Are there pictures, info on the Saturn 3D upgrade ?

SSDs on the Saturn 2/Genesis 3? I have to disagree on that since even today (7 years later) SSDs are still very expensive. Just look how the new Macbook costs around 45% more just becos of a 64GB SSD.

I wouldnt even pack a HDD back in 2001, but I would make it an option.

And negora, yeah another addon would've been a disaster no doubt about that, mostly becos I can imagine that getting a Saturn+LM addon would in the end cost around 600-700, and nobody back then would've payed that for a console.

However, a LM-designed Saturn from the get go is a far better idea. I know that Gigadrive's specs seem too impresive, but remember that back in 94-95 a console made for release in 96 was supposedly going to go against both N64 and M2. It was in 97 that Panasonic canned it, but for most people back then the M2 was a sure thing.

My plans are more damage-control, since they are based on a turning point for SEGA when they had to choose a path and follow it. I would've released the 32X in mid 94 but only in the americas and europe since those were Genesis/MD biggest markets. At $150 it would've been cheaper than 2 FX games, and it would've come in the right moment to counter the new (and technically superior) games from Snes.

Hire LM/Real3D to design the Saturn from scratch, and the only requeriments are a benchmark a little higher than Model2's (like 350,000-400,000 poly/sec with all textures, lights and effects) and a price point of $300 or less if possible.

Then release the Saturn in may 96, 4 months before N64. This would not only help developers create more games for it, it would also change how most buyers saw the PSX back then: with both big players (SEGA and Nintendo) releasing their nextgen consoles in 96, Sony and their PSX would suffer the same mid-gen effect the 3DO did, where the console is more powerful than the current players (in this case 32X and Snes) but considerably weaker than the upcoming ones (Saturn and N64).

After Saturn's launch is key to keep 32X support well into 97-98 like Nintendo did with Snes. Also stop standard Genesis production and replace it with an all-in-one model (neptune) and call it just Genesis 32X. Sell it at $100 so its a low-cost option until Saturn becomes cheaper (which with a LM design wont be possible before 98). I remind you all that SEGA lost a massive amount of the market for scrapping the Genesis, while Nintendo was able to resist any shortcoming with the N64 thanks to the costant revenues coming from the Snes.

In the portable front, I would hire Sharp or Phillips to redesign the GameGear since both companies were making some big breakthroughs in portable devices and LCDs. Get a smaller, less powerhungry (like 4 AAs or a battery pack for 6 hours of play) GG ready for Xmas 95. This is before pokemon became popular so I'm sure it would've had a chance to overthrow the old Gameboy, or at least come as a very close second. Extra features like TV-out and 32X/Saturn connectivity to enhance gameplay could be added too.

About Dreamcast, well, I've already said what it should've have been done back then: get a damn DVD in it, even if it costs an extra $50 is worth it. Also add more memory and for the love of god dont cripple the VR2, it should be able to reach 9M poly/sec with proper cooling. At $250 with DVD it would've beated PS2 to the ground. Also scrap the modem: the fact is that back them online gaming was a gimmick, since anything lower than broadband was a pain in the ass, and selling the modem separately (maybe as an addon with an HDD) means more money for almost-broke SEGA.

 

Ok I managed to photograph the Gamepro magazine with the ad.Sorry it's in Greek I'll try to translate it.So it's the November 1997 issue with a Tomb Raider 2 sneek peak



And now here's the ad:



Here's a small translation from line to line:

"YOU DON'T PLAY IT, YOU LIVE IT

Over 400 games
Stereo Audio CD!
Photo CD to create your own high tech photo album
Video CD to enjoy digital movies
the only console to offer you immediate and easy connection to the Internet
In little time the 3D Accelerator Chip will be released,a 3D graphics accelerator,that will blow your Saturn speed,making it faster than any other console!

And the Andrenaline goes red!"

