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/vr/ - Retro Games

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3301414 No.3301414 [Reply] [Original]

In another thread someone wrote:

>Satrun`s sound system didn't support hardware ADPCM meaning sound effects usually sounded either high pitched or grainy than on PS1

Is this really true?
If so, what does it actually mean on a technical level?
How good does your hearing need to be to hear the difference?
Is it night and day or does the room have to be dead silent for you to barely notice?

Rank the following consoles in audio quality:
PS
SS
N64
3DO
Jaguar
PC-FX
Pippin

>> No.3301429

"This is Sega's pride and joy. The Saturn sound system consists of a relatively powerful sound CPU, but the custom Yamaha sound processor gives the Saturn audio capabilites outstripping both the Nintendo 64 and Playstation."

"Saturn's sound hardware is phenomenal. It's way, way, better than the PlayStation's sound - you can basically plug in a synthesizer and play it through MIDI."
--Saturn Developer, Next Generation, December 1995

http://videogamereview.tripod.com/saturn/specs.html

>> No.3301432

>>3301429
Also, on a personal note I think the saturn has excellent sound quality, in fact you can easily mod in an spdif jack into the system for a direct digtal signal. Whoever said the Saturn had bad sound probably hasn't played one, I've never heard that argument and I know from personal experience that it just isn't true.

>> No.3301442

>>3301414
Well you can hear the difference yourself

Compare the sound effects in Rayman on PS1 and Saturn (the sound effects, not the music).

You'll hear that on Saturn the sound effects are a higher pitch and faster. This was done to make them a smaller size because the Saturn's sound chip can't decompress them on its own like the PS1's sound chip can.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vs_QghlU1s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Hvf6eL4CDg

>>3301429
What the Saturn's sound chip does have going for it is more sound channels (32 vs 24 on PS1), less CPU dependence, and greater adherence to professional workstation interfaces for easier sound production. But IMO the lack of hardware ADPCM is a bit of a fatal flaw. The Saturn's CPU can decode it in software though.

>> No.3301445

>>3301442
Just because the devs were too lazy to properly use the Saturn's sound chip, doesn't mean the saturn has inferior hardware to the PSX.

>> No.3301446

>>3301445
But it's an objective fact that the Saturn's sound chip can't hardware decode ADPCM, it is definitely technically inferior on that front.

>> No.3301451

>>3301446
If they would've designed their sound effects to be synthesized instead of lazily reusing the PSX version samples, then they could've used more powerful parts of the saturn sound chip.

>> No.3301456

>>3301451
The FM synthesis on Saturn is really tricky to use, and it's fairly limited too. At most you get 8 channels.

Also the Saturn version is often regarded as having been finished before the PS1 version though it was released later due to some Sony deal so those sound samples were probably developed first for the Saturn in mind.

>> No.3301458

>>3301445
>>3301446
>>3301451
>>3301451
I think it's fair to say Sega should have taken ease of development into account when they designed the hardware to begin with, but I think first party games had excellent sound, so I guess you're both right in my mind.

>> No.3301575

>>3301456

What now? 8 four operator channels is just like the OPM chips on arcade hardware or the X68000. Then you have the additional PCM channels on top of that.

It's an arcade developers dream

>> No.3301587

>>3301575
>It's an arcade developers dream

In 1990

>> No.3301589

Ps2 audio was better

>> No.3301590

>>3301575
>Then you have the additional PCM channels on top of that.

You don't have additional channels over that because each of the 32 PCM channels becomes one FM operator. It's a trade-off. You lose 4 PCM channels for each 4-operator FM channel.

Also fairly sure all of the FM timing has to be done in software.

>> No.3301604

>Autismo spammer trying to shift Megadrive vs SNES sound chip to Saturn vs PSX

Hilarious. And you guys are all taking the bait.

>> No.3301616

>>3301604
Well, I don't know, it seems pretty constructive to me.

>> No.3301660

Beyond say, shit like an internal PC speaker, isn't audio "superiority" mostly subjective? Sure, the wavetable synthesis on the SNES is superior on a purely technological level over FM synthesis on the Genesis, but there's some games that sound terrible on the SNES and some that sound amazing on the Genesis. Doesn't it really come down to personal preference beyond sheer technical capability? I mean, unless your multiplat game of choice has streaming or pre-recoded audio, in which case I would totally agree with "this version sounded better" shitflinging, as far as native sound synthesis goes I feel like it's six in one, half-dozen in the other. Some people like apples, some people like bananas.

