IGN and Gamespot PS2 VF4 Hands-On Impressions w/ Pics.

How did the Arcade Board 246 get into this?  Isn\'t VF 4 on the Naomi 2?

Okay, whatever...fact is that I\'m still a little disappointed as I said earlier.  Maybe it\'s just the crap pics or my expectations were set to high for PS2 to deliver...

Originally posted by VideoMan


Now if you are talking better being added modes and stuff then saying Virtua Fighter and that line would be quite stupid

Yes it would:nerd:

This thread wouldn\'t be complete without GamingAge\'s hands on impressions:

http://cgi.gaming-age.com/cgi-bin/news/news.pl?y=2002&m=1&nid=11-45.db

In less than three weeks, Sega will release their premiere fighter on the PlayStation 2, making it their first major release as a third party developer. Only a few years ago I was here giving first impressions of Virtua Fighter 3: Team Battle for the Dreamcast, which lead to some controversial results of disbelief. Hopefully, these first impressions will result in a better reaction.
Up until Soul Calibur first came out in the arcade, the Virtua Fighter series was by far my favorite fighting series. I picked up a Saturn for Virtua Fighter 2, and got my Dreamcast and two arcade sticks at launch in Japan for the sole purpose of Virtua Fighter 3tb. Now, with Virtua Fighter 4, which I think is shaping up to be the best in the series, on the horizon for a console release, I couldn\'t have been more excited to be one of the first people to get a hands on trial. Since the arcade version has been available for some time now, this will be a look more on the game as a conversion to the PS2 rather than what the game is.

It\'s not arcade perfect, but it\'s close. I would say at least a 95% conversion, if not better. It\'s certainly a better than the conversion than Virtua Fighter 3tb on the Dreamcast, to help give you an idea. So, what\'s wrong? Right now, just small graphical aspects - and I would like to emphasize the word small. Overall, the game doesn\'t look as clean as the arcade. There is a tad more aliasing and shimmering to be found, and it seems as if it\'s a result of video syncing problems, which was the reason that caused early PS2 games to have similar issues. While not as bad as earlier releases, it is a tad more noticeable when compared to the arcade. It should be noted, however, that Sega didn\'t have very good TV setups (with composite video cables), which could make the issue look worse than it really is.

The next thing that stands out is the difference in lighting. While I can\'t put my finger on the exact problem, I believe it is a combination of some lighting simply toned down, some removed, and in some cases both. In the Aquarium or the bay stage, you can tell the lighting is there, but seems toned down. Also, surrounding light sources have been removed on the roof top stage. You still have the two spotlights on the fighters, but the red light sources are nowhere to be found. In the dojo it doesn\'t even look like there is much lighting at all (and yes, I\'m taking into account there are different settings in the dojo).

Those two aspects are probably the most glaring issues, but again, they are small. It\'s more of something that you may notice, but it never really ends up being a problem at all. Smaller differences include a reduction in the quality of some textures, fewer birds flying on Pai\'s stage, and missing reflections on the Great Wall stage. Tiny things like these most people probably wouldn\'t even notice, unless they were looking for it, let alone have the actual arcade version near by to compare it with. So while they are there, it shouldn\'t be any concern at all.

On the up side, the stages look really good and as far as I can tell, nothing is missing. Wolf\'s caged arena stage has plenty of people cheering on the fight, sand and snow still deform, tiles and walls break, and so forth. That doesn\'t mean there wasn\'t anything missing, just nothing stood out. I\'ve heard a reference that some objects in the background were no longer polygon based, but in fact bitmaps. That didn\'t stand out, either. I wasn\'t looking for it at the time, but not once did I question the integrity of the backgrounds. And even though I said some textures were reduced in quality, for the most part, the game doesn\'t look to have taken much a hit in textures overall.

Likewise, the characters look great. If there was something that wasn\'t hurt in the port at all, it was the character models. They don\'t appear to have taken a hit in polygon count, texture quality, or animation. Characters with loose clothing remained to have the same moving clothing. Without comparing them side by side, I didn\'t see anything at all that was different.

Enough with the graphics, though. What is great about the port is the gameplay is just as responsive on a Dual Shock 2 as it is in the arcade. In some cases, I found myself with better precision and consistency for some moves on the pad. The game felt just a tad faster, too. If you were lucky enough to have played both the beta and the final, you would know that the final was slowed down a bit. This version feels somewhere in between the two in speed. The difference in speed between the beta and final wasn\'t too significant, but something you could notice with timing on certain things. As far as the gameplay being intact, I can\'t say at this time if everything works yet based on the limited amount of time to be had on the PS2 version. It should be noted that from the arcade to home conversion of VF3tb, there were some small gameplay differences that could be noticed at a higher level of play.

