YES!!!! I've always wanted to see a Mario Baseball game, and now my wish has been granted! WOO!!!! This is so fucking awesome, the screens look great!
And a new home console Kirby platformer, woo! I hope they keep the power-mixing system from Kirby 64.
And Zelda, I'm glad Nintendo finally decided to release more screens! I wonder if this background is just a background or if it's an indication of how big the environments will be.
The pics wouldn't load for me. I want to see these games! :(
I hope to see the animal buddies and maybe possibly a partner like Gooey in this new Kirby game. The ability combonations would be nice too, but I could feel the absence of the animal buddies all throughout Kirby 64.
As for the new Zelda, this is the game that I'm most hyped up about. After beating Paper Mario (the N64 one) I was planning to start a new file on Wind Waker. It'll be a great way to get me back into Zelda fever when the new Zelda comes out.
Did I mention that I beat The Thousand-Year Door? Yay me!
The PGC site is working now, but those images are broken... I had to go there! Horrors!
Anyway, Zelda looks like it did in the trailer. Awesome, and I want to see more. :)
Kirby... great to see that they're making another Kirby platformer, and it looks like it's 2d no less! Great! Now just make it as good as the GB and SNES games and we'll be all set... Oh, and how about both a dual power mixing system AND buddies to ride like 2 and 3? To triple or more the number of combonations! :D ... really, I do want to see the buddies again, they were great...
Eh, Mario Baseball. Could be pretty good. I do like baseball. But if I was going to get a baseball game (and even though I like the sport I only have one and it's ancient), I'd probably get one with the real players...
Yeah, a Kirby game with both ability combonations and animal buddies would be great. Though that'd take a lot of programming time since each ability, when paired with an animal buddy, becomes a completely new ability. So say that there are six abilities and six animal buddies. With ability combations, that'd be 21 abilities, plus the default 6, making for a total of 27. Combine them with the 6 animal buddies, you have... 162. Not gonna happen, obviously. I guess what they could do is give you a choice of: a) using an ability by itself, b) combining two abilities, or c) combining one ability with an animal buddy. No way they're going to let you also combine two abilities with an animal buddy.
"2.5d" is a silly designation. What matters more is what the game plays like. That is, yes, technically Doom and Wolfenstein aren't 3D. But they play like a 3D FPS so that's what matters most. Likewise, side-scrollers that use 3d graphics are still side-scrollers and thus play on a 2d plane... Unless you're talking about something like GGA of course where you have both 2d and something that would probably be best described as isometric. :)
Quote:I don't think it would be THAT hard to make 162 different abilities...
No. What would be hard would be actually making them unique.
I guess, but it is kind of strange and overlaps with the "2.5d" term used to describe games like Doom... and besides, the game that you actually PLAY is 2d -- there is no functional third dimension in most such titles.
"Actual" 3d is pretty much just 2D. Well, when you get down to it pretty much all graphics engines are 1D, and the extra stuff is just programming. The computer just sees it all as one big line, not a 2D grib as some books incorrectly protray it, or 3D space as one might think, just one long line of data. So, Doom's graphics engine is 3D, just not polygonal, it's all sprites. By this I mean that sure, all the depth is just a trick of data, but that's exactly what polygons and their depth are too.
2.5D, a sorta silly designation I suppose ABF... Since the gameplay is 2D when you get right down to it, only it sorta curves around hills here and there, I'd say it's pretty much accurate to say the game is a 2D game, but done with polygons. Heck, I've seen games with sprites that looked very 3 dimensional, but I would hardly call them 3D. Honestly the latest versions of directx don't even make any real distinction between 2D and 3D modes, it's all a blend.
"On two occasions, I have been asked [by members of Parliament], 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?' I am not able to rightly apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question." ~ Charles Babbage (1791-1871)
I'd say calling it 2d with polygons makes more sense... like as you say Doom is 3d with sprites. Yes, if you want to get into the programming you could talk about how Doom "fakes" its 3d, but so does Half-Life so yes, the difference is just in degrees. Now, those degrees matter, but the effect is the same... both games look like 3-d environments. And polyagonal side-scrollers are in effect 2d despite their graphics.