Be an idort more often, /vr/. It's good for you!

>> No.3301663

>>3301660
>the wavetable synthesis on the SNES is superior on a purely technological level over FM synthesis on the Genesis
can't you trolls just fuck off? There are so many other boards to troll, why fuck with this one?

>> No.3301671

>>3301663
How exactly was my post trolling? Are you missing the part where I mentioned that technological superiority doesn't correlate to quality?

I've been a keyboardist for 20 years. I've played synthesizers all my life. Wavetable synthesis is more technologically advanced than FM synthesis. It's fact. That doesn't make one better than the other. My console of choice as a kid was a Genesis and my favorite keyboard happens to be the FM based Yamaha DX7. I prefer FM synths to wavetable ones, but that doesn't make them technologically superior, which was the whole point of my post.

>> No.3301675

>>3301671
>Are you missing the part where
no, but I noticed the part where you claim technological superiority of one over the other, despite the two just being different approaches

>Wavetable synthesis is more technologically advanced than FM synthesis. It's fact
No, it's a troll. Subtle difference

>I prefer FM synths to wavetable ones
irrelevant

>which was the whole point of my post
indeed, the core of your post was trolling bullshit, and I called it out

>> No.3301676

>>3301675
That guy's posts seemed well reasoned, but if he's trolling, then I don't know what to believe.

How would you say wavetable synthesis and FM synthesis actually compare, in reality?

>> No.3301679

>>3301675
PCM does require more processing power and memory than FM though

>> No.3301681

>>3301676
wavetable synthesis sounds miles more realistic than FM synthesis could ever dream of, but it relies on the wave table, effectively a lookup table for waveforms. FM synthesis generates everything, there's no pregenerated data, nothing to lookup. It's different philosophies in terms of audio signal generation.
Anon's just mistaking different approaches for technological progres, likely because of their keyboardist background, where it's all about the exact "reproduction" of sounds. FM can't compete in that regard. It's crude procedural generation, if you will. Wavetable synthesis is "cheating" though, as it's not so much synthesizing as it's mixing existing waveforms really well.
You can compare it to photoshopping an existing image vs. drawing one from scratch

>> No.3301684

>>3301675
>you claim technological superiority of one over the other, despite the two just being different approaches

Wavetable synthesis completely supplanted FM synthesis in the marketplace in the same way that flatscreen televisions completely replaced CRTs. Although the latter is technologically inferior, it's still entirely valid and useful as anyone over in the CRT general will tell you.

None of them are going to try and pretend that CRTs aren't inferior on a technological level to modern televisions, in the same way that FM synthesis is technologically - key word here - inferior to wavetable synthesis.

It's like saying that the SNES isn't technologically superior to the NES and that they're just "two different approaches." I don't see how that constitutes as trolling.

>> No.3301693

>>3301684
>Wavetable synthesis completely supplanted FM synthesis in the marketplace
except when you need completely generated synthesis, and don't give a damn about authentic reproduction

>Although the latter is technologically inferior
the /crt/ thread is a shitstain on this board, but CRTs do have valuable aspects. SED is a thing for a reason.

>None of them are going to try and pretend that CRTs aren't inferior on a technological level to modern televisions
They do, and as much as I hate it, they have a point

>in the same way that FM synthesis is technologically - key word here - inferior to wavetable synthesis
Again, your usecase is authentic reproduction of other audio. It's useless if your into more freeform synthesis

>It's like saying that the SNES isn't technologically superior to the NES and that they're just "two different approaches."
except it's not like that at all

>I don't see how that constitutes as trolling
wilfully ignorant? plain dumb? trolling? take your pick

>> No.3301703

>>3301693
You sound suspiciously like the assmad autismo that threw a fit over someone putting a light in his game boy because it was "disrespecting" the handheld.

>> No.3302898

>>3301681
So wavetable synthesis was introduced to professional music production as a new technology in order to overcome the limitation of FM synthesis (while sacrificing some of that technology's capabilities) in realistically reproducing sounds. Sounds like it is a more advanced, but not necessarily superior technology. Which is exactly what that guy was saying.

