Rogue Leader: Rogue Squadron II for GC (1 Viewer)

[Morgan Jolley]

At http://gamespot.com/gamespot/stories...800309,00.html , they have first-hand impressions of this game. It has 5.1 sound, and since its being made by LucasArts, will probably have High Definition. From what the 5 page article says, the game looks to be pretty good. If its available at launch, I might not wait to get a GC...

 

[BrianB]

since its being made by LucasArts

No, it's not. It's being developed by a company called Factor 5, they developed Rogue Squadron for the N64, and are famous for Turrican back on the Amiga. Excellent bunch of coders..
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Nothing In Particular

 

[Calvin Watts III]

In a word - WOW!
I was already going to buy a GC at launch just for this game - now it is a no-brainer! It is times like these that I'm grateful that I work @ TRU in the R-Zone
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"Don't make me angry....You wouldn't like me when I'm angry......"

 

[Camp]

Very, very nice.

and since its being made by LucasArts, will probably have High Definition.

Oh yea, because Lucas Arts has such a glorious history of releasing games in HighDef! ????
What a nutty statement! It's great to be giddy about something that looks so fabulous but be careful about getting your hopes up for something that isn't going to happen.

 

[Dan Brecher]

For the love of god, people, have you SEEN the additional coverage and pics of the Hoth level over at Link Removed ? Stunning shot of how you are able to command ground troops whilst you fly overhead in your speeder.
Good article @ Gamespot I agree. How on earth have they pulled off 5.1?
Dan (UK)
PS: Camp, cool off a little there, huh?
[Edited last by Dan Brecher on July 31, 2001 at 09:26 PM]

 

[Morgan Jolley]

I thought LucasArts is co-developing it with Factor 5. If I'm not correct, my bad. I said that thing about LucasArts and High-Def because they are able to do it with the GC and LucasArts usually likes to take advantage of things like that on good hardware. Also, the game is almost done, so implementing the HD into it wouldn't be too tough to pull off.
The 5.1 had to be done on the software since the GC doesn't do it on the hardware. That is the only thing the X-Box has over the GC, I think. As for the power between them, it all depends on how the game is made.

 

[Gary King]

I'd bet that the 5.1 was either a mistake on IGN's part (a lot of sites have mistakenly called Dolby Surround Dolby 5.1), or through Pro-Logic II. Since the GCN has no announced digital audio output (and due to the amount of computation necessary to compress audio into Dolby Digital), I'd say the chances of Rogue Leader being in Dolby Digital 5.1 are very slim.

 

[Dan Brecher]

Gary,
Possible, but the rumour Rogue Leader had 5.1 has been circulating since just post-E3, and Factor 5 have never been quick to deny such stories.
I dunno, it's odd because you have to question how it'd be possible with the console lacking the right outputs, and indeed if Nintendo have been keeping final secrets about the console from the public until Spaceworld maybe. Again it's also odd that Factor 5 have been tight lipped over the games sound and that they never took it upon themselves to correct any games publictation who'd sated it were 5.1.
Dan (UK)

 

[Luke_H]

Interesting point Dan, if it has 5.1 surround great for everyone, but the visuals alone have sold me. Imagine 480p in 16:9.

 

[Jeremy Illingworth]

I think GC will have a digital out and Nintendo has been keeping it secret. One of the guys from Factor 5 said in an E3 interview that Rogue Leader would be in 5.1. I think he intentionally let it slip to tease people. For one thing, he's from Factor 5. I find it highly unlikely that they can't tell pro logic from digital. It's what they do. And I think that the digital out is being saved for Spaceworld.
jeremy

 

[Morgan Jolley]

At Videogames.com they actually played a near final copy of Rogue Leader and said it had 5.1. They also said that they used a final copy of the controller, which has had the B button changed to be a bean shape like the X and Y buttons, and since the controller has changed since E3, maybe the console will, too. Maybe Nintendo will make a digital A/V cord with the right cords on it that can be bought for 5.1 and High Def. Its up in the air until Spaceworld.

 

[Gary King]

videogames.com also played a near-final copy of Red Faction and said it had 5.1:

Technically, Dolby Pro Logic II is 5.1, encoding it is pretty easy (a fairly simple waveform phase shift - easily performable on the Gamecube's DSP), and it will output on standard A/V stereo jacks.
Dolby Digital encoders don't run in real-time on 1GHz P3s -- I find it highly unlikely that a slower processor (running a game at the same time), or a 85MIPS sound DSP would have the muscle to perform full-blown AC-3.

 

[Morgan Jolley]

Keep in mind that PCs run more than just games, even while you are playing games. The GC has many secrets that Nintendo is keeping under wraps, so we have to wait to find out. Also, the GC is capable of doing 5.1 just as long as it is encoded right.

 

[Gary King]

OK, I've got to get up for work tomorrow, so this will be my final post.
Morgan, it's becoming increasingly apparent that you have little to no concept for the actual amount of computation that's involved in some of these algorithms.
Since software encoders for 5.1 Dolby Digital can run in near real-time (not in games, not with interactive sound -- just converting WAV files to AC3), and a typical encoder board looks like this: http://www.mds.com/products/opus/opus_dolby.htm, it doesn't seem terribly likely that a developer could take a game with as much going on as RL has, and add a software AC-3 encoder on top of everything (even if some method of balancing between the audio processor and the Gekko were possible).

 

[Dan Brecher]

Stuff can be encoded as DPLII? I thought it's just something that decodes Pro Logic sources into a matrixed 5.1 source on HT equipment. I have DPLII on my Tag AV32R, I like it, if Rogue Leader's 5.1 is done in the way DPLII seperates the channels then we're still going to get some incredible results.
Dan (UK)

 

[Dan B]

I still don't know exactly what is going on with the supposed 5.1 sound on this game. The weird thing is that Peer (the editor at the IGN website) says that Gamecube definitely will not have an optical output, and that he is forbidden (by Nintendo) from going into detail on how Rogue Squadron produces 5.1 sound. I don't get that part. After all, any old stereo source can be converted into DPL II 5.1 if it goes through a DPL II decoder. So I can't imagine why Nintendo would keep this information secret unless they are just trying to get everyone's hopes up that the Gamecube can output 5.1.
The latest shots of the game do look great, don't they!?
-Dan

 

[Morgan Jolley]

Nintendo might have someting big to show at Spaceworld that will explain the 5.1 thing, so we'll just have to wait and see. Even if the game doesn't have 5.1, I will buy it no matter what.

 

[Christian Behrens]

Interesting. Curious to see how they pull the 5.1 sound off, but Factor 5 did ProLogic already on Turrican 3 (I believe) on the Amiga, and became the sound specialists for the N64 (speech compression etc.), so they definitely know what they are doing.
Aren't they actually a LucasArts in-house Nintendo development team?!? At the least they do contract work for them...
-Christian

 

[Jeremy Illingworth]

If this guy Peer says there is for sure no optical out but cannot say how they do 5.1 maybe its...digital coaxial. It would be cheaper to make as well.
jeremy

 

[Camp]

Umm.. I think Gamecube has a built-in subwoofer and five speakers. They just unfold from the console like a Gundam. I'm gonna throw my Casablanca away. The coolest part is the Wavebird that will actually fly to your hand when you want to play.
GBA makes a great replacement for my Crestron system controller too.