PS2 driving game performance

Played "Midnight Streetclub Racer" for an hour or so this afternoon. This is an interesting title to compare to PC performance, since it's basically a PS2 version of Midtown Madness 2 (there are differences, but both are developed by the same company, and seem to share a similar code base). Quite simply, there is no comparison. Midtown Madness 2 is unplayable on "low end" systems (such as a P2 300), annoyingly slow on mid-range (P3 500) and tolerable but still sloppy on a fast system (P3 700). Midnight Streetclub Racer, on the other hand, buzzes along at a solid 50-60 fps without any hint of slowdown. The world is at least as detailed and big as in MM2, and the cars are considerably more detailed. The game is fast and fun to play. The PS2 is no more powerful than a high-end PC, maybe even less so in pure computing power. What I saw here was the enormous performance gains made possible by a single, stable hardware spec that the developers could target. And this is on a 1st-gen, launch-day game - a year from now they will wring twice as much power out of the console. Ans this is why I, a dedicated PC gamer for many years, will be turning more and more to consoles like the PS2 for my gaming. Simply put, I'm sick and tired of spending $500-$1000 a year upgrading my PC and then STILL getting sub-standard performance a lot of the time. Joe McGinn _____________________ Radical Entertainment

I agree that the major advantage of a console system is its ability to provide programers with a single reliable piece of hardware to code for. However, its complete lack of ample storage space means limited saves and no add-on such as popular with almost every driving sim. Another down side is that producers are even less likely to release a console title with limited appeal - such as a racing sim. The audience is considerably younger and thus so are the titles...that is why a vast majority of the console ports to pc never do good and the exact reverse is usually true. On plus of a console is that you can play relaxing back on your couch in front of your big screen tv....but I also like a nice crisp clean picture the PC produces on a monitor better. I think the PS2 is over hyped as far as its pure gaming power goes. It is more of a wanna be everything to everyone console system that is not going to stand the test of time as a hard core game system. Both the GameCube and XBox look much more appealing from my standpoint as a PC gamers but they too will need to prove themselves before I plop down the cash for one. Joe62 <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:[email hidden]...

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> Played "Midnight Streetclub Racer" for an hour or so this afternoon. > This is an interesting title to compare to PC performance, since it's > basically a PS2 version of Midtown Madness 2 (there are differences, > but both are developed by the same company, and seem to share a > similar code base). > > Quite simply, there is no comparison. Midtown Madness 2 is unplayable > on "low end" systems (such as a P2 300), annoyingly slow on mid-range > (P3 500) and tolerable but still sloppy on a fast system (P3 700). > > Midnight Streetclub Racer, on the other hand, buzzes along at a solid > 50-60 fps without any hint of slowdown. The world is at least as > detailed and big as in MM2, and the cars are considerably more > detailed. The game is fast and fun to play. > > The PS2 is no more powerful than a high-end PC, maybe even less so in > pure computing power. What I saw here was the enormous performance > gains made possible by a single, stable hardware spec that the > developers could target. And this is on a 1st-gen, launch-day game - a > year from now they will wring twice as much power out of the console. > > Ans this is why I, a dedicated PC gamer for many years, will be > turning more and more to consoles like the PS2 for my gaming. Simply > put, I'm sick and tired of spending $500-$1000 a year upgrading my PC > and then STILL getting sub-standard performance a lot of the time. > > Joe McGinn > _____________________ > Radical Entertainment

Thats the price you pay to stay bleeding edge. And for the price of a PS2 and all the stuff for it.. controllers, harddrive, remote, modem, broadband adapter, keyboard, mouse, $80.00 arcade twich games I can buy a top of the line 1200MHz PC that will do fine for a few years.

