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3DO's Doctor Hauzer was way ahead of its time

stranno

stranno

Member
First fully polygonal survival horror (two years after Alone in the Dark and 2+ years before Resident Evil). Amazing (and ridiculous) facial animations, you can rotate the camera, objects preview in 3D, impressive ingame cinematics, selectable camera angles, jumping puzzles ... Just look at this beauty.

aAh9PlT.gif


doctor-hauzer-2.gif


The game was (so) slow on 3DO though, it ran like 10-12 FPS in the real hardware, not a big deal since its a slow-paced game and there's no single enemy anyway, only traps ala Phantasmagoria. If you play on an emulator (Phoenix is the best 3DO/Jaguar emulator ever) you can overclock the 3DO's ARM though, and at ~30MHz it runs quite smooth.

Its probably the shortest commercial survival horror ever, you can finish it under-25 minutes knowing what to do.
 
The 3do is easily one of my favorite systems ever, due to rare gems like this. Another amazing game ahead of its time was Immercenary, an open world FPS, released in 95

 
3d0 as a concept was certainly ahead of it's time. A cheap entry price and maybe a 94 release with beefier hardware might have saved it.

The whole idea of a licensing hardware model might have nuked it no matter what though.
 
Alone in the Dark 2 for Playstation, released in 1996, was also fully polygonal, in contrast to the MS-DOS version
Ecstatica used ellipsoid technology in 1994 too though I am not sure if that counts

according to the developer:

"The main advantage is the organic-looking characters. Triangles tend to make hard, robotic-looking figures, whereas ellipsoids can be used to create more rounded, human alternatives. Ellipsoids can also be more efficient because you can make a much better looking character out of fewer shapes."

giphy.gif
 
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Vlaphor said:
The 3do is easily one of my favorite systems ever, due to rare gems like this. Another amazing game ahead of its time was Immercenary, an open world FPS, released in 95

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Very prophetic statement in intro by the lady. Also great acting. And dress.

My friend had 3DO whilest I had amiga in that time. I was amazed by some FMV games he had like beatemup FMV I don't remember the name. Also fully realistic images he had on CD. My amiga 500 could display only 64 colors at the same time.
 
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petran79 petran79

Ecstatica use geometry only for the character and NPCs. Backgrounds and (i think) objetcs are still fully 2D, like Alone in the Dark. IDK is ellipsoid can be called geometry though lol, but it was certainly 3d-ish.

Jack is Back (Playstation) use geometry for characters, interactive objects (like key fences, key statues or key graves) and some background effects (like a moving animal inside the bushes or a thunderbolt in the clouds) but pretty much every background is just a 2D bitmap over two or three flat polygons (to avoid texture distortion i think?). Plus some really smooth FMV transitions.

A few GIFS of this game with wireframed geometry overlayed.

3x accelerated Intro + FMV transtition (middle screen boxes is the thunderbolt effect, its hard to see this quick).

ivQGLzC.gif


3x accelerated First fight + objetcs menu.

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First shooting + moving statue.

z42jX3L.gif


Moving it.

xvvkb9F.gif


Snake moving through the static bushes.

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Guess wich one is the interactive grave :messenger_grinning_smiling:

VUyf2XN.gif
 
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Sapiens said:
3d0 as a concept was certainly ahead of it's time. A cheap entry price and maybe a 94 release with beefier hardware might have saved it.

The whole idea of a licensing hardware model might have nuked it no matter what though.
Click to expand...

No the 3DO sold the few million it did because it came out early. If they released in 1994 they would have competed against like 4 other companies two with more money than them and a looming "ultra 64" coming soon.

In fact it's the reason why 3DO went with licensing hardware in the first place. and why Sega was considering to make a 3DO. At the time 3DO came out it was among the best you could do with what was available. Even if Nintendo and Sega had access to the tech they wouldn't be able to afford to launch a 3DO level system in 1993. 3DO managed to get the console out with the help of hardware manufactueres and it was the only way the 3Do was going to come out.

The reason why the Sega got "slightly" better 3D outside image clarity (texture and polygon wise) is, outside of memory, the slapped in second 3D GPU in response to the Playstation and to a lesser extend the Jaguar. (which the 32X was made for.)

By the time the PSX came out in 1994 Sony had tons of money several contracts with companies for cheaper prices, and major distribution centers already in place. The N64 couldn't compete with that at all and only did really well in one region. but the reason why the N64 was able to get that power was because of how fast prices dropped as well as having a contract with a silicon graphics company. Dreamcast was only two years after the N64.

In fact the only reason why 3Do survivied that first year at those high prices is because Atari screwed up with the Jaguar. Because a bunch of magazines were saying 3Do was dead on arrival but it got a reputation of being the luxury powerful console so much that Atari wasn't able to shake it, nor could they afford to. The first two years of PSX games didn't move the PSX away from the 3DO much in graphics either until post Crash Bandicoot.

