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[64bitmodels]

Games from the 5th generation of consoles get a (frankly undeserved imo) reputation of looking like total dogshit. I want to know the games from that generation that impressed you at the time, and whether you think they still look good today.

for me, Crash, Final Fantasy 9, Radiant Silvergun, and Metal Gear Solid are some really great highlights.

 

[Thick Thighs Save Lives]

Oh, 5th gen! My bad.

 

[Nankatsu]

I remember that Star Wars Master of Teras Kasi looked really good in my eye.

Also Driver series looked really good back then.

 

[winjer]

Tekken 3 was a looker on the PS1. And running at 60 fps.
A remarkable port from the arcades.



Spyro was also an impressive game for the time.
The streaming system and the LOD system were groundbreaking for the PS1.

 

[Hollowpoint5557]

Sheep Raider -PS1. Im a boomer who doesnt understand how to post videos and pictures here but PLEASE look this one up and prepare to be impressed.

Wave Race 64
Tekken 3
Doom 64
Quake 2
Virtua Fighter 2
Turok 2 with the RAM pack Nintendo sold at the time looked good back in the day.

 

[64bitmodels]

Another nominee for this would be Re-Volt. granted, it looks far better on dreamcast and PC, but Dreamcast counts as both 5th and 6th gen in my eyes or at least an inbetween. the art direction of this one aged gracefully, especially at higher resolutions




here's a comparison video between all the different versions

 

[Codes 208]

Sonic adventure 1&2 (really hard to place dreamcast, i considered it more of a gen 5 with the xbox being its 6th gen spiritual successor) zelda majoras mask, wave racer 64, mk64, crash and spyro, doom 64, conker

 

[64bitmodels]

Spyro was also an impressive game for the time.

one of the greatest things about that game is its color palette. It's so well chosen, makes every level look soft and fuzzy like I'm staring at a beautiful painting

 

[Kupfer]

Although it clearly looks rough, GT somehow manages to look reasonably realistic on the PS1 original.

 

[64bitmodels]

Gran Turismo 2 looks fine, the car models have held up IMO depite the low polys and textures. But in comparison to ridge racer type 4....

 

[Lumpyoatmeal]

Tekken 3 was a looker on the PS1. And running at 60 fps.
A remarkable port from the arcades.

l spent so many quarters on this game in the arcade.

Back then I remember the arcades still smoking shit for a while on a graphics tip, but the most graphically impressive title was the Soul Calibur port on the Dreamcast.

 

[Bartski]

MGS blew my away back then

 

[Krappadizzle]

Honorable Mentions : Ridge Racer: Type 4 and Crash Bandicoot 3

 

[64bitmodels]

MGS blew my away back then

MGS is honestly a contender for best PS1 game, visually. those environments and art direction... everything is near perfection. If the characters mouths moved it would be perfect.

 

[GymWolf]

Mgs had so many microdetails that other games never had, just for that it was mindblowing, but the characters, especially the faces weren't nothing special.

Saga frontier 2
Tekken 3
Heart of darkness
Parasite eve 2
Vagrant story
Ape escape
Resident evil 3
Gran turismo 2
Crash 3
Spyro 3
Ff8 and 9

Now they all look like shit except the more stylized ones like saga frontier 2 or skullmonkeys.

 

[Fbh]

Visually the 2D stuff like Symphony of the Night and the games with pre rendered backgrounds like FFIX and Chrono Cross hold up the best.

But if we are talking raw 3D graphics I think it's games like Tekken 3, MGS and Gran Turismo.

 

[Sojiro]

The Dreamcast shouldn't be included in these 5th gen comparisons, its a substantial step up from 5th gen and Sega already has the Saturn to represent it for that generation. Its tough finding screenshots/videos of games that haven't been enhanced using emulator features. I will also stick to 3D games without pre-rendered backgrounds or 2D games, as those look better than most of the other choices. Here are some that I thought looked great:

Ride Racer Type 4 - An absolute stunner on the PS1. The tracks are quite detailed, cars looked great, and the lighting in tunnels and day/night transitions was really impressive, and its all ran at a smooth 60 fps. They were squeezing everything the PS1 had for this game, and its a visual feat.


Crash Team Racing - Super colorful, with loads of details on the tracks, and a lot more going on in the backgrounds than Mario Kart 64.


