crazy monkey
Banned
That is a beautiful game.
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How much more powerful was the N64 compared to the PlayStation anyway?
- Thread starter Snakeyes
- Start date
That is a beautiful game.
maniac-kun
Member
The PS1 had no Z-buffer. So Z coordinates could be wrong.
Warm Machine
Member
The N64 could draw better polygons bit no where near as many as a PS1 could draw.
The N64 was lucky in that it could tile a texture across a polygon many times. A PS1 could not do that do if you wanted a tiling repeat across a surface it needed to be subdivided to fit the texture.
If you bust down a Banjo Kazooie environment there really wasnt much there in terms of polycount but it looked fantastic because the polys were so solid and rendered so well. A small bit of a Crash Bandicoot environment would be much more in terms of geometry density.
A PS1 had something like only two decimal points of precision so animation would have a jitter to it as well. Also, seams would appear between geometry more frequently.
The N64 was lucky in that it could tile a texture across a polygon many times. A PS1 could not do that do if you wanted a tiling repeat across a surface it needed to be subdivided to fit the texture.
If you bust down a Banjo Kazooie environment there really wasnt much there in terms of polycount but it looked fantastic because the polys were so solid and rendered so well. A small bit of a Crash Bandicoot environment would be much more in terms of geometry density.
A PS1 had something like only two decimal points of precision so animation would have a jitter to it as well. Also, seams would appear between geometry more frequently.
It was incredible. No other game since shocked me that much.
Speaking of great N64 racers 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=km3kUtZvq00&feature=related
Beetle Adventure Racing desperately needs a sequel.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=km3kUtZvq00&feature=related
Beetle Adventure Racing desperately needs a sequel.
Mama Robotnik
Member
Eh...Paper Mario has very simple, blocky scenery and the usual muddy textures.
That's pretty decent looking for the N64 but it has nothing on this:
That's pretty decent looking for the N64 but it has nothing on this:
KillerTravis
Banned
I only deleted it cuz I couldn't find a comparable shot of RR64. Here it is again
That looks better than anything on RR64. That game is fucking ugly, I find it incredible you're actually defending it against R4.
Can't acutally believe you are defending this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=isUYwKh_FLs
Looks better then this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-S0BwVQ5Vo
Not only is it a jaggy mess with barely any color, but it also feels like you are going at 20 kph and the collision detection is hilariously bad.
Graphics Horse
Member
The jiggling look is from the low precision fixed point* transformations. The DS has the same problem.
*I think they were fixed point anyway.
Eh...Paper Mario has very simple, blocky scenery and the usual muddy textures.
That's pretty decent looking for the N64 but it has nothing on this:
Crash bandicoot still looks amazing
DonMigs85
Member
Apparently there was a CPU microcode that would have granted N64 equal or higher polygon-pushing power than the PS1 but at the expense of precision (which means the janky, warpy polygons and textures you could expect to see on PS1).
Also the texture cache was really absurdly tiny at only 4 kilobytes.
Theoretically N64 also had much higher memory bandwidth than PS1 (500MB/sec versus around 130MB/sec on PS1) but the high latency of early Rambus DRAM tech nullified much of that advantage.
Also the texture cache was really absurdly tiny at only 4 kilobytes.
Theoretically N64 also had much higher memory bandwidth than PS1 (500MB/sec versus around 130MB/sec on PS1) but the high latency of early Rambus DRAM tech nullified much of that advantage.
Yeah I did notice that, sorry should have mentioned it, I guess I was just trying to say we should look at DC exclusives as examples of what wouldn't be possible on the previous generation.
Barely any color, the fug? R4 may have the single best use of color in that generation. The deliberate, pastel, dreamy visuals add so much to its visual flair. Each stage has a specific look. RR64 is just color puke, with car models that look like they belong on the very first Ridge Racer game. Look at the hideous skybox on RR64 compared to the intelligent use of a soft gradient on R4. Gawd, I can't believe I'm reading this crap. R4 is one of the prettiest games of that era, RR64 is the redheaded stepchild of the franchise.
When it comes to speed that's the first race on R4, the campaign starts out really slow and gets progressively faster. Both games are locked at 30fps.
Controls have very little to do with this thread, but any Ridge Racer fan will tell you that R4 is a superior game. You have no idea what you are talking about, especially when you complain about collisions in comparison to RR64.
Dion Blaster
Member
Also count me as someone who had no idea that PS1 was popular at all, let alone crushing the N64. All my friends played Mario Kart, Mario 64, Banjo-Kazooie, GoldenEye, Mario Party, Ken Griffey Jr., Pokemon Snap, Pokemon Stadium, Mario Tennis, that Star Wars pod racing game, and everyone had the blue Tony Hawk cartridge.
