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Post by sunteam_paul on May 22, 2018 18:47:52 GMT
This is a clone of the old thread "PC Engine Pixelization" from the PCEFX forums. Copied across to here to protect against losing it should it close down.
Topic started by: Black Tiger on March 02, 2016, 06:04:26 PM Post by: Black Tiger on March 02, 2016, 06:04:26 PM These aren't complete, but just to get things started. Sapphire: Mosaic effect on skull boss. Scaling post-boss explosions. Parodius Da!: Player sprite scaling New Adventure Island: Mosaic intro to each stage. Gate of Thunder: Scaling sprites during opening cinema. Card Angels: Mosaic effect on cards. Mode 7 map effect during intro/misc. Private Eyedoll: Scaling dialogue text. Magical Chase: 3rd boss scaling balls. 4-in-1/ PC Engine Catalogs/Misc demo disc: Scaling bgs and scaling & rotating bgs. Nexzr: Scaling player sprite. Star Parodia: Scaling sprites. Post-stage Mosaic screens. Bomberman '93: Battle Mode Victory screen scaling. Art of Fighting: Scaling title. Various Hudson games: Scaling Hudson Soft logo.
Post by: Digi.k on March 02, 2016, 06:11:10 PM Valkyrie no Densetsu - player scaling Nexzr
Post by: sunteam_paul on March 02, 2016, 06:11:26 PM Star Parodier: Lots of scaling in game and during intro. Post by: Necromancer on March 02, 2016, 06:40:14 PM Bonk 3 scaled sprites and the aforementioned Cosmic Fantasy 4 mosaics. Post by: lukester on March 02, 2016, 07:05:04 PM Hany on the Road- the intro Post by: Digi.k on March 02, 2016, 07:15:11 PM After Burner II Gradius - ending credits Quote from: Black Tiger on March 02, 2016, 06:04:26 PM Parodius Da!: Player sprite scaling Endings for all characters. planet scaling and characters fly into the screen Blue Bell power up
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Post by sunteam_paul on May 22, 2018 18:53:39 GMT
Post by: ccovell on March 02, 2016, 10:12:21 PM Populous (The Promised Lands): Realtime StarWars scroll Lords of Thunder: Scaling ground in intro
Post by: Gredler on March 02, 2016, 10:21:07 PM What an awesome thread, thanks forhis is a rad list of games that do this impressive magic. Which do you guys feel do it the best, and what sacrifices were made to allow for it? Dropped BG, sprite count limits, or simply frame rate?
Post by: Sarumaru on March 04, 2016, 05:16:37 AM Didn't Art of Fighting also have player character sprites scaling??
Post by: Black Tiger on March 04, 2016, 01:06:36 PM I don't think so, because it would look off. The game just switches between resolutions below the hud. Fatal Furys have two sets of sprites though.
Post by: Digi.k on March 08, 2016, 10:16:38 PM How about Space Invaders Fukkatsu ?? The vector graphics in the intro. (man if only someone did a shmup with vector graphics and sampled speech and sound for the pce...)
Post by: Digi.k on April 09, 2016, 10:04:08 PM Sol Moonarge has mosaic effect on enemy encounters Hani on the road has scaling on the text game over power tennis raster effect on the title screen ?
Post by: Digi.k on May 09, 2016, 04:05:51 AM added some gifs. Art of Fighting intermissions
Post by: Gredler on May 09, 2016, 07:19:47 PM Those animated gifs are more like animated gifts. Man, those really exemplify what I was hoping to see. Seeing people flex their graphic programming muscle in a practical implementation is so exhilarating. Thanks for sharing!!
Post by: Joe Redifer on May 09, 2016, 08:15:50 PM Great thread. More GIFs!
