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Earlier this year, we were teased at the existence of an upcoming Intellivision-based retro throwback system, and five months later, more information about the curious piece of hardware have been unveiled. This system now sports the name of the Intellivision Amico, with a few notable features and details. Firstly, the Amico will retail anywhere in the range of $149 to $179 dollars, when it launches two years from now, in 2020. A bold claim also states that the power within the system will offer "the most advanced 2D sprite-based graphics the world has ever seen", also putting above what either the PlayStation 4 or Xbox One, or according to them, a 'PlayStation 5' could ever reasonably output in terms of 2D visuals. Games for the system are set to have prices from $3 to $8 apiece, with the available titles only being 2D-based games and capped at most at an E10+ rating due to the heavy "family focus" the system has. Its controllers are small, with a touchscreen built into them, while the system itself will have WiFi features, as well as an HDMI port. Games both old and new will be coming to the Amico, and will have updated visuals, multiplayer, and achievements. Development kits are due out in Summer 2019.

 

[smf]

You make a good point, the only way I can see developers bother to make games if they make something completely different is if they either make a toolset like Microsoft did with XNA(Does anyone remember that?), or have popular middleware like Unity, Unreal Engine and Game Maker develop a special version for their platform (not too different from Unity for Wii U in hindsight).

The spectrum next says high. https://www.specnext.com/category/games_apps/

There aren't as many games in development for it as you would want, but it's not exactly in the same league.

i do think it is a lot of bullshit 2d graphics are basically just 2d

Right, not 3d. So Intellivision Amico doesn't have as good a 3d graphics as the PS4 or X1. But the PS4 and X1 aren't as good at 2d graphics as they could be, because they use 3d hardware to do it.

Think of it like using a CPU to software render 3d, you can do it but it's not as good as something that was designed for the job. Throughout history there are examples of dedicated hardware being used to create better solutions. When the Amiga blitter was being designed there had only been a truck sized version that someone had designed for a Sun workstation, everyone else was using software. It was revolutionary for it's time.

 

[Pickle_Rick]

Right, layers upon layers of abstraction for kiddy programmers which wastes processing resources.

Who the fuck still bothers to make games against the bare metal? This isn't the 80s-90s where every drop of performance matters. 2D games aren't the most resource intensive anyway. Especially if you use a game engine with GPU acceleration (which is most of them).

 

[smf]

Who the fuck still bothers to make games against the bare metal? This isn't the 80s-90s where every drop of performance matters.

Why shouldn't every drop of performance matter? Why waste performance that you could use to make a better game?

Everyone would write games against the bare metal if you were targeting a single platform and it was easy enough.

Who the fuck wants to deal with the hell of all those shitty layers of graphics libraries? Maybe the youngsters who don't know any better.

 

[sarkwalvein]

Why shouldn't every drop of performance matter? Why waste performance that you could use to make a better game?

Game developers never write against the bare metal nowadays because they want to be able to use standard game engines, reduce costs on engine development and reassign resources to game development, and to increase the reach to multiple platforms in order to obtain enough profit to assure your investment.

 

[smf]

Game developers never write against the bare metal nowadays because they want to be able to use standard game engines

They use standard game engines because writing all of the code to drive direct3d/ogl is insane. If you can cut out that insanity, then you wouldn't use a standard game engine.

 

[sarkwalvein]

They use standard game engines because writing all of the code to drive direct3d/ogl is insane. If you can cut out that insanity, then you wouldn't use a game engine.

But then your game won't be easy to port to other platforms anymore, so you will lose quite some potential audience.

 

[smf]

But then your game won't be easy to port to other platforms anymore, so you will lose quite some potential audience.

But you are targeting a different audience on this platform and there is a no ports rule. Which could be because you can't port to it.

Although porting a game that directly hits hardware might not be that hard to port either. Porting software written in C from Saturn/PS1 era isn't that hard.

 

[thedrev]

So they claims that for 2D only the Amico is more powerfull that the PS4... It seems that Intellivision did not learn from it's previous mistakes by making this claim.
When they released the IntelliVision in 1980 they also said that it's more powerfull than the Atari 2600, which is true, but the system did not have good controllers and not good publisher supports.
And also, how many power do you need to make a 2D game ? It really does not matter if you dev on a PS4 or PS3, (or PS2)

 

[smf]

And also, how many power do you need to make a 2D game ? It really does not matter if you dev on a PS4 or PS3, (or PS2)

Well that is a different matter. You could buy a Range Rover or Lambourghini.

The Range Rover would be great offroad, but how often do people actually drive them off road?

The Lambourghini would be great round a track, but how many are ever taken round a track?

What they are saying is that it's a console for 2d games and you shouldn't be worried about slow down as it can cope with any 2d game that you've ever seen before. So it's not like those nes on a chip consoles.

We don't have much information about the specification, so it may be able to do sprite scaling. So games like outrun, space harrier etc. It kinda blurs the line of 2d vs 3d.

I do think they have a major cost problem.

 

[Deleted User]

I like the idea of a console for modern 2D games. Was really disappointed Mighty Switch Force 2 didn't get a remaster for the Wii U port like the first, as it was my first 1080p 2D platformer and I was blown away by the HD sprite look.

But if I'm buying a 2D only console, then it has to be portable and no more than $100USD

 

[Foxi4]

I like the idea of a console for modern 2D games. Was really disappointed Mighty Switch Force 2 didn't get a remaster for the Wii U port like the first, as it was my first 1080p 2D platformer and I was blown away by the HD sprite look.

But if I'm buying a 2D only console, then it has to be portable and no more than $100USD

The thread hasn't been active since October last year... Y'think it's dead, @Snugglevixen? Yeah, it's dead.

 

[raxadian]

At first I thought it said 'better 3D graphics'.

Makes me wonder what games they'll have to justify that claim and to entice sales for what feels like a niche product, particularly at that price and with the age restriction.

So far it doesn't fill me with much confidence.



I suspect the round button in the d pad and they'll use the touch screen for everything else.

The controller alone makes it a poor console in my book.

Yeah, is like they forgot most fondly remembered 2D games were for the Sega Genesis and the SNES.

 

[wiewiec]

Yeah, is like they forgot most fondly remembered 2D games were for the Sega Genesis and the SNES.

I could make sense, but this age restriction for games probably kill it...

 

[raxadian]

I could make sense, but this age restriction for games probably kill it...

Not to mention the shitty controller. If you want the golden era of 2D to be back then make a controller with at least four buttons, select, start and the directional gamepad.