🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1gvg4tINNqmm@usenet.INS.CWRU.Edu> aa399 (Len Stys) writes:

>A Blitter is a bitmap copying and transformation chip?
>Is this all that it does?
>
>Most other game systems use a very fast graphics chip to take care of
>the sprites, scaling, scrolling, etc.
>
>The SNES has a CPU speed of 3.58 MHz!  Everyone looked at this speed
>and laughed, but the graphics chip showed that the speed of the processor
>did not matter too much at all.
---

What this tells us is that this game machine is limited to shoot-em-ups and
simple games where there are a bunch of sprites moving around all the time.
But what about games with 3-D graphics (no sprites, just a lot of filled-in
polygons to draw) that require many calculations to rotate, scale, etc.
These are not 2D sprites so the graphics chip won't help any. (I guess)

The Falcon has an optional 16Mhz 68882 which could help in 3D graphics.

>The Sega Genesis is based on a 68000 CPU at the speed of 7.6 MHz.
>This system pretty much relies on the programmer for rotation, etc.
>BUT I'm pretty sure it still has a graphics chip.  And I'm POSITIVE
>that the Sega CD-ROM player has an especially designed graphics chip
>for rotation.
>
>Recently, Nintendo announced to the world that it has developed a graphics
>chip that will be powerful enough for 3-D imaging.
---

Well this changes everything. If they have that, then they would probably
be able to do some fancier things than the Falcon could manage. (well see)

>If the Falcon030 does NOT have a graphics chip that is responsible for
>these features, won't the video game systems pass this system by?

Sure, it would'nt be hard for someone who is only making a game machine
to 'beat' a more general device like the Falcon: The Falcon is also good
at other things, it was not solely designed as a game machine.

>Also, if the JAGUAR has a 64-bit RISC graphics chip like we all suppose
>that it will, the Falcon030 will NOT be able to run any of those games.
>
>I don't know.  If I was Atari, I'd try to get the Falcon030 and Jaguar
>to both have the same graphics chip.  This way game developers would be
>more willing to make games for these systems.  And Atari would have an
>edge over systems.
---

They have an edge in other things with the Falcon. For example, as a
home computer that can do other things as well. (And a dsp + sampler)

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