That's almost all of it except some minor stuff I left because I thought they were not useful.Notice the name Virtua Fighter 3 under the Saturn photo!Also there's a special preview of the Saturn 2!Well it's only 1 page lol but I'm not going to translate it myself except if anybody here who knows greek is willing to translate it.Pm me if anyone wants it/

 

Of course the real point to either a hardware upgrade for Saturn (which would bypass the complex architecture, the twin CPUs and VDP chips, using only audio) or a totally seperate system in place of Saturn, is to allow high quality games to be written with relative ease. To be a home 3D system that Sega can bring its arcade games home to, and create new original software of such high quality that harecore gamers woould choose it over PS1, N64 and (had it launched) M2. Even if ultimately it was 2nd place to PS1, such a system with large amounts of high quality software would remain ahead of Nintendo any anyone else. It also gives Sega a system to last untl the new decade when a more powerful system, strong enough to take on PS2, can arrive.


f2bnp: thanks for the pic and translation!

 

The N64 was built with a customized chip designed specifically for a home games system. In addition, the N64 was not compareable even to a low end SGI. That was just marketing bunk pushed out by Nintendo to hype the hardware. Look at the games and you will see that is a fact. All the money was spent on that chip and the rest of the system specification was hampered as a result. The funny thing is that the Reality chip was offered to Sega first, but they turned it down. Your spec suggests not only an expensive GPU (uncustomized) but also a quad speed CD drive (when single speed drives were put in the PS1 and Saturn, and Dual speed drives were the norm in PCs), a huge amount of RAM for the time (massive cost), a PPC processor AND a modem. It just wasn't possible back then.

It may be fun to speculate at what might have been, but at least be realistic. If any company could have released a system as you describe for the price you quote then they would have.

The M2 was heavily delayed and never ended up being launched. The reason? It was going to be far too expensive to produce. Dual CPUs, an incredibly powerful and expensive GPU (far weaker than the one you describe for this Saturn 2), quad speed CD drive (several hundred dollars alone), 8MB of RAM.

Let's not forget that Panasonic make a lot of the components that would have gone into the M2. Sega on the other hand make no hardware in house. They don't design hardware, nor do they assemble their hardware.

Consider how delayed Model3 was, and how complicated it was to program for. LM designed that technology. What you are suggesting is not based on reality, it's based on the dreams of someone that wanted Sega to succeed. I don't want to appear mean, but this whole thread has turned into a joke.

Every one of those machines you mentioned actually compromised hardware design. Why? Affordability. Yes, even on the PS3 and XB360. The components you specify combined would have been far too costly. Microsoft and Sony have only managed to raise the bar so high this time around at massive losses and staggering R&D budgets. Sega could never have afforded that kind of thing at any point in its life.

The PS3 and the XB360 are roughly compareable to current PC technology. They were around the peak of what could be done at the time of release.

I included those PC specs to give you some idea. Those PC prices weren't just pulled out of the air. They were reflective of component and assembly costs as well as a no doubt healthy profit.

So how would Sega far exceed that spec at 1/10 of the price? Absolutely crazy.

 

The flaws in Saturn's design were so obvious that pretty much any other design would've been better than what we got.

Heck, I think that with a proper VDP the 32X could've had the average (not raw) power of a Saturn for roughly the same price it had (around $150). After all one of the major design issues of 32X IMO was that it made all scaling, rotation, and 3D operations in software on both SH2s. Add a nice integrated VDP and you have a budget nextgen console that can hold its own against PSX for a while.

I agree that a Saturn with almost-Model3 capabilities was out of the question back then, but one thats as powerful, if not slightly more than Model2? No prob, and could be done at the same price point ($400). The thing is, more [useless] components dont only mean more costs and more difficult programming, it also means more manufacturing costs, more weight and therefore more expensive shipping.

A simpler Saturn with a more integrated architecture yet more powerful than the actual model would've more expensive main components (CPU, VDPs, RAM, etc...) but the lack of unnecessary parts would compensate that, so it could be sold for the same price. In fact thanks to its simplicity it could be integrated even further, thus bringing costs down with each revision.

