I had a similar need, and it prevented me from moving to FireFox for a long while. Luckily, I did manage to get fx_cast to work, and it's been flawless ever since. In fact, I'd say it work more reliably than Chrome's casting!
davetansley
joined 2 years ago
Except in the case of the Sega Master System, where the simplistic 8-bit graphics felt like a massive leap up from the terrible box art!
Often it was because the ports were given to different companies to do... one would get the Spectrum/Amstrad and another would get the C64. Also, the whole sound and graphics systems would need to be rewritten, given the Spectrum's lack of hardware sprites or scrolling, or decent sound. Presumably it just made sense to build them separately.
Can't believe I missed that one! Sounds like it made some interesting compromises.
I always thought that as well, and was similarly jealous. But in doing these port comparisons, I've found that the C64 often got a really bad port. See my Bomb Jack post the other day, for example.
If you can look past the visuals and sound, the Spectrum ports often capture the feel of the arcade the best of all. It's probably about 45-45-10 (C64-Speccy-Amstrad), with the Amstrad getting some rare gems like Renegade.
I'm not sure that's the case...
A lot of the time, the C64 and Spectrum/Amstrad ports were done by different companies, in isolation. You'd often see the C64 go its own way, changing up levels and gameplay. While the Amstrad port was usually a lazy port of the Spectrum. You can often see the colour limitations of the Spectrum ported across wholesale to the Amstrad as well.
In the case of Commando, the Spectrum and Amstrad teams had some overlap and the games share some of the same DNA (see the title screen, for example), while the C64 was distinct. It doesn't feel like a lazy Spectrum > Amstrad port though, so it has that going for it. The C64, as usual, feels like its own thing.
It's a cool game.
Oddly enough, the MiSTer FPGA N64 core has undergone some incredibly quick progress in the last few days, and Wave Race 64 is one of the first games that is almost fully playable. Follow the dolphin!
I did a much smaller comparison over on Mastodon a few months back: https://mastodonapp.uk/@davetansley/109767977707445539
It's one of my favourite games from that era, so I'll maybe expand it and post here.
Ferries and other ocean-going vessels seem to be a rich source of arcade memories... I remember lurking around the sit down Galaxians cabinet on the Bowness to Ambleside ferry on more than one occasion.
Nope, Lemmy exclusive :)
Just want to contribute something to building the Retrogaming community, after years of being a consumer only on Reddit.
(mostly it's just an excuse to play loads of games... you know, for science)
In the interests of good comparison science, it's worth mentioning that a couple of platforms also got homebrew ports...
Over on the Atari 8-bit platforms, we have "Gacek", a kind of unbranded version of Bomb Jack. It's really good, and really pushes the old Atari's to their limits. Varied sprites and colourful backdrops, and a range of music throughout the levels. It feels really good to play as well.
There are oddities though - like the way it plays the theme from Gradius/Nemesis on the high score table. And the way it doesn't mention Bomb Jack at all (understandable, given its homebrew nature). So it's not so much Bomb Jack as Bomb Jack-ish. But it's still very good!
The venerable Colecovision also got a homebrew version, this time staying truer to the original. It's also very good, and looks way better than a 1982 console has any right to. Control is fluid and fast, and the music is catchy and not annoying.
The bomb sprites are a bit large however, and the game tends to be a bit on the easy side, given there are fewer enemies on screen. But it's still a tremendous achievement.
Yep. Even when clicking the single checkbox captchas, I try really hard to click it "just like a human would". Which is weird, because I am a human. I think.