Any recent homebrew games that push OCS/AGA technically?

[Digiman]

I see a fair bit of 8bit coding that technically improved over 80s/90s games.

Most Amiga games shown in CU Amiga etc in late 90s had the smell of 99pence PD crap.

Any new OCS/AGA homebrew games as funky as Beast 1, Super Stardust, Lionheart, Sword of Sodan or Lotus 2?

Anybody working on replacing all those horrible arcade conversions in 80s/90s like Outrun etc?

Or did Amiga peak in early 90s?

[Digiman]

Is it running on the 6128+ , I can't remember.
 
The + had 4096 colours and extra hardware sprites, was still running a 3 mhz Z80 though.

Same as the GX4000 console. CPC+ = Hardware sprites, pixel scrolling, 4096 palette and 3.5mhz Z80 IIRC, got one but need monitor to power it. But NEC PC ENGINE with custom chips + 6502 doing Outrun and R-TYPE justice seems more impressive IMO

Ok, they do need one of the later models of CPC so I guess it is less impossible hehehe

What this does show is how much the Amiga was an evolution of the previous generation of computers rather than a revolution :-/

ST is true successor to CPC really. Good colour, fast screen memory access. Z80 in CPC is nothing cutting edge, 1982 Sinclair job. C64 was the finest IMO for pre ST/Amiga launch day. Then Atari 800 (check out Rescue on Fractalus/Koronis Rift).

Amiga was very much Atari 8bit on steroids....also inherited its weak hardware sprites too sadly, blitter has to do everything due to that weakness. Still if you think like tat CPC & ST is evolution of Sinclair Zx80 or Commodore PET and Atari 400/800, C64 & Amiga just evolution of Atari 2600 VCS. But this is gross exaggeration

@ all CPC fans in thread
Anyway look for the CPC Shadow of the Beast overground demo too.....for a machine without hardware pixel scroll it's mighty impressive. BUT demo code <> feasible game engine which this a prime example of.

[Digiman]

Thanks all. Demos use pre-calculated code/pre-shifted data mostly, no good for game engines then.

I agree Amiga is complex and abilities hard to nail 100%, but just look at Space Harrier for Atari XE and compare it to 80s Atari 8bit games.

Even if someone just hacked Lotus II graphics with big clouds, palm trees, sand and Ferraris would be nice but games of era of Super Stardust = abrupt end.

Graphcs/audio helpers are rife on forums worldwide, talented machine code programmers squeezing hardware to 95% for game engines are not easy to find.

[Digiman]

while offtopic - I really enjoy the Amiga 500 demo from Batman group released in 1995 - I'm sure you are all familiar, but just in case

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvqXVAo5WZY

Lovely 32 colour artwork and music is good but not as impressive as torus tunnel on A500/1000/2000 Stardust game's high score screen really or Desert Dream MODs IMO.

I would have expected this game in 640x512 on AGA by now.....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3O0U1QGmi4I

[Digiman]

In a sense, Cinemaware was pushing the envelope quite early.

Of all the 1986 games I think Marble Madness is the brightest star.

[Digiman]

Being playable in 640x512 on AGA doesnt automatically make a game technically impressive. I cant think of any games that Id say are more impressive than any of the games mentioned above that are running in 640x512.
The fluidity of movement, amount of large animated graphics, parallax, great sound (bot technically and to listen to), etc. are what makes those games impressive.

Care to point out even one game that's running in 640x512 that pushes the aga hardware better?

My point was that PC game in the youtube video (Mini Racing Online), an isometric 8 way scrolling game with tiny sprites of F1 cars has not even been replicated on AGA machines in 18 years. Scrolling a 640x400/512 screen and animating a dozen or more 16x16 pixel bobs with some engine sounds SHOULD have happened at some point. It was an example of a simple game that could be converted even today without the need for chipset hacking 020 ASM code.

It points out how little is actually happening in Amiga homebrew.

(A very similar game was in development for OCS/ECS called the big engine/big end. An isometric F1 racer in 320x200 mode. Never released though so just a few screen shots in Amiga games that weren't etc. But if you can do a scrolly iso racer on OCS you can certainly do a scrolly hires iso racer on AGA no? Pixel scroll takes no time at all so it's just blitting the edge of the screen and moving tiny car sprites micro machines style.)

[Digiman]

Regardless of memories, 8 bit was never that good.
Usually the processors were something lame like the Z80 or a 6502 (or its derivitives).
A few machines had good VDGs and sound, but processors were just weak (personally I would have liked a Hitachi 63C09E).
 
Flame on...

You don't need a 68000 to scroll a screen or animate stuff or make great sounds. C64 is proof of that, and actually the Last Ninja tunes on SID make a mockery of the feable Paula efforts (which is normal, most games coders used the same crappy samples and forced them into the songs instead of getting off their asses and SAMPLING THE CORRECT INSTRUMENTS grrrr!!!)

Sure you can't do Starglider 2 on a C64 etc but it's no big loss. There's actually MORE full screen parallax scrollers on C64 than Amiga...go figure :banana:

To be honest the C64 and VIC were pushed a lot, many times. I know this because I spend most of my spare time recording gameplay videos for those two machines mostly and approaching 600 vids now on my channel.

(ie not simple raster split stuff like Starray etc non overlaid parallax even an ST/Amstrad can manage)