The 16-bit War. . . .

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iNCEPTIONAL

The 16-bit War. . . .

Post by iNCEPTIONAL »

Here's my little blog post on it: inceptionalnews dot wordpress dot com/2021/08/21/the-16-bit-war/

What does you think of it?

Note: This is a general forum where it says, "You can talk about almost anything that you want to on this board.", so I'm presuming mention of the console war is actually permitted here, right? If not, just delete the post.

MOD edit: no pagerank bonus for you
Last edited by iNCEPTIONAL on Sat Jul 30, 2022 6:07 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Fiskbit
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Re: The 16-bit War. . . .

Post by Fiskbit »

Talking about the console war? That's fine. If you start waging it and this thread becomes a drama-filled mess, that's not so fine. Keep it friendly.
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Dwedit
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Re: The 16-bit War. . . .

Post by Dwedit »

I see the blog comments do not look civil.
Here come the fortune cookies! Here come the fortune cookies! They're wearing paper hats!
iNCEPTIONAL

Re: The 16-bit War. . . .

Post by iNCEPTIONAL »

Dwedit wrote: Sat Jul 30, 2022 5:32 pm I see the blog comments do not look civil.
It's only one comment in that article where someone said something that wasn't civil, and I have no problem with that whatsoever. He clearly had something he needed to get off his chest, and he had his reasons. It didn't cause me any harm in the slightest. All good.
turboxray
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Re: The 16-bit War. . . .

Post by turboxray »

iNCEPTIONAL wrote: Sat Jul 30, 2022 12:25 pm Here's my little blog post on it: inceptionalnews dot wordpress dot com/2021/08/21/the-16-bit-war/

What does you think of it?
You put Columns in the Genesis section?? You put COLUMNS in the Genesis section!????? Columns!? Are you for real :lol: Ohh this is entertaining..




"winner: SNES", "actual winner: Genesis", "ultimate winner: SNES"

Okay What??? That's definitely some grade school stuff right there. I guess the Mega Ultimate Winner is the 32x??? Turbo Ultimate Winner: SuperGrafx + arcade card + super cd. And "The real hot dog" Ultimate winner is the Neo Geo.


audio channels 6
Genesis has some tricks up its sleeves to go beyond the on-paper specs, such as using the legacy Master System sound chip alongside the Genesis sound channels for more sound channels than the SNES ultimately, although those extra channels sound even more limited and dated than the Genesis’ normal FM sounds and were rarely used.
Weird. I guess I was imagining the Genesis having 10 audio channels and PCM support. Seriously, that's a some horseshite. Look, if you gonna try to speak with some sort of authority then at least know what you're talking about. That's totally disingenuous. It's one thing to have preference, it's totally another thing to be full of it. Get me?



Pro-tip: If you love console war fighting, then definitely leave those comments enabled (yuck).
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Jedi QuestMaster
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Re: The 16-bit War. . . .

Post by Jedi QuestMaster »

audio channels 6
Genesis has some tricks up its sleeves to go beyond the on-paper specs, such as using the legacy Master System sound chip alongside the Genesis sound channels for more sound channels than the SNES ultimately, although those extra channels sound even more limited and dated than the Genesis’ normal FM sounds and were rarely used.
Interesting. I thought more often than not, those Master System channels were used. Can we get a list of games that did?

I think Wily Wars uses it. Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon also uses it.

This also makes me wonder how the SNES would have sounded had it implemented 2A03.
TrekkiesUnite118
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Re: The 16-bit War. . . .

Post by TrekkiesUnite118 »

Jedi QuestMaster wrote: Sat Jul 30, 2022 9:42 pm
audio channels 6
Genesis has some tricks up its sleeves to go beyond the on-paper specs, such as using the legacy Master System sound chip alongside the Genesis sound channels for more sound channels than the SNES ultimately, although those extra channels sound even more limited and dated than the Genesis’ normal FM sounds and were rarely used.
Interesting. I thought more often than not, those Master System channels were used. Can we get a list of games that did?

I think Wily Wars uses it. Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon also uses it.

This also makes me wonder how the SNES would have sounded had it implemented 2A03.
Most games do use them, either for instruments or sound effects. Sonic's jump sound effect is done on the PSG channels last I checked for example. Looking at just music though we can look at either isolating the PSG channels, or just looking at oscilloscope views of each channel to see what they're doing:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CaFSTrU6dPQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDqU6n_ZyaY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tkOXh4G3OAc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSaphtHP8UA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Jm11887pv4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g252rwm9mAk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k9ipZjHLJUw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KjO0Pqo1Qws
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=67fZSJKQfkQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ZbGqfNld50
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NmylX3Fiqog
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uq-ooymCeNs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IPGdbrHi4fA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ieDMxvK_CiE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMfi_airOZA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TXytyMbdBYs
iNCEPTIONAL

Re: The 16-bit War. . . .

Post by iNCEPTIONAL »

I did indeed put the Columns soundtrack down as an example of puzzle game music on the Genesis, and apparently it's considered a great soundtrack in that genre on the system. And, similarly, I put the Tetris Attack soundtrack as an example of puzzle game music on the SNES, and I know that's a great soundtrack in that genre on the system. Two great examples of puzzle game soundtracks from the two consoles respectively.

Yeah, I like how I did that where the one console wins, then switched to the other console, then back to the other one again. That was a bit of fun for me. And I think it accurately reflects that nothing is entirely clear cut, yet, I was still able to form an overall opinion in favour of one of the consoles based on considering all the various factors together as a whole.

I'm happy to leave the comments enabled. I have no problem with people who have different opinions from me, even when they express them with their own particular kind of passion.

