Part 2 - How did this SEGA Genesis Game achieve the "Impossible"?
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 15 ก.ค. 2024
- I explain how "The Adventures of Batman & Robin" had possibly the most coding tricks of any 16-bit game in Part 2 of this Coding Secrets Video.
Part 1 - • How did this SEGA Gene...
Sonic 3D Special Stage - • Sonic's Special Stage ...
Mickey Mania Moose Chase 3D - • How we coded the World...
AL82 - / kkbigal
Is That You or Are You You by Chris Zabriskie is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license (creativecommons.org/licenses/...)
Source: chriszabriskie.com/reappear/
Artist: chriszabriskie.com/ - เกม
It looks like they threw every trick they knew into one game and the result is pure eye candy. Really impressive result for the hardware.
This game was pretty late in the consoles life, so they were trying to keep up with the newer stuff coming up. Sort of like one last harah.
Such a shame they rammed up the difficulty so much.
Lovely looking game and extremely memorable intro and stage 1 themes by Jesper Kyd all wrapped up in the fantastic Batman animated series looks.
@@LeeONardo it seems like a trend. the last few battletoads games on the NES were pure visual effects and the system being pushed as far it could go in 1991, and yet those games are also known to be infamously hard.
@@LeeONardo yeah, it's ridiculously hard after a couple of levels. Kinda like those shmups that have a lot of impressive looking effects going on but can't be appreciated while playing because they make a modern bullet hell feel reasonable
@@LeeONardo It's crazy to think there were games so difficult we were just happy to get to that 'next' stage. I recently spent some serious time learning this game, and I think I maxed out my capabilities at the flying level. I don't think I'll ever get any further. Not only is it difficult, it's relentless.
The amount of nonstop hostility gunning for Batman throughout the game is like the villains took a "the gloves are off" approach to defeating their nemesis.
Yeah games weren't a nice guided stroll through the park like they are now!
It'd be cool if you could interview Stephen Thomson or other members of Clockwork Tortoise about the development of the game.
100% would be amazing
Stephen Thomson actually did comment on the previous video to state he and the team were honored that their work was featured, so he is aware of it.
@@sensifacient yes it’s mentioned in the video here so the about probably already know it. The topic was about having an interview with them.
Yes. These guys achieved some timeless stuff and get 0 coverage.
True...specially if he could talk about the unreleased X-Women game for the Genesis that was being developed by the same team if I remember correctly.
This game looks like a playable tech demo for the Genesis. It's incredible work.
They did NOT have to go so hard on this game but they did and I'm so glad
The execution in this game is phenomenal.
This game and a lot of the TT games on the Genesis are examples of a dev team that really knew the potential of the hardware well and cared enough or more likely had enough time to implement those graphical effects to the benefit of the game.
Yeah but by 1994 when this game was released, the Sega MegaDrive had been available in Japan since 1988, in North America since 1989 and in U.K./Europe/Brazil PAL/SECAM regions since 1990.
That means that Western game developers could have started studying Sega MegaDrive S.D.K. documentation for more than at least two to three years and as such have already programmer experience (depending on if the game programmers were hardcore devs because others made multiple games and didn't really push the hardware much even by 1995)
What this means? that the Sega MegaDrive did not have some hardware Project being approved that derailed game programmers like the Sega of America created 32X did to the Sega Saturn which launched in Japan November 1994 and by May 1997 a certain big shot who was a new employee to the parent company decided to announce that Saturn was not Sega's future...
Imagine if something like that happened in May 1991 just as Sonic Team was finishing up Sonic the Hedgehog, then this game would most likely NEVER have existed.
I would not be surprised if the Batman & Robin team programmed some Amiga games. The Amiga dev scene and Genesis crossed over because of the 68K processor.
@@apollosungod2819 It runs deeper than that. The Genesis CPU had been popularized by the Amiga and Atari ST around 1985, and its VDP was derived from the same TMS9918 derivatives used in MSX computers and Sega's own SG1000, Mark III, and Master System. By the time the Genesis came out, its hardware was somewhat of an industry standard in Japan and familiar to American and European programmers too.
What about the awesome music? I was lucky enough to chat with Jesper Kyd, the composer, many years ago and he told me he did some demoscene tricks to get it to sound this good.
I wonder if that's a bit beyond Jon's scope. Being a programmer, he probably wouldn't spend a lot of time figuring out musical hacks, especially demo scene stuff which typically goes above and beyond normal hardware limitations. You'd just expect the music guy to do his part, I suppose.
