"how did they do THAT on THIS system?" Your pics?

[ubersaurus]

Super NES

 

Donkey Kong Country: Way, way, way beyond what had been seen on other 16-bit systems up to that point in time, whether on SNES or Genesis. The graphics were good enough to probably scare the hell out of Atari and 3DO.

 

I don't know why everyone always thinks that DKC has such amazing graphics... it's all just normal bitmap graphics that were pre-rendered instead of hand drawn. The only really impressive part I thought was that they managed to get some pretty good animation out of the system, and the graphics were quite colorful.

 

I always found the later NeoGeo games to be amazingly impressive. For such an old system, they certainly got a lot of animation out of it. I guess it helps when the cartridges can hold so much data. I don't think any other game system ever enjoyed as much longevity as the NeoGeo.

 

Pitfall II on the 2600 is a work of art. David Crane is amazing.

 

Soul Calibur on the Dreamcast is extremely impressive to me... Despite being a launch title, this game easily looks good enough to be a Gamecube or X-Box game.

 

--Zero

 

Neo geo-13 years of service

Atari 2600-13 years

Intellivision-11 years

NES-10 years

Famicom-20 years

 

Eh, the neo geo has still gone quite a while for arcade hardware. Great looking late-gen neo games include Samurai Shodown V, Last Blade 2, Power Instinct Matrimelee, Mark of the Wolves, and the Metal Slug series.

[Dones]

IMO Actraiser was the game that had me saying "How did they do that?" on the SNES. A release title and definite a system showcaser.

 

Something similar happened when I saw Battle Arena Toshinden on the PSX. It was also a release title and a system showcaser.

 

Mario 64 had me impressed in the same way. It was very ground breaking back in 1996.

[tillenterprises]

I remember being in awe when I bought Pitfall II in 1984 at the local Target store, and popping it in my 2600. I also was amazed at how good Ms. Pac-Man was on the 2600 versus the Pac-Man version. As for Colecovision, I was amazed at how much the Smurf Rescue looked just like a cartoon! It was amazing for 1983 video game technology!

[ElephantStyle]

What is with that Coleco Smurf game???

Walk up to bush, attempt jump, jump failed, hit bush, fall down dead

I mean WTF?

[JB]

The NES game Metal Storm is quite impressive.

 

In addition to the high level of animation(as one reviewer put it "You step witho your left foot, AND THEN YOU STEP WITH WITH YOUR RIGHT FOOT!"), it also has some rather large boss objects(which are typically done with the background layer due to sprite size and # limitations), while still maintaining the background layers.

 

Yes, layers plural. Metal Storm also has the ever popular shiny multi-layer parallax scrolling effect that was so common on the SNES.

You had a foreground and two backgrounds, all 3 scrolling independently of each other in some places. This is despite the NES only having hardware for one playfield layer(the reason most backgrounds scroll in time with the foreground on the NES).

[chairmonkey4406]

didn't neo geo games cost like 300 bucks?

[Adrian M]

Blue Lightning (Atari Lynx) Absolutely astounding for its time and still impressive today! Remember, this was 1989, the era of Gameboy and NES, yet somehow this Atari handheld system was capable of running perhaps the most incredible flight simulator avaiablle for ANY platform at the time (PC's included) and it effectively showed off scaling effects that weren't even available on the Genesis and TG16! Never has a game created such an effective gameplay environment as Blue Lightning. Do yourself a favor and play this again, but focus only on the environments. The canyons, the scaling skies, the farmlands, the ice caves...I have nothing but awe and respect for this game.

 

Solaris - Atari 2600 I remember buying this the day it was released and sitting there in absolute awe as my trusty 2600 ran this incredible space game! "this can't be my 2600" I thought as I played! Most NES games of the era didn't even have gameplay as tight as this!

 

Shenmue 1 and 2 -Dreamcast/XBOX I still can't fathom the amount of work that went into this underappreciated series. Shenmue as a series is a pure masterpiece. Yes, the pacing can be an issue to impatient gamers, but look at the games the way Yu Suzuki intended you to. The level of detail is incredible! Watch the sushi chef practice his craft, hear the sizzle of chinese food as it cooks, follow around a townsperson as he/she goes about their daily routine. It's truly the closest thing the world had to a true, living breathing virtual world. Still light years ahead of its time, and one of the few reasons why I have kept a Dreamcast in my collection!

[DracIsBack]

Blue Lightning is indeed an amazing title. However, it doesn't really fit this thread because it was one of the Atari Lynx's launch titles. It kind of set a precedent out of the gate of what the Lynx was capable of. It's a shame few titles followed its lead.

