D driving games: Pole Position 2, Fatal Run and Motor Psycho. It has also other cockpit 3D/pseudo 3D games: Ace of Aces, F 18 Hornet, F 14 Tomcat, Super Huey.

 

Except trying to extrapolate from these, I believe it would be difficult to ascertain whether the 7800 could hsve an equally good version.

 

My guess is something along the lines of: better in some respects, worse on others.

 

But you’d need a top team of 2-3 programmers (each having made several 7800 games prior to that), 2 or more graphics artists knowing how to make the most of everything, and someone who could handle sound and music using Pokey. 

[JagChris]

It wouldn't be like the SMS. It would be similar and different but would definitely be Road Rash. And I think that would be great. Hell that's a lot of what I like about the early eras. The diversity. For some reason its always been interesting to me.

 

As things get later and later they seem to blend together to me.