Mega Man Legends 2 - I fucking love the art style of this game, and its quite the looker for the system. The draw distance is also pretty good for games of this era.


Bulk Slash - The Saturn isn't known for its 3D strengths, but this game looks really good IMO. The pop in is very noticeable when in flight mode, but the game still looks quite good, and runs really well.


Banjo Tooie - I may like the first game more, but I think the second is a bit of a step up over the first visually. The areas in the game were quite large too, which was impressive for the time, and without even relying on the ram pack.


Diddy Kong Racing - The best racing game on the system IMO, it looks much better than MK64 IMO, and has much more going on with its tracks.


Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask - I could also put Ocarina of Time here since they both have a similar look to them, but I think Majora's has the edge. Clock Town and the dungeons were really large and looked great.

 

[hououinkyouma00]

Gran Turismo 2 looks fine, the car models have held up IMO depite the low polys and textures. But in comparison to ridge racer type 4....

It's this. Ridge Racer Type 4 is my pick for sure. Such a beautiful game even on the hardware.

 

[Beechos]

Umm wave 64 and rogue squadron

 

[RaduN]

Yeah, don't use emulation when you showcase graphix.

All in all the artistic prowess was at an all time high back then.

 

[Esppiral]

I hate when people posts upresed screenshots from older consoles to prove they didn't look that bad.

 

[64bitmodels]

and its all ran at a smooth 60 fps.

30fps unfortunately still impressive though

 

[Rendered Tangent]

Gran Turismo always felt like it redefined graphical quality every generation it appeared on.

 

[Madserb2023]

I found N64 games to be more impressive at the time but when paying PS1 and N64 games natively now, the PS1 is just more appealing even with the wobbles. The image is just so much clearer. Something like Resident Evil 3 Nemesis still looks good.

 

[SEGAvangelist]

Obvious choices, but I think Virtua Fighter 2 (Saturn), Spyro the Dragon (PSX), and Mario 64 (N64) are the highlights for me. I feel like all 3 of those games are polished and impressive releases.

 

[Sojiro]

I hate when people posts upresed screenshots from older consoles to prove they didn't look that bad.

I don't think anyone is doing that intentionally to hide what the games looked like, a lot of screenshots and videos posted now are using emulator features, especially for PS1, I had a hard time finding the ones I did, and even then I question a couple of them.

30fps unfortunately still impressive though

Yeah that is my bad . Giving it a bit too much credit lol.

 

[wvnative]

Crash/Spyro

MGS

Tekken 3

 

[Alexios]

Saturn Alpha 2 is 99% arcade perfect without ram cart. Saturn Zero 3 with a 4MB cart is 99.99%


Saturn Decathlete looks amazing in high res 60fps.


Saturn Sega Rally was a miracle port like RR on PlayStation yet from way more powerful arcade


Saturn Grandia is a looker too, among many others on an underrated often bashed for 3D system.

Dreamcast is of course a 6th gen system and on par with its own generation even if it died too soon to enjoy matured AAA development. Both its numerous own games and the 5th gen crossgen games/ports are way ahead 32bit machines, some shoddier/barebones ports/games don't change this.


​

 

[Sojiro]

Saturn Alpha 2 is 99% arcade perfect without ram cart. Saturn Zero 3 with a 4MB cart is as good.


Saturn Decathlete looks amazing in high res 60fps.


Saturn Sega Rally was a miracle port.


Saturn Grandia is a looker too, among many others.

Sega rally looks pretty great actually, as does decathlete. I forget Grandia was on the Saturn, does it hold up well to the PlayStation version?

 

[Alexios]

Sega rally looks pretty great actually, as does decathlete. I forget Grandia was on the Saturn, does it hold up well to the PlayStation version?

It's better, for some reason they redid floor texturing on important areas like the first city on PlayStation, maybe not enough memory? Whatever the reason it looks wrong, on Saturn you have proper alignment/variety/paths, building shadows, great VDP2 effects for the sea among other better stuff.

​

On PlayStation two better aspects are of course the real transparencies in place of mesh/no transparencies on Saturn (really not as big a deal as people made it out to be back then on CRT TVs, now they do stick out when viewed on modern displays) and character shadows are full sprites, not blobs.

 

[64bitmodels]

the issue with mesh transparencies is that even when viewed on Composite, the image behind the transparency is more fuzzy due to half the pixels being covered up by what's in front. Not to mention differing levels of opacity can't be easily conveyed with mesh transparencies.

