If you don’t own a Jaguar I HIGHLY recommend the BigPEmu! It’s very very good! (And yes I used it to capture footage for this video even though I could play them all on real hardware with less quality capture.) Every Konami NES Game: th-cam.com/video/AO1qrfzyDtI/w-d-xo.html Sega 32X vs. Atari Jaguar: th-cam.com/video/T-JH5iYWtT4/w-d-xo.html
The special moves and finisher in Kasumi Ninja been activated with the third button and then make random moves on the pad like rotate or left right, sometimes they make them, mostly not but in no way on purpose.
yes that last game seens very cool. im love textureless graphics and in good pace, just limited to 30fps. But as im wrote in a comment, its not a big bigger for 3d games when done right.
I worked as a tester at Atari in their final years, just before they sold out to JMS Industries and closed the videogame department. Some of the games I tested were AVP, Pitfall, Highlander, I-War and Jeff Minter's versions of Tempest 2K and Defender 2K. I worked with some of the best, most skilled gamers I've ever met. They had to be. Everything Jeff Minter coded had 100 levels, and to make sure they were beaten, he added additional levels that no one would know about unless they beat the game in its entirety. Defender 2000, had an additional 100 levels of even crazier difficulty after beating the game called 'Vindaloo Mode.' I'm a little surprised that you covered all the games that were released, but never mentioned the Virtual Light Machine (VLM.) Jeff Minter, with the help of a mathematician named Ian Malcolm, coded the Jaguar CD with over 72 customizable visualizations for playing music CD's in the CD drive. The visualizations could be manipulated in real time by using the direction pad and the shoulder buttons. Years later, Minter would develop the VLM 2.0 for PC which he would loan out to DJ's in the UK for dance parties. Those days were an amazing part of videogame history, and it's nice to see younger generations holding an interest or even a passion for the work done during that time. Damn nice video! Cheers!
Awesome memories you have! I love the VLM but it’s not really a game. It actually deserves a video of it’s own. Maybe along with other similar visualizers. (Also playing music from CDs is a TH-cam no-no.) Thanks for posting!
I've long been a fan of Jeff's work, but he wasn't the person to update Defender for the Jaguar. He'd tried updating it with Defender 2 on the ST and Amiga, mixed results, bringing the awful lightning gun weapon from that to D2K, was a mistake. I appreciate Atari messed him around, originally wanting D2K on CD, then moving it cart, but it looked like an Amiga title, your main ship was far too large, the bonus level was weak. Gameplay was far too chaotic, survival was more luck than Judgement. Bethesda did it far better with Protector
The VLM on the Jaguar was great. It has a back door code so you could make your own effects. I would spend hours making my own to some of my favorite song and then record it to VCR tape because you could not save the effects you made. The best VLM Yak made imho is the xbox 360 version. You could use 4 controllers and each one could control a different layer or parameters of the effect in real time.
@billwoods9302 I am the lucky owner of a custom modified Jag + Jag CD which allows an external audio input to trigger the VLM patterns rather than needing a cd to trigger the visuals. It was built by a guy called Joe Britt, who is a big player in silicon valley. I contacted him about 15years ago asking for advise on building my own and he said he'd send his original version over to me because it was sitting in the garage for years. VLM is one of the best aspect of the Jaguar CD
Fun fact Fight for Life is the Beta version The full version was hidden away when Atari didn’t pay the dev but people played it at trade shows and said it was much better
If you’re interested in how the Jaguar generates music, it uses wavetable sound, which is a sample, aggregated into a table to allow rapid manipulation of the sample - giving more sound design possibilities than a standard adsr envelope sample. Basically, it’s sample based.
So like Amiga. But in addition it also has a cosine ROM and fast MAC. So you can do all that Fourier shenanigans. Change pitch, muffle . FM. Sampling happens internal to Jerry and the DSP. What rate is possible? I think you can calculate effects per octave and the interpolate and carry over to the next higher octave. So bass channels are cheap. And top sampling rate not too expensive. The expensive part is to fetch individual 16 bit samples over the system bus. The SDK doesn’t seem to cache wavetables. The Jaguar way of sound is to set Jerry to low priority and have a queue in SRAM. The problem is that JRISC stalls if more than one sample load is in flight or one sample write to the DAC. But it has interrupts and timers. But you may not switch the bank while a Load is in-flight. So you can only use a small number of registers per thread. I guess that you could check if the instruction pointer in the other threads moved? It may make sense to load a registers in one burst timed into the vertical blanking because often there are long periods of inactivity. So JRISC may only block every 4th load or so. Use MOVETA for the second bank. Use ROR, OR for unaligned reads. Jerry bus timing is buggy. You have 6 cycles = 6-1 instructions to do something meaningful with 16 bits of data before the next Load.
@@iwanttocomplain Tom and Jerry both have a JRISC core. It is too weak for graphics, but over-powered for audio. If you look at the PCB, Tom has the R2R network on one edge for video. Jerry has the traces to the DAC.
@@iwanttocomplainAnd a quick soundbite from one of the team who worked on Kasumi Ninja, regarding the aspect of sound on the system. "“I was promised this amazing music system from Atari for KN on the Jaguar so I wrote loads of cool music and then it turned out the system couldn’t handle it and Atari’s code was dreadful.”
I thought I had patience for what I do on my channel. You win dude.....71 titles.....many of which were NOT easy to deal with.....and then all the editing..... You the man.
People always say the Jaguar library was both lacking in titles and basically void of quality. I'm glad to see somebody review them with an open mind. There's not as many duds as mainstream TH-camrs would have you believ.
The Jaguar was such a wasted opportunity. Considering the hardware specs Atari were working with there's dozens of awesome PC titles they could've ported, but alas.
One of the most misunderstood consoles. In 1993 this was a huge deal. These graphics were amazing back in the day. This console was seriously overpowered compared to anything else. You can’t just dismiss it comparing it to 32 and 64 bit consoles that came years after. The timing might have been questionable and the lack of popular titles didn’t help. But this was still super high tech. We were blown away by the Jaguar during its time. Not by Virtua Boy.
The 3DO, whilst weaker than the SNES, never mind the Jaguar, at 2D,handled Texture-Mapping better than the Jaguar. The Jaguar hardware needed at least another 2 revisions to get the bugs out, far better Dev tools and games bigger budgets, then we could really of seen what it was capable of, in the right hands.
I wonder if the Atari Jaguar could have been saved by axing the 3D (which is always rather low FPS anyways) and going full blown on 2D to cut on hardware bugs and release earlier to compete with the SNES and Genesis rather than the Playstation... Perhaps using the Panther design instead of the Jaguar... Probably not.
Hoverstrike (and the CD sequel) are actually really fun once you get to grips with the physics and controls - I find them both surprisingly enjoyable given the general critical reception, they're definitely worth persevering with!
The young highlander cartoon was pretty awesome. I watched it everytime it was on, highly underrated show and not spoken about nearly enough, especially when it comes to the countless lists through out the whole internet.
Don't you think it is bizarre that Atari did not release a Tempest 2000 CD game for the Jaguar CD Drive? The cart version has some slowdown due to bus contention with Audio / music on the DSP, but with CD they could have used the awesome CD audio and possibly added more levels /' features, and recycled most of the code making it a quick easy port.
The lifespan was only about a year. Might not have been enough time, or maybe they thought including the soundtrack on CD with the system was good enough.
I got Mad Dog McCree on DVD. The film, as expected, is equal to the arcade but it's almost impossible to play with the remote. The target is extremelly slow. It's like the CDI version which has the exactly same problem.... with a laser gun! Go figure.
You just had to be there for Myst. It was just so cryptic and mysterious at the time, and really used CD-ROM technology to great effect to do things you couldn't do before CD-ROM technology.
Myst was amazing. Only played the original PC version though. I'm 40 and it's the only game my born in 1947 dad EVER got completely obsessed with and had to beat, he was not into games at all really. He took notes in the journal they provided and everything. The game is definitely not 'nonsense' as this guy says. Also, I had a Jaguar during it's lifespan, and it's by far the worst system with the worst games that I have ever owned- a humongous disappointment. None of these games are really worth playing and I've never once thought Gee I wish I had a Jaguar still, while I still play SNES and Genesis all the time because the games are actually fun
@@turdferguson2 Yeah, I'm 42 and I also only have actually played the original PC version, too. I didn't play it right when it came out, though, I got it a little after, sometime around 1995 or 1996. I had the boxed version and everything. My stepdad also played it, but I don't think he ever finished it. I did. I'll be honest, though, I actually had to get some help from the Internet for a couple of puzzles. But that game truly invigorated my love for that style of exploratory puzzle game, and led to me having the patience and affection for games like The Witness, which I feel is one of the real true successors to Myst that requires similar levels of mental involvement.
