Why PS1 and N64 Games Were Different

Why were PlayStation and Nintendo 64 games different from each other? Why does that matter? Tune in to find out!
Follow Game Design Wit for more content!
Facebook ► / gamedesignwit
Twitter ► / gamedesignwit

[@steveinsanity1]

I've noticed that lately I watch videos about video games more than I actually play them

[@HyperVanilo]

Arent we all do the same?

[@fijiwater4967]

@@HyperVanilo Aren't all the same we do yes?

[@shaggymcdaniel3216]

This is a topic that hasn’t been touched by any KZbinrs yet.

[@duncansiror5033]

Same, just play a handful of games on my Switch. Mainly Smash

[@valtin2914]

@@shaggymcdaniel3216 NakeyJakey actualy did it

[@matrixrory]

Silent hill. they couldn't render far distances so the put in the fog which made the atmosphere even better.

[@milesbrown2261]

I was gonna say that.

[@PhirePhlame]

Spider-Man 2000 did something similar: due to low draw distance they couldn't just render New York, so they embraced the fogginess and made it a plot point that a fog of symbiote catalyst has been spread all over the city and you need to stop it.

[@sonickun95]

You just gotta love when hardware limitations work in the game's favor.

[@Abel-Alvarez]

We need more games that push the hardware to it's limits.

[@teslaliveus6355]

It was shit go play it u cant see shit

[@James-zy5lh]

I’m a strong believer that limitation can be one of the biggest stimulants for innovation. Great video!

[@breakdown7553]

you are right with that believe.

[@iarmdiego]

Nice words, think same

[@osscar29]

Without rules there is no game.

[@bikerboy4161]

Very true. I find myself playing a lot of older games now. At first I thought it was a sign of me getting old and less interested in games today. But now I'm starting to realize it's not that I dont like new games. those older games had to inovate because of the limitations and it's part of what made them great. You had to create a new gaming experience. But dev's now work less on innovation and more on just going with what they know works and how great the game looks. It creates more wow factor in the way the game looks. But less wow in terms of how it plays.

[@gavinlucas9761]

Absolutely Agree, I actually work a lot better when I am limited. Plus I'm honestly more amazed by how old games were able to still be fun even with there limitations.

[@forwatchingvideosandcommen155]

I actually kinda miss when different systems had almost completely different looking/kinds of games, at certain points.

[@martyc909]

forwatchingvideosandcommenting I whole heartily agree! I liked when companies had to pick a "poison." I'm an old school player so I hated load times. When I played PlayStation, I got so bored waiting. But my friends had their issues with N64 too. But it was fun because it felt each system has its own character and the games reflected that.

[@espejoPublic]

yes original mod here XD,

[@todesziege]

The last couple generations of Xbox and Playstation have been so similar they don't really have a reason for both existing.

[@espejoPublic]

is good console , with texture filtering method , for delete the pixelsS, in old years , is goodmethod, my faavorite is psx , per titLeS,, n64 low good titles,

[@bigfudge3223]

I'm glad that's back with the popularity of the Switch

[@plapin3538]

“The enemy of art is the absence of limitations.” - Orson Welles

[@Haldrie]

AKA much of modern gaming where developers simply don't care about storage space or compression (because storage space is cheap and it's not like gamers want to play more then 3 games at a time right) and can render near photo realistic landscapes and characters...but forget that they still have to actually put some game in their game and not just pretty graphics, cutscenes, and FMVs.

[@COOLMCDEN]

Haldrie devs having to compress file sizes is why some companies don’t like the switch.

[@alinepiroutek8932]

Look the requisites to play Galgun 2 on PC. Unacceptable. It is a freaking game that runs perfectly on Vita with way less specs.

[@luisangelcastillo289]

That was for u silent hill

[@alinepiroutek8932]

@@yesham0 Without limitations, everyone becomes lazy. Look Pokémon Let's GO, they did a lazy job because no effort was needed to sell the game. Look how much resources Mighty No.9 needs to run even though it could run perfectly 60fps on Dreamcast. Limitations make people work more to archive goals. Engineers also need to work around limitations.

[@GaiusZero]

I still believe that hardware limitation was an important factor of creativity back then.

[@digital_fairy]

A perfect example is Silent Hill's fog. It became one of the series' most popular aspects

[@boodro2122]

Most definitely! And that led to quantity, also.

[@melficexd]

You had gta top perspective instead of 3rd person view

[@Armedvulcanstorm48]

GaiusZero and now that there aren’t as many limitations people are getting lazy

[@GaiusZero]

@@Armedvulcanstorm48 Not lazy. I would call it uninspired. Not trying new stuff to get around the limitation but doing the same stuff over again thats popular.

[@isweartofuckinggod]

A classic: The fog in Silent Hill was iconic and completely defined horror game aesthetic for decades to come, but it was originally also a workaround for an ungodly short render distance and low detail character designs.

[@kiwicami287]

It was also there to make the dithering look better or something like that

[@Jormbis]

Same thing they did for Spider-Man. They couldn’t render the ground, so they used fog as an important part of the story. The perfect excuse. too bad they couldnt use the same thing for the sequel

[@conkyjoe8932]

While not completely the same thing (I'd still say it's in the same "ballpark" though...), the o.g. PSX Resident Evil games used the tank controls, and fixed camera angles, to make your character control a little less fluidly, and control what the player could/couldn't see from certain points in a room, respectively. While not PRECISELY choices made due to console limitations, nevertheless the developers choosing those design routes worked in those old RE game's favors BIG TIME. As a less fluid-moving protagonist meant an increased likelihood of being grabbed/attacked unless the player was REALLY on their toes, and fixed-camera angles controlling what the player was/was not able to see meant you could sometimes HEAR a threat lurking just off-screen, but no be able to actually SEE it...which assuredly upped the tension and creepy-factor tenfold lol. Mannnnnn...I fuckin' MISS the mid-to-late-90's-era of video gaming. It was such a magical time...RE2, Metal Gear Solid, Mario 64, Starfox 64, Diddy Kong Racing, Shadows of the Empire, FF VII and VIII, Parappa the Rapper, Lunar 2: Eternal Blue Complete (mannnn if you had this edition of this game...then you ALREADY KNOW), Rampage: Universal Tour...I could go on and on. Classic, CLASSIC games.

[@awilliams1701]

The reason we don't remember playing MIB is because they nueralized our memories of it. lol

[@looeegee]

Hey sweetie, you look fine, girl. Edit: shit sorry thought you were a girl.

[@LeonesAce]

@@looeegee I'd still smash tho

[@looeegee]

@@LeonesAce if your a girl then yeah sure, but i'm a dude and still prefer the pussy so no thank you!

[@fukaze2021]

@@looeegee funniest shit i've read today

[@gregoriolobato3033]

Now: -The technology we have now is so powerfull, we can make anything! -What you wanna do? -Microtransactions and Loot boxes

[@yellowblanka6058]

To be fair that's typically the publisher/shareholders doing, not the developer. I can't think of many developers that want to add that crap in, they're usually compelled by the publishers providing the funding.

[@yellowblanka6058]

@Shaman Xeed Yep. Or worse, people who complain about these practices yet still buy games from publishers that do this shit.

[@joshuamcdonell5490]

LMAO. True.