... on that note, during break I finally beat Goemon's Great Adventure... beat the final castle (again, this summer I lost my save file and had to start over. It's really frusterating to have to do that when I had about 42 or 43 of the 44 tickets... though the fact that the game is awesome certainly helped.), then quickly got the last five tickets you had to wait until then to get and then bought the twelve costumes you can get for the characters. :)
Most names and descriptions we give things are not accurate. That is not news, DJ. If we were to give everything very accurate names and descriptions the world would be very confusing. It's easier to classify things certain ways. Yes we all know that all "3D" video games are not actually three-dimensional, but there is an obvious difference from 2D games so we must differentiate between the two.
2.5D is the name everyone uses for 3D games that play like 2D ones. Doom and such are not considered 2.5D because at the time they were simply considered 3D, and nobody uses that technology anymore. 2.5D was coined for games like Pandemonium and Klonoa. It did not exist before then, which is why only those types of games are labeled as such.
Also DJ, this whole "1D" thing is false. Talking about this from a computer's perspective is completely pointless since the computer does not see anything. All it knows about is a list of instructions that it is supposed to execute. The series of instructions do the 2D and 3D math and tell the graphics hardware to do the 2D and 3D things. If you're going to get strictly technical then all games are 2D since the graphics are drawn onto a flat tube. "1D" they are most certainly not.
1D would be simply width...or height, I don't remember which exactly. Display devices like TVs and monitors display 2D only, as 1D is impossible outside of theory and 3D cannot be done outside of holograms and things like that.
Perhaps DJ meant that the pixels are indexed in one long 1D list... but even then the 2D info isn't being lost, it's just being stored in a different way.
Doom was not simply considered 3D. I read PC gaming magazines in 1996. One of the big things about Quake was that unlike Doom or Duke Nukem 3D the game is really true 3D...
Oh, and I played Pandemonium some years back (PC version demo). I considered it what I have been saying: a 2d game that uses polygons. I don't understand why they should be considered so different that they need a totally new label... there isn't much of a difference if there is any at all (I'd probably argue that there is functionally no difference).
Quote:Doom was not simply considered 3D. I read PC gaming magazines in 1996. One of the big things about Quake was that unlike Doom or Duke Nukem 3D the game is really true 3D...
Oh yes it was, it was hailed as the first 3D game. Of course, people who knew better didn't consider it as such, but the main gaming community considered it to be a 3D game. There was none of that 2.5D talk. When Quake came out it was like "ok wait now THIS is 3D".
Quote:Oh, and I played Pandemonium some years back (PC version demo). I considered it what I have been saying: a 2d game that uses polygons. I don't understand why they should be considered so different that they need a totally new label... there isn't much of a difference if there is any at all (I'd probably argue that there is functionally no difference).
You can call it a ham sandwich for all I care. 2.5D is how most people describe those types of games, whether you want to or not.
Quote:You can call it a ham sandwich for all I care. 2.5D is how most people describe those types of games, whether you want to or not.
But it designates a big difference in a place where I would say that there really isn't one...
Quote:Oh yes it was, it was hailed as the first 3D game. Of course, people who knew better didn't consider it as such, but the main gaming community considered it to be a 3D game. There was none of that 2.5D talk. When Quake came out it was like "ok wait now THIS is 3D".
Maybe when it came out people thought Doom was 3d, but they realized not too long after that it wasn't... and technically of course I don't think it ever was. Duke 3D (the Build engine) is much more "real" 3d, but it still has aspects that 'fake' it as well...
Quote:But it designates a big difference in a place where I would say that there really isn't one...
Well there's nothing you can do about it than to call it something else yourself. You're not going to change the way most people talk.
Quote:Maybe when it came out people thought Doom was 3d, but they realized not too long after that it wasn't... and technically of course I don't think it ever was. Duke 3D (the Build engine) is much more "real" 3d, but it still has aspects that 'fake' it as well...
