Speccy vs CPC - battle of the Ages

[steve]

The crocodile worked in French advertisements, but we can never know if it would have worked anywhere else, we english do not pay much attention to adverts so we would not care if they had used a crocodile in this country.

[Executioner]

WTFAMIreading ?

http://www.gamestage.net/english/test.html

I think the only game which he gave the CPC a higher score for graphics was Deliverance. Obviously the reviewer is near blind, and he's also comparing Spectrum AY with CPC AY when 99% of Spectrum games don't even use the AY. Just love the blurb at the bottom of the list about how the ZX is better

[Gryzor]

...better graphics?
 

http://www.gamestage.net/english/test-renegade1.html


Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but seriously..

If it was Speccy vs CPC alone and he gave the Speccy a higher grade I'd say he's really partial. But giving the c64 port, one probably drawn by an 8-year old with Asperger's, a higher mark means he's probably missing a screw or two

[sigh]

If it was Speccy vs CPC alone and he gave the Speccy a higher grade I'd say he's really partial. But giving the c64 port, one probably drawn by an 8-year old with Asperger's, a higher mark means he's probably missing a screw or two

Heh heh.  The speccy 128k version does have the "throw" move and the boss characters waiting at the top of the screen like in the arcade. Would of been nice to have had these on the CPC 128K version.

...and I definitely prefered the C64 version of rolling thunder.

[MaV]

http://www.gamestage.net/english/test.html

OMFG: Does he really believe that a fake percentage value gives the scores any credibility or objectivity? Come on!

His explanations are ridiculous at best. Sure he's going to propagate the fixed "high-resolution" of Spectrum games vis-a-vis the 160x200 16-color modes of the CPC and C64. Sure he's going to downplay color clashing and color palette. He's owned a Spectrum in his teenage years! I like to read reviews about games of any 8-bitter, but he shouldn't fake an unbiased opinion.


And there I thought people have grown up enough to stand by our machines' shortcomings and strengths.

MaV

[MacDeath]

The "8bit wars" series of videos, by "realocomaniac"...(and others)

Although he tested a lot of games from the infamous Speccyports of death list...
But hey, as those were important games from the era... he had no choice.

Yet in his comments he was quite honnest on CPC, telling it is a well rounded machine that could be so great when it gets a proper coded games.

[Gryzor]

Well, you only need to read the closing statement:

Our machine is internally "better" than the others' machines. Our machine will forever be the best of all. The top of any others. And we do not discuss that. We have analysed these three "sweet" computers and tried to go through anything to find out the good and bad of them. We have looked at these machines with neutral eyes, heart and mind, so what results from our tests are ONLY our neutral and humble opinions.

This is just plain ridiculous I mean, the web is full of fanboys, of course, and on top of that it's full of silly people, but openly being a fanboy AND trying to convince others that you're "neutral" is just stupid...

[MacDeath]

I suppose this was some kind of irony, if not douchery.

[sigh]

I do enjoy those 8 bit wars reviews. What's interesting is that on the Chase HQ 8 bit wars, one of the comments written was that apparently in an old ACE magazine interview with Ocean, they said that the CPC version was 100% speccy code with added colour.

[MaV]

I suppose this was some kind of irony, if not douchery.

irony ... hm, I like that. Let's give him the benefit of the doubt and call his page a lecture in irony.


I just watched the Youtube-Video of Enduro Racer. Honestly the Spectrum version is better than Amstrad's ... because the latter one suffered from a speccy port.
The Spectrum version is even more colorful, look at the info bar at the top and compare it to the CPC's version. It's a shame.

MaV

[andycadley]

I do enjoy those 8 bit wars reviews. What's interesting is that on the Chase HQ 8 bit wars, one of the comments written was that apparently in an old ACE magazine interview with Ocean, they said that the CPC version was 100% speccy code with added colour.

I wouldn't be at all surprised, there shouldn't have been a need to rewrite the majority of the code and the Speccy version is exceptionally well done. It just goes to show what can be acheived with a little effort.

[MacDeath]

I just watched the Youtube-Video of Enduro Racer. Honestly the Spectrum   version is better than Amstrad's ... because the latter one suffered   from a speccy port.
The Spectrum version is even more colorful, look at the info bar at the top and compare it to the CPC's version. It's a shame.

one week rushed job.

This would have needed a proper Graphist job...

=recode the graphics in real Mode1.
=Re-address a bit all this...

Bam, the thing is perhaps not that better, but looks better... ad may also be faster because the CPU don't have to convert 1bpp graphics into 2bpp graphics nor "emulate" the colours attributes.

But hey, why pay another guy when the job was already done on speccy
It is well know that Speccies graphics are better because "they are more detailed" ...

Also why get the graphics recoded by a human ? The CPU can do this while running the game...