[@optibinds]

Its not microtransactions or loot boxes its surprise mechanics

[@Zeina107]

Or bung hole mechanics. Anal seepage mechanics

[@markmelo2779]

Sega saturn: *quietly cries in the background*

[@madhatter8508]

Most of the stuff he said about the PlayStation applies to the Saturn too, because they're both CD-based consoles with superior texture mapping to the N64, but on top of that the Saturn had a 2nd CPU and a terrible 3D graphics processor with a slow fill rate to contend with. It took a ton of effort for developers to get something good out of it using the two graphics processors, and SOA pulled the plug on it only a couple years into its lifespan. On top of that, SOJ didn't even want to sell many Saturns because they lost money on each one sold, so they deliberately produced fewer units than consumers wanted in the beginning, which scared away developers because Sega kept their userbase deliberately small compared to Sony and later Nintendo. (Source: Hitoshi Sato)

[@Ehal256]

@@madhatter8508 the saturn and ps1 did not have superior texture mapping, just more space for textures. In fact, both of them didn't even do proper texture mapping in 3d, which is why textures on those consoles exhibit distortion. The N64 was the first console to do perspective correct texture mapping. It's too bad it blurred the hell out of textures by default.

[@robkearsy2995]

Saturn was a great system Sega just screwed up with 32X P'n off retailers. Launching Saturn early not marketing it right. While it had quality game's it would've still been behind PlayStation & N 64 even if it had sold better.

[@fox-paws]

Sega Saturn: Best fighting game ports, too bad alot of them stayed in japan.

[@BensBoringVideos]

7:00 - Dreamcast also quietly cries in the background

[@elviswjr]

I remember when I was a kid one of the popular playground arguments at school was about which console had better graphics. What we didn’t understand is that one wasn’t better than the other. They were just different.

[@tradeo8899]

PS1 was 32-bit but N64 was 64-but. Checkmate Sony!

[@fattiger6957]

@@tradeo8899 who cares? The difference between 32 and 64-bit meant damn near nothing back then. It was more of a stupid marketing thing than proof of technical superiority. You know the Gamecube was a 32-bit system and its games look 100x better than N64.

[@Tuvok_Shakur]

@@fattiger6957 That was one of the arguments we had about the 2 systems when I was in school. 32bits arent as many as 64bits so 64 is better... Final Fantasy 7 has way better graphics on the videos and N64 cant do anything like that etc.

[@davolthe1261]

​@@Tuvok_Shakur PS1 was way ahead of N64 if u ask me, Sony took way more mature approach in gaming, look and graphic of their console, N64 had very boxy graphic feeling compared to PS1(which actually aged better), PS1 has it's much graphic flaws like wobbling which is almost unplayable on modern screens without modern hacks but back on crt tv's it was almost unnoticeable(which sony very smartly took advantage of) with way more graphic details then N64 games

[@tabsntoot]

Thier were mature titles for n64 of course and some very good fps titles. That I believe is where it shone best games like duke 64 and golden eye. But overall it lacked a diverse library. Nintendo were to in-house like they were with the snes. Too commercial and expensive compared to Sonys approach but I genuinely believe the console itself was far better than the ps1 potentially

[@nathanhobson1142]

Back when your choice of console meant EVERYTHING.

[@danbruno5945]

When I was 9 I litrally stared at pictures of Sega Saturn every single day in grandmaster magazine but sadly never got one. Really wanted one so bad tho😭😂😂😂

[@hjames78]

I had both lol

[@GucciPucciMIH]

It still does to some people

[@DmageCase]

@mysteryman2024 Ugh... Your childhood must have been so sad.

[@muco8016]

DmageCase bruh

[@hartantoj]

I actually liked the long play of the final fantasy games and exploring the different backgrounds. The fact that its was long and drawn out gives a certain feeling of isolation when you play

[@Lightblue2222]

Resident Evil 2 had full motion video on n64. But it was more pixelated. Still legit tho.

[@tomrow32]

So did that Pokemon puzzle game on N64.

[@Eric-yt7fp]

Came to say this. FMV was rare on N64, but it was by no means only on PS1 as stated in the video.

[@vraven-tc6cg]

The sound was horrible during the motion videos, especially the speech.

[@Lightblue2222]

@@vraven-tc6cg They had to cut back because of space limitation. I wonder how well the sound and video could have been if the carts held as much space as a cd.

[@grabisoft]

n64 so called "cut scenes" were just fancy gimmick tricks with still images similar to gifs. terrible frame rate and terrible resolution. thats why most developers for that console preferred static images with text most of the time. the n64 was just not capable of displaying videos. the music/sound was complete rubbish compared to digital tracks from CDs. the only good thing about n64 back in the day was that it had no loading times. but the fact that all games came in cartridges was an obsolete feature even for that time. it was mainly a kids console, nintendo always been a kids console so sacrificing graphics/sound/music quality just to get instants loads was worth it . because kids didnt care about that that much. psx was mainly aimed for teenagers that cared more about stories and more sophisticated works.

[@FFXfever]

I wished you talked more about embracing limitations because it's a huge subject. The Megaman series is a perfect candidate to showcase it too, each generations of megaman have been built with their hardware limitations in mind. Original megaman with the screen by screen transition, Megaman X with the enemy spawning pattern, and Zero with short ranged focused design.

[@FurEngel]

Your using the term "static storage" incorrectly. Also, the major difference was access-time to cache (ROM to RAM). The PS1 had a 250ms avg. seek time, while the N64 used mask-rom that varied (80ns to 100ns). This was huge, because game data could be located anywhere in ROM for N64, but for the PS1, game assets had to be blocked or located sequentially. If not, you ended up with PS1 games that would have very long "loading times" as the 2X CD-ROM would locate and load data into its very small RAM (2MB~). The N64 design also allowed lots of content to be non-cached, meaning it could be mapped within the virtual file system and streamed in real time.

[@PANZERFAUST90]

You're using 'your' incorrectly.

[@gblargg]

Not just access time, but bandwidth. 2x CD was 300 KB/sec, N64 was 5,000-50,000 KB/sec.

[@nicolaramoso3286]

Yeah that section was so poorly worded it made me frown. He kinda delivered the right message though.

[@scottwilkins]

@@gblargg There were a lot more limitations on bandwidth that slowed down the N64 to around the same speed as the Playstation on loads during game play.

[@LightLegion]

I'm an N64 guy, but even I have to admit that the FMVs in the PS1 discs do add to the gameplay experience. It's not interactive sure, but they set the mood and the imagination.

[@dmas7749]

and as a PS guy, i have to admit they were there more to show off and flaunt than anything else, not that they couldn't do what you said of course

[@LightLegion]

@@dmas7749 you sure you are not talking about Sega CD? Lol

[@dmas7749]

@@LightLegion: i'm not, it was something of a gimmick at the time, but that's not necessarily a bad thing since some FMVs look actually pretty good...well for the time anyway lol

[@gamephreak5]

LMAO, no they don't. FMV's add absolutely nothing to the gameplay. You sit there and watch them. They're pointless.

[@duffman18]

@@gamephreak5 LMAO, yes they do. FMV's add story and spectacle and wonder to games. Are you seriously trying to claim that Final Fantasy 7 would be the exact same game if you removed the story? That it'd be literally the same, not better or no worse, completely unchanged? To claim they add nothing at all is just ridiculous.

[@bigpharmasports9120]

The ps1 limitations are what make spiro the dragon such a shockingly good platformer/3d game... with decent load times to boot

[@MrMarinus18]

There were quite a few tricks that popped up overtime to get around this. Just like how people figured out many tricks to compress things to fit onto the N64. More efficient transfer methods were developed and people incorporated data loads in every conceivable moment.

[@DarkGhostHacker]

spyro and crash were such amazing platformers. even better than banjo kazooie

[@pierresimpson3572]

Those games looked amazing but they don't compare to mario or banjo. You play crash today the hd version and you see how flat the game actualy was.

[@somerandom2858]

@@pierresimpson3572 Uhh, I will give you Crash, but Spyro is the same style of game as Banjo, but better.

[@pierresimpson3572]

@@somerandom2858 no dude true it's the same style and spyro had beautifull graphics but come on it's not banjo level. In therms of exploration and world building it's even better than sm64. Those games where just too advancsd in terms of gameplay mecanics and level design than anythin g in the competition.

