7800 vs.....

[Vigo]

Whoever said the nes was an evolution on the coleco does'nt know what they are talking about, they couldn't be more different...

 

I am talking only about the NES PPU, which is indeed an evolution of the 9918. They are both programmed the same way, they both share the exact same video timing, they both share the same way in handling sprites, and they both have similar kinds of limitations. Get your facts straight before lecturing me what I don't know...

 

Nes uses a 650x architecture and colecovision uses a z80 architecture, coleco uses of the shelf hardware to drive sound/graphics whereas the nes uses custom designed sound/graphics h/w (and that's coming from someone who would'nt be seen dead with either console)

 

The TMS9918 is, like the NES PPU, a custom chip, with the only difference that the 9918 was used in several systems. You could easily hook up a 6502 CPU to a TMS9918....

 

Also the comparison betw. the msx series and the coleco is also way of base, the only thing that connects these machines is the variants of z80 they use

 

The MSX1 uses the same video chip as the Colecovision (9918) and has the same CPU with the same clock (Z80 @3,58 Mhz). Porting games over to each architecture isn't hard at all, only the sound and the memory map differ.

 

, a better comparison would have been a sega 8bit thingy and the msx...as the sega 8bit thingy is adapted from the msx

 

Wrong, the Sega VDP is a completely different offspring, which is also compatible to the 9918. Plus, contrary to the MSX, which uses a AY-3-8910 soundchip, the SMS uses the SAME soundchip as the Colecovision (SN76489), so the SMS is CLEARLY NOT adapted from the MSX. Sega went their own way in expanding the TMS9918 architecture, which you can easily see when comparing the SMS VDP to the official successors of the 9918 used in MSX2/MSX2+ machines, the 9938 and 9958.

 

Again, get your facts straight. The Colecovision TMS9918 VDP (which was previously used in the TI99/4A) is the ancestor of many different graphic chips developed in the 80's, including the NES/SNES PPU, SMS/Genesis/GG VDP, MSX2 9938/9958 VDP & PC-Engine VDP. The SMS/Genesis/GG VDP's are even downward comaptible to the 9918. They still can display its native video modes!

 

And before you tell me that MSX1 has the TMS9929 VDP: it's the PAL version, which has also been used in the PAL version of the Colecovision.

Edited August 18, 2008 by Vigo

[Vigo]

Both MSX and Coleco use z80 and a form of TI VDP chip ( as does the Sega system )

 

This is almost correct. MSX1 and Colecovision use the same videochip. The Sega Master System however, uses its own videochip developed by Sega, which on the other hand, IS backward compatible to the MSX/Colecovision videochip. And this backward compatibility is also present in the Genesis and Game Gear VDP. Yes, the 16bit Genesis CAN display the original MSX1/Colecovision graphics modes! I suppose all of you know that the Genesis can also play SMS games.

Edited August 18, 2008 by Vigo

[Crazyace]

The game gear was a lot better - not just because of the pallette, but also because there was a lot more time to transfer data across ( due to the number of display lines being reduced )

[Vigo]

The game gear was a lot better - not just because of the pallette, but also because there was a lot more time to transfer data across ( due to the number of display lines being reduced )

 

Right, you can develop some very pretty games on the Game Gear (but also on the SMS). That's why it is a shame that 1st grade companies like Konami never developed any games on it, because they probably would have pushed the envelope quite far, especially looking at their MSX games.

[malducci]

Both MSX and Coleco use z80 and a form of TI VDP chip ( as does the Sega system )

 

This is almost correct. MSX1 and Colecovision use the same videochip. The Sega Master System however, uses its own videochip developed by Sega, which on the other hand, IS backward compatible to the MSX/Colecovision videochip. And this backward compatibility is also present in the Genesis and Game Gear VDP. Yes, the 16bit Genesis CAN display the original MSX1/Colecovision graphics modes! I suppose all of you know that the Genesis can also play SMS games.

 

You sure about that? I thought it was just the SMS modes the Genesis VDP could display and lacked the SG1000 modes. Which connection are you making with the TMS9918 VDP and the PPU, sPPU, and VDC? That they were tile/tilemap based?