Post by: Digi.k on May 09, 2016, 10:48:51 PM Parodius Da!: Player sprite scaling Green Bell power up sprite scaling ?? Blue Bell bomb power up, and I love the black and white silhouette thing there. Post by: Digi.k on May 09, 2016, 11:21:51 PM Magical Chase: 3rd boss scaling balls. Not sure about MC 3rd boss but gif is here. Star Parodier
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Post by sunteam_paul on May 22, 2018 19:06:23 GMT
Post by: Digi.k on May 09, 2016, 11:40:36 PM Post by: Digi.k on May 10, 2016, 12:17:07 AM dragon spirit ending Post by: Digi.k on May 10, 2016, 01:14:22 AM parasol stars Post by: Joe Redifer on May 10, 2016, 01:45:23 AM It's too bad they couldn't warp horizontally as easily as they could vertically for a true scaling effect. Post by: Digi.k on May 10, 2016, 02:16:49 AM sigh this website I'm using to make these gifs have started to add their digital watermark Can the roads on Thunderblade be included in this thread ? Post by: Digi.k on May 10, 2016, 11:13:50 PM metamor jupiter Post by: ccovell on May 11, 2016, 01:10:00 AM Post by: Gredler on May 11, 2016, 01:26:39 AM I love this quote, is shearing significantly easier? I almost said something, agreeing that it's not "scaling", but I love the idea of this thread showing off what the graphical wizardry was pulled off during the heyday, and didn't want to discourage the contributions. Anything that is more than a sprite or tile being displayed as the artist originally drew it I would consider wizardry, as an artist with little/no ability to code graphics stuff.
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Post by sunteam_paul on May 22, 2018 19:13:09 GMT
Post by: Digi.k on May 11, 2016, 01:36:13 AM ah that's a shame and yes that's how I see this thread too. Card Angels Sapphire Post by: geise on May 11, 2016, 02:22:17 AM Even though I have all these games and know about these effects I always still love seeing them. Thanks again for sharing these Digi.k. Post by: ccovell on May 11, 2016, 07:34:24 AM Shearing (just slanting the image by changing the scroll registers each scanline) is a little bit easier than the vertical stretching/scaling that we can sometimes see in PCE games. Proper scaling (in both dimensions) is more CPU/RAM-intensive which is why it's usually limited to the SNES & Genesis. Since the OP posted games with scaling/mosaic effects, I figured that "big pixels" was the thing highlighted here. Post by: Digi.k on May 11, 2016, 10:48:29 AM Another post mentioned that there was scaling in the Star Parodier intro and scanning though clips that scene was the only bit where I could see anything remotely close to a scaling effect unless I've missed something in all those seconds of that animated introduction. But I thought it looked good so I added it in. But what about this ? Post by: Bonknuts on May 11, 2016, 06:08:15 PM Digi.k: I soo loving these gifs! Post by: esteban on May 11, 2016, 09:43:54 PM Don't stop.
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Post by sunteam_paul on May 22, 2018 20:27:39 GMT
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Post by sunteam_paul on May 22, 2018 20:31:25 GMT
Post by: Digi.k on May 12, 2016, 03:09:16 PM Bazar de Gozarre or Bazaru de Gozaru Post by: Bonknuts on May 13, 2016, 01:07:27 AM Bomberman (94?) underwater level. Neutopia 2 underwater area. Aldynes when the ship enters and exits the stage. Post by: Digi.k on May 13, 2016, 02:00:15 AM that one? Neutop has similar effect. Post by: Bonknuts on May 14, 2016, 07:26:34 AM Yeah, that one. Post by: Necromancer on May 16, 2016, 06:19:21 PM It's not much, but this boss scales up and down in size: Post by: Black Tiger on May 16, 2016, 11:18:14 PM It also rotates. Post by: deubeul on May 17, 2016, 01:12:07 PM There's a nice effect on the system card screen when you push the run button in Terraforming (PcE version, at least). Post by: Digi.k on May 18, 2016, 01:49:32 AM Post by: jtucci31 on May 18, 2016, 02:54:53 AM This may be my new favorite thread. Please make many more! Post by: Necromancer on May 18, 2016, 02:44:52 PM I figured out how to make my giffys! Here's Chiki Chiki Boys: And here's an earlier stage in Terraforming with a subtler, better looking wavy background effect:
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Post by sunteam_paul on May 22, 2018 20:38:13 GMT
Post by: Digi.k on May 18, 2016, 05:04:28 PM Seriously from that Terraforming I don't know why NEC Avenue couldn't produce layered scrolling like that in their Capcom ports.. Magical Chase has a similar effect but more subtle Download 2 Post by: geise on May 18, 2016, 06:11:29 PM NEC Ave was lazy. Strider could've been so much more. At least Hellfire-S and Forgotten Worlds were good games regardless of no scrolling. Again, thank you for sharing all these gif images. Post by: Digi.k on May 18, 2016, 08:04:22 PM Dragon Saber... I really dislike some of the changes Namco did with this compared to the arcade but I too feel they were lazy as developers. Post by: shubibiman on May 18, 2016, 08:12:46 PM Isn't there a transparency effect in the background ? Post by: Digi.k on May 18, 2016, 08:22:38 PM that kind of makes me wonder how they did the shadow effects on magical chase stage 4. Post by: Sadler on May 18, 2016, 08:46:26 PM I'm guessing it's all the same set of dynamic tiles, just a different palette for the shadowed areas.