I've always heard AVP was the best game for the Atari Jaguar. Wish it was included in the Atari Game Collection that came out last year on pretty much every console and pc. Cannon Fodder and Syndicate look neat too. Way better than the versions SNES and Sega Genesis got of those two games.
It's probably the most overrated Jaguar game. Stiff to play with levels as simple as Wolfenstein 3d. I soon went back to playing Doom, within about two days bitd. A major disappointment.
@@BigBillKelly-x2zit was the best Aliens title, for it's time, but titles like Alien Resurrection on PlayStation, AVP on PC, blew it out of the water. Jane Whittaker's awful spaghetti A. I routines, running on the 68000,really killed the frame rate. The Predator and Xeno campaigns really needed more depth as well.
A roommate and I had a HELL of a lot of fun playing Hover Strike co-op, with one player driving and the other shooting. I recommend trying it that way and seeing if you still feel it’s a D-grade. Easily a B+ grade game for me!!
@@ScrapKing73They moved coding to the GPU, which saw an increase to the frame rate of between 3 and 5 FPS, textures are some of the cleanest on the system and there are a lot more missions. It's basically the version Atari should of put out instead of the cart version, but is it the Battlezone 2000 Atari originally envisioned? Hmnnn...
Greg, on kasumi ninja you can pick different characters after you defeat them in story. You got to beat it on harder setting to get real ending and boss fight.
Pretty fair I'd say overall. I have most of them, and you were pretty balanced with being harsh on the games that deserve it yet positive on the games that earned it. If you're nuts and somehow can have a LAN party with 7 other Jaguar users (I only know one in my life, and that's my brother that I gave a Jaguar to when I got a spare and have played Doom over JagLink with), you can play Air Cars or Battlesphere Gold 8 player. I do think Ruiner is a real sleeper that you did give some positivity to here. I have a lot of fun with it. It may not be a Naxat pinball game, but both tables are pretty fun to play with solid scoring opportunities.
A V P should have been the day one pack in game, not cybermorph. Atari got real good at self screwing. However jag is my preferred way of playing Zool2 as its the only version that you can turn off inertia, and it makes it all more playable.
I ended up liking Defender 2000 more than Tempest 2000. It awlays seemed more satisfying at a levels end, and the graphic overstimulation and music just hit harder.
You can tell someone has actually spent time with the controller when they bring up how comfy it is. Odd looking? Yeah. More comfortable than their competitors at the time? No question.
I bought a Jag for fairly cheap in the early 2010s (still have it), and was expecting the worst after having seen the controller constantly get put on ‘worst controllers ever’ lists. As soon as I held it for the first time, it immediately clicked. The D-pad could be a tad better in my opinion, and I feel as though the number pad really wasn’t needed - though that adds to the charm these days. Other than that, it’s far nicer than the initial appearance would suggest.
it's sad that the Jaguar was just like a Super NES with less original games. it was supposed to be an evolution but can barely equal the super NES in graphics
Thanks for taking out the time in this interesting video. I know the graphics is nothing special but Breakout 2000 is a great game in my opinion. Not as good as Tempest 2000 but its maybe my second favorite Jag game. As bad as Checkered Flag is I did take put the time (and patience) to beat it. I really want to try the revised version.
More where exactly? Likes of John Carmsck said if they'd built Doom from scratch for the Jaguar, they'd target higher resolutions, better frame rates, WTR Racer coder said his routines could be further optimised ditto Battlesphere coder.. Rebellion say they pretty much maxxed out the hardware with Skyhammer. Slight improvements in frame rates would of been possible, but the hardware simply wasn't as powerful as the Sega Saturn and fell behind the 3DO in areas like Texture-Mapping.
One of the things that let's you know that devs didn't/couldn't truly take advantage of the Jag's hardware is the lack of music on many titles. The Jag had a dedicated chip for sound that was capable of producing CD quality sound in stereo form, but everyone used the Motorola chip that everyone was familiar with and didn't add music due to limitations. The Jaguar was supposedly really difficult to develop for and you just know that very few companies were ever really able to take advantage of the system's full potential. I imagine Iron Soldier 2 is the closest anyone got to really putting the Jag's abilities to the test.
So, many 3D games there. It was obvious where gaming trends were heading at that time, and Jaguar's limited 3D abilities probably hurt console the most when comparing to PS.
Notice how you compare it 16 bit g Systems when the jag is better but don't mention them when the snes or MD is better Total carnage looks rough in jag
Funny you mention being able to choose your own path as something Brain Dead 13 has over Dragon's Lair, as the original plan for Dragon's Lair was to include more options along those lines and there's even some footage of a prototype that saw limited location testing where you could go more than one way in some of the scenes. But the idea was scrapped, apparently because it was too complicated to fully implement (probably also due to the limitations of the LaserDisc player too, since it would have to do a lot more work).
I didn't know Blue Lightning came out for Jag. I had it for the Lynx and not a bad game. I want to check out the Jag version for the hell of it. Always meant to check out White Men Can't Jump as it's gives strong Barkley Shut Up and Jam vibes. Hyper Force reminds me of Electro Cop on Lynx with the multi layers of background/foreground elements. I did own a Jag for a while. Oh Kasumi Ninja... I need to track down Iron Soldier III.
It's Blue Lightning in name only, totally different Dev team for the Jag version, ATD, who openly admit they were in over their heads with it no real idea what they were doing.
"I think Myst looks about as good as any other version" No, the PC version definitely looks better that. Although that might be due to software rendering.
well ..... im gkad i never got a jaguar after seeing more of the games . i remember when it came out , sat next to MD and SNES in store and i couldnt figure how 64bit barely looked better and often worse than 16bit games . sad as i hope it would be so much better . AvP was cool though
I got jaguar in early 94 at babbages right when it came out in the south. At that time next generation systems were 3do, 600 bucks, sega cd, 200 bucks, genesis extra, and neo geo if you could even find it 800 bucks. Saturn a bit later at 400 bucks. Expensive. Jaguar was 249.99 and then 159.99. They did try to give you a pretty good game system for a cheaper price. I really think atari still had that stigma from 1983 that they couldn't shake at the time. So people were weary including publishers. Idk I wish it would have done better.
I feel Jaguar games where much worse even compared to Genesis and SNES. It had slighly better graphics (and MUCH better sprites!) than its 16 bit counterparts, but it lost big time to gameplay, music, chalenge and fun factor. It seems like they forgot to insert music chips in the hardware and the programmers got obsolete in their vision. A good example is their version of "Mario Kart" which had better graphics but NO music, NO items, NO weapons, NO intersting characters, NO challenge. Another example is the racing game where you drive around colecting flashy balls. Doesn't it feel like a 3D 64 bit version of a Atari 2600 game? Well. That's just my opinion. To me it seems that they took too much time to really use the machine they had in their hands. Even with the ports from 16 bit games (Dragon the bruce lee story, Super pitfall, Flashback) they forgot to insert good music to match the updated graphics.
@@CelinhoFilho remember Atari at the time was a family smaller company than the others and was transitioning from computer to video games. Atari karts did have music, great music and items that were used for tires, speed, reverse direction. I have to disagree with the 2600 comment. Way off. Avp is not 2600, doom, wolfenstein, even checkered flag not 2600. Lol
@@mactonight1980I see your point of view. It bugs me that various Jaguar games seemed like they were half developed. Maybe they were short in personal, a smaller company like you said. I have limited experience with Jaguar. I give you that. A friend of mine got one in the later nineties. He had like 5 games. Alien vs Predador was great but the others were pretty lame. Pitfall was cool but not much different from the SNES version. Thank you for your imput
@@MarceloNMF now had atari given it a little more time maybe more experience with the hardware would have made development easier? Idk. I know towards the end games started to roll out but too late.
This video just reaffirms how I thought back then, to just save my money. I wouldn't even try to emulate a single game that I saw in this. Thanks for taking the time to make this video though.
Ahhh the golden age of the console wars. One thing Atari didn’t realize was that graphics may get people in, but to keep them, you had to have interesting, fun games that people wanted to play. There was no Link to the past, or Mario Bros, or super Metroid. First person space shooters are only fun for so long!
Honestly, the Atari Jaguar seems like one of the most forgettable systems made. Maybe that’s an unfair characterization- I’m sure it was fun back in the day - but it didn’t age well. While there’s some good games here, my life wouldn’t be changed by playing any of them nor would I miss any of them except maybe Alien vs Predator. It seems like it has some solid ports, but they are ports, not exclusives or originals
From the mid-90s to just a couple of years ago. I had managed to buy / collect every single Atari Jaguar game. ALL of them except GORF 2000, black light, and an original Battlesphere Gold (I had a replica). I came to realize that I only every played like 10 of them, which I really, really liked. So I made it a point of selling off about 3/5ths of all my Atari Jaguar games, including everything that was CD-related. It was just before a move, so it actually helped out. I made over 20 thousand dollars selling my Jaguar stuff that I never used. I included that in the downpayment of the house I live in now. I kind of miss it, but not that much. I still kept the games I actually play, like Defender 2000, Doom, Wolfenstein 3D, Ultra Vortek, etc... but man... what a cool system.