>>3301693
Nevermind, your posts are incoherent. Reasonable guy says something, and then you quote it with an irrelevant comment. "Wavetable synthesis supplanted FM synthesis in the marketplace" is an objective and verifiable fact. You can't say "except when..." because it's not a hypothetical, it's something that actually happened.

In particular,
>It's useless if your into more freeform synthesis
What exactly are you synthesizing, if not "audio"? You are embarrassing yourself.

>> No.3302940

>>3301414
Saturn SCSP was extremely powerful but the lack of hardware compression meant that it had much less sample memory to work with, which meant that it either had to use less samples or lower quality samples.

Software decoding of ADPCM was still possible, but had obvious limitations (required a lot of CPU power, limited amount of streams). Some late games even did fully software audio through various ADX libraries that allowed for adpcm samples to be used everywhere.
Earlier games (and even the BIOS) sometimes used ADPCM channels for music. Sonic Jam comes to mind.

The chip was in fact so good, that the Dreamcast used the exact same tech - with twice the channels and with hardware adpcm compression support.

Playstation could do hardware adpcm, the same encoding the SNES did (BRR ADPCM), at a strange 37.8KHz sampling rate. Some games used half the sampling rate to save space. This gave most music a very tinny sound, it was awful. But for sound effects, it was much better than the Saturn.

>> No.3302954

>>3301590
>Also fairly sure all of the FM timing has to be done in software.

I believe the tone editor in the devkits allowed you to set up custom FM crap. But it was scantly used because developers did not give a crap. Very few things, if anything, used the FM on the Saturn.

>> No.3302970

So, is this the new SNES vs Genesis?

We're now doing Saturn was shittier than PS1?

>> No.3302993

>>3302970
It objectively was in all areas except the 2d background generator, which was insanely powerful and came with extra memory. And it may have had more general processing power, if you were masochistic enough to get both SH2s and the DSP going simultaneously.

That and it had the RAM expansion, and a damn near indestructible CD drive.

In every other way the PS1 was much better.

>> No.3303009

>>3302954
Are there any examples of games at any point using strictly the Saturn's FM rather than in combination with other audio?

>> No.3303014

Can I point out that the guy who supposedly has 20 years of experience with synthesizers is misapply the term "wavetable synthesis" to the SNES, which used sample-based synthesis?

Sample-based synthesis only really caught on once memory prices dropped low enough to make it viable, it wasn't introduced to "overcome the limitations of FM," since sample-based synthesis had been in use even before the introduction of commercial FM synthesizers.

FM's biggest problem has little to do with its ability to recreate realistic sounds, in general FM is less intuitive to work with, which is why so many Genesis games have shit sound and why so many 80's songs that used DX-7's sound the same, because almost everyone used presets as a result of FM sound design being really hard.

>> No.3303059

>>3303009
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7K_JiiGx0K8
This sounds FMish

>> No.3303064

>>3303014
>misapply the term "wavetable synthesis" to the SNES, which used sample-based synthesis?

... isn't the two thing the same? You have banks of PCM samples, aka a "wave table"?

>> No.3303342

>>3302993
>Saturn shenmue, vf3
>500k polys/s

>implying ps1 is anywhere near

>> No.3303345

>>3302940
>The chip was in fact so good, that the Dreamcast used the exact same tech - with twice the channels and with hardware adpcm compression support.
Very interesting that a 5th gen soundchip, so hindered by the tradeoffs of software decompression, turned out to be perfectly adequate for the 6th gen when the tradeoff between number of channels and sample rate was eliminated.

It makes the design of the Saturn seem rather poorly thought out. Some parts over engineered, other parts full of bottlenecks.

>> No.3303356

>>3303064
Well, I'm ignorant on the subject of synthesizers, but from a purely mathematical perspective a collection of samples is not necessarily the same thing as a library of arbitrary functions, no.

>> No.3303368

>>3303342
500k/s at 5fps, maybe. The Shenmue demo looks awesome, but if you look at it closely you can see that it runs at an awful framerate, has very few characters on screen, has some bugs (like the framebuffer missing a clear), the lightning is pre-baked, etc.