There are chances that when a game is mode0 per exemple, getting a speccy code to start with may not be that problematic...
Graphics are well redone because you cannot convert on the fly 1bpp into Mode0...
So you clearly have to readdress stuffs...

So the CPU don't have to do this stupid job...
that just enough for the CPC because the Graphics are in his language.

[Executioner]

Basically almost any port which kept the "chracter/attribute based" screen management sucked. Some managed to remain playable (Wec Le mans?)

I've heard others mention WEC Le Mans as a Speccy port, but as far as I can see the graphics are all true 4 colour, drawn for the CPC.

[ssg]

@Executioner: Yes I had no idea until MacDeath mentioned it. So no speccy ports remained playable then

[Xyphoe]

Ocean at the time were coding on Atari ST's and PC's - I remember seeing footage of them coding Untouchables on Atari ST then porting it over to the Amstrad. It helps that architecture wise the ST wasn't a great deal different to the CPC (ie no real dedicated hardware scrolling/sprite support)

When you have racing games like Chase HQ and WEC Le Mans you don't necessarily have to worry about the abilities and how you get both machines scrolling large amounts of data vertically or horizontally because that's not what is happening in these games. The bulk of it surely is complex mathematical stuff plotting the course and placement of the road, horizon, and where sprites would be in relation to the coordinates - I then conclude that probably a large amount of the game engine for the Z80 was done along with the graphics on the ST/PC then cross ported onto both the Speccy and CPC.

Which makes a lot of sense, rather than slowly writing the core Z80 code on either the Speccy or CPC then getting the other to play ball.

That's what I'm guessing anyway.

[MacDeath]

Yes, the Wec le Mans graphics must be ported from ST version.
Or not...
At mobygames I see no 16bit versions...

Anyway, basically having a large amount of code being the same on ZX and CPC (or MSX) is not the problem, because this is the shared (and compatible) part of those computers.
Even concerning sounds/AY... this is also the same stuff

The only faulty part is the graphics management.

Memory mapping and Video management are the only unique stuffs on this generation computer.
And on CPC this is actually quite a huge difference with speccy..

So having direct ZX speccy graphics Datas used by a CPC just can't be right.


Also as wde know, the Speccy being the cheap piece of...it is...
You simply can get a fast animated thing with a poorly executed code, because the Video part is soooooo light...

You don't have to really bother with colours and detailed backgrounds (all those just produce horrible colourclashes...)
Nor smooth animation (character based animation is often good enough).

But on CPC all those stuff are not that good.
CPC can actually produce graphics with the complexity of a 16bit computer, after all it is an "Half Atari ST"...

And because all this is heavy, you need shitton of RAM, and a tight and precise code.

Spanish companies were also quite into 464.
They skipped the RAM and tape problem with games in 2 parts.
Actually a clever move.

They also used a largely reduced screen...
That's another problem.
While Dinamic used reduced screen to get awesome graphics and the stuff working on a CPC464...
Most british speccy ports used a reduced screen just because this enabled to use directly the speccy's specs...

French companies were more into 6128... so perhaps did better use of the DiskDrive...(not a lot)
But mostly had no Speccy culture "background".

The French market was quite into CPC-PC-ST in the late 80's (85-90).

all being "Software" machines.

So got into perhaps more adapted kind of games.


A lot of "adventure" games  were produced by french companies...

And while this is somewhat easier to produce than action games, this still make good use of graphists and musicians... and Disk Drives.





Guess what ?those games are largely superior to their speccy counterparts...But, you know ? those kind of games are quite never used but guys who go into "8bit wars" videos...

Mostly because those games (in before Europe united in trades) were quite not exported/translated...
Also because an 8 year old kid don't really play thoses.

Which is such a shame.

La Abbadia del Crima....
why no "l'Abbaye du Crime" version
Nor "the Abbey of the Crime" ?


Actually a shame because the CPC game catalogue features a lot of those.


ZX spectrum ? a great machine ?But it does not even have a version of  Pirates! (sid Meiers) or Defender of the Crown.


How dare you call this a great machine ?

Just a snotling's toy for nippers with colour perception problems.

[FatAgnus]

[MacDeath]

http://www.cpcwiki.eu/index.php/Speccy_Port

edited heavily in order to implement my recent newly found discoveries on the matter...

Not always stricktly accurate and some mis-spellings or mistakes, sorry for this...

English is not my native tongue.

Concerning Wec Le Mans...
The game was good, but perhaps a few bits of speed wouldn't hurt.
On the other hand it features some raster colour changes, which may means it is slowlier than it could have been if it simply looked like this :


But hey, the game was good anyway...

Also, getting a game in mode0 was a good way to not use those rasters... because you already have more colours than needed (well, never enough actually)...
But this would have needed twice "graphics to be worked" time...

erf...

[Xyphoe]

Some games on that list are not Speccy ports.

