Channel Z 5/Channel Z - The A1200 Disk Magazine - Issue 5 (1994-05-01)(Channel Z)(AGA)(Disk 2 of 2).adf/PH/PH

Text File | 1992-09-02 | 10KB | 199 lines

In the start of a new feature here at CHANNEL Z, we have invited
Amiga Artist Paul Horton to have his say in things to do with the
Amiga scene......



Over to you Paul...



HI!

Commodore have the most faithful and dedicated customers around. We
have supported them through their rough patch, when we could so
easily have abandoned them. So how do they repay us? By continually
blowing hot and cold on the subject of the A1200 CD Drive.
First they are, then they cannot, through technical problems, now
they say they are bringing one out! Please Mr. Commodore make a
statement, stating whether or not you are going ahead with the CD
Drive, put all the rumours to rest, once and for all!
You have said that the reason the CD32 didn't sell as well as you
expected was because A1200 owners are waiting for the CD Drive. Well!
there's your answer, RELEASE THE BLOODY A1200 CD ROM DRIVE!
Maybe a third party developer is working on such a device at this
very moment, maybe they will release it, maybe they sell thousands
and thousands of units and make Phenomenal profits!
Take note Commodore, you could be the one making the profit, all you
have to do is pull you finger out!


'MICROCOSM' has finally been released. Could this game do for the
CD32 what 'Defender of the Crown' and 'Shadow of the Beast' did for
the A500! i.e. sell thousands of machines? Only time will tell!



I see the FMV cartridge was finally released, then after all the hassle
of releasing it to the shops and outlets, they had to recall them all
because they were "bugged". Commodore now say they have remedied the
problem and have shipped a new batch out.

I'm all for advertising in Computer Magazines, and realize magazines
need advertising for there main income, but 'Amiga Format' took their
advertising within there pages a bit far recently.
In March's Issue, out of 185 pages a staggering 102 pages were
advertisements, leaving just 83 pages of Articles. This is
ridiculous, there were MORE pages of advertising than actual
Articles. There is just no justification for this amount of
advertising. (Maybe it's just Greed!) They have the cheek to charge
nearly £4.00 for a magazine, a magazine in which I expect VALUE for
money, interesting articles and good reviews.
They cannot use the poor excuse of "Yes, but look what's on the
coverdisks", because other magazines covering the Amiga have
coverdisks that are just as good as those found on AF's Covers, and
don't go over the top with advertising.
Mr. Amiga Format, your readers expect VALUE for money, stop treating
us like fools and start giving us a better value Magazine, otherwise
you may find your readers moving on to better value Mag's!
Incidentally in April's 'CU Amiga', out of 179 pages, only 77 were
advertisements, leaving a satisfying 100 pages of readable text (17
more than Amiga Format), together with Two excellent cover disks. If
'CU Amiga' can do it, why can't you!


With the imminent release of 'TFX' from Ocean, a couple of points
spring to mind. I gather there are going to be two versions, a CD32
and a A1200 Hard disk version. The screenshots I have seen, do look
promising, but those of you who read 'CU Amiga',a few month's back
may have read the article they did on the Game mentioned.
They stated that the screenshots were from the PC version, and that
the A1200 version would only use 128 colours instead of the PC's 256,
but would look identical to the PC version. Er! Excuse me! CU Amiga
but there is no way a 128 colour game can look identical to a 256
colour one! You also stated that the A1200 version was in
development, it turned out that DID (The Authors) had not even
started the A1200 version yet! Not a very good idea to print LIES! in
a magazine, is it!
Your so called EXCLUSIVE article was just a poor and sloppy effort on
your part to try and convince your readers that you had somehow got
inside information on a new A1200 game, when in reality it was just
an article about a PC game! The person responsible for writing the
article probably got paid by a PC magazine instead of CU Amiga!


I have read numerous reviews of the PC version of 'TFX', and none of
them have been to favourable. You need at least a 486 (Top of the
range PC) to make it the least playable. I know this is a A1200
magazine but I am sick of the term 'PC' being used, as most people
think that games released nowadays run as well on a 286 as they do on
a 486.
The only PC that most software houses are catering for now is the
486, the 286 is dead, the 386 is dying, that just leaves the 486.
This is the only 'PC' that is capable of running a decent game,
anything less and things start to get very 'Jerky!'
Take 'DOOM' for instance, a stunning game, but only stunning and only
playable on a 486 and only 'Smooth' on a 66mhz machine! I know, I use
PC's at college and even when its running on a 486 33mhz its jerky!
What ever there reputation, 'PC's are not as good as people make out.
As for PC's being 'Multitasking' machines, well, they can multitask,
but they need massive amounts of memory and they slow down
considerably when asked to do more than one thing.
Speaking of 'DOOM', numerous magazines, including CU Amiga, have
stated that both the A1200 and the CD32 are incapable of playing such
a game. They say that texture mapping can not be done fast enough on
the A1200/CD32! What a load of crap! I have seen numerous Pd. Demo's
on the A1200 that demonstrate excellent use of scrolling 3d texture
mapping. OK, they may not be full screen, but its a start. It could
be only a matter of time before someone releases a 3D texture mapped
game on the Amiga (Excluding Legends of Valour, that was
excruciatingly awful!) Only time will tell.