Edited August 19, 2008 by malducci

[gdement]

You sure about that? I thought it was just the SMS modes the Genesis VDP could display and lacked the SG1000 modes.

Technically I think that's correct, that the SG1000 modes were dropped from the Genesis. But still there's an obvious lineage. SG1000/SMS in one chip, and SMS/Genesis modes in the other.

[Vigo]

Both MSX and Coleco use z80 and a form of TI VDP chip ( as does the Sega system )

 

This is almost correct. MSX1 and Colecovision use the same videochip. The Sega Master System however, uses its own videochip developed by Sega, which on the other hand, IS backward compatible to the MSX/Colecovision videochip. And this backward compatibility is also present in the Genesis and Game Gear VDP. Yes, the 16bit Genesis CAN display the original MSX1/Colecovision graphics modes! I suppose all of you know that the Genesis can also play SMS games.

 

You sure about that? I thought it was just the SMS modes the Genesis VDP could display and lacked the SG1000 modes.

 

Wikipedia says it can not display the 9918 modes, other technical documents indicate it can.

 

Which connection are you making with the TMS9918 VDP and the PPU, sPPU, and VDC? That they were tile/tilemap based?

 

I already quoted the connections. That they are tilemap based is the most obvious fact, but not unique to the 9918. However, the strong connections, which have been introduced firstly by the 9918, and which ALL of its heirs have, are:

 

- Timing is based on the same pixel clock (5,37 Mhz / 10,73 Mhz), 340 clocks per line (the NES/SNES adds a single 341 clock scanline so that the colourburst rolls)

(that's why all those designs can display 256 pixels horizontally, occupying the whole scanline)

 

- Strictly seperate cpu/video buses

- Access through address/data ports, with the address port self-incrementing

- Sprites are multiplexed by the hardware, so that the hardware can manage more sprites than it has DMA time to display them per line

- Sprite overflow flag to indicate too much sprites per line

 

These are the basic elements which have been introduced with the 9918, which have been used as a blueprint for most 80's japanese consoles. Basically, you have 4 main branches coming from the 9918:

 

								 TMS9918 (1979)
								   *
   ***********************************************************************
   *				*					 *							  *
NES PPU (1983)	   V9938(1985)		SMS VDP(1986)************	  PC-ENGINE VDP (1987)
   *				*					 *				 *
   *				*					 *			GG VDP (1991)
SNES PPU(1990)	   V9958(1988)		 GENESIS VDP(1988)

 

Read through some hardware documents at www.romhacking.net and you will clearly see the connections.

Edited August 19, 2008 by Vigo

[malducci]

Ok, you mean spiritually - not directly related as in a modified core. That's what I figured you were referring to.

 

I think the 5.37mhz clock was chosen more for the pixel aspect ratio and lower cost for clock speed. The pixels are almost perfectly square on an NTSC television. That matches up great for 8x8 tile segments. But that's just speculation.

 

 

 

Wikipedia says it can not display the 9918 modes, other technical documents indicate it can.

I confirmed with Charles Macdonald, the modes are missing from the Megadrive/Genesis VDP. Apparently one SMS game uses this mode, some flight simulator, and is the only SMS game that doesn't work on the Genesis VDP..

[CV Gus]

Gradius 2 and Nemesis 3 were shown. Other than making the player's ship look better, no complaints, really.

 

Scrolling (Matt Patrol)- yes, the backgrounds were repetitive in the background (wasn't the arcade, too?)- but look at the buildings, and spinning radar dish, in every even level. You have THREE scrolling levels, all smooth, with LOTS of on-screen movement. Obviously the CV could handle smooth scrolling. Granted, there are limitations, but isn't that true for anything? The CV was simply not nearly as limited as many thought.

 

A side-by-side comparison between the CV and 7800 would help somewhat, but each comparison would have to be followed by an explanation of how it would apply. Scrolling, for example- both the 7800 and CV could handle it, but what limitations would be on each? e.g. "...but if you wanted to do THIS on the CV (Superduper Enemisis 2), the only way to do it is to only have detailed edges, and some stars in the clear areas, because...if, however, you are willing to have choppier scrolling, then you can have a completely detailed playfield. The 7800, with the same game, can do..." :?