Like a good journalist should do (Editor\'s Note: Ha ha ha ha!), taking a look at all the options and modes would be a must. Unfortunately, I was a gamer while checking out VF4, and simply played it all night, and never got to some of the other aspects. What I did check out was the arcade and versus mode. In the beta version, there was an option for the hard drive installation, but we were told this was to be removed from the final. It wasn\'t clear if they just meant for the US version, since we had a Japanese beta. Load times, as it stands, are about four seconds in between matches. At the end of each match, you have the ability to save your replay so that you can view them whenever you like.

While the game is due out in three weeks in Japan, this version is probably several weeks older. But from what we\'ve seen so far, the game is shaping up nicely. If they can fix the sync problem (if that\'s what is causing the increased shimmering and aliasing), then the game could look almost indistinguishable from the arcade. This was really the only part that let me down a bit about the port. Even if it isn\'t resolved by release, the game is still great and it shouldn\'t be a reason to put it off. After a few minutes, the shock wears off and you are left with one of the best fighters out there. After twenty minutes, I was so into fighting that I didn\'t care about any of the small nitpicks. By the end of the night I didn’t want to go, and had nothing but a craving to play more for the rest of the night.

Without a doubt, come three weeks, I will definitely be picking up and playing Virtua Fighter 4.

Does anybody knows the spec of the Noami 2?
I would like to compare it to ps2.

I think why arcade cost thousand of dollars is because they have lots of RAM memory.  That\'s why load time is not a problem.  When port to console, developers have to tweaked here and there to reduce load time to home consoles.  Like the psOne, the when port from system 11 which have more RAM, the games doesn\'t have that good texture and developed have to tweaked a little to reduce load time.  The psOne have only 1 mb of main ram.  Developer did astounding job tweaking it.  Not to mention that the CD only runs at 2x times.  System 11 probably runs at a faster CD speed.

PS2 shouldn\'t be a problem considering that it have 32 mb of main ram.  But I guess Noami 2 have more?  But if load time is a problem, I guess the hard drive should do the trick.  I think why there are jaggies in ps2 version is because of VRAM limitation, it only has 4 mb.  even Sega DC have twice that much.  I believe the Noami Board 2 have much more.  For some reason, the light source look better on the arcade version.  ps2 can do lot of light sources, i wonder what the problem.

Know-it-all, the load times aren\'t the problem with porting games from the arcade to a console.  The main problems come from the arcade having a lot more of pretty much everything.  The Naomi II has a lot more texture RAM (I think 64 mb, but I\'m not sure).  It can also support 10 lights through the hardware, while the PS2 only supports 1 through the hardware and the rest have to be done through the software.

There is still about 20 days until the Japanese release, and about 2 months until the US release.  I just hope that the developers work on the little problems that have been mention by the reviews, like shimmering and jaggies.

naomi 2 is less powerfull than ps2 in terms of polygons but better in texture and lighting. I\'m not bothered to dig up its specs, its somewhere in the IGN archive.

The pics looks like **** IMO, but then agin Ive seen better pics  which looks amazing

vf4 is gonna own :cool:

Originally posted by Ginko
How did the Arcade Board 246 get into this?  Isn\'t VF 4 on the Naomi 2?

Okay, whatever...fact is that I\'m still a little disappointed as I said earlier.  Maybe it\'s just the crap pics or my expectations were set to high for PS2 to deliver...

Isn\'t the 246 board the PS2 arcade board, which is what I assumed it was running on.

if not then I\'m mis informed.

and my point was that if it was running on the 246 board then a 100% PORT SHOULD NEVER BE EXPECTED CAUSE IT WOULDN\'T BE  POSSIBLE

Originally posted by Metal_Gear_Ray
naomi 2 is less powerfull than ps2 in terms of polygons but better in texture and lighting. I\'m not bothered to dig up its specs, its somewhere in the IGN archive.

The pics looks like **** IMO, but then agin Ive seen better pics  which looks amazing

vf4 is gonna own :cool:

Wow, like gamecube can do less polygon counts but better in texture?

[BizioEE]

Originally posted by Ginko
It\'s somewhat disappointing that the PS2 couldn\'t handel VF4 perfectly.  It\'s still going to kick ass!!  Is the game still exclusive to PS2, if it\'s not I bet I know of a system up to the task of a better than arcade port...

no flaming please:D

well...you\'re not so far from the truth ...I think the next VF will be on the XBox...and we all know what AM2 could do with this new hardware...