VISTA-LITE has recently been released, it is a cut down version of
VISTA-PRO 3.0, a fractal landscape generator. VISTA-PRO 3.0 required
a ridiculous 6MB of RAM to use it on an AGA machine. I adored VISTA-
PRO but the thought of shelling out £200 on a RAM expansion, just to
use VISTA-PRO 3.0 put me off a bit!
VISTA-LITE only requires 2MB of RAM but you need a HARD-DRIVE, but as
fellow hard drive owners will know, you are only left with about
1.7MB of RAM when you boot up. So you still need to buy a RAM
expansion!
The reason for the reduced RAM usage is the use of some clever
programming technics, that fool you machine into thinking that your
HARD-DRIVE is in fact RAM. Very Clever Eh!


I went to the recent CAD/CAM show at the NEC Birmingham recently.
I was ready to have my mind blown away with fantastic 3D rendered
images, Animated fly by's of buildings, 3D journey's over computer
generated cities, all demonstrating the true power of the PC!
Boy!, what a disappointment! It must have been the most boring show I
have ever visited.
The Mighty 'Silicon Graphics' had a stand at the show, so I was
expecting big things from them!
First of all the stand was tiny, and all they were showing were
simple wire frame cars spinning around in a circle! Very
disappointing!
There were a couple of interesting stands, one was a 'Virtual
Reality' Exercise Bike where you could cycle around a car park, It
was a home made unit but was still quit affective!
The design team from Mclaren Honda were there together with a F1 Car.
LearJet were there together with a full size Lear Jet.
I was honestly expecting a lot more, and between you and me, if there
had been a Video Toaster there, it would have cleaned up no problem!
If there was ever a reason why the Video Toaster is chosen over the
PC the CAD/CAM show 94 was it!


I made a visit to the 'All Formats Computer Fair' in Birmingham as
well recently. You have all probably heard about these shows, the
organisers travel around the country, going to different venue's,
letting local Company's run a stall (At a Price) allowing them to
sell off there merchandise to the public at cheap prices.
Its a great place to pick up both Hardware and Software bargains.
There were a couple of Pd. houses at the show, both CYNOSTIC and
Magnetic Fields made an appearance and were both doing great
business.
Commercial games were going cheap, and I picked up 'Skidmarks' (No
Underwear jokes thankyou!) for £15, so I saved £10, not bad eh!
I was going to get 'Walker' for £8, but this little brat beat me to
it! I tried to get him to part with it by banging his head on the
edge of a table, but his father made an appearance, so I made a quick
exit.
F1 Grand Prix was running of a Fast PC. It looked stunning as the
frame rate was running in real time!
I want an accelerator, I want an accelerator!
There were Commodore Monitors been sold for £100, loads of cheap
games, IDE Hard Drives, in fact, there was a lot there. If the show
comes to a town near you, pop along, its only £4 to get in. If you
see a small boy with a lump on his head and a black eye, ask him if
he wants to sell 'Walker' for a Fiver!


It looks as though 'Virtual Racing' for the Mega Drive is going to
cost £100. To you and me it is a ridiculous amount of money for a
game, in fact I would go so far as saying NO game is worth that much.
But the sad fact of the matter is, that people ARE going to pay £100
for it!
Its the Parents who are going to end up paying for it, there children
are going to just keep nagging and nagging until their parents
finally give in and go out and buy it! SEGA know it! We know it! Yet
Parents all over the country still cannot say no to their kids!
You have to hand it to SEGA, they seem to be the only ones who
realise Parents of console owners are stupid enough to pay £100 for a
game, a game that the child will probably get bored of within a week!


That's it this month, I can leave the rest of the Mag, in the capable
hands (or is it hand!) of the resident Editor.

See you next Time.

Paul.



** The opinions expressed here are not necessarily those of CHANNEL Z **