[@dark0ssx]

"cartridges held 10% of what a cd could" they were much smaller than that Most of the first n64 games were on 8mb cartridges. Only at the very end of the n64 life cycles did we see 64mb cartridges

[@Kalvinjj]

sometimes the PS1 game's code and assets altogether took up so few megabytes that they just went balls out with actual CD audio - as in, 44.1KHz 16 bit stereo PCM sound. Some games would even be playable on a CD player to listen to their soundtrack! Pacman 20th anniversary is one of those.

[@dark0ssx]

@Chicken Bubblegum Possibly PS was still first to market and cheaper

[@Kalvinjj]

@Chicken Bubblegum I really doubt the PS1 would be dead when the N64 arrived with discs as storage media if that had happened. It's all about the games in the end, the PS1 was also easy to program, the N64 with a CD drive would be more expensive than it was as well. You cannot predict everything, games would have been cheaper too so this would also bring some big differences. Don't forget also that one of the key flaunting points of the N64 would have been gone: the "instant loading", that the video itself also claims to be the key point on some games actually existing and being good.

[@Kalvinjj]

@Chicken Bubblegum Yes, it would have FF7. At the same time would have a ton of loading or possibly different level design on Ocarina of Time, and lots of level loading on Super Mario 64. You ain't gonna get the best of everything on the hypothetical N64 CD unless you add like 8~16MB of some cache RAM that acted like a cartridge, loading all the game data that was necessary for a handful of loads at once. Wanna pay for that? I doubt many would. Adding to your comparison on the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive, it sold very poorly on launch, but still managed to do way better in Europe for example and South America. The PlayStation in other hand sold like hotcakes in the 1st day. It had already a big user base when the N64 hit the shelves. That counts a lot. It could have lost a big chunk of the user base to the N64 OR it could just not lose much at all and both compete head to head. Trying to argue with "facts" that never happened is pretty moot. The only fact we do have is some devs switching to the PlayStation. But also keep in mind they didn't have much reason to stick to anyone other than Nintendo in the 1st place before the PS1 existed, given how the Genesis/Mega Drive performed.

[@lilchad-ig1oj]

Chicken Bubblegum but if that happened Well we wouldn’t have the PS1-5 (yes there will be a PS5) and the handheld market would not be as large as Nintendo would probably still have home console top spot for longer (also the PSP wouldn’t exist as sony would be working with Nintendo on new home consoles for the 6th gen and 7th gen if they kept working together) overall the gaming world is better with the outcome we got even if it would have been interesting to see what they would have come up with we ended up with a handheld king (I would have wished sony won as i love the PSP but oh well Nintendo is still good) and a console maker that is also great (MS probably still would have done xbox without PS existing as they did it because of how popular in general it was not the PS) but anyway this is long and should be put to rest.

[@KurosOverkill]

8:02 you missed one important piece of information, the PSX could play full motion video behind 3d rendered gameplay. Best example of this is in the final fantasy series they could use an FMV instead of a static image. Check out the Garden battle (end of disk 2) in Final fantasy 8 for the best example of this. (kzbin.info/www/bejne/oKXJf6hrrNB6oZo - at 12:30 13:45 16:20, but the best bit is from 26:00 - 28:20 all gameplay with (mostly) fmv in background.)

[@Zealwind]

Parasite Eve 2

[@MrEvodio65]

Yes, that blew my mind back then.

[@Seki09]

I replayed FFVIII recently and was blown away by how good that looked. I even forgot that they did this kinda thing.

[@deemster4249]

The Fear Effect games used looping video for every screen!

[@mraltoid19]

Silent Hill was totally built around the limitations of the PS1, and it worked out to the gameplay's benefit. Also, Resident Evil 2 and Pokemon Puzzle League on N64 had FMV.

Can't render too many things are full speed? Don't render them! Use fog! Use dark corridors, separate areas with doors, etc... Worked perfectly fine. They were forced to do many things and they ended up making a really fantastic, atmospheric game. I Love Silent Hill!

[@HappyBeezerStudios]

If Silent Hill were on N64, there would be no fog. But everything would look the same :D

[@wilfriedsee3141]

HappyBeezerStudios - by Lord_Morgul The video quality is fake. Playstation emulators now have mip mapping, which greatly improves the original graphics of the PS1. On the other hand, N64 emulators clumsily attempt to reproduce the special effects of the N64 console. N64 emulators removes the relief of the sceneries, and removes all the fade effects that make the graphics look like a living cartoon. ( The true graphic paw of the N64, and that no one will ever see on emulators. ) Of course, it also removes the roundness of the characters, removes their beauty, and adds graphical bugs. Which greatly detract from the original graphics of the N64. The problem is that " Game Design Wit " only show you the video quality of PS1 and N64 emulators here. But this is all a big lie. This video quality is from emulators and old video tapes, which have aged over time (which has deteriorated the original video quality), and have been many times re- encoded. Especially for this selection of N64 videos. I don't care of the small PS1/N64 fanboys. I say things the way they are, and I tell you this: the graphics of the N64 destroys the PS1 graphics. This is fact. In terms of 3D, it's like day and night. Pixels are atrocious to look at on PS1. The textures of the N64, on the other hand, are clean and beautiful to look at. This is fact. Whether you like it or not.

[@VaderTheWhite]

@@HappyBeezerStudios There could still be fog. I'm looking at you, Turok!

[@shortyorc121]

@@wilfriedsee3141 too bad all the n64 games run like complete crap. I don't know how I even played the thing as a kid. Conker has to be running in the low teens in frame rate. Basically all the games I have from my childhood run like garbage.

[@joshnorthall13]

I’d say the limitations on the older resi games made them scarier in the sense that the camera was always in the optimal place for scares

[@BinaryDood]

Pre-Rendered graphics made the PS1. Eternally beautiful, look at Chrono Cross and FF9, or most survival horror games.

[@KurtsToys]

I still play Chrono cross about once a year

[@Stungunwol]

Ps1 had problems with rendering large faces too, which required tesselation, which was something the hardware was fortunately well suited for. N64 didn't have that problem, but limited storage meant it had to use limited textures across large faces. Give and take in both situations.

[@sonofedis]

As modern games innovate on graphics and performance, kids today would never understand how mindblowing ps1 games looked back in the day. I still clearly remember, coming home from school, the first time I saw tekken 3 being played at our house. It was mindblowing for a kid like me. It's easy to look at ps1 games today and say it's trash but kids born too late on the video game era would never understand the awe of witnessing graphical evolution every generation

[@looeegee]

@@sonofedis Ok boomer

[@DarkGhostHacker]

Nonoy Encallado exactly!! completely agree. It was amazing for us to grow up and see consoles make huge noticeable leaps in graphics, gameplay and overall performance.

[@Deaddinoproductions]

There’s something so unique and endearing about the look of the static pre-rendered backgrounds and surfaces on a lot of PS1 games. The level of detail was so immersive. I loved my N64 too, but those smudgy textures were never as visually appealing for me.

[@Lugmillord]

The KZbin algorithm has given you the chance to skyrocket.

[@kandigloss6438]

Meh, doubt he would take it tho, first off, the end of this video makes it rather clear he views older games as obsolete and worthless beyond teaching design perables, and the people that the algorithm is recommending this to are people that watch retro gaming videos. Second, he seems on a trajectory that seems designed to get people to NOT want to watch his channel. He started with this well produced (if some times factually incorrect) game design videos, to poorly produced cam pointed at face game design videos that look like they are from 2009 even though they were made just 2 years ago, to lets play style videos...

[@Lugmillord]

@@kandigloss6438 Ahem, what you are saying sounds like you just made things up, like "the end of this video makes it rather clear he views older games as obsolete and worthless beyond teaching design perables". It doesn't say anything remotely close to that. He said that today, hardware limitations aren't as harsh but he said NOTHING that would suggest that older games aren't good. If anything, you are projecting your own thoughts or whatever. Second, if you demand every smal youtuber to have a production quality like people who do it for a living, then go watch corporate channels.