>>3303345
The SCSP was a Yamaha part, not a Sega part. The lack of compression, combined with the small memory, was literally its only weak point - it was a world class sound chip otherwise.

>>3303059
Nah, just PCM with simple samples, pitch ramping, maybe some dsp echo/reverb.

Keep in mind that even the people doing kickass FM synth music, did nothing else but record the song from their professional keyboard and then tune the fm patches until they sounded badass. Lazier developers didn't even do the last part.

Their composing method was the exact same with PCM chips too, they just had to change samples instead of mucking around with FM patches.

>> No.3303374

>>3303356
So which one is based on a library of arbitrary functions, PCM synth or Wavetable synth? As far as I know both are based on having a bank of pcm sound samples, and playing those back at different pitch/adsr.

>> No.3303473

>>3303368
More like 10-15 fps and still looks miles better than anything else

>> No.3303543

>>3303473
I think it's a bit much to be using an unreleased game that we have no evidence was even running on stock Saturn hardware as some kind of proof of Saturn superiority.

On paper the Saturn is far inferior at 3D than the PS1. Two SH2s and DSP have less SIMD performance than PS1's GTE processor alone (although the Saturn has more integer power) and VDP1 has significantly less fill rate than PS1's GPU (and on top of that VDP1 overdraws more - it's a disaster).

Saturn can really only compete with the PS1 at 2D where SIMD performance and overdraw are not a big problem, and the VDP2 chip can actually give it an advantage. It can never be better at 3D on stock hardware.

>> No.3303551

>>3303543
the developers confirmed it was running a stock saturn

>> No.3303558

>>3303543
It would of been pointless for them to spend years developing Shenmue if it didn't run on a stock saturn. It's pretty clear they were pretty far in development from the video, since it even contains footage from Shenmue 2.

>> No.3303564

>>3303551
I keep hearing this but where is the evidence that the developers confirmed that? And how do you know they meant "stock hardware" as in, not intended for cartridge slot expansions, instead of like not running on a dev kit?

>>3303558
>It would of been pointless for them to spend years developing Shenmue if it didn't run on a stock saturn
But first they develop on a dev kit which has higher system specs than a normal unit to make debugging easier.

>> No.3303567

>>3303564
http://www.the-nextlevel.com/features/interviews/am2/

"A: Nearly two years of work was put in the Saturn version. It didn’t use a booster cartridge nor did it use the 4meg RAM card, so yes, the game was programmed for, and the footage seen as an extra on Shenmue II is from the code running on a stock Saturn."

>> No.3303610

>>3303567
>It didn’t use a booster cartridge nor did it use the 4meg RAM card

So it sounds like, exactly what I thought, that he meant stock hardware as in "not intended for use with expansion", not stock hardware as "we're totes not running this on a dev kit".

>> No.3303618

>>3301604
You are the autismo-guy!>>3301616

>> No.3303625

>>3302898
>in order to overcome the limitation of FM synthesis
which are only limitations if you're into replicating instruments

>while sacrificing some of that technology's capabilities
which are important capabilities when you're not replicating instruments

>Sounds like it is a more advanced
different approach

>it's not a hypothetical, it's something that actually happened
indeed, FM synths are still a thing, and are still being produced, because they offer something wavetable can not offer, to a specific crowd

>What exactly are you synthesizing, if not "audio"?
I'm not replicating existing instruments, so a wavetable is useless

>> No.3303631

>>3301671
1.- Stay AWAY of the "dhuurrrrr only sanic and strits of raige had good music, ewuiting els is juuuus farts whaam and eir waep" Bubble
2.- Stop listening to emu recordings
3.- Realized that SNES samples were played at 2x speed yo sound good, resulting on Tempo speed up voice samples and lack of note sustain and decay.

>> No.3303652

>>3303610
Except they said stock saturn, not devkit. If they meant devkit they would of said it. But I guess nothing will convince you otherwise.

>> No.3303657

>>3303652
There would be no need for argument had the game actually been released on Saturn.

But I very much doubt the system could have a quantum leap in 3D performance from just one game. Also, I don't think what they've shown is really that technically impressive (people just project their thoughts of what Dreamcast Shenmue can do to the Saturn version).

