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Can 60 fps help controlling Mario in Mario's DS adventure ? (keep this thread clean)

Panajev2001a

GAF's Pleasant Genius
I'll start with the graphics whore in all of us.

It seems to me that N64 Mario 64 has better draw distance and better Image Quality (Texture Filtering, Perspective Correction and less texture shimmering) and better blending (I liked the water in Mario 64 quite a bit :)).

The DS version is spending more polygons on nearby characters and has a higher frame-rate.

Still, I think the frame rate being higher might help the game's controls since the DS does not have an analog stick, but only a D-Pad. Maybe 60 fps, meaning smoother animation and camera motion, might help controlling Mario.

I'd rather though have stable 30 fps and spend the extra polygon pushing power and fill-rate on better draw distance and better effects. Would the controls get much worse ?

What do you think ?
 

madara

Member
Are you talking about that new 2D Mario but with really weird 3d lego mario running around at times? If so, whats up with that? Really hope most games are not like that.
 

miyuru

Member
Crazy, a Panajev thread I understand ^_^

Hmm I don't really think 60 fps vs. 30 fps will really help significantly towards control...would it?

Tough question. 60 will definitely look really nice though on the DS...and the game already looks really good.
 

Panajev2001a

GAF's Pleasant Genius
madara said:
Are you talking about that new 2D Mario but with really weird 3d lego mario running around at times? If so, whats up with that? Really hope most games are not like that.

:(.... No... :(
 

BenT

Member
Define significantly. At the very least, sampling the controls 60 times per second rather than 30 can result in a more responsive feel. It's getting twice as much input data to react to.
 

Panajev2001a

GAF's Pleasant Genius
BenT said:
Define significantly. At the very least, sampling the controls 60 times per second rather than 30 can result in a more responsive feel. It's getting twice as much input data to react to.

Which might allow for more precision in controlling Mario.

Witha D-Pad you sample a 1 or a 0: either you move or you do not (to put it ina simple way).

Also you can go only in 8 directions.

If you sample the controls more often and animate in finer steps you could allow more precision in the controls than if you only had a 30 fps game (game logic and graphics refreshed every 1/30th of a second = 30 fps game).

Let's say you move a ball 60 pixels across the screen and you want it to clear the distance in 1 second.

Each frame at 30 fps you will move the ball by 2 pixels.

At 60 fps you will move the ball 1 pixel each frame (each Vblank = each frame).
 

Dyne

Member
I'd rather 30 fps, but I would really like 60 fps too. Would 30 fps allow for a larger game in the end?

I think Sunshine fared very well with 30 fps.
 

snapty00

Banned
I don't have Insider anymore, but if you go to the IGNboards and look up the posts for "Chakoo," you can see where he talks about the DS a bit.

Here are some random things that I remember him saying, though:

Things he liked:

1.) Infinitely easier to develop for than Nintendo 64
2.) RAM is better suited for games
3.) Cel-shading is easier to do on DS than Nintendo 64
4.) Realistic shadows can be implemented more easily
5.) It has a hardware Z-buffer, like Nintendo 64

Things he disliked:

1.) Cannot display as many polygons on-screen as Nintendo 64 overall -- even if a game were really optimized
2.) It's missing some very basic hardware effects, including perspective correction and mip-mapping interpolation (he said these will often be done in software, although it's annoying because those are wasted CPU cycles when the system already cannot display as many polygons on-screen as Nintendo 64)
3.) No floating-point unit
4.) The amount of RAM is a bit the low side, so certain Nintendo 64 games would be extremely difficult to do on DS
5.) The horizontal resolution of the DS screens is too low

Anyway, I haven't had an Insider account for about a month and a half now, so maybe he's said some new things since then. Like I said, go to those boards and search for the VIP "Chakoo."
 

Gattsu25

Banned
do what PGR did in regards to framerate: push 30FPS but have the controls run at 60

60fps isn't even a concern with me when it comes to handhelds...as long as the framerate is stable, you know?
 

Gregory

Banned
Are any handhelds even able to display 60fps? From what I`ve played it doesn`t look like it. I will be very surprised if either PSP or DS will have screens able to show 60fps.
 
Gregory said:
Are any handhelds even able to display 60fps? From what I`ve played it doesn`t look like it. I will be very surprised if either PSP or DS will have screens able to show 60fps.
Nintendo either stated on their DS press release or keynote that the system would run 3D games at 60fps. It sounds a bit strange because it is up to the developer whether something like that is going to happen, but apparently games like Mario 64x4 were doing it.
 

BenT

Member
Prepare to be surprised! Good GBA titles don't run all janky on the GB Player, do they? That's cuz they're typically 60 fps. If it was 30 you'd notice. Well, I would.
 

Panajev2001a

GAF's Pleasant Genius
The GBA screen cannot display 60 fps exact.... I think the refresh rate it is more like 59.7, not that it makes a huge difference.
 

Gregory

Banned
Panajev2001a said:
The GBA screen cannot display 60 fps exact.... I think the refresh rate it is more like 59.7, not that it makes a huge difference.

Yep, you`re right it seems. I can`t ever recall playing a 60fps game on a handheld though, most seems to be a slightly blurry 30fps.
 

Panajev2001a

GAF's Pleasant Genius
Jonnyram said:
I may be missing something, but how is control related to screen refresh rate?

Control sampling can operate at the same rate or better, but screen refresh rate helps.

Would you play a platformer in which controls were sampled every 1/60th of a second while the screen was refreshed at 10-12 fps ?
 

Jonnyram

Member
Panajev2001a said:
Control sampling can operate at the same rate or better, but screen refresh rate helps.

Would you play a platformer in which controls were sampled every 1/60th of a second while the screen was refreshed at 10-12 fps ?

In all honesty, it would depend on the game. I don't make a habit of playing 10-12 fps games, because there aren't many of them around, but I would rather play something like that than something with excellent framerate but appalling control sampling.
 

Gattsu25

Banned
no, but I would play one where the controls are sampled every 1/60th of a sec and the screen is updated at 30fps LOCKED :"p
 

jarrod

Banned
hirokazu said:
i never noticed the smaller draw distrance, just the higher polygon characters. any pics for omparison?
Ditto, I think Pana's being a bit premature saying what's better where. At this point 64x4 has the advantage in polycounts & framerates while 64 has better image quality and really that's it from the media available.

Also the IQ should be almost a nonissue given the screen sizes... all around I think Mario 64x4 running on a DS will look quite a bit better than Mario 64 running on your TV.
 

ge-man

Member
Exactly. People have made big deal about filtering for example--have they forgotten how much textures looked like soft shit on the N64. With the smaller screen, I'd gladly give up some polys and filtering for a crisper IQ.
 

dark10x

Digital Foundry pixel pusher
Gregory said:
Yep, you`re right it seems. I can`t ever recall playing a 60fps game on a handheld though, most seems to be a slightly blurry 30fps.

Wait, which handhelds are you talking about? Virtually all 2D GBA games run ~60 fps (whatever the exact number is...).

I also know that Metroid Prime Hunters runs ~60 fps as well.

There is nothing preventing these systems from displaying framerates like that.
 
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