About CD drives, 4X was the norm in PCs, and both Saturn and PSX had a 2X CDROM drive. Saturn's was made by JVC and used a SH1 as microcontroller.

Saying that companies can do no wrong becos they always choose the best option available is not only being over-simplistic, but is a long answer made short with a lot of stuff lost in between. The fact is that many companies (specially tech ones) make several mistakes that sometimes are nothing but stupid. Take for example the C64 portable: it was cancelled becos Tandy's CEO told Commodore's that there was no money in laptops. Who the hell listens to the competition? you know the answer is biased, yet he did listen to him and destroyed the entire division.

With the mess that SOA-SOJ were at the time there's no way the Saturn as we know it was the best choice available.

 

x

 

I wouldnt put all the blame on Sony, specially since Nintendo was also pushing for 3D well before there was hardware powerful enough to properly support it. Starfox for example, unless you're a fanboy, looks pretty lame with its simple shapes and low speed (I think it was less than 20fps). It took them 4 years to get the hardware to run the concept as it should in the first place (and it still looked kinda blocky). Plus project reality was planned as a 3D console from the very beginning, while both PSX (when it was part of the Snes) and Saturn were meant to be 2D powerhouses with some 3D capabilities.

But on the marketing front, it was Sony. In every ad campaign they pushed 3D down the throat of every gamer, IMO hoping to get rid of a competition which had way better 2D lineup than they did (SEGA, SNK, and Nintendo with Snes too). In my opinion it was a way to get of rid of the competition, and also grab most of the first 3D developers out there.

But I also have to blame SEGA, since from my perspective it was a huge mistake to think that after games like Daytona people was not going to ask for that kind of technology in home consoles. Sure, highend 2D was awesome, but I remember me and my friends waiting in line at the local arcade to play some Daytona, and everybody knew that kind of games were the future.

 

kutaragi geared the PSX in all its designs to be a polygone-spitting monster.

 

Well i say sorry about what i said of tantalus before..it was a confussion by my side.

But sincerely, i was so pissed of about the house of dead and sega touring car, if those could have been greatly as panzer dragoon saga or burning rangers graphically, history could have been different without add-ons...well, not only that, also 3rd party support would have been cool

 

Indeed the PS-X, the 32-bit PlayStation, was designed to be a 3D polygon machine from the start.

The 16-Bit Play Station CD-ROM addon for Nintendo Super Famicom/SNES was a different architecture, a different project altogether. When Sony decided to go it alone with a 32-bit system, it was 3D.

Saturn was originally a 2D system, the GigaDrive, back in 1990-1991, based on the System32 arcade hardware which pushed nothing but sprites. I think even when the system evolved into the Saturn in 1992, it was still a 2D machine with minimal 3D capability. during late 1993 to 1994 is when Sega bolted on poorly concieved 3D capability. They switched from NEC V60 CPU to Hitachi SH2 CPU then to twin SH2 CPUs. A 2nd VDP was added sometime in 1993 or 1994 also, if I recalled correctly. Lots of changes that I'm probably not aware of.


The 3D capable, ( PowerPC 603 + Real3D/100 + 16-24 MB ) Saturn/Genesis 2 that I strongly think should have happened in 1996, is certainly not as powerful as MODEL3 or even almost as powerful. It's more powerful than MODEL2 (2.5x) and somewhat more powerful than 3DO M2 (50%+).

MODEL3 uses twin highend Real3D/Pro-1000 GPUs with a combined peak performance of 2 million triangles/sec (1 million rectangles/sec). The Real3D/100 based system can only do 750,000 triangles/sec which is signifcantly less than half MODEL3. Yet because they both use Real3D architecture, a Saturn/Genesis 2 can handle nicely downsized translations. It wasn't my idea to put a Real3D/100 in a console, I'm just going by that 3-page Next Generation article from 1995.



The only difference is, they're saying it would be for a 2nd-generation Saturn.