>> No.3303661

>>3303657
>I very much doubt the system could have a quantum leap in 3D performance from just one game
>I don't think what they've shown is really that technically impressive
these are completely opposite statements

>> No.3303674

>>3303661
What I mean by quantum leap in 3D performance is what other people are trying to imply about Shenmue on Saturn.

>> No.3303680

>>3303674
maybe they aren't implying what you think. Projection is not useful

>> No.3303702

>>3303680
Well they seem to bust out Shenmue any time anybody says the Saturn was worse at 3D than the PS1

What else are they trying to imply?

>> No.3303715

>>3303702
What game do sony fags bring out when anyone says the N64 has better 3D?

>> No.3303728

>>3303715
Crash Bandicoot

>> No.3303765

>>3303715
>>3303728
Spyro as well.

>> No.3303774

>>3303715
Crash, Tomb Raider 5, Syphon Filter, Tekken, Vagrant Story, MGS, Soul Reaver, Spyro, Driver, Twisted Metal, Wipeout. Those are usually the go tos

>> No.3303779

>>3303765
Spyro just has good artstyle

I don't think even Sonyfriends are silly enough to use it as an example of "better 3D"

>> No.3303781

>>3303715
Gex the gecko

>> No.3303782

>>3303774
>go tos
dude, structured programming

>> No.3303793

>>3303782
Sudo RM RF suck my dick senpai

>> No.3303796

>>3303715
what everyone else said, crash, tekken, spyro, etc

the real answer is quake 2

>> No.3303797
File: 1.88 MB, 480x360, reaver.webm [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
3303797

>>3303774
>Soul Reaver

>> No.3303809

>>3303796
Quake 2 and Doom psx were some god damn voodoo magic.

>> No.3303818
File: 42 KB, 213x267, 1391723843926.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
3303818

>>3303809
>voodoo

>> No.3303823

>>3303818
quake 2, definitely. doom didn't benefit from a voodoo card

>> No.3303857

>>3303809
>Quake 2

The N64 version of Quake 2 would look better if the animations weren't so awful.

PS1 version has lots of dithering, even more geometry cut down and the lighting isn't full RGB.

>> No.3303861

>>3303857
>if the animations weren't so awful
now take a second to think why the animations might have been awful

>> No.3303865

>>3303857
the person you responded to only said the game looks damn fine for what the PS could do, with no mention of the N64 in sight. You're the one invoking a console war. Fuck off

>> No.3303870

>>3303861
>now take a second to think why the animations might have been awful

Bad porting job? Even Turok 1 had gorgeous animation

>> No.3303873

>>3303870
ok, take another second, you'll figure it out

>> No.3303879

>>3303873
If you're trying to imply cartridge space, remember that Turok 1 was on an 8 MB cartridge and Quake 2 was on 16 MB

>> No.3303889

>>3303879
you say that as if it's in any way important. It's not

>> No.3303892

>>3303889
Well then since you know everything then please enlighten me

>> No.3303902

>>3303892
games come in different sizes. Ported games come from different sizes. Turok was purpose built for the N64, so all the assets were from the beginning built to fit. Quake 2 had considerably more source material, so some had to be cut. It does not really matter than the Quake 2 cart is twice as big, when the source of that port is 8x as big as the cart

>> No.3303904

>>3303892
oh, and next time, try to use that braincell of yours instead

>> No.3303909

If Saturn is bad at ADPCM, how can it perfectly replicate Battle Garegga's soundtrack using its SPU?

>> No.3303912

>>3303909
if you would read the thread, how come you're posting useless bait?

>> No.3303995

>>3303909
cause battle garegga is mostly fm. whatever samples it uses are small

the game is like 10MB total

>> No.3304120

>>3303902
The whole point of a "good" port is to optimize the game as much as possible for the platform.

Honestly, with the animations RAM space was probably more of a difficulty than ROM space. And yet the PS1 version which has less RAM managed to fit all the animations. While Quake 1 and Quake 2 are pretty much the only N64 FPS games with really bad animation.

Even the Daikatana port probably has better animation quality.

>> No.3304818

>>3304120
>The whole point of a "good" port is to optimize the game as much as possible for the platform.
what? never. The job of a port is to make the fucker run on a different platform/environment, by any means necessary, and as efficient (in terms of development resources) as possible

>> No.3304892

>>3304818
And this is how we got the DMC3 PC port.

