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To be fair, ports of games for that class of console would often be complete rewrites. Sometimes even the assets would be redrawn just from looking at another

To be fair, ports of games for that class of console would often be complete rewrites. Sometimes even the assets would be redrawn just from looking at another version of the game running. Remember, despite coming out later, the gameboy advance would be in the space of SNES/Genesis if it were a home console.

djmips 4y ago
This was often by necessity, I worked on some of these ports and we would just get the game on whatever machine it was coming from (cart, disk, arcade machine) and then we would literally reverse engineer it as best we could - which usually meant just playing it a lot and video taping and making notes. Then we would re-implement / draw / compose a work-alike version on the target platform.
- JohnBooty 4y ago
  As a kid, I always thought the developers of these ports were simply not very good. But once I started writing my own code and working in the industry, I realized that you guys were insanely talented people working under ridiculously punishing deadlines and (as you said) zero access to the original source code, assets, etc. Not familiar with your work in particular but in general, what a heroic and underappreciated game dev niche. Much respect for all that the unheralded port programmers managed to accomplish against the odds.
  - djmips 4y ago
    Yes, also factor in a lot of us were like 19 years old and this was our first project and also we were the lead or only programmer. :D
    - JohnBooty 4y ago
      Absolute heroes of code =)
anthk 4y ago
Nope. The GBA was a 32 bit console, much more powerful than the SNES/Genesis. It was halfway between an SNES and a PSX.
- monocasa 4y ago
  The genesis is arguably a 32 bit console as well. The genesis has only a 16 bit bus to memory, but the GBA has only a 16 bit bus to it's cart and most RAM as well, leaving only on die RAM and MMIO with 32 bit bus accesses. Additionally, it's GPU is very much derived from the NES->SNES family of PPUs. VRAM can be used as a LFB, but it's generally not the best use of the system. I'd argue it's about halfway between a stock SNES/Genesis and an SNES/Genesis with a cart addon chip like an SVP or Super FX.
  - anthk 4y ago
    >The genesis is arguably a 32 bit console as well. 24 ;)
    - monocasa 4y ago
      The genesis has 24 bit address bus, but my 64 bit CPU I'm typing this on only has a 39 bit physical address bus (48 bit virtual) and we still call it a 64 bit CPU.

djmips 4y ago

This was often by necessity, I worked on some of these ports and we would just get the game on whatever machine it was coming from (cart, disk, arcade machine) and then we would literally reverse engineer it as best we could - which usually meant just playing it a lot and video taping and making notes. Then we would re-implement / draw / compose a work-alike version on the target platform.

JohnBooty 4y ago
As a kid, I always thought the developers of these ports were simply not very good. But once I started writing my own code and working in the industry, I realized that you guys were insanely talented people working under ridiculously punishing deadlines and (as you said) zero access to the original source code, assets, etc. Not familiar with your work in particular but in general, what a heroic and underappreciated game dev niche. Much respect for all that the unheralded port programmers managed to accomplish against the odds.
- djmips 4y ago
  Yes, also factor in a lot of us were like 19 years old and this was our first project and also we were the lead or only programmer. :D
  - JohnBooty 4y ago
    Absolute heroes of code =)

anthk 4y ago

Nope. The GBA was a 32 bit console, much more powerful than the SNES/Genesis. It was halfway between an SNES and a PSX.

monocasa 4y ago
The genesis is arguably a 32 bit console as well. The genesis has only a 16 bit bus to memory, but the GBA has only a 16 bit bus to it's cart and most RAM as well, leaving only on die RAM and MMIO with 32 bit bus accesses. Additionally, it's GPU is very much derived from the NES->SNES family of PPUs. VRAM can be used as a LFB, but it's generally not the best use of the system. I'd argue it's about halfway between a stock SNES/Genesis and an SNES/Genesis with a cart addon chip like an SVP or Super FX.
- anthk 4y ago
  >The genesis is arguably a 32 bit console as well. 24 ;)
  - monocasa 4y ago
    The genesis has 24 bit address bus, but my 64 bit CPU I'm typing this on only has a 39 bit physical address bus (48 bit virtual) and we still call it a 64 bit CPU.