 

I'm looking at Q*Bert's Qubes, and see far better graphics than Q*Bert- but not as many characters line up from left to right. For Q*Bert, I'd imagine that you could make Q*Bert and Coily look better (2 colors each), but the rest should stay single-colored, although for the globes you could simply "leave out" dots where the "shadows" on the object would go- a common trick with single-colored objects, I've done it numerous times on the C-64. That's more a matter of design than anything else, though.

 

Thing is, I've had the CV since it came out in 1982. I've had the 7800 for now 20 years, so I've had a good, long time to observe the games of both. If the games are any indication, than the 2 are not that far apart, although obviously the 7800 has an advantage in character motion and display, but the CV has it with sound and (maybe?) certain displays. Bump `N Jump and Matt Patrol are examples of games that look nearly as good as what I'd expect on a 7800, and quite frankly Joust is quite close. And if those MSX games had been released for the CV, it would have had a variety to easily match the NES, and although the NES games are technically better, that difference would not have been great enough for most CV owners to dump the CV in favor of the NES. After all, how many people would have dumped the 5200 for the 7800, given a choice in the matter?

 

Opcode's games have proven that the CV's abilities were all too often untapped, and that it was capable of far more. Perhaps we'll see 7800 homebrewers who will show this for the 7800?

[Vigo]

Ok, you mean spiritually - not directly related as in a modified core.

 

The only official successors of the 9918 are the 9938 and 9958. All other designs were redone from scratch on a gate level, but implement specific key features introduced by the 9918 exactly the same way.

 

I think the 5.37mhz clock was chosen more for the pixel aspect ratio and lower cost for clock speed.

 

Yes, but the TMS9918 introduced it. Atari / Commodore designs are mostly based on 14,318Mhz master clock for 160/320 pixel modes. The Genesis / PC-Engine support both 320 and 256 resolution modes.

 

The pixels are almost perfectly square on an NTSC television. That matches up great for 8x8 tile segments. But that's just speculation.

 

Yes, but this valid conclusion is no contradiction to the fact that all designs I mentioned are based on the 9918. The pixel clock was not the only aspect I was referring to. All designs I mentioned share the same way sprites and VRAM accesses are handled, and although they are more capable than the 9918, the basic architecture is the same. It's a completely different way how Commodore or Atari implemented tile based graphics or sprites.

 

I confirmed with Charles Macdonald, the modes are missing from the Megadrive/Genesis VDP. Apparently one SMS game uses this mode, some flight simulator, and is the only SMS game that doesn't work on the Genesis VDP..

 

Charles is a very capable person with huge knowledge, so I believe him. Nevertheless, the Genesis VDP is a heir of the 9918.

Edited August 19, 2008 by Vigo

[Vigo]

Scrolling (Matt Patrol)- yes, the backgrounds were repetitive in the background (wasn't the arcade, too?)- but look at the buildings, and spinning radar dish, in every even level. You have THREE scrolling levels, all smooth, with LOTS of on-screen movement. Obviously the CV could handle smooth scrolling. Granted, there are limitations, but isn't that true for anything? The CV was simply not nearly as limited as many thought.

 

You can do smooth scrolling on pretty much any architecture which has a bitmap display, or redefinable characters. The fact remains that the Colecovision does not support it in hardware, and the ways how to achieve this are very limited. While Matt Patrol is indeed an impressive effort on the Colecovision, on the 5200, 7800, NES, C64 etc. it would be less than average.

 

 

A side-by-side comparison between the CV and 7800 would help somewhat, but each comparison would have to be followed by an explanation of how it would apply. Scrolling, for example- both the 7800 and CV could handle it, but what limitations would be on each?

 

The Colecovision can not do hardware scrolling, the 7800 can. And we already explained the limitations, but you again, due to your lack of understanding what we are talking about, you ask the same questions over and over again.

 

I'm looking at Q*Bert's Qubes, and see far better graphics than Q*Bert- but not as many characters line up from left to right. For Q*Bert, I'd imagine that you could make Q*Bert and Coily look better (2 colors each), but the rest should stay single-colored, although for the globes you could simply "leave out" dots where the "shadows" on the object would go- a common trick with single-colored objects, I've done it numerous times on the C-64. That's more a matter of design than anything else, though.

