PS2 VF4 report

ok...now that I have ur attention....

Magic box stated that Yu has come out n said the PS2 VF4 started at the same time when they developed the N2 VF4.

He goes on to say that the PS2 VF4 will be exactly the same as the arcade version...with no inferiority in level of detail n gfx.

U guys believe it?

Strange...such a bold comment, I would have expected all the ps2 sites to have it written in bold, reassuring their supporters " hey, our black box n do gfx just like the N2...we are better than X-box n GC".

Yet, only magic box has this "supposedly" Yu comment.

Sounds fishy~/versus/images/icons/mad.gif

<font color=red>~~~SummErs' 'enemy not SPODED, enemy not DOWN~~~'

 

I never though any differently, from everythnig i;ve seen I thikn think PS2 can do an exact translation of VF4. Who knows, may will say it cant do the textures or the lighting. But time will tell once the games are released. I do think though that PS2 will be exactly the same as N2.

CrewNYC

 

Andy Kun~...long time no C

Hope all is well.

Enlighten me on what u saw that made u think the PS2 can produce a clone of VF4.

<font color=red>~~~SummErs' 'enemy not SPODED, enemy not DOWN~~~'

 

Fishy,you bet,............4MB Vram v.s 33 MB Vram for example, T&L v.s no T& L........no,no.
With the polygon count there shouldn't be a Problem,.....but in terms of textures and lightnig there should be problems.
don't forget that Yu mentined that he would like to make a DC-port....he allready told this 2-3 times. The first time he said "if a translation was possible". he didn't mention this problem again...........but there are contractual obligations to sony........Let's say sony bought Vf4 , they won't even allow a DC port? DC version would have nice textures, but problems with the high poligon count(clothes-animation)....still they could do a good compromise , reducing the poligon count in the background(like FV2).

I would like to see a port on a naomi 2 worthy Hardware like GC,XBOX?

cya

 

If it was anyone else saying it I'd be laughing in their face,but this is the guy that made Shenmue /versus/images/icons/laugh.gif,though I guess he wasn't about to say " the PS2 VF4 is going to suck but we're gonna make more money than if we port it to gamecube or xbox"

The thing I'm most concerned about (like most people) is the textures, and while a lot of the PS2s action adventure games have horrible low res textures It certainly hasn't been a problem in the more notable fighting games on the system.

No doubt they'll have fairly good textures on the characters and shonky background textures /versus/images/icons/laugh.gif

 

If the PS2 can do a perfect N2 VF4 I'll shit bricks! More likely, Yu has no direct knowledge of how the PS2 translation is going and is only repeating what the marketing department insists on.

However, I do think the PS2 is capable of handling a good translation. Perhaps the PS2 version will use more polys to compensate for textures.

 

<blockquote><font size=1>In reply to:</font><hr>

More likely, Yu has no direct knowledge of how the PS2 translation is going and is only repeating what the marketing department insists on.

<hr></blockquote>

Why wouldn't he? The way I see it, if I was the executive producer of a game and my own department was developing the game for two different systems (N2, PS2) I'd sure as heck know exactly wtf was going on. Wouldn't you?

You kinda make it sound like Yu Suzuki is a PR fanboy.

cheers,

<font color=white>Llanfair</font color=white>
<font color=orange>Booyah daddy mac! I'm stylin!</font color=orange>

 

> Why wouldn't he? The way I see it, if I was the executive producer of a game and my own department was developing the game for two different systems (N2, PS2) I'd sure as heck know exactly wtf was going on. Wouldn't you?

> You kinda make it sound like Yu Suzuki is a PR fanboy.

Obviously development for the PS2 is staggered with the N2, even though they began at the same time. It's still very much a case of arcade -> console. This is why no PS2 builds have been released even though the arcade version is already testing. As such, Suzuki can't really tell how close the two are going to be and thus probably rely on other opinions. If marketing has declared that the two are gonna be identical (I've actually been told the PS2 version will look better) do you think Suzuki's going to deny it?

You kinda make it sound as though VF4 is the only game Suzuki is working on and that he is an all-knowing god.

Oh wait, he IS a god.

 

No of course Suzuki would not deny it. However, I would think that whatever AM2 has done so far with the PS2 version, Suzuki has seen it and likely been able to form his own opinions.

<blockquote><font size=1>In reply to:</font><hr>

You kinda make it sound as though VF4 is the only game Suzuki is working on and that he is an all-knowing god. Oh wait, he IS a god.

