How much difference does the Arcade Card really make with a Duo-R?

[Necromancer]

sapphire doesn't use no polygons. it's all very well animated 2D sprites.

Pre-rendered polygons are still polygons, you crazy bazzy.

[princemoonrise]

Would love to see Dead of the Brain I-II translated SOMEDAY...  I wonder why stuff goes to french first?  (supposedly thats whats happening with Phantasy Star: Generation 2 for PS2).

I fired up Sapphire again yesterday and I'll have to say... the end result is spectacular no matter how they got there, and it IS using technology they had at-hand to do things that other systems of the time wouldn't have been able to do, in this case, the large amounts of RAM, CD storage capacity, the strong color palette, and having the Mhz to get it all done fast and fluid to display those awesome prerendered sprites, morphing, and multi-mode boss transformations.  There's a reason why the Genesis/Sega CD or the Super Famicom don't have anything like it.

[SignOfZeta]

But the game was released in 1995, after the Playstation and Saturn, two systems "of the time" that could easily do Sapphire.

If you mean "of the time" as in other 16-bit era machines...well, have you seen Pulstar on Neo Geo? If the prerendered stuff in Sapphire makes you go nuts, seeing Pulstar would probably kill you. Not only does it do everything Sapphire does, it does it with a collection of sprites and background graphics that actually look like they belong in the same game together.

I love Sapphire, but it is what it is. It's not the best shooter ever made, it's not even close to the best shooter on PCE even. What it is, basically, is the single most impressive piece of software that has ever run on one of the coolest game systems that has ever been made. That should be enough for a sane person. Making more than that out of it is just otaku bullshit.

[SignOfZeta]

Btw, I also take issue with the notion that software made late in a systems life is usually bad. Evidently people who feel that way don't think much of Panzer Dragoon Azel, KOF 2003, Yoshi's Island, Mighty Final Fight, Judgement Silversword, Ikaruga, Dragon Quest VI, Mother 2, Mother 3, etc etc. I'd say it's actually the norm, at least from 1st parties. These fireball late releases are the reason I barely ever buy machines when they first come out; you basically end up waiting five years for the good shit!

[princemoonrise]

I did mean, more "of its generation", as that it is software for a piece of hardware designed and released in *1987*, it is absolutely insane. Back then I was buying arcade boards and had all the current hardware of 1995 but the fact that there were more technically impressive things out there did not diminish how special, impressive or magical Sapphire was, or still is, on the PCE for me.  Whether or not its "good" is a matter of taste.  Sapphire is not my absolute favorite but its definitely in my top 10 shooters on that system.

I got Pulstar as soon as it was released (on Neo CD), and yeah, its the Sapphire for that platform, freaking hard too but I do recall beating it staying up all night with a friend back in the day.