[Bratwurst]

The NES game Metal Storm is quite impressive.

 

Correct sir, I also agree. Interestingly enough this one came out well before the NES was on its way out too, so it isn't like there was a major last effort involved ala Kirby's Adventure.

 

Irem only made about 4 NES games or so in all, didn't they?

[tyranthraxus]

Neo geo-13 years of service

Atari 2600-13 years

Intellivision-11 years

NES-10 years

Famicom-20 years    

 

Eh, the neo geo has still gone quite a while for arcade hardware. Great looking late-gen neo games include Samurai Shodown V, Last Blade 2, Power Instinct Matrimelee, Mark of the Wolves, and the Metal Slug series.

 

Yeah but who bought a Neo Geo as a home console? Too expensive and

its not really fair to compare an arcade to a home machine. Actually

its not fair to the Neo Geo since most home consoles from the past 15

years are better!

 

BTW Did Nintendo release new Famicom games in the last 10 years?

Any reach the states?

 

John

[SteveW]

Escape From The MindMaster for the 2600 blew my socks off. Walking through 3D mazes, dodging sliding shields while picking up pegs and finding the right pegholes. All the while being stalked by a monster that most of the time you didn't see, but heard. Multiple complex mazes, randomly hidden mini-games, and an actual game ending made this one a technological marvel for the lowly Atari 2600.

[chairmonkey4406]

didn't neo geo games cost like 300 bucks?

[Breakpack]

didn't neo geo games cost like 300 bucks?

 

yeah,and they were huge as hell,IIRC

[kisrael]

Super Smash TV for SNES.At the time the gaming mags were talking about the slowdown of SNES games like Gradius 3 /Super R-Type and when I played this,I was impressed at the amount of sprites on screen and no slowdown.

 

Heck...there was a quite solid port of this for the NES! I corresponded with developer or the dev's friend, it was just a matter of selecting the right colors, but a very amazing effort.

 

By system:

2600 Battlezone. Huge colorful graphics (you can even see the tanktreads move 'right') and it keeps track of the 3D world...hear a bullet offscreen, throw it in reverse , watch the bullet pass in front of you. Cool explosion when you got hit too.

 

C64 Skate or Die. Lovely sprite graphics, especially the skater modeled in 16 or 32 directions...I thought it was an Amiga game almost. Great Rob Hubbard loading screen tunage too. Also, "Elite" was pretty amazing.

 

386 PC Wing Commander. Just...wow. All them spaceships...

 

Interesting thread!

[Breakpack]

Mortal Kombat Super NES:I wasn't a fan at the time,and just played the arcade a few times,but I rented it when it came out (Mortal Monday?).When I first turned it on and started playing it,I chuckled because I was impressed at the quality of the port.Too bad the play kinda sucks and the censored fatalities.

[JB]

The NES game Metal Storm is quite impressive.

 

Correct sir, I also agree. Interestingly enough this one came out well before the NES was on its way out too, so it isn't like there was a major last effort involved ala Kirby's Adventure.

Making it even mroe of a shame that it never got the mass appeal of some of the system's other titles.

 

Irem only made about 4 NES games or so in all, didn't they?

Something like that.

They didn't even try to port R-Type to the NES.

[Adrian M]

 

Irem only made about 4 NES games or so in all, didn't they?

Something like that.

They didn't even try to port R-Type to the NES.

 

But they did for the Gameboy...twice no less! (once for regular Gameboy and then again for GBC)

[Kenshi]

What was that Genesis game (I think it was available for SNES as well) where you start out in a jungle level, and walking and jumping all look realistic, and you have to press a button to pull out your gun and another to shoot? It had something to do with time travel I think. It was the first game I remember where the developers made the characters' actions look realistic, like ducking a little before jumping and swinging your arms in mid-air (on a running jump), instead of instantly travelling upward and being frozen in that funny posture as in old school Mario.

 

Also, it's not a console game, but does anyone remember that (seemingly) holographic game by Sega? I believe it was called Time Traveller. It used mirrors to produce what appeared to be a 3-D hologram. I played the game once in Shreveport, after reading about it in magazines. I spent a buttload of money on it buying time cubes to reverse my deaths. There ended up being a group of people standing around me watching in awe. I figured that game was going to be huge and help revolutionize video games. Then I never heard anything about it again. Does anyone know why this game failed? The gameplay wasn't complex in the least, but with the radical presentation, I fail to see how it bombed.

[JB]

 

Irem only made about 4 NES games or so in all, didn't they?