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Post by sunteam_paul on May 22, 2018 20:50:33 GMT
Post by: Necromancer on May 18, 2016, 08:48:08 PM I think it's just shaded to look like they're transparencies, as the ovoids wave together as one piece, never changing the amount of overlap. Post by: Joe Redifer on May 19, 2016, 12:14:14 AM I think the shadow effect on that level of Magical Chase is very poor. I mean technically the effect is good... it's just wrong. A shadow would not travel WITH the foreground. It would be stationary against the background. That is assuming it's the player that's moving and not the foreground itself. But even then, the shadow would be smaller than the foreground and should not scroll as fast. The developers did not understand how perspective works. Post by: Bonknuts on May 19, 2016, 12:48:34 AM If the foreground is casting the shadow, then it makes sense that it's attached to it. The shadow isn't going to change as long as the angle of the light casting it doesn't as well. There are a lot of things that are unrealistic in 8 and 16bit games. Nit picking this one seems a little strange. Post by: ParanoiaDragon on May 19, 2016, 01:30:01 AM IIRC, Spriggan does a similar thing with shadows in one of the levels....can't remember which one though. Post by: Black Tiger on May 19, 2016, 01:59:32 AM That Magical Chase stage is on the more plausible side as far as 16-bit games go, particularly because of the theme and style. If you want to see non-sensical shadow/lighting effects, try playing Steel Empire. 8:00 in this video shows how realistic/effective that Magical Chase effect is for the time: Post by: Bonknuts on May 19, 2016, 04:44:14 PM I like the design of the effect in Magical Chase. Even though the set of dynamic tiles are pretty repetitive, they break it up with some horizontal color striping against it. Even if it's surreal or unrealistic, it looks really well done. This isn't the only game to use this effect (Star Parodia, Psychic Storm), but it looks best in this game from what I've seen. Post by: Bonknuts on May 19, 2016, 05:03:57 PM Nexzr - ship arriving from hyperspace.. Post by: touko on May 19, 2016, 06:40:31 PM you have forgotten the sprite zooming in chuck no-rice intro : Post by: Black Tiger on May 19, 2016, 06:46:13 PM That effect in Nexzr is basically the vertical equivalent of the Zentradi ships arriving in Macross Scrambled Valkyrie. Post by: Bonknuts on May 19, 2016, 07:32:24 PM <- scaling PCE demo. Doesn't fit inside the 10sec limit of gifs.com Post by: shubibiman on May 19, 2016, 11:05:34 PM Definitely the coolest trick I've seen in a PCE game. Post by: NightWolve on May 19, 2016, 11:12:37 PM Nice, good to see that effect captured in a GIF. I bought that game in the 90's, enjoyed it quite a bit. It's not as great as Blazing Lasers or Super Star Soldier, but the CD soundtrack stands out - it's an overall respectable shooter to have in your library, maybe just a bit too short. Post by: deubeul on May 20, 2016, 07:46:38 AM The first time I saw that destroyer appear back in the days, was such a shock. It still thrills me today each time I play the game. Thanks for that gif! Post by: NightWolve on May 20, 2016, 08:27:02 AM Yeah, it does induce panic/freak you out a bit along with the accompanying sound effects! Post by: deubeul on May 20, 2016, 10:35:01 AM Totally, I was testing the game with a friend and we both jump, after that we were "WTF" and laughing for the next 5 minutes. Good memories. Post by: Necromancer on May 23, 2016, 09:16:07 PM Post by: ParanoiaDragon on May 24, 2016, 09:30:03 AM And....that's probably the best part of the entire game sadly! Post by: NightWolve on May 24, 2016, 06:25:55 PM Wow, and it's popular nostalgia for us retro types. I shared it on Twitter and my rarely used account got the most likes/retweets its ever had since creation! Heh. Got a like from HappyConsoleGamer on it in there too. Post by: touko on May 25, 2016, 03:55:56 PM It's not PCe but SGX,hope you like it too . Post by: esteban on May 25, 2016, 09:55:23 PM It counts! Post by: Black Tiger on May 25, 2016, 11:33:28 PM Tom has a similar SuperGrafx transparency demo using LttP assets. Post by: touko on May 26, 2016, 10:48:25 AM Yes is the same effect (playing with windows), but the book effect after is original, and not done already on PCE/SGX world, even on Md (in comic zone) is not at the same level. it's not obvious here, but i can do a dual playfield scrolling and at the same time the book effect . Post by: Digi.k on May 26, 2016, 12:28:19 PM your demo reminded me of this. Although not as clever as yours Post by: touko on May 26, 2016, 01:05:01 PM It's a sprites priority trick,clever too ... Post by: spenoza on May 28, 2016, 02:23:50 PM Well, the SNES is effectively cheating because it has dedicated hardware to do the job, and it usually sticks to using that method. And the Genesis CPU is a multiplication monster, so yeah.