[BizioEE]

Originally posted by know-it-all-wanna-be
Does anybody knows the spec of the Noami 2?
I would like to compare it to ps2.

I think why arcade cost thousand of dollars is because they have lots of RAM memory...

CPU
 
CPU: 200 MHz Hitachi SH-4 (SH7091)
CPU Memory: 32 MBytes (100 MHz SDRAM)
CPU Memory Data Path: 64-bits
Memory Bandwidth: (800 MBytes/sec)

Geometry Co-processor
 
Geometry Co-processor: VideoLogic custom transformation & lighting (T&L) chip (Code named: ELAN)
Clock Rate: 100 MHz
Sustained Polygonal and Lighting Rate: 10 million polygons/sec with 6 light sources!
Supported Lights: Ambient, parallel, point and spot
Vertex Support: Combined dynamic and static model processing  
Geometry Memory: 32 MBytes
External Memory Data Path: unknown  
Memory Bandwidth: unknown

Graphics Processing Unit (x2)
 
GPU: Two PowerVR2 (CLX2)
Pixel Fill-Rate: 200 MPixels/sec (400 MPixels/sec to 600 MPixels/sec due to infinite plane architecture assuming depth overdraw complexity of 2 to 3 layers)
Graphics Memory: 2 x 32 MB (100 MHz SDRAM)
External Data Path: 64-bits per GPU (128-bits total)
Memory Bandwidth: 800 MB/sec per GPU (1.6 GB/sec total)
Graphic Effects: Polygons/strips/fans engine, 16-bit and 24-bit color, multiple fog modes, super sampling for full scene anti-aliasing, specular highlighting, texture filtering: bilinear, trilinear, anistropic, MIP mapping, bump mapping, perspective correction, 8-bit alpha blending (256 levels of transparency), ARGB gouraud shading, general modifier volumes (GMV) for such effects as shadows, light, transpararency, etc.

--------------------------------------
Geometry Coprocessor
--------------------------------------

Naomi 2 has a dedicated geometry coprocessor to handle transformations and lighting which is rated at 10 million polygons per second with 6 light sources. Note that the T&L processor is not limited to 6 lights, as a maximum of 16 lights per polygon can be achieved, but with a reduction in the polygon rate. The geometry chip will offload all T&L calculations previously performed by the 128-bit matrix math unit on the SH-4. The SH-4 will now be free to devote more of its resources for physics, artificial intelligence, collision detection and overall game code. The hardware T&L unit features combined dynamic and static model processing, and multiple light type support (ambient, parallel, point and spot).

Almost all T&L processors on the market never state what their polygon rate is with the number of light sources present per polygon, and the reason why, is because the polygon rate goes way down with more light sources, with the current T&L processors on the market. T&L should always be rated with number of polygons with number of light sources present. Note: the lighting information for a polygon does not have to be related to a light source, as light information can also be used to make an object look more realistic. Like trying to make plastic look like plastic in a game.

Dual Graphics Chips

Two PowerVR2 (CLX2) GPU\'s with 32 MB of memory each, which is twice the amount that the PVR2 GPU had on the Naomi 1 board. Each chip renders half the screen (rectangular, stripes, and checker board options), so game textures have to be repeated in both local memory pools, but the display list (infinite plane) data covers only the area of the screen that each GPU has to render.

http://www.segatech.com/arcade/naomi2/index.html

Originally posted by Terry Bogard
Ah yes, the DOA3 gameplay destroyer. This game is worthy of the Best fighting game ever, just by reading the impressions. This game is going to rock the house. Bring on that deep gameplay that puts the DOA\'s crap gameplay to shame.  NOTHING can stack up to this game IMO. This is one to keep an eye on.

Terry Bogard  You will go far as you have impressed me
let me introduce myself ... i am ooseven PSX2central Mod and leader of the Scottish Club for DOA bashing !

Ah a Fellow Dead or Alive HaTER ........

yes i like you hate DOA,  for its piss poor gameplay and its newbie button bashing WIN system , where just about every combo can be unlocked by just any brain dead simpleton.

VF Games have the hallmark of rock solid gameplay , great combos and also the added fun of knocking your enemy out of the ring with just your hands and feet.


also note to Ginko

the article did say that its not FInished yet and that version was the first playable demo open to the Press and indeed the public

wow, the specs is also the same as ps2 in most part.  Some other parts, like that it can do multi layer texture and up to 6 light sources in 10 million polygon is cool!  So, it has 32 MB of RAM like the ps2.  I think the Naomi board can extend it to more MB if needed.  Only thing that ps2 has that Naomi doesn\'t is the V RAM.  ps2 has 4 mb of VRAM.  Naomi?  I dunno.