[@Lugmillord]

@@kandigloss6438 since your other reply is not visible to me (deleted?) I reply to the first couple of lines that the inbox displays. You definitely misunderstood the part about the system. He was talking about the technical aspects of the consoles, i.e. the limitations they had back then don't apply today. How you came to think that his statement was about the games when the entire video was only focussing on said technical limitations is beyond me.

[@nitrosherbert888]

You're no route to ha you're new to your new year new to this video should I got popular few years ago

[@CreativityBM21]

It’s kind of sad that you say that. It should give more people the chance to sky rocket. But sadly that’s not the case anymore

[@BooBarr]

The fog in Silent Hill: useful for hiding the limited draw-distance of the ps1, but also greatly improved the mood of the game.

[@daltreywaters]

Yup, it's was a brilliant trick. It was well mapped to the gameplay experience in Silent HIll, which highlights that if you mess that up you can get criticism of using fog, like what happened with Turok 64.

Absolutely! Poor PS1 didn't have to render too many polygons thanks to that. They could even afford vertex lighting with the limited view distance. It's impressive for its time!

[@longplayarchive]

Awesome video.. makes me wanna play some N64/PS1 again

[@JmKrokY]

Ok

[@carlcouture1023]

FF7 wasn't 3 CDs long because of the background graphics, it was 3 CDs long because of the FMVs. The entire game sans FMVs fits on one disc with plenty of room left over. Also there are plenty of PS1 games that have wide open play areas like Spyro, Croc, MediEvil and more. The real reason for these differences comes down to Nintendo pushing for more platformers and Sony pushing for more cinematics.

[@jacobmonks3722]

And by Final Fantasy IX, the cutscenes got so advanced graphically that they needed another disc. But damn was it ever worth it. Final Fantasy IX cutscenes are pretty.

[@M1XART]

Yeah, just wanted to point out that if playstation game is more than one CD, it really only has sequels included on same package on other CDs. Playstation did not have hardrive, so very little of previous disk content survives once you swap the CD. May be few stats on memory card. So "big epic game" like Fear Effect is only on your imagination + memories, not reality. However, this works for linear games and i actually like FF7.

[@AC-pk4ut]

@@M1XART That didn't really matter though for games back then. It wasn't like your actions had multiple consequences in games of that era, so all it needed to remember between disks was character stats, which side quests you'd done, what you had in your inventory (and stats linked to them, eg materia growth in FF7), and things like which treasure chests you'd opened etc. Basically just a few small text files of information.

[@themissinfowar6629]

Sony: we need more *C* *i* *n* *e* *m* *a* *t* *i* *c*

[@shaunthesheep24]

Oddworld Abe's Oddysee was in my opinion one of the best games to look at and play. All the backgrounds on each screen look amazing and the cut scenes were way ahead of it's time in terms of graphics. Its aged pretty well too. 22 years later and I can still go back to it.

[@95ZR580]

MGS dropped around the same time my nuts dropped and it was like we were playing some serious grown up shit. Gaming was never the same after that.

[@MalabarTheGreat]

😂😂😂

[@MichaelBohemian]

perfectly explains indirectly why ps5's SSD move is so important.

[@ggh_-ts6pn]

​@@dx315 you dont understand what you are talking about moron. The PS5 SSD tech is different than all SSD's available for PC.

[@IAm-zo1bo]

@@ggh_-ts6pn what's different?

[@jimjones775]

​@@IAm-zo1bo The ssd is faster then most things on pc. It has the ability to completely eliminate load times and to instantly transfer and read gpu data due to the io throughputs. This will change game development and this is exactly what developers wanted. No more long elevator rides and other techniques to cover up loading. The ability to get creative and do things like switch worlds in a second. (Look at the new ratchet and clank). No limits on movement due to how fast the world can load in things. The ability to load the world as you turn around. At least with first party games, this should change everything.

[@TheFrogInYourClosetWatchingYou]

@@jimjones775 I really doubt it will COMPLETELY eliminate load times.... It will be significantly faster compared to previous consoles sure.... Because previous consoles cheaped out and stuck with HHD's to save money. When it comes down to it most people wouldnt want to pay a premium for a next level SSD when an M.2 NVME is stupid fast as it is and the prices have been dropping and becoming more and more affordable.

[@JETZcorp]

@@TheFrogInYourClosetWatchingYou Linus Tech Tips did a video about this. On PC the main limitation to SSD performance is actually software. Despite the insane wicked speeds of M.2 NVME drives, they don't typically perform any better in load times than a regular SATA SSD, due to software bottlenecks in the OS. PS5 and Series X both outperform PCs on load time pretty handily, because they optimized the entire process to make full use of the "nothing special" SSD hardware. I imagine Microsoft Direct Storage technology will be coming to PC pretty soon, and that'll finally be a reason to care about PCIe 4.0 in gaming.

[@SECONDQUEST]

Holy cow, this is actually really amazing. Such "easy" to reach conclusion but I never heard them put in such easy to understand/follow terms. You pointed out things I had no idea I was thinking about

[@Joetatochips]

Very interesting video. Interesting to think about how various advantages/disadvantages in hardware can influence the genres of games developed (exploration-based platformers vs. story-rich RPGs), and subtly influence their aesthetics. It goes to show how clever designers for both systems were, playing to their console's strengths while rolling with its weaknesses. Also, now I know why the item boxes in Mario Kart 64 looked the way they did.

[@moonlalune8003]

And how they were forced to work on the gameplay mechanics albeit the limitations. That's why we had some interesting games back then that when reworked for the modern console doesn't seem as appealing.

[@jakeic1]

I watched this video while I was waiting for Resident Evil to open a door.

[@madzoroyal]

😂 💦

[@IuriFiedoruk]

There is one small detail, the PSX was actually faster in rendering triangles than N64. You can check this in a great interview frlm Squaresoft developers that tested both before moving FF7 to PSX. The thing is that it would support a smaller number of triangles on the screen at same time.

[@SerBallister]

It's a funny one because the lack of perspective correction on the PS1 meant developers had to subdivide triangles to fix it, so the gains in faster triangle rendering are taken away by fixing perspective issues, to some degree.. The PS1 had some impressively high fillrate, in part due to its dedicated VRAM

[@joshmobijohn]

Great video and super informative my man! It’s always fun watching videos like this when you’re older and able to reflect on the experience from a different perspective. I loved my N64 but was always envious of my friends who had a PlayStation because of the wide array of different titles they had.

[@_baller]

It's crazy how Goldeneye was born at the right time.....there wouldn't be multiplayer today like that, now everyone's miles away playing on their own TV's

[@enriquedossantos3283]

Its not the same, making fun of losers sitting right next to you is far better

[@_baller]

Enrique Dos Santos humanity!

[@Loundsify]

So you never heard of a game called Doom or Quake? They were doing Lan games and then internet gaming before Nintendo consoles even knew what the internet was bro. Goldeneye is an ok game, the developers eventually made the timesplitters series which is way better and also offers 4 player split screen.

[@Haldrie]

I know this is an old video but I have to correct you on something regarding Final Fantasy 7. You said in the video that it needed 3 discs to hold all the background texture data but this is actually not true at all. In fact all of the game's data is present across all 3 discs with 1 exception...the FMVs are split across the discs as 1 disc simply can't store them all and many are replicated for areas of the game you can access on all discs like the ones for the Golden Saucer.

[@RRRRRRRRR33]

It seems the video has a ton of misinformation, a shame

[@Saber_Nico]

that and the locations of event triggers are different from each disk. All the textures and models are the same and present in each disk.