 

Though you can apply all techniques learned from the C64 hires bitmap mode to the Colecovision (the colecovision can even do more out of the box, since you can change the fore/background colour pair every 8 pixels, similar to the C64 FLI mode), the biggest limitation, worse than the lack of scrolling IMHO, with this machine is that it can only display 4 sprites per line.

 

Thing is, I've had the CV since it came out in 1982. I've had the 7800 for now 20 years, so I've had a good, long time to observe the games of both. If the games are any indication, than the 2 are not that far apart, although obviously the 7800 has an advantage in character motion and display, but the CV has it with sound and (maybe?) certain displays.

 

On the contrary whith the NES, I think the 7800 can, with no problem, do every game the Colecovision can do. The problem again with the 7800 is: more colours, more objects, but resolution is usually lower (160 pixels v.s. 256). The 320 modes have very little useage for games except perhaps score/status displays.

 

Bump `N Jump and Matt Patrol are examples of games that look nearly as good as what I'd expect on a 7800, and quite frankly Joust is quite close.

 

Those achievements are impressive for the Colecovision, but are, again, no challenge for those architectures which support smooth scrolling in hardware.

 

And if those MSX games had been released for the CV, it would have had a variety to easily match the NES, and although the NES games are technically better, that difference would not have been great enough for most CV owners to dump the CV in favor of the NES.

 

I am not so sure about this, because, although these are great games, the scrolling is jerky, and the graphics can not match the NES versions of those games. Take that, and the excellent software support of the NES.

 

After all, how many people would have dumped the 5200 for the 7800, given a choice in the matter?

 

You forget that the 7800 is downward compatible to the bigger success of both consoles, the 2600.

 

Opcode's games have proven that the CV's abilities were all too often untapped, and that it was capable of far more. Perhaps we'll see 7800 homebrewers who will show this for the 7800?

 

Untapped potential does not mean being able to port games from each platform to another, but to use the strengths of the hardware. And, besides, even if you are a master coder, you still need a great game. I'll take any good 2600 game over a badly or even mediocre designed 7800/CV/NES/SNES game. That is a concept which defies the whole purpose of these nonsensical "7800 vs...." threads. Nonsensical from a gamer's perspective...

Edited August 19, 2008 by Vigo

[Atari2008]

Untapped potential does not mean being able to port games from each platform to another, but to use the strengths of the hardware. And, besides, even if you are a master coder, you still need a great game. I'll take any good 2600 game over a badly or even mediocre designed 7800/CV/NES/SNES game. That is a concept which defies the whole purpose of these nonsensical "7800 vs...." threads. Nonsensical from a gamer's perspective...

 

I agree, for me that's the reason I keep coming back to the 2600. Although the 7800 is graphically superior and capable of more advanced gameplay, the game library leaves a lot to be desired. Whereas the 2600 had a lot more games that are just plain fun to play. So I'll take basic graphics and sounds any day over a crappy game.

Edited August 19, 2008 by Atari2008

[CV Gus]

I'm sorry to say this, Vigo, but you still simply do not understand what I'm saying, and you do seem to get just a bit arrogant at times.

 

The fact that the CV does not have built-in scrolling is absolutely meaningless by itself. All that matters is the fact that it clearly is capable of it, and smooth scrolling at that. So unless smooth scrolling on the CV comes at such a prohibitive cost that there isn't ever any point in doing it- and Matt Patrol, Nova Blast, B.C's Quest For Tires, Cosmo Fighter 2, and Moonsweeper show otherwise- then all a reasonable person can say is that although the CV can do smooth scrolling, it is not one of its strong points (here's why...). Quite frankly, judging by the fact that you gave up on 7800 programming after a few demo programs, and Supercat's replies in the other thread, I'm not sure you fully understand either CV or 7800 real limits and abilities. You obviously have know-how, but maybe not enough to give a proper comparison. I don't ask the same questions over and over, unless someone can never actually answer them. Simply knowing paper tech-specs is not nearly enough; I'm looking to get answers dealing with the practical. If a system can do something through indirect means, without crippling itself in other areas, then that's all that counts, although in a business cost/schedule sense, built-in things may well count.