What's more interesting is the 3DO was discontinued because of a price war it couldn't hold. The 3DO was the same price as the PSX when it came out and 3DO had to keep up a price war and game bundled to hold out in the US and Japan. More 3DO's were sold in the second half of its life than the first. The 3Do could have maybe hit another 1-2 million units in sales but 3DO didn't have the money to have a price war, panasonic was starting to shake, and LG/Sanyo already jumped ship as they were bleeding dry.
 
keraj37 said:
Very prophetic statement in intro by the lady. Also great acting. And dress.

My friend had 3DO whilest I had amiga in that time. I was amazed by some FMV games he had like beatemup FMV I don't remember the name. Also fully realistic images he had on CD. My amiga 500 could display only 64 colors at the same time.
Click to expand...

Beat em up FMV? You might be getting the 3DO and CD-i confused because that's the only system I can think of with an FMV beat em up.
 
Afro Republican said:
Beat em up FMV? You might be getting the 3DO and CD-i confused because that's the only system I can think of with an FMV beat em up.
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No, I am sure it was 3DO and you made me look for it: http://fmvworld.com/supremewarrior.html

images_supremewarrior_01.jpg


For an amiga guy this was stunning - only place I have seen graphics like that was in arcade shops.
I forgot to mention it was first person view, so I am not sure it still lays under beatemup category.
 
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keraj37 said:
No, I am sure it was 3DO and you made me look for it: http://fmvworld.com/supremewarrior.html

images_supremewarrior_01.jpg


For an amiga guy this was stuning - only place I have seen graphics like that was in arcade shops.
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That's not really a beat em up but I'm assuming you are from outside the US where that was an interchangeable term for fighting until the early 2000's.

But yeah, that kind of FMV wasn't matched on computers back then. 3DO focused on 3D but grabbed the then booming FMV crowd with stunning visuals as well (well for the first 1-2 years.)

Some people forget how big FMV was back in the day. It would be 2 years after the 3DO PC's would be able to do thing like Phantasmagoria.
 
Afro Republican said:
That's not really a beat em up but I'm assuming you are from outside the US where that was an interchangeable term for fighting until the early 2000's.

But yeah, that kind of FMV wasn't matched on computers back then. 3DO focused on 3D but grabbed the then booming FMV crowd with stunning visuals as well (well for the first 1-2 years.)

Some people forget how big FMV was back in the day. It would be 2 years after the 3DO PC's would be able to do thing like Phantasmagoria.
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Yes, I am European so this may excuse me. Sorry for misleading though.
I grew up in that time FMV was present in arcades and slowly on machines like 3DO, and I must say it was very appealing to me.
I remember reading why it didn't survive - people needed more interaction in general with the world.

EDIT: sorry for a bit offtop but that reminds of a "game - proof of concept" I made some time ago: https://quisutdeus.in/Projects/FmvBemup
Yeah I miss MK like games.
 
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keraj37 said:
Yes, I am European so this may excuse me. Sorry for misleading though.
I grew up in that time FMV was present in arcades and slowly on machines like 3DO, and I must say it was very appealing to me.
I remember reading why it didn't survive - people needed more interaction in general with the world.
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it was more that increasing interactivity would be insanely expensive. Look at the FMV adventure games for an example.

I mean can you imagine an FMV third-person shooter? The film and retakes for one action seen would be hundreds of thousands alone.

It's easier to use CG, but at that point you may as well make a fool game instead of an FMV style game so that's the end of that. i think FMV adventure games can still work now with current technology, but I heard even for 1995 -1998 Phntasmagoris 1 and 2 were not cheap. Phantasmagoria 2 had only like 5 scenes as well.
 
Afro Republican said:
it was more that increasing interactivity would be insanely expensive. Look at the FMV adventure games for an example.

I mean can you imagine an FMV third-person shooter? The film and retakes for one action seen would be hundreds of thousands alone.

It's easier to use CG, but at that point you may as well make a fool game instead of an FMV style game so that's the end of that. i think FMV adventure games can still work now with current technology, but I heard even for 1995 -1998 Phntasmagoris 1 and 2 were not cheap. Phantasmagoria 2 had only like 5 scenes as well.
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That is more less what I wanted to express by "people needed more interaction in general with the world" - shortcut for saying it was too expensive and not saying it was undoable.
I remember one FMV game that I really enjoyed on PC and it gave impresion you have a lot freedom but in the same time it was 90% FMV: Star Wars: Rebel Assault - which also was released on 3DO
05_781.jpg


Can you imagine that today's fully CG game like Battlefront from DICE looks much better then FMV game from 90s...
 
