Cybermorph

[superjudge3]

This game is at least 25 times better than the SNES Starfox.

 

Why does it get such a bad rap, I've only beaten the first few worlds or so and I'm already addicted. This game alone should have made everyone out there want a Jaguar.

 

Any thoughts?

[The_Laird]

I have to admit the first time I played this game I was totally amazed, i'd never seen 3D this good. While its been surpassed its still a very playable game today.

[Starcat]

Hi!

 

This game is at least 25 times better than the SNES Starfox. 

 

Why does it get such a bad rap, I've only beaten the first few worlds or so and I'm already addicted. This game alone should have made everyone out there want a Jaguar.

 

Any thoughts?

919731[/snapback]

 

Graphically Cybermorph may be superior to Starfox (not much of a surprise as the Jag hardware is clearly better at 3D than a SNES even with FX chip), but gameplay wise Starfox clearly is better. Cybermorph gets very repetive after a few missions.

 

But I fully agree that Cybermorph is by far not as bad as many people make it, there are much worse 3D games on the Jag. Both graphically and gameplay wise..

 

Regards, Lars.

[SteveW]

When Cybermorph came out, all the game magazines raved about it. It was more advanced than anything that they'd ever played before. I loved Cybermorph, but Battlemorph is far superior. A lot more work was put into it, and it shows. The levels are far more interesting, to say the least, the graphics and draw-in distance were improved, and the music was fantastic.

[goatdan]

Cybermorph was a genre-defining game. We can attribute at least a little portion of many go-anywhere 3D mission based games to it. Grand Theft Auto III? Same basic idea as Cybermorph.

 

Why does Cybermorph get a bad rap? There are a few reasons for that. The first and the biggest is that it simply hasn't held up so well over time. Super Mario Brothers defined the 2D platformer genre, and even though other more complex 2D platformers came out like Super Mario World, Sonic and Rayman, the original SMB still holds up extremely well. Cybermorph simply didn't. When Battlemorph came out, it was such a huge step above Cybermorph that CM was all but forgotten. And the games in this genre have come SO far now... who wants to return to the roots that were SO simple that it just involved going around and collecting pods with a very short draw-in rate on the Jaguar?

 

This brings in another problem. Early 3D games don't hold up as well over time as 2D games do. A well designed 2D game like Pitfall for the 2600 or even Adventure still have a great charm to them because the graphics don't get in the way of the gameplay at all. Cybermorph, with its very short draw-in distance reminds the person constantly that this is an early 3D game, and that they could pick a new game that would have no draw-in and would have at least equal gameplay. The limitations of early 3D games affect their playability when viewed over time, while the limitations of early 2D games just forced the designers to come up with gameplay styles that would fit.

 

When it came out, people had never seen a go-anywhere 3D game before. Games like Star Fox and some of the arcade games of the day hadn't done anything like that before. That's why it floored many people immediately and won so many accolades. It was completely fresh and new. Now it isn't.

 

Finally, Cybermorph is a Jaguar game. While I think (and most of us on the board think) that the Jaguar was a decent system, it is the butt of many jokes for gaming magazines. I feel that this is because many of them believed very strongly in it, but they got burned by the fact that Atari couldn't deliver the games or the graphics that Atari promised when they were promoting the system. When the Saturn and Playstation (and to a lesser extent, the 3DO) came out, they showed the public how much could be done with 3D with less than 64 bits. And Atari's marketing campaign fell apart at the seams.

 

It especially hurt Atari that instead of making games that looked like Checkered Flag, which was what the Jaguar's strong suit was, they insisted on trying to texture map everything, which the Jaguar didn't have the hardware to do. Cybermorph was done with the guorad-shaded polygons correctly, but since it wasn't optimized for the Jaguar, they didn't look too special. If the Jaguar had a ton of great looking guorad -shaded games, they could've carved themselves a niche. Instead, they fell back upon trying to do what everyone else was doing -- and they did it really poorly -- and it made a lot of people disillusioned with the whole system. So Cybermorph gets lumped in as a game that was a disappointment and a horrible game, although it really belongs in a class with games like Adventure, Super Mario Brothers and Sonic -- truly innovative games that changed the direction of the industry.

[Flojomojo]

When the Jaguar first game out, I was very tempted, but since Cybermorph's 3D polygon graphics weren't any better than Spectre on my Mac LCIII, I held off for many years. Unfortunately, it hasn't aged well, either. StarFox doesn't push as much geometry, but its movie-like presentation is much more sophisticated and exciting than Cybermorph's.

 

Cybermorph is the paleolithic ancestor of Star Wars: Rogue Squadron on the N64. It just lacks tension, decent sound, a compelling plotline, tight controls, and pretty graphics. Otherwise, it's a great game!

[Uber Troll]

CyberMorph was a cool game at the time as that it had 3D polygons at all.

 

The main issue to me is that the framerate is simply WAY too slow. Much like the link between frame rate and the responsiveness of a character in Quake, the incredibly slow screen updates poison the gameplay.

 

The storyline and gamedesign were excellent though, with plenty of detail, surprises, puzzles and hidden places. Too bad it hurt so much to play.