@@GregsGameRoom that is awesome!!! I typed this in, and all I see are people selling hard drives. I guess it's an emulator and the roms are being sold on a drive? Is there any one in particular you recommend? Thank you so much! I had no idea about any of this... (getting my 2600+ this week, that's how I found your video, and ventured to this one)
looks like you diddent have problem with games only being 30fps? That is/was a hugo deal breaker for fast 2d games. So perforcement was better even on a standard Amiga 500 on some games. That im call a sluggy port. lol. But with 3d, its a different story. Its works fine for most part when done right.
Big respect for playing and reviewing all of these games! However, in general you can't put lipstick on a pig. The Atari Jaguar--while obviously having a handful of decent games--was for the most part a steaming turd of a console. And Cybermorph was NEVER "pretty amazing" at ANY time. Where did you learn to fly??
I love my Jag. I found enough fun games to play! Printing a new d-pad has also improved the experience. I see these puppies are fetching about $400 now. As an Atari collector, I enjoy having it as part of my collection. However I would have never paid $400 for it.
Yeah, the Jag is not really worth picking up nowadays unless you're a hardcore collector who collects things like the Virtual Boy. You pretty much have to have owned one before they got stupid expensive. Some games are still decently accessible, but you have a few that are pretty expensive with just the cart, like Rayman and Battlesphere.
One of the fortunate things about the Jaguar is that There is an SD cart. It even plays the CD games. If fun and price were on a teeter totter, the price would win over fun. So I agree with you, it's not a good time to buy one.
OK bro u lost all credibility when you said Atari Karts looks better then anything the SNES can do. I don't hate Atari Karts, but F Zero for an example looks way better then it.
Owned one of these back in the day and can remember being really underwhelmed. However nice to see that there is a very active home brew scene keeling it alive
You mentioned that although you did not like Syndicate, I gave it a rating of 80%. Syndicate is a game where you have to really sit down and read the detailed manual to figure out how the game is played - it's not at all pickup and play. In addition, there are several keys on the gamepad that are used, and having a keyboard overlay is extremely helpful.
Tempest 2000 is also now available for the Nintendo Switch, PC, and PS4 through the Atari 50 Anniversary Celebration collection and yes on that one it's actually the legit Atari Jaguar version of Tempest 2000 and not another port like the PS1 and Sega Saturn versions, not only that but Atari Kart and Tempest 4000 are also on those same 3 platforms.
Great vid, its cool to see all the Jag library together, it does show that it wasn't a disaster in the games department (most of the time). I heard Sensible Soccer is best in two player btw, so it might be worth a try with friends. It makes me think it is weird how Atari held back in Europe to support American shipments when it would probably appeal more to Europe with a lot of Amiga/ST ports, I think it was a big reason for why my dad got it (that and the best version of Doom on consoles at the time was on the Jag).
Finally able to watch this (after putting together a new pc), and man what a great dive into the Jaguar. I'll admit, I never bothered with this system during the release, but emulation has definitely given me a new found respect for the console. Even more, I think I'm in love with the Jaguar ports of Defender and Tempest! Great stuff Greg! 👍
The resolution is pretty low. So still images like in Myst rely on strong art direction to make a cohesive end product. It would be interesting to incorporate animated elements and a cool retro interface would add a lot to the 16/32bit pixel art aesthetic. I’m thinking of Heart of the Dragon, which is on the Sega CD which has hardly any colour but the artists more or less pulled it off.
@@iwanttocomplainJaguar has 360 true color pixel on each scan-line. Or 720 CRY ( software dither the gradients after decompression!) . Not sure about overscan. You could scroll through larger artwork. So you say: Mac or PC is better? You can turn on interlacing. With enough jpeg compression, the image is smooth enough and doesn’t flicker. JRISC is optimized for “slow” discrete FT and cosine transformation. This allows you to subpixel smooth scroll through the 8x8 blocks. Still need to find a way to deal with the block artifacts. Would be so cool to see a video compression codec other than the cinepack in the SDK. Of course, best would be real-time 3d cut scenes as on N64 and metal gear solid. For parts. Gives this Amiga or WingCommander3 look. Atari in their wisdom decided that the Object Processor cannot pull at px precision. MPEG and cinepack motion compensation need just that. So one more application where the OP is useless. Maybe use it for low quality full screen scrolling and tearing in action frames.
@MarcLawler-ep6lo Only transparency is the jumping at shadows fog under lamps. It should be additive, but CRY is multiplicative : we multiply light intensity with the pigments. Though , CRY creates negative intensity. I think gamma correction is also missing..at least we can apply it at the vertices. Transparency is more RGB interpolation. It is less critical regarding Gamma Correction. Only JRISC is a little able to do this at a low fillrate. Flames are addictive RGB. Maybe mode Towers II so that the flames have a white core ( saturate) and then a software additive„Halo“ .
I think Atari Karts used a mod music player. "a DSP (actually, it's more like a general-purpose CPU with a few DSP-like instructions added), a 16-bit DAC, and nothing else (not even DMA support). So all sound synthesis stuff is 100% software. There's some sample code from Atari that implements FM and sample-based synthesis, and there are several MOD file players as well. You can also use whatever sound synthesis method you like, as long as it doesn't use too much CPU/memory/bandwith, and you are willing to code it yourself..."
I didn't know the jaguar sucked so bad I use to want so bad to play it but after seeing these graphics.... It's like going to heaven N finding god smoking crack
When I got money to start game collecting I’m so glad I went for the Saturn instead. I always wanted a Jaguar but it was just unaffordable and not worth it.
So...I got my Jaguar in 1994 and I loved it. The reason I purchased one was for Doom. I really wanted a 32X but at the time I couldn't find one as they were sold out (think about that one for a second). I went with the Atari Jaguar and was very happy I did. I hear so many talk about how the Jaguar died because it didn't have any games or quality issues....here is my experience... I got my Jaguar with Cybermorph (not great), Doom, Wolfenstein 3D, and AVP. Doom for the Jaguar was phenomenal and the very best way to play outside of a $2.5K-$3.5K PC. The no music issue I solved with a copy of the Doom soundtrack on CD running through my Sega CD on a smaller TV (it worked really well). The other games were absolute showstoppers for 1994 and weren't really being replicated anywhere else at the time (3DO Wolf was good but not that good). The next month I got Tempest 2000 and Iron Soldier. A month or so later I picked up Super Burnout...and on it went. Rayman, Cannon Fodder, Flashback, Raiden. Was the Jaguar the best console I ever purchased? Far from it. However, the experiences I got from mine were great and well worth the paultry sum of 250 bucks. Addendum- I dropped my Jaguar pretty quickly when I got my Sega Saturn and Sony Playstation on 9/9/95. I tried to get a Saturn during their surprise launch but couldn't find one even in Miami until the PSX went on sale. I traded a ton of games in to get them both but I digress... For reference- What the Wikipedia article is talking about is the difference between the background vs. pixels. The Jaguar runs the actual gameplay@60FPS while the background (like running water) is displayed @30FPS. Yes, it makes a big difference in picture quality. Oh and the Genesis port is better than the Snes one...so I don't get what you said about animations.
Cybermorph, you play as Will Smith piloting a dodgy aircraft with Jada constantly piping up to ridicule him. With tears in his eye's Will carries on regardless.
Okay, okay...I posted once before but I feel like I have to say something here. Super Burnout was absolutely incredible when it released. The game was designed to emulate Sega's Super Scaler Technology and it succeeded spectacularly. At the time no other racing game existed like it for the home market. A+ Grade. Addendum- Sega themselves wouldn't step up to the plate and release their own Super Scaler racing game until the Saturn was widely available in stores. As good as Afterburner Complete and Space Harrier on the 32X were they were not racing games.
Greg, do you have a brick and mortar store? For some reason I thought Adam the woo bought a retro system from a place in central Florida and I thought maybe it was your store? Anyways, I was in the area this week and wanted to find a retro store while I was in the area.
Gouraud Shading is pronounced " GOO - RAW " it's a French name of Henri Gouraud the man who made a PHD thesis at the University of Utah for that shading algorythm, we must thank him he made polygonal 3D way smoother like is co mate Edwin Catmull at Pixar ...