[@jacobogarcia8111]

@@RRRRRRRRR33 The point about N64 games all being about exploration and ps1 ones being more slow-paced is bogus as well. There were 3d platformers that accomplished the same thing as Mario 64 did on a technical level, such as Gex: Enter the Gecko. Ofc no platformer quite surpassed Mario64 on a design level, but on a technical level, the experience you can have in Gex is the same.

[@Liam3072]

Also, the idea that somehow all of a PS1's disc was routinely used for actual ingame assets is terribly wrong. Many, many games had most of the CD used only for redbook audio and FMVs. Ever wondered why Ridge Racer only has a loading screen once at the very beginning? That's because the whole game can fit in the 2MB of RAM of the PS1. Yup, excluding redbook audio, Ridge Racer is a 2MB game. That means you could fit Ridge Racer FOUR TIMES in one Mario64 cartridge if you're willing to play without any music. Obviously, many games were bigger than that. But most could probably fit in a 64MB cartridge (or even a 32MB one) if one was willing to sacrifice redbook audio and FMV.

[@Kalvinjj]

@@Liam3072 in fact there are utilities to compress the ISOs for emulators on phones and such, that cut out the FMVs and compress the audio to MP3. Makes the ~600MB ISOs into like 30MB files.

[@ChrisHanline]

Oh man, that Battletoads pause screen SFX in your intro brought me down memory lane immediately.

[@mintmag8748]

I don't agree with you on 3D platforms. The PS1 had Spyro and Crash.

[@orestes1984]

They weren't true 3D and you couldn't explore the world. They were basically still side scrollers.

[@mintmag8748]

@@orestes1984 So you're telling me Spyro wasn't 3D. Ummm okay.

[@launched_]

@@orestes1984 Haha what?

[@jacobmonks3722]

I love the Crash trilogy and what little I've played of Spyro, but Banjo Kazooie and Mario 64 are games that still keep me coming back to them year after year.

[@orestes1984]

@@launched_ Go play Spyro then play Mario 64 and then compare the worlds. If you still don't get it you're a Swedish Attack Helicopter.

[@pirajacinto4]

Woah, this is amazing man! You were able to explain it so well yet be uplifting about why stuff like this happens. It's great and educational.

[@KokoroKatsura]

HUGE ANIME BREASTS

[@Snotnarok]

I disagree with a few of these points. PS also used flat color, shaded polygons as well to often lessen the resources. Crash Bandicoot and your own example of Final Fantasy VII both use colored polygons with very limited textures. Large game areas could also be displayed on Playstation, though less frequent games like Megaman Legends, Soul Reaver, Driver & it's sequel managed it and I believe there's more that I'm missing. Speaking of Soul Reaver and Crash Bandicoot because of their clever programming to stream data they were not only able to lessen but often eliminate load times. Both games being highly detailed for the time and certainly ran better than both Ocarina of Time's 20fps lock. Sure there's a lot of fog in Soul Reaver but they managed to make it work much like Silent Hill. So if they properly coded the game and positioned data intelligently on the disc they were able to nearly kill load times or rather greatly mask them. As for Video not mattering in the gameplay department, some games like FFVII, FFVIII and Parasite Eve 2 managed to splice or merge gameplay with FMVs. Enabling them to greatly surpass the limitations of the console. FF8 had an entire war going on in the BG while you were still moving your character or having to battle to save yourself. Fear Effect used FMVs/animated backgrounds to again greatly expand the visuals of the PS1. Parasite Eve 2's entire first 'dungeon' had Aya walking across a FMV that was not only able to change positions as she walked but remained animated when she stopped. Does it enhance the gameplay- arguable but it does help them improve the atmosphere. Resident Evil 2 is the only game I'm aware of that has videos on the N64, highly compressed and worse looking & sounding but were able to work because of a custom video encoder. While RE2 on PS was on 2 discs they had so much repeated data because of the bgs they recently admitted they likely could have fit it on 1 disc- which is still remarkable that they managed to cram that onto a single n64 cart despite the downgrades they had to make. I wish you didn't use emulation to show this demonstration since another big difference was the n64 had built in bilinear filtering to their console and AA, which allowed for a more soft image vs PS1's jagged and very sharp textures. I prefer the latter but it was still impressive the 64 had that tech in a console at the time.

[@tHeWasTeDYouTh]

that re2 n64 game was some serious black magic!!!

[@Snotnarok]

@@tHeWasTeDYouTh It was VERY impressive, but funny enough they only really had to fit 1 disc on there. Capcom devs admitted they could have fit the 2 discs onto one. All of the backgrounds were redundant as were many of the sound effects so it was down to voice clips and the bigger issue FMVs. Still impressive they managed to grind down at most 650MB CD to a 64MB cart

[@Snotnarok]

@Apharmd Battler Yup, I didn't want my comment to be any longer than it had to be. Carts were a MASSIVE mistake for Nintendo. Their instance on it for the various reasons they gave ultimately amounted to nothing since the carts were so expensive. Resident Evil 2 when it was out on PS: $50 RE2 when it was new on 64: $70+ RE on PS1 when N64 Ver came out: $20 or less. The Switch KIND of has the same problem now, I really like the Switch but it's more the 3rd parties screwing up by putting half the game or collection as a download. Meanwhile, the witcher 3 team kicking out a 32GB cart while capcom can't be arsed. Sony DID have some restrictions which they dragged with them into later generations. Apparently they were very, very anti-2D games. Capcom had to apparently bargain with them, they want RE? They gotta take the Megaman games. On the PS2 they apparently insisted they replace the sprites with 3D models & the anime intro with CG for the US. I get why, to a degree. They didn't want their system to look like a 16 bit machine but still, it was dumb. Nintendo seems to have gone that route too given the 64 I don't think had any true 2D games, Mischief Makers being the closest. Could be wrong. Honestly as far as capabilities I think the PS1 certainly pulled it off better. Sure, warping polygons and all that but I'd rather have the sharp pixels vs the overly blurry textures & janky AA they have on 64. It hurt my eyes then and doesn't fair any better on a HD TV :\

[@Snotnarok]

@Apharmd Battler I'm well aware the 64 was more powerful, just didn't like the visuals that were, from what I understand forced by the hardware. Like the AA and such. Thought I was clear on that, oops. The factors are usually, games, cost and some other factors. Like the Vita's awful memory cards. You can have the best games all ya want but when they're using that garbage and devs cheaping out on cart space making you download half the game or features it makes that memory card all the more painful. That said, Vita's games were mostly the indie scene that really shined, even Sony's games ported over apparently were not done well.

[@Snotnarok]

@Apharmd Battler Dude I literally said the N64 is more advanced I just prefer the sharp pixels of the PS1. I dunno how I can make it any more clear that I'm saying the 64 had better visual abilities but I just don't like the soft look. I mean it had Silicon Graphics behind it, that was the biggest name in 3D tech. I'm not sure where you got the assumption I grew up with a PS1? Played the 64 well before ever getting a PS1 and got a 64 pretty much for Conker's Bad Fur Day. . .and borrowing friends games since I was late to it. Had to save for ages to get one on sale. I had both consoles, it's not any kinda weird bias or whatever. Really I dunno where you're getting this, no offense but I think you're overlooking that I literally said the 64 is more powerful but I prefer sharp visuals. I get what you're saying about single console owners to a degree? But again you're projecting. I have a Switch, game on PC, got a PS4 that ...collects more dust than use. Even at that gen I had a PS2, GC and a modded Xbox. I have no interest in console bias- it doesn't make any sense, especially in this day n' age. Yeah the AA is massively impressive for the time but I don't even use AA in games today. So yes I'm happily admitting I have a bias for sharp pixels vs softened stuff. But a console bias? Yikes, that's entirely not true. Unless we're talking controllers, because that N64 controller- noooo thanks. The Hori variant? Yes.

[@7EEVEE]

Great video! The aesthetic differences between these two consoles heavily defined two entirely separate artstyles in my mind, it's great to think of spritework as embroidery and the various methods of early 3d rendering pipelines as different material mediums such as various paints, it turns technological limitations into definite art styles, limited only by physical means.

