F-Zero retrospective: The platonic ideal of Mode 7 in action | Super NES Works

[@KuraIthys]

I realise this is old, but there has been a decent amount of developer commentary on F-Zero, and also why it's single-player compared to Mario Kart. The reasons are somewhat different than you might expect. Yes, the DSP-1 also found in pilotwings does help out (the chip does a lot of 3d specific calculations - my guess though is a lot of it has to do with the objects strewn about mario kart tracks, such as pipes, and so on, since calculating the positioning of a point on plane is one of the DSP's special capabilities.) One of the key problems is F-Zero's speed, and what this means for level data. A mode 7 image is composed of a region of 128x128 tiles, each 8x8 pixels in size (which is then scaled arbitrarily.). This makes the map 1024 pixels. However, because of the absurdly high speeds of F-zero, many of the tracks (if you check maps of the tracks at actual scale you'd see this) have sides of anything from 2000-6000 pixels. What this means is that the system has to dynamically alter the map, loading new data into the PPU, and removing older data as it goes. All well and good, but if you then try and make a 2 player version you introduce a raster split (automatically managed through H-DMA) where you're seeing two completely unrelated views of the same track. That's not so hard in terms of using a a mode 7 map that fits entirely within VRAM, but becomes a big problem if you're dynamically streaming data into VRAM. Not only do you need to do stream twice as much data, but you cannot have a second map, so both have to fit in that 128x128 region, and then you end up having to manage what's visible to ensure neither view accidentally sees what was intended to only be visible to the other player. Mario Kart gets around this by fitting an entire track in a 1024x1024 map, with no exceptions or variations. This means multiple views never have to contend with streaming data or seeing something they shouldn't. But... A smaller track means tighter corners, and requires lower speeds. OK, so that is a technical limitation of course, but perhaps not the kind of limitation you might've expected. mode 7 truly is a tricky beast. And sometimes expectation cripples what people might try, For instance, mode 7 + HDMA would have allowed for a very high speed textured raycasting engine that could easily have hit 60 fps and looked somewhere between Wolfenstein 3d and Doom with little to no support hardware required. Unfortunately, it could only do this with the rays being cast horizontally, where pretty much every raycasting based first person game ever uses vertical rays. This would've required some unusual game design, and taking a few risks. Unfortunately, not many developers were keen on taking risks of that kind. (if you're wondering how you can make a first person game using raycasting if it's rotated 90 degrees from most such games, imagine a simplified version of descent, rather than something like Wolfenstein. Most of the action would take place vertically, not horizontally, since that's the axis of rotation you can use... I've been thinking of making this as a homebrew demo at some point, but I never really seem to find the time...)

[@austinlindquist2943]

I'm delving into snes homebrew and I had the idea to try this with a TV turned on its side :)

[@StewNWT]

amazingly detailed comment, much appreciated

[@emilyapricot1313]

I remember being a Sega veteran fan, but being blown away by the look of this game. Not only was it fast and smooth, with a well designed challenge, but there was a lot of attention to detail, such as segments of the map that look like animated cities when you crash or stop and zoom in. Also, the futuristic feel, and potential for realistic death with ruthless challenge made a Sega fan feel right at home, and willing to dig deeper and find the edgy SNES games like Castlevania, and it was colorful enough, with upbeat tunes, to help bridge me to appreciate Nintendo's brand of animation too. F-Zero's illusion was incredible. I never really liked 16 bit racers because of the lack of analog control, but F-Zero had such amazing design - platforming elements, damageable vehicles that allow the player to bump or damage others, and some precise control due to accelerating turns and sharp turns with the shoulder buttons. I stuck around long enough to become an expert !

[@MrCalverino]

I was late on F-Zero, a friend gave me a copy summer 96' and I was blown away. I still listen to the ost today

[@otakubullfrog1665]

A futuristic game was very fitting for the launch of a next generation console. When my next door neighbors became the first kids on the block to own an SNES, the three games they had at first were Super Mario World, F-Zero and Ultraman. All three looked amazing at the time, but I don't often feel the desire to revisit Ultraman these days.

[@westernzoo3344]

you made it again, Mr Parish. I was si sad when retronauts ended and I couldn't hear your sleepy monotone voice any more. But here you are, talking more than ever. The voice that helped me concentrate on my work, the voice that got me through 8 hours long drive. Sleepy and monotone but never tiring. A difficult middle ground you perfectly achieved. Good job.

[@JeremyParish]

Retronauts is still around, you know: www.retronauts.com

[@LadyBrightcynder]

This video felt a lot longer than it is, and I mean that in the best way. It's absolutely crammed with information and presented really well.