You don't seem to mind the terrible frame rate in some games like that Brutal Sports game. Also, watch the Digital Foundry video about Pitfall and you will see how smoother the SNES and Genesis versions run.
@@Imgema yeah, I could identify single frames. Weird that this is the limit here. After backface culling not many polygons are left. Maybe needs bones? The fighters only occupy a small area. I never understood why the court needs to rotate ( for normal moves ). Flatnshaded ( but with light) may look even better than dull textures all around.
@@Imgemaimagitec Design did a shocking Conversion of Pitfall to the Jaguar. Take a 60 FPS Sega Genesis /Sega CD title, reduce it to 30 FPS on a 64-bit architecture, 2D powerhouse console. And to think they were looking at converting it to the Atari Lynx, dodged a bullet there.
Wow, that video looks like a ton of work. I got the Jag as a kid and bought it again this year. I also have a Gamedrive that runs roms and cd images as well. Today the CD Drives are insanely overpriced. I still enjoy playing Tempest, AVP, Doom, Wolfenstein and even Cybermorph. I think your ratings are spot on, except for Highlander. That is an F for poor gameplay, annoying camera and awkward controls at least in my book. I remember reading the previews for Freelancer 2120 that hyped me a lot but got cancelled.
Only the PC CD version of Freelancer was ever started and had serious performance issues, Imagitec Design did get Atari to licence the Jag Doom engine, for the Jag CD version but project never got off the ground. Ex-Imagitec Design took the project with them and attempted to make it a PlayStation title, when they joined Gremlin, but it went nowhere. The Jag CD screens in press at the time, are taken from the PC CD version.
@@Turbotobi79 Going to have to post this as separate posts.. Martin Hooley originally claimed that the reason game was canned was because Atari wanted them to include lots of Custom Lighting Effects and Texture - Mapping, which Jaguar couldn't handle, so they moved it to the PlayStation, then years later he claimed it was canned because it was obvious the Jaguar CD was going to flop at retail and Imagitec would never recoup their investment, which goes nowhere to explaining why they simply didn't push it out on PC instead
@@Turbotobi79 An Artist gave this account: Freelancer was a shit storm from day one to be honest - the best thing about it was the concept art (by wayne reynolds) - I think we used a 3D system by a small team of about 3 people that were brought in from outside - mostly because by then everyone didn't like Emerson Best, who was a rookie producer at Imagitec and wound everyone up, thinking he knew it all. Emerson at best was a green producer - he was brought in for god knows what reasons - completely up his own arse - started to tell us how to do everything and was generally massively disliked." "I think Imag realised that the I- war engine wasn't going to cut it, and I think Martin Hooley was briefly going to stump up the cash for an off the shelf 3D engine, when out of the blue, a small team of people - a three man team, suddenly appeared. No Idea who the poor fu#kers were but we had a connundrum - we could do it in house or use this other team and it was better that the other team would put up with emerson cos we all didn't like him. It did get to a point where even the external team called martin and asked him why it was necessary that emerson called them every single day for 3 hours every single morning though.... #it should be noted the above source from Imagitec Design stated the game NEVER used stop motion models, something we know it DID.. Here's the guy who did the work. www.nevillebuchanan.co.uk/ So take the above claims with a degree of caution obviously still some old wounds amongst Imagitec Design staff.
@@Turbotobi79 Scott Stilphen's Atari Documentation shows Imagitec Design did take delivery of the Doom Engine, which confirms comments Andrew Seed made... File dated:Feb 13 1995 Game has a ? next to listing for Original release Date. Status:Expected/Revised date: 4/95..bought Doom Engine..Revised Schedule needed' Another Imagitec Design musician told me.. This is a blast from the past. I was involved with the game Freelancer at an early stage, creating music, however this was still ongoing when I left Imagitec so don’t know if this ever saw the light of day. I know it didn’t on the Jaguar CD
Thank you for awesome look at at all theses games from someone who actually has played them. Its so refreshing to see an honest take on this powerhouse instead the same old uneducated lame take on this misunderstood system. Great video!
@@GregsGameRoom Power Drive Rally, Super Burnout, Iron Soldier, Rayman and of course Doom and AVP are awesome games. I agree with most of your grades here. I haven’t played any of the soccer games so can’t say on any of these. Tempest Rocks for sure! Sublime
I remember buying this when it came out. I loved the Jeff minter games and aliens. The other games purchased were duds. I think I gave up on it because I also had an Amiga and a turbo duo. I also remember the games were pricey and difficult to find.
Great video. I've been interested in the Jag for a few years but don't have one. I'd love to see a mini come out of they can bail emulation but Skyhammer, Wolfenstein and AvP would be top of the wish list for me
47:09 William Joseph "B.J." Blazkowicz (Polish pronunciation: [blasˈkɔvit͡ʂ]. Yeah,not easy for the first time for pronunciation,but... There is even harder names in Polish. But mine is simple... Kind of😜 ('cause it short version,not full).
If you don’t own a Jaguar I HIGHLY recommend the BigPEmu! It’s very very good! (And yes I used it to capture footage for this video even though I could play them all on real hardware with less quality capture.)
Every Konami NES Game: th-cam.com/video/AO1qrfzyDtI/w-d-xo.html
Sega 32X vs. Atari Jaguar: th-cam.com/video/T-JH5iYWtT4/w-d-xo.html
Thanks. I will try it
The emulator is 10 out of 10
The special moves and finisher in Kasumi Ninja been activated with the third button and then make random moves on the pad like rotate or left right, sometimes they make them, mostly not but in no way on purpose.
yes that last game seens very cool. im love textureless graphics and in good pace, just limited to 30fps. But as im wrote in a comment, its not a big bigger for 3d games when done right.
I worked as a tester at Atari in their final years, just before they sold out to JMS Industries and closed the videogame department. Some of the games I tested were AVP, Pitfall, Highlander, I-War and Jeff Minter's versions of Tempest 2K and Defender 2K. I worked with some of the best, most skilled gamers I've ever met. They had to be. Everything Jeff Minter coded had 100 levels, and to make sure they were beaten, he added additional levels that no one would know about unless they beat the game in its entirety. Defender 2000, had an additional 100 levels of even crazier difficulty after beating the game called 'Vindaloo Mode.' I'm a little surprised that you covered all the games that were released, but never mentioned the Virtual Light Machine (VLM.) Jeff Minter, with the help of a mathematician named Ian Malcolm, coded the Jaguar CD with over 72 customizable visualizations for playing music CD's in the CD drive. The visualizations could be manipulated in real time by using the direction pad and the shoulder buttons. Years later, Minter would develop the VLM 2.0 for PC which he would loan out to DJ's in the UK for dance parties. Those days were an amazing part of videogame history, and it's nice to see younger generations holding an interest or even a passion for the work done during that time. Damn nice video! Cheers!
Awesome memories you have! I love the VLM but it’s not really a game. It actually deserves a video of it’s own. Maybe along with other similar visualizers. (Also playing music from CDs is a TH-cam no-no.) Thanks for posting!
I've long been a fan of Jeff's work, but he wasn't the person to update Defender for the Jaguar.
He'd tried updating it with Defender 2 on the ST and Amiga, mixed results, bringing the awful lightning gun weapon from that to D2K, was a mistake.
I appreciate Atari messed him around, originally wanting D2K on CD, then moving it cart, but it looked like an Amiga title, your main ship was far too large, the bonus level was weak.
Gameplay was far too chaotic, survival was more luck than Judgement.
Bethesda did it far better with Protector
Man you must have played the same game for weeks!
The VLM on the Jaguar was great. It has a back door code so you could make your own effects. I would spend hours making my own to some of my favorite song and then record it to VCR tape because you could not save the effects you made. The best VLM Yak made imho is the xbox 360 version. You could use 4 controllers and each one could control a different layer or parameters of the effect in real time.
@billwoods9302 I am the lucky owner of a custom modified Jag + Jag CD which allows an external audio input to trigger the VLM patterns rather than needing a cd to trigger the visuals. It was built by a guy called Joe Britt, who is a big player in silicon valley. I contacted him about 15years ago asking for advise on building my own and he said he'd send his original version over to me because it was sitting in the garage for years. VLM is one of the best aspect of the Jaguar CD
Fun fact
Fight for Life is the Beta version
The full version was hidden away when Atari didn’t pay the dev but people played it at trade shows and said it was much better
If you’re interested in how the Jaguar generates music, it uses wavetable sound, which is a sample, aggregated into a table to allow rapid manipulation of the sample - giving more sound design possibilities than a standard adsr envelope sample. Basically, it’s sample based.
So like Amiga. But in addition it also has a cosine ROM and fast MAC. So you can do all that Fourier shenanigans. Change pitch, muffle . FM. Sampling happens internal to Jerry and the DSP. What rate is possible? I think you can calculate effects per octave and the interpolate and carry over to the next higher octave. So bass channels are cheap. And top sampling rate not too expensive.