Now how could Real3D/100, a $500 to $2000 board be brought down to consumer/console price points? (in a console costing $300 to $400)

1.) integrating the chipset from 3 main chips into 1 combined chip
2.) manufacturing on a smaller fab process than the original version
(.35 micron instead of .50 micron)
2.) waiting until late 1996, memory prices fall
(this allowed 3Dfx Voodoo boards to be priced at $299
3.) mass production, cost per unit falls

The N64 would've cost $500 ~ $1000 if similar steps had not been taken. The 3DO M2 was even more complex, the early boards having (IIRC) 10 seperate processors just for the custum graphics & audio part alone, not counting the PowerPC. those would later be combined into the single chip BDA.

BTW a Saturn / Genesis 2 in 1996 as I've said would have fewer chips than the Saturn that was released in Nov 1994 in Japan and May 1995 in the U.S..

Instead of like 9 seperate chips, the Saturn / Genesis 2 has 4 or 5 chips instead.

1 CPU
1 powerful GPU for 3D
1 powerful VDP for 2D
1 or 2 chips that combines everything for audio, CD-ROM controller, Peripheral controller and CPUs for backwards compatibility with SegaCD, Genesis, Master System.

so fewer chips but ones that are much better. powerful and clean architecture to keep costs down.

 

I think the point is moot, we can sit and discuss all we want about it, but there's no realistic way of knowing that the cost for Real3D would be affordable. Nice suggestions nevertheless, yet I trust that business decisions aren't made overnight, and they do have more info than me and you when assessing a piece of hardware for a console.

 

I keep seeing this thrown around and it bothers me. How were they to know that the cost of memory would decrease so greatly as to make it affordable. If they were to have made a proposal based on a vague and baseless hope that memory would "hopefully" be cheap enough to make this design feasible their engineering devision would have been laughed at.

 

Thats the one I was talking about, reason why I said "when it was part of the Snes".

2 68000, 1 Z80, VDPs for both Genesis, Master System and SegaCD, the YM2612 and PSG, the SCD ASIC and the memory from the 3 consoles put together? Sorry but no: the fact is that of those 2 only the Genesis was worth the trouble, and that could be made as a separate Lock-On cartridge for the Saturn/Genesis 2 with a carefully made emu that uses the PPC to emulate all the parts of the Genesis.

Both the SMS and SCD had a very limited library (as in worthy) in the US.

You'll be surprised to know how many business decisions are made in a pub or some restaurant. The thing is, during most board meetings half of the people is sleeping, and when someone from R&D is giving a speech theres several key members gone, mostly becos they think that knowing the specifics from a technical design isnt relevant when making business decisions.

For them is all about accountability, the stock price (due to the stocks most board members have) and how much money they're losing. Thats why when numbers hit the red they all panic and start firing anyone, even when the guy is question is a key member from the R&D dept.

To give you an example, many employees of yahoo (which is bigger than many game companies combined) who were fired recently were actually what was left of the R&D dept, the botton to be precise, since all the clever ones were fired or left long ago due to conflicts with the board.

At the end those remaining were blamed for the delay on new yahoo products like panama, when the board members were the ones to blame, since they fired the key developers of that project and many others.

Such things are announced even years in advance.

To give you an example, its been known for months that at the end of 2008 SSD prices will fall, mostly becos samsung is making a new NAND factory.

 

a few points I'd like to make

*using PowePC to emulate the Genesis is a good idea, I forgot about that.
*having Saturn/Genesis 2 be backward compatible with all previous Sega systems, successful ones or not, is somewhat important. It re-assures Sega customers that their software investments are protected, even if BC isnt important to some people, or even Sega themselves
*in this alternate "what if" "wouldn't it be cool" senerio, I've left the Master System as a distant 2nd to Nintendo in the 8-bit battle, but I've made SegaCD into a powerful and successful addon/upgrade that no only has additional CPUs but newer VDPs also, for more colors, sprites, backgrounds, scaling & rotation and other effects, and enough time to let software be made for it (1991-1996), with focus more on Japanese-loved RPGs and super-scaler arcade ports, instead of unsuccessful FMV/live action games.
*of course all of this is 'moot'. the good stuff I'm imagining never happened. we're 2 and a half generations beyond this time in game history

 

Does not the presence of the original hardware assure you that your software investment will remain playable for years to come? I never understood why it was necessary to play all of your games on one single system. What happens to the old unit when you buy a newer model?