[@SvDKILLSWITCH]

F-Zero is still one of my all time favourite games. Like you say, in hindsight it's little more than a well polished tech demo, but the combination of brutal difficulty and fast paced racing is such a unique thing, especially on the SNES. The music is also absolutely stellar. That Sony chip in the SNES produced some of the greatest soundtracks of all time. I still occasionally boot up the SNES to play some F-Zero. It's just a shame that hardware limitations result in PAL versions running 12.5% slower than NTSC.

[@dcashley303]

Agreed, still holds up really well, the biggest let down for me is that there are only a handful of tracks you can play in Time Trial, it'd be great if you could play all of them in that mode. This - the first F-Zero - GX are easily the best in the series.

[@Gadzooki]

Double agreed. I still play F-Zero pretty often to this day. There's something about the overall polish and just feel to the game that wins me over all these years later. And that music!

[@Guts_Brando]

SvD KILLSWITCH How do u like gp legend?

[@KuraIthys]

It's not really a hardware limitation. The PAL version of Mario Kart runs at the identical speed to the NTSC version, albeit at a lower framerate. (but that's a different issue.) The reason PAL games are slower is because of lazy conversions. Nothing more, nothing less. The correct way of doing it is to adjust all the timing values to retain the same speed. the incorrect (And alas more common) method is to tie it directly to framerate, and make no adjustments whatsoever to the timing. Given that games also neglected the technical advantages PAL systems brought (vastly higher blanking times - as much as 80% or more - which can drastically improve the performance of a system when doing advanced graphical effects), PAL gamers frequently lost out not because of inferior hardware, but because the PAL version was an afterthought, lazily converted from games primarily designed for the NTSC market. (in fact, on some of the home computers dominated by European developers, we see that NTSC machines struggle. - an NTSC game will run slower than intended and with letterboxing if poorly converted. But a PAL optimised game may be outright impossible to convert to NTSC, because of the weakness NTSC machines have for certain tasks compared to their PAL counterpart.)

[@Rodzilla97]

F-Zero is probably my fav racing game ever. it still holds up really well, and looks as impressive as it did back then. the best mode 7 games are pilotwings, F-Zero, and super mario kart. those 3 can't be touched. they still look great today, and play great

[@spotifyseascapessmoothjazz]

The game's simplicity is what made it so good. Flat tracks and clean graphics are perfect for focusing on raw speed. Nintendo has said that they would only make a new F-Zero if they could do something new with it. If they would strip down the tracks to be more like the original game and put an emphasis on the physics of speed and car customization to improve performance for handling wind, cornering, hazards and overall efficiency, I think Nintendo would have a fresh, fun and accessible formula.

[@marcelthoma8890]

When i was six years old (in 1992) my father bought this brand new consol. Some kids in the neighborhood had a game consol, but it was either an Atari or a NES. My father bought with the consol F-Zero, too. But this game was to much for my six-year-old self, so i rather stuck to SMW. Just in my late teen years i could appreciate this fast great game with its cool sound track.

[@KaedeLanyo]

We dreadfully need a new entry in the series... GX was fantastic, it's a shame to just leave it there.

[@BrightSpark]

Since SEGA developed that one, maybe SEGA could do a Legally Distinct SciFi Racer that plays like F-Zero.

[@Pika025]

Minor correction, but the SNES has 8 graphics modes, not 7. They start counting at 0.

[@JeremyParish]

Yeah, I realized that after cutting the video. What can ya do.

[@Peter_1986]

I have always kinda disliked how programming languages start from 0, so I frequently insist on turning the array 0 into an unused dummy array and then using array 1 as the 1st array.

[@mparagames]

@@Peter_1986 i like how it counts from 0, ngl

[@MaxW-er1hm]

@@JeremyParish can you tell me anything about the SNES works as an SNES cart? Is it basically the book on a cart?

[@jedgrahek1426]

Hi there Toastyfrog, gives an old fan like me warm fuzzies to see your youtube content, I have a lot to catch up on : ) Just my 2c but I found GX to be a masterpiece, probably the most fulfilling experience I've ever had with an arcade racer, despite my deep childhood love for the original. It's unfortunate that GX didn't get the attention or make the mark it, in my opinion of course, deserved. Yes the difficulty of some of the story missions was just plain stupid, but everything else about the game was nearly ideal in my eyes. Really liking your channel. I wish you all the best man. Your old review of Xenogears is still one of the funniest things I've ever read.