The expensive part is to fetch individual 16 bit samples over the system bus. The SDK doesn’t seem to cache wavetables. The Jaguar way of sound is to set Jerry to low priority and have a queue in SRAM.
The problem is that JRISC stalls if more than one sample load is in flight or one sample write to the DAC. But it has interrupts and timers. But you may not switch the bank while a Load is in-flight. So you can only use a small number of registers per thread. I guess that you could check if the instruction pointer in the other threads moved?
It may make sense to load a registers in one burst timed into the vertical blanking because often there are long periods of inactivity. So JRISC may only block every 4th load or so. Use MOVETA for the second bank. Use ROR, OR for unaligned reads.
Jerry bus timing is buggy. You have 6 cycles = 6-1 instructions to do something meaningful with 16 bits of data before the next Load.
@ArneChristianRosenfeldt so sound comes from Tom and Jerry chips?
@@iwanttocomplain Tom and Jerry both have a JRISC core. It is too weak for graphics, but over-powered for audio. If you look at the PCB, Tom has the R2R network on one edge for video. Jerry has the traces to the DAC.
@@iwanttocomplainAnd a quick soundbite from one of the team who worked on Kasumi Ninja, regarding the aspect of sound on the system.
"“I was promised this amazing music system from Atari for KN on the Jaguar so I wrote loads of cool music and then it turned out the system couldn’t handle it and Atari’s code was dreadful.”
@thefurthestmanfromhome1148 you can’t be writing chiptune music without a chip to test it on.
I thought I had patience for what I do on my channel. You win dude.....71 titles.....many of which were NOT easy to deal with.....and then all the editing..... You the man.
It was a slog, but worth it
Man, I watched the whole thing. Well done. Growing up i never knew anyone with the Jaguar system. Pretty cool to see what it had to offer!
People always say the Jaguar library was both lacking in titles and basically void of quality. I'm glad to see somebody review them with an open mind. There's not as many duds as mainstream TH-camrs would have you believ.
"WHERE DID YOU LEARN TO FLY?" HAHAHAH
The Jaguar was such a wasted opportunity. Considering the hardware specs Atari were working with there's dozens of awesome PC titles they could've ported, but alas.
I’ve never seen someone with such pride over their Jag collection. You even have it placed in its personal discoteq
Towers II: "there's no in game music" - dude, I can literally hear the music playing in the background as you're saying that!
You got me there. When I wrote the script I wasn't watching the video clips.
@@GregsGameRoom Great vid otherwise. I sat and watched the entire thing. Thanks for being comprehensive!
One of the most misunderstood consoles. In 1993 this was a huge deal. These graphics were amazing back in the day. This console was seriously overpowered compared to anything else.
You can’t just dismiss it comparing it to 32 and 64 bit consoles that came years after. The timing might have been questionable and the lack of popular titles didn’t help. But this was still super high tech.
We were blown away by the Jaguar during its time. Not by Virtua Boy.
The 3DO, whilst weaker than the SNES, never mind the Jaguar, at 2D,handled Texture-Mapping better than the Jaguar.
The Jaguar hardware needed at least another 2 revisions to get the bugs out, far better Dev tools and games bigger budgets, then we could really of seen what it was capable of, in the right hands.
I wonder if the Atari Jaguar could have been saved by axing the 3D (which is always rather low FPS anyways) and going full blown on 2D to cut on hardware bugs and release earlier to compete with the SNES and Genesis rather than the Playstation... Perhaps using the Panther design instead of the Jaguar... Probably not.
I just bought a complete collection of jaguar and CD games.
Hoverstrike (and the CD sequel) are actually really fun once you get to grips with the physics and controls - I find them both surprisingly enjoyable given the general critical reception, they're definitely worth persevering with!
The young highlander cartoon was pretty awesome. I watched it everytime it was on, highly underrated show and not spoken about nearly enough, especially when it comes to the countless lists through out the whole internet.
Don't you think it is bizarre that Atari did not release a Tempest 2000 CD game for the Jaguar CD Drive? The cart version has some slowdown due to bus contention with Audio / music on the DSP, but with CD they could have used the awesome CD audio and possibly added more levels /' features, and recycled most of the code making it a quick easy port.
The lifespan was only about a year. Might not have been enough time, or maybe they thought including the soundtrack on CD with the system was good enough.
Defender 2000 was originally intended as a cartridge title, Atari then told Jeff Minter to switch it to a CD game.
I've got Dragon's Lair & Space Ace on DVD and you play with the TV remote. It's the best version I've seen. Looks exactly like the arcade.
Yep, I wonder if those are still available?
I got Mad Dog McCree on DVD. The film, as expected, is equal to the arcade but it's almost impossible to play with the remote. The target is extremelly slow.
It's like the CDI version which has the exactly same problem.... with a laser gun! Go figure.
43:28 I suppose they changed it because there was a game called Vortex on the SNES.
Pretty long & thorough vid, enjoyed it even though I wouldn't play half those games.
Hard to really find the time anymore.
So you would play half those games is still quite positive.
Thanks for doing this enjoyed a number of jag games. Tempest 2000 was my favourite.
You just had to be there for Myst. It was just so cryptic and mysterious at the time, and really used CD-ROM technology to great effect to do things you couldn't do before CD-ROM technology.
Myst was amazing. Only played the original PC version though. I'm 40 and it's the only game my born in 1947 dad EVER got completely obsessed with and had to beat, he was not into games at all really. He took notes in the journal they provided and everything. The game is definitely not 'nonsense' as this guy says.
Also, I had a Jaguar during it's lifespan, and it's by far the worst system with the worst games that I have ever owned- a humongous disappointment. None of these games are really worth playing and I've never once thought Gee I wish I had a Jaguar still, while I still play SNES and Genesis all the time because the games are actually fun
@@turdferguson2 Yeah, I'm 42 and I also only have actually played the original PC version, too. I didn't play it right when it came out, though, I got it a little after, sometime around 1995 or 1996. I had the boxed version and everything. My stepdad also played it, but I don't think he ever finished it. I did. I'll be honest, though, I actually had to get some help from the Internet for a couple of puzzles. But that game truly invigorated my love for that style of exploratory puzzle game, and led to me having the patience and affection for games like The Witness, which I feel is one of the real true successors to Myst that requires similar levels of mental involvement.
Wow an hour+ long video? You outdid yourself Greg.. ! Thank you for your hard work, great video!
Thanks for checking out the video! Yeah, it was a ton of effort!
I've always heard AVP was the best game for the Atari Jaguar. Wish it was included in the Atari Game Collection that came out last year on pretty much every console and pc.
Cannon Fodder and Syndicate look neat too. Way better than the versions SNES and Sega Genesis got of those two games.
Current Atari would have to re-license the characters from (I guess) Disney now. Certainly a pretty penny…
It's probably the most overrated Jaguar game. Stiff to play with levels as simple as Wolfenstein 3d. I soon went back to playing Doom, within about two days bitd. A major disappointment.
@@BigBillKelly-x2zit was the best Aliens title, for it's time, but titles like Alien Resurrection on PlayStation, AVP on PC, blew it out of the water.
Jane Whittaker's awful spaghetti A. I routines, running on the 68000,really killed the frame rate.
The Predator and Xeno campaigns really needed more depth as well.
A roommate and I had a HELL of a lot of fun playing Hover Strike co-op, with one player driving and the other shooting. I recommend trying it that way and seeing if you still feel it’s a D-grade. Easily a B+ grade game for me!!
I haven’t played the CD sequel… I actually bought a JagCD unit and Hover Strike CD, but my JagCD didn’t work (a chronic problem, sadly).
@@ScrapKing73They moved coding to the GPU, which saw an increase to the frame rate of between 3 and 5 FPS, textures are some of the cleanest on the system and there are a lot more missions.
It's basically the version Atari should of put out instead of the cart version, but is it the Battlezone 2000 Atari originally envisioned? Hmnnn...
@@thefurthestmanfromhome1148 That's great information, thank you. :) If only my JagCD actually worked! :(
Greg, on kasumi ninja you can pick different characters after you defeat them in story. You got to beat it on harder setting to get real ending and boss fight.
Really should be able to pick any character from the get-go…
@@GregsGameRoom yeah I dont understand why they did that.
Do you have to beat the entire story in order to unlock them or are they immediately unlocked after beating them in a fight?
I still enjoy my Jaguar. Play it at least a handful of times a year..
