Messages

1426

General Discussion / PSX Emulator (FAO Jari, Dag & Friends)

« on: 2001-03-04 05:30:00 »

I still think porting an XBox game would be far, far easier than porting a PS2 game, say. So what if a particular effect is accelerated on the XBox but not on every PC? Just make it an option ... or use it anyway! All of the library code (DirectX) would be the same. Compare this to, say, FF7, where they probably had to rewrite the whole graphics engine from scratch.

1427

General Discussion / PSX Emulator (FAO Jari, Dag & Friends)

« on: 2001-03-04 03:48:00 »

You've still missed the point. Yes, there'll be a lot of changes needed to port XBox games to the PC. But it will *still* be less than games written for the PS2/Gamecube, that will in all likelehood use a COMPLETELY different system to DirectX. And so what if nothing supports DX8 100% in hardware yet? Do you need 100% hardware acceleration? Nope. Do you see XBox's for sale? No, so by the time they come out, I suspect a lot of PC hardware *will* have DX8 support.

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General Discussion / PSX Emulator (FAO Jari, Dag & Friends)

« on: 2001-03-03 18:48:00 »

Would I buy an XBox? No. Why? Well, if the development environment for it is DirectX, then I suspect anything developed for it could be ported to the PC very, very quickly - in fact, there'd probably be little cost to do it, so most developers will. So there's no point in me buying an XBox, when I already have a good PC. At least with Gamecube/PS2 there might be some games that don't make it to the PC. (I don't think that's a GOOD thing, but it IS a reason to buy one of them!).

1429

General Discussion / PSX Emulator (FAO Jari, Dag & Friends)

« on: 2001-02-27 21:24:00 »

Not necessarily. The gamecube might not be able to render as fast due to bandwidth restrictions, so the doing-everything-in-one-pass is the only  way for them to achieve nice results - and not using special effects wouldn't in that case speed anything up.

This is all pure speculation of course - I'm just saying the only proper way to compare consoles is to actually *compare* them. Since the gamecube and XBox aren't out yet, we can't do that. Any discussion, even based on technical specs, is just guesswork until then.

1430

General Discussion / PSX Emulator (FAO Jari, Dag & Friends)

« on: 2001-02-27 15:12:00 »

Fair enough; but it doesn't necessarily mean anything. Like I said, maybe the Gamecube is far slower at rendering each polygon when multiple effects are used, so the fact it renders many effects at once just serves to even things out - not necessarily make it faster/better.

1431

General Discussion / PSX Emulator (FAO Jari, Dag & Friends)

« on: 2001-02-26 23:02:00 »

Take all technical claims with a pinch of salt. I haven't read up on the specs for the consoles recently, so Nintendo could be telling the truth when they say Gamecube does in one render what PS2 takes eight, but I guess they're *really* saying:

If you take one particular effect, which we've chosen specifically because Gamecube supports it in hardware and PS2, we can do it in one render what takes the PS2 eight renders. Also, we aren't saying how long a render takes, so it could mean anything.

See what I mean? Technical specs can always be distorted to mean absolutely anything.

As for DVD playback - I think it's gonna be an important feature in consoles. Sure, most PC's (including mine) have DVD playback, but unlike a console, most PC's aren't connected to the main TV. You can't deny it's a nice bonus.

1432

General Discussion / PSX Emulator (FAO Jari, Dag & Friends)

« on: 2001-02-24 21:45:00 »

SaiNt ... I was being sarcastic. Don't worry, you needn't check whether I'm eating lunch before posting  

1433

General Discussion / PSX Emulator (FAO Jari, Dag & Friends)

« on: 2001-02-23 20:18:00 »

If the PS2 costs too much, the XBox won't sell at all.

I don't think the PS2 is overpriced - new consoles always cost a fortune, and it isn't that much above what the PSX cost on release.

Re: Virus: A virus is only possible where executable code is distributed, generally speaking. So if some company made a game which updated itself via the net (quite possible with nextgen consoles) in theory the same technique could be used to send a virus to the console. Of course, all it could really do would be mess up the current game and any memory cards. Unless you had a hard disk installed, when you *are* screwed.

That's also the basic problem with XBox/DirectX. If each game uses the version of DX on it's own CD then you guarantee the game runs OK - but what happens if somebody fixes a bug in DX that makes effects look smoother, etc. Either you can't use it - or you're back to the update-a-rama again.

1434

General Discussion / PSX Emulator (FAO Jari, Dag & Friends)

« on: 2001-02-23 17:36:00 »

Damn you, SaiNt!

I read that post just before lunch ... thought I'd eat ... then I come back to find out you've said everything I was going to.