>> No.3304895

I'm not sure I've ever heard a Saturn port that has worse music. Usually its the other way around.

>> No.3304898

>>3303909
>If Saturn is bad at ADPCM, how can it perfectly replicate Battle Garegga's soundtrack using its SPU?

It's just streaming prerecorded music from the disc, nothing magical.

>> No.3304902

>>3304895
Well, I think the general Consensus is that it had better music but worse sound effects. Games like King's Field or LSD are way better suited to the playstation hardware.

>> No.3304905

>>3304892
and virtually every other "modern" port. It's not a coincidence they all eat tons of resources, have crappy controller-based navigation and stuff like that. Games are developed once nowadays. The port is often little more than changing the compiler target and sticking some utility lib in between

>> No.3304909

>>3303543
>It can never be better at 3D on stock hardware.

On scenes where the vdp2 rotating background can be used as a static playfield, it can actually be better, due to that thing saving so much performance. And you can do fogging for no fillrate cost, by making polys transparent to a background, again for no fillrate cost.

So in specific scenarios that can take advantage of that playfield, you can have the Saturn performing equal to or even better than the PS1.

This is however not counting texturing, transparency, and any kind of shading, where the PS1 is clearly better. Primarily in ease of use, but also in speed.

>> No.3304931

>>3304905
Every other older port was done like that too. Executives always thought that porting a game is just dumping in some new artwork, and hitting the recompile button. Then the coders had to pull all nighters for months so they can release a horrible but at least playable port after the 6 months of allocated dev time.

>> No.3304938

>>3304931
>Every other older port was done like that too
might want to take a look again at NES vs. Genesis vs. DOS vs Speccy ports. These platforms are so very different, you can't even reuse the engine. Old ports are much closer to rewrites. Terribly rushed rewrites, but rewrites

>> No.3304973

>>3304931
Well, Doom certainly had this problem. Which is why most of the ports are terrible

>> No.3304979

>>3304973
>Which is why most of the ports are terrible
more likely, most platforms it was ported to were ill-fitting, and the game does not tolerate "downgrades"

>> No.3305046

>>3304909
>So in specific scenarios that can take advantage of that playfield, you can have the Saturn performing equal to or even better than the PS1.

The problem is that these specific scenarios were very rare in the kinds of games that were being made towards the end of the 90s.

>> No.3305071

>>3304938
>These platforms are so very different, you can't even reuse the engine.

Try explaining that to the executives who don't even play videogames. whoops.

>> No.3305091

>>3305046
>The problem is that these specific scenarios were very rare in the kinds of games that were being made towards the end of the 90s.

Not that rare.

Try a city landscape: you only have to make the houses and objects out of polys, since the land is mostly flat (Grandia, Shining Force 3).

Or the inside of a room: you only have to paint walls, since the floor and ceiling is flat (Last Bronx, Shemue video). Well, the floor anyway.

You could even do a forest or so that way, and you'd only need to paint the uneven parts of the terrain and the vegetation (Sonic Jam, Sonic R, Panzer Dragoon Zwei).

Or you can do a kickass sea simulation (Grandia, all three Panzer Dragoons).

On any 3d fighting game, you can do the ground texture with it.

Yes, this will affect your choice of design in a game, but you always have to design your game around the hardware if you want to pull the best performance and most impressive graphics out of a console.
Even if you do completely uneven landscape where the VDP2 plane is useless, you could still possibly use it as an occasional flat water texture (enabling transparencies), or if all else fails you could render an elaborate skybox.

>> No.3305095

>>3305091
See the thing is that having flat terrain was getting kind of old hat by the end of the 90s

>> No.3305128

>>3305095
You don't need to have the entire ground flat, but on any part where you DO have a flat ground, the VDP2 helps conserve memory and enable effects. See Sonic R.

That and you can do free per-polygon fogging into a coloured background (again, see Sonic R), or render some kickass skybox (Scorcher, Nights, Sonic World).

>> No.3305338

>>3305128
Now hold up, here's the thing, VDP2 can only do two 3D rotated backgrounds - so that's not a lot. That's exactly two flat surfaces.

Furthermore, I think you overestimate the benefit of VDP2 being able to do this in a 3D game. It's great if those surfaces need to be textured - if it's just shaded, well there wouldn't really be any advantage over PS1.