[@TalkerFields]

Thank you for this video, Jeremy. You're doing an amazing job of documenting all this stuff!

[@oldDNU]

The orbs on the side of the track are such a vital component to the game’s speed. Each one is roughly the size of your vehicle, so they add a sense of scale to your velocity. It’s kind of like the dashed lines on a highway-the faster you go, the shorter they look. It’s not until you’re stopped do you realize they’re 10 feet long.

[@saschavandl6693]

One of the best Games ever.

[@anthonycruzmusic]

I've fallen in love all over again with the SNES recently. I was disappointed to see that no one has chronicled this system to any real extent. I'm glad Jeremy is doing it and I hope it comes out more often than he made it seem.

[@Raiko101]

Your videos are brilliant. They paint in the missing details of my childhood, adding so much insight into a world I thought I knew pretty well when growing up. Long may they continue! I've got a soft spot for Nintendo and still continue to explore the Gameboy, NES and SNES libraries to this day.

[@Bigbacon]

Hmm stunn runner, loved that game

[@NinjaxShadowXx]

Jeremy Parish is the hero we deserve.

[@TechWithSean]

Parish/Bettenhausen 2024 🇺🇸

[@frankieh]

Awesome video Jeremy. The NES was my first, but the SNES was my true love. Gonna love seeing these once in a while. Also, there is no IP that Nintendo needs to revisit more than F-Zero.

[@mario64remix]

Absolutely! F-Zero, F-Zero X, F-Zero GX... F-Zero NX!

[@THEmuteKi]

I really want to see F-Zero X with its 64DD expansion show up on virtual console. Given that we got Vs. Excitebike of all things I want to say this is the reason it hasn't been put on the WiiU eshop yet

[@k8track]

Looking forward to watching this one, as I do all your other series, particularly Good Nintentions, and most especially, Metroidvania Chronicles. I would very, very much love to see you continue with Metroidvania Chronicles and dearly hope you have some episodes planned and up your sleeve.

[@vaiyt]

One interesting thing: Mode 7 by itself cannot generate a perspective effect or allow you to display an horizon alongside the track. That was achieved by using HDMA to dynamically apply changes to the image while the scanlines went down the screen.

[@TubeHeader]

I'm surprised you didn't draw any sort of connection to Nintendo's F1 race series of games for F-Zero. I just thought they'd be more closely tied together.

[@dcashley303]

A gift! Thank you Jeremy, love everything you put out. Can't wait to see where this Mode Seven series goes.

[@cosmicmonster9418]

Great video! Happy 25th anniversary SNES!

[@JasonConBongos]

I enjoy your in depth series! Thank you!!!

[@MetalPersonJ]

Holy shit...Stun Runner. I forgot about that game. That game was a fucking blast.

[@nimaiiikun]

back then I wished there was an F-zero 2 with split screen 2 player action. great video!

[@rmgb-tv]

Blimey Jeremy you sure do like setting mammoth targets for yourself. Don't burn yourself out now, young man!

[@cube2fox]

Mode 7 games like F-Zero are really 3D though, not just pseudo 3D, like most racing games before it. The mode 7 background is simply one single large polygon.

[@JeremyParish]

It's a bitmap, not a polygon. This is covered in the episode.

[@cube2fox]

@@JeremyParish It can be transformed just like a polygon. A bitmap is just a 2D image, which itself doesn't imply any transformations. Textures are also just bitmaps.

[@shadowpresident4203]

F-Zero is one of the best games of all time IMO, and by far the most enjoyable racing game I've played. The graphics hold up extremely well after 28 years. It was the absolute perfect "killer app" Nintendo needed to demonstrate the potential of Mode Seven scaling and rotation. If I didn't know anything about that era of gaming history or when this was released, somebody could have showed this to me and said F-Zero was a game from 1995, and one of the last SNES games released, which is why it looks so damn good. They'd really figured out the hardware by that time. But NO, it's just the opposite! This is literally a launch title. A LAUNCH TITLE! They made a powerful statement in making this game the world's introduction to the potential of Mode Seven. It would have been so tempting, and so easy, to introduce Mode Seven to the world by having a few Super Mario World levels, except with gimmicky backgrounds! Instead, for Mode Seven's first high profile deployment, it is technology being used in the service of enhancing core gameplay! They're doing something new and cool that is both a fun concept, and very graphically appealing. I just never quite understood the appeal of Mario Kart, and couldn't stop thinking about how much better and faster F-Zero was any time I played it. Mario Kart has multiplayer and some other cool stuff that F-Zero does not, and it's a good game. It's nowhere near the godlike quality level of F-Zero in my book though! The challenge level of F-Zero kept me coming back for years, beating all tracks on the top league, shaving off seconds from my lap splits, trying to beat the game using each of the cars, etc. The soundtrack is one of the best in gaming history, and somehow managed to help me stay upbeat and positive even if I was locked in a tense dual with a CPU-controlled opponent on the final lap. When you complete all five tracks of a circuit, and the first time you see that camera pull back to a gorgeous third-person view of your car rounding the track as you take a celebratory victory lap and bask in the glory that was VERY hard fought if you're playing in King league...It was jaw dropping to see something like that rendered in real-time in 1991, especially on a consumer grade mass market piece of hardware like a video game console. It might even be my overall favorite SNES game. Somehow I just can't really seem to get into the later F-Zero games, as I've tried a few of them over the years on various platforms. WipeOut on the PSX probably felt more similar than any of the official F-Zero sequels. Anyone want to recommend me other F-Zero games to check out for a fan of the original?