Looking back it was like we were in our own little world. We were young of course.
Looking back it was like we were in our own little world. We were young of course.
I had both, and had no idea they were even competing lolz
Im not sure i understood what competing even meant in the sales world..
DonMigs85
Member
RR64 may not have been quite as flashy as R4 (and the cars got weird and wobbly when turning) but it's definitely among the best-looking racers on N64, only beaten by World Driver Championship IMO.
Also, none of the 3D PS1 titles can come close to what Rare achieved with the likes of Banjo and Conker. Rogue Squadron and Battle for Naboo also looked great despite the sub-15 FPS framerate.
Also, none of the 3D PS1 titles can come close to what Rare achieved with the likes of Banjo and Conker. Rogue Squadron and Battle for Naboo also looked great despite the sub-15 FPS framerate.
Dion Blaster
Member
Yeah neither did I, but I don't even recall any of those school yard arguments that people said were common in the SNES-Genesis days.
Graphics Horse
Member
PS1 texture cache has half that, PSP has twice. But of course, those systems have VRAM, which the N64 didn't.
Warm Machine
Member
The genius tools team at Radical Entertainment where i worked had a tool where they could run a retail PS1 game on a Dev kit and a low frame rate, and it would outline the polys in a multitude of wireframe colors.
Each color of wireframe was a render type from simple textures, color per vertex, skinned models, real time lighting, etc. they also had debug text that tabulated the polys into stats and of course, a total.
IIRC Crash Bandicoot was pushing crazy amounts of geometry. Around 4000-5000 tris a frame.
Each color of wireframe was a render type from simple textures, color per vertex, skinned models, real time lighting, etc. they also had debug text that tabulated the polys into stats and of course, a total.
IIRC Crash Bandicoot was pushing crazy amounts of geometry. Around 4000-5000 tris a frame.
so i just got sucked into a killer instinct sink hole because of this thread and now i have a question. how are the backgrounds done in killer instinct(arcade)? are they FMV because they look like 2D but everything subtly changes perspective like if you were to pan a camera across a room.
I think that they both have things that remember fondly that other didnt.
N64 games had absurd amounts of color, which i liked.
But then PSX had absurd amounts of textures, which i also liked.
But i thought Crash Bandicoot struck the perfect balance, so just from memory PSX always won imo.
I always thought it was odd that Mario64 didnt have any grass or anything, like it was one big green thing
Graphics Horse
Member
Good question, I don't know but I'm tempted to say it's mostly just switching through a few hundred still images like you say.
FMV that plays forward or backwards depending of which direction the characters move towards.
boiled goose
good with gravy
To me 3D just looks much cleaner on the N64.
I was visually impressed by games like RE2 and MGS on PS1 because they were so detailed, but something always looked flickery and blurry.
N64 games had low res textures but looked cleaner. Polygons were obvious but very rendered very clearly.
I like the comment that n64 games did look like you were inside of a 3D world while on the PS1 it is very clear you are rendering a 3d world.
No doubt because of the z-buffer and the perspective correction.
N64 had an edge, but it also had its fair share of disadvantages
I was visually impressed by games like RE2 and MGS on PS1 because they were so detailed, but something always looked flickery and blurry.
N64 games had low res textures but looked cleaner. Polygons were obvious but very rendered very clearly.
I like the comment that n64 games did look like you were inside of a 3D world while on the PS1 it is very clear you are rendering a 3d world.
No doubt because of the z-buffer and the perspective correction.
N64 had an edge, but it also had its fair share of disadvantages
A Black Falcon
Member
Sorry, misread about Shenmue (I was thinking Soul Calibur...), but for a PS1 version of that, look at the original, unreleased Saturn version; the PS1 could have done something like that, I'm sure.
Anyway though, you're right that looking at exclusives is best, but as I said, many of its exclusives aren't much of a step over 5th gen either, apart for those three categories. Speed Devils, TrickStyle, Red Dog, Pod 2, etc? Good games, but in terms of geometry, are they much above 5th gen levels?
Look at Donald Duck Goin' Quackers... the N64 can do corridor platforming fine, it's just that only that one game tried (assuming you don't count Rayman 2 as one, even though a lot of the game is like that).
No way, R4's a jaggy mess. As I said, it looks nice for the PS1, but it's no match for RR64.I only deleted it cuz I couldn't find a comparable shot of RR64. Here it is again
That looks better than anything on RR64. That game is fucking ugly, I find it incredible you're actually defending it against R4.