Technically speaking all 3D games are 2D when they're finally displayed. The difference is in the math.
My point still stands that 2.5D was coined after sidescrolling 3D games were invented. That is why that term is reserved for those types of games.
"RPG" also doesn't make much sense, but there's nothing you can do about it.
But at least "RPG" designates a group of games that are noticably different in play from other kinds of games, while "2.5d" platformers are not different in play from 2d ones... they are only different in art style.
And yes, of course it seems to me that all games are 2d when displayed... I'm not sure why DJ says that they're all 1d. Explain?
RPG, by the very words that comprise, could be just about every game that's ever been made since in each of them you play a certain "role".
Quote:while "2.5d" platformers are not different in play from 2d ones...
But if I was telling you about a platformer the two terms would make a difference in how you thought of the game. Example: If I said "2D sidescroller" you'd think of a sprite-based platformer, but if I said "2.5D sidescroller" you'd probably say "Oh, so it has polygons?". Of course, I could tell you that along with saying that it's a 2D sidescroller, but by using descriptions I could get you to tell the difference between a car and a truck only using the term "motor vehicle".
Quote:But if I was telling you about a platformer the two terms would make a difference in how you thought of the game. Example: If I said "2D sidescroller" you'd think of a sprite-based platformer, but if I said "2.5D sidescroller" you'd probably say "Oh, so it has polygons?". Of course, I could tell you that along with saying that it's a 2D sidescroller, but by using descriptions I could get you to tell the difference between a car and a truck only using the term "motor vehicle".
No, "2.5" makes me think of some aspect of depth -- given that 3d means a world that expands in 3 dimensions, then 2.5d should be something in between... like one with some 2d and some 3d aspects, or limited 3d (isometric?) that you could pass off as "2.5d", etc... it doesn't really make me think of something that happens soley on a 2d plane... "2.5d sidescroller" does, but then again I'd say that that is an at least somewhat contradictory defintion. :)
Now, as I said in some cases 2d sidescroller isn't the whole picture -- GGA and its isometric/3d towns is a good example of that -- but in a lot of cases they are.
Quote:RPG, by the very words that comprise, could be just about every game that's ever been made since in each of them you play a certain "role".
That is true. It just relies on people agreeing that "RPGs" are only one specific kind of game really,
Quote:But at least "RPG" designates a group of games that are noticably different in play from other kinds of games, while "2.5d" platformers are not different in play from 2d ones... they are only different in art style.
Art style?
... *slowly backs away from ABF*
Quote:And yes, of course it seems to me that all games are 2d when displayed... I'm not sure why DJ says that they're all 1d. Explain?
I believe I already did.
Quote:No, "2.5" makes me think of some aspect of depth -- given that 3d means a world that expands in 3 dimensions, then 2.5d should be something in between... like one with some 2d and some 3d aspects, or limited 3d (isometric?) that you could pass off as "2.5d", etc... it doesn't really make me think of something that happens soley on a 2d plane... "2.5d sidescroller" does, but then again I'd say that that is an at least somewhat contradictory defintion.
"2.5D" is a hellovalot more easy to say that "3D game that uses typical 2D platformer gameplay", okay? This is the same situation as RPG, where the name doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Everyone calls 3D games with 2D gameplay 2.5D games, so live with it.
Drawn 2d art, polyagonal art, sprites-in-3d art, etc... that's what I mean there...
Quote:I believe I already did.
Yeah, I see that quote now... and that probably is what DJ meant (everything's stored in a 1d list). And that's correct, but as you say that's just representing a 2d image...
Quote:"2.5D" is a hellovalot more easy to say that "3D game that uses typical 2D platformer gameplay", okay? This is the same situation as RPG, where the name doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Everyone calls 3D games with 2D gameplay 2.5D games, so live with it.
It's just '2d platformer made with polygons', really... if there is no third dimension in gameplay it shouldn't really be getting the label, I think... unless, of course, you're talking about the graphical style the game uses.