[@peterobinson3678]

That last 60 seconds tied it all together nicely. Good work!

[@evilinsecticon3813]

Should just compare titles that were cross platform based. Gauntlet Legends, Ms. Pac-Man Maze Madness, Re-Volt, RE2, Mortal Kombat Trilogy, MK4, etc, etc...

[@redwidow1358]

And I'd love to see more videos about how each console handled things like random numbers and how this would change details like water in Tony Hawk games

[@thebasketballhistorian3291]

But most of the best games for each system weren't cross platform ones. And the reason they were the best games (Metal Gear, Final Fantasy, Zelda, Goldeneye) was because they made the best use of each system's unique hardware.

[@chaoscontroller316]

You guys should look up VCDecide. His channel is all about picking two or more versions of a game and showing them together for comparison sake, like for example how Tekken 3 looked in Arcades vs its PS1 port or how different the Mortal Kombat games are on each console.

[@Jack_80]

@@chaoscontroller316 i saw a video like that on soul calibur for dreamcast and how it was the first console game to blow away the arcade version. made me regret getting rid of my dreamcast and games. i played a couple of the later soul caliburs but i somehow didnt enjoy then nearly as much as the original on dresmcast.

[@maximillionroivas3893]

Gauntlet Legends and Resident Evil 2 (IMO) were better on N64. The only thing the original PS-X RE2 has over the N64 were the CGI cut-scenes. But I found the controls and in-game graphics superior on N64.

[@sohee7597]

I loved the music and sound effects that were possible on PS1

[@KokoroKatsura]

A N I M E N I M E

[@Ponnybit]

03:21 final fantasy n64 example: there is a statement saying that the game slow loads because it chnages background a lot and, i quote "this game relied so much on this technique that it had to be put across 3 cds" well.. im very sorry if my english doesnt sound polite, but that is false information. the whole final fantasy 7 game is on about 200 megabytes, there is a copy of it across every game disk, the only difference between the disks is the full motion videos. if you have a real copy of final fantasy 7 (or 8, or 9) you can confirm this ; put a spring in the CD TRAY OPEN detection, after the main intro video when you get off the train, switch the first CD for the second or third, the game will play normaly BUT with wrong FMV sequences.

[@mikeluna2026]

True, but it doesn't erase the loading times, haha... though it was a superb game anyways.

[@lethallawnmower5301]

Ecce Porfirium Really, that’s super interesting

[@kruks]

Can the opposite be done? We can return to Midgar in disc 3, but we can't get to many disc 3 locations by disc 1. Is it possible to load disc 3 (or 4, for the other games) and then play with disc 1? I'd also assume some songs won't play correctly, like One-Winged Angel.

[@lethallawnmower5301]

CruxCapacitor that would be interesting trying to hear one winged Angel like that

[@danieljackheck]

Final Fantasy VII actually had the same data on all three discs except for the FMV cutscenes. If the game didn't have cutscenes it would have easily fit on a CD, and potentially could have fit on an N64 cart with some additional compression.

[@realmrpger4432]

Though for subsequent games that wasn't true. FFVIII and IX locked off certain areas after switching discs.

[@fortheloveofnoise]

What was cool was you could have the game on both consoles and have a VASTLY different experience. The biggest in my personal experience being Road Rash 3D vs Road Rash 64. I loved the version on 64 because you could go off-road to shortcut as well as explore the map......not so much on the PS version. Also, the bikes and world are more detailed on PS1...but was also more "pixely" and thus I preferred the looks of that game on N64

[@V3ntilator]

The same happened with PS3 and Xbox 360 first years. Red Dead Redemption, Rainbow Six Vegas 1+2, Bayonetta 1 were all superior on 360. 360 version didn't have the stuttering, had more colorful graphics and higher frame rate on same games.

[@__boo]

“remember men in black for the playstation 1? me neither” lmaooo

[@irisfailsafe]

Waverace64 was amazing I still wonder how they pulled that one....

[@worminator15]

Great video, super interesting and helpful!

[@williamdoyon6242]

All the Metroid games: Shoot the door to load the next room. This lead to the mechanics of needing specific weapons to unlock different portions of the game.

[@danieladriangiacomelli936]

Another difference is the lack of a Z buffer (which gave that jittery polygon look) and texture filtering in the PSX.

[@CarloNassar]

I think N64 games would look better without texture filtering.

[@CarloNassar]

@DejaVoodooDoll Sorry, I meant that the developers shouldn't have bothered with texture filtering.

[@CarloNassar]

@DejaVoodooDoll At least as good as PS1 titles.

[@delko000]

this

[@ninjapwnsatlyfe]

one of the most informative videos ive seen on the topic

[@Jedavis05]

Great vid bro. Informative. 👍🏾

[@MisterE80]

Actually on PlayStation you could play a game with more than 2 players. If you have 1 MultiTap, you could have up to 5 players; if you have 2 MultiTaps, you could have up to 8 players.

[@pegasusactua2985]

But how many games supported that though And how many of them were actually good

[@richyroa]

THIS IS THE ONLY QUESTION THAT MATTERS XD

[@TekMoliGy]

yea and how many people do you think ever actually even did that when its such a hassle. When the console isn't designed around multiplayer there are way less precentage of the library that support it so you're not gonna bother hooking up your ps1 and a multi tap and then looking through your games to see which ones supported it if any when you can just plug in the n64 and KNOW that you have a ton of games that you can play with friends

[@dominikm.7182]

QUAKE 2! I spent so much time playing with schoolmates.

[@idonteatcheetos]

No way, how would you split the screen for 8 people? I refuse to believe the ps1 could even handle doing that at a playable frame rate.

[@archive3do769]

Totally forgot Gex Spyro and Crash in the beginning of the vid when mentioning platformers

[@guillermo5360]

Maybe because they don't compare to the 64's.

[@diegofrgc]

Ps1 platformers werent as good as N64... And I enoyed Crash and Spyro quite a bit

[@TerrorOfTalos]

Also Ape escape

[@TerrorOfTalos]

@@guillermo5360 If we're talking exclusivity then the notable ones are Rocket:RoW, SM64, Banjo Kazooie and Tooie and Mystical Ninja vs the PS1 which had Spyro 1-3, Crash 1-3 and Ape Escape. This is actually decently comparable regardless of which you prefer.

[@archive3do769]

​@@TerrorOfTalos PS1 outweighed N64 platformers in sheer numbers anyway haha. Not to mention they were all just as good if not better. The PS1 library shits all over the N64 library, but that's besides the point. N64 compared to the PS1 was a commercial failure. Under 300 games that were your average (at best) mediocre title. A small amount of opinions don't outweigh the truth. Fact remains, like you said, that there were plenty of comparable games. And as for games both systems shared, I'd much rather look at the textures full res than a dumbed-down butter knife smeared image I.E. Gex Enter The Gecko/64 and Megaman Legends/64 @guillermo @diegofrgc "They don't deserve to be used as a valid point because of my opinion." Ok, if you say so I guess.

[@SidKnight]

This was an incredible video! Thank you for highlighting so many of these!! I started lmao when you mentioned things like Final fantasy and I was like "Aaaahhh!! Lol, that's why that was so annoying!" Lol. I want to say though, that maybe it was just the times, but somehow, these design quirks made games feel a little more rewarding. Especially figuring things out, and having to run up 45 flights of stairs for a secret. Great video!

[@GuitarHickNick]

Awesome video! Learnt a lot

[@awesomemercerdude]

I HEAVILY regret not taking my N64 with me on my 3-week vacation.