 

You keep saying that the CV does not have built-in scrolling- in fact, you keep saying that, WE GET THE POINT! That does NOT answer the question, since those games I bring up DO have smooth scrolling, so obviously there are ways around the problem. Do you know what limitations there are to this? If so, what? How do they compare to the 7800 limitations you yourself kept bringing up?

 

You said Matt Patrol is impressive for a CV, but not for a 5200. Like how? Both are equally smooth. The 5200 version is blockier than the CV version. By my standards, had the CV version been completed, it would have been better than the 5200 version overall (esp. character graphics), and the more colors in the 5200 background would be countered by the blockiness. And the levels with the buildings in the CV version are more impressive.

 

Can't the CV only show three sprites/line before you get flickering?

 

7800 compatibility with 2600 games meant a lot less in 1984 than it did in 1982, and even less than in 1986-1988 (depending on when the 7800 was first available wherever one was).

 

The NES, overall, is no technical match for the SMS and Genesis, but people weren't exactly rushing to dump the NES for those other two. So why would it be different for the 5200 or CV with the 7800 or NES? Remember that Nintendo itself did not at first dare to take on the American market, which is why they wanted to sell the American (and possibly European?) rights to the NES to Atari. Brand loyalty, maybe.

 

I am only interested in the end results, not just tech-specs. They do not tell everything; if one goes by them and them alone, then one would assume that the CV cannot do ANY scrolling ("it's not built in" does NOT equal "cannot do"). In the case of scrolling, Sirius and Matt Patrol prove that both the 7800 and CV can handle it- the only question is to what extent? What limitations? Again, you have yet to actually answer this; those two pages from before at least answered 7800 limitations.

 

Q.- Could the 7800 handle Moon Patrol? If not, then WHY? I don't think I'm being unreasonable in wanting a side-by-side comparison, with practical explanations. In the Digital Press, such was given a few years ago between two recent systems- including why the particular specification did not say it all. That's what I'm looking for here.

Edited August 20, 2008 by CV Gus

[8th lutz]

Q.- Could the 7800 handle Moon Patrol?

 

Moon Patrol was completed for the Atari 7800. It wasn't released due to the fact Atari couldn't find a way to market the game. This is according to the Digital Press Collector's Guide.

 

No prototype of the game has been found yet, sadly .

 

This answers question if the 7800 could hand Moon Patrol. Moon Patrol Wouldn't be been completed if the Atai 7800 was not capable of handling it.

Edited August 20, 2008 by 8th lutz

[DracIsBack]

Q.- Could the 7800 handle Moon Patrol? If not, then WHY? I don't think I'm being unreasonable in wanting a side-by-side comparison, with practical explanations. In the Digital Press, such was given a few years ago between two recent systems- including why the particular specification did not say it all. That's what I'm looking for here.

 

 

Handle is an "all or nothing" term.

 

One could look at Moon Patrol and say "of course" ... there's a 2600 version.

 

[supercat]

So unless smooth scrolling on the CV comes at such a prohibitive cost that there isn't ever any point in doing it

 

Most systems that have hardware support for smooth scrolling can smoothly scroll most or all types of screens that they can display statically. Almost any system can smooth-scroll some type of display. Even the original PET, which had no bitmap or hardware scrolling facilities, could have scrolled a 46x25 pseudo-bitmap (using blocks of 7x8 hardware pixels) on increments of one hardware pixel. The Colecovision can be made to produce displays that smoothly scroll horizontally or vertically, but the display content must be severely restricted. By contrast, the NES can probably scroll smoothly anything it can display in the first place.

[malducci]

supercat is right. The method for smooth scrolling on the CV, as vigo already stated technically, it very limiting. Very limiting. It's based on "animated" tiles if you will. This effect has also been used in conjunction with hardware scrolling on NES, SMS, and even PC-Engine to give it more simulated multiple layers to scrolling. But back to the CV's case, doing the animated tile method also cuts in on your color choices for horizontal scrolling (vertical is less limited). Animated tile also limits you to type and/or number of tiles you can have onscreen. It looks good in some situations because of X exploit. And "X" specifications/requirements can be very narrow in design choice.

Edited August 21, 2008 by malducci

[Vigo]

The fact that the CV does not have built-in scrolling is absolutely meaningless by itself. All that matters is the fact that it clearly is capable of it, and smooth scrolling at that.