Quote:Drawn 2d art, polyagonal art, sprites-in-3d art, etc... that's what I mean there...
... There can be 3D games that have more similar art to some 2D games than some 2D games to some 2D games. The technology does not change the art, it only changes how you go about making it and the amount of freedom you have.
Quote:Yeah, I see that quote now... and that probably is what DJ meant (everything's stored in a 1d list). And that's correct, but as you say that's just representing a 2d image...
Well the computer doesn't see anything, so that's just a pointless thing to say.
Quote:It's just '2d platformer made with polygons', really... if there is no third dimension in gameplay it shouldn't really be getting the label, I think... unless, of course, you're talking about the graphical style the game uses.
...
You're really dense, did you know that? How many examples do I have to give? The RPG one should have been enough.
Sidescrollers like Kirby 64 have a third dimension, but it's an unusable one. HOWEVER, let's look at a game such as SSBM, which also has an unusable third dimension, EXCEPT when you pause the game and use the analog stick to move the camera around, giving you a view from many different angles. This is something that simply could not be done with a traditional 2D graphic style. Therein lies the difference.
Quote:Sidescrollers like Kirby 64 have a third dimension, but it's an unusable one. HOWEVER, let's look at a game such as SSBM, which also has an unusable third dimension, EXCEPT when you pause the game and use the analog stick to move the camera around, giving you a view from many different angles. This is something that simply could not be done with a traditional 2D graphic style. Therein lies the difference.
That's a good example of where a game does something 2d really couldn't do very well, like GGA and its 3d towns... there aren't NO differences, but they really are minor. That's just a camera trick and it has quite limited applications since it can't be used during the game...
Quote:... There can be 3D games that have more similar art to some 2D games than some 2D games to some 2D games. The technology does not change the art, it only changes how you go about making it and the amount of freedom you have.
Of course, if you're talking about the style it is done in, but what does that have to do with my point? I'm not talking about that, I'm talking about the medium it's drawn on... in this case, polygons or sprites (or sprites and polygons).
Quote:...
You're really dense, did you know that? How many examples do I have to give? The RPG one should have been enough.
Oh, I see what you are saying, I just happen to think differently... :)
Oh GR, I meant the data is just a big 1D stream, no dimensions to it except that it's a connected line from outlet to ground.
So what I mean is Doom is 3D because it looks 3D to your eyes. Now the fact that, in playing it, you realize that there are NO "underneath the stairs" areas, and that whenever you go up or down, elevators are used or other things since it's impossible to have two different height levels directly on top of each other, shows you that in some ways the gameplay is 3D (a wall can get in your way and you can take stairs to get over it), but in a major way it's 2D (If you are on the "second story", the floor below you can't possibly have monsters on it, not until you, ego, lower the active floor TO that level, so in other words no creepy climbing down stairs and then suddenly a monster hiding under the stair case comes after you moments). Purely graphically, it's 3D because that's what it looks like except for the actual sprites, which are 2D layered in a 3D environment.
Now with Duke3D, they actually allowed true 3D because, even though everything was still sprites layered in 3D space, you could actually be a floor above some real action instead of a floor above null space until you lowered the entire floor. Thus, they could actually add a spiral staircase that eventually looped above itself! Amazing!
And then polygons came along, they made 3D space something that could actually make STUFF 3D. Of course, a polygon is still just a 2D triangle. And, the whole way they are done in 3D is just, well, perhaps the best comparison would be to paralax scrolling... Well, no not really, VERY different... but in the sense that far away things look far away to you, but it's all just a trick, they are similar. But when you get down to it, 2D is just an illusion.
And big guy yeah I'm fine with 2.5D. Kirby 64 was like that in gameplay terms since while it was all just running in a single plane, sometimes it curved around mountains and stuff, and when you shot bullets, they also curved around. Also, if kirby tried using a straight edge to measure the curve, it woudl curve too, because ether is something that's intrinsically impossible to prove.
