What if Sega had quit the hardware business in `95?

[Soulis]

To then jump the gun and compare a 1996 title, to DK64 (99') or Banjo Tooie (2000) simply because Nights is considered one of the better coded efforts for the Saturn

In my opinion Banjo-Kazooie is better than Tooie, uses a 16MB cart and it was released 2 years earlier.

Anyway, TVC, i appreciate your answer and i agree on some parts. And thanks for being more informative. But my point was that, imo, Nights would be a better version assuming the same effort that they put on Saturn would be put on the N64, using the extra knowledge and tools that a 18 months of life on the market allows (See Banjo Kazooie, not Tooie). Or, if you prefer, the same percent of hardware that the game uses on the Saturn would be used on N64. There would be some drawbacks, like the sound since the Saturn has a better audio hardware. And maybe the difference wouldn't be "majestic" but i believe it would be at least noticeable. Just my opinion, taking references from other N64 platform games.

Mario 64 is not a showcase of the system, it was the best thing they could do using a 8MB cart and a very early knowledge of the hardware. Heck, Pilotwings was a better showcase imo compared to the other launch titles. Still, even so, i don't think that the Saturn had a good enough 3D hardware to pull off something like Mario 64, even with its low res textures and poly counts.

The N64 had just as many problems as the Saturn in developing games for it. Saturn had those 2 processors and the overly complex hardware and the N64 had the carts and a memory limitation that didn't allow for decent resolution textures. As early as 1997, bigger carts were introduced and some companies like RARE fixed the texture issues but overall, only a handful of companies used the N64 well. The same thing that happened with the Saturn i believe.

Sorry if my post is hard to read, my English are not perfect.

[TailsAlone]

I'd hate to think of a world where the Genesis 3 or the Dreamcast never existed, because those machines were my introduction to Sega. If Sega got out of hardware in '95, we would have been deprived of one great console and a lot of great games would never have been made, though maybe others would have...and some other company would've had to pioneer Internet console gaming. I'm happy that Sega held on as long as it could before throwing in the towel on hardware.

[TVC 15]

In my opinion Banjo-Kazooie is better than Tooie, uses a 16MB cart and it was released 2 years earlier.

Anyway, TVC, i appreciate your answer and i agree on some parts. And thanks for being more informative. But my point was that, imo, Nights would be a better version assuming the same effort that they put on Saturn would be put on the N64, using the extra knowledge and tools that a 18 months of life on the market allows (See Banjo Kazooie, not Tooie). Or, if you prefer, the same percent of hardware that the game uses on the Saturn would be used on N64. There would be some drawbacks, like the sound since the Saturn has a better audio hardware. And maybe the difference wouldn't be "majestic" but i believe it would be at least noticeable. Just my opinion, taking references from other N64 platform games.

Most SDK's point to the Saturn dev tools being finished in mid 1995, despite being launched in late 94'; the Saturn was rushed to market it and it showed in software. Gouard shading wasn't even supported in the Saturn development tools until the second revision of SGL relesed in 96'.

Miyamoto on the other hand had been fannying around with a free roaming 3D styled Mario since the Super Nintendo, using the Super FX chip. Nintendo 64 may have been a nightmare to program in its own way, but the hardware was far less buggy and Nintendo had SGI on hand for technical help. I think all things considered the Saturn's early release date made little difference, and evens out the gap to market the N64 had. Mario was showcased in 95', and it looked like the basic engine was reasonably complete, just lacking a lot of tweaks (such as the UI elements) and content such as levels. It wasn't until late 95' 96 did we see games that finally delivered visually for the Saturn.

Mario 64 is not a showcase of the system, it was the best thing they could do using a 8MB cart and a very early knowledge of the hardware. Heck, Pilotwings was a better showcase imo compared to the other launch titles. Still, even so, i don't think that the Saturn had a good enough 3D hardware to pull off something like Mario 64, even with its low res textures and poly counts.

Regardless of whether Mario 64 perceptibly 'looked' good compared to other launch titles in your own opinion, it was the game that sold the console initially, and was showcase not just in graphics and the solidity of the world Mario could roam but also in gameplay mechanics. I remember being wowed by the game when I played it on a stand in Woolworths here in the UK, it was the first real 3D game I played with perceptible 3D depth and movement, I couldn't get used to it at first and tried walking side to side as though it was a classic Mario side-scrolller.