 

Which, as I said again, is nothing special. All hardware architectures which support at least redefinale characters or bitmapped screens scan do some sort of smooth scrolling using the CPU. This, as I said again and again and again and again, is much more limited and CPU intensive than hardware scrolling.

 

So unless smooth scrolling on the CV comes at such a prohibitive cost that there isn\'t ever any point in doing it- and Matt Patrol, Nova Blast, B.C\'s Quest For Tires, Cosmo Fighter 2, and Moonsweeper show otherwise

 

Those games aren\'t exactly very demanding. They pretty much use every trick available on the CV to achieve something which is pretty much unimpressive on architectures which support hardware scrolling.

Edited August 21, 2008 by Vigo

[Vigo]

- then all a reasonable person can say is that although the CV can do smooth scrolling, it is not one of its strong points (here\'s why...).

 

The Colecovision can do as well "smooth scrolling" as an 1977 Apple II. Nothing in the Colecovision hardware is build to make games scroll. The CPU has to do all the work. Therefore, you are the person being unreasonable and strongly misguided about the concept on "smooth scrolling" on the Colecovision.

 

Quite frankly, judging by the fact that you gave up on 7800 programming after a few demo programs, and Supercat\'s replies in the other thread, I\'m not sure you fully understand either CV or 7800 real limits and abilities.

 

And quite frankly, I don't give a hoot about the opinion of someone, who has never programmed the 7800 at all (and I pretty much doubt you know anything about programming and hardware architectures at all), and doesn't even know what a PAL television is.

 

Facts remains facts, no matter how many ad hominem attacks you are throwing at me: YOU are the one who clearly lacks even the most simple understanding in these matters.

 

You obviously have know-how, but maybe not enough to give a proper comparison.

 

And you, the one without the slightest bit of knowledge, are to be the judge about my abilities. :lol:

 

I don't ask the same questions over and over, unless someone can never actually answer them. Simply knowing paper tech-specs is not nearly enough; I'm looking to get answers dealing with the practical.

 

Who are you to judge what is "nearly enough" ? You don't understand even the most primitive basics of what WE (yes, not only me) are talking about.

 

If a system can do something through indirect means, without crippling itself in other areas, then that\'s all that counts

 

Proof again you did not understand anything we were talking about.

 

You keep saying that the CV does not have built-in scrolling- in fact, you keep saying that, WE GET THE POINT! That does NOT answer the question, since those games I bring up DO have smooth scrolling, so obviously there are ways around the problem. Do you know what limitations there are to this?

 

I, and other people, explained it almost a dozen times to you. But it's more like teaching tap dance to a monkey than making you understand what the difference is between hardware and software scrolling, and what the consequences are.

 

If so, what? How do they compare to the 7800 limitations you yourself kept bringing up?

 

Simple, the Colecovision needs to spend a huge amount of CPU power and memory to shift and copy graphics around to achieve smooth scrolling. This has been mentioned several times before, also by other people than me, my dear friend. In comparision to the Colecovision, the 7800 is only limited in resolution and sound. In Colours, number of objects and scrolling, it is vastly superior to the Colecovision, simply because Maria CAN do it.

 

You said Matt Patrol is impressive for a CV, but not for a 5200. Like how? Both are equally smooth. The 5200 version is blockier than the CV version. By my standards, had the CV version been completed, it would have been better than the 5200 version overall (esp. character graphics), and the more colors in the 5200 background would be countered by the blockiness. And the levels with the buildings in the CV version are more impressive.

 

The Colecovision, as I said again, will have great trouble in smooth scrolling full-screen, fully coloured tile displays, because you would have to shift ALL character graphics in VRAM using the CPU, and furthermore, the fixed 8x8 colour attribute boundaries, which can NOT be made to scroll, pretty much prevent it from using colour attributes freely. The 5200 has no problems with it, since it can move and shift all tiles per hardware. The same with the 7800 and NES. Thats exactly the purpose of hardware scrolling.

 

Can't the CV only show three sprites/line before you get flickering?

 

No, 4. You even fail to research the most simple facts about this chip.

 

And the Colecovision doesn't "flicker" sprites, it simply drops them. Flickering is achieved through software by cycling the Sprite priorities.