[@enriquegomez8114]

F-Zero: Maximum Velocity. GBA F-Zero X. N64

[@rowtow13]

F-Zero GX is hard as balls but so much fun. I love it. The track design was so great.

[@joshuaturner1072]

I'm not big on racing games, but I love Mario kart and F-Zero!

[@timbrown4776]

Truly love the SNES. Looking forward to more Mode 7.

[@snesfan8935]

1:29 is that SFC prototype motherboard?

[@sargesmash1]

I just played through this for the first time recently, and I had a great time with it. Despite the lack of verticality, the courses are tough and fast enough to really enjoy the game regardless of the underlying tech.

[@chopper7585]

Where tf have I been and how have I not seen this channel before now?!?! Awesome series, can’t wait to binge 🙌

[@2001mark]

Christmas 1991 for me with this legend, fun revisiting on SNES Classic. While SMK's 2-player was crack cocaine, F-Zero's hyper trance speed was ideal for 1. Soundtrack still magnificent; Big Blue is breathtaking. Master difficulty still offers tremendous challenge without SMK's degree of A.I. rubber banding... I feel like the tracks themselves are the #1 challenge, not other racers who push.

[@AndrewJohnstonerulez]

we need to get Jeremy a couple interns to help carry this work load

[@METR0lD]

Yes! I was hoping you would do this! I love Gameboy World and Good Nintentions, so I always wanted you to do the same for the SNES.

[@keldonmcfarland2969]

I loved this game as a kid. I played to the point where I was border line hypnotized. (It wasn't until I joined the Marines that I learned the double meaning to "Blue Falcon" hahah!! Nice slip of the censors!)

[@asphaltmemories4597]

My favorite SNES game, and thats a tall order when the console had absolute banging titles. shout out to Kirby Super Star as a close second.

[@swankidelic]

Do what makes you happy, Mr. Parish. If you ever kowtowed to fan demands I would be afraid the quality would be compromised. I enjoy all of your work, and although SNES is my favorite system, if Mode Seven never gets finished I'm happy to read/watch whatever you make.

[@mikejenkins4924]

F-Zero was such a great racing game when I was a kid.

[@severeerror52]

Power Drift looked impressive, but from that footage it also seemed incredibly nauseating.

[@mochikun3038]

this video made me sub keep up the great work

[@NesrocksGamingVideos]

Mode 7 stands for the background mode that allows manipulation of the background nametable to be stretched, rotated, etc.

[@philmason9653]

Oddly, I'm much better to appreciate this game now than I was back in the day. The "everything's flat" aspect left me unimpressed, having seen vector based games and arcade 3D elsewhere. But the things the design did right have become apparent with time. I also appreciated the explanation of how Mode 7 worked, I'd read several over the years but showing how the tracks only took up a few screens at standard res made it all come into focus.

[@elvistwatty]

That soundtrack 👌 🙌 💯

[@seiken1917]

Amazing commentary as always. I’m just a little sad that you didn’t talk about the music that much. It’s such an important part of the experience I think it is way too often overlooked.

[@THE_GIN_MASTER_]

Jeremy, you've done it again. Another great idea

[@andrewdenson]

Great video, awesome channel man.

[@crithon]

13:26 there's a buzzing sound to your dialog.

[@seanspear6224]

Perfect video for the anniversary of the snes launch.