I think the Saturn could have handled Mario 64, with some trade-offs, just in the same way there would be trade offs in the translation of Nights to Saturn. Croc is the only real indicator of a plat former of similar style to the cutesy collector platformers on the N64, and whilst I question its quality, the Saturn seems adequate enough to run the game. I will admit it did arrive a little later than Mario 64 in 97' so by my own criteria I'm a hypocrite for comparing games from different periods.

The N64 had just as many problems as the Saturn in developing games for it. Saturn had those 2 processors and the overly complex hardware and the N64 had the carts and a memory limitation that didn't allow for decent resolution textures. As early as 1997, bigger carts were introduced and some companies like RARE fixed the texture issues but overall, only a handful of companies used the N64 well. The same thing that happened with the Saturn i believe.

I can't disagree with that statement at all, your totally correct. If dev's where willing to write microcode for the N64 RDP (painful) I'm sure more dev's would have put a lot of effort into workarounds regarding the Saturns hardware and its awkward distorted quad renderer. The Saturn just wasn't a financially viable platform to support post 97' in the west.

Sorry if my post is hard to read, my English are not perfect.

Oh and btw your english is great, so don't worry about it.

[AlecRob]

Here's some theoretical games for this theoretical universe:

Sonic the Hedgehog 4 (NEO-GEO CD) (1995)
The sequel to Sonic 3 and Sonic & Knuckles has beautiful 2D graphics with sprite scaling and elaborate bosses. Also has an awesome CD soundtrack of a mix of instrumental progressive metal and jazz fusion. The game is praised by critics for its smooth gameplay, detailed graphics, elaborate boss fights, and it's unique and interesting music. It helped sell many NEO-GEO CD units.

Indy 500 (N64) (1996)
A port of the arcade game. Runs very well at a decent frame rate. Was semi-successful but sales weren't great everywhere due to lack of public awareness. Especially in the US.

Daytona USA (PS1) (1996)
A decent port of the arcade version, however it lacks any new features and is pretty much quickly forgotten by the gaming community due poor marketing. Especially after Gran Turismo is released.

After Burner IV (N64) (1996)
A 3D after burner game. Suffers from choppy graphics and slowdown. It was a huge flop. An updated version was released only in the US called "After Burner IV Deluxe" in 1999. The updated version was largely ignored by the public but was featured in a small, albeit forgettable, article in Gamepro. The game is only released in limited numbers due to lack of demand. Becomes a rare and expensive collectors item years later.

[SonicTheHedgehog]

I would of been very disappointed if they quit in 95. I hate to sound like a broken record but Instead they just should of not bothered making the Mega CD & 32X and just launched a cleanly designed 32 bit system around September 95 using a single CPU (mabee the Power PC 602) and a single powerful VDP or Graphics processing unit. Then they should of fought Sony for Tomb Raider (they couldn't compete financially but they could argue there reputation in the games industry against Sony's at the time) And in the end could of ended the 32 bit gen with hardware sales equal with the PS (roughly 50m units shifted each). Then come with the Dreamcast around September 2001 with a similar Power PC cpu to the gamecube and mabee go with the improved Power VR3 and double the ram that the original DC had. Also use the DVD format and offer DVD movie playback and backward compatibility with its September 95 launched 32 bit systems games but with no modem for around $299.99 at launch.

To strengthen the Sega brand further and give them other ways of income they should of launched a GBA handheld rival with frontlit screen and built in Lithium battery around the same time as GBA with mabee a higher price or same price with lower profit margins to build Sega's reputation further so come the following gen on consoles and handhelds more people would stand by them and trust the Sega brand.

[Team Andromeda]

Most SDK's point to the Saturn dev tools being finished in mid 1995, despite being launched in late 94'; the Saturn was rushed to market it and it showed in software. Gouard shading wasn't even supported in the Saturn development tools until the second revision of SGL relesed in 96

Saturn development tools was finished and shipped out to selected 3d parties in 1994 (even the West) True to say the tools were far from perfect and very buggy, but that is another matter . I don't get the point about Gourad shading either, support for effects can always be added to tools sets latter on, isn't this what happend with PS2 and anti aliasing, or with 2D support being added latter to N64 tools (after Yoshi)

It wasn't until late 95' 96 did we see games that finally delivered visually for the Saturn.