Post by: touko on May 28, 2016, 02:47:26 PM Don't forget the chunky mode of the Md, it's well suited for pixels manipulation, it's not the case with the PCE and his planar mode.
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Post by sunteam_paul on May 22, 2018 21:09:13 GMT
Post by: Bonknuts on May 28, 2016, 07:51:20 PM To put things into perspective: I can scale (shrink) a 64x64 pixel image @ 28k cycles per frame. That's 24% cpu resource per frame at 60fps. That's totally doable. You could break that down further to a slower but still decent 20fps scaling at 8% cpu resource per frame. By comparison, to convert that chunky pixel image I just scaled into planar PCE format, it would take 150k cpu cycle just for that conversion. Scaling is easy on the processor, but that image conversion really slows things down.
Post by: Black Tiger on May 28, 2016, 09:36:56 PM Is there anything that can be displayed without converting from chunky to planar, like wire frame stuff or anything? Any theoretical workarounds, like so many Genesis homebrewers have found to do impossible things on Genesis hardware? Post by: Joe Redifer on May 29, 2016, 12:46:48 AM What is this "chunky" mode you speak of? How are the giant, blocky sprites in El Viento done (explosions, sea creatures, etc)? From my understanding reading some of the things the guy who designed the system has said, the MD/Genesis CAN scale sprites so that they appear bigger/blockier with relative ease, it just can't do the actual enlarging of them (Spite can be seen as 1x, 2x, 4x etc but not be seen transitioning between 1x and 4x or whatnot). Of course clarifications on this would be appreciated. Post by: ccovell on May 29, 2016, 05:58:37 AM Joe: they're unrelated. 1) Some magazines reported early on that the Genesis/MD had sprite scaling hardware, but that simply isn't true. Only Sega's arcade hardware at the time (even some non-"super-scaler" models) could scale sprites. 2) El Viento is just using clusters of 4x4, 8x8, 16x16 (whatever) single-colour square sprites and animating them to make it look like scaling. 3) "Chunky" means all the bits for a single pixel in one graphic tile are in the same byte, or in consecutive bytes. Planar means that each bitplane for a single pixel is split up in separate bytes. For example, bitplanes 0,1 are separated from planes 2,3 by 32 bytes on the PC-Engine. Logic dictates that bits for the same pixel right next to each other can be manipulated much faster by the CPU than when they're separated from each other (a lot more relative memory reads & bit shifts are the unwanted result.) Post by: Bonknuts on May 29, 2016, 06:18:45 AM Chunky mode refers to how the pixels are stored in memory. Chunky=linear=packed pixel format. That is to say, you can access a pixel as a single bit, nybble, byte, word, etc. Depends what the format is. It's fast for doing pixel based effects and manipulation. It's fast for rendering, as well as scaling and rotation (which is why the SNES mode 7 used this form of pixels, while the other modes do not). El Viento just uses the BG layer to make the explosion pixels (they are the size of one 8x8 tilemap entry). Sort of how Sapphire does it for scaled explosions after a boss: Turtles in Time for SNES also uses the BG layer for the scaled enemy when it's thrown at the screen. Yeah, monochrome wireframe effects can easily be doable on the PCE planar format. Planar system lends itself to transparency effects. It also allows more complex dynamic tile support (only update dynamic animation on specific planes); Ninja Spirit does this on the second level to allow the dynamic tiles to appear behind the leaves. As far as the scaling thing, I do have a much faster routine that deals directly in planar mode (for sprites). I haven't got around to using it for anything yet. I got the idea from nesdev forum - from tepples I think. It uses sprites to advance the scaling part. In other words, each 16px wide sprite gets shrink down to 1px (all ranges in between), and instead of ORing a bunch of pixel runs together, the sprites are just horizontally adjusted to remove the gaps. It's possible to do something like a 128x144 huge sprite object with scaling at 20fps @ 57% cpu resource per frame (perfect for a boss or such). Post by: roflmao on May 31, 2016, 04:04:11 AM Holy moly this thread is awesome. It should be awarded a sticky.