Cheers for reading the article, and thanks for the considered feedback.
Last edited by iNCEPTIONAL on Sun Jul 31, 2022 12:11 am, edited 5 times in total.
iNCEPTIONAL

Re: The 16-bit War. . . .

Post by iNCEPTIONAL »

Jedi QuestMaster wrote: Sat Jul 30, 2022 9:42 pm
audio channels 6
Genesis has some tricks up its sleeves to go beyond the on-paper specs, such as using the legacy Master System sound chip alongside the Genesis sound channels for more sound channels than the SNES ultimately, although those extra channels sound even more limited and dated than the Genesis’ normal FM sounds and were rarely used.
Interesting. I thought more often than not, those Master System channels were used. Can we get a list of games that did?

I think Wily Wars uses it. Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon also uses it.

This also makes me wonder how the SNES would have sounded had it implemented 2A03.
That would be interesting to see then: A list of all 700+ Genesis games showing all the ones that used the Master System sound channels and all the ones that didn't. And, if it turns out the majority did in fact use the Master System sound channels, I will happily go in and adjust the last part of that sentence in my article and cut out "and were rarely used". Fair is fair.

Edit: Never mind. I was going to change it, but now I'm just going to leave it as is. Thanks.
Last edited by iNCEPTIONAL on Sun Jul 31, 2022 12:04 am, edited 1 time in total.
TrekkiesUnite118
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Re: The 16-bit War. . . .

Post by TrekkiesUnite118 »

iNCEPTIONAL wrote: Sat Jul 30, 2022 10:04 pm That would be interesting to see then: A list of all 700+ Genesis games showing all the ones that used the Master System sound channels and all the ones that didn't. And, if it turns out the majority did in fact use the Master System sound channels, I will happily go in and adjust the last part of that sentence in my article and cut out "and were rarely used". Fair is fair.
The list of games not using it would probably be shorter. As stated a lot of games use them for music, and even more use them for sound effects. The white noise channel alone is used in tons of games for either rain sounds, water splashing, explosions, etc. Just about every EA Sports game uses that channel for the ambient crowd noise.

Honestly, I'd say the burden of proof is on you to prove they were rarely used.
iNCEPTIONAL

Re: The 16-bit War. . . .

Post by iNCEPTIONAL »

Rather than wait on someone checking all 700+ Genesis/Mega Drive games to see which ones did and did not use the legacy Master System sound channels, and since I ultimately don't actually care how often it was or was not used either way, I just removed the part about "and was rarely used" from the sentence. Sorted.

Now, if anyone wants to confirm if it was supposed to be Columns III rather than Columns that I should have put as the example of a good puzzle game soundtrack on Genesis, I can go and quickly replace that too.
Last edited by iNCEPTIONAL on Sun Jul 31, 2022 12:20 am, edited 1 time in total.
TrekkiesUnite118
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Re: The 16-bit War. . . .

Post by TrekkiesUnite118 »

iNCEPTIONAL wrote: Sat Jul 30, 2022 10:59 pm Rather wait on someone checking all 700+ Genesis/Mega Drive games to see which ones did and did not use the legacy Master System sound channels, and since I ultimately don't care about how often it was or was not used either way, I just removed that part of the sentence. Sorted.
You should also up the number of channels in your chart from 6 to 10 to be truly fair and objective. The fact of the matter is those channels are there and available to the developer to use if they wish to use them. Even if only one game used them, they're part of the hardware and count towards the total number of channels.
turboxray
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Re: The 16-bit War. . . .

Post by turboxray »

TrekkiesUnite118 wrote: Sat Jul 30, 2022 11:01 pm
iNCEPTIONAL wrote: Sat Jul 30, 2022 10:59 pm Rather wait on someone checking all 700+ Genesis/Mega Drive games to see which ones did and did not use the legacy Master System sound channels, and since I ultimately don't care about how often it was or was not used either way, I just removed that part of the sentence. Sorted.
You should also up the number of channels in your chart from 6 to 10 to be truly fair and objective. The fact of the matter is those channels are there and available to the developer to use if they wish to use them. Even if only one game used them, they're part of the hardware and count towards the total number of channels.
And games like Ys III on the Genesis mix 4 PCM streams in real time for the PCM channel. That's basically 4 PCM channels.
iNCEPTIONAL wrote: Sat Jul 30, 2022 10:59 pm Now, if anyone wants to confirm if it was supposed to be Columns III rather than Columns that I should have put as the example of a good puzzle game soundtrack on Genesis, I can go and quickly replace that too.
Can you explain to me how a puzzle game has anything to do with a particular type of sound track?? Are you trying to say the puzzle game music is a serious musical category? The idea just sounds so ridiculous hahah,
Last edited by turboxray on Sat Jul 30, 2022 11:18 pm, edited 1 time in total.
TrekkiesUnite118
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Re: The 16-bit War. . . .

Post by TrekkiesUnite118 »

turboxray wrote: Sat Jul 30, 2022 11:15 pm And games like Ys III on the Genesis mix 4 PCM streams in real time for the PCM channel. That's basically 4 PCM channels.
I wasn't going to bring that up as it's more of a software thing than a hardware spec/feature. Though I guess some of the things you can do with FM Channel 3 could count.
iNCEPTIONAL

Re: The 16-bit War. . . .

Post by iNCEPTIONAL »

Edit: Actually, I'm just going to leave things as they are in the article, and everyone is welcome to comment on whatever aspects of it there. I think that will be more conducive than continuing in here. Thanks for the valuable input that helped me make that decision.
Last edited by iNCEPTIONAL on Sun Jul 31, 2022 12:10 am, edited 4 times in total.
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