Nope . Panzer Dragoon showed very early in what the Saturn was capable of , in fact on its ship date in Japan One could very well argue it was the best looking 32 Bit game around and then you had Virtual Fighter Remix in May 1995 which looked simply incredible and the 1st game to showcase the Saturn High Res mode in full effect

I think the Saturn could have handled Mario 64

Polygon wise most prob, but it would have suffered so much in porting

[sheath]

Wing arms cyber speedway and ghen war had gouraud shading. high velocity even had environment shading.

[TVC 15]

Saturn development tools was finished and shipped out to selected 3d parties in 1994 (even the West) True to say the tools were far from perfect and very buggy, but that is another matter . I don't get the point about Gourad shading either, support for effects can always be added to tools sets latter on, isn't this what happend with PS2 and anti aliasing, or with 2D support being added latter to N64 tools (after Yoshi)

If you mean development hardware and complete hardware documentation then your almost correct, despite the fact there was large holes in the documentation in the west, since it was mostly poorly translated from Japanese. Tools as in compilers again etc, again almost, with poor documentation for the SCU DSP until later and the initial docs borked. I would hardly call the development tools "finished" by any stretch.

The Saturn having an actual competitive development environment, was a while off. I might have been a bit off regarding Gouraud shading support admitatidly, I've just checked the SGL documents and it was supported from offset by mid-95', but there seemed to be a few bugs that later updates addressed, of course Gouraud shading would be available to the developer in pure assembler from the offset. I could imagine until the SGL came along implementing any of these effects was a an absolute chore however.

The SGL libraries weren't complete until mid-late 95', as a complete operating system update, AM3 even suggested that much in there interview with EDGE, Sega Rally was completely in assembly, because of necessity to get the game running as well as it did and because pre-existing tools where limited, and it shows as part of the first wave of showcase software.

Nope . Panzer Dragoon showed very early in what the Saturn was capable of , in fact on its ship date in Japan One could very well argue it was the best looking 32 Bit game around and then you had Virtual Fighter Remix in May 1995 which looked simply incredible and the 1st game to showcase the Saturn High Res mode in full effect

If you mean a fairly barren landscape, horrible moth eared textures along with lots of warping and no lighting or shading then yes it was the pinnacle of 32-Bit software in 1995 Panzer Dragoon has barely scrapped through and stood the test of time because of the beautiful and fully developed backstory and artistry put into its design work. I'd prefer to say artistically it was one of the best of 95, arguing semantics, but technically it was quite ropey, even when taking due respect and viewing it the eyes of somebody from 1995. I'm not dumping on the Saturn, it was very drab. Zwei on the other hand stands toe to toe with the very best of the PS1's output circa 96', but early Saturn software left a lot be desired.

Remix has excellent detailed texture work admittedly but had absolutely no lighting or shading on character models, its just baked in to the textures and runs at 720x240 at 30fps, I'd argue Hi-Res to "full effect" would be 720x480. Textures are no doubt are at 8bpp, since the Saturn could only shade with either 4bpp or uncompressed (16bpp) textures. Decent but only really on par with PS1 output of the same year, with performance that could only initially be extracted by top Dev's like AM2, until 3rd party developers got to grips with the system.

Polygon wise most prob, but it would have suffered so much in porting

I think the Saturn (much later) or even the PS1 could have done a competitive port hypothetically speaking, but loading data and assists on the fly for a seamless and large enviroment could however have been an issue to deal with.

[Team Andromeda]

The SGL libraries weren't complete until mid-late 95'

They were complete in March 1995 to the In-House staff , of course 3rd parties would have needed to wait longer

The SGL libraries weren't complete until mid-late 95', as a complete operating system update, AM3 even suggested that much in there interview with EDGE, Sega Rally was completely in assembly, because of necessity to get the game running as well as it did and because pre-existing tools where limited,

It wasn't just the fact that the SGL tools weren't quite ready it was also the fact that AM#3 like Team Andromeda chose to use their own libraries/tools as they found the official SEGA tools limiting and slow . I don't think any of TA games or many AM#3 game used SGL for their development - They went their own way and some of the better teams will choose to go down that route

If you mean a fairly barren landscape, horrible moth eared textures along with lots of warping and no lighting or shading then yes it was the pinnacle of 32-Bit software in 1995