@@rars0n I would say the opposite. At this point in time many coders did the audio code as well and often has a connection to the demo scene
@Knobcore most EU/US composers used the stock GEMS program. GEMS itself is a tracker-like program and quite limited, so most companies (namely JP ones) like Sunsoft decided to implement their music in a MML format, in which combined with their own driver, usually let them have increased control over how they wanted the hardware to sound. Toy Story is almost entirely GEMS-based, by the way, with the only exception occurring with the MOD player for both the title screen and the ending.
While I don't think GEMS itself is bad, the people using the program usually had no idea what they were doing half the time, so to see the team behind Toy Story actually utilize GEMS correctly is a refreshing thing to hear. I bet there are a lot of other super good GEMS soundtracks, but they're unfortunately drowned out with tons of really bad GEMS soundtracks, often being the result of an overworked programmer half-assing it and calling it a day.
Going on a slight deviation here, and into Toy Story's sound, it seems Allister Brimble was credited for the soundtrack. Considering the MOD file in the game credits him, he likely was the one of the major people of the sound team, since he previously coded a tracker for his NES Codemasters games, and has lots of experience with MOD trackers in general, which means GEMS was likely second nature.
@Carlos Eduardo Espinosa Sánchez It can be concluded that the samples is what pushed Jackson to quit Sonic 3's music team. If we take the quote of Brad Buxer saying "he didn't like the sound of the Genesis" into account, we likely can infer he meant the terrible sample routine, since Jackson himself really enjoyed FM, and even was okay with a previous game with his works (Michael Jackson's Moonwalker)
To this day, I consider this to be the greatest video game score ever.
God, the graphics in that game are so beautiful. It's really impressive how they not only took a bunch of technical tricks, but used them so well together for some amazing results.
I feel like that spotlight effect is a great example of why emulators today need better CRT effect filters. It looks pretty bad in pixel-perfect form, but it would have been nearly flawless on an old tube TV with its color smearing. You probably wouldn't even be able to see the "aliasing" around the edge of the spotlight. (Same with the vertical lines on the clouds; they'd be invisible on a CRT.)
@JM Coulon It's almost too bad monitors couldn't just have CRT filters built into their settings honestly. Could probably help even modern games as far as anti-aliasing (at least it could be an alternative solution for someone if the in-game temporal AA is too blurry)
this is the one Sega Genesis game that didn't look like it had a limited color palette, very colorful game
They really worked hard to make the ol' genesis keep up with the SNES. Very impressive game graphically. And its gameplay is alright as well.
Lion king is another one
There are plenty Genesis games like that. As long as the devs didn't try to make everything look "realistic", developed the game with the Genesis color palette in mind and didn't overuse the dithering effects, the games could look extremely colorful. Some of the most colorful ones I can think off: Magical Taruruto, Super Fantasy Zone, Sonic 2, Rocket Knight Adventures, Streets or Rage 2, Treasure games, Monster World series, Ristar, Panorama Cotton, Shockman, Aladdin, Earthworm Jim, Ranger X and this guy's own Sonic 3D Blast.
Edit: For some reason when I first posted this, stupid TH-cam, reduces my long list of colorful Genesis games to 4. I'm re-adding some... LOL.
This Batman game looks pretty trippy too. Honestly looks more bizarre than Earthworm Jim honestly.
And... Flink, arguably the best use of the palette!
Would be cool to go through some Treasure games, and pick out some interesting tricks, such as their pseudo 3d techniques (Light Crusader, Alien Soldier, Gunstar Heroes, Dynamite Headdy)
Now it's time for the 68000 heart on fire
Oh yeah! Light Crusader had a great isometric engine, I'd love to see a deep dive on that
A lot of the treasure game effects are stuff he's already explained, he'd just be repeating himself at a certain point
Including the 3D polygonal objects in Light Crusader?
@@cordellcox6126 I was thinking of those. They seem like particles, and how in Gunstar Heroes is Seven Force morphing done. It would explain how VectorMan morphing was done too.
Gamehut also did a fanastic vid on this recently. The REAL star of the show IMO is the soundtrack. SInce I rented this at 9 I just cannot get over how incredible it is.
Completely holds up to with a modern sound system and sub.
Yes, the music on this retro game is no doubt phenomenal with a capital P. I was impressed how a game like this from the mid-90s has such an impressive score composition for what it is. But the entire game is all around impressive.