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> Ans this is why I, a dedicated PC gamer for many years, will be > turning more and more to consoles like the PS2 for my gaming. Simply > put, I'm sick and tired of spending $500-$1000 a year upgrading my PC > and then STILL getting sub-standard performance a lot of the time. > > Joe McGinn > _____________________ > Radical Entertainment

I agree with you on the whole except that if you drop the res well below 640x480 Midtown madness does play a lot smoother. With the ps2 running through tv's the comparison is lost a bit. Also another thing console developers dont have to contend with is an operating system designed to do other things than just run 3d games, make that a really sloppy un testeded microsoft operating system :) "Joe62" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:[email hidden]...

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> Played "Midnight Streetclub Racer" for an hour or so this afternoon. > This is an interesting title to compare to PC performance, since it's > basically a PS2 version of Midtown Madness 2 (there are differences, > but both are developed by the same company, and seem to share a > similar code base). > > Quite simply, there is no comparison. Midtown Madness 2 is unplayable > on "low end" systems (such as a P2 300), annoyingly slow on mid-range > (P3 500) and tolerable but still sloppy on a fast system (P3 700). > > Midnight Streetclub Racer, on the other hand, buzzes along at a solid > 50-60 fps without any hint of slowdown. The world is at least as > detailed and big as in MM2, and the cars are considerably more > detailed. The game is fast and fun to play. > > The PS2 is no more powerful than a high-end PC, maybe even less so in > pure computing power. What I saw here was the enormous performance > gains made possible by a single, stable hardware spec that the > developers could target. And this is on a 1st-gen, launch-day game - a > year from now they will wring twice as much power out of the console. > > Ans this is why I, a dedicated PC gamer for many years, will be > turning more and more to consoles like the PS2 for my gaming. Simply > put, I'm sick and tired of spending $500-$1000 a year upgrading my PC > and then STILL getting sub-standard performance a lot of the time. > > Joe McGinn > _____________________ > Radical Entertainment

Did you compare them with the PC version at 640 * 480? This is the resolution the PS2 runs at. I will be interested to see a comparison at that setting. Thanks in advance, Andre Joe62 <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:[email hidden]...

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> Played "Midnight Streetclub Racer" for an hour or so this afternoon. > This is an interesting title to compare to PC performance, since it's > basically a PS2 version of Midtown Madness 2 (there are differences, > but both are developed by the same company, and seem to share a > similar code base). > > Quite simply, there is no comparison. Midtown Madness 2 is unplayable > on "low end" systems (such as a P2 300), annoyingly slow on mid-range > (P3 500) and tolerable but still sloppy on a fast system (P3 700). > > Midnight Streetclub Racer, on the other hand, buzzes along at a solid > 50-60 fps without any hint of slowdown. The world is at least as > detailed and big as in MM2, and the cars are considerably more > detailed. The game is fast and fun to play. > > The PS2 is no more powerful than a high-end PC, maybe even less so in > pure computing power. What I saw here was the enormous performance > gains made possible by a single, stable hardware spec that the > developers could target. And this is on a 1st-gen, launch-day game - a > year from now they will wring twice as much power out of the console. > > Ans this is why I, a dedicated PC gamer for many years, will be > turning more and more to consoles like the PS2 for my gaming. Simply > put, I'm sick and tired of spending $500-$1000 a year upgrading my PC > and then STILL getting sub-standard performance a lot of the time. > > Joe McGinn > _____________________ > Radical Entertainment

until the X-box comes out with it's 8 gig hd to download addons and other things. 733mhz intel and N25 vidcard and internal broadband modem. All for around $300. It has usb connections so we could probably use our wheels on it too? Too bad we have to wait another year for it. They should of made the Giga-Box first. ;) rrevved wrote:

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> > On Fri, 27 Oct 2000 08:31:45 GMT, "Hannabill" <[email hidden]> wrote: > > >Thats the price you pay to stay bleeding edge. > > > >And for the price of a PS2 and all the stuff for it.. controllers, > >harddrive, > > There is no hard drive on any current console. > > > remote, >

-- Solo1 C-Modified (CASC-OR/BARC) 76 Trans-Am 600+hp http://www.barc-oc.com http://www.casc.on.ca

a tv is 320 x 180 Andre Rudkovsky <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:6BcK5.1511$[email hidden]...