[@BlockABoots]

F-Zero does indeed have a rubber banding mechanic!, on Port Town II if you do the shortcut jump the AI will still be the same distance behind you as if you didnt do the shortcut jump

[@Rhacman]

The rubber-banding was pretty severe in F-Zero. Best way to see it is in a practice race where it plots the position of the other racer on the mini-map. Activate an S-Jet while ahead of the opponent and you are likely to see the rubber-band in action. Death Wind is a good course to demonstrate this on since there are boosts built into the track as well.

[@adesignersperspective]

one thing of note is that mode 7 was perfectly capable of doing hills like power drift did - those hills just didn't show up til later in the SNES's in games like the super star wars series (the both battle in super empire strikes back for example) and speed racer to name a couple. there were others as well. at any rate, loving your channel - a great new discovery for me, and a new subscription. (:

[@Cledus2000]

I don't consider Super Mario Kart the "spiritual successor" to F-Zero. Definitely its 'technological' successor, though. A game's soul isn't in its technology.

[@JeremyParish]

Super Mario Kart literally emerged from Nintendo's experiments to design a multiplayer format for F-Zero.

[@Cledus2000]

Jeremy Parish I guess that qualifies it, then. Either way, great video. It got me in the mood to play some F-Zero, which I did earlier this morning!

[@AquaticMammalOnBicycle]

Jeremy Parish but he was making an interesting point, that “spiritual successor” seems to be different from a mechanical or technological successor. Mario Kart is slower and goofier and cuter and cartoonish, three qualities that are 180 degrees away from the breakneck techno futuristic speeds and sci-fi color palettes of F-Zero. Also F-Zero has health bar, damage will blow you up in a violent explosion, and the track rails are electrified, unlike the soft loose grassy track boundaries of Mario Kart. Very different spirits.

[@BeauSkunk]

Nice video, but it fails to mention something Mode-7 graphics also gave to F-Zero, that even popular arcade racers at the time couldn't do. The ability to turn your car all the way around 360 degrees, or even drive on the track backwards due to that. It really gave the game a sense of three-dimensional movement, and freedom, rather then driving on an animated background like racers prior.

[@jamesmoss3424]

F-Zero is an brilliant SNES game. 😀👍🎮

[@8bitDNA]

awesome video, just subbed

[@RyumaXtheXKing]

We got a really got Power Drift port. 8 years later. On Dos. It's also called World Rally Fever.

[@rgijaba5967]

Excellent as always! Though you shouldn't focus on too many series at once, this one sounds more like a side project, so as far as that goes, it's fine.

[@perplexedmoth]

If you are curious how the fixed angle 3D in mode 7 games work, I made a small (under 200 lines) javascript implementation of it here: codepen.io/neur0sys/pen/RZYVdg

[@victornoagbodji]

ty

[@SergioPL]

Great job!! A deep analyze!! Keep going

[@tempanon8672]

Hey, GP Legend and Climax for the GBA are still fun and don't look dated. :P Now Maximum Velocity, that's one that really takes the SNES game's aesthetic.

[@DanielSong39]

The key to F-Zero is that it was more or less futuristic bumper cars. Every sequel has taken away that aspect and that's a shame.

[@kushagra64]

There are 8 graphics mode in SNES from mode 0 to 7.

[@katt-the-pig]

Never played it. I wasn't even that familiar with the game until Super Smash Bros. brought the series to my attention. 2:30 Out of all the clips you could have chosen, why did you choose the clip with the annoying sound effect?

[@drmedborn]

2:40 is that r type?

[@enriquegomez8114]

No, it is AXELAY for the SNES.

[@Tirgo69]

Now I suppose you could use F-Zero to practice for online battles in F-Zero 99. Until the game is taken down in a couple years, anyway.

[@davemarx7856]

F-Zero did a fantastic job of creating the _illusion_ of speed.

[@Monarch-kd6jk]

Great work as always, JP, though I'm not sure you're going to be able to do three platforms justice. But I can see how you may want to branch into other systems on occasion after all those Game Boy games you cover. Incidentally I hope you take a look at my KZbin series, Sega Masters, which covers the Sega Master System, just to check it out.

[@jonmkl]

Honestly, I loved the F-Zero games on GBA. I put even more hours into the than the original!