 

[NeoIkaruGAF]

Good job mentioning Radiant Silvergun, OP. What that game does in later stages is absolutely bonkers, top-tier stuff for 1998.

Conker's Bad Fur Day should be mentioned, too.

 

[amigastar]

Anyone remember the days where home consoles were always behind Arcade game in terms of graphics? Those times are over now.

 

[Krappadizzle]

One that I never played in person but would have probably dropped my jaw:

 

[Werewolf Jones]

 

[nkarafo]

Banjo-Kazooie. Great grahics and good performance.

 

[Alexios]

One that I never played in person but would have probably dropped my jaw:

I was a bit disappointed, it just doesn't play as good as Panzer Dragoon Zwei imo, despite giving you more control. I got it because some of its key creators were on it. But it was still very good, looked great and the FMV videos are cool af. It's such a shame Polyphony Digital stuck to GT only since...

 

[NT80]

Tekken 2 and 3 looked amazing at the time. Tekken 3's stages suffered in the port to console though as they were converted from 3d real time to 2d static backgrounds.
Gran Tursimo
Resident Evil 2 and 3
Einhander. How well did Radiant Silvergun compare to this? I never played it at the time.
ISS/Pro Evo Soccer series

 

[fart town usa]

Off the top of my head.

Panzer Dragoon Zwei (Saturn)
Last Bronx (Saturn)
Shining the Holy Ark (Saturn)
Radiant Silvergun (Saturn)

RE3: Nemesis (PSX)
T.R.A.G: Mission of Mercy / Hard Edge (PSX)
MGS (PSX)
FF9

Plenty others of course. Those Saturn games listed above would give any PSX game a run for its money. Last Bronx is insanely impressive, I don't play it much but it honestly looks stunning.

 

[Go_Ly_Dow]

FF8 and 9 baby.

 

[squarealex]

PS1 have so many crazy thing

Tobal 2 (Hi-Res and 60fps)

Dino Crisis (Full 3D)

Dr.Slump

Hokuto no Ken

Koudelka

Vagrant Story

Megaman Legends 2

Breath of Fire 4

Mizuna Falls

Parasite Eve 2

Final Fantasy IX

Chrono Cross

Spyro Trilogy

Wipeout 3 :

 

[Alexios]

Can't not mention Sonic Jam of course even if it was just one level. I just loved those cutesy 3D Sonic & Tails models compared to the edgy look they tried to get with Dreamcast. And Last Bronx and VF2 that were mentioned need to be seen too, high res 60 fps, with textures (like DecAthlete).

And the pinnacle that could have been.


Folks should really stop posting emulator screens and videos though, that's not what things looked like. And ideally no screenshots at all, polygon/texture warping and other artifacts were a thing that heavily affected how games looked too, not to mention pop in and other such necessities on top.​

 

[64bitmodels]

Can't not mention Sonic Jam of course even if it was just one level. I just loved those cutesy 3D Sonic & Tails models compared to the edgy look they tried to get with Dreamcast. And Last Bronx and VF2 that were mentioned needs to be seen too, high res 60 fps with textures (like DecAthlete).
​

sonic jam was a sight to behold, everything about that little world looked insanely advanced even compared to many ps1 and n64 contemporaries.

Sonic R is also a graphical showcase of the time, ignoring the shite draw distance

 

[Rudius]

Need For Speed High Stakes looks very nice for a PS1 game. It even has night and rain options. On emulators you can force it to run at 60 fps just by overclocking the CPU; this works for NFS3 as well.

 

[adamsapple]

Running 2 worlds on top of each other with real time switching. Very impressive for PS1.

 

[YeulEmeralda]

Ace combat 3

 

[Geometric-Crusher]

Street Fighter vs X-men
Dead or Alive
Guardian Heroes

 

[MadchesterManc]

Always thought Dragon Force on the Saturn was impressive for the time. Could have a crazy amount of sprites on-screen for some epic looking battles. Takes some time getting used to how the game works but it's worth it for the larger battles later

 

[EverydayBeast]

I’ll never forget Tony hawk pro skater 2 on the ps1

 

[Kataploom]

Zelda OoT and banjo are technically and graphically by any measure the most advanced games of that gen, nothing in the PS1 came close to those