How about the transparent (not dithered) face on the road? Is that just clever use of the shadow/highlight function? Or is it just drawn on the road to "look" transparent?
I asked the same question earlier, cos I thought it was shadow/highlight too. Jon says its just part of the road.
Jon appears, batman 1997 horns play
Oof
Back then, transparency was achieved by flickering a sprite on an off really fast, giving it the illusion of transparency.
I'm not sure if that's what was done here but that's my guess
@@aurathedraak7909 ???
This series on the Sega Megadrive effects is awesome. I really enjoyed every single one of the videos!
Can you look into Ranger X (aka Ex-Ranza)? That one does a lot of smart things, even if coding wise they are not really big tricks. It's just that most of the time it's not using tricks for the sake of looking good, but they also have effects on the gameplay. Like it changes the palette the mimic real time lightning as you go behind an obstacle or fly out of a forest, or using highlight mode for light beams or search lights. Both which matter because your robot gets solar power, so when in light, you recharge power faster. But things like the search lights can also sound the alarm on one level, and you get swarmed by enemies. Oh and it does full screen scaling at the intro and has 3d vector cutscenes and ending.
As a dev with moderate experience but a long way to go, these videos are super inspiring and educational. Even though we do have the tech to make the stuff these games "fake", this out-of-the-box thinking and concepts can be applied today in new ways. Thank you!
Interesting breakdown. This game looked and sounded awesome, but I've never found it that fun to be honest. The first shooting stage, for example, goes on for half of eternity and seriously wears out its welcome.
I love that the way you explain these effects doesn’t stop them being so cool.
I can't get enough of this -- it's so fascinating to learn about all of the creativity and ingenuity that went into making these games look amazing. Maybe not as impressive, but ultra-rare was Crusader of Centy, that game had a lot of pseudo 3d elements with some of their bosses and it just was a beautiful game.
The second you said pugsy it unlocked a memory in my mind and that's the name of the game that I've been trying to remember for at least 5 years now thank you for not only bringing it to my attention but literally making it my childhood thank you sir
These videos are fascinating. It's amazing at what some of the best programmers were able to get out of the Mega Drive in contrast to the first games released on it. It's almost like it's a completely different console. Great work as always.
math and clever techniques. amazing! this game was a blast during my elementary days.
What amazing effects they made! Wow
It's absolutely amazing how the simplest techniques made for the most impressive effects overall. Super clever on the developer's part!
It's really amazing to hear about this from someone responsible for all of these wonderful classic games. You're a programing idol my friend!
Brilliant stuff. Thank you for giving coverage to this great game. One lasr thing: if you are one of the team members of the original development team, people would love to read an article on the details of these effects and their Mega Drive implementation. Cheers.
This opens the door to how 16 bit games can be given new life with more powerful development hardware to save time etc & learn possible new ways to refine older software techniques from the ones who pioneered them. There's another TH-camr Strafefox who is doing in essence of what your videos are but less technical more of the making process history. It would be crazy to combine these efforts into a network where coders past & present get together & share ideas about making these types of graphics tricks
Or focus of pushing the current or future hardware ;)
@@litjellyfish Well Stefan there has already been so advancement hardware & software in 3D CGI etc to where games look like a cinematic movie than the games of yesterday to where it's so common to see. But when you see this older games doing all these visuals on a less powerful system to where you see the effort that was put in it. The only thing I can think of that would be future hardware is VR gaming
Always enjoy your coding secrets videos!
This is by far the best sega genesis coding channel.
My favourite part is when he says "I've done something similar in *insert game here*". In all seriousness though, I absolutely love this channel. Thank you for sharing your insight and knowledge.
This is the exact reason why so many of these consoles have great looking games towards the last quarter of its active life, they all accrue techniques/skills/etc along the way from the beginning and then let out the best of the best in whatever game they got to work on. Amazing!
I love and appreciate seeing how these amazing effects are done, Thank you so much for this series!
I am really *really* enjoying these deep dives into other games and see how these effects were achieved. Thank you for sharing your knowledge with us.
The man with the relaxing music and the secrets of my childhood games. It's so absolutely brilliant what you do here. Thanks for this wonderful videos!
I enjoyed both of these videos a lot. I know literally nothing about programming and you do an amazing job of breaking it down to understand. I’ve been needing to play this one for a while.
This channel is the first one I’ve hit the bell for. I love seeing the method to the madness that was coding for the 16-bit consoles. Growing up with these games and now seeing what makes them tick just gives me so much enjoyment.
