SFX chip?

[sl...@cc.usu.edu]

Forgive my lack of knowledge, but there have been many posts related to the SFX
chip and the game genie being unable to work with games with it. Exactly what
is the SFX chip (such as, what does it control/do)? Also, what type of games
have these chips or how do you tell (I assume you check the slots on the game).
Thanks for any information.

_____________________________________________________________________________
| | |
| Frijoles | Dust cleaner?! Why on earth would I want to |
| sl...@cc.usu.edu | clean my dust? |
| 2+2=5 | |
|__________________________|__________________________________________________|

[Robert E. Gerard]

Have you played StarFox? The chip does the polygons, and so far it is the only
game released that uses the chip. FX Trax/Stunt Race FX is the next, and
Citadel will also use it, but both are still in developement.

Robert
eau...@rigel.oac.uci.edu

[Timothy Groner]

The SFX chip is designed to generate those polygon graphics at a much
faster rate than the Super NES can do normal graphics. If the Super NES
tried to do 3D the way the SFX chip did it would be noticably slower, so
they'd have to skip a lot of the special that were present in StarFox, if
it could be done at all.

Tim Groner/94
e-mail umgr...@ccu.umanitoba.ca

[Dylan Cuthbert]

> The SFX chip is designed to generate those polygon graphics at a
> much
> faster rate than the Super NES can do normal graphics. If the Super
> NES
> tried to do 3D the way the SFX chip did it would be noticably
> slower, so
> they'd have to skip a lot of the special that were present in
> StarFox, if
> it could be done at all.

Not just 3d. I think you're going to see a couple of releases before too
long using the super fx chip for some spritey effects.

But, having said that, Starfox 2 is sticking to the polygons.

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[Tim Smith]

Dylan Cuthbert <d...@cix.compulink.co.uk> wrote:
>But, having said that, Starfox 2 is sticking to the polygons.

*Please* *please* *oh please* in Starfox 2 let me kill my teammates.
I'm really getting tired of saving Falco's ass and having him tell me
to mind my own business. It would be so satisfying to silence him
permanently...

--Tim Smith

[Brian R. Landel]

Yeah, I hate Falco. I wish they'd leave an option in Starfox 2
to tell him to shutup.
##

[MAGUIRE WILLIAM BRUCE]

Tim Smith <t...@u.washington.edu> wrote:
>
>*Please* *please* *oh please* in Starfox 2 let me kill my teammates.
>I'm really getting tired of saving Falco's ass and having him tell me
>to mind my own business. It would be so satisfying to silence him
>permanently...
>
>--Tim Smith

Am I, alone, a little ticked that it is going to be 18 months between FX
games?!? Starfox was last March, Stunt Trax FX (or whatever) is going
to be "summer '94"---which probably means August! I understand that you
can't crank out a game in a month, but given how great Starfox is (in
all game-playing aspects) where are additional games using the same
technology? Can only Nintendo do this stuff?!?

IMO you can flush all the fighting sequels (SFII turbo, MKII, SFIII,...)
and give us some NEW, ORIGINAL, GRAPHICALLY IMPRESSIVE, REPLAYABLE,

FFFFF X X
F X X
FFF X GAMES!!!
F X X
F X X

I love third-party developers, but can't ANYONE match Nintendo's:
(1) Starfox, (2) Super Mario Kart, (3) Zelda, (4) F-zero ...

Bruce.

[Giles Goddard]

Other people can write SuperFX games, and they are. I believe Elite is
currently writing another car game using the chip. Cant say when it'll be
released though.
I'd love to see somebody producing a shoot-em-up using the SuperFX.

giles
(Argonaut Software LTD)

[bjbi...@eos.ncsu.edu]

In article <2kmgni$9...@news.u.washington.edu>, t...@u.washington.edu (Tim Smith) writes:
>*Please* *please* *oh please* in Starfox 2 let me kill my teammates.
>I'm really getting tired of saving Falco's ass and having him tell me
>to mind my own business. It would be so satisfying to silence him
>permanently...

You can't already? I'm pretty certain my brother killed Slippy. And a
friend of a friend has also done similar. Teammate flys in front, they
concentrate fire on them thinking they are an enemy and wondering why they
keep getting stop it messages, then the teammate explodes and you just have
static instead of their picture at the end of the game. The friend of
a friend was dumping nova bombs and shooting at 'em, my brother was just
shooting though the asteroid level.

[Dylan Cuthbert]

Yes, wouldn't it... well don't shoot the alien guy chasing your teammate
and he'll die soon enough.

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[Dylan Cuthbert]

> Am I, alone, a little ticked that it is going to be 18 months
> between FX
> games?!? Starfox was last March, Stunt Trax FX (or whatever) is
> going
> to be "summer '94"---which probably means August! I understand that
> you
> can't crank out a game in a month, but given how great Starfox is
> (in
> all game-playing aspects) where are additional games using the same
> technology? Can only Nintendo do this stuff?!?

Aha.. well third party games always have very tight deadlines to reach,
whereas in Nintendo, they do have deadlines, but if the gameplay isn't up
to scratch the game is delayed. Starfox was delayed by about 6 months
from its original schedule. Also in the Super FX case, the chip was only
released to third party developers a few months ago.

> I love third-party developers, but can't ANYONE match Nintendo's:
> (1) Starfox, (2) Super Mario Kart, (3) Zelda, (4) F-zero ...

Super Mario Bros 3 and Super Mario World should also be in there I think.

Most software houses just don't have the resources Nintendo has. Starfox
had a huge team. 3 *english* (yes, we are better than most Japanese
ones) programmers in Japan (me and two others), plus 2 programmers
working in England on just the 3d system, 2 designers, 1 shape designer,
2 musicians, and 1 graphics artist, not including the 20 or so game
testers. In most software houses you're lucky if you have one designer,
never mind two.

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