Something for Darkside

[Warbie]

http://www.gametrailers.com/player/42464.html

'This package will feature 40 of SEGA's greatest first party titles from its 16-bit Mega Drive years and even better; it'll feature some 8-bit classics from its Master System era to sweeten the deal.

?SEGA Mega Drive Ultimate Collection is a must-have for any SEGA enthusiast,? commented Gary Knight, European Marketing Director for SEGA Europe. ?Fans will get a chance to relive fond memories from these classic games in HD format.?

Developers Backbone Entertainment have said to include some classics and according to the SEGA site, the list is as follows:

Alex Kidd in the Enchanted Castle
Alien Storm
Altered Beast
Beyond Oasis
Bonanza Bros.
Columns
Comix Zone
Decap Attack starring Chuck D. Head
Dr. Robotnik's MBM
Dynamite Headdy
Ecco the Dolphin
Ecco II: The Tides of Time
E-SWAT
Fatal Labyrinth
Flicky
Gain Ground
Golden Axe I
Golden Axe II
Golden Axe III
Kid Chameleon
Phantasy Star II
Phantasy Star III: Generations of Doom
Phantasy Star IV: The End of the Millennium
Ristar
Shining in the Darkness
Shining Force
Shining Force 2
Shinobi III: Return of the Ninja Master
Sonic 3D Blast
Sonic and Knuckles
Sonic Spinball
Sonic The Hedgehog
Sonic The Hedgehog 2
Sonic The Hedgehog 3
Streets of Rage
Streets of Rage 2
Streets of Rage 3
Super Thunder Blade
Vectorman
Vectorman 2

The SEGA Mega Drive Ultimate Collection is scheduled for release in early 2009 on both the Xbox 360 and PS3.'

I'll probably pick it up too

 

[Bob_Marley]

The entire Streets of Rage series in HD?

This may well be worth a look.

 

[ríomhaire]

No Soliel ;(

 

[Nomad]

My head burst from my bum in amazement. Must have.... but crap, I only have a Wii.

 

[Vegeta897]

How exactly is this HD?

What's the difference here?

It looks exactly the same, so they're using the same screen resolution, how do you make that into HD? It seems like they're just throwing around that term to entice people... If it were really 'HD' they'd have to redo all the graphics or something.

Edit: Research...

"the Ultimate Collection will apparently output all titles at 720p."

That just doesn't make any sense at all. There is no advantage to doing that because there is no more resolution to gain out of the games that any TV can't already display. Plugging your sega into a giant TV would look just the same, I do not see in what respect this is "HD" except for possibly some optimizations to look better on 720p display.

 

[Krynn72]

Where does it say they're using the same screen resolution? They might have just re-rendered all their assets at higher resolution so you dont get ridiculous aliasing when its up scaled.

Package looks really nice though. I'll probably get it.

 

[Vegeta897]

Where does it say they're using the same screen resolution?

If all the graphics are the original, how could they have a higher screen resolution?

They might have just re-rendered all their assets at higher resolution so you dont get ridiculous aliasing when its up scaled.

"Re-rendered all their assets at a higher resolution" what exactly does this mean? Can you show me an example?

I'm familiar with the sampling options you can do in emulators and such, you can't just anti-alias stuff like you can in 3D games. We're talking about sprites here, color values for pixels are not 'rendered' by the game like they would be with textured, lighted, etc. faces in a 3d game; every sprite is drawn and in the game data itself. Anti-aliasing is just not possible, unless you want to blur everything or do one of the sampling things that emulators have, which completely up to preference and does not necessarily look "better".

 

[Krynn72]

I just meant that if they had access to the original asset files for the games (which could have been made at higher resolution that was ultimately used in the games) they could use those original files.

So if the genesis game had a 60x60 pixel character sprite, they may have originally made it at 200x200 and just scaled it down for the game. Maybe. Or perhaps they just had artists go in and scale up those 60x60 sprites, and then hand-clean up the jaggies. Which would suck very hard for those guys.

Rendered was the wrong word, but im a 3D guy so sue me.

 

[Vegeta897]

If you watch the video I'm fairly certain they did not redo their graphics. They looks the same to me, just as low res as they always were.