But even if they do need to be textured - unless the flat surface is absolutely huge (in which case you'd be likely dealing with an ugly low-detail 3D game) - the PS1 can easily make up for it by being faster at rendering extra polygons anyway.

It's alright if you want to use VDP2 as a flat background for a skybox I suppose with transparencies for fog, but that's a fairly minor part of rendering (ideally you don't want distance fog).

So in summary, Saturn's strengths in 3D are fucking situational to the point of absurdity. It's not a credible platform for designing 3D game. At least in a 2D game VDP2's strengths can be better exhibited.

>> No.3305396

>>3305338
The point isn't to be faster than PS1 (you'd need the entire game to be based on VDP2 effects for that, like Radiant Silvergun) but ultimately to save fillrate and texture memory whenever you can. Since the Saturn VDP1 is so limited, even situational use of a VDP2 playfield can make a big difference. And with creative thinking you can use such flat surfaces in a lot of ways.

For uneven surfaces, as long as the camera stays in certain angles, you can actually use a couple of polygons to simulate a ridge or so. Grandia and Sonic World does that.

>It's alright if you want to use VDP2 as a flat background for a skybox I suppose with transparencies for fog, but that's a fairly minor part of rendering (ideally you don't want distance fog).

You forgot the transparency part of the fog, which is a big fillrate hog. Now you can do something simple like shading the distance polygons to more and more white, but it looks much nicer if you fade it into a background image.
Obviously this also benefits from game design that favours larger open areas instead of something like Quake 2.

>Saturn's strengths in 3D are fucking situational to the point of absurdity. It's not a credible platform for designing 3D game.

I agree that the platform is extremely complicated to use if you just want to sit down and do 3d. But that's primarily because the VDP1 is flat out retarded (and I'm not talking about the quads thing, that's literally the smallest problem of it).

>> No.3305418

>>3305338
>VDP2 can only do two 3D rotated backgrounds - so that's not a lot. That's exactly two flat surfaces.

RBG0 can do two planes, so that's 2 backgrounds that must touch each other at the horizon.

On top of that you can either use RBG1 or NBG0-3.

RBG1 is, unlike RBG0, one plane only, so you can only do another rotate/zoom bg with it, not really useful.

But if you use the 4 scrolling backgrounds instead, you can put any and all GUI the game has onto them, that also saves some memory for the VDP1. Quake for example used all weapon animations on the VDP2. You can also do any 2d menu the game has.

Also, two of those backgrounds can do zoom, linescroll and rowscroll. You can simulate various pinching and skewing effects with those. Again, situational, but you could do some sick shit with it, perhaps in cutscenes, with 0 tax on the VDP1.

>> No.3305704

But what games used the internal sound chip of the PS1 for the music?

>> No.3305723

>>3305704
Final Fantasy 7, which sounds like shite.

>> No.3305732

>>3305723
Probably couldn't have even fit all that music onto redbook Audio though. But yeah, ff7 sounds like a wet fart, which is sad because the music is written incredibly, the orchestral cd they released for Advent Children is amazing.

>> No.3305768

>>3305704
pretty much all of them

>> No.3305785

>>3305704
every game that you can download PSF rips of.

>> No.3307391

How good was the 3DO's music output compared to the PS and SS?

How good was the 3DO's sound effects compared to the PS and SS?

How good was the 3DO's 2D performance compared to the PS and SS?

How good was the 3DO's 3D performance compared to the PS and SS?

>> No.3307395

>>3305723
It sounds fine; other than the highs being too high.

>> No.3308416

>>3307391
Judging by the name of the system, I would guess that it was designed more for 3D than for 2D.

>> No.3308421

>>3301414
Didn't some games use the sound card to process graphics?

>> No.3308446

>>3308421
no, this is false.

People confused the sound effect DSP on the sound chip, with the math DSP co-processor inside the system controller. This is what gave rise to that rumour.

>> No.3308857

>>3301414
>Did the Saturn have worse audio than the Playstation?
Dunno m8, you tell me

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMvbKLIIjZE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCT4OpGEB-g

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mNDcWZpDic8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_WbgPhI8OJ8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-SB2wVXqUXU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=805AYfRvyHQ

PS1 version came out a year after SS version.