Numen Demo on Atari XL/XE

[JoeyJoeJoe5000]

Would this demo have even worked on an actual Atari XE?

[fox6502]

@JoeyJoeJoe5000 On real Atari XE it looks and sounds better than this video from a buggy emulator.

[si79mi]

jaw-drop! Where's the rest???

[klaxer2007]

This demo launced by emulator and by original hardware very different.

[klaxer2007]

This demo launced by emulator and by original hardware very different.

[thorgallpl]

My god. youtube ruined the effect:/

[adv7678]

Awesome! You reach some efects like Amiga in lately 90 

[gamein60seconds]

@adv7678 well as they both come from the same stable, its not surprising :)

[zoidburg111]

outstanding.......true programming prowess......i still have my working 130xe.....

[michaelboett173]

mmhhhh..........no, I like my (better) c64 ;)

[SuperAudioboy]

where were you in the 80s with stuff like this! Atari never fails to impress me, it just seems to keep gettin better. left the c64 behind for sure. Taquart, please please teach me to do this stuff as i can only program in basic!! :-p

[alleneo85]

Opalenica > Poland 2002 Atari DemoScene

Masterpiece !!

[zgroovemeister]

10:37? Where's the rest of the demo? This video is missing one of the coolest parts of the demo - the multi-color multi-hue spinning polygons that looks a lot like the windows screensaver of the same description!

[OneEyedJack1970]

It only runs on the PAL version of Atari, so it's actually 1.77 MHz.

[8bitfan]

H**y S**t!!

Hard to belive that tiny 1MHz CPU with 1MB of RAM can produce 3D graphics! Preety impressive for me!

[monotoko]

You dont even need 1MB of RAM, you need 320KB!!!

[RABBIDGamfan]

1.79 Mhz, to be exact.

[impablomations]

at 3:30 it looks like they managed to do Normal Mapping... how the hell did they manage to do that on an 8 bit atari?? Its only in the past few years that Normal Mapping has made it's way from 3d Modelling Apps, into mainstream games. Unbelievable!

[nuclearthelab]

That's not normal mapping you imbecile, it's just a 2D emboss effect. Still very fast considering it runs on an 8bit micro.

[SuperEmoBros]

jaw dropping!!!

[metalfreak665]

Let this be a lesson to the code bloat authors.

[metalfreak665]

Would that demo run with a newell 1 meg upgrade?

[kalateur]

rather impressive!!

[SirFoggy2Doped]

Amazing demo:D

But I know that there are many ways to soup up an old Atari8;)

Would this actually run on an original unmodded XL?

[gamein60seconds]

The only mod you would need is memory, but that's so that the entire demo can be loaded in and run in sequence. Most of the separate parts will squeeze into 64K. Have to say that the most impressive thing in NUMEN is the graphic power that's being exploited, like the animations with hundreds of colours on screen, the picture to picture fading, and of course the £D Rubick's cube ;)

[Jeffbaynard]

Astonishing. 8-bit at it's finest, thank you Chuck Peddle and TAQUART. Watch it all the way through, it just gets better and better.

[hoser4]

Don't forget Bill Mensche! He worked with Peddle to produce the 6501 and 6502 CPUs. :) (And he created the 65816 used in the SNES and Apple IIgs too.)

[HeavenTaquart]

the guys did an awesome job... had a lot of fun when we discussed Numen... unfortunatly I have lost all emails with preview version and even a complete Numen version with different soundtrack (which I prefered first).

[olynxmano]

This truely the best "complete" demo 'til now.

But there is still space for more, because many known techniques are not used here...

So, possibly, there is more to come.

[Stopmotionist]

As cool as it is on YouTube, it's infinitely better watching the real thing - even in an emulator.

[VideyoJunkei]

yes...the pictures with the odd strobe effect? those are interlaced for more resolution-the effect is very much lost in an emulator!!!

[Stopmotionist]

Not really; my emulator has a "flicker-fixer" option that displays interlaced images as they would appear on an actual TV. Wooo.

[kravorzlair]

I see that Atari 800 is much more powerful than nes or sms

[Stopmotionist]

Much less, actually - but these programmers knew how to make it LOOK that way. You won't find any games with graphics like that on the Ataris.

[kravorzlair]

Yeah I agree with you, my mistake. But fuck it all those demos have so much nostalgia in them that you won't find it anywhere else.

[gamein60seconds]

To be thruthful, the Nes was very simlar, and ran at the same clock speed as the atari computer line, which was nearly twice as fast as the C64. The Nes did have a slightly better sound chip, and video hardware that was geared for the games of the time, but it was nowhere near as flexible as the chipset in that Jay Miner put together. The Sega Master System did have a significant edge on all these machines however. Though again, its abilities were less eclectic than this 1978 machine.

