Nick1984
'What a knucklehead!'
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Post by Nick1984 on Mar 8, 2012 23:14:22 GMT
Official thread for Last Bronx Release Date: October 1997 Number of Discs: 1 Packaging: Standard Case Number of Players: 1-2 Simultaneous Players: 2 Languages: English Controllers: Control Pad, Virtua Stick Licence: Commercial Publishers: SEGA Developers: SEGA AM3 Genre: Fighting Intro: Gameplay:
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NeoGeoNinja
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Post by NeoGeoNinja on Mar 8, 2012 23:34:38 GMT
PERHAPS UNBELIEVABLY... Last Bronx is my favourite of the 3D SEGA fighters for Saturn. Technically, VF2 is waaay out front and FVipers is a better fighting game too, but the fact of the matter is: I enjoy playing Last Bronx MORE than the other two For one, I MUCH prefer the characters. I think they're ALL unbelievably cool in LBronx. I love the music too! Especially Yoko's. Not to mention, I think the stage backgrounds are very cool also. AS FOR THE CHARACTERS... I think they're ALL great and all fun to use. Usually, I have beef with one or two characters per game, but I don't have that problem in this game. My favourite (for whom I voted) is, and always has been Joe. His use of the Nunchuks combined with his Kicks is just too cool. My fave three are (in order): Joe, Yoko then Nagi. Those are who I tend to favour most, but in this game, it's quite hard to have solid faves I find
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Nick1984
'What a knucklehead!'
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Post by Nick1984 on Mar 9, 2012 10:50:22 GMT
I always found Nagi impossible to play as/against. Female characters in fighting games always seem to block all the time.
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Aydan
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Post by Aydan on Mar 10, 2012 2:49:13 GMT
God damn.. are those backgrounds in 3d? I honestly can't tell. It looks a shit load better than VF2's backgrounds that's for sure...
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Nick1984
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Post by Nick1984 on Mar 10, 2012 9:55:25 GMT
No, but the illusion is far better than VF2 or FV.
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Post by Anthaemia. on Mar 10, 2012 11:04:50 GMT
On the subject of Last Bronx and its backgrounds, does anyone remember the pre-release coverage of this game's Saturn conversion? According to various sources, until about the 40% complete point its entire stages were polygonal, but this approach was ultimately replaced with parallax scrolling layers for everything beyond the ring surrounds. From the screenshots and video footage I've seen of this period in its development, I genuinely couldn't tell the difference!
As for my favourite character, I would have voted for Lisa a few years ago, perhaps because she's a fellow drummer or due to certain other... *ahem* assets she features. However, these days I'm more likely to play as the badass Kurosawa, so naturally I chose him. Some of his attacks are truly brutal, such as when he grabs characters by their hair and throws them to the ground. When playing against Nagi, this particular move becomes all the more sinister if you consider their relationship within the overall storyline. Also, I find his use of a bokken (wooden sword) quite unusual, even in a weapons-based fighter.
Ironically, I find myself playing as Yoshimitsu in Soul Calibur, so maybe I've developed a taste for blades recently? Anyway, now that I'm grown up with a significant other, wouldn't finding such blatant "jailbait" as Lisa appealing in any way be quite bizarre? Then again, I'll have to ask her - fortunately for me, the missus can be quite understanding about this kind of thing! On the other hand, I can't imagine her being so enthusiastic about my fondness for Candy in Fighting Vipers, though for the record my absolute favourite in that series is still Raxel.
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Nick1984
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Post by Nick1984 on Mar 10, 2012 12:05:45 GMT
On the subject of Last Bronx and its backgrounds, does anyone remember the pre-release coverage of this game's Saturn conversion? According to various sources, until about the 40% complete point its entire stages were polygonal, but this approach was ultimately replaced with parallax scrolling layers for everything beyond the ring surrounds. From the screenshots and video footage I've seen of this period in its development, I genuinely couldn't tell the difference! I've had a look at SSM and can't find any images with polygonal backgrounds, however Yuko's subway stage has a polygonal ceiling.
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Aydan
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Post by Aydan on Mar 10, 2012 13:30:33 GMT
Share those images. Don't do the whole 'I'm keeping it secret 'till I'm ready' nonesense because we've had that since like 2007/8 (if I recall). The stages look fantastic to be fair and they asctually look rendered by the Saturn. Perhaps the backgrounds were originally rendered by saturn then turned into 2D and layered so well it looks like it's being rendered by the Saturn in real time?