Pretty fair I'd say overall. I have most of them, and you were pretty balanced with being harsh on the games that deserve it yet positive on the games that earned it. If you're nuts and somehow can have a LAN party with 7 other Jaguar users (I only know one in my life, and that's my brother that I gave a Jaguar to when I got a spare and have played Doom over JagLink with), you can play Air Cars or Battlesphere Gold 8 player.
I do think Ruiner is a real sleeper that you did give some positivity to here. I have a lot of fun with it. It may not be a Naxat pinball game, but both tables are pretty fun to play with solid scoring opportunities.
A V P should have been the day one pack in game, not cybermorph. Atari got real good at self screwing. However jag is my preferred way of playing Zool2 as its the only version that you can turn off inertia, and it makes it all more playable.
Bob Brodie of Atari has said there were discussions within the company to replace Cybermorph with AVP as the Pack-in title.
Idiots never ran with it.
Can you cover homebrews as well?
I did unreleased games and protos. I’ll get to homebrews and ST conversions eventually.
@@GregsGameRoom thanks! Doesn't have to be all that is out there, maybe some select good ones to check out would be nice 😊
I ended up liking Defender 2000 more than Tempest 2000. It awlays seemed more satisfying at a levels end, and the graphic overstimulation and music just hit harder.
You can tell someone has actually spent time with the controller when they bring up how comfy it is. Odd looking? Yeah.
More comfortable than their competitors at the time? No question.
I bought a Jag for fairly cheap in the early 2010s (still have it), and was expecting the worst after having seen the controller constantly get put on ‘worst controllers ever’ lists. As soon as I held it for the first time, it immediately clicked. The D-pad could be a tad better in my opinion, and I feel as though the number pad really wasn’t needed - though that adds to the charm these days. Other than that, it’s far nicer than the initial appearance would suggest.
it's sad that the Jaguar was just like a Super NES with less original games. it was supposed to be an evolution but can barely equal the super NES in graphics
Thanks for taking out the time in this interesting video. I know the graphics is nothing special but Breakout 2000 is a great game in my opinion. Not as good as Tempest 2000 but its maybe my second favorite Jag game. As bad as Checkered Flag is I did take put the time (and patience) to beat it. I really want to try the revised version.
Breakout 2K is good, it's just a little boring. It puts me to sleep...
This system was such a let down. To say it was 64 BIT is a joke! Every game looks like 16 BIT OR 32 BIT at best in some games. SNES is just as good!
Like most "failed" consoles, you know the hardware can do more, there's glimpses of it in more than a few of these.
More where exactly? Likes of John Carmsck said if they'd built Doom from scratch for the Jaguar, they'd target higher resolutions, better frame rates, WTR Racer coder said his routines could be further optimised ditto Battlesphere coder..
Rebellion say they pretty much maxxed out the hardware with Skyhammer.
Slight improvements in frame rates would of been possible, but the hardware simply wasn't as powerful as the Sega Saturn and fell behind the 3DO in areas like Texture-Mapping.
One of the things that let's you know that devs didn't/couldn't truly take advantage of the Jag's hardware is the lack of music on many titles. The Jag had a dedicated chip for sound that was capable of producing CD quality sound in stereo form, but everyone used the Motorola chip that everyone was familiar with and didn't add music due to limitations.
The Jaguar was supposedly really difficult to develop for and you just know that very few companies were ever really able to take advantage of the system's full potential. I imagine Iron Soldier 2 is the closest anyone got to really putting the Jag's abilities to the test.
Soccer kid was also released for the genesis and mega drive
the remote missile in IS2 is also in IS1
So, many 3D games there. It was obvious where gaming trends were heading at that time, and Jaguar's limited 3D abilities probably hurt console the most when comparing to PS.
Notice how you compare it 16 bit g
Systems when the jag is better but don't mention them when the snes or MD is better
Total carnage looks rough in jag
PC port I believe and things were not good at HMS at the time, staff not being paid bonuses or wages.
Funny you mention being able to choose your own path as something Brain Dead 13 has over Dragon's Lair, as the original plan for Dragon's Lair was to include more options along those lines and there's even some footage of a prototype that saw limited location testing where you could go more than one way in some of the scenes. But the idea was scrapped, apparently because it was too complicated to fully implement (probably also due to the limitations of the LaserDisc player too, since it would have to do a lot more work).
I didn't know Blue Lightning came out for Jag. I had it for the Lynx and not a bad game. I want to check out the Jag version for the hell of it.
Always meant to check out White Men Can't Jump as it's gives strong Barkley Shut Up and Jam vibes.
Hyper Force reminds me of Electro Cop on Lynx with the multi layers of background/foreground elements.
I did own a Jag for a while. Oh Kasumi Ninja...
I need to track down Iron Soldier III.
It's Blue Lightning in name only, totally different Dev team for the Jag version, ATD, who openly admit they were in over their heads with it no real idea what they were doing.
"I think Myst looks about as good as any other version"
No, the PC version definitely looks better that. Although that might be due to software rendering.
Just remember this been about when the playstation was and thinking wow - it doesnt even compare to the snes let alone the psx which just crushed it
well ..... im gkad i never got a jaguar after seeing more of the games . i remember when it came out , sat next to MD and SNES in store and i couldnt figure how 64bit barely looked better and often worse than 16bit games . sad as i hope it would be so much better . AvP was cool though
Thanx to the algorithm for sending me this video. I currently own a Jaguar and quite enjoy it.
I got jaguar in early 94 at babbages right when it came out in the south. At that time next generation systems were 3do, 600 bucks, sega cd, 200 bucks, genesis extra, and neo geo if you could even find it 800 bucks. Saturn a bit later at 400 bucks. Expensive. Jaguar was 249.99 and then 159.99. They did try to give you a pretty good game system for a cheaper price. I really think atari still had that stigma from 1983 that they couldn't shake at the time. So people were weary including publishers. Idk I wish it would have done better.
Jag was pretty cheap in comparison. Fits with Atari’s “Power without the price” motto.
I feel Jaguar games where much worse even compared to Genesis and SNES. It had slighly better graphics (and MUCH better sprites!) than its 16 bit counterparts, but it lost big time to gameplay, music, chalenge and fun factor.
It seems like they forgot to insert music chips in the hardware and the programmers got obsolete in their vision. A good example is their version of "Mario Kart" which had better graphics but NO music, NO items, NO weapons, NO intersting characters, NO challenge.
Another example is the racing game where you drive around colecting flashy balls. Doesn't it feel like a 3D 64 bit version of a Atari 2600 game? Well. That's just my opinion.
To me it seems that they took too much time to really use the machine they had in their hands.
Even with the ports from 16 bit games (Dragon the bruce lee story, Super pitfall, Flashback) they forgot to insert good music to match the updated graphics.
@@CelinhoFilho remember Atari at the time was a family smaller company than the others and was transitioning from computer to video games. Atari karts did have music, great music and items that were used for tires, speed, reverse direction. I have to disagree with the 2600 comment. Way off. Avp is not 2600, doom, wolfenstein, even checkered flag not 2600. Lol
@@mactonight1980I see your point of view.
It bugs me that various Jaguar games seemed like they were half developed. Maybe they were short in personal, a smaller company like you said.
I have limited experience with Jaguar. I give you that.
A friend of mine got one in the later nineties. He had like 5 games. Alien vs Predador was great but the others were pretty lame. Pitfall was cool but not much different from the SNES version.
Thank you for your imput
@@MarceloNMF now had atari given it a little more time maybe more experience with the hardware would have made development easier? Idk. I know towards the end games started to roll out but too late.
This video just reaffirms how I thought back then, to just save my money. I wouldn't even try to emulate a single game that I saw in this. Thanks for taking the time to make this video though.
This is a COOL video! I am going to try most of these games now.
Ahhh the golden age of the console wars. One thing Atari didn’t realize was that graphics may get people in, but to keep them, you had to have interesting, fun games that people wanted to play. There was no Link to the past, or Mario Bros, or super Metroid. First person space shooters are only fun for so long!
Solid B? More like solid P
Honestly, the Atari Jaguar seems like one of the most forgettable systems made. Maybe that’s an unfair characterization- I’m sure it was fun back in the day - but it didn’t age well. While there’s some good games here, my life wouldn’t be changed by playing any of them nor would I miss any of them except maybe Alien vs Predator. It seems like it has some solid ports, but they are ports, not exclusives or originals
From the mid-90s to just a couple of years ago. I had managed to buy / collect every single Atari Jaguar game. ALL of them except GORF 2000, black light, and an original Battlesphere Gold (I had a replica). I came to realize that I only every played like 10 of them, which I really, really liked. So I made it a point of selling off about 3/5ths of all my Atari Jaguar games, including everything that was CD-related. It was just before a move, so it actually helped out. I made over 20 thousand dollars selling my Jaguar stuff that I never used. I included that in the downpayment of the house I live in now. I kind of miss it, but not that much. I still kept the games I actually play, like Defender 2000, Doom, Wolfenstein 3D, Ultra Vortek, etc... but man... what a cool system.