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keraj37 said:
That is more less what I wanted to express by "people needed more interaction in general with the world" - shortcut for saying it was too expensive and not saying it was undoable.
I remember one FMV game that I really enjoyed on PC and it gave impresion you have a lot freedom but in the same time it was 90% FMV: Star Wars: Rebel Assault.
05_781.jpg


Can you imagine that today's fully CG game like Battlefront from DICE looks much better then FMV game from 90s...
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Yeah but an FMV game in 2018 made like Mad Dog would look better than a Titan PC. The difference is a game like Mad Dog, Crime Patrol, Phantasmagoria, would cost a ton. Phantasmagoria remade with new actors and modern effects in 2018 would be likely cost a much money than a game like GTA V and that would be for a shorter game with less additional content.
 
3DO came out too early.

It had the right idea... CD drive and polygons, but when it launched in 1993, I guess the specs at the time and cost of CD drives were too much. Wiki says it launched at $700 US which is absurd. Which means at the time, the Canadian price was probably around $1,000.

The games took forever to load and polygonal games looked mostly awful.

However, at a game store I remember seeing SF II and aside from the terrible load times, the game look great and the CD quality sound was remarkable. Never heard a game at the time with such great audio.
 
StreetsofBeige said:
3DO came out too early.

It had the right idea... CD drive and polygons, but when it launched in 1993, I guess the specs at the time and cost of CD drives were too much. Wiki says it launched at $700 US which is absurd. Which means at the time, the Canadian price was probably around $1,000.

The games took forever to load and polygonal games looked mostly awful.

However, at a game store I remember seeing SF II and aside from the terrible load times, the game look great and the CD quality sound was remarkable. Never heard a game at the time with such great audio.
Click to expand...

Just factor in inflation since then and the today's price would be 3 times higher as the $ lost its value more less 3 times since then I think.
 
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StreetsofBeige said:
3DO came out too early.

It had the right idea... CD drive and polygons, but when it launched in 1993, I guess the specs at the time and cost of CD drives were too much. Wiki says it launched at $700 US which is absurd. Which means at the time, the Canadian price was probably around $1,000.

The games took forever to load and polygonal games looked mostly awful.

However, at a game store I remember seeing SF II and aside from the terrible load times, the game look great and the CD quality sound was remarkable. Never heard a game at the time with such great audio.
Click to expand...

No it wasn't too early. one of the biggest misconceptions of the 3DO. it wouldn't be until 1996 before the PSX even proved to be better and even then their were 3Do tier games releasing on the PSX among the better stuff like MGS.

It launched high because they didn't make the hardware they hired companies to do it and only 3DO made money off software so the manufacturers could only make money off hardware.

As for games taking forever to load that is random just like the PSX, depending on the game. Several comparisons are available online for loading. It also depended on which 3DO you ran it on because LG 3DO's had the worst compatibility and performance.
 
petran79 said:
Phantasmagoria did run fine on a 486sx processor and this CPU was introduced in 1991
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The Tex Murphy Game, Under a Killing Moon, ran full screen FMV on a 386 and the whole game ran at 640x480.

Annoyed me years later how games in Windows would have postage stamp sized video.
 
keraj37 said:
Just factor in inflation since then and the today's price would be 3 times higher as the $ lost its value more less 3 times since then I think.
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Here in Spain the Goldstar 3DO came out at ~420€. Adjusting the inflation, nowadays it would costs ~695€.

UK also had the Panasonic FZ1, but importing it was so damn expensive, like 600€.
 
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Afro Republican said:
Not full screen with High quality graphics. The second one was even worse, would barely run and have a game breaking bug.
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I had a 486sx, 512 kb vram and 4 MB RAM in 1995. Game did run on HQ mode though it would run smoother on a DX processor. Can not remember the hardware I used for the sequel but I do not remember any gamebreaking bug and it played smoothly, though I used a walkthrough so did not experiment much.


Speaking of FMV, In 1996 the game Bad Mojo did something interesting too, mixing Quicktime videos into gameplay and make them interactive. It felt like multimedia presentation but it was done in a very effective manner. If you stepped on the symbol a video would play either in a separate window or during ingame. Still today no detailed CGI graphics managed to capture the detail and realism of hq scanned and digitized images, some animated as well through stop motion. Playing that game with even higher res digitized images at higher resolutions in today's monitors, would ensure a more surreal experience.

384098-938702_20080729_screen009.jpg
 
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petran79 said:
I had a 486sx, 512 kb vram and 4 MB RAM in 1995. Game did run on HQ mode though it would run smoother on a DX processor. Can not remember the hardware I used for the sequel but I do not remember any gamebreaking bug and it played smoothly, though I used a walkthrough so did not experiment much.


Speaking of FMV, In 1996 the game Bad Mojo did something interesting too, mixing Quicktime videos into gameplay and make them interactive. It felt like multimedia presentation but it was done in a very effective manner. If you stepped on the symbol a video would play either in a separate window or during ingame. Still today no detailed CGI graphics managed to capture the detail and realism of hq scanned and digitized images, some animated as well through stop motion. Playing that game with even higher res digitized images at higher resolutions in today's monitors, would ensure a more surreal experience.