 

7800 compatibility with 2600 games meant a lot less in 1984 than it did in 1982, and even less than in 1986-1988 (depending on when the 7800 was first available wherever one was).

 

It surely means nothing looking at the huge software library of the 7800...

 

The NES, overall, is no technical match for the SMS and Genesis, but people weren\'t exactly rushing to dump the NES for those other two.

 

The NES still has the superior sound compared to the SMS.

In case of the NES, it is clearly the software which drove the hardware. But that is irrelevant in regards to the lack of scrolling capabilities of the Colecovision.

 

So why would it be different for the 5200 or CV with the 7800 or NES?

 

The Colecovision was produced before the videogame crash, the NES revived the market through 1 single game: Super Mario Bros, which is still the most sold game in history (40.000.000).

 

Remember that Nintendo itself did not at first dare to take on the American market, which is why they wanted to sell the American (and possibly European?) rights to the NES to Atari. Brand loyalty, maybe.

 

Yeah, blablabla, it's completely irrelevant to your original question, which ironically is purely technical in nature, but you refuse to accept any technical explanation, to compensate for your lack of knowledge. So, as a discussion partner, all you have to offer in this discussion is whining and bickering.

 

I am only interested in the end results, not just tech-specs.

 

Well, then this whole discussion is pointless, because the tech-specs clearly determine what a hardware can and can not do. Besides, if you consider the \"end results\" (the whole software library of the Colecovision), the Colecovision would be a far worse machine than the MSX1, although both architectures are almost similar. That\'s why the best way to discuss these matters is on a technical level. It is not my or other people's fault if you fail to comprehend or participate in these discussions.

 

They do not tell everything;

 

Only if they are imcomplete, like the illegal opcodes or other hardware tricks on the C64 and other 8bit architectures.

They do not tell YOU anything.

 

if one goes by them and them alone, then one would assume that the CV cannot do ANY scrolling ("it's not built in" does NOT equal "cannot do").

 

I have always said that the Colecovision can not do hardware scrolling and this remains true, no matter how much you ignore and twist my words. In the previous post>>s<<, I already explained to you that pretty much any hardware with redefinable characters or a bitmap display can do some sort of scrolling, since *drum roll* CPU's are made to move data! Now, get through your head again why, other architectures are even considering implementing hardware scrolling.

 

In the case of scrolling, Sirius and Matt Patrol prove that both the 7800 and CV can handle it- the only question is to what extent? What limitations?

 

We already told you several times. And I won't go into further detail until you, at least, try to read the other posts in this and those other idiotic "7800 vs..." threads.

 

Again, you have yet to actually answer this; those two pages from before at least answered 7800 limitations.

 

No, I already did it several times in several threads. Besides, >>I<< have to do nothing. It is >>you<< who is whining and constantly requesting people to spoon-feed >>you<<.

 

Q.- Could the 7800 handle Moon Patrol? If not, then WHY? I don't think I'm being unreasonable in wanting a side-by-side comparison, with practical explanations. In the Digital Press, such was given a few years ago between two recent systems- including why the particular specification did not say it all. That's what I'm looking for here.

 

What you basically asking for is someone coding games for you to prove this point. May I be so frank and tell you that your lack of education in those fields simply isn't worth it? How much arrogant can one get?

 

Stop asking technical questions. You are a non-technical minded person. You are a gamer. And a gamer should play games instead of wasting other people's time.

 

And, if I may be so frank, you are as much, if not more, arrogant than me, with the big distinction that, contrary to myself, you have NOTHING (and I mean REALLY NOTHING) in your hands to participate in this discussion, yet, you are constantly trying to question people's knowledge, instead of listening and comprehending. Trying to educate you on these matters is like feeding a black hole. You are consuming energy, yet, you give nothing back to this universe.

Edited August 21, 2008 by Vigo

[DracIsBack]

CV Gus - I'm at a loss as to what you want to get out of these threads that hasn't already been said.

 

The strengths and the weaknesses of the graphical architecture of the Colecovision has been discussed ... ad nauseum.

The strengths and the weaknesses of the graphical architecture of the Atari 7800 has been discussed ... ad nauseum.