I still see backward compatibility as a gimmick pushed onto the market to persuade the more casual gamers of old to adopt an otherwise gameless console while proper software support can be garnered.

Shadowlayer I understand that much, but we are talking about a system that was released in 94 and spent many years before that in the design phase. So I suppose it is not to unreasonable to think that they would not have known how cheap memory would be had they waited til late 96' when giga is proposing that they had released it.

 

Honestly I'll like to say that the idea of addon is great, but only if they design the base console and the addons at the same time so all parts can work together.

Most components, specially back in the 90s, were made years in advance to release so they could be tested and improved. Back then it would've been easy to design the Genesis so it could perfectly merge with a CD drive using only one port. For example, SEGA could've bought the Zorro II port from Commodore's AMIGA PCs back in the 80s, and use in on the Genesis so the SegaCD could interact using only that port, thus all I/O goes through the Genesis.

And lets not forget programming, were both consoles components would work in perfect harmony, just like extra boards did with the Amiga. And with my vision of a SegaCD without another 68000 but with enough extra chips to make the Genesis as powerful as a AES, the SCD itself would be more like an expansion board plus a CD drive.

Then theres the 32X: just like Nintendo started working in project reality in 93, SEGA could've planned a 32bit expansion back when the Genesis was designed. Back then the only thing necessary would've been a port fast enough to move data between boards. Then after launch is all a matter of putting enough engineers to work on getting the best and cheaper components for the addon's release in late 94.

You can design a chip years before release and use the time to improve the design so it becomes cheaper, so a chip that was $200 in 93 could be $50 or less in late 94, just in time for the 32X release.

That way, the Genesis+SCD+32X combo could've been even more powerful than the PSX, but with each member of the family beating the competition at the time (Genesis beating Snes, SegaCD beating 3DO and 32X beating PSX) and technically for a fraction of the price considering you buy one, then the other and the other as those are made available.

Anyway, my scenario as I said starts in early-94 when the Genesis peaked, the 32X was still in the lab and the Saturn was totally different.

In this case the top priority would be to get a Saturn with LM-made components in late 95/early 96.

The thing is, without the 32X I doubt the Genesis market share would stay the same until Saturn is released. But at the same time the 32X was the one to blame for all the flack SEGA got back then.

I see two problems with the 32X: it was released too late to become a player, and the hardware was so poorly made that 3D was crappy and the 2D upgrade wasnt enough. Since 3D at the time was expensive it would've been wiser to make a 2D powerhouse as powerful as Saturn was, or at least as an AES. In either case it would be enough to put any FX-based Snes games to shame, and would keep Genesis users happy for the rest of 94 and 95 until Saturn is released.

That and a mid-94 launch (just in time for summer vacations).

 

didn't want to open a a new thread, it got mentioned in one comment
can anyone tell me more about CRI
it is a subsudiary of sega?, they are the guys behind CRIware?
that middleware that uses those adx. files(so comon on DC, and in team ninja games) are a part of CRIware?

 

CRI was a part of CSK (which also owned SEGA) they made stuff like the ARX and Softdec seen in many DC games.

They became an independent middleware company after the DC died.

 

CRI / CSK have been around for years. They did Mega Drive conversions such as Galaxy Force II and Dyna Brothers. In fact they did quite a few Mega Drive games. I'm also pretty sure they did the Saturn version of Virtual On or wa it the Dreamcast one? One thing for sure is that they really F*cked up Sega Touring Cars on the Saturn.

Yakumo

 

thx for the info
there seems to be a strong relation between cri and am2
i see that cri was incorporated by former personel from am2
i think that that the a lot if not all sega games were created around these libraries created at cri
not that matters just i was curious because i always saw cri mentioned in a lot of games(iirc even in model2 games)