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> Did you compare them with the PC version at 640 * 480? > This is the resolution the PS2 runs at. > > I will be interested to see a comparison at that setting. > > Thanks in advance, > > Andre > > > Joe62 <[email hidden]> wrote in message > news:[email hidden]... > > Played "Midnight Streetclub Racer" for an hour or so this afternoon. > > This is an interesting title to compare to PC performance, since it's > > basically a PS2 version of Midtown Madness 2 (there are differences, > > but both are developed by the same company, and seem to share a > > similar code base). > > > > Quite simply, there is no comparison. Midtown Madness 2 is unplayable > > on "low end" systems (such as a P2 300), annoyingly slow on mid-range > > (P3 500) and tolerable but still sloppy on a fast system (P3 700). > > > > Midnight Streetclub Racer, on the other hand, buzzes along at a solid > > 50-60 fps without any hint of slowdown. The world is at least as > > detailed and big as in MM2, and the cars are considerably more > > detailed. The game is fast and fun to play. > > > > The PS2 is no more powerful than a high-end PC, maybe even less so in > > pure computing power. What I saw here was the enormous performance > > gains made possible by a single, stable hardware spec that the > > developers could target. And this is on a 1st-gen, launch-day game - a > > year from now they will wring twice as much power out of the console. > > > > Ans this is why I, a dedicated PC gamer for many years, will be > > turning more and more to consoles like the PS2 for my gaming. Simply > > put, I'm sick and tired of spending $500-$1000 a year upgrading my PC > > and then STILL getting sub-standard performance a lot of the time. > > > > Joe McGinn > > _____________________ > > Radical Entertainment > >

On Fri, 27 Oct 2000 10:15:30 GMT, "Andre Rudkovsky" <[email hidden]> wrote: >Did you compare them with the PC version at 640 * 480? >This is the resolution the PS2 runs at. Yup. MM2 is so slow (to me) that I haven't even bothered trying to run it at higher resolutions. That's playing on a P3 500/TNT2 at work, and a P2 300/Voodoo2 at home (on which the game is unplayable).

On Fri, 27 Oct 2000 16:55:11 GMT, "rik anthrax" <[email hidden]> wrote: >a tv is 320 x 180 Bzzzzt, WRONG, thanks for playing!

>This is the resolution the PS2 runs at. > > Yup. MM2 is so slow (to me) that I haven't even bothered trying to run > it at higher resolutions. That's playing on a P3 500/TNT2 at work, and > a P2 300/Voodoo2 at home (on which the game is unplayable). methinks a V5 running at 2x or 4x fsaa at 640 would be fast and great looking. Is there a demo? I'll explore that avenue for you. dave henrie

On Fri, 27 Oct 2000 16:55:11 GMT, "rik anthrax" <[email hidden]> wrote: >a tv is 320 x 180 What TV are you watching? The scan lines outght to be HUGE. NTSC has almost 500 visible scan lines, while PAL has almost 600. Horizontal resolution varies depending on the format (DVD, VHS, TV).

On Fri, 27 Oct 2000 16:55:11 GMT, "rik anthrax" <[email hidden]> wrote: >a tv is 320 x 180 No, it isn't. The horizontal resolution of an NTSC TV signal is 525 lines. TVs don't have pixels. For practical purposes, however, you can say that a TV can handle resolutions of up to 640x480. If you don't believe me: http://www.ncsa.uiuc.edu/SCMS/training/general/details/ntsc.html ~daxe

You omitted to mention what was the resolution on the PS2. It's easy to get good FPS at 320 X 200 LOL. I booted up Grand Turismo on my PS yesterday night (was bored ;) and I angrily shut down the console after 30 min of frustration: you can't see a thing on the night races due to horrible pixellation. I'll take a driving sim on the pc any day. Joe62 wrote:

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> > Played "Midnight Streetclub Racer" for an hour or so this afternoon. > This is an interesting title to compare to PC performance, since it's > basically a PS2 version of Midtown Madness 2 (there are differences, > but both are developed by the same company, and seem to share a > similar code base). > > Quite simply, there is no comparison. Midtown Madness 2 is unplayable > on "low end" systems (such as a P2 300), annoyingly slow on mid-range > (P3 500) and tolerable but still sloppy on a fast system (P3 700). > > Midnight Streetclub Racer, on the other hand, buzzes along at a solid > 50-60 fps without any hint of slowdown. The world is at least as > detailed and big as in MM2, and the cars are considerably more > detailed. The game is fast and fun to play. > > The PS2 is no more powerful than a high-end PC, maybe even less so in > pure computing power. What I saw here was the enormous performance > gains made possible by a single, stable hardware spec that the > developers could target. And this is on a 1st-gen, launch-day game - a > year from now they will wring twice as much power out of the console. > > Ans this is why I, a dedicated PC gamer for many years, will be > turning more and more to consoles like the PS2 for my gaming. Simply > put, I'm sick and tired of spending $500-$1000 a year upgrading my PC > and then STILL getting sub-standard performance a lot of the time. > > Joe McGinn > _____________________ > Radical Entertainment

-- Philippe "Philster" Sergerie

The PSX is 5 years old, the graphics on it look comparable to a 5 year old PC ;) The PS2 (I would assume) will look far better than the original PSX. I saw Ferrari 355 Challenge running on the Dreamcast yesterday, looked very nice IMO, at least as good as the modern sims on my PC. -- Ian P <email invalid due to spam> Philster <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:[email hidden]... > You omitted to mention what was the resolution on the PS2. It's easy to > get good FPS at 320 X 200 LOL. I booted up Grand Turismo on my PS > yesterday night (was bored ;) and I angrily shut down the console after > 30 min of frustration: you can't see a thing on the night races due to > horrible pixellation. I'll take a driving sim on the pc any day. > >

sorry for the error!! you made my point though......there will be no 1280x1024 resolutions playing a console thru a tv monitor. daxe <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:[email hidden]...

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> On Fri, 27 Oct 2000 16:55:11 GMT, "rik anthrax" > <[email hidden]> wrote: > > >a tv is 320 x 180 > > No, it isn't. The horizontal resolution of an NTSC TV signal is 525 > lines. TVs don't have pixels. For practical purposes, however, you > can say that a TV can handle resolutions of up to 640x480. > > If you don't believe me: > > http://www.ncsa.uiuc.edu/SCMS/training/general/details/ntsc.html > > ~daxe >

"Dave Henrie" <[email hidden]> wrote: > methinks a V5 running at 2x or 4x fsaa at 640 would be fast and great >looking. Is there a demo? I'll explore that avenue for you. No, there's no demo. But I don't believe the 3D card is the bottleneck. It should run fine on a TNT2. Joe McGinn _____________________ Radical Entertainment

Philster <[email hidden]> wrote: >You omitted to mention what was the resolution on the PS2. 640x480 ... same as I was running on the PC. Joe McGinn _____________________ Radical Entertainment

Whoa... what kind of sad televisions do they have in your part of the world? Stephen rik anthrax <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:PriK5.19502$[email hidden]... > a tv is 320 x 180 > Andre Rudkovsky <[email hidden]> wrote in message > news:6BcK5.1511$[email hidden]... > > Did you compare them with the PC version at 640 * 480? > > This is the resolution the PS2 runs at.

You ommitted the best reason for buying a PS2. You can purchase it for about $300.00 and then turn around and sell that piece of overrated technocrap for $1,000.00 on E bay and then go out and buy a reaL GAMING SYSTEM.... a new PC with a 800 mhz to 1Ghz processor and a Geforce video card.... Thats why I, a dedicated PC user for years will buy a PS2. The PS2 is no more powerful than a high-end PC, maybe even less so in > pure computing power. What I saw here was the enormous performance > gains made possible by a single, stable hardware spec that the > developers could target. And this is on a 1st-gen, launch-day game - a > year from now they will wring twice as much power out of the console.