[@KuraIthys]

The SNES cpu is an interesting case. The two most prominent competitors to the SNES are the Turbograpx which has a CPU running at about twice the clock speed, but derived from the same 6502 family. However, it's an 8 bit CPU to the SNES's 16 bit. Depending on context, that could present a huge performance difference, or not. The 6502 family programming guide for instance notes one of it's example programs runs 6 times faster when 16 bit operations are available than it does without them. That rather negates the clock speed difference, but only conditionally, and is highly dependent on the type of operation performed. The SNES CPU also has some quirks that make it even weaker than it seems, since much of the time it runs at 2.68 mhz, not 3.58. (It sometimes also drops to 1.79 mhz but this is slightly less relevant because the only reason it ever does that is to read controller input. It still does marginally slow the system down though.) So... How much of a bottleneck is this slowdown really? Well, firstly the CPU runs at 3.58 mhz doing internal operations, or accessing any of the graphics registers, or the APU port. It can also run at 3.58 mhz when reading from ROM, but only if the ROM can cope, and only from certain address spaces. A decent chunk of games cannot handle fast reads (faster memory is more expensive), meaning nearly all data access slows the system to nearly 75% of it's theoretical speed. Worse still, main system RAM runs at 2.68 mhz as well, meaning ALL RAM access happens at the reduced speed. Well, in theory you could shove faster RAM into a cartridge, but this was rarely done as a means of improving performance. Besides which, the memory map means that main system ram unavoidably contains both the Direct page, and the hardware stack, since both have to be in the first 64k of the memory map. While there IS cartridge address space mapped here, it cannot operate at high speeds. This means basic advantages of the 6502 family have been slightly crippled. Slow RAM is especially problematic because most operations are Register + Memory, meaning nearly everything you do involves a memory access. (contrast this to a Register + Register design such as the 68000 or x86, where most operations are done on memory registers, with loads and stores only when absolutely nessesary) So we see that in a lot of cases, the SNES cpu is only getting 75% of even it's theoretical performance. But why? Why is the CPU so slow, and why is the system built in a way that slows it down even more. In a word? Cost. See, one of the problems of the 65816 is it has very fast memory access. Single cycle memory access in fact. Why is that bad? Sounds like a good thing surely, right? Well in theory, yes. But in practice? It gets very expensive. For most of 70's, 80's and early 90's RAM was one of the most expensive parts of a computer... And faster RAM is more expensive than slower RAM. (faster ROM too). As if single cycle memory access wasn't bad enough, the 65816's design actually demands that memory respond in half a cycle, making this problem even worse. Still, the upside is it has high memory bandwidth. At least, in theory. If it wasn't hobbled by RAM (and widespread use of ROM) that wasn't actually fast enough to keep up with the CPU... So, how about that 68000 seen in it's main competitor? It runs at twice the clockspeed, so surely it has faster memory right? Actually no. No it doesn't. See, the 68000 is both a Register + Register design, making fast memory access less immediately critical, but in fact it's memory access is only done once every 4 cycles. So 7.16 mhz clock speed / 4 = 1,79 . In other words, the Mega Drive/ Genesis acts as though it was only running at 1.79 mhz for memory access. In reality it's faster than this, because it uses 16 bit access to the SNES's 8 bit access. So in actual fact, they are equal in terms of memory access speeds. And if you consider memory access speeds, clock speeds, and the cycle lengths of various calculations, you could make a reasonable case to argue that the SNES cpu is about as powerful as the Mega Drive's one. Except... That presumes that 3.58 mhz speed. And we know a lot of the time it's running at 2.68, not 3.58. Or 25% slower. Now, the devil is in the details, but that gives you some idea of how it compares... But why have this weakness? Well, fast RAM and ROM is expensive. And here's the thing; due to taking 4 cycles to perform memory access, the Mega Drive only requires RAM and ROM rated for 1.79 mhz. (and even has mechanisms for using slower ROM than that if cost was an issue.). yes 16 bit RAM is involved, but the cost for the 8 to 16 bit change was less dramatic than needing faster memory. To put this in the terms normally used for RAM, this means it needs memory capable of operating at about 558 nanoseconds, give or take. (slightly faster due to system quirks.) The SNES, operating at it's reduced 2.68 mhz chosen for it's main memory and a lot of the ROM used, especially early on needs not 373 milliseconds (single cycle), but thanks to that design quirk it needs an insane 186 nanosecond access memory, or 3 times as fast as the Mega Drive's lower limit. For 3.58 mhz it needs not 279 nanosecond access times, but 139 nanoseconds. (in practice, games using fast ROM seem to need 120 or even 100 nanosecond ram to cope.), or memory that is 4 times as fast. As you can imagine, to match the Genesis/Mega Drive's clock speed, would require the use of insanely fast 70 ns or faster, which is a big ask even on a purely technical level for 1990, much less a financial one. (on the other hand, at the same clock speed, a SNES would have double the memory bandwidth, which is not an insubstantial advantage. We can sort of test this theoretically in that an SA-1 is the same CPU core running at about 5 or 10 mhz. With again, memory speeds being part of the reason why it operates at multiple speeds. But the SA-1 is the answer to 'what would the SNES have done with a more powerful version of it's main CPU') It's one of those things. The CPU demands fast memory, and that drives up the cost, or forces reductions in CPU speed... That of course, suggests perhaps it wasn't the best choice, but it's one of those design tradeoffs that seems reasonable at the time, but looks a bit foolish in hindsight.