"On two occasions, I have been asked [by members of Parliament], 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?' I am not able to rightly apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question." ~ Charles Babbage (1791-1871)
Quote:So what I mean is Doom is 3D because it looks 3D to your eyes. Now the fact that, in playing it, you realize that there are NO "underneath the stairs" areas, and that whenever you go up or down, elevators are used or other things since it's impossible to have two different height levels directly on top of each other, shows you that in some ways the gameplay is 3D (a wall can get in your way and you can take stairs to get over it), but in a major way it's 2D (If you are on the "second story", the floor below you can't possibly have monsters on it, not until you, ego, lower the active floor TO that level, so in other words no creepy climbing down stairs and then suddenly a monster hiding under the stair case comes after you moments). Purely graphically, it's 3D because that's what it looks like except for the actual sprites, which are 2D layered in a 3D environment.
Exactly. Oh, it's also 2d because there is no height element to the game... that is, you don't actually have to aim up or down at things to hit them, only left or right... :D
Quote:Now with Duke3D, they actually allowed true 3D because, even though everything was still sprites layered in 3D space, you could actually be a floor above some real action instead of a floor above null space until you lowered the entire floor. Thus, they could actually add a spiral staircase that eventually looped above itself! Amazing!
Good point. I was referring to how Build uses sprites for the characters and stuff, but yeah, it does have real 3d terrain with layers and stuff and aiming so it's definitely a whole lot closer to it than previous efforts.
Quote:And big guy yeah I'm fine with 2.5D. Kirby 64 was like that in gameplay terms since while it was all just running in a single plane, sometimes it curved around mountains and stuff, and when you shot bullets, they also curved around. Also, if kirby tried using a straight edge to measure the curve, it woudl curve too, because ether is something that's intrinsically impossible to prove.
It's just a curving 2d plane... the polygons let them do fancy graphical tricks but don't actually effect the gameplay. In Kirby 64 it doesn't even have the impact of Goemon's Great Adventure, I'd say, for how much the polyagonal graphics affect the game...
Quote:That's a good example of where a game does something 2d really couldn't do very well, like GGA and its 3d towns... there aren't NO differences, but they really are minor. That's just a camera trick and it has quite limited applications since it can't be used during the game...
Kirby 64 uses all three of its dimensions. The math is still 3D. Just because you don't move along the z axis doesn't make it 2D. There are still three visible dimensions in the game.
Quote:Of course, if you're talking about the style it is done in, but what does that have to do with my point? I'm not talking about that, I'm talking about the medium it's drawn on... in this case, polygons or sprites (or sprites and polygons).
You said that the difference is in the art, which is false. Most of the art that goes into 3D games is actually 2D art, since you're making textures for every surface.
Quote:Exactly. Oh, it's also 2d because there is no height element to the game... that is, you don't actually have to aim up or down at things to hit them, only left or right...
The way you differentiate between 2D games and 3D games is by looking at the math. Any 2D game can kinda look 3D (like Doom), but Doom's engine does 2D math while Mario 64's does 3D math, which tells the graphics hardware to do 2D or 3D things, respectively.
Quote:It's just a curving 2d plane... the polygons let them do fancy graphical tricks but don't actually effect the gameplay. In Kirby 64 it doesn't even have the impact of Goemon's Great Adventure, I'd say, for how much the polyagonal graphics affect the game...
It is not just curving a 2D plane, Kirby 64's engine is fully 3D. My friend is actually making a 3D engine for our next side scrolling platformer, and even though it will look completely 2D, the engine is actually doing 3D math. Kirby 64 actually looks just like a regular 3D polygonal game, it's just that you don't move on the z axis. Four Swords Adventure, for instance, uses a 3D engine but looks 2D. So which one is 2.5D? The one that looks like a 3D game but plays like a 2D one. Pandemonium, GGA, Kirby 64, etc. It's not the best or most accurate descriptor but that's how it always is.
Quote:Kirby 64 uses all three of its dimensions. The math is still 3D. Just because you don't move along the z axis doesn't make it 2D. There are still three visible dimensions in the game.