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Post by sunteam_paul on May 22, 2018 21:11:47 GMT
Post by: Digi.k on June 02, 2016, 03:51:11 AM Post by: Digi.k on June 08, 2016, 03:00:49 PM Emerald Dragon Post by: Gredler on June 08, 2016, 07:05:54 PM I second this for a sticky, behold the power of the little engine that could! Brings a tear to my eye Post by: Black Tiger on June 09, 2016, 12:46:42 AM That last Emerald Dragon pic is cool, because it means that the background is sprites. Post by: Gredler on June 09, 2016, 12:58:56 AM A clever use of the background color to "light" the smallish pillar/stonehenge sprite and cloud. So nice. Post by: exodus on June 09, 2016, 01:18:36 AM Have we discussed yet why this thread is called pc engine pixelization? this does not jive with what I'm seeing. Post by: Black Tiger on June 09, 2016, 01:32:55 AM It was supposed to be about the popular pixelation style, but people just started posting any kind of special effect and here we are. Post by: ccovell on June 09, 2016, 04:50:08 AM I tried to rein it in a bit when I mentioned that some pics didn't have any scaling going on, only warping or shearing, but... eh. :roll: Post by: exodus on June 09, 2016, 06:45:46 AM but pixelization doesn't mean scaling...? like these are all pixels, so I'm not sure what pixelization was supposed to mean in the first place here! That said, I like seeing all these fun effects! Post by: Gredler on June 09, 2016, 07:58:13 PM "Feats of Graphical Programming: Pixelation and other programmed VFX" Post by: Necromancer on June 09, 2016, 08:04:54 PM Ya know you can change the original posts subject line to something more appropriate, right? Post by: esteban on June 09, 2016, 08:32:58 PM Pixelization Party @pce @tg-16 Post by: Black Tiger on June 10, 2016, 01:19:30 AM It is what people called the 16-bit equivalent of "jaggies" bitd. When pixels are grown, but not because scaling is actually taking place, or assets that never shrink or grow are depicted as though the pixels are much larger than what are technically individual pixels, it's called pixelization. It's also the literal definition. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pixelization It was an unfortunate fad which was popularized by the SNES' Mode 7. It got out of control and it became common for games on all platforms to pixelate things just for the sake of it, even if it was prendered nonsense which takes up as much space as polished redrawn frames of a different size. Even SNES games are loaded with fake scaled/pixelated assets, since the hardware's built-in scaling is so limited. Just like how most SNES "transparency"/translucent effects are done with flickering. Quote from: Necromancer on June 09, 2016, 08:04:54 PM Ya know you can change the original posts subject line to something more appropriate, right? It's still appropriate, since most people around here think of stretching and distorting as pixelization. Post by: Joe Redifer on June 10, 2016, 01:41:10 AM Holy shit I thought this thread had been deleted or sunk really low or something. I hardly ever look at the stickied stuff. Pretty soon the stickied posts will take up the entire first page of the forum.