So much great engineering. The hardware and drivers provide a specific set of capabilities, and these true gaming engineers took the tools they had and built things that nobody knew were even possible. I'm sure their ingenuity surprised even themselves at times. Amazing what could be produced with these "simple" (ha) tricks.
First effect in the video: "okay this is another great effect"
🤣 🤣
i see a new CodingSecrets video, i open it and immediately hit the like button ... bcs i know it's gonna be pure gold again! :-D keep up the great work!
Amazing stuff as usual. Would love to see more .
This game had so many impressive technical tricks going on in it, really is a showcase of some of the best of what the MegaDrive has to offer visually.
Love it, great explanation of the the effects. This was always a favorite Sega game, especially for the graphics and soundtrack. :D
I… think you may be overthinking some of this.
The helicopter light is the same effect as the robot lasers: the background is designed such that every line has a different width, and then it picks a different scroll position for every scanline to make the shape it wants (note how there are never any gaps within a given line). Alien Soldier does something similar when some bosses die and explode.
As to how they compute its shape, that's another matter. My guess is that they shape the circle and the triangle (compute the minimum and maximum positions of both for each scanline) and hope that they overlap enough that any missing gaps wouldn't be too obvious.
John O'Brien was the main programmer, he also did Chase HQ on the spectrum, another masterpiece. A coding wizard.
And the scaling stuff for Batman Returns and Cliffhanger CDs! Nobody could rock the Sega CD's special features like him and also the guys at Core.
@@GameSack Batman returns on the mega cd with the 3d road effect and all those scaling sprites just looks absolutely stunning!
@@willyarma_uk It really does. I've also noticed that all of his games are EXTREMELY difficult. Batman Returns' driving scenes are super tough and it's probably his easiest game.
@@willyarma_uk Sega CD has hardware sprite scaling though. And a second, faster CPU.
@@noop9k Thanks, I knew that
How have I never heard of this game? The visuals rock!
Seriously incredible work on this video, and to the game devs.
This channel is great, love the information about all the secrets.
Pugs was a weird game, but I loved it on Sega CD. The physics were fun. Holding a gun and pulling yourself up ledges.
Since I finished a few times I assume I was playing it correctly? If definitely had a sandboxy feel to it.
Yay! He's back! I love your videos!
Fantastic video, thanks for this. The guys who coded this can be proud
Truly appreciate this channel, keep up the stellar work!
This is really cool, love seeing behind the scenes
I adore the specific game breakdowns, and please keep them up, but
Maybe an idea can be to explain some of the terms you use with examples? Like when you say “horizontal interrupts” and kinda explain in maybe a bit more of a technical series(for us programmers who get that sort of thing a bit more)
I googled the subject and found the generalized “interrupts” for computers and while I’d guess the two are related, I would love to know the specific differences and use cases.
There’s terms old and new in these videos that I’m sure many of us get the concepts, but recently game dev has changed so much with the computer doing a lot of heavy lifting for you for effects and things that I’d love to know more about these more specific tools like a video JUST on horizontal interrupts, how you access their functionality, and examples of how you can use them to achieve different effects.
Just an idea of course, but stay your course anyway because you’re doing great with these videos!
Loved these 2 videos (and clearly many other people did, too!) so would love to see more analysis like this of other games
Found you through this video! Awesome info and subbing. Goodbye podcasts on lunch LOL
I wish the creators of all this games would come forward and tell us more about the development and just themselves.
Very Well Done Video! ! ! , Luv the very slight background music effect
Best 16 bit game to date, period. And one of the best games ever made! Pure masterpiece!
@JM Coulon For me, the whole package: gameplay, visuals, music is an absolutely perfect symbiosis. I've never played a game that make me feel so high on adrenalin from start to finish.
I am a huge fan of run and gun games, I have played countless of them, some amazing ones. Trust me, to this day, nothing tops this game!
Loved this video and part #1!
Holy shit. Did I just experience a YT-video in 2021 that wasn't full of pointless talking and just straight to the point at hand. That had med stumped for a good while. Great video champ. Keep it up
Wonderful video. Very impressive effects in that game.
This is actually interesting episodes of Coding Secrets, A interview with the creators including Stephen would also be interesting too.