I already mentioned Untouchables, this was coded on PC/Atari ST for the Z80 code. There's a YouTube vid somewhere of the programmer doing this! (if I can now find it)

I think a "Speccy port" game must be a game coded on or directly for the Spectrum intentionally, THEN later ported across to the Amstrad.

Just because the graphics are 4 colours or similar to the Speccy doesn't mean it's a 'speccy port'

In my opinion anyway, dont mean to offend anyone/MacDeath

[MacDeath]

Yes you are right...

Especially concerning this one, but I felt it fit the "monoblue games of death" theme...

On the other hand, Heroquest is more like a crossdev than a speccy port...well... sort of.
Many speccy features remains (256x192 screen...)... ok ...


I will remove Untouchables if you insist...

The problem is that the line between Speccy port (pork) and crossdev is so thin...

Yet having the CPC version formated alongside Spectrum (ex : 256x192...) may be some Handicap for CPC which could have done better without this limitation per exemple... (or not).



Anyway, some of those games are quite even more terrible and add an extra layer of butthurting insults due to the fact the franchises used to be good on CPC...

SWIV is Silkworm2 actually...
Gauntlet 3...
Double Dragon3...

ouch, this hurts !

[redbox]

Also, getting a game in mode0 was a good way to not use those rasters... because you already have more colours than needed (well, never enough actually)...
But this would have needed twice "graphics to be worked" time...

Burnin' Rubber...? 

[FatAgnus]

I can't locate the post, but I read "Knight Lore" at one list.
Perhaps it could be considered a port, but that game was so great...
I love Ultimate games, they could be better-faster on Amstrad, anyway, its concept was a revolution IMHO.


"Head over Hells" was amazing, they did it better, but Ultimate simply "did it"

[MacDeath]

The many isometric speccy ports with monocolours...
I gotta check this but if those are masked, then they could have gone Head Over Heels quite easily actually.

Despite less colours on screen (4 inbstead of the CPC was simply jsut better than speccy on isometric.

**Square attributes just don't make it well concerning isometric design+colours.
**masked graphics = 2x1bpp = 2bpp = Amstrad's Mode1.

http://www.cpc-power.com/index.php?page=jeux&lenom=3D%20iso

lots of potential speccy porks here...

Attack Of The Killer Tomatoes
Bomb Scare
Bubbler
Chain Reaction
Crystal Castles
Danger Mouse In Double Trouble
El Cid
Fairlight - A Prelude
Fairlight - A Trail Of Darkness
Firetrap
Frontiers
Gauntlet III - Final Quest
Glider Rider
Greyfell
Gunfright
Hate - Hostile All Terrain Encounter
Highway Encounter
Hydrofool
ISS - Incredible Shrinking Sphere (this one is OK... concerning graphics...)
Jahangir Khan World Championship Squash (lol attributes...)
Knight Lore (not bad for such an old one actually...)
Last Ninja 2 (shame shame shame shame on You !)
Marble Madness Deluxe Edition (deluxe ?)
Martianoids The Game
Molecule Man ( I bought the tape, and never used it more than once... shitfest all the way...)
Nether Earth
Nexor (this one seems legit and well ported...)
Nosferatu The Vampyre (this one is OK...)
Pac-Mania (obviously well commented already)
Phantom Club (Ocean could also screw us a lot )
Poli Diaz (lol a CGA port actually...)
Pro Skateboard Simulator (Code master ? more liek code shiters on this one...)
Prodigy
Rasputin
Sepulcri (this one is OK)
Strike Force Cobra (Shyte !)
Super Hero (Ok one....)
Super Trolley (not sure...)
Sweevo's World
The Great Escape (ouch...)
Vector Ball (could do better IMO...)

and so on...
That an awnfull lot...

[MaV]

And don't forget the Mastertronic games: Knight Tyme, Spellbound, Stormbringer.

While these didn't suffer from color clash, as far as I can see, they definitely could have been done better.

MaV

[MacDeath]

Do you think a "complete" list of speccy ports would be usefull ?

This is gonna start to make a lot of stuff...perhaps.
And would need some sort of classification.

Also :

The great Escape : ouch this game... i did played it... I have forgot about it, it was such a great game actually...
just too bad it wasn't a bit more properly done graphically...


Also :

Duet : a shame as this game was fun and could be played in co-op...

Airborn Ranger : this one was not so bad actually... And got "properly ported" after all...

Microprose Soccer : more liek Sucker than soccer...
A lot of footies games were shamefull speccy ports after all...

Also :

According to these, one of the main problem with speccy games and colours clash(it)es was that the attribute was far too often attributed (d'oh) on priority to backgrounds...
While the most proper way (other to simply get a CPC and proper CPC games... ) was to set the attribute priority onto sprites !

Clashes remains but the game is far more good looking and playable.

Once again the spanish did it right... sometimes...