The Vic20 had some really good software. I still remember Gorf on it. I had a skiing game that was quite impressive for a game that used less than 3.5KB of RAM (yes that is 3.5 kilobytes).
You're probably right the main limitation is memory.
Skyfox was written around the constraints of these platforms from the outset, and if you have a little bit of extra memory to waste there are tons of methods you can use to do less work.
On the C64 at least (not idea about the Apple II, as I don't think I ever even saw one in person - they were not widespread in Europe), custom character sets (so you could move just a few characters to move an object), hardware sprites and careful animation of small subsets of characters in the custom character sets, coupled with multiple versions of these character sets with pre-scaled objects were all common ways of handling 3D.
Only a very few games ever tried doing 3D "properly" with bitmap graphics, and they uniformly looked much worse. E.g. Elite.
More VIC-20 coolness: Anything by Viznut/PWP. Check out one of the demos, keeping in mind this runs on unexpanded hardware with less than 4KB of RAM: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OaFPU6oRXJ8
Some interesting write-ups about VIC-20 oddity exploited by the demoscene:
Wow. The vic-20 was my first computer, and I did not think tht was possible on it. At the time I remember thinking I should have asked for a Spectrum instead but I didn't think my parents would take it seriously :-)
Vic-20 wow...those graphics are mind-blowing. I have some great memories of the random sentence generator, filled with every bad word several twelve-year-olds could think up. Good times. ;)
I had a VIC-20 back in the day and I never thought something like this would be available on that type of machine. It was soooo limited, even compared to most of its peers at the time. It was also cheap, that's why I could afford one on a paperboy's salary. :)
Later I upgraded to a C-64 and was blown away by how much better everything was. This VIC-20 project makes me wonder how much a C-64 would be capable of today with modern software tools and methodologies and dedication. I'm betting you could approach Amiga 500 territory with it.
Wow, DOOM! I had some nice memories to talk about: where as a newbie, I found a way to beat gurus and chased after them in deathmatches. Maybe a blog post in the weekend.
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[ 2.6 ms ] story [ 47.8 ms ] threadIf that really is vic-20 hardware... that's amazing!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQLFwUu5cTY
...but yeah, I actually knew someone with a VIC-20 and the software for it was truly abysmal even at the time.
You're probably right the main limitation is memory.
Skyfox was written around the constraints of these platforms from the outset, and if you have a little bit of extra memory to waste there are tons of methods you can use to do less work.
On the C64 at least (not idea about the Apple II, as I don't think I ever even saw one in person - they were not widespread in Europe), custom character sets (so you could move just a few characters to move an object), hardware sprites and careful animation of small subsets of characters in the custom character sets, coupled with multiple versions of these character sets with pre-scaled objects were all common ways of handling 3D.
Only a very few games ever tried doing 3D "properly" with bitmap graphics, and they uniformly looked much worse. E.g. Elite.
Some interesting write-ups about VIC-20 oddity exploited by the demoscene:
http://www.zimmers.net/anonftp/pub/cbm/vic20/programming/vic...
http://www.pelulamu.net/pwp/vic20/waveforms.txt
(h/t Nate Lawson, who sent this to me last night).
Later I upgraded to a C-64 and was blown away by how much better everything was. This VIC-20 project makes me wonder how much a C-64 would be capable of today with modern software tools and methodologies and dedication. I'm betting you could approach Amiga 500 territory with it.
I recommend all the demos from Oxyron and Booze Design.