Something like that.

They didn't even try to port R-Type to the NES.

 

But they did for the Gameboy...twice no less! (once for regular Gameboy and then again for GBC)

*sighs*

You REALLY have to wonder about their priorities at that point.

[RJ]

@Kenshi- To answer your 1st question- "Flashback".

[Kenshi]

Flashback indeed. That was really bugging me. But now the mystery is solved.

[DracIsBack]

2600 Battlezone. Huge colorful graphics (you can even see the tanktreads move 'right') and it keeps track of the 3D world...hear a bullet offscreen, throw it in reverse , watch the bullet pass in front of you. Cool explosion when you got hit too.

 

I clean forgot about that game. You're totally right though. It was another "WOW" game!

[Adrian M]

What was that Genesis game (I think it was available for SNES as well) where you start out in a jungle level, and walking and jumping all look realistic, and you have to press a button to pull out your gun and another to shoot? It had something to do with time travel I think. It was the first game I remember where the developers made the characters' actions look realistic, like ducking a little before jumping and swinging your arms in mid-air (on a running jump), instead of instantly travelling upward and being frozen in that funny posture as in old school Mario.

 

Flashback was the name of the game...it's the spiritual successor to the "Out of this World" series of games that came out on SNES and Sega CD. These games looked deceptively easy, but the control is a bit sluggish due to all the animation routines, so you really need to spend some time learning the timing.

 

Also, it's not a console game, but does anyone remember that (seemingly) holographic game by Sega? I believe it was called Time Traveller. It used mirrors to produce what appeared to be a 3-D hologram. I played the game once in Shreveport, after reading about it in magazines. I spent a buttload of money on it buying time cubes to reverse my deaths. There ended up being a group of people standing around me watching in awe. I figured that game was going to be huge and help revolutionize video games. Then I never heard anything about it again. Does anyone know why this game failed? The gameplay wasn't complex in the least, but with the radical presentation, I fail to see how it bombed.

 

Yep, I remember the Sega Hologram arcade games. Time Traveller was fun at first, but keep in mind that it was a LaserDisc game, and just like Dragon's Lair, once you memorized the game (didn't take long, it was very short), there wasn't much in the way of replay value. LaserDisc games are essentially scripted movies with very very few random elements.

The Hologram arcade system was expensive for operators to purchase, and because it utilized a LD format, the reliability wasn't always great.

[kisrael]

2600 Battlezone. Huge colorful graphics (you can even see the tanktreads move 'right') and it keeps track of the 3D world...hear a bullet offscreen, throw it in reverse , watch the bullet pass in front of you. Cool explosion when you got hit too.

 

I clean forgot about that game. You're totally right though. It was another "WOW" game!

Yeah...I can't believe how many people think Robot Tank is a superior game, probably on account of its weather condition and partial damage features...but that whole swivel-so-if-you-can't-see-the-missile-it-can't-see-you vibe never did anything for me - it's not modeling a 3D world at all.

 

Flashback was the name of the game...it's the spiritual successor to the "Out of this World" series of games that came out on SNES and Sega CD. These games looked deceptively easy, but the control is a bit sluggish due to all the animation routines, so you really need to spend some time learning the timing.

Out of This World was really cool. *Very* stylish for its time, and still holds up well design wise. Neat story.

 

I wonder if some other game will start using polygons in a non-3D way...

[desiv]

I JUST had that "Wow, how did they do that" feeling!!! With my main computer.

 

True, it's a decent machine.

 

2 gig AMD chip. 512meg memory. nVidia graphics card.

 

So, anything graphically impressive should be expected, and not retro..

 

BUT.. I just (re)discoverd the DEMO scene. Just like the great demos/intros for the cracked games on the C64 and Amiga (and others, I had those..)... They do that for the PC as well (You're all probably saying, DUH, but I hadn't seen any.)

 

And my co-worker called me over to show me a DEMO..

 

It's beautiful!! Expansive! Great (in the theme) music!! Nice demo. I said not bad..

 

He said...

 

It's 64k!!

 

k? Kilobytes???

 

WHAT?? I wasn't sure a 64k program was possible for a Windows APP :-), but this one is textured and sampled and incredible!! No WAY!!!

 

THIS was the same feeling I had in the C64 and Amiga demo/intro days. I frequently kept games I hated because the intro's were so kual! :-)

 

Here's the link:

The Product

 

(They (the demo team) have other demos too, (including a 16 byte (yep, BYTE) demo that's cute..) but this is my favorite.

 

desiv