R4 doesn't look THAT special, though... decent to good for a later PS1 racing game, but certainly not one of the prettiest games of the era. And as for "best use of color that generation"... yeah, no way. Absolutely not. And RR64's visuals look pretty good, what's wrong with using a lot of colors? It looks good as it is!
Nice comparison there, and yeah, RR64 definitely looks better between the two videos, I would say.
Yeah, I mentioned this, that the PS1 has to cover for its lacking hardware by overlapping polygons, while the N64 can use lower-poly models that look just as good or better, because of the perspective correction.
what am i reading
Forget it, it's Chinatown.
CambriaRising
Member
Are we really going to have an N64 graphics thread without the best looking N64 game?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IByBJ-HZbaQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IByBJ-HZbaQ
tkscz
Member
What N64 games were you playing? Ever N64 game I played had an extremely far draw distance. Rarely did I see fog. In fact, Conkers bad fur day had no fog and draw distance was incredible for the time. That first question was serious by the way, I want to know.
Are we really going to have an N64 graphics thread without the best looking N64 game?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IByBJ-HZbaQ
Oh my god i loved that game so much
paper mario was not really the type of game i was referring to. it had a very unique graphical style that was obviously not the norm. when i said "blocky, muddy and barren" i was thinking more of the wide open 3D games
Pimpbaa
Member
You must have not played the Turok series.
TheNatural
My Member!
I take 64 vasoline-a-vision and AA over PS1's jittering pixelated crap any day. I think a few games like Resident Evil could pull off a decent look on the PS1, but I would take the 64's look over any PS1 title any day.
KillerTravis
Banned
Thanks for posting those beautiful screenshots. Now I want to play all those games again T_T
And obviously a game like Conker can have more details on it's environment, the whole game is like a narrow path with two invisible walls covering the sides.
tkscz
Member
Well the PS1 frame rate wasn't much better when the going got rough. It also had those warped textures that looked weird. But hey, I enjoyed both, so to who, his own and what not.
yes and no. Played some of it, but not the full game (wasn't my copy). Though, when I think about all the N64 games I've played (not owned), South Park was fogged as shit, but it ran off the Turok engine so...
Barn boys and War were the only levels that didn't, and still look incredible.
Vulcano's assistant
Banned
Some of the most demanding N64 games had loads of gray and were not that visually appealing - Perfect Dark Comes to mind - it had a shitton of other stuff going on though. Split-screen multiplayer with bots in Perfect Dark was probably the absolute most demanding piece of software in any console at the time.
Wyndstryker
Member
This thread reminds me of this little thing.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPO7c_XmesU
The FF Tech Demo on N64 tech
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPO7c_XmesU
The FF Tech Demo on N64 tech
CambriaRising
Member
My favorite N64 game after Majora's mask.
BruceLeeRoy
Banned
Yup. Unwrapping the N64 and booting that up for the first time is still the most vibrant gaming memory of my whole life.
How many of you old bastards remember seeing these characters first announced in the EGM cover story on the new N64 FF game.
With me post pictures of TR 4. That game had skinning, dynamic lighting, awesome particle rendering(water drops off customer), physic driven polys(laras hair, flares, and shell casings). Oh please posts the pictures. Oh almost forgot, the engine could do multi texture rendering.
Vulcano's assistant
Banned
Btw, talking about Turok, Shadow of Oblivion was a looker. First game I played with lip-sync in real-time cutscenes.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZ_4NKSraaQ&feature=player_detailpage#t=308s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-UvK3zxfNE&feature=player_detailpage#t=122s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZ_4NKSraaQ&feature=player_detailpage#t=308s
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-UvK3zxfNE&feature=player_detailpage#t=122s
Wyndstryker
Member
I remember seeing the story in a GamePro since thats what I read back in the day.
Karsticles
Member
N64:
N = 14
14 x 64 = 896
PS1:
P = 16
S = 19
16 x 19 x 1 = 304
896 / 304 = 2.86.
The N64 was almost 3 times as powerful as the PS1.
N = 14
14 x 64 = 896
PS1:
P = 16
S = 19
16 x 19 x 1 = 304
896 / 304 = 2.86.
The N64 was almost 3 times as powerful as the PS1.
BruceLeeRoy
Banned
Hmm you know what it might have been Gamepro come to think of it.
Trevelyan9999
Banned
The PS1 seemed way more powerful than the N64 to some people due to the CD-Rom it had that could produce CGI cut scenes that the N64 lacked. Resident Evil 2 on the N64 was the only game that really pulled it off for the system.
Vane_MagicCity
Banned
LOL
In all seriousness, the N64 was called the N64 but the PS1 was actually called the PlayStation at the time.