[@AlexRubenstein]

Oh, shit, it's Jeremy Parish from 1up. :)

[@Disthron]

I think it would have been possible to have added hills and dips into F-Zero. Some other games achieved this by using the scanline technique used in games like Rad Racer and Outrun.

[@NesrocksGamingVideos]

I doubt the mines are sprite based. They seem to be simply a tile on the background.

[@dcashley303]

9:18 check out what we have to deal with in PAL territories kzbin.info/www/bejne/eouccmaoideIhJI

[@PhantomHarlock78]

What you are using to play SNES games and capture the video?

[@JeremyParish]

An RGB-modded Super NES upscaled through a Framemeister.

[@T3hKaiser]

Can't most NTSC Super Nintendo's display RGB natively? I just ordered my Framemeister, very excited but also very nervous.

[@JeremyParish]

Original models can (with the exception of one internal rev), but I'm using the "junior" hardware model that requires a modification.

[@T3hKaiser]

Gotcha. Thanks for the reply.

[@unoclay]

Just got my own framemeister this past week. It's worth the wait, my (RGB modded) NES never looked better. Be forewarned though, I ordered in late Jan and then got bumped several times until finally receiving in April. Havent experimented much with SNES yet, but the bump in quality is a little less than the NES--or im doing something wrong. It looks good, but not (so far) light years better than my former upscaler.

[@killervacuum]

great idea for a series!

[@Dilios_of_Sparta]

It's Game Boy World, and this is F-Ze . . . WHA . . WHA . . WHAT?!?!

[@massivepileup]

Does that make it the first home console racer where you actually turn, not just slide left or right?

[@RyumaXtheXKing]

F-Zero is basically an eleaborate top-down racer and those have existed for a while.

[@MissAshley42]

I remember not liking _F-Zero_ as a kid. I couldn't get a handle on the controls, and the pinballing infuriated me. I revisited it later when it popped up on Wii U for super cheap and found it slightly more enjoyable.

[@Arcadiality]

Good show. More,more :). That machine was awesome,even in the shitty PAL territory.

[@skullbanger3751]

great vid

[@miriamalmeida6687]

Snes the best console

[@THEmuteKi]

13:45 geez, is that really how laggy the original SMK gets in multiplayer? christ, I haven't played it in forever, but, just, wow

[@THEmuteKi]

I think F-Zero is a much better looking game due to how simplistic the course design is. The slightly more complex art in Mario Kart really lays bare just how flat the course design is, really.

[@JeremyParish]

Dunno, I used found footage clearly captured from an emulator, so I wouldn't take it as gospel. As I do more of these I'll build up a library of reference-quality footage, but at the outset I have to source a lot of material externally.

[@Saxonation]

Having played SMK somewhat recently, I cannot remember it performing worse in multiplayer, and certainly nothing like whats shown here.

[@THEmuteKi]

+Saxonation OK, cool. Other videos suggested the same but most weren't direct capture and it's been too long since I touched the game myself

[@DTM-Books]

No, Super Mario Kart doesn't play like that at all. Multiplayer is full speed at all times. Parish just used the wrong emulator, that's all.

[@FLOPPINNUTZX2]

Good stuff! :)

[@gwacstore5406]

well done, this is such a well made video, this made my day the commenters here made my day too you all are so inteligent and funny

[@brokenscart7989]

Can someone link me to that axelay music :)

[@MagnumCypro]

Your not holding down when you land.

[@raleighcockerill]

do you mean 8 in total?

[@evafarrow2594]

Clock speed alone is a bit of a false measurement -- different chips run at different Instructions Per Clock (IPC). This was most evident with the 6502 vs Z80. A 6502 would complete a NOP in 1 clock, where as the Z80 would use 4; so in actuality a 1 MHz 6502 has the same processing power as a 4 MHz Z80. The Z80 edges ahead because it has 16-bit registers and instructions, saving on code needed to do the same thing. So, it's unfair to think of the SNES 65C816 as 'half the speed' of the 68K. Their IPC is similar, but the 68K is a vastly superior architecture (largely 32-bit), so in practice the 68K won out.