The strengths and the weaknesses of the graphical architecture of the Nintendo Entertainment System has been discussed ... ad nauseum.

We've even talked about the C64, Sega Master System and Turbografx 16.

 

It's also been said, numerous times, that the libraries of any of the consoles probably don't truly reflect "the best" of what they can possibly do.

 

Can the 7800 "Moon Patrol"? Sure ... there are versions of that game on the Colecovision, the 2600 and Atari XL etc. Why couldn't it do a version? Heck, the are versions of Double Dragon on both the Atari 2600 and Sega Genesis.

 

The considerations that would have to be taken into account with any system have been discussed, ad nauseum.

 

It almost sounds like you want to give a group of 7800 programmers and a group of Colecovision programmers the challenge of making At the rate you're going, MOON PATROL to see who could more closely mirror the arcade version and report their findings on how they tackled various problems presented by the game and bringing it to a particular architecture.

 

Seriously dude - the discussion has been a good one, but I think you'd do well to go back and re-read what has been said, setting aside "anger". You may pick up something you missed last time or something that makes more sense given later explanations.

 

My two cents.

[Gorf]

Colecovision/7800/SMS... what ever!

Try coding performance on an Astrocade system without any help but magic ram.

It shifts the pixels for you..woopdie doo! Oh it can also expand pixels and Or and Xor.

 

Even still, the Astrocade is a great system that was designed more as an expandable

computer that played games. I would have loved to see the Z-Grass come out for that

unit. Talk about vaporware! ...well protos supposedly exsist somewhere.

 

I think you Colecovision/7800/SMS... what ever codrs have it easy actually.

[Rik]

For whatever technical reasons the CV is superior over the 7800,and vice versa,for the ones who dont have one or the other...just get both systems and enjoy what both have to offer ,i say. Edited August 22, 2008 by Rik

[RangerG]

To continue the conversation, if Coleco had gone ahead with the Super Module - would it have then competed with the next generation (7800, SMS, NES)?

[Vigo]

Colecovision/7800/SMS... what ever!

Try coding performance on an Astrocade system without any help but magic ram.

It shifts the pixels for you..woopdie doo! Oh it can also expand pixels and Or and Xor.

 

The Astrocade has 4K of ram, you spoiled brat! The most prominent system where your ability and ingeniuity as a coder directly translates into gameplay is clearly the good old 2600.

 

I think you Colecovision/7800/SMS... what ever codrs have it easy actually.

 

From that perspective, you are right. Nevertheless, if you talking about minimalist CPU driven hardware, hardly anything beats the 2600.

 

4k of video ram...

Edited August 22, 2008 by Vigo

[Gorf]

The Astrocade has 4K of ram, you spoiled brat! The most prominent system where your ability and ingeniuity as a coder directly translates into gameplay is clearly the good old 2600.

 

No argument on that but I'd till like a few player missile or sprites.

 

From that perspective, you are right. Nevertheless, if you talking about minimalist CPU driven hardware, hardly anything beats the 2600.

4k of video ram...

 

 

4k of video ram is more to my argument, in the fact that most of it is for the screen. Unless you want to eat up more and

more of the viewable screen, you really only use a few lines off the bottom of the screen. Typically, I set aside 256 bytes.

Everything else I do it usually ROM based and table driven. The magic RAM has its usefulness but its hardly a player/missile

or sprite. The other thing that sucks is the hardware rotator is only operational in high res mode and the astrocade does not

have the ability to be expanded to 16k vid ram....unless you want to hack the hell out of the thing. It's no easy task either.

Magic at best saves you a few cycles by doing the necessary bit shifting you'd need to do in software. It also does flipping

OR and XOR writes and rotation in hi res.

 

The one other thing with the Astrocade is the interrupt line feature which makes it rather simple to get more colors on screen.

The interrupt system also makes music easy to do. Other than this everything IS the Z-80. The Address, DATA and I/O chip

can't do any of their own processing outside of the magic functions and memory handling. The worst blunder of the Astrocade

however, is the expander connector not having the needed signals to add the other 3 banks of RAM to the Address and Data

chips which build the display together. Im sure cost played a part in that decision.

 

 

Nonetheless 4k of ram in a vid console is spoiled.