<hr></blockquote>

I think Yu Suzuki is a great game producer. I have no idea of all the other games he's working on. But what I do know is that he's in charge of AM2. My point was that if he's in charge of AM2 and AM2 is doing the PS2 version then it seems pretty likely that he's got a good idea of what's going on - and likely does not need to rely on the opinions of other departments to make his own judgements. I would hope that he would know what's going on for ALL the games AM2 develops under him. What good business savvy executive wouldn't?

cheers,

<font color=white>Llanfair</font color=white>
<font color=orange>Booyah daddy mac! I'm stylin!</font color=orange>

 

In reply to this, I made an exact comment to Adam about this. I said I bet they are working on the two versions at the same time and that they will be exactly the same. Looking at the video's Adam couldn't believe what I said, but I told him as a money making strategy, the N2 version will probably reflect the limitations of the PS2. My guess was always they are making the N2 version specifically limited so it can translate exactly to the PS2. I also objectively said the color palette looked dark to me, I even went further to say I thought it was using somewhere between 8-12Megs of texture and with compression the PS2 could bring this exactly. I didnt think the light sources were anything special either and the PS2 could handle it. Before I get flamed though, lets wait and see. If Magic Box is right, then these assumptions are pretty correct.

CrewNYC

 

If N2 is used to its full potential there is practically no way that the PS2 can do a perfect port. A close port is possible but not a perfect one.

AFAIK the PS2 is not capable of bumpmapping and it seems that the character clothes on the N2 version are using bumpmapping. If this is the case than it is already certain that it will not be an exact port.

There is also the fact that the N2 has 32megs of texture ram which when compressed to 8:1 would give about 256 megs of texture ram. The thing that is currently bugging me is that the game does not seem to be using mipmapping. This should be easy to achieve since there is so much texture space available.It would also enable the hardware to be more efficient.

Maybe they are really compromising the N2 version to resembel the PS2 one.

Anyway I will say this again. There is no way that the PS2 can produce an arcade perfect port of the game. The only console possible for such a feat would be the XBOX IMO or maybe GC(i doubt it). In the vertex lighting dept there is no current hardware that can beat N@omi2. The only one to match it is XBOX and that is when really pushing the system.

CIN

 

If I remember, nobody seriously thought the Super NES could handle the home conversion of Street Fighter 2, but Capcom proved them wrong. Same with Virtua Fighter 2 on the Saturn. Even with the excellent quality of those games, they weren't absolutely perfect versions. Remember the backgrounds on VF2?

The point is that they were exemplary conversions of state-of-the-art arcade games that also, more importantly, PLAYED perfectly. I think that will be the same with VF4 on Playstation 2. It likely won't be a pixel-for-pixel copy of the arcade game, but it will be close enough, and it will certainly look better than anything else on the console scene. What matters is that we get a classic fighting game that becomes wildly successful with the public. And, hey, when Sega goes the Capcom route and pulls out revisions every six months (you know Taka's showing up sooner or later), that just means more fans to lap it up.

-------
Daniel Thomas
it snowed in Minnesota this week...that makes 9 months...

 

A nice point and people certainly can translate the play on a general level, but in those examples it seems that there were some issues.

SF2 on SNES had a different feel to it, that generally had to be adjusted to a bit. I'm discounting the slowdown when music changes, but some would also complain about that. Fortunately, it was a good enough port to be played similar when you got the feel down but I think there were some differences that were significant depending on the level you played.

VF2 as I understand it has its fair share of differences from the arcade in gameplay. US version was a more extreme example, but even the Japanese version I hear has its differences (still fun as hell for me to play though).

I guess the porting process is never easy and I'm not sure if there's a perfectly ported fighting game yet.... KI series on N64 were supposedly on similar hardware and it just felt wrong compared to the arcade (which also felt wrong/versus/images/icons/tongue.gif, but I think you get the point).

Street Fighter Alpha 3 on Dreamcast has Vism issues.

Fortunately, the trend is that the margin between ports and originals are getting smaller and smaller, or so it seems.

-Chanchai

 

I guess my doubts stems from several thigns...

1. Suzuki is now more of a producer than a programmer. He's a PR guy. The guy at the top. The main man. The man that Sega rallies behind. He's like the CEO of the company that looks at broad things but doesn't really pay attention to the minute, day-to-day operations. It's like being the CEO of McDonald's and guaranteeing that service there is the best. It's an impossible claim because the service at the local branch is beyond the CEO's control and could very well be bad.

2. Suzuki is involved in a lot of games. Shenmue 2 (which should be his main focus), that propellor game, and who knows what else. I would be a lot more impressed if Katagiri--the game director--actually made those comments instead of Suzuki.

3. The background in Jeffry stage makes me believe in Andy's theory, but then after I saw those two clips--the insane animation, lighting, particles of snow--and I have a hard time believing the PS2 can do a perfect (and Suzuki did say PERFECT) port.

4. The Arcadia AM2 interview--what about all that stuff about conceptualizing the game in order to maximize hardware?

<blockquote><font size=1>In reply to:</font><hr>

Arcadia: Looking at the transition from Virtua Fighter to VF3, the series has come a long way. Does AM2 pay special attention to certain aspects in each sequel, perhaps a formula?

AM2: The differences between Virtua Fighter, VF2, and VF3 are fairly distinct. We've been worrying about how to truly distinguish Virtua Fighter 4 from the previous installments in the series. If we just did the normal upgrades associated with working on new hardware, Virtua Fighter 4 would end up looking almost identical to VF3. This time we've been asking ourselves; 'What can the Naomi2 really do?,' rather than approaching development from a conceptual angle.