Yes, there are three visible dimensions. But the actual gameplay is just 2d that weaves around in this 3d environment... it probably would be harder to do than a standard 2d game, and it makes it look more unique (with curving and branching paths that split from eachother and stuff), but calling it almost a different genre? I'd definitely not say that. It's just a somewhat different take on the same genre.
Hmm... that is a good question, about how you would go about designing it. I guess you would just make the level and then later set the camera and path (like for GGA where it splits and the different paths seperate into totally different areas)... so from a technical perspective yes it is 3d. But from a gameplay perspective it isn't really. Like take Star Soldier: Vanishing Earth (the one topdown scrolling ship-shooter for the n64) for the N64. It's "3d" as in it uses polygons, ships fly down into the field, guns below the area you can shoot shoot up at you (and you can't hit them), etc, but all you can do is go along on this plane... obviously it's using a 3d engine as there are all the bullets and ships that use the third dimension, but for you yourself it might as well not be there (and those things I described aren't things that would be impossible in 2d either, of course...).
Quote:The way you differentiate between 2D games and 3D games is by looking at the math. Any 2D game can kinda look 3D (like Doom), but Doom's engine does 2D math while Mario 64's does 3D math, which tells the graphics hardware to do 2D or 3D things, respectively.
It gets fuzzy for cases like Duke Nukem 3D, though... that is more 3d than non but it still is using some of those 2d tricks.
Quote:Yes, there are three visible dimensions. But the actual gameplay is just 2d that weaves around in this 3d environment... it probably would be harder to do than a standard 2d game, and it makes it look more unique (with curving and branching paths that split from eachother and stuff), but calling it almost a different genre? I'd definitely not say that. It's just a somewhat different take on the same genre.
Who the heck called it a different genre?? Sidescrolling platformers are sidescrolling platformers! "2.5D" is just used to indicate that it's a sidescroller that looks the same as a normal 3D game.
Quote:Hmm... that is a good question, about how you would go about designing it. I guess you would just make the level and then later set the camera and path (like for GGA where it splits and the different paths seperate into totally different areas)... so from a technical perspective yes it is 3d. But from a gameplay perspective it isn't really. Like take Star Soldier: Vanishing Earth (the one topdown scrolling ship-shooter for the n64) for the N64. It's "3d" as in it uses polygons, ships fly down into the field, guns below the area you can shoot shoot up at you (and you can't hit them), etc, but all you can do is go along on this plane... obviously it's using a 3d engine as there are all the bullets and ships that use the third dimension, but for you yourself it might as well not be there (and those things I described aren't things that would be impossible in 2d either, of course...).
Did you not read my post? Seriously, I doubt you read any of it.
The math involved is 3D, thus is is a 3D game. End of discussion.
Quote:It gets fuzzy for cases like Duke Nukem 3D, though... that is more 3d than non but it still is using some of those 2d tricks.
Some of Duke's engines are 3D, while others are not. There's not just one "graphics engine".
I'm not saying you can't call it that if you want, you certainly can, I'm just saying that I don't really use the term "2.45d" and don't really like it. Either call them 3d (graphics) sidescrollers or just sidescrollers...
Quote:Some of Duke's engines are 3D, while others are not. There's not just one "graphics engine".
As I said, trying to define that game in terms of graphics engines gets fuzzy...
Quote:I'm not saying you can't call it that if you want, you certainly can, I'm just saying that I don't really use the term "2.45d" and don't really like it. Either call them 3d (graphics) sidescrollers or just sidescrollers...
Good for you! It's too bad that you don't decide the names for these things, isn't it?
And it's "2.5", not"2.45".
Quote:As I said, trying to define that game in terms of graphics engines gets fuzzy...
No it doesn't. It's the most precise way, actually.
Quote:No it doesn't. It's the most precise way, actually.
The game is both 3d in parts and 2d in parts... are you saying that for Duke Nukem 3D you be precise by saying "it's both"? That seems like a somewhat vague definition to me...
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