1435

General Discussion / PSX Emulator (FAO Jari, Dag & Friends)

« on: 2001-02-23 13:57:00 »

Release date *does* matter. If it was only a year or less difference, maybe not but there's no way that's all it's gonna be. PS2 is out now, and has been for quite some time even here in the UK. It's already been out for nearly a year in some other countries (when was the release date in Japan?). XBox doesn't even have a development kit. Do you think it'll be out any time soon? I don't think so. Anybody who wants a high-end console within the next year will *have* to buy a PS2. Beyond that, like I said before, the XBox will probably be triple the price of a PS2 when it comes out, and on release date will have far fewer games. Guaranteed to fail? No, but I'd be surprised if it "beat" the PS2.

1436

General Discussion / PSX Emulator (FAO Jari, Dag & Friends)

« on: 2001-02-22 21:09:00 »

My money's on PS2. Why? It's out *now*, and you can buy it over the counter (at least here in the UK). It's got backwards-compatibility with PSX games (OK; so the XBox might have Dreamcast compatibility; evens it out at best), DVD playback (so have the others; again, even so far), broadband expansion possibility, etc.

All of these features are present in the other consoles (Gamecube/XBox) but the PS2 is here already. The PSX dropped in price pretty fast, so by the time the XBox sees the light of day it'll probably be 3X the price of a PS2, if not more, and there'll be lots of games out for the PS2. Same goes for the gamecube. The N64 crashed and burned as far as I'm concerned because it came out at exactly the wrong time - lots of PSX games available, and PS2 on the horizon. Could happen again.

Just my 2c.

1437

General Discussion / PSX Emulator (FAO Jari, Dag & Friends)

« on: 2001-01-19 16:38:00 »

Dag Sverre: Hear hear. Remember, the original PS only had a 33MHz RISC and that wasn't bad ... the PS2 *is* a damn good console. Lacking games so far, but don't most new releases? Think about it; PSX had Tomb Raider 1 early on. Compare that to TR3 or whatever the latest one is ... quite an improvement, ne? PS2 could very probably improve a lot, in the same way (and it doesn't look bad even now!). It takes time before developers can use the full potential of a system.

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General Discussion / PSX Emulator (FAO Jari, Dag & Friends)

« on: 2001-01-15 14:22:00 »

Nightstar: Ouch! Don't go there. I've seen the source for some of those plugins and we're talking serious complicated. Can't speak for anyone else, but it's beyond me...

1439

General Discussion / Final Fantasy X Media Released!

« on: 2001-02-14 14:01:00 »

Next time, try not to contradict yourself. It's *our* job to contradict you.

1440

General Discussion / How old is everyone?

« on: 2001-01-29 18:23:00 »

May 1982? That's me as well.

1441

General Discussion / How old is everyone?

« on: 2001-01-17 02:11:00 »

Well, since the thread is already too long...

PC 1) 386 20Mhz, 512K graphics card, 4MB RAM, 40MB hard disk, Dos 6/Win 3.11 (The Doom Machine)

PC 2) P75, 24MB RAM, 1MB S3 Trio, 260MB hard disk, Dos6/Win3.11, SB16 compatible. (The Quake Machine)

PC 3) K6-II 500, 192MB RAM, 16MB Savage 4, SB Live!, Win98, 56K modem, 100MBit network card, Miro DC30 video capture/edit card, 20GB hard disk, 10X DVD drive. (The Kick-Ass Machine)

However the first two are back home ... can't exactly bring *everything* to uni!
(PC #1 cost 30UKP inc. monitor, hehehe).
(So did PC #2 .. except no monitor.)

1442

General Discussion / How old is everyone?

« on: 2001-01-11 01:33:00 »

That's why there's a non-Java index to go to ... maybe I should make the link a bit more obvious.

1443

General Discussion / How old is everyone?

« on: 2001-01-10 01:51:00 »

Hmmm ... I coded my site entirely in Notepad, and that uses DHTML (tho mostly Java, I'm afraid ... still working on that). You do get better results, IF you know HTML well. I tried using a proper editor, and it just annoyed me that I couldn't tweak everything just how I wanted. Now I use it just for the HTML reference  
They are good when you're starting out tho.

1444

General Discussion / How old is everyone?

« on: 2001-01-04 02:41:00 »

First really important thing I remember was the Gulf War ... can't remember anything *important* before that. What else did happen in the late 80's (on a world-wide important type scale?)

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General Discussion / How old is everyone?

« on: 2001-01-03 21:10:00 »

18 from UK ... like it says in my profile. Actually, I'm surprised by how many replies came from UK ... tho that could be due to the time the message was posted?

BTW, does anybody else think the clock on this server is wrong? The times all seem an hour out (and no, we aren't on daylight saving where I am at the moment).