Arcadia: So the focus is to push the Naomi2 hardware?

AM2: Moreover we're not setting specific conceptual goals. For example, if we set our sights on creating photorealistic graphics and we couldn't accomplish that, our entire focus would be lost. So we sat down and really tested the hardware, then figured out what we could do and applied it to development.

Arcadia: In general then, after you did significant research on the Naomi2 hardware, what goals did you set?

AM2: Character animation and background interaction became very important. Making the characters move realistically in-game, not just in cut-scenes. We've spent an enormous amount of time working on clothing design, facial animation and body detail.

<hr></blockquote>

 

<blockquote><font size=1>In reply to:</font><hr>

Suzuki is now more of a producer than a programmer. He's a PR guy. The guy at the top. The main man. The man that Sega rallies behind. He's like the CEO of the company that looks at broad things but doesn't really pay attention to the minute, day-to-day operations. It's like being the CEO of McDonald's and guaranteeing that service there is the best. It's an impossible claim because the service at the local branch is beyond the CEO's control and could very well be bad.

<hr></blockquote>

Ok. Well, your idea of a producer and my idea of producer are two very different things. First off, a producer is not a CEO. Not even close.

A producer in the music industry is far from a CEO - they are the 'sound shapers' of what's recorded by a band. They envision what the song should sound like and are very much dominant in how the music is to be played and recorded. To some, the music is more theirs than the band.

And a producer in the movie industry is far from a CEO. The role here is not unlike the music role. They are very much involved in how director is taking shots and how the editors are piecing it together for the final cut.

A CEO is an executive administrator - the top guy who ensures the company's focus is in the right direction - having vito power for budgets and major decisions.
Your analogy to McDonald's - it's a bit a bad comparison. You compared a video game developing *department* to a multi-billion dollar company. The CEO of McDonald's has a tremendously role than Suzuki at AM2. This is plain to see.

Yu's a video game producer. Operative word producer. Sure, as his department is not all that big he probably has some administrative responsibilities - funding requests from head office, executive decisions on hiring (if necessary), executive decisions on which games to produce of the many they likely evaluate each year. But his main job is a producer. Unless the job title 'producer' has a remarkably different definition within japanese video game companies, Yu is way more of producer than a CEO. Since neither of us know jack about the corporate structure within Sega and its departments - we're both merely speculating Yu's role. Who knows, maybe AM2 actually has a CEO-like department head that's not Yu?

Either way, I totally think that Yu has seen the PS2 development and has based his own opinions on them.

cheers,

<font color=white>Llanfair</font color=white>
<font color=orange>Booyah daddy mac! I'm stylin!</font color=orange>

 

CIN why do you think I made those exact statements. I believed from day 1 sega was making a business decision. To me the most logical thing to do is create a perfect port of VF4 for PS@ and N2, alsmost as a showcase game for the PS2 and show Sega's efforts on the machine. Sure one hardware platform is more powerful than the other, but it doesnt mean they will use one hardware platforms power to the max.

CrewNYC

 

Well, obviously, the analogy wasn't meant to be taken quite that literally. My point is more that there is a hierarchy of things and the producer is at the top and that he is mainly responsible for the broad strokes of the product. There are people below him that specialize in certain roles/functions. There is a game director, a music director, a marketing director, etc. The guy at the top is the least likely to know about the details that each of the directors below him are responsible for.

How much hands on work do you think Suzuki really has for VF4? Just look at Miyamoto and what he is to Nintendo. His name gets attached to practically every major project from Nintendo, but usually his role is supervisory except for a pet project or two (Mario for example). I have heard that Suzuki's role in VF4 is similar like that...and that VF4 is more AM2 than Suzuki himself.

Anyway, this is really a pointless exchange. If the PS2 can do Naomi 2 exactly, then I will be impressed. Development may have begun on both platforms simultaneously, but common sense suggests that development on the PS2 is behind the N2. Past history does not favor Suzuki's claims, but let's wait and see.

 

I agree Andy. But what I find strange is the fact that in the past SEGA used to have the most powerful hardware in the Arcade and they would always use it to the full.

Sega has a lot of experience on N2 since it has been ready for a long time and it is similar to N1. It would be foolish IMO to not use the N2 power to the full to be able to do a perfect port on the PS2. In fact I think that SEGA should have used a much more powerful and advanced piece of hardware that N2 for VF4.

VF series was always light years ahead of everything in the gfx dept in the arcades and more importantly it was impossible to do an exact port on a home console. It seems that this time this is not the case. This and the fact that it is being converted to a home console in such a short time after the arcade release could be the reason that VF4 may not be as popular as the previous versions.

CIN

 

"the fact that it is being converted to a home console in such a short time after the arcade release could be the reason that VF4 may not be as popular as the previous versions."

oh so true, this WILL happen....

<font color=red>PICCOLO</font color=red>


--proud member of CvfC--

 

hey piccolo are you a Segagaga Fan......?