[@vidjenko8349]

you forgot that a handheld was capable of doing the same. The Atari lynx had scaling and rotation abilities too.

[@CommodoreKulor]

The Lynx had scaling but no rotation.

[@davidsabillon5182]

Subscribing!

[@videogameobsession]

Hey Jeremy, I'm a huge fan of these videos! Really great stuff here. One thing though. I would greatly appreciate it if you could credit me (Matthew Henzel / VideoGameObsession()com) for the images when you use them. I don't mind that you use them, in fact I am happy to see them show up in such a well produced piece like this and the others, but I put a lot of time and effort into scanning and editing each and every one of the 5,000+ scanned images on my website. I see them show up in everything from books to Microsoft's E.T. documentary without so much as a small credit for my work and that's a bit depressing. I've been scanning, editing, and sharing my work on the net since September of 1996 and a few individuals stole all of my NES Black Box scans, erased my watermark, and uploaded them to many other websites such as Wikipedia and MobyGames with his name as credit. I added some hidden things that I use to verify they are my scans, but it's not my intention to go after anyone or cause problems. A simple credit is all I ask for. Just enough traffic to appease the handful of ads I have on my website to help pay for the yearly server fees is all I care about. I continue to make and provide scans 20+ years later so people like you can use them for great things like this. Thanks! Matt / VGO

[@JeremyParish]

Hi Matt, I always try to credit sources. Which images are you referring to here? My browser history goes back two years and doesn't show any indication that I've ever been to videogameobsession, so I'm not sure what images are under dispute.

[@videogameobsession]

Hi Jeremy, Like I said, many of my scans have migrated from my website. I see them pop up on Pinterest sometimes , as well as the others I mentioned. Often times the watermarks are erased, so I don't blame you or anyone else who wouldn't know. It's most often the NES black box scans which I scanned and put on the net way back in 1996. The originals had "SpooNMan" watermarks at the bottom, and more often then not that will be missing and a darker black rectangle will have replaced were it was. It's much easier to see if you bring it into Photoshop and raise the brightness. In this video it does have my watermark on on the box. From here: www.videogameobsession.com/videogame/snes/SNES-F-Zero-vgo.jpg Again, I don't mind that you use them. It's not my intention to cause any inconveniences.

[@JeremyParish]

Huh, honestly I have no idea why I used a web-sourced image here. I try to use my own photos and scans as much as possible. I'll be on the lookout in the future.

[@videogameobsession]

Thanks for the reply. It's not a big deal. And again, I don't care if you use any of my images if you just add a small credit in the description or credits.

[@videogameobsession]

Also, if you need anything that isn't on my page I may be able to scan it for you. I've been replacing my of my old scans with newer, more detailed versions and now that I know my way around Photoshop much better than I did in 1996 I can clean them up and remove defects. I plan on rescanning all of my 30 Black Box games as well. It takes me about 1-2 hours per box to get them the way I like them now so it may take a while. Some of the newer examples: www.videogameobsession.com/videogame/snes/SNES-LegendOfTheMysticalNinja-vgo.jpg www.videogameobsession.com/videogame/snes/SNES-ContraIII-vgo.jpg www.videogameobsession.com/videogame/snes/SNES-QBert3-vgo.jpg www.videogameobsession.com/videogame/snes/SNES-SimCity-vgo.jpg www.videogameobsession.com/videogame/snes/SNES-BugsBunnyRabbitRampage-vgo.jpg www.videogameobsession.com/videogame/snes/SNES-ArkanoidDohItAgain-vgo.jpg www.videogameobsession.com/videogame/snes/SNES-EarthwormJim1-vgo.jpg I've also made the watermark translucent and very tiny so it's not obtrusive. My ultimate goal is to make my scans the highest possible quality on the net, short of sourced art from the respective companies. I am scanning at 2400dpi and resizing down a bit to eliminate moire. I am keeping the width at 3,000px so it would even scale nicely for 4K videos. I'm sorry if I came across accusational at first. That was certainly not my intention. I like seeing my work being utilized in exceptional videos with great production values and smart writing such as yours. -Matt

[@christophe2201]

It was maybe good at its time but now, it's only a crap that screw up the eyes!

[@wiggy8912]

Outrun and F-Zero have virtually nothing in common from a technical standpoint.

[@garfieldepicmoments]

Would you say that F-Zero would have been more visually impressive if Nintendo had decided to equip the SNES with blast processing?

[@argedismun2]

Where's f-zero now , no wii or wiiu or switch