 

 

BTW-When someone says anything positive about Checkered Flag, I immediately question their mental competency.

[Flojomojo]

BTW-When someone says anything positive about Checkered Flag, I immediately question their mental competency.

920223[/snapback]

Checkered Flag looks great -- in still screen shots.

 

It plays great, too -- on the Lynx.

[SteveW]

It especially hurt Atari that instead of making games that looked like Checkered Flag, which was what the Jaguar's strong suit was, they insisted on trying to texture map everything, which the Jaguar didn't have the hardware to do.  Cybermorph was done with the guorad-shaded polygons correctly, but since it wasn't optimized for the Jaguar, they didn't look too special.  If the Jaguar had a ton of great looking guorad -shaded games, they could've carved themselves a niche.  Instead, they fell back upon trying to do what everyone else was doing -- and they did it really poorly -- and it made a lot of people disillusioned with the whole system.

920062[/snapback]

 

I don't know about that, Hover Strike CD had everything textured, and even had some cool lighting effects and animated ground textures that the cartridge didn't. A lot of the problem with Jag games was the size of cartridges as compared to CDs. And the Jag had memory problems, too. According to John Carmack when he talked on Slashdot about developing Doom for the Jag, the odd memory scheme limited the texturemapping performance. If I remember correctly, it was something about scratchpad memory instead of 'real' memory.

[TheGrandPubaa]

It especially hurt Atari that instead of making games that looked like Checkered Flag, which was what the Jaguar's strong suit was, they insisted on trying to texture map everything, which the Jaguar didn't have the hardware to do.  Cybermorph was done with the guorad-shaded polygons correctly, but since it wasn't optimized for the Jaguar, they didn't look too special.  If the Jaguar had a ton of great looking guorad -shaded games, they could've carved themselves a niche.  Instead, they fell back upon trying to do what everyone else was doing -- and they did it really poorly -- and it made a lot of people disillusioned with the whole system.

920062[/snapback]

 

I don't know about that, Hover Strike CD had everything textured, and even had some cool lighting effects and animated ground textures that the cartridge didn't. A lot of the problem with Jag games was the size of cartridges as compared to CDs. And the Jag had memory problems, too. According to John Carmack when he talked on Slashdot about developing Doom for the Jag, the odd memory scheme limited the texturemapping performance. If I remember correctly, it was something about scratchpad memory instead of 'real' memory.

920239[/snapback]

 

Or maybe it has something to do with the 4k local pipeline? Oh, and it's good to remember that the 68000 was/is a bus hog, so that limits the overall ablities of the Jaguar as well, unless you base your engine on the 68000 primarily; I guess it's alright in that scenario.

[sega saturn x]

But I fully agree that Cybermorph is by far not as bad as many people make it, there are much worse 3D games on the Jag. Both graphically and gameplay wise..

I just figured i would point out that just because there are worse games on the jaguar does not make cybermorph any better.

We can attribute at least a little portion of many go-anywhere 3D mission based games to it. Grand Theft Auto III? Same basic idea as Cybermorph.

That seems like a pretty gigantic stretch, since I'm sure that there were go any where games before cybermorph came out.

This game is at least 25 times better than the SNES Starfox

Star fox really isn't all that great it's C grade and cybermorph is more along the lines of D grade.

[TheGrandPubaa]

But I fully agree that Cybermorph is by far not as bad as many people make it, there are much worse 3D games on the Jag. Both graphically and gameplay wise..

I just figured i would point out that just because there are worse games on the jaguar does not make cybermorph any better.

We can attribute at least a little portion of many go-anywhere 3D mission based games to it. Grand Theft Auto III? Same basic idea as Cybermorph.

That seems like a pretty gigantic stretch, since I'm sure that there were go any where games before cybermorph came out.

This game is at least 25 times better than the SNES Starfox

Star fox really isn't all that great it's C grade and cybermorph is more along the lines of D grade.

920575[/snapback]

Ouch, man. Now you're stomping on my territory...Star Fox is classic. It's fun, and that makes it infinitely better than even the more highly advanced shooters that have come since then. But, that's just one man's opinion.

[goatdan]

BTW-When someone says anything positive about Checkered Flag, I immediately question their mental competency.

920223[/snapback]

Checkered Flag looks great -- in still screen shots.

 

It plays great, too -- on the Lynx.

920233[/snapback]

 

I wasn't saying anything positive about Checkered Flag's gameplay, which is absolutely abysmal. But the graphical presentation that it has is what the Jaguar's strong suit is / was. Texture Mapping became the buzzword though, and low and behold everything needed that on the Jaguar too then, instead of them carving out their own niche.

 

I don't know about that, Hover Strike CD had everything textured, and even had some cool lighting effects and animated ground textures that the cartridge didn't. A lot of the problem with Jag games was the size of cartridges as compared to CDs. And the Jag had memory problems, too. According to John Carmack when he talked on Slashdot about developing Doom for the Jag, the odd memory scheme limited the texturemapping performance. If I remember correctly, it was something about scratchpad memory instead of 'real' memory.