And now you can get a Jaguar Game Drive and play all the games again for just $200. :D
@@GregsGameRoom that is awesome!!! I typed this in, and all I see are people selling hard drives. I guess it's an emulator and the roms are being sold on a drive? Is there any one in particular you recommend? Thank you so much! I had no idea about any of this... (getting my 2600+ this week, that's how I found your video, and ventured to this one)
It's actually a Flash Cart. You can even play JagCD on it! I did a review here: th-cam.com/video/B1-6x9rR6qw/w-d-xo.html
Had one only game worth playing was doom actually a brilliant version
looks like you diddent have problem with games only being 30fps? That is/was a hugo deal breaker for fast 2d games. So perforcement was better even on a standard Amiga 500 on some games. That im call a sluggy port. lol. But with 3d, its a different story. Its works fine for most part when done right.
Massive deal if you went from playing Pitfall :Mayan Adventure at 60 fps on the 16-bit Sega MD to 30 fps on the 64-bit architecture Jaguar..
Big respect for playing and reviewing all of these games! However, in general you can't put lipstick on a pig. The Atari Jaguar--while obviously having a handful of decent games--was for the most part a steaming turd of a console. And Cybermorph was NEVER "pretty amazing" at ANY time.
Where did you learn to fly??
I love my Jag. I found enough fun games to play!
Printing a new d-pad has also improved the experience.
I see these puppies are fetching about $400 now. As an Atari collector, I enjoy having it as part of my collection. However I would have never paid $400 for it.
Yeah, the Jag is not really worth picking up nowadays unless you're a hardcore collector who collects things like the Virtual Boy. You pretty much have to have owned one before they got stupid expensive. Some games are still decently accessible, but you have a few that are pretty expensive with just the cart, like Rayman and Battlesphere.
One of the fortunate things about the Jaguar is that There is an SD cart. It even plays the CD games.
If fun and price were on a teeter totter, the price would win over fun. So I agree with you, it's not a good time to buy one.
OK bro u lost all credibility when you said Atari Karts looks better then anything the SNES can do.
I don't hate Atari Karts, but F Zero for an example looks way better then it.
I honestly couldn't decide if he was being sarcastic or not.
41:51
Looks like "my first design" basic program from the 90 ...
Would a post Jaguar homebrew video be possible? There are some nice homebrews for the Jaguar and CD.
i love Alien Vs Predator for ataria jaguar! great video !
Owned one of these back in the day and can remember being really underwhelmed. However nice to see that there is a very active home brew scene keeling it alive
I like the homebrew scene, but most Jag homebrew don’t push the hardware too hard.
I'm glad I didn't buy one. Atari ST and Lynx were fun. I decided to wait two years for the OG Playstation.
You mentioned that although you did not like Syndicate, I gave it a rating of 80%. Syndicate is a game where you have to really sit down and read the detailed manual to figure out how the game is played - it's not at all pickup and play. In addition, there are several keys on the gamepad that are used, and having a keyboard overlay is extremely helpful.
Tempest 2000 is also now available for the Nintendo Switch, PC, and PS4 through the Atari 50 Anniversary Celebration collection and yes on that one it's actually the legit Atari Jaguar version of Tempest 2000 and not another port like the PS1 and Sega Saturn versions, not only that but Atari Kart and Tempest 4000 are also on those same 3 platforms.
Great vid, its cool to see all the Jag library together, it does show that it wasn't a disaster in the games department (most of the time).
I heard Sensible Soccer is best in two player btw, so it might be worth a try with friends. It makes me think it is weird how Atari held back in Europe to support American shipments when it would probably appeal more to Europe with a lot of Amiga/ST ports, I think it was a big reason for why my dad got it (that and the best version of Doom on consoles at the time was on the Jag).
Finally able to watch this (after putting together a new pc), and man what a great dive into the Jaguar. I'll admit, I never bothered with this system during the release, but emulation has definitely given me a new found respect for the console. Even more, I think I'm in love with the Jaguar ports of Defender and Tempest! Great stuff Greg! 👍
Thanks man! This was definitely my most challenging video yet!
Where did you learn to fly
By playing Jaguar…
What would be the best controller to use to emulate the Jaguar? Its so hard to get a real Jaguar now.
Do you think a visual novel would work on the jaguar. Asking for a friend who is developing a jaguar game
The resolution is pretty low. So still images like in Myst rely on strong art direction to make a cohesive end product.
It would be interesting to incorporate animated elements and a cool retro interface would add a lot to the 16/32bit pixel art aesthetic. I’m thinking of Heart of the Dragon, which is on the Sega CD which has hardly any colour but the artists more or less pulled it off.
@@iwanttocomplainJaguar has 360 true color pixel on each scan-line. Or 720 CRY ( software dither the gradients after decompression!) . Not sure about overscan. You could scroll through larger artwork. So you say: Mac or PC is better?
You can turn on interlacing. With enough jpeg compression, the image is smooth enough and doesn’t flicker. JRISC is optimized for “slow” discrete FT and cosine transformation. This allows you to subpixel smooth scroll through the 8x8 blocks. Still need to find a way to deal with the block artifacts.
Would be so cool to see a video compression codec other than the cinepack in the SDK.
Of course, best would be real-time 3d cut scenes as on N64 and metal gear solid. For parts. Gives this Amiga or WingCommander3 look.
Atari in their wisdom decided that the Object Processor cannot pull at px precision. MPEG and cinepack motion compensation need just that. So one more application where the OP is useless. Maybe use it for low quality full screen scrolling and tearing in action frames.
I forgot to mention. Someone makes visual novels on the Saturn. So that might be easier.
@MarcLawler-ep6lo Only transparency is the jumping at shadows fog under lamps. It should be additive, but CRY is multiplicative : we multiply light intensity with the pigments. Though , CRY creates negative intensity. I think gamma correction is also missing..at least we can apply it at the vertices.
Transparency is more RGB interpolation. It is less critical regarding Gamma Correction. Only JRISC is a little able to do this at a low fillrate.
Flames are addictive RGB. Maybe mode Towers II so that the flames have a white core ( saturate) and then a software additive„Halo“ .
@@iwanttocomplain actually I cannot stand flickering SD CRTs. If you want easy on a lovely system, why not try the original iMac?
I think Atari Karts used a mod music player.
"a DSP (actually, it's more like a general-purpose CPU with a few DSP-like instructions added), a 16-bit DAC, and nothing else (not even DMA support).
So all sound synthesis stuff is 100% software. There's some sample code from Atari that implements FM and sample-based synthesis, and there are several MOD file players as well. You can also use whatever sound synthesis method you like, as long as it doesn't use too much CPU/memory/bandwith, and you are willing to code it yourself..."
Sensible Soccer is one of the best games ever made.
Its beloved for good reason.
(Syndicate too!)
As I begin to watch this video, I can feel the pressure, the burden and the responsibility; to take on this challenge….
It was a daunting task, but rewarding because I got to play games that I hadn’t spent much time on. I do need to figure out Syndicate though!
Needs more adverts.
I didn't know the jaguar sucked so bad
I use to want so bad to play it but after seeing these graphics....
It's like going to heaven N finding god smoking crack
When I got money to start game collecting I’m so glad I went for the Saturn instead. I always wanted a Jaguar but it was just unaffordable and not worth it.
So...I got my Jaguar in 1994 and I loved it. The reason I purchased one was for Doom. I really wanted a 32X but at the time I couldn't find one as they were sold out (think about that one for a second). I went with the Atari Jaguar and was very happy I did. I hear so many talk about how the Jaguar died because it didn't have any games or quality issues....here is my experience...
I got my Jaguar with Cybermorph (not great), Doom, Wolfenstein 3D, and AVP. Doom for the Jaguar was phenomenal and the very best way to play outside of a $2.5K-$3.5K PC. The no music issue I solved with a copy of the Doom soundtrack on CD running through my Sega CD on a smaller TV (it worked really well). The other games were absolute showstoppers for 1994 and weren't really being replicated anywhere else at the time (3DO Wolf was good but not that good). The next month I got Tempest 2000 and Iron Soldier. A month or so later I picked up Super Burnout...and on it went. Rayman, Cannon Fodder, Flashback, Raiden. Was the Jaguar the best console I ever purchased? Far from it. However, the experiences I got from mine were great and well worth the paultry sum of 250 bucks.
Addendum- I dropped my Jaguar pretty quickly when I got my Sega Saturn and Sony Playstation on 9/9/95. I tried to get a Saturn during their surprise launch but couldn't find one even in Miami until the PSX went on sale. I traded a ton of games in to get them both but I digress...