Here's another thought which came to me too, why didn't more games use 3D backgrounds? Look at the draw distance and how much stuff is going on in Virtua Cop 2 during the first level big chase when driving after enemies, loads of 3d characters, long draw distances with buildings and stuff...
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Nick1984
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Post by Nick1984 on Mar 10, 2012 14:06:51 GMT
They'd have had to reduce character detail.
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Post by Anthaemia. on Mar 10, 2012 15:50:13 GMT
Yuko's subway stage has a polygonal ceiling. By all means, someone please correct me if I'm wrong on this, but wasn't that particular effect achieved by layering two bitmaps using the VDP2 chip? I'm sure it was done the same way as the pillars of Kurosawa's parking lot stage, though it does give the impression of being constructed from polygons. Well, almost... I don't have my back issues at hand right now, but I seem to recall SSM mentioning that very early builds of Last Bronx were using 3D backgrounds, though AM3 weren't entirely sure if it would be possible to keep these in the final game while maintaining the target 60fps refresh rate and detail of character models, plus the ring surrounds. Even after replacing the furthest elements with parallax scrolling, they were still clearly pushing the Saturn quite hard, which explains the flickering that occurs when too many polygons are displayed on screen at once. Then again, having circular shadows rather than something a little more realistic probably helped as well. On the subject of my long-promised project briefly for a moment, I'm definitely not hoarding any kind of Last Bronx related media that can't be found elsewhere, though I guess the prototype footage may prove a little harder to find than screenshots printed in the likes of SSM. However, I'm fairly sure the best source is a clip from the 1997 Tokyo Game Show, which was a 30% complete version. Actually, it might be on the Mogitate Partner disc uploaded to the SS:UK YouTube channel - I'll have to check later. As for Virtua Cop 2, the main benefit of creating a rail shooter is that your engine only has to draw certain sides for a lot of objects (such as buildings), since you'll only ever view things from pre-determined perspectives. Of course, this doesn't always work. Sure, it was rushed and never properly optimised, but there's no reason why The House Of The Dead couldn't have turned out far better than it did! Come to think of it, maybe this method isn't entirely foolproof, as Crypt Killer looked quite rough as well.
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Nick1984
'What a knucklehead!'
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Post by Nick1984 on Mar 10, 2012 17:32:10 GMT
Wouldn't only needing to process one side of the polygon suit fighting games too? Considering the small range of views in fighting games only nearby objects need to be rendered.
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Post by Anthaemia. on Mar 10, 2012 18:59:19 GMT
Had the Saturn not been killed off when it was, you probably would have found a lot more developers exploiting this very point. Several later fighters boasted full polygonal ring surrounds, including D-Xhird, Savaki and - of course - Fighting Vipers, where the effect wasn't just eye candy. I realise such a release may not have been necessary, but can you imagine a theoretical Virtua Fighter 2 Remix with the wall around Wolf's stage restored to its Model 2 glory (even though Fighters Megamix already sorted this particular issue)? This would have made a perfect stop-gap to VF3, and with the expertise gained from advances in programming (such as the upgraded third revision of the SGL OS), maybe they could even have included a basic 3D recreation of the bridge over Shun's raft-based arena that so many complained about in the original conversion? Finally, considering just how many of its arenas relied on the background elements being integral to their overall appearance, I'm sure the cancelled Sonic The Fighters would have utilised similar trickery as well. Unfortunately, now we'll never be able to find out... What could have been, 'eh? *sigh*
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NeoGeoNinja
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Post by NeoGeoNinja on Mar 10, 2012 19:35:30 GMT
WELL... it's a shame that this thread has derailed somewhat into a history lesson as opposed to an actual discussion about the actual game, it characters and gameplay etc. Not so much a criticism of the contribution thus far, but I'm surprised at the overall lack of interest and discussion on the whole. I thought this was a SEGA Saturn fan site essentially?
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Nick1984
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Post by Nick1984 on Mar 10, 2012 19:38:30 GMT
I've got no problem with it, Anthaemia has posted a lot of useful info so far. I was hoping these 'official threads' would entice him into pouring his brains with more info on these games.
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NeoGeoNinja
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Post by NeoGeoNinja on Mar 10, 2012 21:48:46 GMT
YEAH... fair enough.
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