Doom 32x Beta

[Da_Shocker]

CAn somebody point me out to this beta?

[Silanda]

It was on the page Kool Kitty89 linked to earlier, but here's the specific page: http://www.hidden-palace.org/?releases/98

[kool kitty89]

The 32X port DOES do the "standard" PC VGA style lighting. When Doom starts on the first level, look at the ceiling... see how the brightness drops the further away you go? That's the way it works for 256 color mode on the PC as well. The way that works is that there is a translation table for each light level that converts the 256 color pixel value being drawn to another 256 color value that represents the same color at a different light level. The ambient light level for where the player is located combined with the distance from the player determines which light table to use while drawing the pixel. This yields rather lousy results, but it's quick and only needs 256 colors (paletted).

For a nice description, see this link: http://doom.wikia.com/wiki/COLORMAP

I know what the PC lighting looks like; I've played the DOS version enough to know... fairly choppy lighting gradients with posterized textures at times. The 32x version doen't have it, or at very least, not on any version I've played in fusion. The SNES version definitely has the simple 256 color shading, but the only lighting effects I see in the 32x port are simile on/off light flicker. (the jack has super smooth gouraud shading, of course)
This is most definitely real hardware, and I can't see it there either.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6XjRUBcV2hA


The Xbox emulated port in Doom 3 retains the original lighting and rendering style quite clearly for example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaxZ1x5v4Fs

[Nuxius]

That has to do with the screen size, not the use of original textures... (other than a few parts of th elevels removed like the pillars next to the staircase)

I was referring to the screen size, sorry I didn't make that clear enough. The texture changes were obviously due to the cart size limit placed upon them by Sega.

Dithering? What dithering did they use more than the PC original?

No other version of Doom uses any form of dithering (unless it was applied to the texture beforehand). It's unique to the 32X version.

Do you mean th elow detail mode with 1/2 horizontal resolution? (which 32x, Jag, and SNES also used -plus PC if you selected it)

That is a completely different thing and not related to dithering at all.

What would be the point of that? Piggybackign on the space optimizations of the Jag port does make some sense, but it's not entirely clear how much less efficient the earlier builds are. (there's no level select to get a quick glance at the number of levels and such)

Two magic words: Cart space. That and memory constraints as well. (as we found out when we tried to port MAP20 from the Jag port over to the 32X port)

What makes less sense is that similar cuts were made fromt he 3DO and PSX/Saturn ports (including missing enemies/bosses iirc) where storage limitations were no longer an issue.

The only enemies the PSX and Saturn versions are missing are the Boss Cube and the Arch-vile. Both were due to memory constraints. (this was mentioned in an interview with the PSX team)

As far as using the Jag level set goes, it was mostly due to time constraints for the PSX version. For the 3DO port it was mostly the same. For the Saturn port it was a bit of that, added with a lot laziness and just plain carelessness.

The SNES version is the epitome of compromise though, only 2 MB of ROM, more limited RAM, and a great deal of trade-offs made with the limitations -perhaps a bit less extreme if the SNES CPU is handling some of the game logic. (it would seem that some other ports could have been better witht he lesser limitations and similar compromises -the SNES port was a fair bit later)

You have to remember though that SNES Doom (like GBA Doom 2) uses a custom engine built from the ground up.

Plus, wasn't it a Japanese team developting it?

American.

[Chilly Willy]

No other version of Doom uses any form of dithering (unless it was applied to the texture beforehand). It's unique to the 32X version.

Incorrect. The 32X uses low-detail mode like all the other (low-end) console ports. There is no dithering. Sounds like you're looking at Doom 32X in an emulator with filtering and TV processing turned on. Turn off filtering, turn off the TV post-processing, turn off the aspect correction, and look again - pixels are just doubled horizontally... it's plain old low-detail mode.

[kool kitty89]

I was referring to the screen size, sorry I didn't make that clear enough. The texture changes were obviously due to the cart size limit placed upon them by Sega.

Hmm, yeah, but note that all the protos and final version used 3 MB, so no more space, however I'm not sure how much is in the early versions. (and how much they later cut to fit in more levels)

[QUOTE]
No other version of Doom uses any form of dithering (unless it was applied to the texture beforehand). It's unique to the 32X version.[/quote could you post an emulator screenshot to show what you mean. It sounds like you mean the vertical bars seen on some textures, but that's just an artifact from low detail mode, PC looks about the same when set to low detail. F5)

If you mean texture dithering, that's another issue, and still unrelated to rendering. (just an art choice due to limited colors)

The only enemies the PSX and Saturn versions are missing are the Boss Cube and the Arch-vile. Both were due to memory constraints. (this was mentioned in an interview with the PSX team)

So limited RAM space? That would inply the 3DO version was just a sloppy port as it has just a much RAM as the PSX. (2 MB main 1 MB VRAM)

American.

Hmm, on the GEMS issue, another reson would be the MIDI support, that would certianyl make a conversion simpler from one MIDI format to another. Still, the choice of soem instruments, even for GEMS was poor. (especially the lead instrument in E1M1, that and the bass drum or whatever that comes in -the occasional riffs and such are at least as good, if not better than in Adlib/SB on PC -again no SB16/pro specific support)

[T2KFreeker]

So limited RAM space? That would inply the 3DO version was just a sloppy port as it has just a much RAM as the PSX. (2 MB main 1 MB VRAM)

Yup, that was the huge problem with the 3DO port of DOOM. The system actually could have handled a decent version of DOOM but Art Data was not only inexperienced with programming for the 3DO, they were also rushing to get it out before the 32-X version of the game. Very sad indeed because the soundtrack was amazing and still one of the best ever using the original style DOOM music.

[kool kitty89]

I wouldn't be surprised if the 3DO port is all software rendered, not using the 3DO's GPU or matrix coprocessor at all. (not sure how useful the coprocessor is for faycasting calculations, it was intended to 3D calculations rather like the PSX's GTE) The GPU could do affine texture mapping fine, but did have to contend for bandwidth with the CPU. (still much faster than software rendering I'd immagine)

[Grounder]

I played numerous Doom 32X betas. It's pretty interesting seeing how they wanted the soundtrack and levels closer to the original in several of the betas.

Over time, they got lazy and gave us the final version. :-/

[OldSchool]

Watched the 32X review... wow, that sucks with the screen real estate being so small. I don't see how anyone could stand playing that way.

[Silanda]

Yup, that was the huge problem with the 3DO port of DOOM. The system actually could have handled a decent version of DOOM but Art Data was not only inexperienced with programming for the 3DO, they were also rushing to get it out before the 32-X version of the game.

Couple of corrections from what I recall from back in the day. After over a year of hyping the vaporware that was this game, ADI finally farmed the coding out to Bill (now Rebecca) Heineman, who was not at all inexperienced with the system having coded the excellent 3do version of Wolfenstein. It was a port of the Jag version that was extremely rushed however(developed in about 10 weeks), but AFAIK due to ADI's incompetence rather than competition with the 32x version (it wasn't released until early '96).

Their incompetence was such that the version that made it to store shelves wasn't even the gold version that had been turned in, it was an earlier beta.