Talking 'Bout This Generation

[Nash]

Hand them a copy of National Treasure and tell them it comes pre-installed with the invincibility cheat.

Oh. Shit.

[Some Stupid Japanese Name]

stuff

A long time ago, a game called Space Invaders came out. It was very successful. Suddenly there were tons of Space Invaders clones.
A little time after that, a game called Super Mario Bros. came out. It was very successful. Suddenly there were tons of Mario clones.
A little time after that, a game called Street Fighter II came out. It was very successful. Suddenly there were tons of Street Fighter clones.

Send in the clones.

[Pineapple]

Super Mario was pretty good man.

[Frogacuda]

Bullshit. Show me a shooter on Saturn or PS1 that looks as good as Pulstar.

Cotton 2, Soukyugurentai, Guardian Force, hell even Darius Gaiden...

The RAM simply wasn't there to support very detailed 2D games, not just fighters.

Nothing to do with the RAM, really, the NeoGeo had the same amount of RAM as the Genesis and far less than the Saturn or PSX, it just had several hundred dollars worth of speedy ROM packed into a cartridge.

Which technically the Saturn was capable of, too, it's just no one would have bought a game like that if they made one.

[YellerDog]

Now, you do see some high end 2D...in indie games. Braid, Machinarium, Cortex Control are a few examples that well-animated, well-executed 2D is still around. It's just not on the same grand scale that 3D Shootmans is, nor will it ever be again unless the form becomes mainstream again, or more people are willing to fork over $200 - $400 per copy.

I could see a potential for high-end boutique games, much the way things like T-Shirts have a high-end boutique audience; problem is, piracy kills your scarcity, which is one of the selling points of that kind of thing.

If you found a way to combine the $200+ vinyl toy audience into the games audience, you'd have a thing... which was kind of the Neo Geo's bag there for a bit.

[Yoshi]

Cotton 2, Soukyugurentai, Guardian Force, hell even Darius Gaiden...

GTFO

Nothing to do with the RAM, really, the NeoGeo had the same amount of RAM as the Genesis and far less than the Saturn or PSX, it just had several hundred dollars worth of speedy ROM packed into a cartridge.

Which technically the Saturn was capable of, too, it's just no one would have bought a game like that if they made one.

Because of the CD media, it was a RAM limitation with the Saturn. I fully understand that the Neo didn't need a lot of RAM since it used cartridges and that the Neo CD had a relative shload of RAM at the time.

[YellerDog]

I don't think anyone regards the Neo CD as anything but a blip, Yoshi.

[Yoshi]

Horsepower shmorsepower. Saturn had better games at the end of the run. This is largely due to the Capcom > SNK rule.

That depends largely on the genre.

Anyway, I hear you own a computer. If there's no "Neo Geo Quality 2D" games coming out, it's because there's zero demand. Better start liking indy games!

I'm not talking about "Neo Geo Quality 2D" anymore. I want the equivalent for today. So 120 fps, 3D, 1080p+, bazillions of shaded polygons, 8x AA, etc. standard.

[Yoshi]

I don't think anyone regards the Neo CD as anything but a blip, Yoshi.

I loved the shit out of mine, since it got me in the door before I could afford the real deals.

[YellerDog]

I'm not talking about "Neo Geo Quality 2D" anymore. I want the equivalent for today. So 120 fps, 3D, 1080p+, bazillions of shaded polygons, 8x AA, etc. standard.

Problem being nobody wants to do that, nobody is buying that. The benchmark across the board is catching up to that gradually as it is, just takes time.

What a drag it is, getting old.