384098-938702_20080729_screen009.jpg
Click to expand...

Very interesting, thanks for bringing it on.
 
petran79 said:
I had a 486sx, 512 kb vram and 4 MB RAM in 1995. Game did run on HQ mode though it would run smoother on a DX processor. Can not remember the hardware I used for the sequel but I do not remember any gamebreaking bug and it played smoothly, though I used a walkthrough so did not experiment much.


Speaking of FMV, In 1996 the game Bad Mojo did something interesting too, mixing Quicktime videos into gameplay and make them interactive. It felt like multimedia presentation but it was done in a very effective manner. If you stepped on the symbol a video would play either in a separate window or during ingame. Still today no detailed CGI graphics managed to capture the detail and realism of hq scanned and digitized images, some animated as well through stop motion. Playing that game with even higher res digitized images at higher resolutions in today's monitors, would ensure a more surreal experience.

384098-938702_20080729_screen009.jpg
Click to expand...

Phantasmagoria would not run well on that set up. It would have bad image quality, motions for scene transitions and character motions would be slow, and longer load times.

It wasn't unplayable just not the best way to play 2 however required a bit better hardware.

Also interesting statement on bad mono. What's more interesting in 1998 Break lands was the first attempted at an FMV third person shooter. Wasn't very smooth but it did over the shoulder shooting that would be popular today. But the game bankrupted the company.
 
I bought one in 1995 after an insurance settlement. I remember having fun with some of the games. One that sticks to mind is a licensed shooter for Stallone's Demolition Man. It also had the best version of Road Rash at the time. There seemed to be more EA games than anything on it. I remember buying Street Fighter just hoping it would get more Capcom support.
 
HeresJohnny said:
I bought one in 1995 after an insurance settlement. I remember having fun with some of the games. One that sticks to mind is a licensed shooter for Stallone's Demolition Man. It also had the best version of Road Rash at the time. There seemed to be more EA games than anything on it. I remember buying Street Fighter just hoping it would get more Capcom support.
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The 3Do has a library of around 400 games, more than the N64, and it has quite a few gem on it outside EA games and Street Fighter 2, here are some suggestions:

1. Slayer
2. Deathkeep
3. Alone in the Dark
4. Alone in the Dark 2
5. Battle Chess
6. Blazerion
7. Burning Soldier
8. Blade Force
9. Bust-A-Move
10. Cannon Fodder
11. Crime Patrol
12. Crash N' Burn
13. Demolition Man
14. Dragon Lore
15. Crime Patrol
16. Drug Wars
17. Eye of Typhoon
18. Killing Time
19. Escape from monster manor
20. Gex
21. Guardian War
22. Lucinnes Quest
23. Space Hulk
24. Shockwave
25. Shockwave 2
26. Lost Eden
27. Mega Race
28. Incredible machine
29. Immercenary
30. Samurai Shodown
31. Flash Back
32. Myst
33. Another World/out of this world
34. Novastorm
35. Po'ed
36. Return Fire
37. Primal Rage
38. Quarantine
39. Star Blade Remake (includes original)
40. Phoenix 3
41. Star Control II
42. Syndicate
43. Theme Park
44. Wolfenstein
45. Super Wing Commander
46. Wing Commander 3
47. Slam N' Jam
48. Kingdom the Far Reaches
49. Off-World interceptor
50. Star Fighter
 
Also if you buy a 3DO don't touch a Gold Star for any of the more advanced games because they run like crap and in a few rare cases some games can't run at all.
 
Just found out about this. God it looks like shit. Worse than Overblood. Also hearing that there's no enemies is really disappointing. Still kinda wanna play it though.
 
ClanOfNone said:
I'm pretty sure 3DO was the only console to get a Star Control 2 release, that game alone elevates its status.
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And the only console port of Alone in the Dark. As well as the only console port of the vanilla version of Alone in the Dark 2, since Playstation and Saturn got the Jack is Back "remastered" version, with some really awful models.
 
brap said:
Just found out about this. God it looks like shit. Worse than Overblood. Also hearing that there's no enemies is really disappointing. Still kinda wanna play it though.
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It got ran at AGDQ this year.



A neat game for it's time, but yeah, nearly unplayable today.
 
stranno said:
And the only console port of Alone in the Dark. As well as the only console port of the vanilla version of Alone in the Dark 2, since Playstation and Saturn got the Jack is Back "remastered" version, with some really awful models.
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FM Towns console had a port of the first game, ran like shit though and some of the backgrounds were compressed to shit. I don't know if the actual title on the game case said Alone in the Dark though I think they named it something else., but it said Alone in the dark in game.
 
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