[@MotivationManifested]

awesomemercerdude 🤣🤣

[@Garrysullivanjones]

They are tough like a brick , some dust won’t kill them like a CD Lens!! Some goldeneye yeah. Frame rate can lag a bit but whatever, smoke bongs

[@awesomemercerdude]

@bee boo Thats awesome! I only have a jailbroken Wii and that can only do so much! lol

[@BlitzvogelMobius]

5:22 The rendering distance of N64 vs PS1 games I think is poorly addressed because it becomes a focus on "the PS1 doesn't have the power to do so" when in truth it can do so quite competently when done *correctly*. Because of the PS1's affine texture mapping issue, long distance renders were difficult because devs had to spend so much render time on dense geometrical meshes designed to mitigate the affine texture problem. Smaller triangles, less noticeable warp across the triangle's texture coordinates, but of course, more triangles takes away from the render budget. There are videos of Super Mario 64 running in emulation with texture perspective correction disabled, and you can see how such large individual triangles as used in N64 games would've been a no-go on the PS1 because the warping would take up so much screen real estate. Spyro got around the problem using a highly layered level of detail system where closer objects received denser meshes and texture mapping, and further out the textures would be skipped entirely for simplified gourand shaded polygons colored correctly to allow for nice fade in and out for their respective textures. I think there's 7 layers in total, but it means Spyros large game world's had nice transitional details between the most and least detailed layers. What I imagine is the memory management nightmare having only 2 MB main memory and 1 MB video constantly streaming data from the CD. Even if the PS1 could display perspective correct textures, you'd have to get around it's more limited memory size and the ability for a cartridge to stream in data much quicker. The affine texture problem was IMHO PS1's biggest fault. The lack of subpixel precision, texture interpolation and no z-buffer were not that big a deal in the face of having to waste polygonal rendering budget on extra triangles. I wonder if Sony was unwilling to commit the extra silicon or if there were problems in getting hardware z-buffers to work.

[@dolbyprologicii]

yes... you said it yourself... the ps1 doesnt have features to do correction... hence developers had hard time trying to minimize warping, or otherwise design a different game genre... hardware sucked and the developers were the only ones who had to do all the work to get it at least feasible.

[@litjellyfish]

Blitzvogel it was not cost issues. Remember at this time fast performing perspective corrected texture mapping and a buffer was not common. Silicon graphics that provided the chip for n64 was ahead. Hardware with similar features appeared in 96-97 on the pc

[@SerBallister]

Z buffers cost a lot of ram bandwidth, similar to why transparent polygons are so much more expensive in terms of fillrate compared to opaque ones. Also you would need a ton a RAM. I don't know if you've seen what a PS1 VRAM dump looks like but a good percentage of it is taken up by the 2 framebuffers, I'd say about 30% for 320x256 resolution. You would need more VRAM for sure.

[@zuffin1864]

Creativity is just as much or even more about creating with the hand you are dealt, as much as it is about expressing your seemingly endless ideas. Great video!

[@AxiomofDiscord]

I think this is one of the most fair comparisions I have ever heard. Also you reminded me that I have been told before that creativity more important when you find yourself limited by your resources than when you have all the resources you could ever want.

[@Shadowfang3336]

Is the high amount of static storage why the PS1 was populated with more 2D games (such as Megaman X4 and Castlevania: SotN), as they could take advantage of highly detailed art assets without suffering from slower 3D rendering?

[@daltreywaters]

Possibly. You did have some good 2D games on N64 as well like Mischief Makers and Yoshi's Story, but I believe the lack of proper 2D games for that era was mostly due to the industry moving towards 3D games.

[@HappyBeezerStudios]

And thern devs fell into the early 3D trap. Where being 3D was the gimmick that couldn't outweigh the lackluster game, the early 3D Castlevania are a good example. Also the PS1 got some great 3D RPGs and strategy games.

[@edwarddore7617]

the Saturn had a ton of 2D games

[@MrMarinus18]

Well a big reason was that the PS1 was easier to develop for. Therefore small developers who didn't have the budget for large 3D games went for the PS1 over the N64.

[@badreality2]

Wait, I can answer this question before I watch this video. It is because one used CDs as a medium, which offered more game/sound storage, but horrible loading times, while the other used solid state memory (cartridges), which had the opposite effect at the time. ...It is also because one console's controller had a joystick and the other's did not. ...for a time. It is because one was developed with a built-in four-player split-screen support, while the other one needed to use an adapter for four-player split-screen support. Finally, one uses anti-aliasing, one doesn't...

[@cuyo02]

and the n64 can render 150 000 polygons per second while ps1 can draw 300 000

[@Juanknes]

@@cuyo02 150 000 properly rendered vs 300 000 flickering and aliased ones

[@packagegamesstudio1125]

Great video, thank you for sharing!

[@platinummad4701]

To be honest some of my best multi-player memories were in a PlayStation with a 4 players adaptor, Crash Team Racing and Twisted Metal were my jam.

[@steverogers8163]

Should probably have mentioned the size of the RAM as well. The N64 had 4MB by default (expandable and required for many games to 8 MB). The PS1 had 2MB with an additional 1MB on the GPU chip. So it wasn't just the slow load speed of the PS1 that limited play field size but also the amount of RAM the system had to play with.

[@lk101010]

Steve Rogers the way the 64 was designed limited the system to use the RAM as either VRAM or regular RAM. Most games used it as VRAM and streamed data straight from the cartridge. If you want to compare RAM speeds, the fair comparison would be PS1 RAM vs N64’s cartridge.

[@ooferssixtynine4232]

The n64 could also increase ram from 4mb to 8mb.

[@chad_bro_chill]

Correction: Only three games require the expansion pack: DK64, Perfect Dark, and Majora's Mask. There's a bunch of games that offer higher resolution or similar with the expansion, though.

[@MrMarinus18]

The N64 also was made to use the cartridge itself as additional RAM if needed. It couldn't be read as fast but for objects that didn't need to move quickly it was another expansion.

[@richardmh1987]

Actually, by the end of it´s lifespan, N64 cartridges were getting bigger storages and some developers got very good at maximizing such storage space, so we got jewels like Conker's Bad Fur day where you get voices and in game cinematics and some great visuals without losing fast loading times. It's a shame that large storage capabilities were too expensive back then cause something aking to an USB or an SD card with one or two Gb would have been more than enough to have very intensive narrative games with amazing visuals and virtually inmediate loading times, but that would have been incredibly expensive back then.

[@conorcoon5138]

Awesome video. Super interesting that I didn't realize any of this until watching and then it all clicked.

[@vihangasilva]

Very interesting video. Good job!

[@papavitohisthoughts6534]

To make the best games possible, it took much effort and creativity to merely get mechanics to work. First impressions mattered even more as well

[@swordguy1243]

2019 checking in : Currently replayed tomb raider 1,2,3,4and5 . Now playing soul reaver ps1 These games have the best mood/vibe ever . Maybe its me i love old 3D graphics and level design

[@jackrotz2139]

I really enjoyed this. Sure I've watched videos before on the technical limitations of these 2 classic consoles that I had the privilege of growing up with, however, you really hit the nail on the head with your descriptions about design. I really enjoyed your conclusions on gaming design and design in general. Thanks for the vid

[@popfiction5687]

Fantastic video. Very informative.

[@SoloWing88]

C&C on the ps vs 64 is an interesting take on this,with the 64 having full 3d, but the ps being more authentic

[@_TheElMan]

I don't think that was due to technical limitations, but more due to nintendo pushing 3d on everything. Look at Castlevania 64 Vs SotN. SOTN looks miles better now, as the ps1 was a superb 2d device, but at the time was mocked that the N64 having 3d wiped the floor with the "old" 2d ps1 game.

[@realmrpger4432]

​@@_TheElMan Apparently the N64 was very bad at rendering sprites. It's not that Nintendo pushed 3D games as much as it was a requirement for developers. Squaresoft moved FFVII to the PS after they realized how much more powerful it was (see Polygon's FFVII Oral History)

[@HeyImGaminOverHere]

Awesome video! Subscribed!