I can do all of those effects on the Amiga A500 easily enough. In fact, the simplest one is the circle where on the Amiga, the easiest way to do this is to use a triangle and a pre-calculated co-sinus and use its values to cut horizontal lines from the triangle. You can make the circle any size you like just by choosing at which line you start at in the triangle. You'd still need to blit and fill the rays to the circle though, but that's easy enough. It's the same thing that's done for sphere routines in demos like in say Rink A Dink Redux by Lemon where he's actually blitting into multiple bitplanes because of the number of circles he's drawing.
Amazing stuff. Thank you for sharing it with us.
"simple" effects but used creatively, that is the power of good imagination
Half a byte being called a "nybble" is the best thing I've heard all week
Very Nice way to make great effects on mega drive, and your perception is outstanding. Thanks for bring It to us.
Great content, so very interesting. Keep up the good work 💪
I'm glad this video popped up on my suggestions page because I wouldn't have realized that TH-cam unsubscribed me from this channel for some reason. Must have been recently as I had already watched the previous episode.
This game was magical back in the day. Thanks for demystifying it!!
It's a strange feeling watching these videos knowing that this man worked on games that defined my childhood lol
No matter how calm your voice is or how calm the music is. Just watching gameplay of this game gives me strong anxiety attack. Especially the Hatter boss fight. I remember how hard he punished me when I first picked this game. Absolutely brutal experience. Also a masterpiece from every point of view, especially the soundtrack.
Man...How Clockwork Tortoise never made more games was always baffling to me.
From a couple of interviews online it sounds like one of the co-founders left, X-Women was cancelled, and the company just kind of fell apart after that.
I love this channel it gets very technical.
I absolutely love that intro music. Please never change it!
Do you know what music that is? I have herd it before but dont know where its from.
@@BiancaRoughFin The song is: 'Is That You or Are You You' - Chris Zabriskie
I love your videous sooo much! You a great man. and you doing a great job! I am a UIUX designer, but I always respect programmers. For me everything what you are doing is a pure magic!!
you need to do more of these videos, i really like them.
Amazing video to learn about old-school game development techniques!
This and Toy Story are like mu fav childhood games on Sega Mega Drive. I can’t believe I’m actually seeing videos of someone who made one of the game and is reviewing the other.
Looks like another case for PI Jon Burton. As always great video, thanks a lot!
Seeing these cool looking games makes me go play them.
Back then we all believed that there was a special 3D chip inside the cartridge... Amazing work, you really pushed the boudaries of the 16 bit console!
The team who did this game really knew how to use Genesis full power, awesome.
It's so weird that there's such deep dives into Genesis games of all things. By far, us Genesis owners were in the minority. Nobody has a Vectorman tattoo. I love a good deep dive, and that's exactly what you provide. It feels like providence that it happens to been into my childhood.
How do we convince the people that made sonic mania to do something similar of an upgrade for Vectorman?
It's saturday 7 AM, watching coding secrets, while my code compiles.
I haven't had any sleep, it's still "yesterday" for me :D
Love it, looks great, I don't remember seeing this before. 🦇🃏
I love this series so much!! Thank you for sharing your insights on these techniques! Do you think you'd ever do a Coding Secrets video on the Genesis game Cotton Panorama?
This game is amazing!
I played a lot on my mega drive when I was younger and still play when I can.
Coding Secrets shows us some of the best graphics on the Mega drive and then explains how to make them better. It's why I love this channel
fantastic insight. thank you!!!
Awesome series, please never stop these amazing insights 👍
I'd love to see some proper in depth long form deep dives into some stuff you've done, and others like this included that weren't you. Maybe starting from scratch(or from where ever) and going through the process of coding stuff like this :D
One thing is for sure, this game is beautiful
Yay, I've almost forgotten about this! Finally! :D
Awesome video!
Th haxmor team absolutely love the breakdowns of coding secrets
Finding ways around limitations of a system is what makes a great programmer. And the limitations themselves - a product of a time when RAM and processor power was expensive - are what gives each of those old systems their personality. Because those barriers are not there anymore, modern systems' games pretty much all look the same and the systems themselves have no personality. This, I think, is one of the reasons retro gaming is so popular right now.
Excellent insight into coding.
Amazing, thanks for the video.
Please talk about the cancelled Swat Kats game for the Mega Drive.
yes please
@@NoahNCopeland OMG you're the guy behind the Sonic Triple Trouble remake.
I'm guessing it was cancelled because cats would literally be the worst animal to anthropomorphize and take care of hostage situations? 🤣
@@plasmaoctopus1728 You haven't seen the show it's based on have you?
@@Nathan-rb3qp Hehe just making a bad joke
I love these videos.