Not all games make their sprites like that, anyway. Manually hand-drawn sprites look the best in old games like this. I don't really think they did scaling down in Sonic, unless they did some severe cleanup work afterwards, which would just be more trouble than it's worth.

Here's an example of the kind of filters they could be using to make it seem "HD" but I don't even think they're using these.

On the left is the original unfiltered. Nice clean pixels, old games do not look "aliased to shit" when scaled up like this. If you think it looks bad, you're using the wrong word to call it shit looking. In the middle is a filter that adds some 2x smaller pixels where it thinks there should be some, and blurs it a bit to make it seem smooth. Some people like this, though it has obvious disadvantages like the overall blurry and messy feel, which I don't think would go over well on a nice big display where you can see details well. The third is essentially the same thing without the blurring. As you can see, still messy looking. You just can't beat the original cleanness and the fact that it's how it was intended.

 

[Darkside55]

E-SWAT

Sold. Sold for one single game. They could've put E-SWAT on a disc by itself and sold it to me for $40. This is beautiful. Thanks for bringing this to my attention, Warbie.

 

[Bad^Hat]

Cool, I guess, but I don't think I like Sega that much. No Gunstar Heroes either... but then wasn't that confirmed as an upcoming stand-alone arcade title?

 

[Darkside55]

Gunstar Heroes was made by Treasure, hence why it isn't in the pack.

Treasure needs to release a collection.



Aw. Like three seconds after posting that I made myself sad.

 

[Kiva128]

Phantasy Star II
Phantasy Star III: Generations of Doom
Phantasy Star IV: The End of the Millennium

****in' sold!

 

[kupocake]

Gunstar Heroes was made by Treasure, hence why it isn't in the pack..

Why is Dynamite Headdy in there then? I mean, from the Treasure perspective, as opposed to the perspective that nature never meant such awesome to be contained on an optical disk.

The '1080p' output is no different to using any of the full-screen filters on a PC emulator. For that reason, and because Mega Drive compilations are always so lazily put together (and I have enough of those games on Sonic Mega / Gems Collection), i'd say this is a pretty passable collection. You already have these games. Because if you don't, I refuse to acknowledge your existence.

 

[Vegeta897]

The '1080p' output is no different to using any of the full-screen filters on a PC emulator.

Thank you.

 

[CyberPitz]

Yeaaahh, just let me pet my complete Sega collection of Roms..

*pets...*

Yes, my love.

 

[Sedako]

comix zone

I just gasm'd out of places I thought impossible. Although, it does look as if they've simply applied a pixel filter, rather than translating all the games into HD.

 

[staticprimer]

Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine? Can this really be real?

 

[V-Man339]

It is.

 

[Darkside55]

Why is Dynamite Headdy in there then? I mean, from the Treasure perspective, as opposed to the perspective that nature never meant such awesome to be contained on an optical disk.

You know what? I don't know. I kinda glossed over the list and didn't even really register Dynamite Heady being on there, because it's sitting above E-SWAT. So I guess there is a Treasure game on there, but they opted for the more iconic one. Everyone should know Dynamite Headdy, but few people actually know Gunstar Heroes.

I still want a Treasure pack, that way I can get Guardian Heroes and Mischief Makers on the same disc.

 

[Ennui]

If I had either of those consoles I would be picking this up. Streets of Rage is one of the most fun co-op games ever.

 

[Darkside55]

They got Streets of Rage on the Wii too, if you have one of those.

 

[Ennui]

I don't, but a Wii is the only one I have any interest in potentially owning. Interest that just went up a little bit more now that I know that.

 

[Kyorisu]

Oh another one of those lets make kids re-buy everything packages. I'll stick with my complete rom packages thank you very much,

 

[kupocake]

Have they signed in blood that NA / EU SEGA won't remove Streets of Rage from this compilation as they did with Sonic Gems over ratings concerns?

And surely no Mega Drive collection can truely be complete without Moonwalker. It invented gaming camp-value. WOO!

 

[Darkside55]

Such a good game, Moonwalker. SUCH a good game. Used to eat up all my tokens at the arcade.

The Genesis version...not so much. Or, not as good, anyway. Still good.