[@GamingMyWholeLife]

Good Video, just uploaded a similar video of my own and came across yours after. It's really fun looking at the early 3D systems and reflecting on the pro and cons of each. Both amazing systems and I'll never stop talking about them or making my own videos, lol. Keep up the awesome work, I enjoyed this

[@RideauLakesFarm]

Back in the day when consoles were different from each other. Now they pretty much have the same games

[@RaggedsEdge]

Laughs in snes and genesis.

[@kohkisparten117]

Next gen seems a bit interesting in terms of leaks so far. Xbox seems to have a bit more raw power/compute units, but PS5 seems to have faster streaming of data. It might not be as big of a difference as these old consoles were, but it’s still interesting to see what the Sony exclusives will focus on vs Xbox exclusives. Maybe a difference between an more interactive vibrant open world vs more detailed models etc.

[@capricornone2362]

Nintendo Switch stands out as unique to me.

[@LionelMessi-jv4pb]

@@capricornone2362 not for me,switch is only about ports

[@lilchad-ig1oj]

Capricorn One! The switch is a handheld so it should be in its own class away from xbox and play station Wait it kind of is but people for some reason don’t think so Handheld is switch and home console is xbox and play station and they are different Handhelds are meant to be portable so the gameplay and design of the console has to fit that Home consoles is where we get big screens. Good graphics and advanced gameplay

[@dinstrass9279]

i really thought you would compare games that were on both consoles at some point.

[@WAVP371]

Thanks bro' entertaining and amusing, always a great combo!!!

[@unbelievablevideos3557]

Thanks for the video you did a great job explaining stuff that will become very useful for me in the future!

[@NotOrdinaryInGames]

Have you covered real time loading (from disk), chunking, and LOD?

[@matthewstorr1042]

I have to say this is rather informative and quite interesting, cheers!

[@daltreywaters]

Thanks!

[@MattyXB]

1:36 SNES vs. PS1? I thought its a N64 vs. PS1 Video.

[@armandduarte4193]

Very enjoyable video- thanks for the info!

[@spencermarley7990]

@4:38 "...now imagine that experience on Playstation". Yeah, it's called Gex: Enter the Gecko and it was pretty damn good.

[@youuuuuuuuuuutube]

Not good to show emulated games running at a much higher resolution than on the real consoles.

[@Garrysullivanjones]

Are you calling original n64 visuals blurry? Yeah they are, that’s why I kept a old school trinitron 📺 , it has s video and component cable, only 50/60hz . No internet required to game, no fees, bliss

[@youuuuuuuuuuutube]

@@Garrysullivanjones Your solution is the best. The complaint is that this is a comparison video, talking about technical stuff, so ideally we want to see exactly what the original consoles output, but of course I can understand that they don't have the original consoles, so it's OK to use an emulator, but in that case, it should still try to look as close as possible to the real hardware. Many of the video segments are totally not representative of what the original hardware was outputting (and I actually prefer the original look because the low res is hiding a lot of the artifacts that are visible in higher resolutions).

[@TheInflicted]

Agreed. Much of the footage shown depicts the games, especially the PlayStation games, looking WAY cleaner and sharper than they would have ever looked on the actual hardware.

[@dmas7749]

@@youuuuuuuuuuutube: the lower res compliments the textures better as well, and yeah i don't know what he was thinking not doing a comparison at native res for both platforms

[@MrMarinus18]

I don't know. Both systems but especially the N64 were specialized for CRT displays. Since that was how people played them I think emulation gives them both a more fare chance. On a modern display the PS1 indeed looks better because it was less specialized for CRT.

[@z0mb1e564]

Cool video, I'll have to check out more of your stuff

[@BeerBourbonandGames]

Wow very informative video. Glad I stumbled upon this!

[@someguy7526]

PS2 was really damn good too. N64 and PS2 were my favourite and childhood, beyond countless memories for both.

[@nofatchxplzthx]

man i dont know, i was too busy playing golden eye

[@poika22]

I was too busy playing Quake. "Ask anyone that played Goldeneye multiplayer back in the day and they will tell you it was awesome" Yeah unless they had access to a PC in which case the experience with Goldeneye was "haha that's cute, now let me get back to a proper FPS."

[@Mittens0407]

@poika22 Perfect Dark had an incredible multiplayer.

[@MiguelXisto1]

Loved the video. Really informative.

[@Queso305]

This was excellent! Definitely subbed

[@vibri_]

I miss when consoles had differences from eachother besides "which one has 3% better graphics"

[@sh4dy832]

There still is a thing called "Nintendo Switch". And in my eyes, it actually has a right of existance opposed to the other two, because it does, what my pc can't do: Portability, and sometimes motion control. The ps and xbox are basically my pc, but with worse hardware specs (and a handfull of exclusive titles).

[@lilchad-ig1oj]

Sh4dy consoles should exist lmao Not everyone knows how to build PC or want to and if you don’t then you gotta get pre built and they are much more expensive to get the same real life performance Yes PC of same cost might be more powerful if you build it yourself but the optimisation that consoles have means the performance is better ( if you spend enough the pure power can outclass consoles obviously) Consoles don’t have to deal with most problems PCs can get (some still happen with them like dust, games not working but overall a console is easier to look after and keep it working for a decade like my PS2 from childhood that works perfectly) A lot of games you might play on PC get most pf their revenue from consoles so they are vital for your games to have the money to be made ( PC exclusives don’t count of course) Basically if you have the money, time and dedication PC is better for you If you don’t have one of those things then consoles are the way to go

[@jpsalova]

5:41 wouldn't the on-screen detail be primarily limited by RAM and not storage medium capacity? Though of course storage is a seconday limit - you can't have variety across a large level since it wouldn't fit on storage in the 1st place.

[@sherlynnjunior3734]

This was a great explanation of the two systems. Thanks !

[@BlackFoxVMT]

Great and Informative video =)

[@Frisenette]

Completely wrong! 99% of all PlayStation games would easily fit into a cart minus FMV and red book sound. Gouraud shading was just as possible on PlayStation. In fact it was very good at it, ramping up polygons massively when texturing was turned off and only shading was used. The main problem with the N64 was the texture cache/buffer. It was the same size as the PlayStation one, but could not be reloaded mid polygon and was essentially cut in half when MIP mapping was turned on. With a better texture buffer scheme the N64 could have done graphics quite close to what the Dreamcast did three to four years later, from the get-go.

[@shukterhousejive]

The N64 also used a high-accuracy GPU microcode that was intended for scientific and rendering jobs which cut performance by almost 5 times, and Nintendo didn't let developers substitute their own code until the end of the system's lifespan

[@chriswilson1853]

The PlayStation was actually FASTER at rendering individual polygons, but because it couldn't do perspective correct textures , large textured polygons looked warped and very poor. So programmers had to resort to tricks such as subdividing them into smaller pieces which made the warping less noticeable but still present. The N64 also had a Z buffer which meant that objects always obscured whatever was behind correctly. The PlayStation relied on the programmer rendering objects in the correct order, which didn't always work correctly, sometimes resulting in parts of objects flashing on and off and other artifacts.

[@nattila7713]

@@shukterhousejive lol, 10fps n64 titles says helloooooooo :D

[@Frisenette]

Chris Wilson N64 would have been faster at rendering non textured polygons if it had ever been allowed to. Turning off the z-buffer means a more than doubling in fillrate and rendering speed. You need to do sorting with painters algorithm or similar. But you need to do that anyway for antialiasing to work, and for correct layering of alpha blended polygons. Not to speak of gains in overdraw from early culling of non-visible objects. You waste the hardware for the z-buffer, but you could still use it for limited effects such as stencils volumes.

[@eliaha6]

@@nattila7713 Playstation títulos de 2fps + Loading de 1 hora helloooooo