920239[/snapback]

 

Hover Strike's framerate suffers though no matter where you play it. And it wasn't the size or the compression rate of the cartridges -- if I recall correctly, Hover Strike was on a 2MB cart, so if it needed space it could've gone on a 4MB cart -- but the fact that the system was still relatively "new" when it was being programmed, and Atari didn't really help third parties develop games. So the improvements on HSCD are mostly due to the fact the programmers learned new tricks, not the media being better.

 

 

We can attribute at least a little portion of many go-anywhere 3D mission based games to it. Grand Theft Auto III? Same basic idea as Cybermorph.

That seems like a pretty gigantic stretch, since I'm sure that there were go any where games before cybermorph came out.

920575[/snapback]

 

Oh good, you're still here.

 

Cybermorph has actually had the fact it was the first 3D go-anywhere style game mentioned many times. Since you're so smart, why don't you name another go-anywhere 3D console game that came out before it?

[Smiley]

I got a copy of this game with a boxed jag from ebay, played it once and never got into it. Bored me. And StarFox, gameplay wise is surely better than Cybermorph. no comparison.

[sega saturn x]

Cybermorph has actually had the fact it was the first 3D go-anywhere style game mentioned many times. Since you're so smart, why don't you name another go-anywhere 3D console game that came out before it?

You know i never said go anywhere 3-d or console game, but i can name a game that is on the pc and lets you go anywhere, ultima.It always seemed to me that GTA borrowed a lot of ideas from PC games like that, and less from cybermorph. Come on you have to admit that's a huge stretch.

Edited August 29, 2005 by sega saturn x

[jesusc]

Battlezone?

[The_Laird]

You didn't actully go anywhere in Battlezone. The tanks were 3d but it was a 2d background that just scrolled. So no.

[ZylonBane]

You didn't actully go anywhere in Battlezone. The tanks were 3d but it was a 2d background that just scrolled.

At least Battlezone had a background. Cybermorph just had a nondescript gradient. So no, you can't use that argument to dismiss Battlezone.

 

I nominate Flight Simulator II on the XEGS. It's a terrible example, but it's there, so deal with it.

[+davidcalgary29]

Mercenary is, perhaps, a better example. IMO, of course.

[JagChris]

I don't really think Battlemorph was all that great a game. People keep saying that they think so much more work and effort was put into it. I don't see that. It seems to me like they just used the same engine with a little different graphics and some new enemies. It was easier to beat than Cybermorph. I was disappointed in Battlemorph. It seems like they didn't even really try. Although folks like Oppressor and such think Battlemorph is a great game and I respect their opinion I just don't see where theysupposedly put all this new work into Battlemorph or that its that much better than Cybermorph.

[jesusc]

Driller, 1987, by Incentive Software.

[walter_J64bit]

Mercenary is, perhaps, a better example. IMO, of course. 

920868[/snapback]

 

That game took me 2 years to bet!

[goatdan]

Cybermorph has actually had the fact it was the first 3D go-anywhere style game mentioned many times. Since you're so smart, why don't you name another go-anywhere 3D console game that came out before it?

You know i never said go anywhere 3-d or console game, but i can name a game that is on the pc and lets you go anywhere, ultima.It always seemed to me that GTA borrowed a lot of ideas from PC games like that, and less from cybermorph. Come on you have to admit that's a huge stretch.

920699[/snapback]

 

You know, I was referring to the fact that it was a go-anywhere 3D and console game, so you suddenly saying that it doesn't have anything to do with that means nothing.

 

Driller, 1987, by Incentive Software.

921265[/snapback]

 

What console did that come out on?

[superjudge3]

I like it because after you get a handle on the controls, it's a blast flying around at top speed dodging hills and buildings and blowing up bad guys. It's great!

[justclaws]

Hello,

 

I don't really think Battlemorph was all that great a game. People keep saying that they think so much more work and effort was put into it. I don't see that. It seems to me like they just used the same engine with a little different graphics and some new enemies.

How long is it since you played the two games, more than for just 2 minutes?

Really, nostalgia has a + effect, but adrenaline memory also fades, for a - too.

 

It was easier to beat than Cybermorph.

Easier to beat? Well it certainly kept me busy trying to do so for quite a while...

 

I was disappointed in Battlemorph. It seems like they didn't even really try. Although folks like Oppressor and such think Battlemorph is a great game and I respect their opinion I just don't see where theysupposedly put all this new work into Battlemorph or that its that much better than Cybermorph.

Everybody I showed BattleMorph to thought it was a great game, not just Jag fans.

 

Things like being able to shoot away the pillars from bridges to destroy enemies,

to skim along the water and then drop into it (with instant change of music), the much

better choice of colours, the longer draw distance (integrated with the background),

the larger range of enemy ships, the cut-scenes, things like the tunnels and bosses,

the different types of missions! You need to go back and refresh your memory...!

 

The only thing I hated about Cybermorph was the menu sounds, really awful...

but the game had depth, which unfortunately did not appear for a few missions.

 

Cheers,

JustClaws.

Edited August 30, 2005 by justclaws