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Post by sunteam_paul on May 22, 2018 21:14:19 GMT
Post by: Necromancer on June 21, 2016, 07:02:47 PM Post by: exodus on June 21, 2016, 10:19:06 PM tengai makyo II and neo metal fantasy both have stuff in their intros as well
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0GEASa7sytQ)
(https://youtu.be/CqsrWv_Uv8U?t=3m59s) Post by: Digi.k on June 22, 2016, 06:00:29 AM Post by: Digi.k on June 22, 2016, 03:56:36 PM Post by: Vimtoman on June 22, 2016, 04:10:07 PM Devils crash eyeball on main screen. Post by: Punch on June 22, 2016, 06:47:36 PM I wonder if Out Live uses software sprite scaling too, seems pretty smooth. Post by: exodus on June 22, 2016, 08:58:38 PM I wonder if they didn't just draw those devils crush things manually? Post by: Necromancer on June 22, 2016, 09:02:03 PM I'm sure almost all the scaling and rotation stuff posted is hand drawn sprites/tiles. Post by: Digi.k on June 22, 2016, 09:37:50 PM
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Post by sunteam_paul on May 22, 2018 21:19:36 GMT
Post by: Punch on June 22, 2016, 10:09:20 PM baiii hadasan! Post by: esteban on June 22, 2016, 10:11:24 PM Download 2 Post by: Punch on June 22, 2016, 10:14:28 PM And Rasuto Armaggedon. Post by: Digi.k on June 22, 2016, 10:26:03 PM Quote from: Punch on June 22, 2016, 10:09:20 PM the buddhist version goes clockwise while the nazi is anti. Post by: Bonknuts on June 29, 2016, 11:30:46 PM JB Harold opening, but I couldn't makes gifs of it for some reason.
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Post by sunteam_paul on May 22, 2018 21:46:33 GMT
Post by: Digi.k on June 30, 2016, 01:41:32 AM dracula x Post by: Digi.k on June 30, 2016, 01:53:33 AM Post by: NightWolve on June 30, 2016, 02:06:48 AM Hm, somewhat interesting. Never had interest about that game, so would never have checked it out. Post by: Punch on June 30, 2016, 02:39:18 AM I think that Dracula X has prerendered sprite effects. No way that's real time CPU stuff. Post by: ParanoiaDragon on June 30, 2016, 07:50:02 AM It's actually a really fun game IMO. I picked it up on clearance at TRU oh so many years ago in the bloom of my yute! However, it IS a games that is really only playable once. Once you know who done it, it's just not the same. Post by: Bonknuts on June 30, 2016, 04:21:38 PM JB Harold's in game music is horrible and terrific at the same time. Only people who have played through this game know what I'm talking about (cringes/rejoices).
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Post by sunteam_paul on May 22, 2018 21:50:15 GMT
Post by: Digi.k on July 06, 2016, 03:56:39 PM Post by: Black Tiger on July 07, 2016, 03:50:16 AM Panic Bomber has a different effect each time the title screen appears. Post by: Digi.k on July 07, 2016, 04:18:38 AM Post by: Black Tiger on July 07, 2016, 04:26:04 AM The PC Engine has so many scaling, rotation, mosaic, misc effects, that it feels like it should have the stereotype that the SNES does for gratuitous pixelization effects. What's extra cool about that Panic Bomber title screen, is that even that last little strip at the bottom does a stretching raster effect at the end.
Post by: exodus on July 19, 2016, 07:02:29 AM The battlefield '94 system 1.0 error screen does a pretty neat fade effect!
Post by: Digi.k on July 19, 2016, 12:44:04 PM also Formation Soccer 95 della John Madden Football Soldier Blade
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Post by sunteam_paul on May 23, 2018 17:47:41 GMT
Post by: Digi.k on July 21, 2016, 02:37:28 PM more Saphire gifs Are these real polygons ? Post by: bob on July 21, 2016, 03:29:32 PM cant make gifs at work, but lets not forget a high fly ball coming at the screen in World Class Baseball. also, doesnt SAZ have an animation of Zonk crashing into the screen? surprised i dont see the GoT pillars either, but i skipped through some of the pages before all the gifs loaded. Post by: Necromancer on July 21, 2016, 04:30:06 PM These things? - There's quite a few enemies that scale up out of the background too: < edit > I forgot ze baseball: Post by: bob on July 21, 2016, 06:14:55 PM nice, necro!
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