[Stopmotionist]

No way did the NES have a better sound chip. Listen to pretty much anything by Grayscale (Polish Atari chiptune group) - they use the POKEY's 16-bit modes and it sounds amazing. Nothing like a SNES, of course - but it's still pretty impressive for a chip designed in 1978, and it sounds a lot smoother than and has a greater range of sounds than the NES chip.

[gamein60seconds]

I have almost everything grayscale have done, mainly cause i'm a big fan of X-ray. But the Nes chip has five channels, one of which is PCM. Admittedly, there is some terrific music on the A8, and yes you can get sixteen bit frequencies out of it, but only by sacrificing one of the four oscilators. I'm not a fan of the way the nes sounds, but its hardware is more advanced, it just never got pushed.

[gamein60seconds]

Love the rubic's cube. :)

[guyvf]

the melody seems familiar.

[superkeff]

Thatz fu¤#n' respect.

/AN COOL - TCB

[HarryPitfall]

Impressive Raycasting...

[Jawattdenn]

There is no raycasting, it's a portal engine like Duke3D.

[HarryPitfall]

WOW! Much more impressive!

[matthew871]

that's amazing

[grazzt519]

so freaking amazing. Too bad apac mode wasnt used that much in the atari days.

[gamein60seconds]

That's not Apac mode, its a version of HIP from Hard Software. Uses an interlace to allow double the resolution of Apac, that's why it flikers. looks much better on a tv :)

[rogerjowett]

atari xl anyoneseen the samcoupe yet?

[huntercentury]

Man this makes me miss my old Atari 800XL. What a great computer.

[potorrino90]

parece unos buenos graficos

[wvoutlaw2002]

God bless the GTIA and 6502 microprocessors.

[marantz1250]

I've been programmoing Atari 8-bits for years, but I can't work out how they did some of this stuff.

ATAR - The best 8-bit computers ever made !!

[zaphodb777]

Worship the /|\lmighty fuji!

[steveasat2]

Those FPS scenes are impressive, resemble maps from Tempus Irae.

[dreameroz]

Ich bin einfach sprachlos!! *WHOOW*

Respekt, Respekt...... !

Das hat 16-Bit Qualität!!!!

[dinosoph]

impressive!

[NotATube]

This is pretty impressive, but it should be pointed out that (IIRC) the demo requires 320KB to run, meaning it won't run on any stock Atari (i.e. 8-128KB). 320KB is enough to hold a *lot* of pre-rendered low-res graphics, particularly with judicious use of cycling repeated frames- both of which I would guess this demo is very reliant upon. That aside, there must still be some pretty neat technical tricks underlying this to fit it all in.

[gamein60seconds]

All the individual sections run on a stock atari. The only reason to have this running on a 320Kb machine was to be able to lose the in sequence loading. Anyhow, full motion video runnig on a machine from the seventies is quite impressive, pre rendered or not! lol

[zeusgb]

A great piece of design and programming.

[YuToobIsGay]

wow, we could have seen a fps on atari lol

[nebby6]

Holy frigg! Pretty amazing for a chipset that was released in 1979. Whoo! Jay Miner was certainly the graphics hardware genius.

[nebby6]

Hmmm.... This demo is likely making heavy use of the Atari GTIA chipset, which was added into the machines in 1982. However, that's still damn early for this kind of performance. Thanks for posting this. It would be cool for Nolan Bushnell to see this demo. :]

[mcappp]

GTIA was launched in 1980 in 400/800 models and sold as a replacing for old 400/800 machines launched in 1979 (these computers have the CTIA instead)

[Tonino1973]

Der C64 war eine nette Maschine, der Atari XL/XE war besser...

[RABBIDGamfan]

Can you upload part 2?

[nitewaves77]

That's Pokey with a lot of assembly tricks, sounding like the very famous SID.

[ErkyOfChrome]

Pokey isn't in the same class as the SID but a good musician can embrace the limitations of a sound chip use them to good effect. Pokey has a distinct sound that can be used to good effect.

[CreamoniQ]

Yep. It's Pokey. Sounds are bit raw but music is good. ;-) I love the tune.

[yaKC]

P.S I had to stop recording when I thought it was at 10 mins, so there`s another 3D walkabout section at higher speed, some raker spinning coloured 3D shapes, changing palette`s on side`s to look like light sourced and more of that 3D stickman that rocks..

I love the soundchip, is that the famous Pokey chip by any chance?

[yaKC]

Right, first off, this demo only looks about 8/10 of what it does on an emulator, cos there`s a few effects with interlacing static screens, and at 20 fps they look distorted, plus lower res...

slight blurring also, but yes, very nice demo...

The bits where effects are only at 2 - 4 fps are the way it looks at proper machine speed, I checked and emulator was always at 100 % :)