Warping ? There's only a small amount of warping in Panzer Dragoon thanks the VDP 2 being used - only in certain sections like the tunnels will you see warping . Texture mapping wise it was a brilliant demonstration almost with out equal on any console system in March 1995 EP 1 and 5 in-particular looked stunning , the game featured some of the most impressive bosses ever seen in a 3D shooter too at the time some of the best water effects (even if they were the most realistic)
For a 1st generation Early March 1995 piece of software it was a fine demo of the Hardware and not much on the PS or the Saturn could touch the game for graphics at the time . One really does need to go back to March 1995 and they really wasn't much on either systems at the time

Remix has excellent detailed texture work admittedly but had absolutely no lighting or shading on character models

I don't get the point about lighting; Looking over the fact that the Saturn was shit at lighting effects , its not as of the game it was based on was noted for its Lighting , there was only ever one stage that even used light effects , there was no sun in the game and it wasn't until VF 4 that SEGA brought in hit lighting effects be that in the Aracdes or home . Getting back to the game the featured better textures than Tekken imo (the texture Mapping detail was jaw dropping at the time) and just pissed on it for sound effects , ok the backgrounds was low/standard Res but it was the 1st time people saw a good example of High Res being used in a 3D on a console (other than title screens) and back in May 1995 that was quite a sight.

Decent but only really on par with PS1 output of the same year, with performance that could only initially be extracted by top Dev's like AM2, until 3rd party developers got to grips with the system.

I like to you name me any PS game that run at 720x 240, never mind 704x480 I can't think of one through the system life time and I would have expected AM#2 to be one of the 1st to use the Saturn High Res mode given that they were an Arcade developer and those sort sorts of Screen Res was only meant for the Arcades /ST-V and of course they did help make SGL - So it was a given that they would be one of the 1st to exploit the system graphics, very much like AM#1 were the 1st to really start to show what the DC/NAOMI could do with HOTD II - Given they developed the NA@MI tool set

I think the Saturn (much later) or even the PS1 could have done a competitive port hypothetically speaking, but loading data and assists on the fly for a seamless and large enviroment could however have been an issue to deal with.

Polygon wise , no doubt . But the best thing about Mario 64 wasn't just the freedom it was on the fact that almost every object looked so solid and with no hit of break up not matter how close or far away you were (its draw distance was truly amazing ) And I think that could have only be done on the N64 at the time

[gamevet]

The music in NiGHTS isn't redbook audio. it's dynamic midi, which changes depending on the mood of your NiGHTopeans in any given level.

No. Some of the music comes directly from the disc. Just pop it into your PC and you'll hear over a dozen different music tracks including She had long ears and hehehe. Yeah, there are some midi tracks in the game, but you'll find it's about 60/40 in favor for the CD tracks.

[16-bit]

I don't think Sega would have been better off if they had just stopped making hardware in '95. I think they would have been better off it they had put a little more thought into developing the Saturn hardware, making it easier to develop for, and had just skipped out on the 32x completely.

Also, the Sega CD would have been much better if they had focused on actual games sort of like how NEC did with the PCengine CD in Japan instead of putting so much time and money into making quite frankly, awful FMV games.

My two cents.

[TheSonicRetard]

No. Some of the music comes directly from the disc. Just pop it into your PC and you'll hear over a dozen different music tracks including She had long ears and hehehe. Yeah, there are some midi tracks in the game, but you'll find it's about 60/40 in favor for the CD tracks.

You realize those are omake tracks, right? Those aren't used in-game.

[Gogogadget]

They'd of been better off if they stopped trying so much at the same time, trying to support the Sega CD, 32X, Genesis and Game Gear with the looming Saturn release, it leaves little room to buy all of those consoles?

They should of either, released the 32X as the CD addon (Sega CD 32X or whatever), or just canned the 32X and focused solely on Saturn, it's not like anyone had any reason to pick up the 32X when the Saturn had already been announced.

Also, Sonic 4 on Neo Geo CD would be a dream game, if that happened..

[TheSonicRetard]

Why would anybody assume Sonic 4 would have been created for the Neo Geo if Sega had exited the hardware business? Aside from the fact that Sega had more powerful arcade boards at the time, like the System 32, if Sega had any intention of creating a 2D sonic during that era, they would have done so.

[Gogogadget]

In 1995, a Neo Geo Sonic game would of never happened, the AES wasn't exactly a roaring success, the prospect of Sonic on the Playstation or N64 would of left a bad taste in many fans mouths at the time, I could imagine :P