For reference- What the Wikipedia article is talking about is the difference between the background vs. pixels. The Jaguar runs the actual gameplay@60FPS while the background (like running water) is displayed @30FPS. Yes, it makes a big difference in picture quality. Oh and the Genesis port is better than the Snes one...so I don't get what you said about animations.
if theres a single game worth owning a jaguar for in this video, i'll eat my hat
Got salt?
Easy: Tempest 2000. If you need more: Raiden, Doom, Wolf 3d
@@cyrollaniron Solider 1 and 2,Skyhammer, best get a knife and fork and glass of water for that hat 😂
@@cyrollan Raiden, Doom, and Wolf are all cross platform titles. i'm sure there's a decent version of Tempest in some arcade compilation.
I’m getting secondhand buyers remorse watching some of these reviews. I would read all the boxes at The Wiz
Great video. I liked it alot.
Thanks!
“Choosing a character for story mode is a basic thing every fighting game should have.”
*Soul Calibur V has left the chat*
Cybermorph, you play as Will Smith piloting a dodgy aircraft with Jada constantly piping up to ridicule him.
With tears in his eye's Will carries on regardless.
LOL
Great marathon of games
ps. doomscale yeah the doomscale
Thank you for this demo, all in all, it looks okay.
A 64 bit system that cannot do better than Nintendo or Sega😂
Instead of Zoop, I'd take Tetris AND Klax. I can find enjoyment outta Zoop. but I like puzzle games that pose a challenge and aren't droning piles
Heck yeah! Love me some KLAX! I think there’s an ST conversion cart though.
Okay, okay...I posted once before but I feel like I have to say something here. Super Burnout was absolutely incredible when it released. The game was designed to emulate Sega's Super Scaler Technology and it succeeded spectacularly. At the time no other racing game existed like it for the home market. A+ Grade.
Addendum- Sega themselves wouldn't step up to the plate and release their own Super Scaler racing game until the Saturn was widely available in stores. As good as Afterburner Complete and Space Harrier on the 32X were they were not racing games.
Amazing Video. This is the only system i never played. I hope i can play it by my self in the future
Usually gaming conventions have them for play.
@MarcLawler-ep6lo thats Not the Point. I will Play the Jaguar Not my pc
Missle Command 3D on a Windows Handheld with gyro enabled??? 🤔🤔🤔
Greg, do you have a brick and mortar store? For some reason I thought Adam the woo bought a retro system from a place in central Florida and I thought maybe it was your store? Anyways, I was in the area this week and wanted to find a retro store while I was in the area.
yes Atari Jaguar Doom was the best
Gouraud Shading is pronounced " GOO - RAW " it's a French name of Henri Gouraud the man who made a PHD thesis at the University of Utah for that shading algorythm, we must thank him he made polygonal 3D way smoother like is co mate Edwin Catmull at Pixar ...
What's with the reolution on World Tour Racing? It looks like a GBA game.
You don't seem to mind the terrible frame rate in some games like that Brutal Sports game. Also, watch the Digital Foundry video about Pitfall and you will see how smoother the SNES and Genesis versions run.
The player moves as smooth as prince of Persia . Faulty monitor config?
The game runs at 30fps on Jaguar, see a scrolling comparison, this isn't about character animations.
@@Imgema yeah, I could identify single frames. Weird that this is the limit here. After backface culling not many polygons are left. Maybe needs bones? The fighters only occupy a small area. I never understood why the court needs to rotate ( for normal moves ). Flatnshaded ( but with light) may look even better than dull textures all around.
@@Imgemaimagitec Design did a shocking Conversion of Pitfall to the Jaguar.
Take a 60 FPS Sega Genesis /Sega CD title, reduce it to 30 FPS on a 64-bit architecture, 2D powerhouse console.
And to think they were looking at converting it to the Atari Lynx, dodged a bullet there.
@@thefurthestmanfromhome1148why and how does that happen? Just a lazy port or what?
Wow, that video looks like a ton of work. I got the Jag as a kid and bought it again this year. I also have a Gamedrive that runs roms and cd images as well. Today the CD Drives are insanely overpriced. I still enjoy playing Tempest, AVP, Doom, Wolfenstein and even Cybermorph. I think your ratings are spot on, except for Highlander. That is an F for poor gameplay, annoying camera and awkward controls at least in my book.
I remember reading the previews for Freelancer 2120 that hyped me a lot but got cancelled.
Only the PC CD version of Freelancer was ever started and had serious performance issues, Imagitec Design did get Atari to licence the Jag Doom engine, for the Jag CD version but project never got off the ground.
Ex-Imagitec Design took the project with them and attempted to make it a PlayStation title, when they joined Gremlin, but it went nowhere.
The Jag CD screens in press at the time, are taken from the PC CD version.
@@thefurthestmanfromhome1148 Thanks. I was not aware the Doom Engine was supposed to be used. At least they had some fine concept art.
@@Turbotobi79 Going to have to post this as separate posts..
Martin Hooley originally claimed that the reason game was canned was because Atari wanted them to include lots of Custom Lighting Effects and Texture - Mapping, which Jaguar couldn't handle, so they moved it to the PlayStation, then years later he claimed it was canned because it was obvious the Jaguar CD was going to flop at retail and Imagitec would never recoup their investment, which goes nowhere to explaining why they simply didn't push it out on PC instead
@@Turbotobi79 An Artist gave this account:
Freelancer was a shit storm from day one to be honest - the
best thing about it was the concept art (by wayne reynolds) - I think
we used a 3D system by a small team of about 3 people that were
brought in from outside - mostly because by then everyone didn't like
Emerson Best, who was a rookie producer at Imagitec and wound everyone
up, thinking he knew it all.
Emerson at best was a green producer - he was brought in for god
knows what reasons - completely up his own arse - started to tell us
how to do everything and was generally massively disliked."
"I think Imag realised that the I- war engine wasn't going to cut
it, and I think Martin Hooley was briefly going to stump up the cash for an
off the shelf 3D engine, when out of the blue, a small team of people
- a three man team, suddenly appeared. No Idea who the poor fu#kers
were but we had a connundrum - we could do it in house or use this
other team and it was better that the other team would put up with
emerson cos we all didn't like him.
It did get to a point where even the external team called martin and
asked him why it was necessary that emerson called them every single
day for 3 hours every single morning though....
#it should be noted the above source from Imagitec Design stated the game NEVER used stop motion models, something we know it DID..
Here's the guy who did the work.
www.nevillebuchanan.co.uk/
So take the above claims with a degree of caution obviously still some old wounds amongst Imagitec Design staff.
@@Turbotobi79 Scott Stilphen's Atari Documentation shows Imagitec Design did take delivery of the Doom Engine, which confirms comments Andrew Seed made...
File dated:Feb 13 1995 Game has a ? next to listing for Original release Date.
Status:Expected/Revised date: 4/95..bought Doom Engine..Revised Schedule needed'
Another Imagitec Design musician told me..
This is a blast from the past.
I was involved with the game Freelancer at an early stage, creating music, however this was still ongoing when I left Imagitec so don’t know if this ever saw the light of day. I know it didn’t on the Jaguar CD
Because Vortex was a SNES game?
Whut
@@cyrollan He asked why Ultra Vortek was called that when it was scheduled to be called Ultra Vortex
Yes.
Still have mine, with a working CD-unit also...
Thank you for awesome look at at all theses games from someone who actually has played them. Its so refreshing to see an honest take on this powerhouse instead the same old uneducated lame take on this misunderstood system. Great video!
Agreed. Most of the Jaguar library is good!
@@GregsGameRoom Power Drive Rally, Super Burnout, Iron Soldier, Rayman and of course Doom and AVP are awesome games. I agree with most of your grades here. I haven’t played any of the soccer games so can’t say on any of these. Tempest Rocks for sure! Sublime
I remember buying this when it came out. I loved the Jeff minter games and aliens. The other games purchased were duds. I think I gave up on it because I also had an Amiga and a turbo duo. I also remember the games were pricey and difficult to find.
Well done sir. Absolutly enjoyed this!
Glad to be of service!
Great video. I've been interested in the Jag for a few years but don't have one. I'd love to see a mini come out of they can bail emulation but Skyhammer, Wolfenstein and AvP would be top of the wish list for me
Graphics do not matter if the games aren't fun
Atari Lynx was hella slept on
47:09 William Joseph "B.J." Blazkowicz (Polish pronunciation: [blasˈkɔvit͡ʂ]. Yeah,not easy for the first time for pronunciation,but... There is even harder names in Polish. But mine is simple... Kind of😜 ('cause it short version,not full).
1:03:03 "right now oil are companies in control.d old animen"
I kinda lol'd here