Sonic Jam and Grandia Prelude...some thoughts...
BelPowerslave
Just got Sonic Jam and Grandia Prelude in the mail yesterday...thought
I'd post some thoughts, see what others thought of it and all.
Sonic Jam: Only got a chance to play for about 15 to 20 minutes. Messed
around in the Sonic World for a bit. It's pretty cool to see pre-Sonic
Adventure 3D Sonic. The main thing I wanted to see was Sonic 1, v2, so I
started into that. I liked that you could set the way you wanted to play
it(with or without spindash, etc). It's nice to finally have v2, though
I will say I am still going to look for the cart eventually. Now, and
maybe it's just me, but I am almost to the point of plugging the Saturn
back in to the regular AV ports...this S-Video on Saturn 3D is killing
me. God, the dithered shadows are just sad. I think it hit me the
hardest when I played Saturn Wipeout the other day...turning on the
shield actually impaired my driving ability. I don't know, I don't think
that Saturn developers ever wanted us to see it in S-Video...
Grandia Prelude: Played around with it for at least 30 minutes. It
consists of 4 menus(all in japanese, so I have no clue what I am doing).
The first one lets you listen to these three people talk, then you get
that amazing little flight over the town. Then apparently, you have to
do something...but I can't remember exactly what. I think you are
looking for some other kids, and this could be what I remember from
first seeing in Seattle at the Lobotomy offices when Dan Jevons was
showing it to us, or maybe the PSX Grandia demo(is there one?). The
water, my God, the water!! Can anyone believe it? It about floored me!
At any rate, I moved onto the next menu after a while...
The next one takes you to this mountain, where all this lava is
everywhere. It's pretty cool. You get to do some fighting there.
The other two menus are kind of odd: One takes you to the characters,
where, I'm assuming, you listen to other characters talk about them? I
have no idea. The other is a list of phots, you choose one and it shows
you that scene from the game. Pretty hip.
All in all, I must say...this game is damn impressive. I also find it
ironic that the PSX, this supposed 3D powerhouse was doing FF7 which
consisted of 3D characters in a 2D world...and the Saturn, the supposed
"inferior" system was doing 2D characters in a 3D world. Man, just the
amount of textures in the game is amazing, not to mention being able to
move the camera whenever you want. I found the trees to be pretty cool.
They weren't the two triagles-style trees you find in most games, but
looked really full and round(without being crappy 2D trees like Mario 64).
How is the PSX version? The few times I have seen it, I thought it was
pretty sad compared to the Saturn version. I'd love to play Grandia, but
I'm not learning Japanese to do it...nor will I play it through a FAQ. I
know, I know, why did I buy the demo? Well, I can warrant messing around
with a demo, I just can't warrant buying a full version I can't read
anything in.
Bel
--
Whip Ass Gaming: http://users2.ev1.net/~belpowerslave/
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- David Aames, Vanilla Sky
Sweet Zombie Jesus
"BelPowerslave" <belpow...@ev1.net> wrote in message
news:3E6E2066...@ev1.net...
>Now, and
> maybe it's just me, but I am almost to the point of plugging the Saturn
> back in to the regular AV ports...this S-Video on Saturn 3D is killing
> me. God, the dithered shadows are just sad. I think it hit me the
> hardest when I played Saturn Wipeout the other day...turning on the
> shield actually impaired my driving ability. I don't know, I don't think
> that Saturn developers ever wanted us to see it in S-Video...
For me, the crispness overrides the flaws. When you play a 2D game, it
looks SO much better in S-Video. Especially Sonic....with A/V, you're gonna
have those rainbows in the waterfalls and bleeding colors and all that.
Hey......and why are you playing Wipeout on Saturn? Playstation,
baaaaaaaaaaaybeee. :)
--
-Greg
==============================================
"Hello floor!!! Make me a sammich!!!!"
-GIR, Invader Zim
==============================================
BelPowerslave
> looks SO much better in S-Video. Especially Sonic....with A/V, you're gonna
> have those rainbows in the waterfalls and bleeding colors and all that.
That's true, for the 2D games it's damn good.
> Hey......and why are you playing Wipeout on Saturn? Playstation,
> baaaaaaaaaaaybeee. :)
I like it a bit more on the Saturn, it moves faster in normal mode and
way faster in the advanced. Granted, it's most likely due to the
framerate, but I still prefer it. ;)
Scott H
>
> Just got Sonic Jam and Grandia Prelude in the mail yesterday...thought
> I'd post some thoughts, see what others thought of it and all.
>
> Sonic Jam: Only got a chance to play for about 15 to 20 minutes. Messed
> around in the Sonic World for a bit. It's pretty cool to see pre-Sonic
> Adventure 3D Sonic. The main thing I wanted to see was Sonic 1, v2, so I
> started into that. I liked that you could set the way you wanted to play
> it(with or without spindash, etc). It's nice to finally have v2, though
> I will say I am still going to look for the cart eventually. Now, and
> maybe it's just me, but I am almost to the point of plugging the Saturn
> back in to the regular AV ports...this S-Video on Saturn 3D is killing
> me. God, the dithered shadows are just sad. I think it hit me the
> hardest when I played Saturn Wipeout the other day...turning on the
> shield actually impaired my driving ability. I don't know, I don't think
> that Saturn developers ever wanted us to see it in S-Video...
I agree with SZJ on this one. The crispness of the textures and edges
overrules the dithered special effects in some games for me. Games that I
used to think looked bad, like Tomb Raider and PDS look night and day better
with S-Video, to me anyway.
> How is the PSX version? The few times I have seen it, I thought it was
> pretty sad compared to the Saturn version. I'd love to play Grandia, but
> I'm not learning Japanese to do it...nor will I play it through a FAQ. I
> know, I know, why did I buy the demo? Well, I can warrant messing around
> with a demo, I just can't warrant buying a full version I can't read
> anything in.
The Saturn version has a better framerate, better and bigger textures and
better voice actors. PS version has translucent smoke and special effects
in more areas, and a lot more slowdown.
Benjamin
> Grandia Prelude: Played around with it for at least 30 minutes. It
> consists of 4 menus(all in japanese, so I have no clue what I am doing).
> The first one lets you listen to these three people talk, then you get
> that amazing little flight over the town. Then apparently, you have to
> do something...but I can't remember exactly what. I think you are
> looking for some other kids, and this could be what I remember from
> first seeing in Seattle at the Lobotomy offices when Dan Jevons was
> showing it to us, or maybe the PSX Grandia demo(is there one?). The
> water, my God, the water!! Can anyone believe it? It about floored me!
> At any rate, I moved onto the next menu after a while...
Grandia Digital Museum (what I think you're refering to) is a Saturn
exclusive. The water makes me dizzy for some reason (I'm assuming
you're refering to the level with the stairways and elevated paths
over the ocean, about three levels long. It's a great extra for the
game, though I _still_ haven't beat it. I'm pretty sure I just need to
improve at the mini-games though to earn those extra items.
> How is the PSX version? The few times I have seen it, I thought it was
> pretty sad compared to the Saturn version. I'd love to play Grandia, but
> I'm not learning Japanese to do it...nor will I play it through a FAQ. I
> know, I know, why did I buy the demo? Well, I can warrant messing around
> with a demo, I just can't warrant buying a full version I can't read
> anything in.
>
> Bel
The voice acting, character movements, and variety of images in the
Saturn game are _that_ good that you can get a good idea of what's
going on without knowing Japanese. The only thing I really feel like I
missed out on was all of the extraneous dialogue in towns.
Benjamin